Chapter Two

"Danger zone ETA two minutes," Virgil reports, looking over at Gordon whose been busy examining a holographic data map of their landing site. "How's it looking?"

"The storm is pretty severe." Gordon doesn't look up from his screens to reply, all neatly professional as he focuses. "We'll have to land as close to Thunderbird One as we're able to, or we may end up being too far away to be of any use." He frowns as he looks over the display, taking in the cluster of tiny blue patches amongst the white of the swirling miasma below. "Manoeuvrability is going to be limited in this weather, we might have to go out on foot and seek a more precise area."

"Any word from Scott?" There's a deep furrow of worry in Virgil's brow as Gordon just shrugs. The younger is still staring intently at the storm readings that have picked up considerably since Scott landed, trying to establish the safest ground for the landing struts. "John?" A flick of Virgil's fingers calls up the hologram of their space bound brother. "What's the status of Thunderbird One? Has Scott found the skier yet?"

If Virgil is surprised at the matching furrow in John's brow, he… well actually he does a pretty poor job of hiding it.

"Uh-oh." Virgil can't help grinning at him. "Don't tell me that's the patent pending Space-Case-Frowny-Face. What's got you all concerned up there, Johnny?"

"Focus, Thunderbird Two," John prompts, rolling his eyes at the questionable professionalism and playful butchering of his name. "The blizzard is causing interference on Thunderbird Five's sensors," John reports, with a lot less of a glare than Virgil had been expecting to provoke. "I tracked Scott's landing, but my comms aren't getting through the weather." He seems pretty put out by this, as if having the most advanced satellite in orbit but being unable to track his own brother in snow is some kind of personal offence.

To John, Virgil supposes, with a little amusement, it probably is.

"Don't worry about it, John." Virgil swears he's not laughing at him, just… alongside? "We'll get a connection when we land I'm sure. Interference should be less under the cloud layer."

"Keep me posted, Thunderbird Two," he says, before promptly signing off. He's never one to hang around and chat but, Virgil thinks for a moment that their skinny spaceman had seemed a little embarrassed.

The landing engines fire from below with a whumph of force, almost jolting both brothers from their seats. Had it not been for the harnesses across their chests, Gordon's sure they'd have both ended up sprawled on the floor. He looks over at Virgil and raises a sceptical eyebrow: it's not like his brother to make an error in the landing, but then, Gordon supposes, it is a rather nasty storm outside. Control of a two hundred and fifty foot heavy-duty transporter through the air isn't exactly easy. He's pretty sure he couldn't have done it.

The sky beyond the wide viewport of Thunderbird Two is all swirling whiteness, thick and heavy as giant flakes are tossed down at the earth. Squinting, the blurred red shape of Thunderbird One's nose cone can more or less be made out in the haze. It's the only indication amongst it all that they're even in the right place. Gordon lets out a whistle through his teeth.

"Geez, is everything still in one piece?" he asks his brother, leaning over. It had been a particularly bumpy landing for the deft-handed pilot of Thunderbird Two.

Virgil nods. "Yeah, sorry. Wind shear," he says, and smiles over at Gordon a little sheepish. "Let's go and see if we can find out what's happened to that brother of ours." The straps of his harness snap back into place with a thwap as he gets up from the pilot's chair.

"It's not like him to lose contact like this, don't you think?" Gordon notes, and the worried expression seeps back onto Virgil's face. He looks up through the windscreen in front of him at the shape of One for a long moment before glancing back to Gordon.

"I know, I know. I'm worried too." He shakes his head, now staring down at the comm. "Let's try him again. Now that we're under the cloud cover, we might have better luck." With a quick tap, Virgil opens up an audio channel. "Thunderbird Two to Thunderbird One, are you receiving, Scott? Interference has been bad but we've landed."

There's a pause of crackling static.

"Scott? Are you reading us?"

No reply from the other end.

Slowly, Gordon's eyes meet Virgil's. The older of them has shuffled into action, packing the pouches of his sash with their cold-weather rescue kit. The sharp frown is becoming a permanent feature.

"John just said it was storm interference," Virgil says, like he doesn't quite believe it. "It's probably just because the weather's worsened." Virgil finds a bit of a strained smile for his younger brother as he rummages in the contents of the frostbite-oriented medical pack, checking it's fully stocked… just in case. "You know, he's probably grabbed this skier and is holed up all cosy in One checking him over. Nothing for that squid sense of yours to worry about, ok Gords?" he jests, trying to make the heavy atmosphere inside Thunderbird Two a bit lighter.

There's a roll of narrow shoulders as Gordon shrugs in reply.

"I dunno, Virg… something just doesn't sit right with me about this…" He can't quite put his finger on it, but he's got this foreboding feeling…

But... well, maybe it's just because of this whiteout. Because of the blizzard. Gordon tries to shake the weird sensation off with a literal jiggle of his head, looking, for a moment, like there's someone puppeteering him wrong. After all, none of them exactly feel comfortable working in the snow, not after what happened to their mother. So… Maybe it's just that?

