Hope you guys are looking after yourselves x It's another oldie for today :) Again from 2019, but it's had a bit of a revamp since then. This one's set just after Signals Parts 1 and 2.

A Human Reaction

'Thunderbird 3 is go!'

Virgil clenched his teeth in an attempt to stop them rattling around in his skull as they broke through the atmosphere. It was a feeling he could never get used to, but one he would always put up with for the thrill of blasting off into space. He may not have been the most space-obsessed in the family, but there was something very appealing about the utter calm and quiet that came after the battle of making it up there. And it helped him feel closer to his dad.

Alan, though… Alan was something else. For Alan, it was more than that. God, with Alan it was like… He could grin through the whole process and not once break a sweat. Yes, you could argue that he just did it more often than Virgil, but that wasn't it. A lot of people said Alan was like dad, but he was actually more like John. With dad, he loved the thrill of going to space, the exploration of something that others may not have seen before. That was something he'd passed down to Scott and Virgil. But Alan and John belonged among the stars, and whenever they came back home, it was like they left part of their souls out there as a promise to return. Virgil often thought that was why they both took to their 'birds twice as fast as the rest of them – and that really was saying something.

Seeing him like this, it was easy to forget that Alan was only seventeen. Hell, he was better than most astronauts that had had a lifetime of training. The age and the skill just shouldn't have matched up, but here they were – shooting towards an out of control freighter ship, and Virgil had absolutely no doubt in his mind that Alan would have the whole situation under control in minutes. His own presence on the mission wasn't strictly necessary.

'Hey, Virg?'

'Yeah?' Virgil glanced at his brother. The smile had slipped from his face, replaced instead by an intense look of concentration as he stared at the expanse of stars in front of them.

'Thanks for… you know, agreeing to come with me.'

Virgil hummed. 'No problem.' Then he frowned. 'Why did you ask me to come?'

Alan shuffled in his seat and shrugged. 'I dunno. Just wanted the back up, I guess.'

'Fair enough.'

And it was. It really was. In their line of work, you had to go with your gut; and if your gut was telling you not to go alone you took that seriously. But still…

'Is everything okay with you?' Virgil asked.

There had just been something in the way his little brother had asked him to come. Something off. He hadn't thought anything of it at the time – the way he hovered by his side at the piano, hopping from foot-to-foot like he needed the bathroom. Of course, Virgil just assumed that he actually had needed the bathroom.

'Hm?' Alan spared him a fleeting look. 'Me? Oh yeah, everything's fine. We're approaching the freighter now.'

The freighter was a big ugly-looking thing. It was like someone had haphazardly stuck a bunch of rusted, metal boxes together and shoved a rocket on the end of it. Then slapped on a bunch of antennas and yellow and red reflector strips for no apparent reason. It really was a terrible design, and Virgil had every intention of tearing into every flaw later on with Brains. Then there was the real damage from the accident. There was a ragged tear in the belly of the ship, and there was a wild orange glow that just screamed fire. Of course, fire wasn't good in any kind of rescue situation, but in space – well, let's just say there's a reason why any engineer worth his salt wouldn't put anything flammable on a spaceship.

'This is no good,' Virgil said. 'We need to dock, now.'

Alan frowned. 'I can't see their docking ring. Hey, John?' John's hologram blinked to life. 'Can you see anywhere we can dock on the freighter's schematics?'

'Hang on.'

Virgil tilted his head, watching the sickeningly fast spin of the mammoth-ship. 'Can you do it at that speed?'

'Meh.' A cocky smirk appeared on the teenager's face, paired with a shrug of his shoulders. 'Probably.'

Before Virgil could reply, John spoke up. 'Well, the good news is that I can see a docking ring.'

'And the bad news?' Virgil asked.

'It's almost thirty years out of date. There's no way it'll connect to Thunderbird 3, or even the docking bubbles.'

'That is bad news,' Alan mumbled.

Shaking his head, Virgil stared once more at the tumbling freighter. There was nothing else for it. 'We'll have to go EVA and evacuate via the astroboards.'

Virgil didn't even wait for John's confirmation. Locking his helmet in place, he clambered out of his seat and propelled himself towards the door. The whole thing was a recipe for disaster, and if they didn't act now, there might not be anyone left to save. Heck, they still couldn't contact the crew, so who was to say it hadn't already gone that way. Whatever the case, they had to act now to stand even just the smallest chance.

'Virgil, wait.' Alan hadn't moved. His wide blue eyes were fixed on the freighter, and he was biting down hard on his bottom lip. 'I think… what if we cut a hole in the ship and attached a docking tube that way?'

