Hey, there. Had the day off for Veterans Day, so I had some time to write. :) An important holiday in my household, as pretty near every member is, or was, in the service. Anyhow, thank you, Tikatu, Bow Echo, Creative Girl, Shadow and Whirl Girl, for reviewing. Will respond, post haste.

19

The Manhattan Quarantine Zone, on a chilly, cloud-shot afternoon-

It was a stupid idea, and he knew it. Never work in a million years… except that it had to. John Tracy had herded his charges away from the targeting beacon's insistent red and white glare. Other side of the building seemed safer, and better shielded from view. The mirrored glass wall here was nearly intact, though it juddered and hummed, whenever the wind shifted quarter. This end had part of a crumbling ceiling, too.

John pushed Buddy and Ellie into that one sheltered corner, telling them,

"Eat. Get some rest. I've got … something to work on."

Buddy nodded, saying,

"Right-o, Bluey. I'll take next watch, then Ellie, 'ere. She's good as both of us put t'gether." Yeah. Hard not to like the guy, even if he was obsessed with mythical reptiles.

Shaking his head a little, John stepped away and looked up. The yellow pollution sweeper hung clanking and sputtering right overhead, looking like a smudged, moldy gourd. He could hear its rusted fan blades scraping their housing as they swept up fumes and contaminants. Mark II. A very old, obsolete device, still in use because WorldGov wouldn't waste money on a long-abandoned dead zone.

John had dealt with its kind, before. Knew that safety of sorts lay inside, along with basic comm and med gear. Just had to find a way up there. Ideas? The sweeper was too high to reach with plain muscle, even enhanced by the lifting power of Brains' fancy shoes. Not too high for his exopod, though. All the astronaut had to do was find a way to summon the d*mn thing.

See, Thunderbird 5 was up in high orbit, halfway around the world, receiving a constant sh*t storm of incoming messages. One little chirp from a radioactive quarantine site would strike 5's sensors like a raindrop in a hurricane… and, God, his head hurt. Wasn't the sort to take painkillers, usually, but…

"Got any aspirin?" he asked Buddy, as Ellie took background video and made a few sound files.

"Right 'ere, Mate," the explorer responded, smiling gamely. A brief pocket search turned up a small case of headache pills. "Take what y' need."

John nodded carefully (felt like an effing three-day hangover). Accepted a tablet and swallowed it dry. Then he said,

"Thanks. I'm going to try summoning equipment from Thunderbird 5, but I'll need to boost the signal. My… the… spacesuit... it only listens for one kind of message. No competition. Need one of your cameras, though." And his own wrist comm, and cufflinks. The lasers' power source was a multi-D particle battery. Much stronger than his wrist comm could handle. Wrong size and shape, too, but Ellie had a hairpin, and Buddy, a couple of foil gum wrappers.

Those, with several rubber bands, made a quick and dirty adaptor, while the camera provided lensing for a tight, focused beam. Well, he hoped it would, anyhow. Thinking was slower than normal. Muddier. Took him awhile to build the Franken-smitter, even with help. Fifteen minutes, altogether, as that high-voltage beacon flashed its non-stop destruct call. Thing sounded like a combination bug-zapper and bacon pan.

"Couldn't we just heave th' blighter over th' side?" Ellie fretted, leaning into Buddy for warmth. John shook his head, no.

"Booby-trapped," he explained, hunting for words. "Rigged to go off."

Just had to hope that the local robotic destruction crew was occupied elsewhere. Eos… he wondered about. Hoped, y'know… she was safe, and Penny, too. Got the apparatus put together at last, just as the sun's red, swollen limb touched that broken-jawed skyline. Pollution sweeper was wandering off again, having vacuumed up as much as it could. So, no time to waste on scollops and doo-dads, as Grandma would put it.

"Just need a few minutes," John told the universe, needing things to start going right. It was getting colder, and that wind had developed a knife-like slash. Looking westward, John pressed one end of a folded gum wrapper to the silvery, lozenge-shaped particle battery. The camera beeped and juddered like it had just bolted hundred-proof vodka. Routed by his wrist comm, a brief signal shot forth, bounced off the sweeper's antenna, and hurtled upward.

"Did it work?" Buddy asked, not keen on leaving before he'd found that non-existent croc, of his. John took a moment to process, then nodded.

"Think so. Ought to reach the pod bay and trigger a launch. Eos 'll know what's happened… and tell Dad. Sent coordinates, so…" The weary astronaut gestured with one hand, meaning, approximately: the exopod can free fall, then cut on over. Once he had wings again, John could make his way up to that slowly departing sweeper. Get them all out, himself, without endangering family.

He'd meant to stay up and wait, but grew too tired to stand. Fell asleep, with his head on Ellie's shoulder. She rubbed his forehead and temples, humming something that reminded John of safety and warmth. Buddy held their one working cufflink, meanwhile; looking out for more drones, or mutated plant life. Important, because those predator vines never rested, even with sea water. Even at night.

About half an hour later, he and Ellie saw something zipping their way through the dark sky. Too small and quiet for an aircraft or drone, Buddy reasoned. Almost, the red-capped explorer fired a cuff-laser blast. Only, his wife whispered,

"Buddy, wait. Johnnie… John, wake up, Chookie, an' come 'ave a look. Whaddya think, Luv? Shoot it down?"

The astronaut shuddered awake; stiff and sore from hard ground and cramped posture. Better rested, though. Looking upward, he spotted two small, blinking lights streaking toward them at a very sharp angle. Were there other fast-moving glows, close behind?

