Opened by Fire

Bill’s evening was interrupted by a knock on the door. He set down his battered e-novel and peered through the window. A young woman wearing the green and tan of the National Forest Service glowered at his cabin’s front door like she could force it open with sheer will.

Bill preferred the doorknob.

“What is it?” he asked through a crack in the doorway.

“Hello to you too,” she fumed. Bill hadn’t seen this Parkie around yet. She was broad-built, with a wide face and hair shorn close to her brown skin. Snakes, hummingbirds, and morning glories wrapped around her forearms. Bill was sure she had two entire tattoo sleeves beneath that tan shirt. The name Eddy Jiménez was embroidered above a shirt pocket bulging with old-fashioned cigarettes. He hadn’t met her yet, but he knew her type right away. It made him want to shut the door and turn the deadbolt.

“Hold it,” she said, sticking her boot into the crack. “I’m here for the Fire Warning Service. You need to evacuate. Level 4. Gonna be here soon. And—” she leveled a glare at him “—you need to pay your fine.”

“My fine? For what?”

Eddy pointed at the rhododendron in front of Bill’s living room window. Shards of white metal littered the foliage. A little propeller whirred sadly in the evening wind, and a cracked camera lens reflected a red sunset. It was artistic, really.

 “For destroying the bot I sent you. You should know what they are; they’re standard communication now for remote folks outside of the network.” She tapped her watch, and a holo-image hovered above her wrist. It was Bill, coming at the camera with a fireplace poker. She flicked a finger, and two similar images flashed by. “Actually, three.”

“Okay, fine.” Bill fished his wallet out of his jeans. “But I’m not comin’ with you. Your fancy AI computer isn’t God. That storm is gonna pass us by. Always does. These woods haven’t burned in eighty years.”

“That’s exactly the issue.” Eddy waved at the spruce and cedar trees, exasperated. Rich undergrowth nestled Bill’s cabin in glorious golds and greens. It was late August, but the Klamath forest was fighting this year’s drought with everything it had. “Look at all this fuel! When this burns, it’s going to burn hot. You do not want to be here.”

“I do,” Bill said evenly. Suddenly he felt every one of his sixty-four years. “My roots are here. This is where I raised my son. I’m not leavin’.”

As if to make a point, Bill’s words were punctuated by a thunderclap. Dark, mile-high clouds churned overhead. There was a flash, a pause, and another boom.

Eddy looked surprised. “That wasn’t supposed happen for another couple hours. Wind must be picking up stronger than expected.” She straightened her shoulders. “That’s dry lightning,” she spat. “And you’re sitting in a tinderbox. We need to leave. Look, thanks to the FWS, we haven’t had a fire-related death in NorCal since 2030. We’ve got a twenty-year streak. My boss wanted me to make sure you didn’t end our record. And I came because I wanted to hand you that fine in person. Those were my bots. You’re gonna live to pay me back. Okay?”

Bill’s mouth clamped shut, stunned by the sincerity of her outburst. “Okay. Just lemme put a sprinkler on the roof first. And I need to grab a few things.”

“Level 4 means Go Now,” Eddy reminded him.

“Yeah, yeah.” Forcing his steps to be steady, mostly to annoy her, he shuffled toward the back of the cabin. He was halfway up the ladder, sprinkler in hand, when Eddy clamped a hand onto her earpiece and shouted, “Level 5! Shit! We’re going now!”

From his higher vantage point, Bill saw that the thunderhead was on top of them now, spitting lightning like an angry god. Pockets of red flame littered the nearby ridgeline. Wind buffeted pillars of smoke and sent the aspen leaves into a frenzy. The fire was already here, and it was hitting hard. Eddy reached up to grab the sprinkler out of Bill’s hands and chucked it onto the roof. She turned the spigot and the sprinkler spewed water right into his face.

“Sorry! Come on!”

She shoved him, spluttering water, into her electric Jeep and slammed the door shut. “We can’t go yet!” he protested. “I gotta go get—”

“No you don’t!” She leapt into the driver’s seat.

“But my cat’s in there!”

An ear-splitting crack of lightning rent the air. The burning crown of a Ponderosa pine toppled onto the driveway behind them. Fire-lit sap showered across Bill’s lawn.

