#marks&wings

Maybe it was the water, weighting them down so much they couldn’t fold up against his back.  Maybe it was the injury, red swirls in the water telling him it was bad.  Maybe it was neither of those and he just didn’t have the strength.

The reason didn’t matter. What mattered was that he couldn’t, that each frantic surge up to keep his head above water exhausted him more and more, that the sudden appearance of speed boats roaring into view towards him didn’t mean help was on the way.

He’d been shot down. That much was obvious, even if he hadn’t had the time to mentally catalogue exactly what had happened and why. No-one else was around; the stretch of ocean he’d been over – was now in - was devoid of human life.  Supposed to be devoid of human life.

But it had been a manmade thing that had blown through his wing, and now there were more manmade things headed his way.  It didn’t take a genius to put the clues together.

Flying away was out of the question – if he could, he wouldn’t have ended up in the water in the first place – and swimming wasn’t going to help him either.  Keeping his head above water was enough of a challenge; with his waterlogged wings, not to mention the injury, there was no way he’d be able to get any lateral direction at all.  And even if he could, there was no way he could out-swim a speed boat or several.

They spluttered to a halt just in front of him, fanned out in a semicircle.  Too far away to touch, but close enough to see the look of triumph on the face of the man in the one directly in front of him.  It wasn’t reassuring; any remote chance that they’d come to help him out was dashed into pieces.

Sound carried over water. Even over his own gasps for breath and the slosh of the waves his desperate attempts to survive were producing, he could hear the laughter.  Satisfaction.

The next moment, their voices went from cruel and jovial to terrified, pitch rising and culminating in a frantic “grab him now!”

Wide eyes weren’t looking at him.  They were looking past him, faces white and drained of blood, and Scott had no idea what they could see, but if it wasn’t good for men in speedboats, it wasn’t going to be any good to a drowning man with wings pulling him down.

Still, on his next surge out of the water – barely a surge, a weak splutter fuelled by determination and more than a little bit of panic – he turned his head.

A tall, pitch black fin was bearing down on them.  Him.  It towered far above him, easily taller than Alan at a glance, and Scott’s first instinct was fear.  There was blood in the water after all.  His.

It rolled up, a pitch black back to go with the fin, before diving down.  A flash of white confirmed its identity.

Orca.

Orca weren’t known to attack humans, were intelligent enough to recognise them even when they didn’t look right, but the speed it had been approaching with, and the dive-

The men on the boats were shouting and screaming, equally panicked even though they weren’t the ones in the water with it.  Some were fumbling weapons.  At least one gun ended up overboard as it was dropped by shaking hands.

Scott couldn’t see it. Keeping an eye out for the apex predator that had decided to investigate what was going on and keeping his head above water were one task too many – two tasks, really, but Scott wasn’t giving up on living just yet – and after it had dived, he’d lost track of it.

Then something collided with him from beneath, taking what breath he had away as the deep depths his wings had been dragging him down into was replaced suddenly with smooth, thick skin, and that pitch black dorsal fin erupted from the water scant inches from his face.

It kept going, kept rising until his chest was out of the water.  The majority of his wings.  His waist, his knees, and it registered that the orca had scooped him up onto its back.

He didn’t know if that was normal orca behaviour.  He didn’t know much about orca.  His gut told him that didn’t matter.

Scott reached out, arms trembling and weak after his fight with the waves, and wrapped his arms around as much of the dorsal fin in front of him as he could.  The creature was huge, but not so huge his wingtips weren’t still draped into the water, threatening to drag him back off the moment the orca moved again.

The men were still shouting, engines sputtering back into life, but Scott ignored them – even the panicked gunshots that went laughably wide considering the size of the orca, if only because they went so wide.  He didn’t know he was safe, on the back of an apex predator that on the surface had no reason to help a drowning human with wings, but as his fingers closed around the far edge of the fin and then – and only then – did the huge creature move again, he felt that maybe, just maybe, he was.