"Get inside," he told the Pendergasts, standing up for a better view. "Head for a lower level, find something that floats, and make your way to a safer building."

They didn't move, at first, so John added,

"Now, dammit! Not sure that's my exopod, or that it's not being followed by drones. Go. Keep the laser for protection. If I make it to the sweeper, I'll come back and find you. If not… do your best to stay alive. My folks are looking for us. I promise you."

Alone, Buddy might have argued, but he had Ellie to think about, and video footage to edit.

"Luck, Bluey," he said, flailing in the darkness to clasp John's shoulder. "See you on th' flip side, Mate."

The astronaut got a brief, tight hug from Ellie, and then the explorers were gone. He listened to their rustling, whispered retreat, then turned to face those oncoming lights. Odds weren't all that bad, John figured. 3 out of 5 that his exopod had caught the weak signal… 5 in 10 that it had evaded detection, coming in from above, shielded by Eos… 4 in, dunno… 5 or 6, maybe, that it wouldn't just crash from excess momentum. Anyhow, he'd probably make it, unless fever and headache had screwed up his maths.

Funny, that you're fondest of life when it looks so close to the end. John memorized the whole d*mn situation, standing there with his fists clenched at his sides on a cold, New York evening. Wind gusts, star gleam, clunky floating sweeper, and unseen waters muttering secrets, down below. Radiation pricked at his skin; more noticeable, without the sun in the sky. Just him, braced at the edge of whatever came next.

XXXXXXXXXXX

Thunderbird 5, a little bit earlier-

Jeff Tracy was doing his best to contain that legendary, volcanic temper. To say that he was getting nowhere at all with the GDF was putting things mildly.

"Linda," he said to Colonel Casey's grim, holographed image, "Thunderbird 3 has full decon capability. She's not going to carry anything back from quarantine! One quick flyover…"

"Will encourage a horde of thrill-seekers and scrap-pirates, Jeff. You know that!" the tense, brown-haired officer wasn't giving an inch. "Laws and borders exist for a reason! They've been established to protect the peace and save lives. Remember what happened when a salvage crew got too deep into Scotland?! That's right… they triggered a Goddam Manhunter, Jeff! Now, drop it. The answer is no. Look all you want from orbit, but nobody crosses a dead zone border. Not anymore. And that directive comes straight from the Chancellor!"

Jeff breathed deeply; too angry for words. He'd never been so frustrated. So terribly helpless in the face of stone-wall intransigence and genuine need. Had the Director been physically present, Jeff would have shaken her till her teeth rattled. Instead, all he could do was float in the midst of blinking, beeping, worthless technology.

"Colonel Casey," he began, raggedly, "I…"

That's when something happened. Some sort of feeble, incoming ping opened the exopod hatch. Launch exopod Y/N? flashed up on one of those circling holo-screens. Jeff's brown eyes widened. Hurriedly, he jabbed the nearest green 'enter' button, meaning: H*ll, yeah! Heard the launch tube engage and the suit whoosh away without its pilot, seconds later. Jeff's heart hammered, but he kept his face as smooth and bland as Charlie's, when plotting escape from bath time.

"I… think that you're mistaken, Colonel, but I won't do anything rash. International Rescue operates at the whim of WorldGov, and we know it. I intend to launch surveillance probes and scan the New York quarantine zone, from orbit. You may inform Chancellor Shaw that I'll share any findings with the GDF research team." Had to keep her talking, while racing to scramble an avalanche of cover. "In the meantime, Linda, how are we coming with those rescue subs?"

Casey appeared to relax a bit. She smoothed a hand over her tightly bound hair and then straightened her uniform, saying,

"They're on their way, Jeff. I had to dispatch Hawaii's fleet and Guam's, because the Japanese launch bay sustained major damage in that sudden quake. Any clue why the epicenter was untouched? Except for two-thousand-plus deaths, there's been no damage to downtown Kyoto, at all."

Jeff honestly didn't know, though he suspected Rigby's ride-along friend. Didn't say so, though. Just kept Casey distracted while he launched wave after wave of tiny, fast-moving recon probes. Assuming that John was after his 'wearable ship'… and possibly smack in the middle of a dead zone… he'd need the thing not to be tracked.

"We're looking into it, Linda. As I recall, something similar happened on Mars, once, when a polar lander unexpectedly came back online, after crashing."

Casey grunted, shaking her head.

"This is several orders of magnitude beyond a resurrected probe, Jeff. I was thinking that maybe your chief engineer found a way to use those nanobots of his for city-wide reconstruction."

Jeff blinked, firing the last wave of probes.

"I'm, ah… not able to comment on that possibility, Linda," he said. "But, I'll ask him. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got operations to run in Kyoto and Pacifica City. I'll keep you posted. Tracy, out."

There was a knot in Jeff's gut as he switched comm to Thunderbird 3, because Alan was sure to recognize the exopod's transponder signal… and almost certain to follow it down.

XXXXXXXXXXX

Elsewhere-

He was trapped in a nightmare of paralyzed darkness. Couldn't move, speak or see. Wasn't sure how much time had passed, or where he was. Just that he had to hold out; hang on to sanity. Bit by bit, something started to happen. Flashes of memory rose unbidden; stuff from the past that he'd long since forgotten. Then, streaks of sensation, as though someone was mapping his brain. The questions started shortly thereafter.