Hiya! A little bit more, before work. Thanks, Susan, Thunderbird Shadow and Bow Echo, for reading and reviewing. Hugs! =)

7

Near sunset, over Kyoto, Japan, in the speeding Chaos Cruiser-

Havok kept up a stream of vile curses as she flew. Had to dodge a city-wide network of earthquake-escape 'risers', lifting refugees away from the still-shaking ground. Electronically guided, shaped like silvery dishes, the big, numbered escape craft simply rose in the air like long streams of bubbles, getting hundreds of people at a time up and out of harm's way.

Well... until Fuse disrupted their guidance and power, that is, sending the saucer-shaped floaters crashing into each other, those swaying buildings, or right back down to the ground. Pain in the arse, really, as Havok had to evade drifting escape-craft and hurtling, wind-milling people. Like one of them stupid videogames, only without a d*mn point screen. Shrieking victims rained from the golden-red sky like ripe fruit, some of them striking and draining her Cruiser's shields. Bugger.

The Yamato Space Port was just ahead, but first, Havok had to collect her daft, shouting brother. Unbelievably, he hadn't left off. Was yet strutting and bellowing challenges at the edge of that rumbling crevice; effing and blinding like some loud, drunken footie-thug.

"C'mon!" roared the dark-skinned young man. "Try some o' this, ya fekkin' gits! I'll do f'r all o' ya! Bring on IR!"

Bloody Nora! There was no tractor beam or 'grabber' aboard, so the girl risked swooping down low, sharply cutting her speed and de-cloaking the Cruiser. Caught a glimpse of her brother's face; watching him look first surprised, then really happy to see her.

"'Avok!" he boomed. "It's you!"

"Bet y'r sweet arse, it's me," she muttered, dipping down to just about whack his gob with the ruddy harness. "Catch hold, an' let's scarper! Got places t' be, an' tech t' pinch."

Grinning, Fuse leapt for the green-nylon harness and cable. Didn't buckle it on, or nothing; just thrust a big, metal-clad arm through the straps. Was swung at the end of his steel alloy tether like a gleeful wrecking ball, deliberately smashing into fleeing Kyotans and tilted escape risers. Must've killed twenty or thirty more people, just getting up to the tower, which glowed gold in the setting sun.

With all that momentum, the armoured young man was able to crash straight through a perma-glass window, booted feet first. Went skidding inside like a surfer, riding on shattered glass, forcefield and blood. The ground had mostly stopped shaking by that point, but security hadn't come back yet. Better still, most of them cop-bots was still turned off and rolled up tight. Perfect.

Knowing that his sib would soon be along, Fuse took a quick scan of the Yamato Space Port. Seemed like a cake walk on first check, with nothing but gentle alarms, soothing music and holographic evacuation leaders.

"Honored guest!" chirped one of them, appearing in the air before Fuse. Looked like a smiling, bowing black cat with a badge and bell, its left paw upraised in greeting. "Your safety is very important! Please follow me, and I will take you to shelter."

"Piss off," snarled Fuse, bashing a fist through the holographic black cat, which went all pixels for a moment, and then reformed, closer than ever.

"Honored guest!"

Fuse took another swing at the glowing feline, roaring every oath he knew at the top of his lungs. Didn't phase the d*mn thing one bit.

"Your safety is very important!"

The channeler took off running. Anything, to get away from that chirping voice and oozing concern. Only, the cat simply kept reappearing, forcing Fuse to dodge.

As luck would have it, he ran the right way, trailed by his own personal, saucer-eyed nightmare. Like Briggs goin' for the goal, he crashed through a set of double doors, busting full-tilt into a large upper room containing lots of machinery, windows and one little pencil-necked blighter. Professor type, with cracked glasses and holo cat of his own. Tycho Reeves, it was, and wouldn't Evie be chuffed, to get both machine and inventor, at one go?

"Honored guest," chirped the cats, in unison. But,

"'Ullo, Pretty!" grunted Fuse, charging up like a rugby tackle to bash the little geek straight in his pale, frightened face. Broke them glasses in half. "Say g'night, an' get ready t' travel."

XXXXXXXXXXX

Pacifica City, a few minutes afterward-

Job one: get out of the water. Job two: find a way clear of that dark, flooded ballroom, without damaging the already listing, domed city. Couldn't just open a hatch, down below, even if they weren't all emergency-locked. The water had stopped surging, but remained bitterly, brass-monkey cold; 39, 38 degrees, at a guess. Tasted like blood and brine. Worse yet, exposed wiring sent a series of painful shocks through the trapped, floating people. Reeves' machine wasn't quite dead, yet.

Meanwhile, darkness, exhaustion and cold had nearly accomplished their work. Even the song had trailed off, with John's red comm light all that they had for illumination. His brothers would be on their way, the astronaut knew. All that he had to do was keep his charges alive, until the rest of the pack arrived.

Thinking: tiled ceiling… AC and wiring crawlspace… in there, somewhere, John reached up over his head to push at the nearest ornately-carved panel. It moved upward, some, but he was pushed down; getting a mouth and nose full of freezing water in the process. Had to cough it all out, then try again. Parker thrashed over to help, giving John a shoulder to brace against.

"Thanks," gasped the astronaut, pushing off and up. The panel clattered, ground against something metal, but moved. Another strong, sudden lunge pushed it completely off its grid, revealing a three-foot-square gap in the ceiling.

