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hmsloop_hotspurTitle: Strong, Dark, and Early
Fandom: Hornblower (Forester, with hints of A&E): modern AU among NYC firefighters and paramedics (belongs to my “War That Never Ends” series)
Pairing: Hornblower/Bush
Rating: T (strong language)
Wordcount: 2000 words approx
Summary: A new kid on the block is clued in on an open secret, and it all begins with coffee. Forhmsloop_hotspur’s “Coffee” and “Comfort” prompts. Crossposted between the comm and my journal.
Spring 2001
When probationary firefighter “Mouse” Romanenko had been assigned to FDNY Battalion 11, he hadn’t imagined that he’d learn more about cooking than his kitchen-proud grandmother had forgotten. Then again, he hadn’t counted on being assigned to the same company as an ex-chef who’d won the department cook-offs three times running and was gunning for a fourth. The guys had said he’d used to work for some five-star hotel in Midtown, that he’d served up first-class cuisine to heads of state, that he’d washed out of basic training for the Marine Corps, that he’d been fired for punching a guy over a soufflé. (They couldn’t agree on whether the guy he punched was a customer, or another chef.) The guys had said a lot of things about “Julia” Doughty. Hell, some of them might even have been true. Mouse was just grateful that someone was attempting to run interference between him and the asshole who was trying to shove a video camera in his face every fifteen minutes. The only good thing was, the asshole, “Showbiz”, was a late riser, so Mouse could get some work done in the mornings before the camera got in the way. For given values of work: they hadn’t had a callout in a while, so here Mouse was, mopping the floors after the night shift, cleaning everything and every surface in sight, taking inventory, getting breakfast ready for the firehouse, learning how everyone took their coffee.
For the tall skinny EMS guy they called Toots, that just seemed to mean “coffee first, ask questions later.” He didn’t talk like a New Yorker, but he certainly needed his coffee like one. Mouse knew how he felt. No cream, which was kind of strange, and plenty of sugar. On good days, all you had to do was point Toots to the shaker. On bad days, it was best just to steer Toots gently in the direction of the coffee station, like backing out one of the rigs.
(It had taken Mouse much longer than usual to find out the poor bastard’s last name was Hornblower. He still hadn’t figured out what Toots’ first name was yet, and he could only guess why the guys called him Toots. Nothing to do with Tootsie, though there were times Mouse wasn’t so sure.)
It was not a good day. Toots stumbled in like something out of Night of the Living Dead, like his body had arrived on time but his brain was about five hours behind. The guys who would normally say “hi” to him saw his face and got out of his way. He barely acknowledged the LT enough to avoid insubordination, with a grunt that might’ve been “morning,” before making a beeline for the coffee.
Except that Julia (Mouse had to admire his cojones) body-checked Toots and got him just a little off-course, away from the coffee urns and towards the stove. Toots looked ready to commit homicide, half-asleep as he was. Mouse backed up a couple of steps himself.
“Not today, sweetheart,” said Julia, grabbing up the little glass-sided coffeepot from the counter and shoving it in Toots’ face. “This one’s yours.”
A couple of sniffs and Toots calmed down. It was almost funny to see Mister Hyde turn back into Doctor Jekyll, just from the smell of coffee. “I thought that was the Chief’s?” he said, which it was, but he took the pot from Julia and pushed down the plunger-handle with steady force.
“As of today it’s yours,” said Julia with a grin. “Chief’s is over here. Mouse, grab that,” he snapped, gesturing towards the moka-pot that had just begun to burble on the back burner, “lay it on the tray. No, on the piece of coat there. Regular firehouse coffee’s doing you no favors, Toots, and you won’t take cream with it.”
“Shouldn’t have to,” said Toots, “if the grind’s any good.”
“Which is why I’m giving you the French press,” said Julia. “Little coarser grind than regular drip, and a good steeping time to get the max caffeine. And this used to be the Chief’s, so nobody’s gonna dick around with it. I’ll make sure that stays the case. Enjoy.”
Toots was still too under-caffeinated to say anything more than, “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Say, Polansky,” for the Chief’s assistant had heard (or smelled) his cue and come into the kitchen, “permission to let Toots relieve you of the coffee duty this morning?”
“Granted,” said Polansky with a nod, glancing at the files in his two hands and under one arm; “I could use the help. Mouse, Chief wants to see you, too.”
Oh shit. Me? he mouthed.
“Yes you. Step to it.”
“Yessir,” he said, straightening up the hem of his shirt, running a hand through his hair, and following at the tail end of the little procession upstairs.
