Outside, the weather was perfect. The sun shone down golden rays that glinted off the family pool. Wispy clouds drifted in a light breeze. If you were sitting on the beach, you could get a nice tan being neither too hot or too cold. From the outside Tracy Island was the picture of perfect tranquillity.

Inside the villa, however, things were quite different.

"Why did you do it?" Alan rounded on his brothers as soon as their father made his exit. Brains wasn't far behind him, muttering about reading up on biomechanical technology. "Father told you to leave it alone and now look what's happened to John" he gestured to the hologram only to find it wasn't there.

"John?" Scott called his brother. "John are you still there?" The sound of retching could be heard down the comm which Scott quickly muted. Knowing that his brother needed a moment but not wanting him to feel alone, he routed the call to his private line and walked outside. Behind him, in the lounge, the debate started up again.

"John?" Scott tried again, audio only. "How're you doing." He grimaced as more retching could be heard, then, finally the sound of running water.

"Jesus Christ, Scott, what have I done?" John's voice was weak and threatened to crack.

"You helped someone who was trying to help us."

"Did I? You heard dad. She was probably programmed to do that, and I fell right into it. I never thought for a second that she was anything other than what she… said… But she didn't say, did she?" John said almost to himself. "I asked her why she was doing this and she said to help but then things moved so quickly… Then there was the threat to Virgil and" he broke off. Scott didn't need to see him to know he was pinching the bridge of his nose and trying to control his breathing.

"You did what any of us would have done" Scott tried.

"Really?" John gave a humourless laugh. "You'd have hacked the UK citizen's database and created a record for her."

"If I'd had the skills, then yes" Scott said seriously. "I heard what you heard. She called us, she wanted to help, she sounded genuinely scared when she told you she didn't have another name and, until dad said otherwise, I also didn't think that she'd have any other reason for putting herself in such danger other than to help."

"Great, so we're both idiots."

"Are we? I'm not so sure. She said she didn't have any memories from before she was seven years old. It's more likely that she has a record but no way to access it as she doesn't even know her own name."

"That's what I thought at the time" John sighed sounding annoyed with himself. "Some communications expert I am. I didn't manage to get that across to dad."

"Given that you were facing dad in full parental mode I'm not surprised" Scott said wryly as he walked back inside and put the call back on the main viewer.

"Dad hasn't even said what he wants to do about the threat to Virgil" Gordon was saying.

"There is no threat to Virgil other than her!" Alan shouted back.

"It doesn't make sense Alan" Gordon rounded on him. "Scott and Virgil met her by accident" he gestured in Scott's direction; "didn't you say your car had stopped at the lights?"

Both Scott and Virgil nodded.

"So, if the light had been green, they never would have seen her. I then met her by our design, not hers. Penny and I followed her and I was the one dumb enough to give her access to my comm. Maybe, then, she put us together with International Rescue but are you really saying she took this series of events and reported them back to someone who then put together a scenario to fake an introduction to a gang, which we could over-hear, so that we would trust her enough to fall into a plan to take Thunderbird Two? Wouldn't it be easier to just set a biomech on us?"

Alan looked stumped but Gordon didn't give him a chance to reply.

"Besides, I met her and, other than kicking like a damn horse, she seemed like a real person to me. You met her too Virgil, what did you think?"

"It never occurred to me that she might not be human. She needed help and seemed rattled by the whole incident."

"Right" Gordon said, "and we heard you speak to her, John. I wouldn't have thought anything was amiss there. Did you?"

"No, I didn't" he said quietly.

"She's not one of these things" Gordon said emphatically. "She might have been taken by people involved with them, hell she might have even met one, but I'll drink the entire swimming pool if she is one."

"It doesn't matter though, Gordon" John reminded him. "Dad's right, I never should have done what I did. It's little better than cyber terrorism to hack into a governmental database like that. Even if I was doing it with the best of intentions, it doesn't erase what I did."

"Can you? "Alan asked suddenly. At the blank stares he clarified, "erase the record you made, I mean? If there's no evidence of it then nothing can happen to you."

"I probably could" John hesitated. "But, should I? It would mean two counts of interfering with governmental records if I were caught but, it's not just me on the line here. What if Oracle is for real? If Salvatore decides to check her record again and finds it gone, he'll kill her."

"John" Virgil implored him. "You're looking at some serious jail time here."

"I'm looking at it either way" John stated plainly. "It's entirely my own fault too. But I don't want to take her with me if she really is looking out for us. We need more information."

"Dad's looking into it" Alan reminded him.

"Dad has already made up his mind" John said. "He thinks she's a biomechanoid and therefore not human. Right Grandma?"

In all the commotion everyone had forgotten that Grandma was still in the room. She hadn't moved from her position on the sofa but instead of twisting the tea-towel into knots she now had it smoothed out across her knee.

"We were all terrified of biomechanoids as children" she said with a faraway look in her eye. "The boogie man in every story. My mother used to tell me I had to be home before the sun went down or the biomechs would get me. But I never saw one. I don't know anyone who did for sure. Your grandfather always thought they were responsible for the death of his friend, Mark Rogers. He blamed them terribly and I think he instilled that hate into your father."

"But not in you?" Virgil asked.

"How can you hate a hammer for doing what it's designed for?" she said. "These were normal people converted into biomechanoids. No one was ever even sure if it's something they chose because, as your father said, they have their personalities completely wiped away. But who would ever choose that? I always felt a little sorry for them. People vilified them on one hand and cast them aside as little more than dumb machines on the other. The truth was that they were never really the problem, the Free World Movement was." She looked to her second youngest grandchild, "But, from what you're saying, Gordon, this girl has thoughts and feelings of her own. If that's true then she can't be a biomech."

"But from what dad said those responses could have been programmed into her" Alan continued doggedly.

"I don't think so Al'" Gordon replied. "The situation was too random; besides, I saw the look she gave me when she realised I thought she was a whor-lady of the night" he managed with a sideways look at Grandma. "She was angry. A robot wouldn't care what I thought of her and who would think to programme that in as a just-in-case scenario?"

"I'm going to go and have a lie down" Grandma said. "John, honey, don't worry. Your father isn't going to pull you down from Thunderbird Five."

"How can you be so sure Grandma?" he asked.

"Because there's no extradition in space" she said sadly. "You're better off up there until we get to the bottom of this and John" she looked directly at him, "I don't have to tell you not to do anything like this again, do I?"

"No, Grandma" he said, looking miserable.

"It'll be alright, John. We'll work it out."