One more Parker-braced lunge got him high enough to seize the sides of the opening, and then heave himself upward. He was almost too weary and cold to continue, but the thought of all those scared, drowning people forced John to keep trying. A combination spasm, pull-up, and boost from below got him all the way out of the water. He flopped and squirmed forward, finding himself in a cramped, dusty, chandelier-maintenance crawlspace. Metal bars dug into his belly and chest. Something scraped his hand and drew blood, but... yeah... he'd done it.

Wasn't sure how much room he had, or whether the panel grating would hold his weight (189 pounds, stark naked).

"Jaeger... " John began, but the AI was already acting, sending sparks and shoots of red fire to strengthen that metal-grid ceiling. "Perfekt. Danke..."

Now, for step two: turning the h*ll around. He kept it slow and easy, lest a too-sudden move send him back through, onto somebody else. Very cautiously, John got himself reoriented; twisting in place, so he could reach down through the gap. He picked up the pace, then, because some of the folks below were calling for missing others. To h*ll with caution. People were dying, slipping down into that black, icy water before the person beside them knew what had happened.

Holding tight to one of the steel grid bars, John put his left hand down and took hold of someone. A complicated maneuver followed, next, because he was lying down, and had to hang on tight whilst rolling over, to draw his customer up through the gap, and across his own body. On the bright side, warmed himself up pretty quickly, like that. Had to shove the wet, half conscious man… King Denys… off to one side and keep working.

Penny was next, kissing his ear in the process of getting landed like a fish. Meanwhile, the room's tilt was increasing, putting more strain on that fragile false ceiling. Must've been quicker than it felt, but John would have sworn that it took a full fifteen minutes to get everyone up, out and evenly spaced. He plunged back down, at the end, because Parker had grown too chilly and unresponsive to reach up for his hand, and nobody else had anything left.

That icy, full-body shock was like knives stabbing at every inch of his body. Had one of his brothers been present, John would have joked about certain anatomical attributes trying to crawl back inside of him. It was that cold. Anyhow, he got hold of the fading driver, and pushed him back under the gap.

"Come on, Parker… almost there… not going to… desert Lady P… the king and a duchess… are you?"

The older man mumbled something colorful, but managed to reach up and take a bodyguard's hand. John would have followed, only…

XXXXXXXXXXX

Thunderbird 2, up in the cockpit-

Virgil Tracy altered the tint of his Bird's windows to block out some of that sunset. Not taking his eyes away from the instruments, the big, dark-haired pilot said,

"Gordon, I'm gonna need full schematics on Pacifica City, plus a real-time situation report." (Which Virgil wouldn't have had to ask for, had John been up in Thunderbird 5, where he frickin' belonged.)

"On it," responded Gordon, pulling up space on his data screen. The muscular swimmer specialized in underwater construction and safety. Had visited Pacifica City on several childhood fieldtrips, even.

"Got a blueprint, Virgil, but it's kind of old… there've been some upgrades since Ming Hotels took over the place… and I'm having trouble getting through to anyone onsite."

Gordon looked up, hiding real concern behind a wide, cocky smile.

"Guess they're all busy painting their toenails, or something."

Virgil grunted morosely, pushing the throttle forward another notch. Anything more, and he'd redline the engines.

"Keep trying, Kiddo. Scott says he heard from John, so we know they're alright, in there. Power outage, or something." Sure wished he believed that…

"Thing is," said the aquanaut, glancing at his grim older brother, "I can get down there, but what then? Thunderbird 4 will hold one other passenger. Two, if they're small. How the h*ll do we evacuate eight-hundred people, Virge?"

The pilot chewed his lower lip, briefly. Then,

"We don't. We keep the city stable and upright, until those GDF rescue drones show up. How bad is she listing?"

Gordon examined his technical data, culled from a network of comm-buoy and satellite feeds. Hazel eyes narrowing slightly, he rubbed at his scruffy chin and said,

"Twenty degrees, trench-ward, looks like. Won't know for sure till I'm down there… but those seaquakes are making things worse."

"Uh-huh," Virgil nodded. "How deep is the water, out there? What're we looking at, distance-wise?"

The sun had just about set by then; disappearing at last, with that sudden green flash you sometimes got, in the tropics. They had to hurry. A minute, h*ll, thirty seconds might make all the difference.

"Twelve thousand feet," replied Gordon, after checking his schoolboy memory against datafile fact. Wincing, the swimmer then added, "Sh*t, that's a lot of cable."

Virgil shook his head, not mussing a single, gelled strand.

"She's too heavy, Kiddo. Even if we had enough line, 2 hasn't got the power she'd need to keep a whole city from falling. We're gonna have to think outside the warehouse, here. How many sub-retrieval floats 've you got?"

Gordon considered. The floats were meant to quick-raise a drowned submarine. They were lightning-fast, and really powerful.

"Um… five, but I can get down to the pod and start cooking up more, Virgil."

The handsome pilot smiled at his eager, excited younger brother.

"Looks like we got us a plan, Fish-stick. Get in there, and get busy."

Gordon unstrapped, vaulting out of his seat like a rubber ball.

"I hear and obey, Glorious Leader! Twenty credits says I've got a dozen more floats ready to go, by the time we're on site. Go ahead, bet me."

Grinning, Virgil glanced away from the instrument panel and windows.

"You're on, Tadpole. Twelve new floats by showtime, or you owe me twenty credits… and a case of beer."

Gordon paused in mid-dash to scowl at his older sibling.

"Hey! No fair, upping the ante… but okay, Wise-ass. Case of beer, too. Doesn't matter, 'cause you're gonna lose."

Said Virgil, very quietly, as the aquanaut vanished aft,

"That's what I'm betting on, Kiddo. Make it happen."