“Look, I’m sorry! But you are not gonna die!” Eddy shouted as she pressed the pedal all the way to the floor.

#

Bill loved old car chase movies. That was nothing compared to Eddy, who whipped that Jeep around forest roads like a stuntwoman. They bounced along the washboard roads, wind kicking the fire at their heels the whole way down the ridge. They were making for Etna. That was Bill’s hometown, but only in the sense that the mail bot came from there. He lived 30 miles into the Klamath forest. The road to town had never seemed this long.

They arrived at Scott Valley to find that the fire had beaten them. The entire town of Etna was ringed by an inferno. A few local fire bots had been auto-activated by the smoke and heat. Some had rolled out of city buildings, others flew from the local fire station. All were valiantly fighting new structure fires. Eddy wove her Jeep downtown, dodging abandoned cars. They had passed several car fires on the way to town. Their batteries burned scarlet, the pink undertones eerily cheerful against the apocalyptic backdrop. Many of the buildings, thankfully, were updated to modern fireproofing regulation. It was going to take a lot to set them ablaze.

Thunder still roared overhead. They might be overwhelmed soon.

“United Methodist Church!” Bill shouted.

“What?”

Bill pointed to the map on the Jeep’s dashboard. “There’s a big lawn there! They host soccer games in August. They keep it irrigated; grass will be green!”

Eddy swerved between two abandoned sedans. “Got it!”

Most of Etna had the same idea. Eddy gave up on dodging traffic once they were a block away from the church. She helped Bill out of the passenger seat. “Can you run?”

Bill glared at her. “Ain’t dead yet!”

They ran, jostling elbows with panicking families. Eddy stalled to help a four-year-old back onto her feet.

“You know where your parents are?”

The little girl nodded, tears streaking her cheeks. She pointed toward the lawn. With a grunt, Eddy picked up the girl and somehow ran even faster.

Cinders drifted in the air above them. When they landed in the weeds or brown lawns of nearby homes, they started new fires. One hit the back of Bill’s heel, and he kicked it away with a rough yell.

“Y’alright?” Eddy asked.

“Yeah! We made it!”

By now, a couple hundred people had gathered in the wide, green lawn in front of the church. Eddy deposited her cargo into the arms of a grateful mother. Night had fallen; the only light came from the flames engulfing the valley. The air was thick with smoke that reeked of burnt rubber and pine.

“What now?” Eddy asked, rubbing a singed forearm.

“Well, we should turn on the sprinklers.” Bill pushed his way toward the church. “That earpiece of yours still work?”

“Yeah.”

“Call whoever you need to get us airlifted outta here. We sure as hell ain’t driving out.”

“Sure, but first, I’m calling the bots this way. We’re gonna need as many as we can get.”

#

The town of Etna waited, soaked and choking on smoke, until the fire bots arrived. They encircled the church lawn and kept the fire at bay until rescue personnel could arrive. A couple of the oldest models sprayed fire retardant; the newer ones were equipped with wave-compressors. Loud cracks echoed in the valley as the bots compressed the air and created momentary vacuums. The fire fought back, battering the flying bots with heat and wind. The blaze was so hot, the wheels of the larger, ground-transport bots melted and stuck to the asphalt.

Before they could be overwhelmed, big-bellied quad jets lifted the residents out. The rescue teams worked quickly, squeezing as many people into each jet as possible. Once the night was over, half the town had been destroyed.

It was August 22, 2055. The first day of the Klamath Complex Fire.

#

“The Scott Valley fire has joined with the Marble Mountain and Foster Farm fires to officially become a complex. A gigafire is defined as greater than one million acres. That’s what we’re looking at here folks. Forestry management is attributing it to a particularly hot El Niño year on top of a decade of drought in Northern California. Couple that with a nasty lightning storm and gale-force winds, and you’ve got a recipe for a fire that hits fast and hard. We haven’t had one this catastrophic in a long time. It was thanks to the quick work of the Fire Warning Service that so many Etna, Greenville, and Callahan residents have made it out unharmed. Now it’s up to the Fire Service bots to get things under control. The complex is currently 60% contained. And now, we have Susan with the weather—”

“Sweetheart! Someone’s at the door for you!”

