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This sucked.
Kayo was trapped, tangled in several cables in the shipping yard because she’d leaped without looking - again. So far her attempts to free herself had only resulted in smashing her wrist communicator.
At least John had already been in contact, informing her that help was on the way. Of course he couldn’t resist pointing out she wouldn’t be in this mess if she hadn’t been trying to track down some smuggler.
He didn’t get it. The smuggler had been involved in several thefts of materials such as experimental alloys and engine components. The kinds that went into space crafts. Whoever wanted those materials was probably building something.
Something that would spell trouble for the GDF and possibly the world at large if it wasn’t stopped. Something that could possibly result in another Zero-X situation.
Kayo couldn’t allow that.
So she’d tailed the smuggler to the shipping yard where he’d stashed a crate of alloy. He’d seen her and made a run for it. She had pursued him.
Now here she was, dangling from several cables and watching idly as blood dripped down her arm and made a small puddle on the metal below. At least one of the cables pinning her arm was acting as a sort of tourniquet, slowing the bleeding.
Where the cut had come from initially, she wasn’t sure. When she’d briefly grappled with the smuggler? When she’d jumped? When she’d been struggling? There was no way of knowing now.
Distantly, she heard the rumble of Thunderbird One’s engines. Ah, there was her rescue. She heard boots pounding against metal and concrete. “Kayo!” Scott’s voice echoed off the shipping containers.
His tone was that same not-quite-panicked stern tone Jeff got when he was worried one of them was in danger and they needed to respond. Respond now. If she wasn’t mistaken, a bit of twang had creeped into his voice too.
Both her older brothers had a habit of letting their Kansan roots show every now and again. Even more so now that their father was back and they were hearing his twang all the time.
Kayo was absolutely going to rib Scott for it. Later though.
“I’m over here!” she called in reply.
She shut her eyes as she heard the footsteps approaching. She didn’t want to see Scott’s stupid smirk when he saw her strung up like some kind of puppet with its strings tangled. He was going to be insufferable about it.
There was a thud when he jumped down from the ledge, the pounding of running footsteps slowing to a steady clomp. She could just imagine him looking up at her, taking in the predicament she’d gotten herself into.
“Hey, Scott,” she commented, “Don’t tell Dad about this, yeah?”
Oh, Jeff was going to know she’d needed a rescue. Hell, he probably already knew. He didn’t need to know about her being tangled up in cables though. About the stupid mistake she’d made. And he definitely didn’t need to know about the bleeding gash in her arm.
Now until they were in the same room and he could see she wasn’t bleeding out or something. He worried even more than Grandma and Virgil combined. (Something Kayo had once thought was impossible, but was he even Jeff Tracy if he wasn’t constantly changing the definition of ‘impossible’?)
A heavy silence followed her words. A moment later she realized her slip. She’d called Jeff ‘Dad’. She had half a mind to try and correct herself. Say something along the lines of how she’d meant to say ‘don’t tell your dad’. She wasn't sure it’d help her case any.
If anything, it’d just give Scott another thing to laugh about. Speaking of, why was he being so quiet?
Something crunched underfoot when he took a final step forward. Fragments of her wrist communicator if she had to guess. “Sorry, Tanusha. Dad already knows.”
Shit.
She’d forgotten Scott was out on a space rescue with Three. Which meant he couldn’t have possibly been piloting One.
Peridot green eyes flew open and locked on to the figure standing below her. She took in the silver baldric crossing in an X over his chest. The bright green on the back of his gauntlets. Blue-grey eyes looked up at her in a perfect mirror of Grandma’s unimpressed glare.
“I meant to say ‘don’t tell your dad’?” she offered sheepishly.
If anything, that only strengthened the glare. “Ya know that’s not the part that I’m not happy about.”
Ah. Yeah. It was the ‘don’t tell’ part. There was no saving that one.
“Are you cleared for field work yet?” she asked.