The Chief must’ve had really good ears or a really good nose, because the sound of his typewriter stopped a good ten seconds before Polansky got half in front of Toots and knocked on the office door. “Is there coffee?” the Chief called through it.
“Yessir,” Polansky called back.
“Then get in here.”
Polansky opened the door, but it was Toots (plus tray) who got in first. “I thought you didn’t like coffee,” he said without preamble.
“Hey, it might be a good morning after all,” said the Chief, and if he wasn’t exactly cracking a smile, there were the beginnings of some smile-lines behind his reading-glasses.
“No guarantees,” said Toots, “Julia’s getting a little experimental with the coffee. The espresso-pot is yours, I hear?”
“Yeah, I’m tryin’ to reduce intake. I don’t need it to wake up, I need it to deal with all these goddamn forms and memos and shit. Talk about cruel and unusual, Jesus.” Polansky stacked the files he’d been carrying into a tidy pile, and added them to the Chief’s in-tray before stepping back and to one side. “There go more of them.”
Now was obviously not a good time for Mouse to introduce himself. Some of those forms probably had his name at the top.
“Take a few minutes’ break and have some of this?” offered Toots, with an expression Mouse hadn’t seen on his face before, a complicated one. Sort of Bogie in the last act of The Maltese Falcon, maybe? “I could call it doctor’s orders.”
The Chief snorted. “Sure ya could. Go ahead.”
Toots picked up the two coffeepots, one in each long-fingered hand, and poured the doses with precision. It was quiet enough all of a sudden that Mouse standing in the doorway could hear the coffee splash into the two cups on the tray on the Chief’s desk. Still not a word said, Toots handed over the Chief’s cup, picked up his own, and the two of them took a trial sip.
Now here was a moment straight out of Hitchcock. The actions were perfectly ordinary, but the expressions… Mouse half-expected an orchestra to strike up outside the window. The Chief looked more spellbound than Spellbound, though it would’ve been hard to say which of them was Gregory Peck in this scene. Even Toots’ long face looked just a little lit-up on the inside, just reaching his eyes. Mouse didn’t think it was just that the coffee was that good. Polansky’s face hadn’t moved one fraction. Apparently he didn’t think this was totally weird. Mouse tried to keep the same kind of straight face, but seriously, what the fuck.
The moment passed. Cut, print, reset, new take. Action. The Chief caught Mouse’s eye in a steely blue gaze, set down his coffee-cup, and beckoned him in, all business. “You, uh, wanted to see me, sir?” Real smooth, Romanenko, good job.
“Just checkin’ up before Showbiz McGinn and his friends get here. I like to get a good idea of who’s workin’ for me. Is it ‘Mouse,’ or is it Mike?”
“It’s been Mouse since the Academy, sir,” Mouse said, managing not to shrug. “There’re a lot of Mikes.”
“One more in this room,” said the Chief, with a jerk of the chin to Polansky. “I was ‘Trip’ in the Academy myself. Stick around long enough and you’ll find out what they call me now. Julia treatin’ you right?”
“Yessir. He’s teaching me a lot.”
“Good. I know it’s been quiet – I guess you’re one of those damn ‘white smoke’ probies we get sometimes – so you’re learnin’ more about the inside of the firehouse than the outside. That’ll change, trust me. The important thing is, you never stop learning. I’m Battalion Chief and I’m still learning on the job. There’s always something. The minute you think you’ve got a handle on everything, the minute you stop learning, there’s somethin’ new, someone new, some new procedure, some new technology...” The Chief took his glasses off and waved them towards a computer sitting awkwardly on a side-table, silent as Polansky. “Point is, you keep on learnin’, or you start fuckin’ up. Don’t fuck up, kid.”
“No sir,” Mouse said gravely.
The Chief nodded his head, just a little, the smile-lines creeping in. “Little bird tells me you’re into movies.”
“Yessir.” God alone knew who had told the Chief that.
“The Metro Twin on Ninety-Ninth and Broadway ain’t what it was, but it is what it is, in case you’re interested. Any questions?”
“No, sir.”
“Okay.” The Chief put his glasses back on, jerked a gnarled thumb towards the door. “Vamoose.”
“Yessir,” Mouse didn’t quite gasp, and vamoosed rapidly.
Kitchen. Nobody else hanging around, thank God. Julia was doing something with a clipboard, and the sheer normality of it made Mouse want to laugh. “Okay?” said Julia, and Mouse ended up telling him all he’d heard and seen in the Chief’s office. He tried to edit his words even a little, but he hadn’t gone into firefighting to work in public relations, and he just ended up stumbling over his words and telling things out of order. Julia, doing his best Polansky impression, went “Uh-huh,” and “Yeah,” and “Right,” at the right moments, but said nothing else, which was unlike him.