Eddy clicked off her earpiece. She was hoping to relax in her girlfriend’ apartment and get caught up on the news, but the doorbell was getting more and more insistent. She set down the bot she had been tinkering with.

“Got it!”

Eddy extricated herself from the ratty couch, wove between several potted plants, and answered the door.

“Bill!”

“You look like you never got my text,” he groused. He looked the same as ever, if a little dirtier. His rough grey hair was tied into a low ponytail. He wore the same checkered shirt. And his bushy eyebrows came together in a characteristic scowl.

Eddy checked her watch. “Uh, I did. You’re just… very….”

“Exactly on time,” Bill pointed out smugly, letting himself into the apartment. “I haven’t had any breakfast yet. Got any coffee?”

“Just started some!” Faye sang from the kitchen.

Eddy shuffled her way past Bill and into the kitchen. She didn’t want Faye to feel stuck trying to entertain him.

“Thanks for lettin’ me intrude,” Bill told Faye politely. He pulled up a stool and squeezed against the cluttered countertop.

“Absolutely! Eddy told me what happened in Etna. You’re a real hero.” Faye laughed, the sound small and delicate. She was the opposite of Eddy in every way: tiny, outgoing, free-spirited. Her hair was a different shade of color every month. For August, it was turquoise.

Bill waved dismissively. “Nah. You should’ve seen Eddy. She drove that Jeep like she was stealing it. She should go to Hollywood! Would make a killing as a movie star.”

Faye laughed again. She pulled a trio of mugs from the cabinet and started filling them with fresh coffee.

Eddy crossed her arms. “Gonna miss that Jeep,” she muttered.

“Anyways, Bill, what brings you here? Eddy didn’t say.”

“Because he wouldn’t tell me,” Eddy said. “Just asked for your address.”

Bill smiled placatingly. “Pretty lucky we’re both sheltering in Redding, huh? The hotel they got me isn’t bad. And I rented a sweet ride. Nice red truck. Always wanted one.”

“Bill.” Eddy tapped her foot.

Faye giggled.

“I need to go back. To the cabin.”

The apartment went still. Faye’s coffee kept flowing until it spilled over the side of a mug.

“…And you want me to go with?” Eddy asked.

“I don’t think I could make it alone. I’m in my sixties, and this week I’m really starting to feel it. Would be nice to have someone else along who knows what they’re doing.”

“Bill. There’s not going to be anything left. You know that. You must’ve seen the fire maps.”

“That cabin has stood there a hundred years. It survived the last fire. It will again. Fires don’t get everything when they pass through. Leave patches.” Bill leaned over the counter, staring right into Eddy’s soul. “I know it.”

Eddy didn’t stir. “What do you need?”

Bill pulled out an ancient smart phone. A skinny tortoiseshell cat was enshrined on the cracked lock screen. “Myrtle. My cat. It’s been a week. She’s gotta be out of food by now.”

“Aww!” Faye cooed. “Eddy! You gotta!”

Eddy’s stomach sank. She remembered the moment they left the cabin, and Bill’s frantic shout about his cat. She had pulled him away from there. Just in time, but still. She took a long, steadying breath through her nose. But still.

She put a hand on Faye’s shoulder. “Look, I know you’re the biggest cat person on the planet. But Bill can call an animal rescue. They’re working out there right now.”

“I did,” Bill said sourly. “They won’t go all the way out to my place. Not for one cat.”

“And we will?”

“You saved my life. I trust you.”

Guilt tightened Eddy’s throat. “Is she worth it?”

Bill looked her straight in the eye. “You bet.”

The room was tense. Faye shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other, unsure. Then she got onto her tiptoes, wrapped her hands around Eddy’s face, and kissed her on the forehead. Eddy melted a little. “Go save Myrtle,” she whispered sweetly. “For me?”

Eddy let out sigh. “Okay. But I have one condition. No, two.” She lifted a finger. “We don’t do anything stupid. I’m turning right around if it gets too bad. Second, I’m not Forest Service when we’re out there. I happen to like my day job.”

#

They left after coffee, Faye’s spare cat carrier rattling on the backseat of Bill’s rental truck.

Eddy tapped the map. “It’s three hours on a good day.”

Bill looked out the passenger window. The sun was a red blister on an ashen sky. The Air Quality Index was over 400. Hazardous. “Not a good day,” he observed dryly. His voice was muffled by a mask. Eddy had taken hers off in the truck.

