"Dad, I need to speak to you" John's voice cut through their father's ire.
"Not now John!"
"Yes, now dad! Whatever you're discussing, this is more important. I need you to get everyone together. I have something you all need to know about. Call me back when you've got everyone."
Scott blinked, derailed by John's abrupt ending.
"I'll go get everyone" he said turning to leave the office before being dismissed.
"Not so fast, we aren't done here."
"Dad, whatever John has it's big, or he would have just told us. We can finish this later."
"We will" his father promised.
It took less than ten minutes to get the whole family gathered in the lounge. Virgil and Gordon had collapsed onto one of the couches, both still looking the worse for wear despite managing to get a shower and change of clothes. Scott supposed he probably didn't look much better himself. Worse even, as he was still in uniform. With Kyrano and Kayo still on the mainland and Grandma having been pulled from the kitchen, they were only waiting on Brains to come up from his lab. The moment the scientist appeared Jeff opened a line to John.
"A few weeks ago Scott and Virgil assisted in a mugging in central London" John began without any preamble. Scott shot a look at both Virgil and Gordon, both instantly awake and looking worried. They hadn't discussed talking to their father about this. "Not long after, the same woman was spotted on security footage in a warehouse fire in Johannesburg."
Scott risked a glance at his father. The man was standing stock still, eyes intent on his second eldest. Scott swallowed, if he thought things had been bad before they were nothing compared to now.
"She called me a little less than an hour ago."
"She what?" That came from Gordon, Scott and their father simultaneously. Jeff spun on his sons his features getting progressively darker as he took in each of their expressions. Only Alan seemed as confused as he was.
"What do you mean she called you?" Jeff said. "Any why did none of you tell me that the woman from the mugging was on the footage."
"What I said" John ignored the second question. "She opened a direct line to Thunderbird Five and called for International Rescue."
"How did she get a direct line to Thunderbird Five?"
"We can discuss that later."
"We will discuss that now!" Jeff was starting to turn red.
"Right now, I need to play you a copy of the call" John overrode him. Without waiting for permission, he pressed play.
By the end of the recording Scott found he had suck into one of the couches. Virgil was looking pale and a little wide eyed at the threat to him. Grandma had her fist knotted so tightly in the dish towel she'd bought with her that her fingers had gone white. No one said anything and Jeff took a few deep breaths trying to both calm himself and process the new information.
"I need you all to start at the beginning and tell me how you managed to let things get this far when I expressly forbade you from looking into this any further."
The boys all looked to Scott and under his father's gaze he found himself rising to his feet once again to give a full report. But something stopped him.
"No" he said. Gordon's head snapped up, his hand still resting on Virgil's leg in a show of comfort or support. Maybe both.
"Excuse me?" His father's fuse really was nearing its end now but Scott had had enough. It was time for some answers.
"I said no. Not until you have told us whatever it is you've been keeping from us. Why dad? Why could we not look for this woman? Why could we not try and aid those people? Why did you feel the need to keep so much from us?"
He thought for a second that his dad had softened but it was gone in an instant.
"It was for your own good."
"Jefferson!" Grandma, it seemed was also at her wits end. There had been tension in the house for months over this and now there was a direct threat to one of her grandsons. "The time for keeping things a secret has passed. We have a situation, as you all like to say, and we need to know everything we can about it so that we can handle it. So, cards on the table, all of you." The glare that went around the assembled men could have cut glass. Only Brains and Alan were immune as they still had no clue what was going on.
"You first son."
Scott was tempted to argue again but wisely backed down. If their dad tried to hold out on them again, he was sure grandma would intervene. So, one by one, they each told their father what had happened over the last few months. Scott expected his father to take Gordon's tale of burlesque clubs and underground fighting rings badly but it seemed, by then, that Jeff only had eyes for John and, as the tale had wound back to the call, Scott could see the anger drain out of his father to be replaced by an overwhelming sadness.
"John" he said as the astronaut finished. "You provided her with a name and a citizen's record. How exactly did you do that?"
John looked very uncomfortable and suddenly seemed unsure of himself. Scott felt his heart sink as he watched his brother.
"I sort of, er, created a new one."
"You created a new one? A new record, I take it?"
Scott suddenly wished his father was still angry. The anger would be easier to deal with. Right now, John was facing both barrels of every kid's worst nightmare; a disappointed parent.
"I assume this means you added her to the UK citizen's database?"
"I did. Those men would have hurt her, of possibly killed her and she was only in that situation because of us" John tried to explain. From the corner of his eye Scott saw Virgil nod emphatically.
"John, did it ever occur to you to ask why she wasn't on any database?"
"Of course it did" John sounded slightly offended. "There could be a hundred reasons from clerical error, to her having her record removed for legal reasons."
Jeff sighed, sat back in his chair and ran both hands down his face. He seemed to be fighting an internal battle. Scott was just about to demand answers one again when his father looked to his grandmother and seemed to gain strength from what he saw on her face.
"What I'm about to tell you all is classified at the highest level. The only reason I know is, if you can believe it, because of a clerical error on the part of the GDF and then a few very pointed conversations with some of my old colleagues" he took a steadying breath.
"The GDF believe that the footage you stumbled upon in Johannesburg was of a biomechanoid factory."
In the silence you could hear a pin drop but it didn't last for long.
