Gordon did his best to keep Scott conversationally engaged during the flight to Melbourne but Scott was very quick to drift off in thought. At one point Scott took the butterfly out of his medical bag and held it in his hand the way he had seen Laura do in the mornings. He so wished that he had been able to say more of a good-bye, to somehow let her know how much he appreciated all that she had taught him.
The Doctor ran extra tests on Scott this time and it took much longer than was expected but when he left the office Scott held a paper in his hand that declared him fit to fly again.
Camp life was quickly pushed to the back of his mind when he showed Gordon the Doctor's clearance.
"Want to fly the rest of the way home?" Gordon asked.
"You mean you'll let me?" Scott asked truly surprised.
"Let you? It's about time you got back to work" Gordon teased.
They were less than ten minuets out when they were invited to meet the rest of the team at a mine collapse near Queenstown, New Zealand. The course correction was made and further information was radioed to them in route.
A group of kids were touring the mining town when a sudden thunderstorm hit. Everyone ducked somewhere for cover just before a lightning strike hit the mountain and started a rockslide blocking the opening to an old mine shaft. The teachers were still trying to determine just how many kids were missing. So far at least ten students were unaccounted for. Scott did the best he could but he wasn't in thunderbird 1 and he had a head wind. He and Gordon arrived after a huge boulder had been pulled away creating an opening for six boys to climb out and the four girls were found sitting in the bus doing their nails. Since the rest of the team was aware that Scott and Gordon were coming they waited for them to land.
After a high spirited greeting among brothers Scott showed off his letter from the Doctor and was allowed to fly the rest of the way home in Thunderbird 1 to reacquaint himself with the controls. Dad came along and gave Scott permission to try it out at maximum thrust.
"Yahooooo! I'm Back!" was heard in a high pitch over the radio, and on the surface at least, all was as before.
The next morning Scott rose earlier than the rest of his family and wondered around the house trying to stay quiet. He was so excited to be home, one glance at the pool and he had to get in. He was still swimming lazy laps when he saw his father standing on the side of the pool.
"This is the first time in a while that you've been able to get in water and not worry about getting eaten."
"Yeah, " Scott answered, "It's good to be home again."
"What do you say we get some breakfast then you can show me the new 'toys' you brought back."
"Great," Scott answered as he quickly climbed out of the pool to a towel in the extended hand of his father. "You're going to be surprised at some of the stuff I have to show you. Laura went over the order form with me and made recommendation before I left."
"Laura?"
"Yea, Laura Linstone," Scott was surprised by his father's reaction. "You met her."
"Yea I remember," Jeff responded.
Scott was so excited about showing his father the stuff he brought back that they took there breakfast to his office and ate it while Scott started pulling things out of his Medical bag. As Scott had expected his father was surprised by many of the items in the bag. None more than the hammock stretchers and the surgical kit complete with and envelope full of instructions tailored to Scott's possible needs sealed inside a special pocket in the pouch.
"How did they get this stuff so small?" Jeff exclaimed in awe. "We could carry some of this stuff in our pockets."
"Hey. That's an idea Dad," We could each carry one of these stretchers in our flight suits, that way we would be able to move an injured person quickly when we need to. Everything else we ether wouldn't have time to use or we could wait for it to be retrieved from of the equipment. There's no maintenance to these so we could just put them in our suits and forget them."
"Hopefully we'll remember them if we ever need them." Jeff joked as he marveled in his son's enthusiasm.
Father and son laughed and Jeff grabbed his son by his shoulder and gently shook him. "It's good to have you back Scott."
The two talked over the new toys and how each one would apply to each of their rescue apparatuses and put together an order, but before they finalized it Jeff wanted to talk the battery charging systems over with the engineer. As Jeff walked out of the room with the catalog in hand Scott started cleaning up the mess he'd made with his new toys. As he started to put things back he found the butterfly in the bottom of the bag. There was a slight tear in it that brought near terror to Scott. He quickly took it to his father's desk and borrowed some tape to repair it. Scott looked the butterfly over to make sure that it didn't need anymore repairs. When he was sure the butterfly was in the best possible shape he sat looking it over next to the window. After he examined each design and the unevenly cut wings Scott folded the body together and placed it between his fingers like he had seen Laura do so many times.
