To the lovely anonymous reviewer who commented that this is one of the best stories they've ever read – thank you, thank you! I can't begin to express how much your review made me smile. A tear or two may have even leaked out! And I have some good news for you; I've got loads more chapters lined up, so the end is still a long way off. My boys have been keeping me very busy during quarantine!
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Chapter 24.
There was a reason John spent most of the year twenty two thousand miles above his brother's unstylish haircuts.
Put simply, they drove him bananas.
Alan's soda burps, Gordon's slobby manners and Virgil's appalling taste in ringtones were some of the regular offenders.
The primary culprit however, was Scott's temper.
John's tolerance for anger was surprisingly low. As far as he was concerned, anger was merely a by-product of excess adrenaline in the bloodstream. It was a fleeting and useless emotion, serving only to cloud judgement and jeopardise social structures.
Unfortunately, Scott often resorted to using anger as a tool to navigate difficult situations. John was quite content to let his eldest brother stagger along as he saw fit, however took a very different stance when said anger was directed at him.
"I told you!" John snapped, dropping his head into waiting hands, "I told you all of this before we even left the house, but did you listen? Of course you didn't. You never do."
After successfully dropping Maria back home, Scott had charted a course towards the beach that Kayo and Gordon had visited the evening before, which happened to be in the picturesque community of Botafogo. Three minutes into the flight however, and Scott had made the shocking discovery that Rio's dense neighbourhoods meant that there were no suitable locations where he could safely land Thunderbird Two.
"Couldn't we dispatch a pod?" Alan helpfully suggested from the backseat, "That way one of us could get a head start on searching."
"Oh yes, Alan," John replied in a tone that positively dripped with sarcasm, "That would be a splendid idea, if only for one thing. Unfortunately, our dear eldest brother forgot to load up a module before we departed the island, so we're essentially flying a ship with a giant hole in the middle of it. No wonder the turbulence has been awful."
Scott's jaw clicked in silent anger as he peered out the window to glower at the ground, "There's nowhere that's both stable and large enough for me to safely put her down. We'll have to land on the outskirts and make our way through the city via a different mode of transportation."
John clapped his hands together in fake delight, "This day just gets better and better! Such a shame Virgil and Gordon aren't here to share in the experience. And Grandma. And Brains. And Kayo. And Parker. And Lady Penelope. And Colonel Casey. And Sherbert."
Scott's blue eyes flashed in warning, "John, don't push it."
"Oh, I would never dream of questioning your leadership abilities," John drawled, cockily propping his feet up on the dash, "You've handled this entire situation in an exemplary manner. From choosing the largest Thunderbird and bringing a group of four people on a mission that only required two, then subsequently finding out that the aforementioned largest Thunderbird is too massive to land anywhere near our intended destination, then realising that you failed to make use of the very feature that makes said Thunderbird so large by forgetting to load up a pod module, thus limiting our options for alternative transportation which is necessary only because of the previously mentioned inability to land near our intended destination, all while refusing the translation and navigational services of a highly sophisticated AI in favour of a ginger brother who, right now, really isn't that keen on helping you. Alan, would you have done anything differently?"
In the back passenger seat, Alan blanched, "Leave me out of this!"
"Because I personally would have taken Thunderbird One," John continued, ignoring Alan's frantic throat slashing gestures, "Which has two seats. Conveniently, only two seats were needed for this particular mission; one for Scott, one for Maria and after Maria's departure, one for Kayo. Then, I would have engaged the autopilot and left Thunderbird One hovering over Guanabara Bay, so as to not cause any localised wind disturbance. I would have then jetpacked my way onto Botafogo beach, asked EOS to run a scan for Kayo based on a DNA extraction from Thunderbird Shadow's cockpit, apprehended her and returned home before dinner. Of course, I did suggest all of this to Scott before, however amazingly, not a single word managed to penetrate that thick head of his. How Kayo can think he's the most attractive thing to have ever walked this earth is beyond me. "
As John basked in the glory of his dramatically impressive and logically sound argument, Scott took the opportunity to catapult himself out of the pilot's seat and into the redhead's lap, his fist reeled back in rage.
Alan idly wondered if launching himself out of Thunderbird Two's rear hatch at their current altitude would result in life termination.
-x-
Virgil sighed as Gordon snored loudly and kicked him in the ribs before rolling over, taking most of the duvet with him.
It was the middle of the night, and Virgil had been pulled out of a dreamless sleep by the aquanaut worming his way under the covers. Gordon had reported that he still wasn't free of his hangover nausea, and had come padding down the hallway in search of the comforting presence of his older brother.
Virgil hadn't had the energy to protest, so had merely patted the mattress next to him and mumbled a request for Gordon not to puke on the covers. The blond had seemed quite happy with the arrangement, and in no time had conquered three quarters of the bed and taken all but one of Virgil's pillows hostage.
