A/N: I wasn't going to write another chapter, but I think I left a few lose strings flapping around. So here's chapter two. Many thanks to anybody who's reviewed. Mixed verse.
Disclaimer:As much as I would love to own our boys in blue, I don't. I make no profits from this, and I hope to gain nothing more than to make people happy with it and, hopefully, a bit of concrit.
Chapter 2
The young woman was, understandably, terrified. Neither Virgil nor Gordon had managed to get a coherent sentence from her since finding her trapped under a collapsed wardrobe, five minutes ago. There should have been no problem getting her out, however, due to the catatonic state which she was in, they were facing difficulties. When Virgil had reached out his hand to her, attempting to calm her down, she had grabbed it, and refused to let go. Her nails were sharp but worn, as thought she had been scrabbling at the wood in her attempts to get free. The pink nail varnish was chipped, and the hands covered in scratches and dust. Had she been in her right frame of mind, Gordon suspected that the first thing she would have done was rush off to find a nail parlour. You could tell a lot about people by their hands, he had learnt.
The point was, though, that they were facing difficulties, and the woman wasn't making it any easier. She had called Virgil 'Jason' at least five times, and had not seemed to notice Gordon at all. To top it off, Scott kept radioing in.
"Virgil, Gordon, get out of there, this place isn't going to hold."
"Whose he telling?" growled Gordon, as Virgil replied with some difficulty, as he only had one available hand. Gordon would have spoken to Scott, however, he was busy trying to lever the wardrobe to a position where they would be able to pull out the woman, who had began to pour her heart out in between choked sobs.
"Damnit, Virgil, I said hurry up!"
Much to Gordon's satisfaction, his older brother didn't reply to Scott, instead just mumbling an incoherent profanity.
"You've nearly got it, Gords. Just a little bit higher. The aquanaut grunted, and shoved his weight against the heavy wood, no doubt filled with various outfits that had only been worn once, or had not yet even been tried on.
"Okay, that's enough. Hold it there."
He heard scrabbling from the other side, and the top half of the woman's body emerged. She was, Gordon concluded, in a state. The suit was, or had been, in a pink which reminded him instantly of the stunning Lady Penelope, whom he had wished his father to invite to live on the island, for various occasion. Yes, he missed Ma very much, but all the Tracy clan could see just what the patriarch felt for the English rose. Shaking his head, he forced himself back to the present, which was far more important than any love affair.
Kicking and scrabbling, the second half had nearly emerged, when Scott radioed in again. This time, Gordon only just managed to stop himself from swearing loudly at his eldest brother. Scott's timing had always been far from perfect, but this was just taking the biscuit.
"Two minutes, Scott!" Virgil managed, before ignoring whatever it was that Scott was babbling about. On the way back home, Gordon decided, there were going to be some serious words said. Hopefully not to the extent of a fully blown argument, but you never could tell.
"Have you got her, Virg?"
"Yeah, she's out."
As the woman threw her arms around Virgil, kissing him repeatedly on the cheeks, Gordon let the wardrobe fall back to the ground with a thump.
"Okay, let's get out before the fire really takes hold in here."
The woman, however, had other ideas. Her black, soot covered hair bouncing around her shoulders, she suddenly pushed Virgil away, making him lose his balance, and rushed over burning debris to scrabble at a door which linked this room to the next. When Gordon tried to pull her away, she began howling, scratching at his face, trying to get the door open.
"Mother! No! Mother!"
"Virgil, give me a hand!"
As Virgil leapt over the smouldering wreckage of the highly expensive bedroom, trying not to trip over the various shoes that were scattered around the floor, the building gave a huge shudder, and Gordon felt his stomach lurch. An explosion of fire burst through in to the room from the corridor, and the two Tracy men threw themselves to the ground, pulling the hysterical woman with them. The floor in the middle of the room collapsed inwards, the beams giving way to the fire which had tortured them for so long. The fire licked the ceiling, gushing out of the window, blocking any hope of escape, and tearing at the bed, wardrobe, shoes, chairs, tables and all the other plush furnishings which had once been such a strong selling point for the hotel.
Hearing his brother yell out in agony, Gordon watched in terror as part of the crumbling ceiling followed the floor and, in charred and mutilated chunks, buried his elder brother.
"Virgil! No!"
If he'd had the time, he would have tried to free Virgil – or at least find his body – but the woman was still struggling in his arms, trying to claw her way back to the door as the floor beneath them tilted dramatically, smashing them against the far wall. With an agonising crack, Gordon felt something break, but there was no time to mourn. Still pulling the woman close, in a vain attempt to protect her from the debris, he tried to block his ears from her piercing wails…
…and then, the falling sensation stopped. The entire episode had taken less than half a minute.
