Jeff Tracy heard soft voices talking as he approached the den. He knew his sons were trying to figure out what was going on. As he walked into the room though they quickly stopped talking and turned to look at them.
They were both sitting on one of the couches. Virgil still looked half asleep and his hair was disheveled. Jeff knew he was wondering what was so important that Gordon had woken him up for it.
Jeff walked over and took a seat in one of the chairs next to the couch. He searched for the words to tell them what had taken place.
"Dad, what's wrong?" Gordon asked when his father didn't immediately start volunteering information.
"Is it John? Did something happen to Thunderbird 5?" Virgil asked immediately fearing the worse.
"No, nothing happened to Thunderbird 5," Jeff told him. "But this does concern John," Jeff started.
"Is he hurt?" This time it was Gordon asking the question. He knew whatever it was it was serious for his Dad to have this much trouble telling them.
"Physically Jon is fine," Jeff informed them. "However emotionally . . ." Jeff let his voice trail off. There was no easy way to break this to them. "Emotionally your brother is in a lot of pain. He tried to take his life earlier tonight."
"No, John wouldn't do that," Virgil said before his father could say anything else. He quickly stood up. He wasn't going to sit there and listen to this.
It just couldn't be true. Not John! John, who was always the first one ready to help anyone out. The one who had showed him how to mend a bird's broken wing. Who had spent weeks nursing some stray kittens he had once found. Virgil had found him crying over one that didn't make it. How could he even think about taking his own life.
Virgil found his exit blocked by his father.
"Virgil, I know this isn't easy to understand but it's true. Have I ever lied to you before?"
Virgil looked at his father. He still didn't want to believe it but his father had a point. His Dad would never lie to him. He knew that.
Relenting, Virgil turned around and dropped back down on the couch next to Gordon. He put his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. He felt his brother's hand come to rest on his shoulder.
"Dad, I don't understand," Gordon said as Jeff sat back down in the chair. "What would make John even think about . . ." Gordon let his voice trail off. He couldn't bring himself to say it.
"I'm not sure Gordon. He hasn't really talked to anyone about it yet but I do know this, for John to even contemplate it, he had to be in a lot of pain. A lot of pain for a long time because your brother would never want to do anything to hurt any of us," Jeff told them, pausing to let his words sink in. "Given the time of the year, I would say this has to do with your mother's death. I'm not sure John has been able to completely get over that loss."
Jeff found himself searching Gordon's face. Searching for an answer. Had his other sons dealt with the loss of their mother okay. Virgil still wasn't looking up.
Gordon felt himself nodding. He could understand that. He knew how much he missed his mother. How painful this time of the year could be but he had always had Virgil. They had faced it together. He knew he couldn't have dealt with it on his own so how could he blame his brother for not being able too.
"Scott, always told us not to bring it up around John because it would be to hard," Virgil said finally looking up. Jeff heard the unspoken question - why would Scott do that when it was now apparent that was the wrong thing to do. "Gordon and I have talked about it. Why didn't he ever bring up?"
Jeff could see the hurt in his son's eyes. Jeff knew that Virgil had always looked up to John. Virgil had always tried to spend as much time as possible with John. It was only after John started withdrawing form everyone that Virgil had started spending more and more time with Gordon. Still, whenever John was around Virgil had always tried to be around him as much as possible. There was seldom a game played on Tracy Island when Virgil and John were not on the same team. Virgil had always made sure of that.
"I don't know," Jeff told him. It seemed as if he was saying that a lot. "I know that John tried to talk to me about it a few times and I always tried to avoid the conversation. I was too wraped up in my own grief to see that John wasn't like me. He needed to talk about it to work through it. For me, talking about it was the last thing I wanted to do. I can deal with things on my own. Scott's like me in that aspect. He was following my lead. He thought we were doing the right thing. I thought I was doing the right thing."
Virgil stood up. He was angry. Angry at his father, at Scott and at John. Angry with himself for being mad at them. He needed some time alone.
"Virgil?" he heard his father say questionly as he headed for the front door.
"I need some time alone," he said without looking back. He knew if he stayed in the room he was going to say something he would regret. Tell his father what he was thinking right now which was that this was his fault.
Jeff Tracy watched his middle son storm out of the house. He had known that everyone was going to react differently to the situation but he hadn't expected Virgil to be the one to storm out.
"Dad, what can we do to help?" Gordon asked him bring his attention back to his remaining son.
"Well, I think for starters we all need to start talking to each other about your mother and about her death. Hopefully, if we all show that we are open to the subject John will start talking to us - whether all of us together or each of us individually."
"What about professional help?"
Jeff shook his head.
"That has to be John's decision. If it isn't then it won't do any good because he won't open up and it may just push him further away from us," Jeff told him.
