“Heart Sight”

by Brit

Unending gratitude to my good friends, beta readers and assorted cast of characters…you guys are the best (and you know who you are, even if you won’t admit it!). Thanks for ALL the encouragement and guidance, with this story and all the other scribblings.

The following story is a work of fiction, produced solely for entertainment purposes and sharing with fellow fans of “Starsky and Hutch”. No profit is being made from the posting of this work. No infringement on the rights of anyone holding ownership of the “Starsky and Hutch” characters, names, or stories is intended.

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Chapter One

It had ended like any other day.

There was certainly nothing out of the ordinary to distinguish it from many of the others spent doing legwork. It turns out that a shop owner had been paying the local heavies for protection, and when he finally got enough spine to tell them what they could do with their blood money, they torched his place. This had actually been happening to several businesses throughout the city, but this time, the shop owner got burned in the process, literally. As in “to a crisp”. Which is why we were called in--now it was a homicide, not simply another unsolved arson. I don’t mean to sound so callous about a man’s death, it’s just that sometimes it’s easier this way. You internalize it too often and it’ll eat you up when you’re not looking.

So, now we were heading back home…I mean, to the station. Huh. What kind of subconscious slip was that? I guess it’s just that we spend so much time there…well, you know what I’m getting at. Anyway, I was driving (for a change) and decided to take the freeway. It was almost seven o’clock and I hoped it wouldn’t be congested for once. That was our first mistake.

Within three miles of getting on Interstate 5, we came to seven lanes of parking lot. I said something distinctly unpleasant and threw my head back in frustration. All I wanted was to get back to the station, report to Dobey and head for home. We were both hot, tired and irritable as it was, but add the fact Starsky claimed to be nearing starvation to the magnitude of death, well, it was about to get ugly.

Starsky snatched up the microphone and called Dispatch, asking if the Highway Patrol had reported what was going on. After checking it out, a new operator named Cora responded.

“Zebra Three, Highway Patrol reports a multiple vehicle accident at the Interstate 5 and 405 junction and are requesting assistance.”

Starsky looked at me with a pained expression as he reached under the seat for the Mars light. “Figures. Now we gotta go direct traffic?”

He sighed and slapped the light on the roof, then depressed the button on the microphone. “Zebra Three responding.”

Cora came back on, “Zebra Three, I’ve got a note here from Captain Dobey reminding you to finish your reports tonight before you log out.”

“You’re all heart, Cora.”

“Don’t blame me, Zebra Three. I’m just the dispatcher.”

I managed to grin at the sour look on Starsky’s face and began to edge the LTD across four lanes of traffic. The other drivers stuck with us were less than congenial, but after several minutes of hollering, badge waving and gesturing--not all of them pleasant--we were able to slip onto the shoulder. The car rumbled along at thirty-five, but it didn’t take much time to make it to the head of the procession. Apparently, the accident hadn’t happened all that long ago, since it appeared the fire and rescue squads had arrived only moments before we had.

What lay before us was nothing short of mayhem. Starsky muttered something under his breath as I pulled ahead, counting the number of vehicles involved as I did. There were at least sixteen cars and a single dilapidated half-ton truck sprawled about in various states. Gas, oil and anti-freeze pooled beneath several cars and the tanker lay on its side like a wounded animal. Fortunately, it hadn’t ruptured. A quick glance at the identification along its side and rear indicated it carried Freon, the non-explosive stuff found in radiators and refrigerators. I exhaled gratefully. If it had been a volatile load, like gas or something…well, it would have upped the ante tenfold. As it was, there were several injured and miles of backed-up traffic. I could tell right off that we were going to need more ambulances.

I pulled the LTD further off the shoulder and out of the way, and we headed into the thick of things. A lanky CHP officer by the name of Barizca was obviously in charge, directing the other patrolmen and EMS where needed. At the flash of my badge, he nodded and requested we help with the wounded, herding them toward the first ambulance that was acting as a sort of triage. Starsky and I split up and began checking the cars for the injured. Splitting up was our second mistake.

