Once again I have to apologise for the delay in posting - real life, specifically work, has (unfortunately) taken over lately. This might be the last story for a while as things are likely to be busy for some time yet and I hate leaving big gaps between updates. I've still got plenty of ideas and hopefully I'll get the chance to put them into words soon. A big, big, thank you to everyone who's read and reviewed this one and once again, I'm sorry it's taken so long to complete. Whirlgirl, a special thanks to you, I love reading your feedback and I appreciate it more than I can say. Bee

Chapter Six

Brains could only stare at the timer as it continued its relentless countdown towards zero. If he'd been a different kind of man he might have taken the opportunity to relieve some of the fear and frustration he was feeling by taking a swing at the person who'd just made a bad situation a whole lot worse, but, he reasoned, what good would that do? Blake hadn't known what was at stake when he'd disturbed Brains as he checked out the bomb. Whatever his faults, ultimately he was just a man hoping for a good night out, just as all the others had been a short time ago. Not Brains himself, of course - his objective had simply been to get out of the place as quickly as possible.

That at least hadn't changed, but Brains knew his chances of success were minimal. He should tell John what was going on, say his goodbyes whilst he could...

"What's wrong?" Blake was a con man to be sure, but he was a good one, highly-skilled in the art of reading faces and body language. The sudden tension in the back and shoulders of the man in front of him hadn't gone unobserved. He reached out to grab Brains' shoulders and pull him away, then let his hands drop as a ripple of excitement ran through the crowd of people who were staring up at the ceiling watching the hole through which Tin-Tin had disappeared.

Swinging round, he watched as the girl lowered herself down through the ceiling panel and nimbly clambered down the plastic palm tree.

Coughing as she breathed in a lungful of gas - the fresh air of the ventilation shaft had been more than welcome - she announced that there was indeed a way out, a statement greeted with cheers from everyone, including Blake. Forgetting Brains for a moment, he headed across to hear what she had to say.

"There's an access tunnel alright," Tin-Tin informed them. "The only trouble is that the cover's screwed down. But if we can get it open we can make our way through and into the old tube station."

Blake saw a chance to regain a little dignity, still smarting after the humiliation of being unable to scale the palm tree. "Where do your maintenance guys keep the tools, Sir?" he asked loudly, striding over to George Underwood.

Whilst Underwood pondered this, Tin-Tin moved over to Brains. "Can I have the..." The hand she was holding out to receive Brains' toolkit dropped as she registered the expression on his face.

"What's happened?"

Brains' stutter was always worse when he was stressed. He didn't have the time to explain in words, so he simply stood aside and pointed at the timer.

They had just over seven minutes. It wasn't nearly enough.

"Oh, Brains..."

Brains had never admired her more than he did in that moment. A lesser person would have given up, but not Tin-Tin.

"Give me that toolkit!" she ordered. "We can save some of them. There's nothing you can do about that thing?"

Brains shrugged. He'd defused bombs before - or at least, he'd given instructions from the safety of the lounge on Tracy Island whilst someone else did the job - but he wasn't sure he could do anything with this one. For a start, it was so haphazardly constructed, with wires trailing everywhere, that he doubted the person who had set it would have followed any of the usual rules.

"I-I'll t-t-try."

Tin-Tin gave him a hopeful smile before dashing back to the others, immediately issuing instructions to some of them, sending a couple up the palm tree and through the ceiling, along with the toolkit, then getting a few more to help organise the others into an orderly line. Blake would have been useful right then - people still believed him to be a member of International Rescue and automatically did what he said - but typically, he'd disappeared. But at least it meant she could get the job done with no distractions. Those who admitted to a fear of heights or had some other reason why climbing might be a problem, were sent to the back of the queue, something which would condemn them to certain death - not that they knew that, of course. Not for the first time the girl wondered how Scott Tracy could make triage decisions like this on almost a daily basis yet still sleep at night. Well, her conscience wouldn't be plaguing her about this one, that was for sure - she wasn't even in the queue. She wouldn't be alive to regret anything.

She guessed they had about five minutes left. If only she could talk to Alan one last time...

"We're in!" The cry came from one of the men she'd sent to get the tunnel open and people began to make their way up to safety. Satisfied that the escape attempt was going as well as it possibly could, she made her way back to Brains.

"Any luck?" she whispered, resting a calming hand on his back.

Brains shook his head. He paused for a moment in whatever he'd been doing and slipped his watch off his wrist, passing it back to Tin-Tin.

"Thank you." Tin-Tin gripped his hand for a moment, then moved away to a quiet corner, trying to find the words to express what she was feeling right now.

It seemed Alan didn't have the words either and they simply stared at each other for a long moment. Finally Tin-Tin drew in a deep breath, but just as she was about to speak, the unwelcome sound of Blake's voice echoed around the club.

"There's a bomb?"

It seemed George Underwood hadn't just told him where to find the tool box... Tin-Tin cursed both men as panic broke out amongst those who up till now had been waiting patiently for their turn to leave. As the hitherto orderly line disintegrated and people charged towards the only means of escape, she gave Alan one last sad smile before reluctantly breaking the connection and making what turned out to be a futile effort to calm things down.

"Did you have to tell him?" she snapped at Underwood, who at least wasn't adding to the chaos, being too unfit to even contemplate trying to scale the palm tree.

"He's International Rescue!" Underwood protested. "I thought he'd help, not..." Words failed him as he watched Blake knock a girl to the ground as he clambered awkwardly up the palm tree.

