Chapter Text
“So what exactly is this hunk of junk anyway?”
John yawned and frowned as he looked through the schematics, massaging the side of his head to try and deal with a migrane. He’d been up for the last seventeen hours and he’d been looking forwards to turning in for the night. At least this rescue looked like it would resolve itself fairly quickly. “Hunk of junk is more accurate than you think. It’s an automated scrap retrieval unit. They were made a few decades ago to deal with the debris cluttering up Earth’s orbit. They were designed to collect debris and then burn themselves up in the atmosphere when they were full. There aren’t many left in operation for obvious reasons.”
Alan’s blue hologram wrinkled its nose in disgust “So, someone’s gotten themselves stuck in an old trash can?”
“Seems that way yes. The distress signal was automated, so we don’t know how many people are there or if anyone’s injured.”
“I’m taking the astroboard up to it. I can’t see any other ship around.”
“We don’t know how long they’ve been trapped, we’ll have to locate their ship after we’ve rescued them otherwise it’ll just become another piece of space junk.”
“Err John? There’s no door?”
“There was never any need for a door. It’s made to be disposable. No need for maintenance.”
“Should I go back to Three and get something to cut through the metal?”
“Ill advised. You don’t know if you’ll end up hitting someone in there.” John smirked, never wanting to miss an opportunity to tease his little brother. “You’ll have to go in the same way as our intruder.”
“The trash chute?”
“Oh yes. It’ll look like a large opening at the front. Careful, it uses static to gather up tiny fragments of debris, so you’ll be wading through at about thirty years worth of space dust.” A single chip of paint out here had as much momentum as a bullet, so it was necessary to try and gather up as much as possible.
“Gross.” A second later he yelped. “Ow! Static shock. Hello in there? International Rescue. We heard you needed assistance.” There was a fumble and a click as John’s little brother switched on a torch.
“See anything?”
“Woah there’s so many old pieces of tech in here. I haven’t seen a type sixty-two gas exchange resin outside of museums.”
“Any sign of people?”
Alan frowned “Not yet. Looks like Oscar the Grouch needs a wake up call.” John winced at the sound of metal being hit. “Hellooooo. International Rescue here?”
There was a bang.
“Alan. What was that?”
Alan chuckled nervously which was never a good sign. “I don’t mean to worry anyone, but the hatch has just slammed shut.”
Alarm bells were beginning to ring for John. He’d been through this far too many times to underestimate how quickly things could go wrong. “Can you still not see anyone?”
“No.”
“Get out of there now.”
“But what about-”
“Now Alan.”
Alan grunted. “Yeah about that. I can’t get the hatch to budge.”
This felt wrong. There was a chance that the person they were sent to rescue had run out of oxygen, fainted, or made their own way out of there. John didn’t want to take that chance, not with his little brother on the line. This was a trap, and he’d deal with the consequences if he was wrong.
“I’m getting into the exo-suit. I’ll send out a call to the nearby GDF ships to see if anyone’s close enough to give you a hand.”
“What? No! That would be so embarrassing.”
John ignored him, already running to the Exo-suit docking area, his mind working overtime. He heard Alan yelp and out of his peripheral he could see his brother’s hologram stagger.
John stopped dead in his tracks. “What was that?”
“I caaaaan’t be 100% sure because I’m stuck inside, but I think the engines just started.”
John uttered a few words under his breath that his baby brother definitely shouldn’t hear. “EOS show me the projected trajectory.”
She brought it up on the screen. “The recovery unit is predicted to attempt re-entry in five minutes. With it’s current heading, this will be a failure. I believe that the unit’s disposal protocol has been activated.”
Alan looked nervous. “You don’t mean-”
“It’s going to try and burn itself up in the atmosphere.”
No. No. No.
The exo-suit wasn’t quick enough. If he jettisoned all of Five’s non essential weight, there was a chance he’d get there in time but it was more likely that he’d end up dragging his own ship into a downward spiral.
“Alan is there anything in there you can use to cut through the walls?”
Nothing. The hologram glitched out, leaving a distorted mess where his baby brother once was.
“Alan?” John was supposed to stay calm when his brothers needed him, but he was trying hard not to panic. “Alan!” His voice grew louder and shakier.