Within an hour, the Highway Patrol had two lanes of traffic moving slowly around the wreckage. If the tanker had been explosive, there was no way they would have let anyone within miles of it. Several of the cars involved in the accident had been towed away, and the Aeromed chopper had flown out the more seriously injured. Two of the fire engines were in the process of hosing the lost fluids off the road with whatever the foamy stuff was they used. An empty tanker was en route to transfer the Freon from the disabled rig before it could be righted and hauled away as well. With all the people still milling around, I had lost sight of my partner quite a while ago, but wasn’t too concerned, just hungry. I grinned with the thought that Starsky should be well past the starvation level by now. Maybe we’d just log out and go right to Huggy’s for dinner. Dobey had probably left for the evening and the reports could wait until morning.

I had just accompanied the jittery driver of the overturned truck to Barizca, who was taking statements for his accident report, when I caught a glimpse of the familiar dark curls on the other side of the tanker. Starsky was holding a small child on his hip while talking with the still-shaken mother. Two other children, a little girl probably around five and a boy maybe three, stood alongside Starsky. The girl had her hand on my partner’s jacket, the other held the little one’s next to her. For some reason the picture made me smile.

I left the truck driver with the CHP officer. He seemed increasingly nervous at the prospect of giving his statement. I reasoned it could have been a reaction to the accident, which can be a scary thing in and of itself, or maybe the incident was his fault and he was afraid of retribution. I put the man out of my mind as I crossed the tanker one last time en route to the LTD. The sun was beginning to set and a slight breeze stirred up the air around me, an odd mix of anti-freeze, gas, exhaust and something else--something rotten. Hard to say what. I continued over to my car, thinking we should be wrapping things up here soon and I intended to log us out for the day. The reports definitely could wait until morning.

As I was coming back to Officer Barizca, I noticed the truck driver becoming more and more agitated, throwing repeated glances over at his rig. I noticed the stench of rotten something again and followed his darting gaze back to the tanker. What was it that had that smell? Rotten eggs?

Liquid petroleum.

LP was the only thing I could think of that smelled like rotten eggs. So, the tanker wasn’t hauling Freon, but was most likely illegally carrying the gas, probably stolen. You’d be surprised what you can buy on the black market these days. No wonder the driver had seemed so nervous. It wasn’t a question of if the tanker would go up, but rather when. The realization sent me forward at a run, and I grabbed the driver by the arm and slammed him face down onto the patrol car. “He’s got LP in that tanker! Clear the area!”

Without asking questions, Barizca charged toward the officer directing traffic, yelling for his partner to stop the oncoming cars. We were too far away for him to be heard above freeway noise, pumping fire engines and slowly approaching vehicles. I turned around to look for Starsky, and the truck driver took advantage of my lack of attention to break free. I didn’t waste any time chasing him down. I had more important things to worry about at the moment.

The sound of scraping metal sent a cold finger up my spine. A quick look back at the traffic confirmed it: a Nova--Starsky would have said rivaled my LTD--was just passing by the tanker. The scraping sound was coming from its tailpipe dragging along the blacktop, a shower of sparks behind it.

Barizca and I realized what was about to happen moments before all hell broke loose.

I bellowed Starsky’s name and waved him away from tanker, realizing the slim chance of him hearing me over all the noise. Somehow, miraculously, he did. It was probably only a whisper in his ears, but my partner’s head whipped around like he’d been stung. I had no idea if he was too close to the tanker should the spark ignite the fumes, had no idea how big of an explosion there would be, or how much damage it would cause. All I knew was that my partner was in harm’s way.

And I couldn’t protect him.

But all Starsky needed was to hear the warning in my voice to put him in motion. He spun on his heel and took it all in within an instant: the dragging tail pipe, the running CHP officers, the little boy who was no longer beside him. The toddler had been in tow moments before, but was now a few yards away from Starsky and the rest of his family, closer to the tanker. He had dropped his sister’s hand and wandered away, and was squatted down, picking up something off the tarmac, oblivious to anything else. Starsky thrust the child he’d been carrying into its mother’s arms, then shoved the woman and the little girl into a scramble away from the truck.

He turned and charged toward the little boy, his face… I still have nightmares about all of this and the expression etched in his face. It was a mixture of fear, horror and perhaps sorrow. I think he knew what was about to happen and expected the worse. But he went anyway. That’s Starsky. That’s my partner. Anyway, he was within a yard of the kid, his arms outstretched to snatch the boy up when it went.