“Don’t try an’ change the subject, young lady.” That was a ‘no’ then. Grandma was going to go through the roof when she found out. That was a problem for later though.
Blue-grey eyes flicked to looked at something above her head. Flitting from left to right just like John when he was calculating the best course of acting. He pulled the laser cutter from his belt, “Alright, hold still.”
“Can’t do much else,” she quipped.
The answering hum was almost more of a growl.
He took a final step forward, his free arm wrapped around her waist. Kayo hadn’t even realized how much her shoulders were starting to ache until he started supporting her weight.
For a long moment the only sound was the humming of the laser as it cut through the cables above her. As the cables dropped, she found herself resting more and more against Jeff’s shoulder.
She worried about whether or not he was up for it. It was his first time back in the field since his return from deep space. A return to the field that hadn’t been approved by a doctor.
Despite her worries, Jeff remained steady on his feet as he held her with one arm and cut her free with the other. Her right arm came free and she let out a quiet sigh of relief. That shoulder was going to ache tomorrow. Both of them were, but her dominant arm always seemed to take the brunt of things.
“You kids often conspire t’ hide things from me?” He finally broke the silence.
“Only temporarily. Just until we get home,” she answered.
“Uh-huh…” He didn’t sound entirely convinced.
The last cable gave way. Jeff staggered slightly, but managed to lower her to the ground without either of them falling. She let out a sigh of relief feeling solid ground beneath her boots again.
She felt Jeff’s arms tighten around her in a brief hug. She was only able to return the embrace with one arm. “Thanks,” she said.
When they separated, Kayo’s attention immediately went to her injured arm. She craned her neck to look at the cut across the back of her upper arm. It was bleeding profusely now that there was no pressure on it. It also stung like hell.
“So are ya gonna explain what happened here?” Jeff asked as he exchanged the laser cutter for a first aide kit.
“I was pursing a smuggler, jumped in the wrong spot…” she trailed off, resisting the urge to shrug as he wrapped her injured arm.
Jeff shook his head. “Look before ya leap, Kayo.”
“I know! I know! I just…” she sighed. “This guy’s been transporting stolen goods for months now. Different types of metals and components… either he or whoever he’s working for is building something. Some type of ship probably. Better to stop them before they finish rather than deal with whatever damage they might do with said ship.”
He gave her a look that was somehow both Scott’s wry ‘well done, idiot’ and Virgil’s disapproving ‘you need to take better care of yourself’ expression. “Well, somethin’ got caught at least.”
She glared at him in response. He ignored her reproachful look as he tied off the bandage. Kayo maneuvered her arm experimentally. The bandage was a little tight when she bent her arm, but that’d be fine.
Perfectly serviceable, even.
While Jeff turned to start reassembling the first aide kid, Kayo turned towards where she’d left Shadow. If she got up in the air fast enough, she might be able to get a scan of that metal alloy. Then she could zero in on where that smuggler had gone.
“Where do ya think yer goin’?” Jeff called after her.
“To see if Shadow can get a scan on that smuggler. The alloy he took off with isn’t exactly common,” she answered.
“Kayo that arm needs to be tended to properly,” he said.
“It’ll take five minutes tops to get a lock on his location. I can send it to John and we can track him from there.” She didn’t stop walking.
“Ya really expect me t’ believe you’re just gonna hand this off to John and not try an’ catch the guy?” She heard the disbelieving raised eyebrow in his voice.
She couldn’t tell a lie if she didn’t speak at all. She just quickened her pace.
“Tanusha Kyrano yer not too grown t’ throw over my shoulder,” he threatened.
That made her stop.
She turned to look back at him. He was standing with his arms crossed over his chest, blue-grey eyes stern.
He could lift her, judging by how he was able to hold her up while he’d cut the cables. Could he really carry her anywhere though? Was he recovered enough for that?
Did she want to deal with Grandma and Virgil coming down on her if she tested it and proved he was wrong? Not really. Did she want him to end up hurting himself trying it and finding out he was wrong? Certainly not.