“So I guess it’s none of my business,” Mouse finished, but Julia held up the hand that wasn’t holding the clipboard and spoke lower.
“You’re damn right it isn’t. Or anyone else’s but theirs. I know what you’re asking.”
“Are Toots and the Chief…?” Mouse stammered.
“Are they ‘Toots and the Chief’? Not that it’s any of our business, but as best we can tell, hell yes. How long have they been ‘Toots and the Chief’? Nobody’s sure. Polansky’s known them longest, figures they’ve been an item as long as he’s known them, at least. But let me just say one thing. If this is going to be a problem for you, you’re going to be a problem for us, and I’ll tell you why. Toots Hornblower isn’t just the best thing that happened to the Chief; he may be the best thing that happened to the whole goddamned department. You got the ‘never stop learning’ spiel, right. Who the hell do you think the Chief learned from? It sure wasn’t Jack Sawyer.”
Mouse was at a loss for words.
“Yeah, ‘ohh,’” said Julia. “Don’t ever play poker, Mouse. You’re a good kid. I didn’t think you’d have a problem, I just wanted to make certain of it. The Chief put you with me because I get people even better than he does.”
“I guess I was just – surprised, is all,” said Mouse, surprised at how small his voice sounded.
“You’ve got a right to be,” said Julia, more sympathetically. “It’s what you do next that’s the main thing. That’s what the Chief meant about always learning. You’ll have a lot more surprises under your belt by the time you’re done with this battalion. Now, c’mon – I’ve got a puttanesca sauce to put together and a reputation to uphold.”
Fandom: Hornblower (Forester, with hints of A&E): modern AU among NYC firefighters and paramedics (belongs to my “War That Never Ends” series)
Pairing: Hornblower/Bush
Rating: T (strong language)
Wordcount: 2000 words approx
Summary: A new kid on the block is clued in on an open secret, and it all begins with coffee. For
hmsloop_hotspur’s “Coffee” and “Comfort” prompts. Crossposted between the comm and my journal.Spring 2001
When probationary firefighter “Mouse” Romanenko had been assigned to FDNY Battalion 11, he hadn’t imagined that he’d learn more about cooking than his kitchen-proud grandmother had forgotten. Then again, he hadn’t counted on being assigned to the same company as an ex-chef who’d won the department cook-offs three times running and was gunning for a fourth. The guys had said he’d used to work for some five-star hotel in Midtown, that he’d served up first-class cuisine to heads of state, that he’d washed out of basic training for the Marine Corps, that he’d been fired for punching a guy over a soufflé. (They couldn’t agree on whether the guy he punched was a customer, or another chef.) The guys had said a lot of things about “Julia” Doughty. Hell, some of them might even have been true. Mouse was just grateful that someone was attempting to run interference between him and the asshole who was trying to shove a video camera in his face every fifteen minutes. The only good thing was, the asshole, “Showbiz”, was a late riser, so Mouse could get some work done in the mornings before the camera got in the way. For given values of work: they hadn’t had a callout in a while, so here Mouse was, mopping the floors after the night shift, cleaning everything and every surface in sight, taking inventory, getting breakfast ready for the firehouse, learning how everyone took their coffee.
For the tall skinny EMS guy they called Toots, that just seemed to mean “coffee first, ask questions later.” He didn’t talk like a New Yorker, but he certainly needed his coffee like one. Mouse knew how he felt. No cream, which was kind of strange, and plenty of sugar. On good days, all you had to do was point Toots to the shaker. On bad days, it was best just to steer Toots gently in the direction of the coffee station, like backing out one of the rigs.
(It had taken Mouse much longer than usual to find out the poor bastard’s last name was Hornblower. He still hadn’t figured out what Toots’ first name was yet, and he could only guess why the guys called him Toots. Nothing to do with Tootsie, though there were times Mouse wasn’t so sure.)
It was not a good day. Toots stumbled in like something out of Night of the Living Dead, like his body had arrived on time but his brain was about five hours behind. The guys who would normally say “hi” to him saw his face and got out of his way. He barely acknowledged the LT enough to avoid insubordination, with a grunt that might’ve been “morning,” before making a beeline for the coffee.
Except that Julia (Mouse had to admire his cojones) body-checked Toots and got him just a little off-course, away from the coffee urns and towards the stove. Toots looked ready to commit homicide, half-asleep as he was. Mouse backed up a couple of steps himself.
