Short Stories and Oneshots

Helping Hands

Author: FreelyBeYourself 

Platform: Fanfiction.net

Type: Thunderbirds (movie-verse)

Movie-verse. A missing scene fic of sorts following the events in London, in which Fermat needs help and thankfully has two honorary big brothers to provide it. Fluff/angst/hurt-comfort.

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It was on the way back from the bank that he first felt it: a twinge in his lower back, a deep, deep ache that was somehow neither muscular nor skeletal but seemed to encompass aspects of both. Reaching back absentmindedly, twisting a little in his safety restraint, he tried to rub the soreness out of the spot – only to yelp loudly in pain, clamping his other hand over his mouth to stop the sound before he drew too much attention to himself. This was not his moment to ruin; everyone was reveling in the fact that they were still somehow alive, and Fermat felt he had no right to disturb that reveling. Suddenly feeling claustrophobic in his need to stay inconspicuous, Fermat sucked in a deep, steadying breath.

"Fermat?" Scott called, looking back at him over his shoulder from where he sat at the controls of Thunderbird One. The rocket was currently flying over California, and even as Fermat watched, the coast disappeared behind them and suddenly there was nothing but water for as far ad the eye could see. How ironic, Fermat thought, that the endless water, which was their safety buffer, the isolation it provided which allowed International Rescue to run undetected, could look so lonely and forbidding. Until this morning, it had always looked like coming home.

"I'm f-f-f-fine, Scott," he replied quietly, perhaps a beat too late, and Scott frowned in disbelief, but let it drop, turning back to the windshield as he flew. Technically the rocket should be flying on autopilot, but Fermat knew that Scott needed the distraction; like everyone else, Scott had reached his breaking point, and flying was the only thing stopping him from losing it right then and there. (And Fermat only knew this because he was much more observant than anyone gave him credit for. He also knew that, in the seat to his left, Lady Penelope was redoing her makeup not because she wanted to look decent, although, he mused, that was probably part of it; but rather, she was trying to keep her hands busy so that they wouldn't shake. And in the seat next to Scott, Parker was only pretending to sleep – Fermat had caught the man peeking out between his eyelashes every few minutes, as if expecting trouble. Yes, Fermat caught onto a lot, and had become quite adept at reading body language – a fact which he had never felt the need to share with anybody. That knowledge of body language was also why he was perfectly aware that nobody wanted to have a conversation with him).

Looking down at his own shaking hands, Fermat's eyes widened as he realized that the tips of the fingers on his right hand were bloody. He happened to know for a fact that they had not been this way a few moments ago. Carefully reaching back once more to inspect his lumbar region, he winced as he bit back the pain which he had now come to anticipate. When he pulled his hand back around again, more blood than before appeared. It wasn't a lot – not a startling amount by any means – but when had he been hurt? Fermat honestly couldn't remember. Scientifically speaking, he knew that he was coming off an adrenaline high, and that the adrenaline had probably been what had stopped him from feeling this injury until now. Wouldn't it be ironic, he mused, if everyone managed to survive the trauma of the day – freezers, lack of oxygen in a satellite in geosynchronous orbit, fist fights with people twice their size, near-incineration – and he, Fermat, died from an injury he didn't even know that he had?

The thought was disturbing, and he felt himself slowly being overcome by a sense of panic. Surely not; surely he wouldn't die now, not after surviving the island invasion and flying all the way to London and helping to save not only the Tracys, but an entire monorail full of innocent people from death.