[Gift] Seasonal | Bruned Out | Fire Brigade

The fire roared. Embers flew. He hadn’t grown up wíth forest fires. It was one of the few things they were protected from in the facility. Sure there had been fires. But the concrete walls had stopped most of them. The few he had watched had been mild compared to the huge fire that was facing him. It had been going for hours at this point. Climbing around them. 

Pickle and Xylitol had been with him when they were confronted by fleeing dinosaurs. They had shouted something and Ochei had not understood it at first. Fire? How could that be so bad that they had to run from it as if their lives were in danger? But the truth had caught up with him faster than he expected. It was as if the universe heard him say it and wanted to show him just have bad it could be just because. 

“The fire is spreading fast.” Pickle shouted over trees cracking under the immense heat. Xylitol was leading the way for the three of them as they kept walking away from it. “This doesn’t make any sense. It’s as if it’s spreading around us. But it really should be following the wind.” Pickle kept shouting. 

Ochei understood what she meant. She meant that there was something unnatural about this fire. But to what extent she meant he couldn’t figure it out. He had never before experienced a fire fuelled by the wind like this. Every time it blew the fire seemed to get nourishment from the wind and rise even higher. 

“I think someone is spreading it intentionally.” Xylitol yelled back at them as embers teased his scruffy feathers. Ochei could see a few of them smoke lightly. He could also tell when bigger embers landed on his spiked back. Thankfully his thick skin seemed to take most of the damage and keep him from the pain. “It seems as if it's being spread in a circle to expand it as quickly as possible.” 

“You mean to tell me that someone is intentionally making this fire bigger?” Ochei couldn’t hide his surprise as he yelled back to his partners. To think that someone would intentionally burn down a forest was unthinkable to him. Let alone all the poor souls who now had to try and escape it. “Can we do anything to stop it?”

At this question the green Albo stopped for a moment. She looked back at the fire as if Ochei had triggered her brain to find a solution. If anyone could it was sure to be her, she was the smartest dinosaur Ochei had ever met. 

“The wind isn’t super strong.” She said as another gust triggered hundreds, if not thousands of embers to spread. 

“Not super strong?” Both Xylitol and Ochei questioned her a t the same time. 

“It could be worse.” She nodded. “If we get help from other dinosaurs we could dig out all the vegetation. Create a ditch for the fire. It spreads the most over the grounds.” 

“What about the trees?” Ochei looked as the ember tried their best to travel across the tree tops. 

“It’s fall.” Xylitol. “Everything is dry.” 

“Yes, which means most of the leaves in this area have started to fall off!” Pickle had begun to run ahead of the two male Albos. They followed without asking any questions about where they were going, as long as they kept going away from the fire. “There’s not too many leaves left on the tree tops. Look.” 

Both Xylitol and Ochei looked up as they ran. It was true. Some trees still had almost full leaves, but most of them were almost completely bare. 

“Can’t we stop it ourselves?” Ochei asked, eager to help and stop the fire.

“No, we need more help. We need to dig fast.”

“The water.” Xylitol yelled over them as Pickle answered Ochei’s question. “It won't cross the water!” All three of them turned to watch the lake. There was no way the embers could make it all the way across the water. If they could help stop the fire in the direction the wind was blowing they had a chance to actually stop the fire. Or at least slow it down.

“Let’s hurry!” Ochei yelled. Neither of the other two stopped to answer him. It was decided on what they would do. They would help. Their home was to the east of the lake where the fire was spreading. Of course they would stop it. Or at the very least slow it down. They hurried as much as they could, neither of them were fast. They were all heavy dinosaurs. But thanks to the low amounts of gusts of winds they at least managed to outrun the spread of the fire. And as they got far enough away from the wind they heard the sounds of other dinosaurs. 

At first they couldn’t tell if the other dinosaurs were shouting in fear, but as they got closer it became very evident that they were in fact working together to carry as much water up from the lake as possible. One of them, a green Styra, was shouting out orders as he dug his horn into the ground, turning the dirt as fast as he could. 

“We are here to help.” Pickle shouted between breaths. Ochei and Xylitol behind her. The Styra looked up from the ground at them, for a moment he just stared. It felt like minutes even though barely a second had passed. Then he nodded.

“Help me dig!” 

926 words.