The air got steadily worse as they headed up the I-5 interstate. The streets of each town were mostly empty, with a few stray pedestrians kitted in N100 masks. The health risks of wildfire smoke were well-proven. People tended to be cautious.

The east side of the fire complex was the most well-contained. Charred pines butted against the highway, but structures were intact. A few bots lingered here and there, monitoring smoldering patches. They settled on the ground, their blades folded downward so their solar panels could drink in the sunlight. Occasionally, one would fly up and streak toward a hot spot. There would be a loud crack from their wave-compressors; then an errant flame would go out.

Eddy knew that it was the west side, deeper in the wildlands, where it was still being left to burn. They only had so many fire bots to go around each season. People and buildings always came first.

They would be headed west soon.

“How old is Myrtle?” Eddy asked, mostly to distract herself.

“Seventeen. Gettin’ kinda crusty.” Bill chuckled. “At least we match.”

“She’s cute though. Faye loves torties. Always wanted one. I keep telling her three is enough.”

“You live with her?”

Eddy stiffened. Bill hadn’t asked her many personal questions yet, and this wasn’t a good one to start. “No. My place is outside of Etna. Well, was, probably.”

“How long you been an item?”

“Seven years,” Eddy said briskly.

“Well then, about time—­­­

”

“I’m glad you’re supportive,” Eddy interrupted through gritted teeth. “But I prefer long distance. I like living alone. Having my own space. I’m a terrible roommate. Messy, and there’s always bots laying around people could step on, and—” She gripped the steering wheel. “It just wouldn’t work.”

Bill lifted his hands. “All right, just don’t shoot me.”

Eddy let out a long breath. “Sorry.” She looked at the map. “Guess we gotta survive another two hours together. Got any good stories?”

“About what?”

“I dunno. About your cat. Or maybe….” Another stand of fire-stripped trees whipped past. “You ever seen anything like this? You’ve been in NorCal for a while, right?”

“Yeah. A while.” For a long time, Bill didn’t answer. Just looked outside the window. The silence was awkward at first, but then Eddy started to understand. He was seeing the world outside not as it was, but how it had been. Green, grassy. And back further. When there were fewer grasslands and the forest was dense with trees. When the rains came often and the air smelled sweet after. When Bill was young, the scars on the Earth were only just starting to form.

“When I was young,” Bill began, “we had a lot of Big Ones. There was a drought up here, going on for decades. Plants couldn’t change fast enough. There was a fifth season every year: after summer came fire season. I haven’t seen air this bad in a long time. Used to happen every year. People started to leave the wildlands. Headed into the city with their air purifiers. It was too dangerous. The government paid ’em too. Paid us to leave.” His voice softened. “My dad didn’t. I didn’t. My son didn’t. Held onto the old woods, the spruce covered with old man’s beard. Elderberry and wild rose. A lot of that’s gone now. Turned into scrublands.”

“There’s a big patch of lupine behind my apartment,” Eddy said gently. “Doesn’t mind the heat waves. I always think it’s so pretty, when the whole field flushes purple. Even if it is kinda scrubby.”

“Yeah.” Bill snorted. “Everyone else has been better at changin’. All these regulations and the bots everywhere. My son was a firefighter. That job’s obsolete. A lot safer for everyone. Now when fires happen, they aren’t Big Ones. Little brush fires, and the bots are right there to watch ’em.”

“Except this one.”

“Freak event. Ain’t much to do about dry lightning and a windstorm.”

“Guess we’ll have to keep changing. Getting more resilient.”

“Guess so.”

They fell into a contemplative silence. It felt comfortable now. Every once in a while, Bill shared a weird little anecdote about his cat. He had a lot of pictures on his decrepit smart phone. They were a lot nicer to look at than the smoke.

They were surprised to find the highway to Etna still open. Burnt logs littered the gulleys. The bots had been very busy trying to clear access.

When they reached town, the truck slowed to a crawl. Half of Etna was gone—just char and stone. The conflagration had been hot enough to overwhelm even some of the fire-retardant architecture. Main street was a just a line of brick faces, with nothing behind them. Several houses had been stripped down to their chimneys. Black car-bodies littered the streets like shriveled insects. She made a detour past the Methodist church, and for a minute she forgot to breathe. Her Jeep was a pile of twisted metal, but the stone church was still standing. Even the rhododendrons in front were untouched.