All this within a matter of seconds.

The explosion was horrific. Deafening. Hot. I had almost made it back to the relative safety of the squad car, still watching my partner’s charge, but the blast knocked me on my face. I quickly scrambled back up, ignoring the pain in my back and head, and ran toward the inferno the tanker had become. I darted in and out of staggering and prone people. Many of them were hurt, but even those lying flat were beginning to stir. A few of the cars closest to the tanker, including the Nova, were engulfed as well. Nobody could have made it out of those alive.

I passed them all.

On the other side of the burning truck were two still figures. The mother Starsky had been assisting had picked herself and her daughter up off the blacktop and rushed back, dropping to her knees at the side of her little boy and scooping him into her arms. I don’t remember making a conscious decision not to stop and check on them, but by the healthy squalling the kid was soon doing, I knew he could wait a moment while I continued on to the unmoving figure sprawled a few feet away.

Starsky was lying on his back where the blast had laid him out. I would be grateful--later--that the fireball had not simply consumed him and the little boy. Right now, I was just plain terrified. Starsky’s face and exposed hands were a bright red, probably with at least second-degree burns. His mouth was open, but it looked like he was struggling to breathe. I knelt next to him and laid my hand on his chest, which bucked against my palm in his effort to get air. He made a high-pitched wheezing sound with each gasp. It took me a couple of precious seconds to try and figure out what was wrong. Seizure? He must have hit his head on the tarmac. I scanned Starsky’s raw face, the slight swelling of his lips. Burns from the blast? Chemical burns? Airway? Lungs? The heat from the blast may have scorched the delicate tissues, causing them to swell and close off.

“Medic!” I can’t tell you how frantic I was. My best friend lay there, struggling to breathe, and there wasn’t a stupid thing I could about it. There was blood running into my eyes, and I brushed it away as I stood up. I scanned the bedlam around me for anybody who could help. I must have looked pretty desperate, because one of the two paramedics that had been checking out the little kid immediately trotted over.

Before he could ask me what I needed, I grabbed him by the arm and hauled him to his knees next to Starsky. “He can’t breathe!”

Apparently my assessment had been correct, because he yelled over to his partner for an endotracheal tube and oxygen. The other paramedic gripped the mother’s shoulder as she kept a damp cloth of some sort on the back of her toddler’s head. He ran to the ambulance and retrieved a canister of oxygen and some other paraphernalia, then came back to us. The first man had a hand under Starsky’s neck, attempting to keep his airway open. He had already administered a shot of something. A tracheal tube was quickly inserted into Starsky’s mouth, and I flinched as they guided it in. Under the best of conditions, they’re unpleasant and painful. I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like ripping against a burned and rapidly closing throat. Trust me, I’m not complaining. My partner hadn’t been able to breathe; if they had to open up his throat to keep him alive, I would have offered them my jackknife. Oxygen quickly followed and Starsky’s breathing stabilized. Some sort of burn-gel was liberally slathered on his face, throat and hands. I was grateful he’d been wearing his leather jacket and a cotton shirt that day. If he’d had his nylon windbreaker on, it might have melted right onto his skin.

A team of firemen materialized and assisted the paramedics in getting Starsky onto a backboard and into the ambulance. I climbed in right behind them, but knew enough to stay out of their way, even though I wanted to be at Starsky’s side. I guess I should have wondered if there was anyone else who needed more help, was more seriously wounded, but I didn’t. Good, bad, or ugly, I just didn’t care. I’ll deal with that guilt some other time.

The ambulance tore away from the accident site, and a quick glance confirmed some of the firefighters were busy trying to extinguish the blazes, while others were helping the injured. After starting an IV, there wasn’t much more the paramedics could do for Starsky’s burns, and they went about the business of monitoring his airway and breathing. They followed up by taking his blood pressure and other vitals, then began asking me the routine questions I knew the answers to by heart: not on any medications, no known allergies, his doctor’s name, medical history, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I barely heard them or my own answers because I was too preoccupied with watching the rise and fall of my partner’s chest. It’s absurd, but I was afraid that if I somehow looked away or relaxed for even a second, Starsky would stop breathing.

I can’t remember being that scared in a long, long time.

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Chapter Two