What if he wasn’t wrong though? What if… What if Jeff was back to as-close-to-normal as it got with a Tracy?
“You’d have to catch me first,” she pointed out. She started walking backwards, her pace quick and sure. “I’m a lot faster than I was when I was sixteen.”
He tilted his head downward slightly, his eyes glinting with that Tracy brand stubbornness she was so well acquainted with. “Ya really want t’ test that?” He sounded just like any one of her brothers when they were refusing to back down from a challenge.
Problem was, she was a Tracy too - in heart if not in name - with that same inability to refuse a challenge. Turning on her heel, Kayo bolted.
->->>
Virgil heard One dock and started for the hangar. He couldn’t really be mad at Dad for taking off. Not truly. Kayo had needed rescued and One had been the only ‘bird available. Two had been en-route home and could have stopped and gotten her on the way, but One was able to get there faster.
Besides, it wasn’t like an earthquake, or a tornado, or some highly charged generator about to explode. It had just been Kayo doing something reckless and getting herself stuck. A pretty easy rescue. A good one for Dad’s first time back in the field since… Since Zero-X.
Still, Grandma hadn’t cleared him for field work yet. Even Virgil - though he was more confident in Dad’s recovery - was hard pressed to clear him. It was still too soon to tell the extend of the permanent damage done by his extended stay in the Oort Cloud.
To soon to tell what he could handle out there and what he couldn’t.
If he was being perfectly honest with himself - and being honest with yourself was often the difference between life and death - Virgil didn’t know if Dad would ever be able to go back to being in the field full time.
Both One and Shadow had docked. Though the sixth Thunderbird appeared to have docked via autopilot.
A cold feeling seeped in between Virgil’s shoulder blades. Why hadn’t Kayo flown her ‘bird home? The big brother and field medic in him had him quickening his pace towards the gangway that would connect to One.
“Using the jetpack was not fair!” At his sister’s declaration, Virgil slowed his steps. The tightness in his chest easing at the indignation in her voice. Kayo was fine. She’d lost… something, but she was perfectly fine.
Dad’s laugh echoed through the hangar, “Don’t remember there bein’ any rules about that.”
“Ugh. You’re worse than Gordon!” Kayo retorted. She was trying to sound angry, but there was an undercurrent of laughter in her words.
“I’ll tell him ya said that,” Dad replied. “Now if I’m n’t mistaken’ that’s a Virgil hoverin’ around the corner.”
Virgil couldn’t help the smirk that came to his face as he leaned back against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest. Aiming for Gordon’s higher-pitched voice (and getting pretty close if he did say so himself) he said, “Don’t know. Could be Gordon.”
He heard Kayo snort in amusement as Dad wryly answered, “Must’ve had one hell of a growth spurt while I was out then.”
They could see his shadow couldn’t they? Oh well.
Shrugging and admitting defeat, Virgil came around the corner. “Didn’t mean to hover, just got distracted listening - what was that about the jetpack?”
“Nothing,” Kayo answered quickly. She tried to briskly walk past him and away from the conversation. The white gauze on her arm with a spot of crimson seeping through caught his attention and his hand shot out to grab her arm before he’d even consciously thought of the action.
“What happened there?” he asked, hands already working to loosen the knot in the bandage.
“Minor laceration, it’s fine, Virgil.” Kayo rolled her eyes. Though she didn’t try to free herself.
He frowned as he observed the cut. “Y’know, Kayo,” he said as he turned to grab the first aide kit, “I think your definition of ‘fine’ is just as bad as Dad’s.”
Instead of a protest, Virgil heard his father chuckle, “Like father like daughter, I guess.”
“Ugh.” Kayo buried her face in her hand. “I’m never going to live that down am I?”
Virgil couldn’t quite kill his smirk, “Oh, finally slip up, Kayo?”
“Shut up.”