Oh, God, this sucked.

His consciousness tore its way through the proverbial jungle of images, feelings, and memories. Roiling together in no particular order, and making them all the more confusing. Then there were the overwhelming nausea, and pain–insistent, incessant pain. And someone's been messing with the thermostat again. In spite of his closed eyes, the outside world continued as a vicious centrifuge with the pain as its hub. But opening his eyes would only make things worse, for the darkness would resolve into blurred images dancing in a frenzied carousel. I really, really hate this.

He could guess–hell, he knew why he was feeling this way. It was a rare enough experience, with each previous occurrence carved into his memory in exquisite detail. This episode's precise details were still lost in the maelstrom that was conscious thought, but he knew he'd had some kind of anesthesia. It didn't matter if it was the appendectomy he'd had at twelve or that torn shoulder muscle last year. They'd yet to invent an anesthesia that agreed with John Tracy.

"John. John?"

The voice was unfamiliar, but his mind groped toward it like a lifeline.

"It's okay. We're giving you something for the nausea. Just relax."

Relax. Right. Like telling a. . .a. . . to . . . . He gave up, unable to think of any appropriate comparisons that could adequately describe the maelstrom raging in him.

". . . last time he had. . . ."

"Thirteen forty-five. . . ."

"Notify Doctor . . . " the voice faded out, then suddenly was stronger. ". . . father here?"

Just hearing the conversation was an effort. Following it was almost impossible. He latched onto the salient word and slurred, "Dad?"

"Ssh," cautioned another of the voices, "It's all right."

Yeah, right. Easy for you to say.

"Hey, John."

He knew that voice. A hand touched his; solid, comforting, and familiar. He stopped fighting, and the salmagundi–where did that word come from, anyway–of his thoughts fused into blinding whiteness.

The whiteness faded to black, and he had no sense of how long it stayed that way. The next time he dared open his eyes, the images were still somewhat blurred. But their kaleidoscope whirling had ceased, leaving behind a headache that ranked twenty on a scale of one to ten. Still, the absence of vertigo made it easier to focus on the figure curled in a nearby chair, dozing.

"Hey," he croaked, his voice feeling as though it had been packed away in someone's attic, "No parking zone."

The figure jerked awake. "John," he said, relief evident in both voice and expression. Unfolding himself from the chair–and looking like a stretched-out hedgehog as he did so–he stood, and moved next to the bed. "How do you feel?"

"Lousy," John admitted. There wasn't a spot on him that didn't hurt, whether actual or sympathetic. His mouth tasted as though he'd been sick somewhere during the de-anesthesizing, and the room still felt overly warm. "Where's Dad?"

"Packed him off," Scott yawned, "Told him I'd wait here, but only if he went and got some rest himself, since you were sleeping the day away." He stretched, inadvertently rocking the IV stand in the process. "Oops."

"You're disturbing the peace," John said in mock complaint.

"You haven't heard peace disturbed," Scott retorted, rubbing the kinks from his neck, "'Till you've been stuck in Three with Virgil and Alan." He sighed in exasperation. "Those two need their heads knocked together."

"Didn't you?"

"Couldn't reach," his brother grinned. He stretched again, and added, "Besides, they were flying. I didn't want to end up in some other solar system."

John chuckled. The motion jarred both his shoulder and head, and the pain made him wince. It was a good kind of hurt, comparatively. But with it, real memory kicked in, and his expression turned thoughtful. "What about the other stations?" he asked.

"Situation's over," Scott told him. "ASP personnel regained control of their station, and did something at ISS to disrupt that station. ISS evacuated back to ASP, and then the military turned around and went after IWN's station." He folded his arms on the bed's railing, leaning briefly against it. "From what they said, when they came over and hauled off those jerks, I guess Five was next on their list, but Dad had already made 'other arrangements'."

"Thanks to Gordon," John murmured. "How's he doing?"

The lack of immediate response took an equivalently long time to register. Concerned, John looked at Scott, watching him blur into two indistinct images. He shook his head, willing his brain and eyes to focus, and the images resolved back into one. "Scott?"