Tin-Tin didn't bother replying, instead heading back to Brains who was also watching the mayhem.

"Any luck?" she asked.

"N-no."

"How long?"

Brains held up two fingers, tried to smile and failed miserably. Tin-Tin reached for his hand and clutched it tightly.

A shout rang out amongst the screams and curses that had filled the room ever since Blake had started the panic. Sure enough, it was the man himself, protesting as someone prised his hands away from the branch he was clinging to - he'd made it about a third of the way up the tree before freezing. Running out of patience, the man behind him shoved him out of the tree before continuing on his way. Blake hit the ground and lay there breathing heavily for a moment before rolling away to avoid being trampled underfoot by those still hoping to escape.

Brains turned back to the timer, unwilling to witness the fear and distress of the others. Thirty seconds. Was his life really over? It had been a good one - well, it had once he'd met the Tracys. At least he'd accomplished some wonderful things. The Thunderbirds would continue to fly, and for that he could be proud.

Twenty seconds...

Ten...

Tin-Tin gripped his hand even more tightly. "I'm sorry I got you into this," she whispered.

"I-I'm sorry I c-couldn't get y-you out," he told her.

Five...

Four...

Three...

Two...

Would he be aware of it? Would it hurt? Was there anything after this? Would he and Tin-Tin be together if there was?

One...

Brains closed his eyes as the timer clicked over to zero.

A few seconds later he opened them again.

"Brains...?" Tin-Tin's voice was barely a whisper.

He looked at the timer.

Zero.

"Is it...?" Tin-Tin still seemed incapable of forming a sentence.

Brains didn't dare touch anything. "I-I d-don't know," he answered. "M-maybe it's a d-dud. Or who-whoever set it d-didn't d-do it r-right."

"Well they messed up everything else," Tin-Tin said. Suddenly she seemed to realise she was still clutching Brains' hand. Releasing it, she murmured something about making sure they took advantage of whatever extra time they had, moving back to the rapidly diminishing group of people still waiting for the chance to leave and doing her best to help them.

Brains reported back to John, both embarrassed and delighted at the cheers that greeted the news of their survival.

"One's already landed," John told him. "Two will be there any minute now."

By the time Scott and Alan appeared in the club only a handful of people were left. Blake was amongst them, a second attempt to scale the tree having proved as unsuccessful as the first. He'd never expected to come face to face with the real International Rescue and he frantically tried to think of some way to excuse his duplicity.

But it seemed he wouldn't need to. Everyone left was too keen to get out to waste a thought on him and the IR crew ignored him completely, apparently more concerned with getting to the girl who had so fascinated him and the strange man who accompanied her. Well, they'd been the ones to get everyone out, it was natural they'd want to talk to them.

But she was bound to tell them about him, and that couldn't bode well. He took another look at the tree. It looked just as terrifying as it had before, but surely he could do it this time...?

He couldn't.

He got about halfway before freezing, unable to move either up or down.

"Hold tight, Sir, we'll get a rope," the dark-haired IR man called, barely bothering to hide an amused smile.

The blond man wasn't concerned about him at all, all his attention focused on the girl. Well, Blake could hardly blame him. She seemed quite taken with him, too. It looked like that geek she'd arrived with was finally out of the picture. Blake couldn't even see him. He'd probably made himself scarce, not wanting to look inadequate in the presence of some real heroes.

The tree swayed a little as someone began to climb. Shaking, Blake gripped the branches even more tightly.

The climber drew level with him and Blake's mouth fell open. It was the man he'd just dismissed so scathingly. He couldn't believe it! Not only had this man got a girl Blake couldn't get, but he seemed to have a lot more physical prowess, too.

Brains smiled as he passed Blake. Heights didn't bother him and he'd undergone some basic training when IR had been set up. He didn't often do anything like this, and he could easily have waited for Scott and the others to set up a ladder, but he just couldn't help himself. The look on Blake's face...

Half an hour later it was all over. Everyone was safely evacuated from the club, Virgil and Gordon had made the place safe - the bomb had indeed been wired up wrongly and had never been in any danger of going off - and now the air was clear again and the broken gas pipe sealed. George Underwood was on his way to a police station and International Rescue were preparing to leave.

Those who had been trapped had been held until a medical team had checked them out, but there had been no ill-effects from the gas they'd breathed in and one by one they were sent on their way. Blake had kept his head down while he waited, relieved that no one was taking much notice of him now that the real International Rescue, complete with uniforms, gadgets and - best of all - the Thunderbird machines, were on the scene. He sneaked over to the park where they'd landed, desperate to get a glimpse of these incredible craft,.

That wasn't all he'd seen, though.

That girl and the International Rescue man were locked in a tight embrace, the man she'd been with originally watching from the side. Then the red-haired IR man came up and gave him a hug, laughing as he said something Blake couldn't catch.

Now what was all that about?

He turned to leave - and forgot Tin-Tin immediately as he bumped into the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen.

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry," she said, her voice as sensuous as her appearance. Her clothes suggested money - lots of it, in fact - and her aristocratic accent just confirmed it.

As the woman expressed her deep concern for him after the ordeal he'd just endured, insisting he allow her to take care of him, Blake thought that maybe he could salvage something from the night after all.

It seemed the woman felt the same way. "I'll just call up the Rolls," she told him. Then we can go somewhere private and, well..."

The smile she gave him nearly took his breath away. Oh yes, Blake thought, as he obediently followed her to - of all things - a pink Rolls Royce, his luck was in, alright. This could change the course of his life forever.

It did.