There was a chance that the orca was exactly that.  A sea creature that had come to investigate and decided in its wisdom to intervene.

But there was also a chance it wasn’t.

Scott didn’t know if orca was in Gordon’s resume, if his aquatic brother had ever got close enough to one to add it to his ever-growing collection of possible transformations. He didn’t have that link with him that Virgil and John did, the second and third Tracys always able to pick their brother out from a myriad of seemingly-identical marine wildlife. Some days, Scott hated that. Hated that Gordon could hide so completely from him.  Hated the fear that came from the knowledge that one day something might happen and he wouldn’t know until Virgil screamed, or John threw himself into a silent frenzy. Hated that he’d be entirely helpless.

Even now, he hated it a little, because he’d never been scared of Gordon no matter the form he took, but he’d been scared of the approaching orca.  He didn’t have the link to confirm the identity of the creature that was saving him.

But he had his gut, and his gut told him that somehow, it had to be Gordon.  Never mind that Gordon hadn’t been in the area as far as he knew.  Never mind the fact that Gordon was supposed to be at home, and if he was here, it meant he’d been out swimming without telling him.

His gut told him he was safe, and he trusted his gut enough to relax as the orca’s clicks and whistles washed over him.  The orca didn’t speak any human languages, but to Scott the fury was clear.

The speed boats circled them.  With his head resting on the smooth, damp skin of what had to be his brother, Scott could only watch as they loudly debated if it was worth trying to snag him.

A tail – fluke, Scott dimly recalled – slapped the water when one got too close.  Scott was doused with water, his fingers tightening their grip as much as they could as the wave threatened to wash him and his useless wings back into the ocean, but the boat – carrying something that looked a lot less friendly than the simple handguns used by the men on the others - was capsized.

If he’d needed any confirmation he was being defended, that was it.

The orca that was almost certainly Gordon swam around in a circle, the movement nudging Scott further onto his back from where he’d slipped, more agitated clicks and whistles making it very clear that further advances would not be tolerated.

His wings – his waterlogged, injured wings – were just in the way.  Scott grit his teeth and tried to pull them in, away from the water and folded so he could let them go.  The left wing obeyed, albeit with effort against the weight of the added water.  The right screamed and despite himself he let out a choked-off cry which he hurriedly muffled by biting his arm.

Apparently that wasn’t moving.  Whatever they’d shot him with must have hit the muscles that controlled the spreading and folding of the wing.

One wing furled and one wing at full span had him sliding, pulled down by the spread weight on his right, and he snapped his left out again instinctively.  Another tight circle from the orca beneath him and he was shifted back to where he’d been.

So that meant no folding his wings.

Scott sighed, trying and failing to ignore the agony throbbing from his wing.  Around them, it seemed like the speed boats had decided it wasn’t worth battling an orca to get their prize.  The capsized men were being dragged onto boats, before the engines roared and they disappeared in the blink of an eye.

The aggressive clicks and whistles stopped for a moment.  When they started again, there was something different about them, and Scott got the distinct impression he was being addressed.  He might have been imagining it, but they sounded concerned.

“I’m okay,” he reassured the creature.  He wasn’t, not with a hole in his wing that was probably still leaking blood and exhausted from his battle to keep his head above water, but even if probably-Gordon knew that, he didn’t need him to say it.  “Thanks.”

Gordon or not, the orca had saved him.  Scott didn’t know what the men had been after, but anyone who tried to catch his attention by shooting him out of the air probably didn’t have friendship on the agenda.

He got another series of clicks and whistles in response, before the huge creature slowly began to swim. Scott could tell it was nowhere near the speeds an orca would normally travel at, but even that tugged at the wingtips still in the water, discomfort traveling up the appendages and resulting in additional loud complaints from the right.  But he didn’t complain; he, too, had no plans to hang around where he’d been shot down. The orca clearly had a destination in mind, and it was one Scott very much hoped was home.

