A Christmas Rescue

By Mazza

It was the night before Christmas but it was the last thing he cared about right now…

All Scott cared about was getting to Helen Hodgkin and her family on time. Looking at his brothers, it was the only thing they cared about as well.

"What's the plan of action, Scott?" Virgil asked him with a serious look on his face.

It was going to be tough. There had been an avalanche over the house in Oregon and no one was sure if they had arrived on the scene too late. All they could see of the house was the tell-tale chimney stack; otherwise they wouldn't have known where it was. All they could do was pray that the house hadn't collapsed but either way they still had to find out. The family were going to be suffering from the cold if they were still alive. The vapour coming out of Scott and his brothers' mouths was enough of a sign that the temperatures were plummeting and the wind was increasing, making it seem even colder.

"Right, Virg, you go and get the snow truck and the avalanche equipment and Alan, you had better go with him. Try and get the worst of the snow out of the way."

"F.A.B." They said in unison, heading out to their duties.

"What do I do?" Gordon asked.

"You and I are going to grab shovels and start digging. I just hope they're all okay in there."

"How many of them are there?" Gordon asked as he and Scott ran to get shovels through the snow.

"Four," Scott replied, "A Mom and her three kids. From local reports, the children are nine, seven and four. Their father abandoned them all not long ago."

Gordon shuddered, "God, sounds like they've had enough on their plate. What a thing to happen at Christmas."

Scott agreed. If he had kids of his own he certainly wouldn't abandon them. He wondered what the father would feel if he discovered that all of his kids had been wiped out by an avalanche on Christmas Eve. Remorse, Scott hoped.

Once they got the shovels, they ran back as fast as they could to the scene while Virgil and Alan were emerging out of the pod with the snow truck.

"Commencing mission now." Virgil confirmed through the wrist-com.

"Try to clear the packed snow near what I think is the front of the house. If we find a serviceable door it might save us having to come down through the roof."

"Right, Scott."

Scott and Gordon started the nerve-wracking climb up the mound of snow the avalanche had left to dig down to the roof. The wind cut into them through their thermal gear and caused them to nearly lose their balance on the lighter flurries of snow. Near the chimney stack, he and Gordon started to dig as fast as they could. Luckily, the snow wasn't too dense and had the consistency of frozen washing powder near the top but it wasn't to be underestimated. There was still hope that they would find a nearly intact roof. However, even through his tough thermal gloves, Scott could feel his hands start to seize up.

"Gee," Gordon shivered, "I hope we get down to the roof soon. The cold is pretty savage around here!"

"You said it." Scott replied clearing one of the more solid lumps of snow. Keeping moving was the only thing making the cold slightly bearable to him. "I think we need to get Brains or somebody to get us better gloves. Don't know about you but I'm pretty protective about my fingers. I would hate to part with any of them after being so attached."

"And toes." Gordon added.

Virgil and Alan, on the other hand, were having more trouble clearing the snow down on the ground as they seemed to skid against pushing the snow. "Scott, we're going to have to go out with pick-axes on this one to begin with as it's almost like a brick wall. Virgil has tried but it's no use. If we go with more force, it could put the family in more danger."

"Well then get the pick-axes, Alan, and step to it!" Scott replied briskly. "They could be dying of hypothermia in there! Luckily the snow here isn't as frozen solid so we're making progress with the roof. I hope to God that we don't meet more snow after that."

"Come on then, Alan," Virgil responded, admitting defeat with the snow truck, "let's get to it." With a smile he added, "Though we have fancy machines, in this instance you can't beat manual labour."

The tension was agonising for all four of the brothers. None of them could get to the house fast enough and the temperature was continuing to drop. After fifteen minutes or so, Gordon shouted out, "Scott, I've found roof tiles!"

"Great, Gordon, about time too."

"Looks intact."

"Let's see if we can find a window, wouldn't like to go barrelling in through the roof if there's someone underneath it."

"Good thinking."

After five minutes or so, they had found a skylight. "Can you see anybody?" Scott asked Gordon.

"It's all frosted up, hang on." He started to scrape the glass with the shovel to see inside, but all of a sudden the glass caved in to the room below. Gordon winced at Scott. "Oops."

"Hopefully there wasn't anyone underneath that." Scott looked at Gordon reproachful and then knelt down to shout in the house, "Hello? Anyone down there?"

After a few seconds he heard a small voice going, "Mom, Mom! Someone's here!"

At the sound of that voice, which was weak and filled with helplessness, Scott dropped down into the room below. The window could have cut him but he didn't care. It was a kid's bedroom, but none of them were in the room at the time. He nearly broke the door down to try to find the voice and found himself on the landing. Part of the wall had caved in at the other side of the house, it was lucky that he and Gordon had made their approach at the stable side as until Virgil and Alan had found the door, it could be the way out for a quick getaway.

"Hello?" Scott called out, "This is International Rescue, we're here to come and get you. Where are you?"

"Downstairs!" The voice called out shakily, "Kristin, do you hear that? International Rescue's here to get us!"

Scott nearly slid down the stairs to get down to the voice. The steps had frosted over it was that cold in the house. If he hadn't got his snow gear on he would be freezing himself. The wall where the front door should have been had fallen away, Virgil and Alan never would have found it. He tried the door to the left, nobody. When he opened the door to the right, he saw that the window was cracked and that four shaking bodies were huddled into each other in the far corner. He had found them, though he only hoped that it was in time to save them. Within seconds, he approached the family and stood as near as he dared, for standing too close before proper help came could have resulted in disaster.