“Almost makes you religious,” Bill commented.

“What was that you said? Every fire leaves patches.”

“Yeah.” Bill’s eyes never left the church’s front lawn. The grass where they stood was gone, eaten up by the inferno. “Now’s as good a time as ever to start prayin’.”

Eddy knew Bill was thinking about his cabin. She turned the truck around and headed west.

Once they left Etna, they didn’t have to go far before they hit a problem.

Bulky, troll-like security bots loitered in front of a metal fence. Unlike the fire bots, these rolled across the ground. Large cameras centered between their shoulders scanned for trespassers. The road headed towards the Klamath forest was blocked. One of the bots headed towards Bill’s truck and whistled. “FIRE AND RESCUE PERSONNEL ONLY! THIS AREA IS UNSAFE! TURN AROUND NOW!”

Eddy made sure to put on her mask before rolling down the window. She pulled down her baseball cap, obscuring her features even further.

“I’m with a resident,” she explained. “We’re here to rescue a cat.”

The bot’s eyes flashed red. “NO RESIDENTS! THIS AREA IS UNSAFE! TURN AROUND NOW!”

“Shit.”

Bill leaned over. “You work with these, right? Can’t you, I dunno, reprogram them or something? Shut ’em off?”

Eddy laughed. “Look, I’m no bot-whisperer. I tune up message drones. Besides, too many of ’em. There’s a third one over there.”

Bill watched them roam around the road for a minute. Then he leaned over and plucked the pack of cigarettes out of Eddy’s shirt pocket.

“Hey, not in the car—”

“I don’t smoke,” Bill snapped. “These things are programmed to put out fires, too, right?”

“Yeah. Car fires mostly. They’re pretty awkward on rough terrain. Bill, if you’re trying to start something….”

“Sure am. Lighter?”

“Bill.” She handed him the lighter against her better judgment.

“Just drive. I’ve seen what you can do.”

Bill chucked an entire pack of lit cigarettes out the window, straight into some dry brush. Eddy clenched her jaw. One bot noticed and started screeching, eyes spinning with red and blue lights. The others rushed to follow it.

“Now!”

Eddy kicked down the accelerator, hollering, and careened past the bots. The truck crashed through the fence. A piece of metal caught in a wheel-well and clattered around.

“They definitely got our plate number!” Eddy yelled over the noise.

“I’ll pay the fine! Just go!”

“That damn cat better be there!”

They dove headlong into the hills, laughing.

#

Eddy did her best. But even with stops to use the chainsaw Bill had brought, the burn zone was too fresh, too decimated, to allow passage.

Eddy rolled the truck to a stop. The road was absolutely littered with debris. Here, rows of fallen pines extended around the corner and out of sight.

“We can’t do this, Bill. It’ll take us days to clear all that.”

Bill hopped out of the truck. “Then we don’t. I can walk.”

Eddy tapped the map. “It’s another five miles.”

“Good thing we left in the morning then.” He pulled out the cat carrier and his backpack. “You can wait here. But I’m going.”

Eddy rolled her eyes. “I’m not leaving you. Come on, at least let me carry those.”

Begrudgingly, Bill handed over the supplies. Eddy tightened her N100. The smoke was dense here, thick like clotted milk. It stung her eyes and dried her throat. Ash fell as continuously as snow. The afternoon sunlight seemed to just barely filter through, covering the chapparal zone with an eerie orange glow.

Slowly, they picked their way over the logs. Their bodies were soon covered with soot. Bill was spry, but Eddy still helped him over the bigger ones. Bill stopped complaining about that, eventually. It was nerve-wracking, sweaty work. Fires bust to life unexpectedly as small pockets of fuel took off. Trees burst apart and toppled over, the cracks loud as gunshots. They had to be careful to avoid widowmakers and unstable terrain. Over the next couple hours, Eddy suggested turning back several times. Bill wasn’t having it; they were so close. Eddy resigned herself to making sure the old man came out alive.

As they got closer, Bill’s face got tighter and tighter. Eddy guessed that once again, he was remembering what the woods had looked like. His eyes lingered on a massive lodgepole pine, its top blasted by lightning.