It wasn’t long before a familiar engine whined into earshot.  Content to remain slumped where he was, numbing fingers weakly clutching the dorsal fin and head resting on the black skin, Scott only blinked as Thunderbird Two loomed in the distance.

Ahead of it was a black streak, diving straight for them.

“Scott!”

Virgil’s apparent nonchalance at landing directly on the orca’s back was the final, unnecessary, confirmation that it was Gordon.

Giant black wings, the biggest in the family by some half a metre or so, stayed fully extended for balance as Virgil crouched by him, one hand on the dorsal fin for extra stability while the other landed on his shoulder.

“What happened?” his brother demanded.  Scott could see worried deep brown eyes focusing on his right wing, and wondered if it looked as bad as it felt.

“Shot down,” he admitted, knowing there was no point lying when his bleeding wing was in full view.

Fear flashed through the worry in his brother’s eyes, and Scott knew he was thinking about what might have happened if Gordon hadn’t intervened. He plastered a reassuring grin on his face.

“I’m okay,” he promised.

“No, you’re not,” Virgil snapped back, wings bristling.  The hand on his shoulder moved and Scott muffled a cry as gentle gloved hands explored the area around the wound.  “This is nasty, Scott.”

He knew that, but he was okay.  He was okay because Gordon had been there, because Virgil was there, because he could hear Thunderbird Two coming to a hover overhead, with either Alan at the helm or under the remote control of Thunderbird Five’s inhabitants.

“I’m okay,” he repeated, wishing not for the first time that he had the same link with his brothers the middle three had, so he could push the emotions behind the words into Virgil’s head until he understood what he meant.

But then, the two of them had never needed that to understand each other.

Virgil’s eyes softened just a bit.

“Let’s get you home,” he said.  Orca-Gordon let out what sounded almost like an indignant set of clicks and whistles.  “I know you are, Gordon, but Thunderbird Two is faster and his wings are still in the water.”

Scott assumed Gordon had been protesting that home was already where he’d been taking him.

More clicks and whistles, but the orca slowed to a halt.  Virgil fiddled with his wrist comm, and the giant Thunderbird lowered, her belly opening and a harness descending.

Scott was no use at all, still too exhausted from his dunking to do anything except lay on Gordon’s back as Virgil fussed around him with straps until he was secured for hauling up.  It wasn’t the most glamourous of transportation, and being in the air without being able to rely on his wings for flight if something happened was more than a little unsettling, but it did the job.  With Virgil also hooked into the harness and travelling up alongside him – although his wings were only folded and not let go in what was a quiet assurance for Scott’s nerves at being mid-air with his own out of action, which his younger brother almost certainly did for that exact reason – he soon found himself safely inside the green ‘bird.

What he wasn’t prepared for, as Virgil lifted him to his feet and gently hauled an arm across his shoulders while his own snaked around Scott’s waist for support – obviously taking as much care as possible not to disturb his wings – was Gordon’s entrance.

Scott had assumed another harness would be sent down, if Gordon even chose to get on board instead of racing them home.  In his exhaustion, he had clearly forgotten his aquatic brother’s penchant for dramatics.

Watching an orca breach was breath-taking.  That much sea creature did not seem like it should be able to clear the water much, if at all, but in true Gordon style, the black and white face almost reached the still-open hatch before fading back into the tanned skin and blond hair of his human form.  Scott’s heart leapt up as he realised Gordon wasn’t high enough to grab the edge of the hatch, but before he could react, a tanned hand grabbed onto a trailing harness strap and his second-youngest brother climbed the rest of the way into the module bay.

Beside him, Virgil was all but quivering in vibrant disapproval.

“Gordon-” his brother growled.

“I knew what I was going,” Gordon interrupted, waving a hand as though to dismiss Virgil’s ire at the reckless stunt.  Whatever else was exchanged on the matter seemed to be non-verbal, as amber eyes flickered in Virgil’s direction in what could have been an eyeroll even as the blond picked his way over to Scott’s side.