He raised his hand slowly then lowered it again watching the butterfly wings respond to the air movement. Then Scott set his hand on his knee in the path of the air vent and looked past the butterfly and out the window. In his mind Scott could see Laura dancing on the beach with her butterfly, the breeze blowing through her hair. Scott knew he was fantasizing but he liked how it felt to remember her and didn't want to stop. He felt so guilty for his feeble good-bye.
"I should have chased her across that camp," Scott said softly to himself.
Laura's presence in his life had an effect that Scott just couldn't understand. He just hoped he could bring a drop of her special form of compassion and tenderness into his work.
Scott then forced himself to move forward. Setting the butterfly down he reloaded his medical bag then placing the strap over his shoulder Scott picked up the butterfly and carefully took it to the housekeeper with a request to get it framed for him.
After studying the information Scott had given them on the battery chargers they still could not make a decision as to which ones would work best in their units so it was decided to make a call for one more piece of information to base their decision on.
After going though all of his information Scott found a phone number for Mikealson Foundation and made the call with his father and Brains, the team engineer, sitting at the desk next to him. The question that they needed an answer to was asked several different ways and they were transferred to at least nine different departments before they ended up in the London office. The person there didn't have a clue what they needed either but he did have one thing to offer.
"Hold on a moment, one of our field workers just walked through the door. If she doesn't know the answer to your question no one will."
"Hello, This is Laura Linstone," Scott and crew heard seconds later. "What ever these guys just told you, don't believe a word of it. Now how can I help you? "
Scott who had started laughing as soon as he heard Laura's voice finally he got control: "Laura, this is Scott, we need your help deciding which battery charging system will be best for our new 'cute little toys'.
"They're not toys," Brains said in shock at Scott's words, "They're Sufist—" Both Scott and his father put their hands up to stop him from saying anymore.
This was the perfect situation for the team. Laura already knew who they were and enough about their equipment that they didn't have to worry about their secrecy needs and how much or how little information to give out to get the information that they needed.
"Hi Scott," Laura responded, "How on earth did you find me here?"
"Purely by accident," Scott answered.
"Well to answer your question," Laura paused a second to think, "You are planning to have separate response kits in each unit aren't you?"
"Yes," Scott answered quickly, "We're tailoring the contents of those kits to each unit." Scott was relieved that he didn't need to say anymore.
"Let me think a second, Most of the battery packs are interchangeable I don't think you would be using any that aren't. Wait a minute! There are several diagrams and schematics on Mike's Web site. I'm sure there will be one that your engineer can work with."
"Mike who?" Scott asked
"Mike Makework," Laura answered then recited the address over the phone while Brains typed it in at Scott's side. "It was put together in memory of Mr. Mikealson's son."
"Y-y-y-y yes, this will give us all the information that we need." Brains confirmed
With business out of the way Scott just had to find some way to keep Laura on the phone for a little while longer.
"So are you working in London now?" Scott asked While Brains looked up from his computer and Jeff gave his son a looking over.
"No actually I just stopped in to pick up some new prototypes that they want me to try out." Laura answered still in awe that they had gotten a hold of her. "I only expect to be here an hour, two at the most."
"So how are you doing," Laura asked to change the subject. "Are you back to full duty?"
"Yeah," Scott answered realizing he was a little freer to talk than she was but his father was still looking over his shoulder so he was inclined to sensor his words at least some. "I've flown a few rescues. It's good to be back"
"Having any headaches or dizzy spells?" Laura asked.
"None," Scott answered feeling a little too much like her patient, not a friend.
"That's great; sounds like you're fully recovered." Laura talked in her usual cheerful voice. "Hey it's nice to talk with you again. I have someone standing here who needs to talk to me too so I had better go. You take care" With that she was gone again and Scott was painfully aware that he had no idea how to contact her again.