Gordon nodded. Unlike Virgil, who seemed to be angry, Gordon wasn't sure what he felt. He really didn't feel anything, just numb inside. He had no idea how he should act around or what he should say to John when he saw him.
Jeff and Gordon talked for awhile longer before Gordon finally headed upstairs to his room. Even after Gordon had left, Jeff continued to sit down in the den. He was waiting for Virgil to come back in. When he finally did, Virgil walked right past him without even acknowledging his father's presence.
With a sigh, Jeff stood up and headed to bed himself. Tomorrow was going to be a long day.
Scott wasn't sure what had woke him up. As he laid there in bed he couldn't hear anything out of the ordinary. He turned his head to look over at his brother's bed just to find it empty.
Scott immediately sat up on the side of his bed and looked around the room. The sun was just beginning to rise out of the ocean. As he looked toward the window that faced east he saw his brother sitting there on the window seat staring outside. John was sitting sideways, his back against the wall, arms folded across his chest.
"Bad dream again?" Scott asked softly as he sat down on the edge of the window seat. His brother still looked tired to him but Scott remembered the panic state that John had woken up in up on Thunderbird 5.
John nodded. Like the times before, even though he was awake the images of the dream were still there in the back of his mind.
"Want to talk about it?" Scott asked him.
John looked over at his brother in surprise. Scott had always been the one trying to keep the others from saying anything around him. Avoiding the topic, just like Dad. John was trying to figure out if Scott really wanted to hear about it or if he was just trying to be polite. All he saw in his brother's face was genuine interest and concern.
But John wasn't ready to talk about. After so many years of keeping it inside he was having trouble trying to put into words what he was feeling inside.
John shook his head and looked away from his brother and back out at the sunrise.
"Well, whenever you're ready, I'm here," Scott told him softly.
Scott wanted his brother to talk to him. He kept seeing the sight he and Alan had walked in on, the light glinting off the blade of the knife John was holding. If they had not gone up would he have gone through with it? Scott didn't know the answer to that question. He just felt as if his brother was slipping away from them. The last time he had felt like that was after the fire, during the week that John had been in a coma.
The two brothers sat in silence for awhile. Finally, Scott couldn't take the quiet anymore.
"I thought you and Mom were right behind me," Scott found himself saying even though he was not one to normally talk things out. He thought maybe if he opened up some it might be easier for John to open up. "It was only after I was already outside that I realized you weren't and then they wouldn't let me go back inside. I wanted to but all I could do was stand there and wait."
John moved so that he was sitting next to Scott, both facing away from the window.
"And then there was all the waiting at the hospital before we knew if you were going to make it or not. I felt responsible. Like I had let you and Mom down. The only thing that made me feel better about the situation was that I did what Mom had asked me to. She wanted me to get Alan out and I did that, but that was only after we knew you were going to be okay. If you hadn't made it . . ." Scott let his voice trail off. That was something that he didn't want to dwell on.
"I went back for her," John said quietly. "I wasn't far behind you. We were in the hallway heading for the front door when I heard her cry out for help. Some boards from the floor had fallen on her. I tried to reach her but other boards blocked my path. I had move them to get through and then more debris started falling. By the time I got to her it was too late.
Scott heard John's words from the night before:
"I failed her. I failed you and the others."
Scott knew now exactly what they meant. Understood the guilt that his brother had been carrying around for eleven years.
"John, you tried. You risked your life to try and help her. Don't ever think you failed her or us because you couldn't save her," Scott told him.
"You can't always save everyone," came Jeff Tracy's voice from the doorway echoing the words you had drilled into his sons from the first day they became involved in International Rescue. Scott had always clung to those words whenever a mission went wrong.
Both brothers looked up, surprised to see their father there. They hadn't even realized he had come into the room.
"How long have you been there?" Scott asked him.
"Long enough," Jeff answered as he crossed the room to him. Scott scooted over to give Jeff room on the window seat between John and himself. "Neither of you have anything to feel guilty about or feel ashamed of from that day. I never said this, and maybe I should have, but I've always been proud of the two of you for how you handled yourself that day. Your three younger brothers are alive because of the two of you."
"And you," Jeff said turning to John, "now that I know what happened during the fire, I couldn't be prouder. It takes a lot of bravery for a firefighter to go into a burning building after someone with safety equipment. You did that with no safety equipment with the building falling around you. That takes a very special person to do something like that. In my eyes, you're a hero John Tracy. Don't you ever forget that."
Jeff let his words sink in. He didn't expect them to miraculously change his son's views on what happened that day, he knew that would take time, but it was out there. John knew how he felt and eventually John would come to believe it himself.
"Now I orginally came up here to see if you two were joining us for breakfast," Jeff said breaking the silence that had fallen on the room.
"Yeah, we'll be down in a little bit," Scott told him answering for the both of them.
"Okay," Jeff said and stood up and headed for the door and back downstairs to the kitchen.