Virgil shook his head. 'We'd still need to go EVA for that. And that would depressurize whatever section we cut into. I don't trust any of the readings we're getting off this thing, and I do not wanna accidentally throw someone out into space – I can't imagine that their spacesuits are designed any better than the ship.'

'The astroboards are the quickest and most efficient way to evacuate the ship,' John piped up, his head tilted questioningly at the youngest brother. 'And you don't normally need an excuse to take them out.'

Alan whipped his gaze from the freighter to John, to Virgil. And in the briefest moment before his eyes snapped back to the spinning ship, Virgil felt like he could have drowned in the panic that flooded his way. His stomach went the same way as the ship – a jagged tear opening up and sucking out all his insides. Except his heart, that was. No his heart was still firmly thudding in his chest, being tugged in two different directions by desperate claws. There wasn't enough time.

'Alan.' Virgil kept his voice low and his eyes hard. He waited for his brother to face him. 'We have to do this.'

xxxxx

Deliberately slowing his pace to a stroll, Virgil did his upmost to exude a sense of calm. He needn't have bothered. Alan was channelling his inner-John, his nose planted firmly in a book. Virgil glanced at the title as he sat down – Hyperion by Dan Simmons.

'Wow,' Virgil said, shuffling to get comfortable, 'that's a pretty ancient book you're reading there, Sprout. Real paper, too.'

Alan grunted in acknowledgement.

'It's John's copy, right?'

Grunt.

'Did he say you could borrow it?'

Grunt.

'You enjoying it?'

Grunt.

'You want ice-cream?'

Silence.

'Eh, you're right. John would kill you if you got ice-cream on one of his books.' Virgil sighed, glancing around the room. He struggled for a moment. Out of all of his brothers, Alan was the trickiest. Scott and John you could corner, coax them into a yelling match in which they would undoubtedly spill all their troubles. None of the others could usually get Gordon, but Virgil knew his little dance by now and knew how to get around it. But Alan was still growing, still learning. Still evolving and changing. So, for now, it was always guesswork.

He decided it would be better to simply rip the band aid off. 'Is there anything you wanna tell me about today's mission?'

He was met with a stony silence, but Alan's hands shuffled slightly on the edges of the book. As soon as his grip was restored, his knuckles turned white.

Virgil leaned forward in his seat. 'Look, Alan, Gordon's at an appointment on the mainland and you know Grandma went with him, we'll not see them until at least this evening. Kayo's chasing a lead on the Chaos Crew and Brains is visiting Moffie to get a second opinion on his designs. Scott's headed up to the shower. Given the amount of sludge he's managed to coat himself in, I'd say we have a good twenty minutes before he comes down for debrief. I'm perfectly happy to leave your freezing up out of it, but I need you to tell me what's going on.'

Alan's voice was muffled and shaky behind the book. 'Didn't freeze up.'

'Sure you did,' Virgil replied, 'and that's alright. Happens to all of us at some point or another.'

His only reply was a scoff. The book trembled slightly. Virgil let it sit for a moment before continuing. 'It happened to me just the other week, at that bushfire in Victoria. I think it was the first time in… God, I don't even know how long, but it was the first time I'd done one of those alone for quite a while.

'Anyway, I got there, and the heat was just so intense. It was just flames everywhere you looked, and you know I don't normally think twice about running into a burning building but… I don't know, it just got to me. There must have been more than fifty firefighters there, and as soon as I arrived it was like they all suddenly forgot how to do their jobs. They were all just looking at me, waiting for me to tell them what to do and, you know, I just clammed right up for some reason. Weird, right? But then John was there, like he always is, talking me through it. I told Scott about it at debrief, obviously he was worried, but once I convinced him I was alright he said it was fine. We're only human, after all.'

A soft sniff sounded from behind the book. Slowly, Virgil stood himself up and crossed the short distance between himself and his brother. Crouching down to his level, Virgil gently pulled the book away from Alan's face. Watery, red-rimmed eyes stared back at him. 'Oh, Alan,' Virgil whispered.

'I just -' He broke off with a sob.

'It's okay.' Virgil rubbed his little brother's arm. 'It's okay, just take your time.'

'It's not. It's not okay, it's –' He choked a little, pushing the book to one side. '– I just – I can't stand it. I can't, I – I'm just so scared, all the time, that – and I –'

'It's okay. It's okay to be scared.'

'No, it's not. It's not that.'

