February flashback: Chicago Fire season 4, episode 13

A scene from the Chicago Fire episode The Sky is Falling. Photo Credit: Courtesy of NBC.
A scene from the Chicago Fire episode The Sky is Falling. Photo Credit: Courtesy of NBC. /
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Two years ago today, Chicago Fire scared us half to death with Chicago Fire season 4, episode 13. Look back at the episode in our February Flashback.

With Chicago Fire taking most of February off for the Winter Olympics, we’re rolling back the clock and revisiting the Chicago Fire episodes that previously aired this month.

Two years ago, Chicago Fire premiered one of its most suspenseful, terrifying episodes with “The Sky Is Falling.”

What started with Christopher Herrmann (David Eigenberg) and Mouch (Christian Stolte) signing the house up for a boxing match against Chicago PD to raise money for Mouch and Trudy Platt’s (guest star Amy Morton) wedding escalated into a life or death episode for most of our heroes.

The initial tension centered on a rapidly deteriorating Jessica “Chili” Chilton (Dora Madison). Her drinking and behavior was so out of control that her partner Sylvie Brett (Kara Killmer) had finally reported it to Chief Wallace Boden (Eamonn Walker).

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That only made Chili angrier. She went over Boden’s head trying to get Brett reassigned, but it backfired when the District Chief agreed with Boden’s plan to stage an intervention and give Chili one final chance to save her career.

But if Chili thought that was her worst moment, things were about to get significantly more intense! The city and Firehouse 51 had been experiencing a string of bomb threats and false alarm calls that the FBI believed were the work of a group setting up a major terrorist attack.

As the firehouse was watching television coverage of what appeared to be that attack at the Sears Tower, 51 got a fire call and what unfolded at the scene was truly terrifying. There was no smoke, no fire, but several civilians in the building and a sniper waiting on the roof. Our heroes were trapped by gunfire, both inside and outside of the building.

As two gunmen methodically made their way through, executing everyone they encountered, Chili and Brett hid together and were almost spotted by one gunman who turned out just to be getting a soda.

While Chili and Brett faced mortality, Matthew Casey (Jesse Spencer) and Gabriela Dawson (Monica Raymund) had been hiding with civilians in a secure room when smoke started pouring in through a vent. They had no choice but to leave the room, trying to avoid the shooter they could see with heat-sensitive cameras. The terror of knowing that cold-blooded killer was mere feet away was palpable and the fact that not one person coughed in all that smoke was remarkable.

The hallway gunman opened fire on Casey and Dawson’s group just as they were escaping the building and was neutralized by SWAT in the process, while the sniper was taken out by the FBI just as he took aim at Kelly Severide (Taylor Kinney). But what about Brett and Chili?

Still hiding behind the couch, Chili and Brett could hear one of the women who’d been shot in the hallway calling for help. They left the safety of the couch to help her and were almost immediately found by the man who’d almost found them before. Just as Chili and Brett were preparing to die, the gunman was taken out by SWAT.

All of our beloved 51 members made it out alive, but this was definitely one of Chicago Fire‘s most nail-biting episodes.

Back at the house, Dora Madison delivered a very emotionally raw scene as Chili apologized to Brett and admitted she needed serious help: “I don’t expect for you to forgive me. I just wanted to tell you that you were right,” she said.

“Do you know what it’s like to be doing insane things and not really know where it’s coming from? I thought it was my family, that they were all the problem. But now they’re not here and I realize I’m the problem. I need help.”

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Chicago Fire season 4, episode 13 was the beginning of the end for Chili, while it ended on a heartwarming note (as best it could) with Platt and Mouch donating the money they’d raised to the shooting victims, rather than using it for their wedding. But this was an episode that fans, and probably the characters, wouldn’t forget any time soon.

Next: Chicago Fire schedule for February

You can re-watch Chicago Fire season 4, episode 13 on DVD or iTunes. Check back all month long as we revisit the episodes that were throughout February!