Author's note : This is my first Thunderbirds fanfic and the first time I've ever written in this style.

Disclaimer : I really own nothing here.

Anyhow, the parts in italic are in Malay and in bold are meant to be in English.

Thanks for reading.

/

She would never forget where she had lived the first years of her life.

It was a wonderland in many respects.

A wild place, the Borneo rain forest had been rescued from deforestation by various global organisations sometime in 2030. She was vaguely aware of that fact, although at the time, it hadn't seemed all that important to her.

All she knew, all that she cared about was that she was free so long as she remained inside of the camp and the rain forest made a wonderful playground. Of course, there was always someone watching her. One of the workers or more often her mother. Still, she could spend her days climbing through the trees, chasing the jungles smaller and more harmless creatures or on the lookout for tigers.

She would run along laughing and screaming through the camp. Every day seemed to bring joy and the promise of a new adventure.

She attended a small school which had been set up near the camp. Like almost all of the other kids there, her parents worked as part of the Tracy Industries mining expedition. She was probably a little too young to fully understand but it seemed to have something to with some special rock that could power things, at least that's what her parents had told her.

Her exploring and chasing through the rain forest causes her mother to despair as no sooner has she cleaned up her daughter than she will be climbing another tree or crawling through the bushes after a lizard. Every evening, she has to have a shower to clean off the day's accumulated dirt. Even although her nails are short, she somehow manages to get inches of dirt underneath them. Her hair isn't much better always having twigs in it which she's picked up involuntarily. They call her wild and maybe she is.

It doesn't matter what time of the day it is, she is always able to find her parents to show or tell them about something new she's discovered in the world. They smile and act as if she's made a brand new revolutionary discovery. Somehow, even if they're busy, they always find time for their daughter.

She rushes to see her father, it doesn't matter to her whether he's busy or not. It doesn't occur to her that when he's talking to the tall important looking man in a suit, that it might be important and that now might not be the a good time to disturb him. Instead, she charges over to him. When he doesn't immediately spot her, she tugs on his hand with her free one.

"Tanusha? What is it?" He asks his voice kind but that tells her none the less that this isn't the best time.
"Look what I caught!"

She holds out a small fury creature which is probably scared out of its wits. It looks around startled, probably believing that it's about to become dinner for these strange bipedal creatures which had invaded it's home. Kyrano blinks a couple of times, wondering just how his daughter managed to catch such a creature before picking her up in one arm.

"It's a treeshrew, my darling." He informs her.
"Can we keep it?" She asks with big pleading eyes.
"Now, Tanusha, that wouldn't be fair would it?" Her father tells her, full of infinite patience. "It belongs in the wild. Like the tigers. Go put it back so it can be with its family."
"Okay..." She mutters disappointed.

Her attention suddenly focuses on the stranger as if it's the first time she's seen him. There are a lot of strange people like him around the camp, her father calls them Americans. They speak in some strange language she can't understand and are quite different to the people she's used to. She's seen this one around quite a lot, he's important, father speaks with him in American.

When he notices that she's starring at him, he offers her a warm and friendly smile which reminds her of father's. Kyrano smiles at his daughter's curiosity.

"This is Jeff Tracy. I work for him. He's a very important man. He runs things here." He declares. "What do we say to people we've just met Tanusha?"
"Hello, Mr. Tracy." Tanusha speaks loudly, with confidence sometimes uncommon in kids of her age.
"Yes but what if they're American?" Kyrano chuckles slightly, aware that Jeff probably knows what she's saying.
"H-Hello Mr. Tracy." She manages more shyly in her best English.
"Hello, Tanusha." He speaks to her in heavily accented Malay. "Kyrano big say about you."

She laughs at his poor Malay. Earning a disapproving look from her father as well as a reminder about good manners. Mr. Tracy doesn't seem to mind however and she decides that all in all, her dad's boss is probably okay. She's put back down a couple of moments later and is told to go and release the captive shrew and that they'd be time for playing later after her parents had finished work. She runs off laughing, heading towards the forest.

Mr. Tracy and Kyrano watch her disappear smiling to themselves.

"Cute kid." Jeff remarks thinking back to his own family, currently being cared for by his mother.
"She is very bright and always running around. We are very proud." He pauses for a moment before laughing. "She wants to be a flying tiger when she grows up."
"Kids are like that." Mr. Tracy laughs along. "One of mine wants to be a squid."

Mr. Tracy eats diner with them fairly regularily. Her mother prepares a meal as the sun begins to set over the jungle. She learns that this strange American was once an astronaut, that he flew higher than the sky, into space where the stars are. She can help but look at the star-traveler with wonder and with infinite patience on behalf of both the former astronaut and her parents, they are able to translate some of his tales of what it's like among the stars.

At night, her parents tuck her in. She lies there, exhausted from the day's running around but begging for another story or telling them about how she wants to fly.

"One day, you too will reach the stars..." They promise her.

The days there used to just roll into one another. Each bringing joy and excitement and always something new to discover.

Every evening, she would run home following school and tell her parents about everything that had happened. Everything that she had learned, all of her dreams and how she wanted to fly in the sky. They would listen with endless patience, amused by the way that their daughter talked about everything in the world as if it were new and wonderful.

Back then, she had known no pain, no suffering. Not yet. Her only cause for complaint was that she hadn't ever seen an elephant and her father promised to fix that once the mining operation was set up and fully functioning.

Her father was a good man, kind and gentle who wanted the best for all. That was why he was so keen to help Mr. Tracy set up the mining in a way which wouldn't damage the local wildlife or at least as little as possible and the businessman seemed only too happy for that to happen. More than that though, he was her father, always there for her, encouraging her, telling her never to give up and to go and reach for the stars. One day, she would fly, he promised her.