Around them, everything was pitch black. Apart from the sweltering heat and the roaring sound which surrounded them, it would have been impossible to know about the raging fire. Above them, the unsteady, temporary roof of charcoal like debris quivered as more falling plaster from the higher floors landed on it. He pulled the woman as close as he could, still remembering his duty to save lives, and, thankfully, she had become still and silent, making his job easier.
When everything seemed to have become still, save for the roar of the fire from beyond the blackness, Gordon gave the woman a gentle shake. She didn't move, lying limply between his arms, his body crushing hers in the small space. He squiggled around, although it was distressingly painful to do so. He gritted his teeth, reminding himself that he had been through worse in the hydrofoil accident, and gave the woman another gentle shake. Again, there was no reaction.
Trying to keep his cool, Gordon groped around in the darkness for her wrist and, finding it, fumbled to feel the pulse.
There wasn't one.
He shut his eyes, not that there was any difference, and groaned. By this point, his right arm was beginning to feel numb, due to the woman lying on it, but he couldn't move. Besides anything else, he had a sneaking suspicion that he had broken it. Attempting to feel his fingers, Gordon tried to twitch, but found that he couldn't. He hoped desperately that the numbness was due to the dead woman, but there was no way of being sure.
Trying not to let himself cry, he whimpered, a cross between agony and mourning.
Virgil. Dead.
Alan . . . had Alan still been in the building when it collapsed?
He must have been. Hadn't he run up to the floor above them, having heard a child wailing?
Two brothers down.
He didn't think he would take long. The pain was, by now, too excruciating. Just like the hydrofoil accident. His back was the worst, having been smashed against the wall when he was falling. Great. Another bunch of scars to add to the collection.
He whimpered again, a large tear escaping him, and then another, and then another.
"Gordon? Gordon, is that you?"
Virgil.
Did that mean that he, Gordon, was dead, too? Where was Alan? Ma? Ma must be here! Here in this hell.
In a way, he contemplated as he gritted his teeth, it was a relief to know that he was dead. It meant that he didn't have to experience death itself. He wondered vaguely, as the pain began to leave him, when it had happened. How had he managed to miss dying?
Besides, where were Ma and Alan? He could still hear Virgil's voice. Reaching out his god arm, however, he found that he was entombed all around. Virgil wasn't here. An illusion. That's all Virgil's voice was. Some kind of illusion.
Choking out tears, Gordon finally allowed the darkness to swallow him up completely, until he knew no more.
Gordon scrubbed away feverously at the yellow paintwork of his beloved Thunderbird, the soap suds covering his hands like snow. The snow that covered the ground outside the hotel . . . no . . . no, he mustn't think about that. Stupid Scott, bringing it up again, after all this time. Didn't he know how Gordon felt about it? Then again, Virgil had confided in him that he'd seen Scott drinking in the early hours, just like Dad had after Ma died; maybe he felt it, too. Not the same thing, obviously. He hadn't been trapped in that horrifying darkness. He'd thought Virgil and Gordon were dead.
Then again, Gordon had been certain that they were dead, too, not to mention Alan. He'd been so relieved to find out that Alan was fine. He'd almost started crying again.
A tear drop splashed in to the soap suds.
Wiping his eyes furiously, Gordon chided himself. No, he wouldn't start crying. Again. That would make it, what, the fourth time this week? What was wrong with him? He hadn't been like this since Ma died! It was almost as though he couldn't do anything being reminded of that horrible, horrible, mission.
Scrubbing away more furiously, embedding himself in his task, Gordon failed to notice the doors to the hanger opening, and a figure walking through. Not until the person was right beneath him, and called up.
"Gordon! Can I talk to you?"
He froze.
Scott.
Peering over the side of the 'bird, he tried desperately to find an excuse to get out of speaking with his brother. Once or twice, he had thought briefly that, if Scott hadn't disturbed Virgil and himself whilst they were trying to free the woman from the wardrobe, they may all have got out fine. Then, he had told himself off just as quickly. They would have had to get the old woman from the next room – Virgil had told him much later that the reason the dead woman, a Miss Stevenson, had been holidaying with her old mother, trying to get over the loss of the old lady's husband and sister dying within a week of each other. It had been the old lady who had been on the other side of the door which Miss Stevenson had been frantically scrabbling at, just before the explosion.
"Gordon?"
"I. . . I was just finishing up. I'll be two minutes."