Virgil frowned. 'Then what is it?'

'I'm the only one whose had their Thunderbird stolen!'

It was blurted out; and as soon as he'd said it, Alan slammed a hand over his mouth, like he was trying to force the words back in.

Virgil blinked. 'No you're not.'

'Yes I am.'

'No. You're not.'

'Yes. I am.'

'Alan, no –'

'Yes I am, yes I am, yes I am. Listen –' Alan's hands were squeezing his now, desperately clinging, his words coming thick and fast. '– the thing with the Hood doesn't count. 'Kay? He only had control of the Thunderbirds for, like, two seconds then, BAM, we had 'em back.'

'Two seconds too long.'

'But he never actually got to sit in any of the cockpits.'

Virgil sighed running a hand through his hair. 'Alright, I'll give you that. So, this is about Havoc stealing Thunderbird 3 the other day?'

Alan nodded, tears spilling over once more. 'I just couldn't… You know, all I could think about out there is what if she comes back? What if, this time, she gets away with it? What if we get stuck in space and the Hood gets exactly what he's been after all this time? What if -'

'Whoa, whoa, whoa!' Virgil put his hands firmly on Alan's shoulders. 'Whoa. Take it easy. First of all, you know Brains has been working on that. He's just waiting on Kayo's approval as head of security before he installs it. Second, Havoc would never get away with it – or The Hood. Not for long, anyway. Either the GDF would shoot them down, or we'd get there first. Okay? We wouldn't let them win, that's not who we are. And, come on, if any of us get stranded? You know there's nothing on Earth, or in space, that would stop the others from coming for us.'

Alan sniffled. 'Yeah, I guess.'

'You guess?' Virgil cuffed the teenager on the upside of his head. 'You guess? No guessing about it, Kiddo, they would. And we all know you'd do the same for any of us.'

Wiping his eyes on the sleeve of his shirt, Alan nodded. 'Yeah, no question.'

'That's what I like to hear.' Virgil said. He ruffled his little brother's hair and eased himself up onto the sofa next to him. 'And, hey, you know that what happened with Havoc doesn't matter to us, right? We're just glad you and Kayo okay.'

'I know,' Alan said, 'thanks, I just… I feel so weak and stupid and –'

'You're not.'

Alan sighed. 'But, what if I am?'

Virgil glanced over his shoulder to look for Scott. Not seeing him, he settled deeper into his seat and turned back to Alan. 'It's normal to feel like that sometimes. Self-doubt is… probably one of the worst human emotions. But that voice that's telling you that? He's talking crap. He wants you to believe that because then he wins. I mean, think about it, let's – let's turn that around for a second, okay? Gordon's the only one of us who's had his ship literally torn apart by one of The Hood's goons. Is he weak and stupid?'

'No!' Alan yelled.

'Really? I mean, it's happened twice now.'

'No,' Alan said more firmly. 'No, he's one of the bravest people I know.'

'Exactly. Now, why would that be any different for you? You not only got your ship back from a madwoman trying to steal it, but you also pulled it out of a crash course with seconds to spare.'

'Yeah. I guess I did.'

'That's pretty badass, if you as me.' Virgil smiled, throwing an arm around his brother and pulling him close. 'So that's why you asked me to come today? Because you were worried?'

Averting his gaze, Alan sighed. 'Uh-huh.'

Virgil nodded. 'Good call. It's always best to bring backup if you're uncertain.'

'Yeah and it turned out to be a two-man job anyway.'

'Well, that too.' Virgil laughed.

A noise on the stairs made the two of them jump. They whipped around in time to see Scott regain his balance, the mugs on the try he was carrying wobbling dangerously. Then they settled, and the oldest brother breathed a sigh of relief. 'Nearly,' he said, shooting the two of them a devilish grin.

Virgil breathed deeply, tasting the air. 'Mmm. Is that coffee?'

'Sure is.' Scott crossed the room and set the tray down on the table. Noticing Alan's screwed up features, he laughed. 'Don't worry, Sprout, I got you hot chocolate instead.'

Virgil chuckled. 'That kind of day, huh?'

'You know it,' Scott replied, flopping back onto the sofa. 'Ugh. John's monitoring Kayo's mission, so he said to start without him.'

'Sure,' Virgil said. He cast a sideways look at Alan, who took a deep breath and pulled away.

'There was an incident on our mission that I'd like to discuss.'

Scott raised his eyebrows, glancing quickly at Virgil for confirmation before turning back to the youngest. 'Alright, Alan,' he said. 'You have the floor.'