Thunderbird Two's speakers are still crackling emptily.

It doesn't feel like just that.

"Thunderbird Two to Scott?" The aquanaut tries again on the comm, just in case. "Oi, are you listening Pie Face?! We said we've landed! Did you get snow in your ears?"

"Let's head over to One and take a look." Virgil joins him next to the blank holo projector, clapping a big gloved hand on his little brother's shoulder to steer him away from the comms. "Stop grumbling, Crabstick." He instructs, "Knowing Scott, he's over there just sipping hot chocolate with his new extreme sports pal and waiting for our lazy asses to do the med-evac."

Gordon looks up at his brother and can't help the snort of amusement that escapes him. Virgil is even bulkier than usual when bundled in their cold climate thermals; vaguely resembling a big blue teddy bear with all that padding. It's a good look.

"Simple enough," Gordon, the tension broken, agrees with the plan of action and starts suiting up beside him, pulling the fuzzy hood of his cold weather uniform tight around his ears to protect them from windchill. "Think our comms will work when we get closer?"

"Thunderbird Two to Gordon." Virgil speaks into his wrist comm, and is pleased by the answering bleep from his brothers wrist. "Comms between us seem to be working ok," He claps a hand on his brother's shoulder, "so proximity should fix the issue. One's not very far. This'll be a cakewalk!"

Later, he really, really wishes he'd been right about that.

…

Out in the snow, the swirling whiteness has thickened. Huge feathery snowflakes flutter down, billowing white against a yellow grey sky and settling on the landscape below, like the drape of a thick, muffly blanket. The flakes catch on eyelashes and in the strands of any hairs that escapes the confines of their hoods in thick white clumps.

Virgil's breath billows from his mouth in a great cloud of white, blending in with the flurry before it's whisked away by the wind. The cold stings his lips and nibbles at the tip of his nose and, vaguely, Virgil wishes their winter kit had had the sense to include a balaclava, or at least a damn scarf.

He'll make John knit him one as soon as he gets home, he'll threaten him with gravity if that's what it takes, you see if he won't. Better John's dexterous, meticulous fingers take up the task than Grandma's. He'll be seeing the last lumpy monstrosity she made in his nightmares for years…

"It's as cold as Parker's 'stiff upper lip' out here!" Gordon yells at him over the storm, interrupting Virgil's delightful thoughts of torturing their space-bound brother for knitwear. The younger Tracy's wrist is up and glowing with holograms of the landscape around them. The no-signal of unanswered calls glows continuously red beside it as they approach Thunderbird One, his boots crunching in the heavy snowfall - prints filling up as quickly as they're made. "Huh, you sure we didn't land in the middle of the arctic?"

"I'm not Alan," Virgil replies, a little offended, "This isn't like the time he set Thunderbird Three down in Antigua instead of Argentina."

Gordon huffs out a laugh beside him, watching as it physically manifests itself in the cold air before him.

"I don't even know where Antigua is."

"Well then, we'll just have to send Alan there if we ever get a call." Virgil grins at him, slapping a hefty palm on Gordon's unsuspecting shoulder that feels rather like being hit by a good-natured chair. "I'm sure he's very familiar with it now, after all that homework John gave him on the subject." Ignoring Gordon's comical staggering, Virgil reaches up to thump a fist against the solid metal side of Thunderbird One, having finally reached her hull. "Oi, Scott, open up, there are two popsicles here getting tired of being ignored, let us in to defrost."

The thumping of his fist echoes eerily, the reverb through the sleek, curved metal plenty loud enough to not be ripped away from them by the wind.

There's a pause.

"Scotty?" Gordon thuds his fist against the hatch in much the same manner. After another long moment, with a huff of annoyance, he rips off his glove to lay his hand against the access panel. "For crying out loud, if my fingers freeze to this I'm suing him." For what, exactly, Gordon isn't sure. Maybe a years supply of imported, Grandma-free cookies? But he doesn't have time to ponder it because the hatch slides open with a whoosh of warmth escaping from inside. Cautiously, he peels his fingers back from the borosilicate glass of the panel, silently thanking Brains that these are designed well for extreme temperatures, and that his hand didn't just have to experience the tongue-icypole effect.

"Scott?" Virgil has pushed past him, face shadowed by the darkened interior of Thunderbird One. "Hey Scotty? Anyone home?"

Like the knocking, the echoes of his own voice are the only thing he hears in return. Quiet falls between the two brothers, concern acting much like the heavy blanket of snow outside, muffling their senses and creeping chilly threads out, blind feelers, seeking to curl around their hearts and tighten the grip.

The rocket plane is very much devoid of anyone, Scott or skier alike. And the constant silence is really beginning to get on Gordon's nerves.

