"Category 5"

What Otis began last week is now having dire consequences on this episode of “Chicago Fire”.

See, Otis never liked Rice and not once didn’t he ever try to hide that from anyone at the station. But by accusing the other man of being a coward, he’s made things difficult for both Rice and Severide. Severide being the one to vouch for Rice. And Severide being a good friend of Rice’s.

So Severide told Otis to stop. Just stop with all the petty grievances or else he’ll have a problem with him from now on. And the threat at first seemed to affect Otis. Yet, all the same, he still didn’t like Rice and Rice didn’t like him.

Otis went out of his way to be disrespectful to Rice. And he even refused help from the other man while they were all out on call. So when they returned to the station, Severide once again issued a warning. Only this time he did it in front of everyone.

And that caused Casey to question his men.

He took Otis and Cruz aside and he demanded to know what was going on. And the guys told him they believe Rice to be a “ducker”. If it wasn’t one thing with Rice then it was another. So the guys thought he was afraid of going into a burning building and as a firefighter that was the worst thing they could have said about Rice.

Hence Casey then had to be the one to tell them back down. They didn’t really have any proof to back up their claims and by insulting a member of Severide’s team, they’ve created an issue within the house.

And it’s not like Casey doesn’t have enough on his plate to deal with. Nesbitt keeps trying to make amends and Sgt. Voight has been reaching out to him. It seems the detective needs Casey’s help to open a proper investigation into Nesbitt’s work dealings. Yet Casey doesn’t want to involve himself with anything that Voight could possibly do in his “line of work”.

So Dawson got word from her brother and she chose to talk to Casey. Apparently, Nesbitt is accused of human trafficking. Police believe they bring over women from Eastern Europe to either work in his clubs or he prostitutes them. And so didn’t matter that Casey didn’t trust Voight, he knew he had to do something if the cops were right about Nesbitt.

And they wanted him to go back into business with Nesbitt. They said they needed someone on the inside.

Meanwhile things appear to be popping off at the Firehouse 51. Because even though they were warned, Otis and Cruz simply couldn’t stop themselves. They continued to joke around and call Rice names like “deadweight”. And for the most part, Rice tried to stay calm.

Occasionally, he would gripe to his lieutenant but he never said anything to Otis directly until after the other man confronted him.

They were putting away their equipment at the same time and Otis got lippy. He told Rice that he knew what he was. A Ducker. So Rice said that for now he wasn’t going to do anything. He was still the new guy and he was going through his probationary period. However, once that’s over, he told Otis that the two of them could take a walk.

And things only got worse later on. New girl Chili was convinced to hold a fundraiser to raise some money towards her new business venture but the event was ruined when Otis just kept on talking. So he and Severide came close to getting into a fight.

Severide took a swing at a man that used to be a friend and the other guys stepped in to stop things from going any further.

Chief Boden ended up hearing about what’s going on and he called in both Casey and Severide. He told them to keep their men under control. And, personally, he told Otis to stop running his mouth. Otis’s gut feeling didn’t suddenly turn him into Rice’s lieutenant. So he was advised to let Severide handle his own men.

51 is not in a good place as they’re called to an accident during their next shift. Truck 81 gathers to help a victim who was thrown from a truck that’s now in flames. The truck explodes and begins to roll down the street, on a collision course with our firefighters. Things look pretty grim until Severide runs head on at the truck and stops it by pinning an air tank under the tire. Before he gets steamrolled, Boden pulls him to safety.

Kelly Severide risked his life to save Truck 81.

As it dawns on Otis and Co. that Severide truly does have their backs, Severide, too, rethinks his position. He begins to have doubts about Rice’s mask malfunction story and he was finally asking the right questions. By this point he had to. And after he was asked about his equipment, Rice stayed with his story. He told Severide that everything was fine now. He said he got his equipment looked at and it was merely a faulty gage.

Then, when Severide specifically asked if anything was wrong like if Rice was having an issue, Rice assured him that not only was he not a ducker but Severide didn’t have to worry about being both his lieutenant and his friend anymore. From now on he can simply be his lieutenant.

And as for Casey, going in undercover sounded easier than it was.

Casey takes the Chicago P.D. cell phone-turned-wire into an extremely shady back room meeting at Stiletto’s, and, let’s be honest, he does not play it cool at all. Casey, you are good at so many things, being an informant in order to take down a human trafficking ring is not one of them. The thickly-accented man-in-charge orders Casey to a thorough pat down, and just when Casey thinks he’s passed the test, the man sternly requests to see Casey’s phone...