Flashbacks and Memories (Part 13)
By Jenny Taylor
After a while of sobbing and grieving, Doctor Jaycee Anderson and four of the Tracy brothers; Scott, John, Alan and Gordon, slowly calmed down to the point of talking and listening again. The boys are still at a loss hearing that their dad Jeff Tracy is now dead, but again, they only heard the basics of the story and Jaycee wanted to tell them everything she knows.
Jaycee is the first to come back into reality, even though she silently still grieving from the inside, she had to, no… wants to tell the boys what happened to her amongst other questions she knew that they are silently asking her. She let out a big, long and slow sigh, before looking at the boys, who still hanging either onto each other or her, depending on where each of the brothers are sitting, heads down and tears falling from their reddened eyes.
"Are you guys ready to continue to listen to my story?" She asked slowly, sadly and anxious, letting her words sink into the boys and waited for them to speak.
"Not really…" The eldest replied as he straitens his back and wipes away his tears with his gloved hand, his voice is filled with sadness, honesty and defeat before slightly changing into determination, worry and curiosity as he knew what needs to be done as he looks directly into her eyes.
"But… given what you told us so far, there's still a lot more that you want to tell us…including into how… we've lost dad." Scott turned away from Jaycee as his voice broke at the mention of his dad's demise and tears threaten to fall again. Jaycee freed her hand from Scott, picked a packet of paper handkerchiefs from her pocket, single-handily opened it and withdrew a handkerchief and silently offered it to him.
Scott took the silent offer and gave her a quiet 'thanks' before blowing his nose, then wiping away his tears and then took some deep breathes to calm and compose himself while Jaycee offered John and Gordon with the handkerchiefs which they both accepted and copied the actions of the elder.
After offering the red-head and the fish with the handkerchiefs, she took one and tried to used it to wipe away Alan's tears, which was a bit awkward for her as the youngest buried his face into the side of her chest and had nearly fallen asleep crying.
Jaycee gently coaxed him awake and gives him the soft paper tissue, which he accepted and wiped away his own tears before leaning back onto her chest with both hands clutching the tissue, sniffling while Jaycee gently wraps her arm around him and then rubs comforting circles on his back before repeating the question she asked earlier as she feels that only Scott had listened to her question and not the others, but she wants conformation from the others before she could continue.
"John? Alan? Gordon? Do you three want me to continue with my story?"
"If it's the only way that we can find out who killed dad, then yeah, I'm in." A solemn aquanaut replied before looking up at her, waiting to find out more from his cousin. Jaycee silently nodded and waited for the replies from the two astronauts.
"I agree with Gordon on this." John replied as he sighed before regaining his posture, looking up at the female of the group and his voice nearly returning to his 'rescue' mode and readied himself to record his cousin's story. "We'll need your testimony as evidence to bring whoever killed dad to justice." Jaycee slowly nodded in agreement and then looked down at Alan as they waited for his response to her question.
"Can't believe he's gone." The youngster spoke quietly, his voice is barely above a whisper as gently shakes his head which lays on his cousin's chest and tears roll down his cheeks. Both Jaycee and Scott heard him, they looked at each other before looking back down at the teenager.
Scott stood up and walked towards Alan, anticipating Scott's movements Jaycee gently coaxes Alan so that both him and her can shuffle along the couch so that Scott can sit next to the baby of the family. As Scott sits on the couch, he wraps his arm around him and lifts him awkwardly onto his lap.
Normally Alan would resist and retorts such actions, but this is an exemption and lets his big brother lift him and setting him to sit sideways on to his lap and Alan rests his head on his brother's chest as Scott leans back into the couch, wraps him arms the baby blonde and kisses the mop of blonde hair.
Jaycee shuffles along next to Scott as he uses his right arm to coax her to join him to embrace and comfort Alan, then she lifts Alan's legs so they lay across hers and then she lays into Scott's embrace and reaches out to hold Alan's hands with hers, with neither brunettes' taking their sorrowful eyes of the baby blonde.
Once Scott, Jaycee and Alan shifted positions, Gordon and John stood and stretched for a moment as sitting on a coffee table wasn't a comfortable place to sit for long hours. Then Gordon placed himself next to Jaycee, leaning back onto the couch looking at her while John sat next to him at the end of the couch, shifting his body into a position so he could see his brothers and cousin clearly, without obstruction from the aquanaut's head.
"Alan…Alan…" The gentle voice of the female brings the youngster out of his empty trance and looks up towards the one person that the youngest consider as his mom. "I know what losing a parent feels like, weather they were taken by men of evil, like our dads, or by Mother Nature, like our moms. But remember this… no matter what happens, the spirits of our parents will always be us, within our hearts and will guide us through these dark times.