I should've known. . . . "Not too good," he sighed, straightening up. He noted the worry forming in John's eyes, and added, "Physically, he's fine. Couple of scratches and bruises."

"But . . . ?"

"But . . . " Scott hedged. He weaseled around John's gaze, then reluctantly met it and sighed again. "He called me after you got out of surgery. He was acting kinda flaky, but I thought it was just because of stress. You know, from the situation and all. Then Alan came, and said something about those guys shooting you and Gordon said it wasn't them. He said. . . ." he clenched his fists, regretting his inability to strangle Alan before he'd opened his mouth.

John closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again. "He didn't mean to."

Scott snorted. "If he had, Dad'd have him in remedial training so fast . . . okay, okay." He held up his hands in surrender at his brother's glare. "Anyway, they were supposed to be going to the hotel, and I told Gord to call me from there, cause Dad was here with you. But. . . ." Who'd've thought a piece of paper would've hit me so hard . . . but Gordy was always screwing around during first aid training. "But then we got a rescue call."

He hesitated again, remembering. Sitting there on Five, powerless to do anything other than listen to the transmissions. Wishing he'd been more insistent with Dad, wishing that Alan would say something, wishing that he could interrupt without Gordon hearing. Remembering the horror as it happened, remembering the raw anger in Virgil's voice, remembering the transmitted squeals of the children, along with the frightened yelp of Alan's that he bet no one else heard.

And then, the immutable silence, broken by Alan's signal. The cold feeling in the pit of his stomach, as he listened to Gordon's flat, unemotional recitation while simultaneously fumbling his own call back to Tracy Island. Followed by more silence, which was interrupted only by Virgil's announcement that they were pulling him back to Tracy Island.

"Scott?"

Mentally, he shook himself, and met John's look. "Gordon freaked out on the rescue," he said carefully. He watched John recoil in denial, and shook his head. He could only wish he was making this up. "It was like he was having flashbacks, or something. He-" He stopped abruptly. How do I tell him that Gordon almost killed Virgil and nine other people with his . . . what? Carelessness? Absentmindedness? What the hell would you call it? He reminded himself that John might sound like he was fully recovered, but there was no doubt that his brother was pushing himself beyond the mental fog and physical exhaustion that always surrounded him after anesthesia.

Still, he knew John wouldn't be satisfied if he stopped there. "He almost caused an . . . incident," Scott said. "Dad's grounded him."

John quirked a smile at the phrase "an incident." Code word for "major fuck-up." Still, if Gordon was beating himself up over this . . . these incidents. He frowned at hearing that Gordon had been grounded.

"Not because . . . " Scott's image wavered in his vision. God, I'm tired, so tired.

"I don't know," Scott admitted, kneading his own forehead. He didn't even want to consider the fact that one of his brothers might be cracking up–and there was nothing he could do about it. For so long, he'd been Mr-Fix-It, the last-step-before-Dad. Like John had been "Dear Abby." And between the two of them, they'd caught most of their brothers' angst and dealt with it before it reached their father.

But not this time. With John out for the count, and his being stuck up on Five during the crux of the situation, Scott felt as though he'd had one shoe off, one hand tied behind his back, and both eyes blindfolded throughout the whole mess. One step behind all the way.

John was silent, his eyes again closed. Scott figured his brother had fallen asleep, for–God knows–John had enough to deal with, on top of the stuff he'd just now loaded on him. Rising, he tried to move quietly out of the room.

"Scott."

"Yeah?" He turned back to the bed, the moment slowing into eternity as he waited.

"I want to see him."

He looked at John carefully before replying. As imperturbable as John could be, he was as capable as any of them in kicking ass as needed. Worse, actually, 'cause you didn't expect it from him. Scott hesitated, wondering if maybe his brother was really ticked off at Gordon. This could be bad, really bad. Mentally crossing his fingers, he equivocated, "If Dad says."

There was no answer. Convinced that John had indeed fallen asleep, Scott softly amended, "If Doc Perry says."