Summary: International Rescue is the most advanced and capable rescue organization on the planet, performing daring and impossible rescues that others won't even attempt. Even with all the technology and know-how at their disposal, Jeff Tracy is forced to face the most daunting rescue of all. But...how can you rescue your past?

Author's Note: Written many years ago, been housed at the Tracy Island Chronicles all this time. Just adding it to my repertoire!

TO SAVE THE FUTURE

Chapter One

There's something to be said for living in Paradise, Jeff thought as he stretched in front of his open balcony door. Here it was mid-November, and it had to be at least seventy-five degrees outside at seven o'clock in the morning. He tightened the towel around his waist and stood for a few moments in the warm glow of the sun, its rays shimmering off the droplets of water on his skin.

At sixty-two years of age, Jefferson Tracy had only just reached mid-life by 2033 standards. Physically fit, and with a mental acuity rivaling that of each of his five sons, Jeff had made a comfortable, yet intriguing, life for his family after his wife, Lucille, had passed away twenty-nine years earlier.

After recovering from the shock, Jeff saw to it that his boys would want for nothing by starting an aerospace company of his own. Over time that company became two, and then three, and then four. As it stood now, parent company Tracy Corporation encompassed thirty-four subsidiaries, not to mention substantial holdings in more than two dozen other corporations worldwide. Patent ownership on any number of inventions from medicines to heavy machinery also belonged to Tracy Corp, but the rescue activities of the Tracy family remained unknown to the world.

International Rescue had been a dream of his for many years. A philanthropist by nature, Jeff recognized early on that adequate rescue teams and equipment were few and far between on Earth. And rescues in space? They'd barely been conceived of. Every day on the news, it seemed, were stories of mass disasters caused by mudslides or avalanches or earthquakes. And on a smaller scale, three workmen needlessly dying only because there wasn't a way to get into a towering inferno to save them...or a child drowning because even though he'd been trapped in an air bubble when his family's yacht sank, there wasn't a ship nearby that could dive deep enough to rescue him before that air ran out.

The seed had been planted. Over time, as Jeff amassed billions of dollars in profits, the seed germinated, taking root in his mind and stretching toward the heavens as it struggled to reach the light of day. Through careful planning and execution, Jeff made his dream a reality. And even more than that, he kept his sons with him the entire way. The five of them manned International Rescue, and had since its first rescue operation seven years before. From eldest Scott, his field commander, to youngest Alan, astronaut and part-time space monitor, his sons had gone above and beyond his expectations in every way imaginable. Pride was too shallow a word to express how he felt about them all.

As the sun rose slowly over the horizon, a voice broke through his silent reverie.

"Father? You up?"

Jeff's eyes crinkled as he walked to the wall panel intercom near his bed. "Sure am, Scott!"

"Great! Brains has been up all night working on that new phase converter for Thunderbird 1. He'd like to give us all a demonstration."

"The lab?"

"Yes, sir."

"I'll be there inside ten minutes."

"F.A.B."

Jeff cut the line and turned toward the sliding glass door one last time. Welcome to a new day, he thought as a vision of Lucille appeared in his mind. It's what she'd said to him each morning as they awoke in their bed, usually entwined in each other's arms. He turned toward his dresser and smiled. As he'd done nearly every morning since her death, he whispered, "Welcome to a new day."

"Morning, Dad!"

"Morning, Gordon! I'm assuming there's a mug over there with my name on it."

Gordon grinned as he picked up a large black mug of steaming coffee and held it in the air. "Right here."

"Thanks, son," Jeff replied as he took the offered cup and smiled at the copper-haired man. Fourth in line, Gordon's hair color came from Jeff's own heritage as part Scottish. His skin tone, lightly tanned even when he hadn't seen the sun in months, hearkened back to Lucy's Cherokee blood. At six feet tall, Gordon was the shortest of his brothers, and equal in height to Jeff.

"On your way to the lab?"

"Sure am. You coming?" Jeff asked as they headed out of the kitchen.

"Have to. Brains is so excited. He'd be devastated if we didn't all show. Well, all except Grandma."

"Why all except Grandma?"

"She was up at three a.m. fixing him something to eat. She's gone back to bed."