“Not today, sweetheart,” said Julia, grabbing up the little glass-sided coffeepot from the counter and shoving it in Toots’ face. “This one’s yours.”
A couple of sniffs and Toots calmed down. It was almost funny to see Mister Hyde turn back into Doctor Jekyll, just from the smell of coffee. “I thought that was the Chief’s?” he said, which it was, but he took the pot from Julia and pushed down the plunger-handle with steady force.
“As of today it’s yours,” said Julia with a grin. “Chief’s is over here. Mouse, grab that,” he snapped, gesturing towards the moka-pot that had just begun to burble on the back burner, “lay it on the tray. No, on the piece of coat there. Regular firehouse coffee’s doing you no favors, Toots, and you won’t take cream with it.”
“Shouldn’t have to,” said Toots, “if the grind’s any good.”
“Which is why I’m giving you the French press,” said Julia. “Little coarser grind than regular drip, and a good steeping time to get the max caffeine. And this used to be the Chief’s, so nobody’s gonna dick around with it. I’ll make sure that stays the case. Enjoy.”
Toots was still too under-caffeinated to say anything more than, “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Say, Polansky,” for the Chief’s assistant had heard (or smelled) his cue and come into the kitchen, “permission to let Toots relieve you of the coffee duty this morning?”
“Granted,” said Polansky with a nod, glancing at the files in his two hands and under one arm; “I could use the help. Mouse, Chief wants to see you, too.”
Oh shit. Me? he mouthed.
“Yes you. Step to it.”
“Yessir,” he said, straightening up the hem of his shirt, running a hand through his hair, and following at the tail end of the little procession upstairs.
The Chief must’ve had really good ears or a really good nose, because the sound of his typewriter stopped a good ten seconds before Polansky got half in front of Toots and knocked on the office door. “Is there coffee?” the Chief called through it.
“Yessir,” Polansky called back.
“Then get in here.”
Polansky opened the door, but it was Toots (plus tray) who got in first. “I thought you didn’t like coffee,” he said without preamble.
“Hey, it might be a good morning after all,” said the Chief, and if he wasn’t exactly cracking a smile, there were the beginnings of some smile-lines behind his reading-glasses.
“No guarantees,” said Toots, “Julia’s getting a little experimental with the coffee. The espresso-pot is yours, I hear?”
“Yeah, I’m tryin’ to reduce intake. I don’t need it to wake up, I need it to deal with all these goddamn forms and memos and shit. Talk about cruel and unusual, Jesus.” Polansky stacked the files he’d been carrying into a tidy pile, and added them to the Chief’s in-tray before stepping back and to one side. “There go more of them.”
Now was obviously not a good time for Mouse to introduce himself. Some of those forms probably had his name at the top.
“Take a few minutes’ break and have some of this?” offered Toots, with an expression Mouse hadn’t seen on his face before, a complicated one. Sort of Bogie in the last act of The Maltese Falcon, maybe? “I could call it doctor’s orders.”
The Chief snorted. “Sure ya could. Go ahead.”
Toots picked up the two coffeepots, one in each long-fingered hand, and poured the doses with precision. It was quiet enough all of a sudden that Mouse standing in the doorway could hear the coffee splash into the two cups on the tray on the Chief’s desk. Still not a word said, Toots handed over the Chief’s cup, picked up his own, and the two of them took a trial sip.
Now here was a moment straight out of Hitchcock. The actions were perfectly ordinary, but the expressions… Mouse half-expected an orchestra to strike up outside the window. The Chief looked more spellbound than Spellbound, though it would’ve been hard to say which of them was Gregory Peck in this scene. Even Toots’ long face looked just a little lit-up on the inside, just reaching his eyes. Mouse didn’t think it was just that the coffee was that good. Polansky’s face hadn’t moved one fraction. Apparently he didn’t think this was totally weird. Mouse tried to keep the same kind of straight face, but seriously, what the fuck.
The moment passed. Cut, print, reset, new take. Action. The Chief caught Mouse’s eye in a steely blue gaze, set down his coffee-cup, and beckoned him in, all business. “You, uh, wanted to see me, sir?” Real smooth, Romanenko, good job.
“Just checkin’ up before Showbiz McGinn and his friends get here. I like to get a good idea of who’s workin’ for me. Is it ‘Mouse,’ or is it Mike?”
“It’s been Mouse since the Academy, sir,” Mouse said, managing not to shrug. “There’re a lot of Mikes.”
“One more in this room,” said the Chief, with a jerk of the chin to Polansky. “I was ‘Trip’ in the Academy myself. Stick around long enough and you’ll find out what they call me now. Julia treatin’ you right?”