“Graveyard of old friends,” Bill muttered as he turned away.

Eddy kicked aside a pile of pine needles. She grabbed a pinecone and held it up for Bill.

“There will be more. Lodgepole cones need fire to open.”

“Thanks for the biology lesson, Parkie,” Bill snapped.

Eddy ignored him; by now she was used to Bill’s barbs. “I’ve learned a lot in the Forest Service. Guy who got me into it, he was the biggest biology nerd. Talked about lichens like he knew them personally. He was Hoopa. In charge of the Indigenous Burn Program. He said fire keeps the forest alive.”

“Yeah, yeah, hope after disaster and all that. That’s very sweet. Very nice.”

“It’ll come back,” she continued. “It’ll look different when it does. But next time, it won’t be so—”

Eddy stopped. Suddenly she knew why this part of the road looked vaguely familiar. It was Bill’s driveway.

Bill’s cabin was gone. Just a concrete foundation, and in the center a warped woodstove.

“Oh my god. Fuck. I am so sorry.”

Bill snatched the carrier from her and stumbled into the wreckage. “Myrtle? Myrtle!”

Eddy pretended to look for a little while. She knew Myrtle couldn’t have made it. Tears pricked her eyes. She didn’t even know the poor thing. She was crying anyway.

Eventually Bill stopped shouting. He picked his way to the far corner of the cabin’s footprint.

“Bill. I’m really sorry, but she’s not here. We should go. We need to get to the truck before dark.”

He ignored her. Hands shaking, he lifted blackened logs and pushed aside insulation. Eddy helped him, not sure what he was digging for, until he unearthed a toaster-sized fire safe.

He sat on the concrete and settled the box across his lap. This whole time his face had been stern. Not a tear. Until he carefully clicked the box open and pulled out a manila envelope. Old-fashioned photographs slid out of the paper and onto his hands. Tears splashed across them. Bill gently wiped them dry.

Eddy lingered nearby, feeling like she was intruding.

“Who is that?” she couldn’t help but ask.

“Hunter. My son.”

She crouched beside him. He flipped slowly through the pictures. There, a black-haired boy on a swingset. A buck-toothed grin in front of a new car. A college graduation. And a tanned, tousled man in firefighting gear. Bill lingered on that last photo, running his thumb along the edge.

“He was a hotshot. Dove right into the worst of the burn zones. Tough kid. Someone had to do it, and he was good at it. It was hard work. Those boys huffed a lot of ash and smoke.”

Suddenly, Eddy understood. Why Bill hated the cigarettes. “Lung cancer?” she asked quietly.

“Myrtle was two. Damn cat was in his will.” He pressed his hands against his eyes. When his shoulders started shaking, Eddy turned away. She knew he didn’t want her to see.

The photos turned over and over in her head. The fire-blasted forest was still, silent, and full of ghosts. She thought about Faye’s cats, and who would take care of them if she was gone. She felt unsteady on her feet, like the world could slip away at any moment. Nothing felt safe anymore.

“You never take enough photos.” Eddy turned to see Bill slide the envelope into his back pocket. “That’s free advice.” He cracked a tiny smile. “Thanks for taking me back.”

“Yeah.” She was relieved to see that he was returning back to himself. But she was still restless. “Hey. If I—” Eddy hesitated. It felt surreal, to be asking this now. And asking Bill of all people. But suddenly this was urgent. The time she thought she’d had—that wasn’t guaranteed. “If I ask Faye, will she be okay with me staying?”

“Quit worryin’ about it. I saw the way she looked at you.” He jabbed her with an elbow. “Just get over it and get married already.”

“W-what?” Eddy stammered. “No! Hold on!”

Bill laughed. The sound came out cracked and strained at first, and then he was belting laughter across the hillside. After a second, Eddy joined him. Something came unfurled then. A hurt she had been carrying inside ever since the fire started. She opened her chest and let it go.

Something brushed against her ankle. She looked down, astonished, to see a soot-covered cat purring by her feet. Her coat was gummy, and her skin was crusted with black scabs. But she was unmistakably a tortoiseshell.

“Hey Myrtle,” Bill said. He picked her up and she nestled in his arms, motor humming. “I’m home.”