Title: We'll be home for Christmas
Day One – A Tale of a Fateful Trip – Part 2
Author: Gumnut
8 -14 Dec 2019
Fandom: Thunderbirds Are Go 2015/ Thunderbirds TOS
Rating: Teen
Summary: The boys can't fly home for Christmas, so they have to find another way.
Word count: 2701
Spoilers & warnings: language and so, so much fluff. Science!Gordon. Minor various ships, mostly background.
Timeline: Christmas Season 3, I have also kinda ignored the main storyline of Season 3. The boys needed a break, so I gave them one. Post season 3B, before Season 3C cos we haven't seen it yet.
Author's note: This is my 2019 TAG Secret Santa fic and it is a big one ::headdesk:: I hope you enjoy it. I know I have thoroughly enjoyed researching a gorgeous corner of this planet.
Many thanks to vegetacide and scribbles97 for cheering me on and their wonderful support through this craziness. And to onereyofstarlight for geeking out with me over the setting.
And as always, thank you all for creating such a fantastic fandom. Thundernerds rock! I hope you all have a wonderful festive season. Thank you all so much for everything.
Disclaimer: Mine? You've got to be kidding. Money? Don't have any, don't bother.
-o-o-o-
The sunset that night was as good as any they had ever seen on Tracy Island. The ocean swell was minimal as predicted and Gordon threw out a sea anchor to hold them tight while they ate dinner. They could have kept going, but instead chose a moment of quiet and together.
The meal was a lazy affair out on the boat deck consisting of burgers assembled by John and Alan.
For a change the conversation was light. A voyage down memory lane, Dad, the saga of FAB2 and Parker's, uh, misfortune with it, and an incident in WASP training that Alan literally had to drag out of Gordon with threats of revealing something worse that the three other brothers were still in the dark about.
The glare sent Alan's way promised some serious dunking at some point. Alan's grin in return clearly said it was worth it.
While they were sitting still, Gordon threw out a sensory buoy. Apparently, the aquanaut had gone all out and stocked the yacht with all his marine biology equipment. No doubt, Scott had been back and forth between Tracy Island with his brother at least once. It wasn't often the scientist in Gordon got a chance to play in his environment.
Sure, Tracy Industries had made some major ecological investments in the area, including the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary which protected a whole swath of ocean between Tracy Island and New Zealand. Gordon had worked with his father early on in that project and advised that as much as possible should be protected. Their proximity to the island group and the purpose of International Rescue hadn't always coincided and it was Gordon, young though he was, who made it work.
And besides, Tracy Island was outside New Zealand's and their other nearby neighbour, Tonga's control and their security system didn't let anyone near them anyway.
But Gordon had always been conscious of the greater good beyond human matters and their family as a whole kept their Island as ecologically isolated as possible to protect its non-human inhabitants. If anything, it was proof that humans could exist within an established ecosystem and impact it minimally as long as due care was taken.
The sensor buoy he threw off the side of their boat sunk into the depths somewhat and sharpened their sensory net to activity underwater including sounds and movement. The holographic interface threw up a three-dimensional display of the water under and around the boat up to a kilometre across.
The aquanaut placed the projector in the middle of the table. "Would you look at that."
Vigil stared at the somewhat blurry dots and shapes moving across the display. "What?"
Gordon rolled his eyes and, reaching into the hologram, zoomed in on one spot teeming with dots of movement. The middle of the table was suddenly full of a school of large fish.
Virgil shifted back and he wasn't the only one.
"A little warning next time, bro." Alan was frowning at Gordon.
"Eh." And no, their aquanaut did not care, his eyes latched on the fish. "A school of tuna, southern bluefin, in fact. Good to see, though they are at the edge of their range." He grabbed his tablet and, while four other brothers stared at him, he entered some data, his eyes dancing between the two displays.
Virgil couldn't help but smile. Scott caught his eye and did the same. Virgil's smile became a grin.
Gordon didn't notice. His fingers darted into the hologram again and minimised the tuna only to bring up another school of fish on the other side of the display. More notes were made on the tablet.
The silence around the table was profound. Even John had a small smile on his face as he watched Gordon.
A dark shape moved amongst the fish. It was much larger and it wasn't until it slid into the centre of the school that it became clear exactly what it was.
"Wow." Alan voiced the awe for all of them. Well, except Gordon who was still staring at the fish.
Virgil resisted the urge to reach out and touch the hologram of the shark cruising through scattering fish. He wasn't sure what type it was, but it was big.
A moment later Gordon realised they were all staring. A glance at the shark and he punched at his tablet. "Bonus! She's tagged!" Another stab or two. "Hilda? Oh my god, it's Hilda."
Hilda?
"Who's Hilda?" Virgil asked the question, but Gordon was absorbed in what he was doing.