"But that's impossible" Scott stated and Gordon agreed. This started a clamouring of voices as everyone in the room demanded to know why Jeff thought this, how did he know, why had he not said anything sooner?
"Is this for real?" came a small voice. Scott looked to his youngest brother. There were many emotions on display round the room but only Alan looked truly afraid. Scott crossed to his brother and sat down in front of him.
"Alan, what do you know about biomechanoids?" he asked, uncertain how much had been covered by Alan's school.
"They're humans infused with nano-technology, right? It makes them faster and stronger. One of the boys at school said they had superpowers and were able to throw electricity from their fingers. Mr Hargraves said they weren't real people, that the nanites wiped all trace of personality from them and left only a programmable robot. Mr Hargraves said they killed thousands of people and are the reason that any kind of biomechanical technology or genetic interference on an otherwise healthy human is now strictly illegal."
"That's mostly right, son" Jeff said from his desk. He hadn't missed Gordon subconsciously rub his ribs when Alan had mentioned strength. "I don't think the bit about electricity is true but there are some pretty outlandish reports from the Bionics War. As you all know, and quite rightly said, the result of the war was that bio technology and associated nanotechnology was made illegal just about everywhere. The biomechanoids themselves were destroyed; the scientists involved in creating them were all imprisoned. Or so we thought. It seems as though the GDF didn't manage to catch all of them and it is believed that someone has financed their creations again."
"They did it to build better soldiers, right?" Alans asked and his father nodded.
"Yes, why send in a platoon of soldiers when you could send in one augmented human? But the process was flawed. It stripped all the humanity from a person leaving only a machine with no concept of right or wrong. Instead of disbanding the initiative, the people who made them simply hired better and better programmers. Suddenly the biomechanoids could mimic emotions, they could laugh or cry, you wouldn't even know. They became the ultimate in sleeper warriors not even able to give away their own missions as it was hidden in their own programming so deep that they didn't know it was there until it was activated. Bringing an end to the Bionics War was one of the main unifying factors for our planet. But then, you all know that."
"Mr Hargraves also said that anyone found to be working on biomech technology, or giving assistance to those who did were charged with high treason" Alan said gazing up at his space bound brother.
Every other eye in the room swivelled back to Jeff who now just looked deeply, profoundly, sad.
"That's right, son" he looked to hologram of his second eldest who now seemed to understand the severity of the situation.
"But she isn't a biomechanoid!" Gordon's exclamation caused a few in the room to jump. "The woman I met wasn't some unfeeling, uncaring robot. She helped out her friend when she didn't have to, she helped me when she didn't have to. Hell, if she was created only for war then why didn't go harder on me in the ring?"
"Gordon, you came home black and blue" Grandma reminded him.
"Yes, but she didn't do most of that."
"She broke your knee."
"Hardly, he waved her off."
"It doesn't matter, does it" John said hollowly. "If she is and is now in hiding and I've helped her" he swallowed "I'm guilty of aiding and abetting."
Virgil glanced at Scott and saw what was building before anyone else did but he was feeling too numb to try and stop Scott's explosion.
"This was preventable!" He ranged then rounded on his father. "If you'd told us anything, anything, we would have stayed away but we thought you were trying to keep International Rescue a secret over the lives of those people."
"You think I would put our secrecy above human lives?" Jeff's own anger relit.
"That's what we all thought" Virgil backed up his older brother. "You completely dismissed us with little more than a 'because I said so.'"
"That should have been enough! I am your father and your commander and, military or not, you all know how to follow the chain of command. When you don't things like this happen" he gestured furiously towards John's hologram and John shrank away despite the thousands of miles between them.
"Don't blame John" Scott spat back. "If it wasn't for him, we wouldn't have known about the threat to Virgil."
"Is there a threat to Virgil?" their father countered. "It's more likely that the threat comes from her. If she is a biomechanoid she could have been programmed to lead us into a trap. She'd play the role perfectly and wouldn't even know she was doing it. These things are not people. They're machines made for war. You all are too young to know and your grandfather, God rest his soul, isn't here to tell you but you've all studied them in school. You know what they can do. I won't have you boys anywhere near them."
Silence fell over the room again as each person remembered the video footage that always got played on the anniversary of the Bionics War ending. Biomechanoids were relentless. The most publicised footage was of a military base in Cairo, a single man scaling the outer-walls, ignoring cuts from razor wire, then dropping inside the line. It was shaky hand-held footage and had been heavily censored until considered suitable for public use. The three military men in the room had seen the rest of that incident. Security camera footage from inside the base showed a normal looking man calmly make his way to the command room. His armour protecting him from bullets as he methodically shot or cut down the soldiers in his path. When he got to the nerve centre of the base he destroyed everything in it, people and machinery, then simply turned to leave. The Egyptian government had ordered a drone strike on their own base to stop him.
"I'm so sorry dad" John said. "I didn't realise… I didn't think-"
"No, you didn't" Jeff cut him off coldly. "And I'm seriously considering the wisdom of letting you remain aboard Thunderbird Five if you're going to abuse the power you've been given like that. We just have to hope that she wasn't converted. If she was, John, then there will be little I can do to keep you out of prison. Now, if you'll all excuse me, I'm going to go see what I can find out from the GDF - as quietly as I can – and I'm going to find out how much trouble we really are in."