Virgil was supporting him from his left, away from the injured wing, and Gordon didn’t get too close to his right out of obvious concern, but Scott still found himself the object of scrutiny.

“You look awful,” Gordon told him bluntly, stepping backwards as Virgil clearly decided to save the lecture for later and refocused on leading Scott and his still-spread wings over to the medical bay.

Scott had told them both that he was fine, and it was perfectly clear to him that saying it again would not affect his brothers’ opinions.  So he switched tactics.  “Thanks,” he said dryly, leaning heavily on the levity – and also Virgil’s shoulder as his slightly unsteady self was guided over to a stretcher. It worked enough to get a small grin from the blond.

Normally, the stretcher would be secured up against the module wall. With his wings still more outstretched than not, despite the water weighing them down – painfully, now that gravity was in the equation rather than buoyancy – there was no way that Scott would be able to lay on anything remotely close to a wall.  Brains, however, was a genius with multiple fail safes, and while they tended to try and avoid lifting on rescues unless there was no alternative, he had included a reconfiguration of the stretcher that could be laid on with wings outstretched.  Just in case.

It was secured to the roof of the module, lowered mezzanine style when required, with sides that folded out to support the outstretched wings. Additional telescopic legs extended from the underside to lock into ports on the module floor, firmly locking it in place against any movement the Thunderbird might make in flight.

With the rest of the equipment that could potentially be in the module, it was sometimes a tight fit, but it fit and that was what mattered.

Scott didn’t bother resisting as Virgil coaxed him onto it, trying his best not to entirely face-plant as he returned to horizontal and the relief of gravity no longer tugging at the edges of his wings.  Cushioning his head with his forearms, he shifted his left wing until it draped itself over the extension, still waterlogged.  A glance over at it showed pinions in disarray from his unwelcome dunking, the sensation of which hadn’t particularly registered over the pain of the other, but now that he’d seen it began to niggle incessantly in the back of his mind.

The right was less inclined to obey, muscles screaming in protest at the mere idea that they should move, and it was with great reluctance that he left it as it had flopped.

There had been enough crying out in pain in earshot of little brothers today.

Unfortunately, his brothers seemed to disagree as Virgil appeared somewhere near his head, murmuring apologies as his hands cradled the shoulder of the wing and manipulated it into position.  Lighter touches further down, out of sight, told him Gordon was helping the rest of the wing follow the movement.

Scott bit down on an arm to muffle any vocalisations at the pain.

“Sorry, Scott,” Virgil repeated, sympathetic pain in his own voice. “I’m going to need to stop the bleeding before you lose too much blood.”  Treatment meant more pain, but Scott knew it was an unfortunate necessity.

He turned his head away as Virgil drew out the anaesthetic, trying to ignore the sting of the needle at the base of his wing.  It wouldn’t completely dull the pain, their wings were all too sensitive for that, but it would take the edge off, at least.

“Hey.”  Gordon appeared in his line of vision, hair mussed where he’d obviously attacked it carelessly with a towel.  A hand rested on one of his arms, his second youngest brother always tactile, and more so after one of them had been in trouble.  Scott was half-surprised there wasn’t an octopus wrapping around him. Something in Gordon’s eyes told him it had been considered.

“Hey,” he replied, doing his best to ignore the sensations as Virgil got to work on his injured wing, sending shoots of supressed pain through his flight muscles as they reacted to whatever he was doing.  Scott had learnt from experience that sometimes it wasn’t worth watching.

Considering he’d been in the water, Gordon’s hand was surprisingly dry against his own still-wet skin.  It wasn’t like him to dry off so quickly; often it took a brother or three or a grandmother to persuade him otherwise.

His brother had something in mind, and Scott might not be linked with him, but he was pretty certain it involved him.

“Do you want a hand?”  Gordon glanced meaningfully at his wing – left, uninjured, wing – and as if on cue the irritation of pinions out of alignment flared up again.  Scott could handle it himself later, if Virgil didn’t get there first after finishing with the injury – which would no doubt include soothing the ruffled feathers on that wing as well – but later meant later and Gordon was offering to do it now.