Jeff chuckled. "Guess that's the only way to keep Brains alive when he gets hooked into a project like this - force him to eat at ungodly hours."

The men continued to chat amiably as they took an elevator situated in the hall just outside the kitchen down to the floor that housed, among other things, Tracy Island's laboratory. Or, as their resident engineer had made clear, his laboratory.

Even after so many years of living on the same island and working very closely together, Brains was still an enigma Jeff couldn't quite figure out. Sometimes he could work straight through for days on end. When his mind got hold of something, it tended to hang on like the jaws of a bear. But on other days, Brains could sleep for hours, rarely eating anything at all, and when he did, pecking at it like a bird.

Jeff couldn't help but smile as he and Gordon entered the lab. The scene was so familiar to him. There was Brains looking pale, drawn and extremely excited, nervously hopping from one foot to the other while John, Scott, Virgil, his mother Ruth, Tin-Tin and Kyrano stood in a semicircle around him. Nearly every one of Brains' smaller inventions was introduced to the family in this exact same way.

"I thought you were in bed, Mother."

"What? And miss all the excitement? Never."

"What's this all about, Brains? You've finished the phase converter?"

"Yes, Sir, M-Mr., uh, Tracy."

"So what's the point of this again?" John asked.

"Well, a-as you all know, I-I've been working on a way to, uh, make Thunderbird 1 more e-efficient. However, my idea of using a phase converter wasn't flying too well if you'll, uh, pardon the pun. Yesterday afternoon, I-I finally figured it out. If this works, a-and I've no doubt it will, it will add years to the life of 1's a-atomic pile."

""How can you demonstrate something in here that is going to fit into Thunderbird 1?"

"Y-You see, Mrs. Tracy, I have the converter a-attached to this configuration of wires which in turn is connected to the, uh, computer." Ruth nodded. "The energy output of the converter will register on this monitor here," he continued, pointing at the nearest screen, "a-and you'll be able to visually identify the efficiencies to be gained by, uh, what happens when the energy created by an e-external source, in this case the generator I have hooked up over here, is phased through the, uh, device."

"You're making my brain hurt," was her only reply.

The family chuckled as Jeff stepped forward. "Okay, Brains. Show us what she's got."

The engineer turned on the generator, then pressed a button on the phase converter, which measured about four feet by four feet square. It hummed to life, and Brains pressed another button next to the first. "A-All right. Here we go."

Having left his reading glasses in his room, Jeff moved closer so as better to view the results on the computer screen. He was amazed by the output coming from a two hundred horsepower generator. "That's measuring at least 450 hp."

"Yes, uh, Mr. Tracy. I-It's capable of increasing the power output by nearly fifty-five percent, but using the same amount of generative e-energy a-as before."

Jeff leaned over the shiny silver converter box and noticed a small screen on top. Green numbers lined the five-inch black screen, and the numbers were constantly changing. Curious as to its use, Jeff reached his hand out, his forefinger touching it lightly. "What's thi-?"

Static electricity poured into his hand, up his arm, across his chest, spreading throughout his body. He was vaguely aware of someone yelling, someone he thought he should know...one of his sons, maybe. His body stiffened and the others watched as visible waves began emanating from the converter like rippling water, bluish in color and silently approaching.

"Drop!" Brains cried, and everyone fell to the floor. Scott reached out and tried to grab his father's ankles, but electrical charges, like tiny bolts of lightning, zapped his hands and he cried out in pain.

Jeff's face was blank, his mind spinning in hundreds...no, thousands...of directions. He was seeing events from his past: his youth, his Air Force years, his time as an astronaut. Then he began to see things he didn't remember witnessing, rescues he couldn't possibly have seen sitting back on Base, but which were so real it was like he was hovering at each scene, watching them unfold.

The waves continued from the converter, and honed in on the nearest source of heat they could find: Jeff Tracy's body. They enveloped him, and in the split second Brains looked up, he thought it almost looked like an aura surrounding his employer. Gordon, John and Scott struggled to get to their feet, but the waves kept them pinned to the floor.

And just like that, it was over.

Just like that, Jefferson Tracy was gone.