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across his uniform pants had melted into the back side of his thigh.
    John Baxter was waiting for him in the ER. “God, help us,” he whispered when he saw Landon’s blood oxygen level. “We’re going to need a miracle.”
    Paramedics, friends of Landon’s, wheeled him into a treatment room and carefully lifted him onto a bed. John rattled off orders as the medical team sprang into motion. “Get his uniform off, but be careful.”
    The oxygen treatment tank was ready, and John slipped a mask over Landon’s face.
    “Hang in there, Landon. Come on.” It was unusual for a firefighter these days to suffer from such severe smoke inhalation. After all, Landon should have had breathing apparatus. Unless-for some reason-he hadn’t used it.
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    The treatment was administered through a ventilator that would breathe mechanically for Landon, forcing clean, damp air mixed with medication into his lungs in an attempt to clean out the smoke and chemicals. But damage done in a fire was often too severe for the treatment to do much good.
    The first hour was critical.
    Red numbers flashed on a monitor. Minutes after his rescue, Landon’s blood oxygen level had been in the seventies-barely high enough to live. Paramedics had intubated him immediately, but even now his oxygen level was dangerously low. He had mild burns on his throat, but miraculously his blood tests didn’t show severe carbon monoxide poisoning.
    A strapping young paramedic came up alongside John and stared at Landon. “We …
    we can’t lose him, Doc. He’s the best there is.”
    John glanced up and saw fear on the paramedic’s face. For a moment their eyes held; then John looked back at Landon’s still form. He crossed his arms tightly in front of him. “I’ve known Landon Blake since he was a boy.” John pinched his lips together, his chin quivering. “I’m not letting go of him yet.”
    There was silence for a moment, and the paramedic coughed. “How’s the boy? The one who came in before Landon?”
    “He’s fine.” John gazed at the oxygen monitor. Eighty-nine… eighty-eight….
    Come on, Landon, breathe! “The child has some smoke damage, but not bad.” John shot a look at the paramedic. “It’s amazing, really. He was in the fire as long as Landon. Smoke like that usually kills children first.”
    “Then you don’t know?”
    John leaned against Landon’s bed. “Know what?”
    “It was Landon. He gave the boy his air mask. Saved his life.” The paramedic drew a steadying breath. “When the firemen found them, Landon was unconscious, collapsed over the boy like a shield. He’d covered his own mouth with the neck of his coat. Probably saved his life. Somehow he managed to use the weight of his arm to keep the air mask over the boy’s face.”
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s a I I e y
    Realization settled over John like a damp cloak. While the child breathed from Landon’s air tank, Landon had breathed smoke-thick, poisonous, deadly smoke.
    John looked at the monitor again. Ninety … eighty-nine … it would take a miracle. “What about the other firefighter, the one trapped with Landon?”
    “He got out unharmed.”
    “Good.” John gave a slow nod. “The next hour will be crucial.”
    The paramedic nodded, too choked up to speak. He took Landon’s hand and squeezed it. “Breathe, buddy.” He swallowed hard, his chin quivering. “We need you.”
    Long after the paramedic left, John stayed by Landon’s side, monitoring his oxygen level and making sure his burns were being tended to. They weren’t as bad as John had originally thought-probably more steam burns than anything else. The fireproof material in Landon’s uniform pants must not have melted until the last few seconds. The burns were on only a small section on the back of his thighs and a few spots near his lower spine. They might even heal without skin grafts.
    He would need surgery to set his broken leg, but it was a clean break. It could have been worse. Besides, it wasn’t Landon’s