The quiet was nice. And the low ambient light level was almost soothing. As he became somewhat foggily aware of his surroundings, Jeff took a sighing breath. The pain that had been twisting through his head was almost tolerable.

He had vague memories of being moved from Thunderbird Two to the infirmary, a confusing jumble of concerned faces and too loud voices. He'd wanted to grit it out, but the nauseating agony in his head had kept him from holding the thought long enough for it to matter, and eventually, he simply sank under the weight of his own misery.

It was almost a surprise to him that he could put the thoughts together. His head ached in a distant way, but nothing like it had before. He thought he'd try opening his eyes, but it was tough going. His eyelids seemed to have a mind of their own, staying stubbornly shut.

He made a soft grunt of frustration, and heard a rustling. Even with his eyes closed, he could immediately identify the familiar wisteria scent and soft, cool hand caressing his cheek. It wasn't so hard to open his eyes after all. "Mom?"

Ruth smiled gently at her son. "I'm here, baby. How do you feel?"

"Bit of a headache. Not too bad. How did you get here? How long have I been out?" Jeff tried to push himself up on his elbows, gritting his teeth as his headache flared.

Pitching her voice at a quiet level, Ruth laid her hand on his chest. "No, honey, you just lie back. You need your rest."

Giving in, Jeff rested his aching head on the pillow, but persisted. "Mom, I left you in Kansas. How did you get here?"

"Did you think I would stay at the farm partying knowing you were hurt? I came as soon as I heard." Eyeing her son's frown, she continued, shaking her head. "I had Scott come and get me. You've been sleeping for three days. And no, there haven't been any rescues or problems."

"Gordon?"

"He's fine. I'm keeping an eye on him. Right now, I'm far more worried about you."

"I feel fine, Mom." Jeff didn't quite look his mother in the eye. To distract her, he said, "Actually, I'm kind of hungry."

Ruth reached over, and gently, held Jeff's chin, forcing him to look at her. "I'll go fix you something, but you are not to get out of this bed. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Mother."

Pursing her lips at the exasperated tone, Ruth caressed her son once more, then got up from her perch at his bedside and left the room. Jeff plucked at the bedspread for a moment, looking around the small infirmary. He had no intention of staying in bed when there was work to be done, but for the moment, he felt listless and weak.

Closing his eyes, he drifted until the door opened and a soft clatter announced the arrival of his lunch. He opened his eyes to find Gordon carefully setting down a tray on the bedside table. Seeing his father's eyes on him, he grinned. "Hey, welcome back, Dad."

Jeff was pleased to see the color in his son's cheeks, as well as the sparkle in his eyes. "You look like you're feeling okay."

"I feel great. You know, Dad, the main problem with being cooped up in Kansas is the tremendous lack of ocean. I just breathe better out here, you know?"

Jeff smiled. Gordon had always been a water baby. "I know. What have you got there?"

"Beef barley." Gordon lifted a cover from a bowl of soup and pulled the hospital table around so that Jeff could get to it easily.

Before Jeff could voice his desire for a more hearty meal, the scent of the soup hit his nose, and his mouth watered. When his son made a move as if to feed him, Jeff snatched the spoon from his hand and dug in. The soup was thick and delicious. "Mmmmm, that's good."

"Should be. It's the first thing you've eaten since you scarfed down two jars of pickles on the life raft."

The spoon paused halfway to his mouth. "What?"

"Two jars of pickles. Don't worry about it. It's very common to lose some memories after a concussion."

"Nice try, son, but my memory is fine. I did not eat those pickles."

Gordon sighed. "It was worth a shot. Did you know she actually did email Kyrano with that list?"

Jeff chuckled, then winced as a sparkle of pain flashed at the back of his head. "Kyrano told her? That doesn't sound like him."

"No, Kyrano's the best. But Johnny got wind of the list, and now he has me."

"Well, it's not as if I didn't warn you, son."

"True. You done with that?"

Jeff looked down and was mildly surprised to find he'd finished the soup. "Yes, I guess I am."

"Okay, well, why don't you lie back down and take a nap?"

Jeff snorted. "Why don't you go get me Scott and Brains? I need to get up to date on things."

"Okay, now I know you've lost either your memory or your marbles. Or maybe both."

Jeff raised an eyebrow, "Excuse me?"

"Dad, you start trying to work and you're gonna end up in Kansas staring at a wall. Take it from me, it's not as much fun as you might think."

"Gordon, I'm not going to stay in this bed for the rest of my life. Now go get your brother. Please."

It wasn't a request despite the wording, and after a moment, Gordon shrugged and left the room. Realizing he needed the bathroom, Jeff attempted to sit up and swing his legs out of the bed. Although he completed the movement, he had to hold hard to the bed, waiting for the dizziness and sudden pain to pass.

"Dad! What are you doing?" Scott came in and moved swiftly to his father's side.

Jeff got his breathing under control, and grasped his son's strong hand. "I've got to get to the bathroom."

"Oh, well, give me a moment, I'll get the wheelchair."

"What? No. I don't need a wheelchair. Just lend me a hand, here."

With Scott's help, he made it to the bathroom and back. By the time he was back to the bed, his legs were shaking with fatigue, and he was grateful for the chance to lie back down. Scott fussed with the blankets, tucking him in, and Jeff frowned. "Leave that, son. I want a report on what is happening."

Scott stared at his father, a cool assessing look on his face. "Yes, so Gordon told me."