Like all of them, there were very few people Scott trusted near his wings, and despite not having wings of his own, Gordon featured on that shortlist.

Gordon didn’t often touch their wings, not since gaining his own Mark and losing any and all jealousy he’d ever had about being the one left out even though he’d never cared to fly, but like Grandma – and Dad – had wriggled his way into learning to care for them regardless.  Scott had fond memories of watching Virgil talk Gordon through it on his own black feathers the first few times, offering himself up as practice. Their mental link had probably helped Gordon comprehend what it was like, and sometimes Scott wondered if it was similar for him and his own Mark, or if it was entirely different.

“I’d appreciate one,” he admitted, no reason nor desire to decline when it needed doing at some point anyway.  Gordon grinned and dropped a towel on his head.

Typical annoying little brother, but Scott took the hint and, careful not to jostle his right arm or wing, where Virgil was working, ran it over his hair to get the worst of the water away.

When he finished, Gordon was out of sight.  His location was betrayed a moment later, when Scott discarded the towel and nimble fingers immediately made themselves known at the junction of the wing and shoulder.  As always, a light tremble ran through the wing at the initial contact, which Gordon waited out before starting.

The methodical approach his brother settled into was soothing, and Scott didn’t have to work too hard to convince himself to focus on that rather than the far less soothing sensations coming from his right wing, where Virgil appeared to have progressed to wrapping the wound.

Considering both the size of his wings – they might be marginally smaller than Virgil’s, but they were still huge – and the waterlogging he couldn’t just shake away, Gordon’s treatment took time.  A towel was introduced, only the lightest of touches to avoid damaging any feathers, but enough to absorb at least some of the water, and Gordon’s fingers coaxed out enough of the rest that Scott could feel the weight easing away. It wasn’t perfect; he’d still need to shake the wing at some point, or at least hold it open while upright so the rest would seep away.  But it was enough to be a relief.

The secondary relief of his feathers realigning to true and the itch fading away was also very welcome indeed.

By the time Gordon was done with the back of his left wing, Scott could feel Virgil doing the same thing to his injured wing.  It wasn’t as enjoyable, entirely due to the injury and all sensations therefore determined to report as varying levels of pain, but it was a good pain – comparable to the satisfaction of peeling scabs – that faded as those feathers, too, found themselves realigned by the care of a brother.

“The front will have to wait a while,” Gordon said, reappearing in his eyeline.  There was another towel in his hands, which he was clearly using to get rid of the water that had transferred from Scott’s wings to his fingers.  “Feeling better?”

If Gordon had asked, Scott was more than willing to lift his wing from the stretcher so he could get at the currently face-down feathers, but the look in his brother’s eyes said that even if he did that, he wouldn’t be touching them.  Considering the bone-deep exhaustion that had done nothing but grow as he’d felt safer and safer with his brothers, it was true that Scott might – might – not be able to hold it up long enough.

“Yeah,” he acknowledged.  “Remind me not to go swimming with them lifted in the future.”

There was an aborted noise from Virgil, who still didn’t have the whole story and was no doubt going to be demanding it later – alongside the rest of the family – but Virgil wasn’t the one who’d faced down and prepared to attack multiple boats to keep him safe, so Scott ignored it.

Gordon knew what he was doing; he could see it in the quirk of his lips and the resigned amusement in his eyes.  There was more than one brother who would be having nightmares tonight, after all.

“If you even think about it, I’ll drag you straight back out faster than you can say Thunderbird One,” his brother replied after a moment. It was light-hearted, matching Scott’s attempt at levity to keep both their heads above water about what had happened, and what could have happened, but it was also a promise.

Gordon might not have the same link with him that he did with his other older brothers, but somehow he’d be there.  Like he was this time, and eyeing the swimming shorts that were the only attire his water-loving brother wore, Scott decided that just this once, he’d let him off going swimming so far from the island.