"They'll always be with us and they're with us now, to help and comfort us while we wait for Virgil." They all turned to look at the double doors where the surgeons are battling to save the legs and life of the gentle giant, who lies helpless, unconscious and oblivious to actions performing by the medics.
Jaycee then turns back to face the baby blonde. "I will have no doubt that they're with him now, helping him, to give him strength, courage, belief, hope and comfort that he'll pull through and… although I don't know how much damage his legs have sustained but I do know this…" She pauses and looks at all of the brothers like she addressing to them as well as Alan. "When Virgil wakes up, we'll help him, to give him hope and courage to walk again as well as finding the bastard who did this to him and bring him to justice."
The boys were taken aback, wide-eyed in shock, not only because they had forgotten a similar speech which she'd spoke before when they were kids, but also the language she'd used to describe the Hood.
"I can't believe that you'd just said that." Scott exclaimed open-mouthed in shock, which gave Jaycee a puzzled look.
"Said what Speedy?" She asked, unsure to what the eldest was referring to until the red-head of the family spoke.
"You calling the Hood a bastard! And the word bastard is a swear word." He spoke in his usual informed manner, making the doctor wide-eyed into what she had just said in surprise and confusion.
"Is it? I didn't know that." She replied in worry. "I've heard people using that word, but I never knew what it meant or why it was used." She lowered her head down in shame. She never, ever used swear words in her life, because she hated them with a passion and this is the first time that anyone had told her that a word she'd used was a swear word.
"I thought you knew every swear word." Gordon spoke in surprise to Jaycee's statement.
"Yeah…" Alan agreed as he perked up from where he's sitting on his hero's lap, his voice has hint of surprise and joy. "We'd used to punish Scott whenever he'd used them." A small smile appeared on the blonde astronaut and a large grin appeared on the aquanaut's faces, while the brunette grimaced at the memory of him being punished in the most embarrassing way by the female and his younger brothers for swearing.
Jaycee sighed and shook her head. "I'm afraid I don't know anything anymore. If this kidnapping didn't happen then yeah I'd probably would, but… (sniff) because of the terrorist and what he did to our family and the G.D.F. I sadly don't know anything, let alone learning how to be a civilian." Her voice trailed off at the end of her statement as the boys looked at her in shock worry and then at each other asking silent questions to each other and replying in the same manner.
This terrorist has links to the GDF? What did he do? These are some of the questions that the boys are silently asking each other and the answers are all the same… They do not know and the only person who has those answers are sitting between them. They pondered in silent wondering what to ask her next and then, as usual, the lone wolf of the pack re-asks the question, in hope to get the ball rolling.
"You mom said that the boy was killed by ants right?" He asks, making the female look up at him in confusion, due to the sudden change in the subject.
"Yes." She replied in a small voice of uncertainty as she cocks her head to one side in confusion as well as the other brothers in a similar fashion, wondering why John had gone back to the incident involving ants.
"Did your mom tell you what kind of ants they are?"
Jaycee paused for a moment to think about it before looking back at him. "She did, but I can't remember the name of them, except… (she closed her eyes, trying to remember what her mom said about the tiny creatures) that they are in the top ten of the world's deadliest ants." She opened her eyes after saying the last part of her statement slowly as she tries to remember her mom's ordeal with the terrorist.
That last part of the statement sent John back into his self-implied 'mission' and brought back up the information he had earlier when he gave them a lecture, which was interrupted when Jaycee became pale with fear. He looked down the info spread before him until he reached the point where he'll pick up from.
"Where did you get up to Johnny?" Gordon asked with curiosity as John sifted through the info.
"Firstly, don't call me Johnny." The red-headed astronaut scowled at his younger brother before returning to his fact-finding mission-cum-lecture. "So far we started from the bottom of the top ten deadliest ants which are: Pony ants, Meat Eating ants, Green Tree ants, Argentine ants, Bullhorn Acacia ants, Saifu Ants, Fire Ants and lastly we're up to number three of the top ten is Florida Harvester ants."
He paused to look up at the female member of the family and allowing her to think over what he had just said. "Are any of these sound familiar to you Jaycee?" He asked.
Jaycee thought for a moment before shaking her head. "I'm afraid not Lone Wolf."
"So… what are the top two of the world's deadliest ants then John?" Scott asked worryingly, feeling that he'll regret asking that, partially for two reasons. First was that John will answer that in a form of a lecture and secondly was that when John does answer, he answers that he'll give out could go either two ways.
One is that Jaycee didn't know or heard any of the last two ants and would mean John would have to do some more research in order to find the ant that Jaycee remembers. The second is that Jaycee does know one of the last two, not only they'll know which ant species that killed that helpless boy in front of their aunt/her mom all those years ago, but they'll also gain some evidence that would bring this terrorist, whom has evaded capture for years, to justice.