He didn’t ask to be anyone’s emotional rebound.
But with Eddie gone and Buck in whatever phase of denial comes after grief but before acceptance, Ravi Panikkar just became a stand-in. Not just on the team—in the dynamic. A ghost in someone else’s storyline.
He spent the whole day getting called the wrong name.
“Eddie, grab the med bag!” “Eddie, your handwriting got worse.” “You shaved, huh?” (He hadn’t.)
Chim tried once. “Ravi—Eddie—shit, sorry,” but the damage was done. At some point, even he stopped correcting them.
By hour six of this call—a gnarly three-car pileup off the 110—he was over it. Running on fumes, bloodstained gloves, and the vague urge to walk into traffic.
And then it happened.
She was in the passenger seat. Minor injuries, shocky, bleeding from the scalp but alert. He got her out, calm and careful, the way he always was. Cradled her head, told her to breathe. Kept her talking.
Once they had her loaded up on the stretcher and he pulled off his gloves, she caught his hand.
“Thank you,” she said, voice hoarse but sincere. And then— “Ravi, right?”
He blinked.
No one had said his name all day. Not once.
He literally looked down at his chest like he’d forgotten he existed.
“…Yeah,” he managed.
She smiled, blood on her lip and gratitude in her eyes. “You saved my life.”
He stood there for a second longer than he meant to. Nodded once. And walked back to the engine with something unfamiliar and warm cracking open in his chest.
A week later , Bobby’s reading a clipboard. Hen’s on the phone. Chimney’s elbows deep in leftovers. Buck’s shirtless for some reason. The usual.
So when a woman walks in—confident, familiar, a little nervous—everyone kinda… pauses. She’s clearly here for someone, and everyone in the room makes the silent calculation:
Do I know her? Did we save her? Did I flirt with her at that wellness fair?
Buck perks up like a Labrador. “Hey. Can I help you?”
She gives him a smile, warm but distracted. “Actually, I’m looking for—”
Hen walks in. Eyes her. “Hey, do we know you from that apartment fire on La Brea?”
She shakes her head. “No, I’m looking for—”
Chimney cuts in, pointing at himself. “CPR class? Home Depot? That one time I delivered a baby in an Uber?”
She laughs, genuinely now. “Nope, none of those.”
Bobby, sensing the confusion, tries to restore order. “Miss, are you here to see one of us?”
She smiles—like really smiles—and glances past all of them, toward the back where Ravi’s just stepped in, a little sweaty, clearly fresh from training.
“Yeah,” she says. “I’m here for Ravi.”
You could hear a pin drop. Even Ravi blinks, glancing over his shoulder like Me? And then she walks right up to him, hands him a coffee (exactly how he takes it. Witchcraft) and says—
“Thought you could use something normal today.”
He looks at her like she just rewrote the universe. Like after weeks of being “Eddie” and “uhhh?” someone finally said his name. Meant it. Knew it.
Chimney, quietly to Hen: “Damn. That’s kinda hot.”
“No, that’s romantic.” Hen smirks
And Ravi? Ravi finally feels like the main character in someone’s story.