Disclaimer: I do not own the Thunderbirds, the Tracys, any of it. I only own the story line.
This chapter is dedicated to my grandmother who helped me come up with the plot for this chapter; and to Chrissy who helped me realize the difference between a bond between parent and child, and child and child. :)
"John," Scott started, "is there any scan you can do, test you can run, anything at all that can help us determine what happened to Thunderbird Two?"
"There's no other aircraft debris in the area, so Virgil couldn't have crashed into anything," John replied. "No other aircraft were even supposed to be in the area at the time. A scan does show that there was a power outage right at your location, but the power is up and running so nothing that would have knocked Virgil's bird out of the sky. Especially at his elevation."
"Alan and I will start to search the ship for anything salvageable and bring it back to base."
"FAB Scott, we'll be waiting for you," Gordon responded as he ended his transmission.
"Try and find something Scott," John stated as he signed off.
"FAB," Scott replied shallowly and softly as he turned to look around the hull of the ship. Dark, dismal and filled with questions. Everything was a mess. The pilot chairs were not fully fastened anymore, cords hanging from the roof because the cover panel had fallen off. The window was smashed, the brisk wind from the shore drifting through the hull. Materials had shifted, cupboards had broken open, and the hinges crushed under the accordioned weight of the ship when it crashed. Scott looked around dazed. Days earlier he, Virgil and Brains were doing modifications on Virgil's ship. They has added a new balance module to the wings. To help level things out a little when Two was carrying heavy cargo, making it easier.
Now, exactly four months after his dad had gone missing, Virgil, his brother, was now gone as well; and like their dad, nobody knew what condition he was in, or if he was even still alive. Unlike their dad going missing though, Scott knew that this was different. Yes, losing a parent is devastating, although, losing a brother… it's like losing your best friend, someone who always had your back, took the heat for you when you were in trouble, and could always relate to you better than any adult at the time ever could. Because even if brothers are five years apart in age like John and Alan were, they still knew vividly what it's like to live a young life. Each Tracey brother knew exactly how the other operated. Their strengths, their weaknesses, they connected on a deeper level. Losing Virgil would be like losing a shadow; a shadow is always there and it only goes away when things are dark and cloudy. But now was not the time to think about that. He needed evidence. Clues. "Start sorting through this mess Alan, we have to find something."
"Got it Scott." Alan replied almost adrenalin filled. Bound and determined to find something that will help them find Virgil. After about an hour of searching Alan and Scott had come up with a few of Virgil's tools, cables, med pack, that sort of thing. Some of the larger parts of the ship like the pods extensions that were still partially intact would have to be transported by Thunderbird 3. Although they would need something to help them load them into the cargo bay. "Should we tell John to tell the workers that their black box is ok," Alan questioned.
"Yeah, it couldn't hurt…" Scott trailed off, "wait, does a black box still record data even after it's been removed from its specified place?"
"I don't know. Radio John, he'll know!"
"Salvage team to Thunderbird 5, John, will the black box tell us what happened to Virgil's ship?"
"Maybe, black boxes have evolved, get back to base, plug the box into the control centre and patch the date to me." John stated, a small amount of hope rising in his chest.
"FAB John, let's go Alan." With that string of hope Scott and Alan loaded everything they could into Thunderbird three and headed back to Tracy Island. Scott sat in his seat bouncing his leg all the way back home, this could be the key to finding their brother. Although it hadn't been that long since he went missing, every moment without Virgil just raised more and more concern. Was he safe, was he hurt, is he…
Once back at Tracy Island, Scott and Alan wasted no time getting to the living quarters and patching the information to John. "Hey guys," Gordon acknowledged, "so do you really think that this black box could help us find out what happened to Virgil?"
"We don't know, but I hope so," Alan piped up turning to look at his brother. "Gordon?" Alan stared at his brother who was pale and swaying. His eyes were drifting, his body limp. Gordon had tried to take a step forward when he collapsed, Alan diving to catch his older brother.
"Gordon!" Scott cried. Gordon just lay in Alan's arms, eyes fluttering as he tried to stay awake. Scott brought his hand to Gordon's face, "he's clammy and cold. We need to get him to the med bay." With that through Scott picked up his sick brother fireman style as Alan ran ahead to prep the med bay. Brains was away with his lady friend on power plant tour so it was up to them to help Gordon.
"Scott, do you know what to do," Alan asked as Scott entered the room.
"Not really Al, but we are going to have to figure something out, we risk exposing ourselves by taking him to a hospital." Scott looked defeated. He placed Gordon on the bed and looked him over head to toe, he had never seen anything like this before. "I'm going to call Brains, even if he can't get here he can tell us how to stabilize him."
"Do it," Alan replied. Virgil was usually the one to deal with all the medical stuff. Without him, the last two Tracy's on the island were lost.
"Brains," Scott started.
"Hello S-Scott. Thank you f-for arranging this w-week."
Scott sighed, he hated calling to tell Brains what he needed, but it had to be done, "Hey Brains, I'm sorry, I hate to cut you off but we have a situation. Virgil is missing and Gordon is sick, but a different type of sick than we have ever seen. Brains, we don't know what to do."
"Scan his v-vitals, I'll take a look and see if we can stay-stabilize him."
"FAB Brains." Scott used his communicator to scan Gordon, "so what do you think?"
"L-looks like Gordon has been exposed to some radiation." Brains resulted.
"Gordon said that he went on a late night mission last night; Tracy Island to Thunderbird Five," Alan said to his wrist.
"Hey Alan, I got your transmission with the data, give me ten minutes to have EOS analyze it."
"Thanks John, but that's not what I'm calling for. Gordon got exposed to some radiation, what was the mission you sent him on last night?"
"I sent him to save a workers on a collapsing rig. Is he ok?"
"Not really, he's going downhill fast John, we've got Brains on the other line helping us stabilize him." Scott brought Brains' hologram into view for John.
"John, what was the rig doing?" Alan asked.
"Here let me check, the scientist on the rig was mining... for Uranium and hit a gas bubble causing the ground to collapse. I'm going to run some tests up here on the gas, and call the scientist, see hows she's doing. Maybe her team is treating her and we can do the same with Gordon."
"FAB John, thanks." Scott said as he ran through the steps Brains was giving him to try and remove the toxins from Gordon's body. "Hang on Gordon. Please, we can't lose you too."
"Ah" Virgil gasped as the sudden light shocked his eyes. Everything was so bright for while that all he could hear was the mans voice, but to be fair he wasn't really listening due to the sensory overload. The room was small, no bigger than an average gymnasium, although there was a lower roof. The walls were grey cement as was the floor. In the far corner from the door Virgil lay strapped to the table. Facing him were four spot lights. Big, bright and extremely annoying. Between two of the lights there was a metal cart with tools all over it. Medical tools. Virgil assessed that they were for torture. Not like any of it would do much anyways, Virgil was already in physically agony from the crash, and having no medication to dull the pain didn't help.
The only other thing in the room was a wheeled chair. The man was behind the lights, silhouetted. "You're not going to like this Mr. Tracy, but I can assure you that it will bring me great joy."
Haha I'm so mean for leaving you on such a cliffhanger.