"I did not expect to find her this far south."
"You know this shark?" Alan's voice was small.
"What? Oh, yeah, Hilda likes to feed in our lagoon."
"What?" Scott's deeper voice cut through the stunned silence. "That shark was in our lagoon?"
Gordon blinked up at him. "Well, yeah, how do you think I tagged her? Been following her movements for the last two years. She loves some of the smaller fish that feed in the coral reefs. She can't quite fit into all of them, but she enjoys herself in any case. Caught herself a couple of seabirds from the colony on Mateo a few months back. It was awesome." Not once did his eyes leave the display and the shark swimming across their dinner table.
"I am never going swimming again." Alan's voice was tiny.
Gordon finally looked up and his eyebrows shot up. "Hey, she's cool. You lot aren't tasty enough anyway."
Scott sighed and dropped his head into his hand. "Why do I bother?"
Something flashed in the corner of the display and Gordon immediately minimised it back to a sea of floating dots. "Hey, we've got a big one coming into range. Oooh, no, two...yes!"
Virgil jumped as the display flickered and zoomed in again, this time bringing up another large shape. His fish brother was literally bouncing in his seat. "Ooooh, she's a mama." And there beside the humpback whale appeared a young calf.
Virgil stared.
"And they are talking. Listen to this." Gordon grinned as he punched his tablet with an eager finger. Suddenly the room was full of grunting and clicking sounds and the occasional moan.
God.
Virgil reached behind him, fingers grabbing for the sketchbook he had thrown there earlier while still fighting with his pencil. Within moments both pad and pencil were in hand and he was drawing. Fast. The pencil scraping across the page. Curves, bumps waves of lines. On the table the two whales flew through the phantom water. On the paper, Virgil's fingers lost themselves in the art. Graphite formed the whales' flanks, the sharpness of the pencil lead compensated where the display could not provide clarity. But most of all he drew fast. He did not know how long they would be there, or how long he would have the privilege of seeing them.
He disappeared into the page, finding that zone he had been so seeking the last few days, and it wasn't until the display flickered off and he found all four brothers staring at him that he snapped out of it.
A glance at Gordon. "They've left the area, bro. I held them in range as long as I could." Brown eyes were apologetic.
Virgil blinked and looked down at what he had been drawing.
Two whales leapt off the page in front of him, silver and grey graphite shone, caught by the cartridge paper tooth. Tilted in pose, they were turned just slightly towards each other, so obviously parent and child, it touched his heart.
"That's awesome, Virgil!" Alan was all jubilation and eagerness.
A glance at Scott and Virgil found something akin to pride in his eyes. John was smiling. Gordon stood up and walked behind Virgil, peering over his shoulder. "Can I have it? Or a print?"
"Uh..."
Gordon's hand landed on his shoulder. You don't have to answer now. Just know that that is a damn good drawing, bro, and I like it."
Virgil grabbed his arm before he could move away. "How often do you see whales?"
A shrug. "It is late in the season, but we might see a few this time of year. The humpbacks migrate through here. I've certainly seen enough from home."
"They come near Tracy Island?"
Gordon frowned at him. "I thought you were in touch with the world around you, Virg. All that artistic standing in the wind stuff. Of course, they do. I'm taking you whale watching as soon as possible. You don't need to swim to see whales. God, guys, we live on an island in the middle of thousands of miles of ocean. Pay more attention. Yeesh."
Okay, perhaps he had a point. Gordon had always loved the ocean and the worlds beneath it. Scott always loved the sky, John and Alan adored space. Virgil...was about how those worlds worked. Perhaps he needed to pay more attention to the ones underwater. "It appears I need to."
Those familiar brown eyes blinked at him before a hand covered the one Virgil had on his arm. "Hey, I've got an idea." He slipped free of his hold and grabbed his tablet again. "Just need to log into my home server..." The tablet took a royal stabbing with his finger. A moment and he set the device down on the table, poked it a couple more times until it projected up another underwater scene.
Five fully grown humpback whales and two calves frolicked in the holographic water. "There you go. Last year, not two hundred metres from our front door."
Virgil just stared. His fingers itched to capture the scene. He hadn't felt so inspired in months. "C-can you send me a copy?"
Gordon stared at him a moment, something in his eyes. "Sure. Tell you what. I'll copy a bunch of these recordings onto the family server and you can do with them what you like."
He couldn't look away from the whales. "Thank you, Gordon." He needed some colours. Phthalo blue. Payne's grey. Phthalo turquoise. Cadmium yellow and possibly orange to up the contrast. White and maybe some Alizarin Crimson.
"Virgil, you okay?" Scott.
"Huh?" He shot a glance in his brother's direction. Scott was frowning at him. "Uh, yeah. Did you bring any of my paints?"