“John?” EOS chirped, sounding uncertain.
“Yes?”
“You have a call from a source I don’t recognise.”
John frowned. The call had been directed at Thunderbird Five, not International Rescue.
It was intended for him and only him. Nothing good could come from this. He clenched his fists. He couldn’t afford to waste time hesitating.
“Bring it up.”
John had already been expecting it, but the sight of The Hood in front of him still struck him with fear. Until that moment he could have lived with the false hope that this was an accident that they could work around.
He forced himself to remain impassive, calm. “You did this?” He said coldly.
The man gave a mock bow. “Who else?”
“Let him go Hood. He’s just a child.”
“Ah but I’m afraid that decision is no longer up to me.”
John wanted to scream with frustration. He wanted to check on Alan’s progress. but he didn’t dare tear his eyes away from the screen. Every second he wasted felt like a stab wound. “What are you saying?”
“I’m not looking to take down your silly little organisation today. But you do have something I want.”
“We always do.”
“No, not International Rescue. You. John Tracy. Eye in the sky.” His own cybernetic eye glowed mockingly and John felt his skin crawl, even though he wasn’t in the same room. “You see everything. Everything that happens. Everything that isn’t meant to happen. All those dirty little secrets that could bring the people below to their knees.”
“We’re a rescue organisation.”
“Don’t play coy. I’m impressed. I know you’ve been keeping tabs on things down there that don’t fall under the jurisdiction of a rescue organisation, haven’t you? There’s information on there that would be very damaging to some of my business partners.”
By business partners John assumed that he was referring to the warlords, drug barons and traffickers he’d been keeping track of from orbit; dangerous people that might get in his brothers' way during a mission, or worse try to hurt them. It was a failsafe in case any one of them got captured. “And you want me to destroy it?”
He chuckled. “No. I want everything. Including what you have on the GDF.”
John’s heart sank. He knew everything. There was no point trying to deny it. “Why?” He demanded. “Won’t your so-called business partners take it personally when they find out you’ve got this information?”
“On the contrary. I’m giving them the opportunity to buy it back, along with anyone else who wants it, of course. I do love a good auction. On the other hand, I would love to be a fly on the wall when you explain to the GDF why you’ve been gathering information on their weaknesses behind their backs.”
John didn’t let the jab rile him up. He’d accepted that risk when he’d started gathering intel on the GDF.
If he gave away those files, there would be chaos. The entire criminal underworld would be too busy tearing each other apart to go after the Hood and innocents would be caught in the crossfire. It would be throwing a bomb into a fireworks factory.
“You can either hand those files to me, or let your brother suffer the consequences of your treachery. After all he is just a child.”
“Two minutes, John.” EOS informed him.
This had all been done deliberately, to isolate him and force a snap decision out of him. If he’d had more time, he could think a way around this. If only he had more time.
“The files are encrypted. It’ll take time for me to reverse that.”
The Hood shook his head. “You may be a genius but your ego gets the better of you. Rest assured I have my own resources to call upon. Send the encrypted files over.”
If he sent those files across, he was condemning hundreds, maybe thousands of faceless civilians to death. The effects would be so far reaching that he doubted he’d ever really know the scale of it.
John pleaded. “The amount of chaos this will cause won’t be good for business-”
“The files. You don’t have time to argue.”
John had lost.
This was his little brother and at the end of the day when John’s values were called into question there were no depths that he would not sink to in order to save him. The Hood knew that.
I really hope you forgive me for this.
“John?” EOS asked quietly. “One minute remaining.”
His hand hovered over the screen for just a second before he sighed, gathered his courage, and clicked send.
The Hood smiled and the sight made John want to vomit. “Thank you for your cooperation, Mister Tracy. The recording of this conversation will do just fine for verifying the information’s authenticity.”
His smug expression was the last thing John saw before the call ended and he was left alone. He didn’t have time to process what had just happened before Alan’s hologram greeted him. His little brother smiled.
“Hey John. The engines just… stopped and the hatch opened. I think I did it!”
John couldn’t find the strength to reply.
Three hundred miles below a new video began circulating the internet.