He was one of many rescuers that worked their way through the building, following the explosion.
It had been a gas leak somewhere in the basement, he’d been told. It had brought down the entire multi-level apartment block. People were still being found alive. Much of it was unstable, with an occasional subsidence throwing up clouds of dust. He had climbed up a slope of building rubble to investigate a sound coming from a dark cave-like crevice. It had been formed by two giant horizontal slabs of concrete coming down, almost on top of each other. He peered in, but the dark, dusty environment hid any real detail. Despite the safety-hardhat, face mask and heavy protective clothing making moving around difficult, he switched his helmet torch on and crawled a short distance into the gap.
Moving the beam around, he could just make out the face of the man he had so often seen in the pub with his dog. He was barely conscious, groaning and looked to be completely trapped. He only knew him by sight. Nevertheless, he knew him to be a brute of a man, a heavy drinker and not a particularly nice person to know. He had seen the ruffian kick his dog on a number of occasions. He had to remind himself that part of his training was to keep personal emotions out of it; the rescue mission was what it was all about.
Then he heard a different noise; a soft whine. It was the dog, crouched beside its master. The animal didn’t look pinned down in any way that he could see. It was surely free to move, he thought. It could only be the animal’s loyalty to its master that made it stay by his side.
He called softly to it, and despite it having a slight limp, it managed to crawl out into the daylight. The man picked the animal up, and cradling it in his arms began to carefully make his way back down. He paused when he heard the rumbling behind him. Looking back, he saw that the two great slabs had come together, with plumes of dust billowing out.
Moving more quickly, with a firm grip on the dog, he made his way down to the street where the emergency response vehicles were gathered.
It was his mask that concealed his satisfied grin.