The days surrounding Christmas were filled with disasters that kept the team going night and day. One particularly dangerous rescue was of a plane crash on the top of a mountain in Switzerland on Christmas Eve. The team was able to rescue seventy-five passengers before they succumbed to the harsh cold weather getting them to a place where they could at least call their families for Christmas. It was already Christmas day when the team arrived home and even thought they were tired they took the time to open presents as a family. Dad gave a speech about the true gift that Christmas was that they were all there together safe and sound.
It was a good thing that they opened their gifts when they did because they spent that afternoon rescuing a crew from an oil rig that was buckling due to ice shift at, of all places, the North Pole."
It was a good thing that the disasters of the world were quiet for the next few days. Scott and the team were helping Brains redo some of the wiring to accommodate the new equipment. They could have handled it if they had gotten a call but all went much smoother because they didn't.
The day Scott picked up the new equipment was like Christmas he was so excited. At the counter of the main warehouse Scott went over his order to make sure it was correct then while he was loading everything onto a cart he asked:
"Can you tell me where Laura Linstone is stationed now?" He wasn't sure what he would do with the information once he got it but Scott still wanted to know how to get a hold of her if he needed to, or really wanted to.
"Is she the one who trained you on this equipment?" The clerk asked.
"Yes she is," Scott hoped that meant that they would be more willing to give him the information he requested.
"Give me a minute and I'll go find out." The clerk stepped back into an adjoining office and asked the staff working there if anyone knew where Laura Linstone was stationed.
"She's taking time off." Came a faint answer from an unseen source. "Her Grandfather has cancer and she's taking care of him so that he can die at home."
The overheard news hit Scott like a brick in the stomach. 'Her Grandfather was all the family she had left.'
"Miss Linstone, is taking a leave of absence to spend some time with her family." The clerk interrupted Scott's thought process. "Here is the name of the person who is taking her calls while she's out." The clerk added while handing Scott a small piece of paper.
Scott thanked the clerk and left with his goods but all the way home his mind and soul was filled with and hurting for, Laura.
It wasn't hard to picture Laura giving her Grandfather the best of care available Scott was sure he couldn't have been in better hands. But who was going to be there for her? Who was going to comfort Laura through the heartache of watching her last living family member die a slow horrible death?
It took Scott the rest of the afternoon to put the Medical kits together for each unit, as he worked Laura was never far from his thoughts.
Then next morning Scott started teaching the rest of the crew how to use the new equipment. The first toy they would learn about would be the stretchers that they would be carrying on their uniforms. They're use and unfolding was straightforward, it was learning to fold them back up that took most of the morning.
As Scott taught the rest of his team, over the next several weeks, he called upon his memories of Laura often using them as an example of how to teach. As he taught his brothers Scott found himself wondering how she was getting on and wanting to do something to let her know someone cared about her. He wanted to somehow be there if she needed someone to talk to, maybe even a shoulder to cry on.
During the quieter times Scott had no trouble envisioning Laura sitting next to her Grandfather holding his hand, talking over old memories of good times gone by. Then Scott could see her step out of the room shutting the door behind her. Once she was out of her Grandfather's sight she would bite her upper lip and fight back the tears in her eyes. After a few quivering sighs she would stop, breathe in deep and find her resolve to remain strong and never let her Grandfather see her crying.
By the time Scott had finished training his teammates and brothers on the new equipment two months had gone by and Scott wondered if Laura was still caring for her grandfather. One boringly quiet afternoon Scott got the idea to try and find a home address for Laura using the Internet. He'd done this before and found people, He just wanted to find out where to send her a letter or card to let her know someone was thinking about her. When Scott set down in his room that afternoon he was sure he could find the information in just a few minutes. But the information was not so easy to find.
As a result Scott would spend an hour or more reading articles about Laura Linstone every night before bed hoping somewhere there would be a mention of where she was from, someplace she called home. Instead he just learned more of how wonderful she was and the great work that she did and became more and more in awe of her.