Snooooore. Grunt. Exhale. Roll over.
The soft beeping sound of the den's holoprojector gave Virgil an excuse to roll off what little of the bed he was still entitled to and pad towards the door, sighing in irritation when Gordon stretched in his sleep and starfished to claim possession of the space he'd just vacated.
Yawning into his fist, Virgil shuffled downstairs and switched the holo-table on, his mind hazily shifting into rescue mode as he prepared to deal with whatever emergency needed fixing.
The scene that met his sleep encrusted eyes wasn't at all what he was expecting.
An elbow. Then a foot. Then a butt. Then a knee. Then a fist.
All accompanied by copious screaming and swearing.
Virgil's swift analysis of the situation was that Scott and John were in the middle of a scuffle, and Thunderbird Two's holographic communicator had been activated by one of their flailing extremities accidentally hitting the dash.
Virgil snickered to himself as he sank down onto one of the sofas, all thoughts of returning to the warmth of his bed long forgotten as he watched John headbutt Scott square in the nose.
It wasn't like he had much of a bed to return to anyway.
-x-
Alan's blue eyes darted fearfully between his brawling brothers.
Scott had John in a headlock and was demanding an apology from the redhead, however was forced to release his grip when John sank his brace enhanced teeth into his eldest brother's forearm.
Things weren't much better outside. Failure on both Scott and John's parts to man Thunderbird Two's controls meant that the giant aircraft had started to violently rock from side to side. Down on the safety of the ground, a small crowd of confused locals had gathered to gasp and point at the great green behemoth as it spasmed through the air.
Desperate for his brothers to regain some form of control over themselves, Alan braced his hands against the armrests of his seat and blurted out the first thing that sprang into his airsick head.
"I pee in the pool!" the youngest cried, feeling a smidgen of accomplishment when Scott and John paused in their brawling to shoot disgusted glares in his direction.
"You what?!" Scott spat, his attention sufficiently diverted from the second headlock he'd managed to trap John in.
"Alan! We swim in there!" John howled in outrage, wrenching his head free from Scott's grip and glowering at the youngest, "That's one of the most disgusting things I've ever heard, and that's saying a lot considering we live with Gordon!"
Scott looked ready to fly into a full blown lecture, however was distracted by the blinking green light of the holographic communicator.
"Shit!" Scott swore loudly and abruptly deactivated the communication system, silently praying that nobody back home had witnessed what had just taken place inside Thunderbird Two's cockpit.
"Put her down somewhere stable," John instructed, raising his hand to stem the small stream of blood that was exiting his nose, courtesy of Scott's fist, "We've already wasted enough fuel just by hovering around here doing nothing."
"It'll have to be on the outskirts, like I originally said," Scott replied, oblivious to the swelling that was starting to develop around his left eye, courtesy of a well-timed elbow on John's part, "Nowhere around here has an obvious landing zone."
"Couldn't we just leave her on autopilot and manually eject?" Alan asked, eager to prove himself useful.
"No jetpack and no pods, remember?" John wearily replied, tilting his head back and pinching his nose to stem the blood that was flowing forth, "Scott really went through this entire plan with a fine toothed comb."
Scott shot John a glare that almost stripped the redhead of his eyebrows, however was able to bully the worst of his temper back into its cave when he saw his brother's snout stuck in the air like an aristocratic ostrich. As well as being allergic to almost everything, the redhead also suffered with terrible nosebleeds that hadn't improved with age.
"Here," Scott opened one of the overhead storage lockers and pulled out a first aid kit before passing it to Alan, "Have a rummage in there and see if you can locate a packet of tissues for old Space Radish here."
Alan seized the bag and began sorting through its contents, however couldn't resist a joke to try and lighten the mood, "International Bless You, at your service."
"Hilarious," Scott replied drily, absently flicking a switch above his head.
As if summoned by Alan's terrible attempt at humour, John chose that precise moment to explode into a violent sneeze, the cellulose fibres in the tissues Alan had just handed him triggering yet another one of his allergies. Blood sprayed out of the redhead's nose in an impressive fountain, only to splatter all over Scott.
"Eugh, John!" the eldest roared, recoiling in disgust and leaping out of the pilot's seat, "For god's sake, aim at Alan next time! Now I know why dad banished you to Thunderbird Five! Oh, gross…!"
John accepted the fresh tissue Alan offered him and daintily blew his nose, "Maybe next time you'll think twice before punching me in the face."
-x-
Back on Tracy Island, Virgil shook his head in amusement as he made his way back up the stairs. With a bit of luck, he'd be able to return to his room and slip back into bed without Gordon even noticing.
Unfortunately, luck was a rare commodity in the Tracy household.
"What was that I heard about Alan peeing in my pool?"