“Yessir. He’s teaching me a lot.”
“Good. I know it’s been quiet – I guess you’re one of those damn ‘white smoke’ probies we get sometimes – so you’re learnin’ more about the inside of the firehouse than the outside. That’ll change, trust me. The important thing is, you never stop learning. I’m Battalion Chief and I’m still learning on the job. There’s always something. The minute you think you’ve got a handle on everything, the minute you stop learning, there’s somethin’ new, someone new, some new procedure, some new technology...” The Chief took his glasses off and waved them towards a computer sitting awkwardly on a side-table, silent as Polansky. “Point is, you keep on learnin’, or you start fuckin’ up. Don’t fuck up, kid.”
“No sir,” Mouse said gravely.
The Chief nodded his head, just a little, the smile-lines creeping in. “Little bird tells me you’re into movies.”
“Yessir.” God alone knew who had told the Chief that.
“The Metro Twin on Ninety-Ninth and Broadway ain’t what it was, but it is what it is, in case you’re interested. Any questions?”
“No, sir.”
“Okay.” The Chief put his glasses back on, jerked a gnarled thumb towards the door. “Vamoose.”
“Yessir,” Mouse didn’t quite gasp, and vamoosed rapidly.
Kitchen. Nobody else hanging around, thank God. Julia was doing something with a clipboard, and the sheer normality of it made Mouse want to laugh. “Okay?” said Julia, and Mouse ended up telling him all he’d heard and seen in the Chief’s office. He tried to edit his words even a little, but he hadn’t gone into firefighting to work in public relations, and he just ended up stumbling over his words and telling things out of order. Julia, doing his best Polansky impression, went “Uh-huh,” and “Yeah,” and “Right,” at the right moments, but said nothing else, which was unlike him.
“So I guess it’s none of my business,” Mouse finished, but Julia held up the hand that wasn’t holding the clipboard and spoke lower.
“You’re damn right it isn’t. Or anyone else’s but theirs. I know what you’re asking.”
“Are Toots and the Chief…?” Mouse stammered.
“Are they ‘Toots and the Chief’? Not that it’s any of our business, but as best we can tell, hell yes. How long have they been ‘Toots and the Chief’? Nobody’s sure. Polansky’s known them longest, figures they’ve been an item as long as he’s known them, at least. But let me just say one thing. If this is going to be a problem for you, you’re going to be a problem for us, and I’ll tell you why. Toots Hornblower isn’t just the best thing that happened to the Chief; he may be the best thing that happened to the whole goddamned department. You got the ‘never stop learning’ spiel, right. Who the hell do you think the Chief learned from? It sure wasn’t Jack Sawyer.”
Mouse was at a loss for words.
“Yeah, ‘ohh,’” said Julia. “Don’t ever play poker, Mouse. You’re a good kid. I didn’t think you’d have a problem, I just wanted to make certain of it. The Chief put you with me because I get people even better than he does.”
“I guess I was just – surprised, is all,” said Mouse, surprised at how small his voice sounded.
“You’ve got a right to be,” said Julia, more sympathetically. “It’s what you do next that’s the main thing. That’s what the Chief meant about always learning. You’ll have a lot more surprises under your belt by the time you’re done with this battalion. Now, c’mon – I’ve got a puttanesca sauce to put together and a reputation to uphold.”
no subject
Date: 2019-04-30 09:09 pm (UTC)“Are Toots and the Chief…?” Mouse stammered.
“Are they ‘Toots and the Chief’? Not that it’s any of our business, but as best we can tell, hell yes.
Hell yes, indeed. :-D
btw, I'm so intrigued by how you've put Bush in a command position over Hornblower. (Or is Hornblower off to the side, in a separate organization? He appears to be part of the firehouse here.) It's lovely to see him get the respect he deserves.
no subject
Date: 2019-04-30 09:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-05-05 07:07 pm (UTC)Also, Toots is such a good nickname. Honestly, the one issue with any kind of modern ish AU is having a character named Horatio Hornblower who goes by that frankly ridiculous name. This is really enjoyable, thank you!
no subject
Date: 2019-05-05 08:12 pm (UTC)Funnily enough my modern AU was inspired by someone else's, and we've both in our different ways had to square "how to evoke the Age of Sail" and "what to do about poor Hornblower's real name". I guess Hornblower is lucky that, in New York, *lots* of people including firefighters have ridiculous names.
no subject
Date: 2019-05-05 08:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-05-07 04:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-05-07 09:40 pm (UTC)