When he said nothing more, Jeff felt a prickle of ire. "Well?"

"Grandma said she thought you'd figured it out."

The headache that had been threatening like a cloud on the horizon started to overtake him and he had no patience to puzzle out Scott's cryptic words. Biting off the words in a last ditch effort to hang on to his temper, Jeff said, "Scott, if you have something to say, say it."

With maddening calm, his eldest son nodded. "All right. Father, we've been killing ourselves. None of us could see past the vision. All we saw was people needed help and we could provide that help. What we lost sight of was that if we don't take care of ourselves and each other, we can't help anyone else."

Scott shook his head. "I don't know, Dad. You'd think it would have been obvious, but I missed it somehow. We all did. Even when we were planning all these changes to lighten the workload, it just didn't penetrate."

Jeff frowned, wondering what could have brought on this tone of confession from his son. "Son, I'm fine."

Scott glanced up, startled. He shook his head. "We got you home, and Brains checked you out, said it was just a mild concussion. Miserable, but not really dangerous, as long as we took care."

Jeff brought a hand up to rub his forehead. "I'll agree with the miserable part."

Scott smiled ruefully, having had his own experiences with concussions. "Anyway, like I was saying, I knew you were going to be okay, so I went back to work on Thunderbird One. Virgil and Alan were doing some repairs on Pod Three. Brains was working away on his designs. Kyrano and TinTin were with you. I don't know, I just didn't even think about Gordon. I guess I just assumed he would be on the beach or in his room." Scott shrugged. "I found him in Thunderbird Two, working on a faulty relay in the impeller couplings. He was dead white, sweating, and damn, without a tee shirt on, he looked like a scarecrow he was so scrawny. I asked him what he was doing and he looked at me liked he just didn't get it."

Jeff frowned. "He promised his grandmother he'd take it easy. Hell, I promised her he'd take it easy."

"See, but that's just the point, Dad. As far as he was concerned, he WAS taking it easy. I just stared at him, and it all fell into place. We really are killing ourselves. It's a mindset we all have." Scott looked his father in the eye. "I'm changing that mindset, Dad. As of now, we are no longer going to work to the exclusion of our health and well being."

Jeff shook his head. "And what if people die while we're sitting around with our thumbs up our asses?"

"You really think I'm talking about lying around in the sun all day? We both know that would never happen. We'll continue to work hard, Dad. We'll just do a better job of it, and we'll take care of each other in the process."

"All right, son, I have to agree with you on that. Did you convince your brother?"

"I think so. Alan was a big help. He gets it. Virgil is a tougher nut to crack, though. I'm still working on him."

"He'll follow your lead."

"Yeah, he will. I think once we have everything in place, he'll come around."

"What about John?"

Scott grinned. "He doesn't quite get it, but we have an advantage there. He's stuck on Thunderbird Five until we go get him."

"Well then it sounds as if you have it under control."

"Not quite. There's still the main stumbling block."

Jeff frowned. "What's that, son?"

"It could bring the whole thing down around our ears, put us all in an early grave."

"We won't let it." Jeff said firmly.

"I don't know, Dad, it could be insurmountable…"

"Son, in the past two years you boys have shown me that nothing is insurmountable. Now, what is this stumbling block?"

With a sly grin, Scott replied, "You."

"Me?" Jeff exclaimed indignantly. "Son, you know I have you and your brothers' best interests at heart. Trust me, I get it. We are going forward with every innovation Brains can manage. Don't you worry about that."

"Good. Then you won't mind taking a nap."

Jeff opened his mouth to respond, but couldn't immediately think of anything to say. Scott had trapped him. Seeing the expectation in his son's eyes, he couldn't help saying mulishly, "Working on a report is hardly taxing, Scott."

"Yeah, that was pretty much what Gordon said, and he landed up in Kansas for a month. Dad, it's all or nothing. Are you committed to making our lives better or not?"

Put that way, Jeff had to agree, albeit reluctantly, "Yes, Scott, I am. Oh, all right, I will rest. But I expect to be plied with all the corn relish I can eat."

Scott laughed, relieved. "That, I can handle. I brought back a couple of cases when I picked up Grandma. Oh, but you better not ask for any of Aunt Tina's pickles. Grandma was not thrilled when she found out you ate two jars of them."

"Do you mean to tell me she fell for that? And coming from Gordon?"

"Uh, well, he had a little help."

Jeff frowned at Scott's apparent embarrassment. "What do you mean?"

"I didn't know about the scam, Dad, I'm sorry. Grandma came and asked me if you'd vomited up some pickles on Thunderbird Two, and it never occurred to me to lie. Seems Gordon told her you ate the pickles and puked them up, and that Alan and I had seen you do it."

"Do me a favor, son."

"Sure, Dad, anything."

"On that raft, your brother ate most of one jar of pickles. I had maybe three of them. If he's told her I ate two jars, then he's squirreled that second jar away somewhere. Find it for me, would you?"

A evil smile came over Scott's face. "You've got it, Dad."

Returning the smile with a wicked grin of his own, Jeff wiggled himself down in the bed. "Thank you, son. I think I'll just have that nap now."

"Okay, Dad." Scott headed for the door. Opening it, he paused, looking back, "It's good to have you and Gordon home."

Jeff smiled as his son left the room. Putting his hands behind his head, he gave a thought to what Scott had said. Slowing down would be hard, but he realized the alternative was eventual failure. Sighing he rolled over. Maybe he could get a report on it later.

The End.