WARNING: descriptions of torture.


Hanging By a Threat

Everybody has a breaking point. That moment where everything – all the stress, all the pain, all the anger – becomes too much. That split second moment where you think that surely this is the biggest amount of strain you can possibly take. And then you break.

Scott kinda thought his breaking point had been a while ago. Those first few days, not immediately after their dad had gone missing, but after they'd… after they'd decided to stop searching. You might have thought that after witnessing the plane your father was on exploding that you'd just assume him dead right away. But with no debris, it hadn't been a call they'd felt comfortable making. More to the point, what if he'd managed to scramble into another escape capsule and jettison at the last possible second? What if the explosion had hidden that from view?

Calling off that search had been the hardest thing Scott had ever had to do. Especially because a huge part of him still whole-heartedly believed that their dad was out there somewhere, alive and well. But he could see what the search, the hope, the disappointment, was doing to his family. He'd discussed it at length with John and their grandmother. They all agreed it was the right time to stop. For the sake of the family. But it'd come at a cost. They'd shut down International Rescue for a very brief period. And with nothing else really to do they'd become like ghosts, floating around their island home with no purpose.

Scott was loath to admit it, but he'd been the worst. He didn't sleep, didn't eat; he allowed the guilt to take him over completely. Often, he'd be found sitting at their father's desk. Just sitting. Staring at nothing, responding to no one. It was Alan who snapped him out of it. Actually, Alan had snapped them all out of it. And he did that just by deciding that enough was enough. He demanded Scott get International Rescue operational again, before the world forgot them or, worse, resented them for disappearing. When Scott didn't respond the first time, the kid had taken a baseball bat to a replica of Thunderbird One that he'd found on the internet and threatened to do something similar to the real thing if Scott didn't do something. It was more the violent nature of the act than the threat itself that got him moving.

So, they'd rebuilt. Not in the physical sense, because everything was still in place. But they rebuilt their faith in what they did, rebuilt the internal structure of the organisation (because, naturally, things had to shuffle around a bit). They quickly rebuilt what little trust they'd lost with the public, the GDF, and the World Council. Things started to feel normal again. And Scott thought that if he could rebuild himself from that very lowest point in his life then, well, there was nothing he couldn't overcome.

But this? This might just be his new breaking point.

He'd been locked in this cell for days – though how many he wasn't sure. The entire time his head was covered with a hood, reinforced with a blindfold over the top, and the room had been rigged to play white noise at him from all angles. Every few hours someone would come in and change the position he'd been instructed to stand in. Scott knew about stress positions, had trained for them in the Air Force – but because he wasn't special forces his training hadn't been extensive. It was always right when he was on the brink of collapse that it got switched up, and each one was more painful than the last. Whether that was because they were genuinely supposed to be more painful or because he was simply more fatigued was unclear. Perhaps it was a bit of both.

His most recent position had been sitting on the floor. Whilst this might sound like a nice reprieve, it was the exact opposite. They sat him cross-legged, with his hands placed atop his head. With already aching muscles, even just a few moments sat that way was excruciating. And he was left there for hours.

When the door next clanged open, he braced himself for the next position. But it never came. Instead, he was dragged out the door. The assault on his senses was both welcome and overwhelming. The sound of boots on gravel and the wind whistling, the smell of the outdoors – he could tell there was rain on the way just from that smell. It was, unfortunately, short lived. Within a few seconds, he was hauled through another door, and it slammed shut behind him. He was thrown down on a chair and the hood and blindfold was whipped off.

Scott almost wished it was The Hood sat before him. Because at least he was a known entity. Instead, it was a woman. Pretty enough – immaculately groomed and a perfectly painted face – but there was something about her eyes. Even when she smiled her greeting, there was a hardness to them. They betrayed little to no emotion, and to Scott that was terrifying.

'You are the commander of International Rescue, correct?' Her tone was short and clipped. Scott thought he detected the hint of an accent. Definitely European, but he couldn't quite place where.

The trick with interrogation was to gauge how much danger you were in. How valuable your information was. How deadly it could be. And, considering all those things, deciding exactly how much of the truth you could reveal. Because telling the truth kept you alive. It was all a balancing act.

'I'm an operative of International Rescue,' he croaked, lack of water evident in his voice.

'And you are their commander, yes?'

He shook his head. 'No.'

'But you give the orders.'

'You've been watching us?'

The woman smirked. 'Not a difficult task. So, you do give the orders?'

'No, I relay the orders,' Scott said.

'And what does that mean? Relay?'

'I receive orders from higher up and I pass them along to my colleagues.'

'You mean your brothers.'

Scott blinked slowly, maintaining eye contact to attempt to conceal his surprise. As much as he willed it to, his brain couldn't conjure up a plausible reply fast enough. He was too tired. He was in too much pain. It clouded his mind. In his silence, the woman began to lay out pictures before him. Pictures of him and his brothers. Both in uniform and in civilian gear. It seemed that the woman had been playing him. She knew exactly who he was and how much he had at stake.

'Now we understand each other a little better,' she said, 'let's talk terms.'

'Terms?' Scott asked, raising an eyebrow. 'I wasn't aware this was a negotiation.'

'Everything is a negotiation, Mr Tracy,' she purred. 'I'd have thought someone who's taken the reigns of his father's business would understand that.'

'Well, you'll have to forgive me. I was thrown off by the torture routine.'

'Yes, I apologise for that,' she said. Not that she sounded very sorry. 'A necessary evil.'

'Necessary?'

'Of course. We had to demonstrate your options.'

'My options?'

'Yes.' She smiled. It made his empty stomach roll. 'Your options. Which, of course, are to hand over the Thunderbirds and all their accessories and access codes. Or I can drag in one of your brothers and have you watch them go through our little – what did you call it? Torture routine. And, only when you're begging for their release, will I offer you this choice again. Refuse my terms, and I kill that brother and move onto the next one.'

Scott's head swam. He couldn't give up the Thunderbirds. In the wrong hands, they were weapons of mass destruction. These were definitely the wrong hands. But… he couldn't subject his brothers to torture either. Gordon might be able to withstand it – he had an exceptionally high pain tolerance, and he'd been trained for it in WASP. But that didn't mean Scott wanted to put him through it. Not now, not ever. And Virgil? John? Alan? There was just no way. Absolutely no way.

'So, Mr Tracy… what will it be?'