Two minutes. That's how long Virgil had told Scott they would be. It turned out to be two days. Gordon cursed his choice of the words. Swinging around, he accidentally knocked the bucket over, and there was a yelp from below.
"You could have just told me to come back later, Gords!"
Peering over the edge of the submarine, Gordon realised that he had just managed to completely soak his brother, unintentionally. Perfect. He would have to go and get changed now, giving Gordon the perfect excuse to escape.
Scott, however, had no such ideas. Striping off his t-shirt to wring it out, he looked up at Gordon.
"Look, I'm sorry I was so sharp last night. Please can we talk?"
Gordon shrugged, but carried on simply staring. Sighing, Scott pulled himself up the ladder, and shrugged the wet t-shirt back on.
"I'm sorry, Gordon."
"Mm."
It was an ambiguous sound, and could have meant anything from 'You've already said that,' or 'I know,' to 'Get off my Thunderbird and leave me alone.' All things considered, its closest translation to anything understandable was the latter, which upset Scott. Silence spread its wings, and the two siblings looked away from each other. Slowly, Gordon picked up his sponge, and began to make slow circles in the suds, polishing the paint. Scott grabbed it, and threw it on to the floor of the hanger, in the middle of the stretching puddle of water.
Still not saying anything, Gordon just glowered, and drew his knees up, wrapping his arms around his legs. This was his territory, and Scott had no right to invade.
"I never meant to offend you."
His only reply was a shrug.
"Virgil said you'd go like this. Please don't go all cold on us, Gords. I'm sorry. I don't what else there is to say."
Still, there was no reply. The elder man bit his lip in frustration, not knowing how to handle the situation. The only time Gordon had ever done this was with the hydrofoil incident, and he hadn't been around for a lot of that, due to the Air Force keeping him on duty.
"Is it me, or is it everything?"
At this, Gordon looked away, blinking furiously. Yes, it was Scott, but yes, it was everything. Every single little thing. Every time Virgil spoke, it was like being back in the darkness again, thinking he was being spoken to by an angel he could neither see nor touch. Each time he saw Alan, he remembered the blind panic that he had felt when he thought his baby brother had died first. Grandma and Onaha took the place of the old woman they had never even seen. Tin-tin replaced Miss Stevenson. The sunlight just taunted him, and the night time, especially starless nights, were even worse, because it was like being cramped in that awful, dark space again. Small spaces were the worst. Gordon had never considered himself to be a claustrophobe, but since being in that tiny little space for so long with the corpse pressed against him, well, even his bedroom walls felt as though they were closing in, at times.
"Please, Gordon?"
"It's everything."
The tears that had been threatening to spill now began to trickle down his cheeks in a steady wave. He wiped them away with his arm, only succeeding to cover his face in soap suds, which made his eyes stream even more.
He felt Scott wrap his arms around his shoulders, and begin to rock him gently, just as he had done every time Gordon had gone running to him as a small child, after falling over, having nightmares, or getting in to trouble at school. At first, Gordon seized up, but then he relaxed, and let his head fall in to Scott's shoulder.
They stayed there for a long time, with Gordon sobbing his heart out, unaware that they were being watched from the shadows by another figure.
At last, Gordon pulled away, Scott's arm still around his shoulders, and he wiped away the remaining tears which had dried on his reddened, flushed cheeks.
"Sorry," he mumbled.
"Nothing to be sorry about. If there's anyone who should be sorry. . ."
"Maybe we should both stop saying sorry."
"Maybe."
For the first time since before the mission, Gordon let his lips twitch in to a brief smile. Rubbing his eyes once more, Gordon looked around.
"I should clear up."
"I'll give you a hand."
Opening his mouth to refuse the offer, Gordon changed his mind, shrugged, and smiled again.
"Fancy something to eat first? I want a cookie."
"Virgil finished them off last night. I think Onaha has some more cookie dough on the go, though. If you're interested, of course."
"Feel like eating so much cookie dough you make yourself sick?" This time, the grin truly belonged to the old, happy-go-lucky Gordon who pulled pranks every other day. Glad to see his brother returning to his old moods, if somewhat tentatively, Scott jumped at the chance.
"You're on! What's the plan of action?"
"You distract her, I'll grab the bowl."
"Right!"
Clambering down the ladder, and running off towards the door to the hanger, slipping a little on the water which now completely drenched the floor, the pair disappeared out of sight. The sores left by the mission had by no means healed, Alan thought, as he emerged from the shadows, but at least they were beginning to mend. Wishing he could summon up the guts to spill his emotions out to somebody, anybody, Alan shook his head and stalked off to find the tools which he had been looking for.