Scott looked at John and his younger brother answered. "Your travel kit is in your cabin."
"Great! Thank you." He grinned at John and stood up...slowly as his body reminded him he wasn't running at one hundred percent. A step and he hugged a stunned Gordon. "Thank you, Gordon. Thank you."
"Uh, you're welcome?"
Virgil stepped back and grinned at him. Gordon was staring at him as if he'd lost a marble or two. His expression only made Virgil laugh. A pat on his arm and Virgil grabbed his sketchbook and with another grin headed off towards his cabin.
He had it. All he needed was his tablet and a network connection and he had stock to paint to his heart's content.
"Don't you stay up painting all night!" It was Scott, yelling the length of the boat, but it only made Virgil's grin wider.
-o-o-o-
Shit. The idiot was likely to exhaust himself at his easel. He would have to make sure he checked on him later, make sure he was sitting, not standing. Wouldn't help for his brother to exacerbate his injury just because he zombified when painting.
John was staring at him.
"What?"
A soft smile. "Nothing."
Scott eyed him, but John was his usual calm self, refusing to reveal any hint to his thoughts.
Lips thinning, he shot his brother a glare, which was ignored, and turned back to Gordon...only to find the table now covered in what appeared to be densely packed sardines of some kind.
Okay, he'd had enough of fish. He pushed himself to his feet. Gordon didn't notice.
Scott had been hoping to sit down with Virgil and just have a little one on one bro time, but he had to admit that seeing it all come together for his arty brother like that had been pretty amazing and there was no way he was going to deny him the moment.
He would likely emerge from his room sometime tomorrow with a new masterpiece in his hands that Scott would, as usual, be totally stunned and blindsided as to how he managed it. Hell, that whale took all of fifteen minutes and it literally leapt off the page.
Stepping back from the table, he brushed a hand across John's shoulders as he passed behind him and slipped inside. There was a bar in the corner of the lounge. He grabbed the whisky he had bought that morning and poured himself just a smidgen. He didn't want to get drunk. He just wanted something to line his mouth, give him the taste.
Tumbler in hand he made his way through the main cabin and up onto the bow where they had stood for a good part of the voyage earlier in the day.
The sun was only a memory of the far side of the horizon, the sky darkening quickly and the ocean that gently rocked the boat, and no doubt Virgil's easel, was becoming blacker than the sky above it.
The moon hadn't risen yet, but the stars were breaking through the remnant light, and combined with the faint breeze, night was setting in.
Scott let a breath out.
In its own way it was beautiful. He wasn't one for waxing poetic, but the sky was his home. He breathed it in with every breath and out here away from the lights of life, he could almost hear it.
"Makes you think, doesn't it?"
Despite himself, he jumped.
"Woah, big bro, just come up to share a drink with you. Spock and McCoy killed all the rear lights so they can stare at their distant balls of gas and talk the hard sciences." His brother rolled his eyes. "They've obviously never attempted to collect samples from a hydrothermal vent several kilometres down. 'Hard' would be the least of the terms used."
His brother's verbal diarrhoea came to a sudden halt and Scott took the moment to let his shoulders drop.
"You okay?" Gordon looked up at him and Scott realised he had a tumbler in his hand similar to the one in his own.
A half smile. "I'm good." And he returned to looking out at the black hole of an ocean. "Thank you for coming up with this idea." He rolled his shoulders just a little and took another sip of his drink. "I think we all need it."
"Not a problem." Gordon moved up to stand beside him and sipped his own whisky. "Not often I get a chance to get out here for a good stretch of time. I'm enjoying myself."
"I noticed." He twisted his lips. "Hilda?"
Gordon grinned. "My senior year French teacher. The woman was all bite and no bark."
Scott frowned. "Miss Schwank? I thought you liked her?" One handed air quotes. "'I'd like to go all Jacques Cousteau on her.' I think I actually have that in writing somewhere."
Another grin. "I did. She was gorgeous. Blonde with all the right measurements and a tongue that could do all the right things, no matter the language." The smile vanished and he looked down at the tumbler in his hand. "She was one of the Lost in the 2060 Tsunami Disaster. Found her name on the nets." The stars lit his brother's eyes as they looked up at him. "On her honeymoon, apparently."
Scott swallowed. He remembered the vivacious woman, all sharp words and determination. "Sorry to hear that."
Gordon sighed. "So, now we have a great white shark with the same attitude. Just as beautiful, just as determined, just as likely to bite my head off if I go anywhere near her." The grin was back. Another sip and his brother's expression was all fondness.
A smile crept onto Scott's face. He reached up and dropped his hand on his brother's shoulder and squeezed gently. Another taste of whisky and he turned back to stare into the darkness.
-o-o-o-
End Day One