"Nope. Nope nope. This is just like a zombie movie," he complains over-loud into the silence. Even One's engines are quiet. When you're used to hearing her purring constantly, like a tame house cat, the lack of it makes her disconcertingly empty shell feel like walking into a tomb. "Have you even seen Zombie Storm Two: The Icescape?" Gordon hisses to his brother, "It's literally this. Scott just had to disappear on his own in the middle of nowhere. He just had to."

"Come on." Virgil, a paragon of brotherly patience, adjusts his sash and steps back into the cold swirling whiteness with irritatingly few second thoughts. "He can't have gone too far in his search. He's got to be close by, and he might need our help. We've got to catch up."

Gordon has some very colourful things to say about that idea, things their Grandma would most likely wash his mouth out with soap for.

"I hate the cold," he complains to deaf ears. Gordon's not sure if Virgil's ignoring him on principle or if he just can't hear him over the roaring of the wind. "It's cold and it icy and it's damp and…"

"... I thought you loved all kinds of water." His theory about being ignored is confirmed three minutes later when Virgil finally speaks up. Gordon is briefly thankful that his brother has the tolerance of a saint when it comes to having his ears talked off by annoying younger siblings.

"It's wet but it's cold and wet," he helpfully points out. "I like my water liquid and swimmable, thank you very much. And warm," he adds with a shiver. "Much, much warmer."

Virgil sighs and shakes his head, returning to carefully scanning the landscape for any sign of their brother or the man they're supposed to be rescuing. A quick call up to John on Five helps disprove their the-snow-is-messing-with-the-signal theory, which, as their astronaut does struggle to pick out heat signatures for them, is another point on the something's-horribly-wrong tally.

Snow seems to have completely covered any tracks that their older brother might have left but, in this weather, unless something swooped down from the sky and lifted him away, Scott couldn't have gotten too far in his search for the missing skier.

"I've got a faint reading Northwest of you, about 200 feet away." Up in space, John flicks the blip across his HUD with lithe, skilful fingers. Fingers pleasantly free from frostbite, Gordon notes with a scowl as the mark appears on the map at his own wrist. "It's some kind of small heat source but I can't say for sure it's Scott, or even human." John says, frowning. "Keep an eye out for the local wildlife. I don't want to hear Gordon's been eaten by wolves."

"Why me!" comes the indigent splutter. "Virgil's got way more meat on him, if we're gonna be attacked by zombie wolves they're going to go for him first!"

"Thanks, John." Virgil's far too cheery for this whole situation, pointedly ignoring Gordon's outrage. "We'll call you if we find anything."

"You'd better. I'm monitoring your position," they get told, and it occurs to the younger that Virgil's cheer might just be being forced in order to alleviate some of the worry in those wide, blue-green eyes, just before John signs off again.

The blip, it turns out, is roughly over what appears to be a grotty old ski shack - a mottled, ugly grey chunk of concrete that stands out against the crisp white of the snow. Virgil makes his way toward it, Gordon at his heels as best he can, struggling in the snowdrift that his brother appears to power through with ease. There is, at least, no sign of wolves. There doesn't seem to be easy enough access for wildlife to be using it as shelter.

"Zombie bunker," Gordon hisses into the gloom, as they press themselves side-by-side into the shadowed shelter of the doorway. Virgil's shoulder tests the strength of it, and he's much more pleased than Gordon to find it unlocks and creaks open with relative ease. "I'm telling ya, Virg. Zombies."

"You watch too much TV." Virgil rolls his eyes good naturedly at him as he makes his way inside with Gordon cautiously following. "If you were a skier trapped up here, first thing you'd do would be to find shelter, right? This is our best bet… Scott?" he calls into the darkness, sliding one of the green, industrial glowsticks from his belt and bending it with a satisfying crack, sending light spilling out into even the darkest, dirtiest corners. "Hey! Are you in here? Hello?"

Gordon isn't sure if having the eerie green glow makes the zombie aesthetic worse, or if having any kind of light is better than having no light.

"Ok, this place is a lot bigger inside than it looked," Virgil notes, peering through various doors, down shadowed corridors and into dusty kitchens and locker rooms. "We should split up and search for him."

"That's a horrible idea. Literally horrible. People get murdered when they split up, you know," Gordon unhelpfully points out. "And it's always the fair haired, good-looking ones that go first!" he laments, a hand fluttering at his own brow like he's walking onto a stage, not deeper into piles of old ski equipment, his feet crunching on broken glass and making dust billow up as objects get shoved out of his way.

"You'll be just fine then, if that's the case." Virgil takes the opportunity to fling a second glowstick at his brother, successfully cutting off the yelp of protest he makes at that statement. "Go on, Fishcake, get a move on. Real life isn't like the movies, you know."

And oh boy is he going to regret that little declaration later.

...

A/N: NEW WORRRDSSS! If you could leave us a reivew to tell us what you think so far that'd be AMAZINGGG 33