The voice belonged to the youngest, a boy, in the centre of his mother and his two older sisters. They couldn't speak and their lips were starting to turn blue. None of them were dressed up for the conditions – only sweaters, jeans and slippers – and it looked like one of the sisters fingers were starting to turn too blue for Scott's liking. They were all huddled around the little boy trying to keep him warm but at a cost of freezing themselves.

"Gordon, I found them!" Scott said urgently into the wrist-com, "They're all alive but they're absolutely freezing. Bring down the snow blankets. Virg, Alan, stop digging and get back to the sickbay and prepare stretchers. They'll all be suffering from hypothermia."

The boy looked up at Scott, full of fear. "Are we going to be okay?"

Scott wished he could have hugged him and consoled him, the same way he had when his brothers were little, but he couldn't. The boy could freeze even more or go into shock and it was something Scott wasn't prepared to risk. Instead he replied as soothing as he possibly could, "You're all going to be fine, but we're going to get you out of here and make sure you're all alright."

The mother moved her eyes to look at Scott with huge relief filled in them. She tried to move her mouth to speak.

"It's all fine, honey." Scott soothed, "Don't try to move just now. My buddy is coming down with snow blankets until the rest of the team help you get out of here."

"Will Santa still be coming?" the boy looked up at his mother. Her eyes looked sadly down at him.

"Of course he will," Scott answered, not wanting the boy to give up, "In fact we're on call in case anything goes wrong with Santa's delivery. I'll put in a good word for you." He winked.

"Wow, you know Santa?" the boy exclaimed; one of the girls' eyes widened as well.

"Not personally, but my commander does. Thankfully, Santa's not needed our assistance so far, but he knows he can rely on us if anything goes wrong. So what are you hoping to get from him?" Scott felt it best to keep the conversation going until Gordon came down with the blankets. At least thinking about Christmas would keep all their minds pre-occupied from freezing.

"Well I hope I get the new fire truck, Kristin wants the new princess Barbie and Mel wants a guitar," he babbled.

Mel, the older sister, rolled her eyes at this. Scott figured that she was at the age where she had started not to believe.

"Wow," Scott reacted. "Good choice. When I was your age I had a rocket I used to play with all the time."

"I want to be a firefighter when I grow up." He beamed.

"It's a good thing to be," Scott agreed, trying to keep up the conversation, "The world certainly needs more firemen."

Gordon stumbled in with the blankets.

"At last," Scott smiled. He turned to face the shivering huddle, "Don't worry, we'll soon have you out."

As soon as the blankets were on the floor, Scott and Gordon set them all to the room temperature. These were no ordinary blankets. Brains had invented blankets with temperature sensors which were specifically designed to help people with hypothermia. Once they had been set to the temperature outside – which in this case was the temperature of the house itself – on a small panel at one corner, after thirty seconds they could be wrapped around the person and it gradually heated up to a warmer temperature at a pace which wouldn't send the sufferer to a possible fatal shock. Scott wasn't quite sure about the science behind it, he knew it was something about the chemicals in the microfibres but it was at this point that Brains had lost him. As long as they saved lives and he knew how to work them, he felt he didn't need to know.

When the blankets were ready, Scott lifted the boy out of his mother's lap and wrapped him in one of them while Gordon put the rest around Helen and the girls. The boy looked so helpless, a lot like Scott's brothers when they were little. But Scott couldn't think about that, he had to think of the task at hand.

"I brought some water as well." Scott shot Gordon a look. "Room temperature water; don't worry, I'm not stupid enough to bring in boiling water."

Gordon gave them all a bottle each with the caps opened. After a few seconds, Helen was able to speak.

"Thank you so much for keeping Freddie calm." She smiled up at Scott weakly.

"No problem, ma'am," Scott replied, "keeping people calm is what we do best."

"My name's not Freddie," the boy pouted at his mother, "It's Fred."

Scott chuckled, "You tell her, champ."

At that point, Virgil and Alan came down with stretchers to take the family out to the sickbay.

"Good grief, I thought I was going to break my neck down the stairs." Virgil exclaimed as he entered. Scott had noticed that Virgil had a cut on his face and there was a rip in Alan's jacket. The snow around the house must have been tougher than they expected.

"We'll need to take the younger ones first." Scott commanded. "The youngest girl, Kristin, is in a bad way and I don't know how long it's going to be before Fred passes out with the cold."

"Freddie can come with me at the end," Helen said when she realised that they only had two stretchers, "Take the girls first."

Virgil nodded and laid his stretcher near Kristin, "Come on, honey, we'll soon get you warmed up again." She could barely move so Virgil and Alan lifted her on to the stretcher, fastened the straps around her and took her up the stairs.

"I can move without help." Mel said sharply, thinking that Scott and Gordon were going to do the same. She managed to get on herself and was carried away, following her sister.

It took a bit longer to get out than get in, especially as the stretchers had to be manoeuvred out of the skylight. The wind was also proving to be against them as it kept blowing the top layers of snow over the freshly dug holes. Once they got to Thunderbird Two, Virgil and Scott went back for Helen and Fred, leaving Gordon and Alan to tend to Mel and Kristin.

As soon as they climbed back into what they had established as the girls' bedroom, they heard an almighty roar of falling rubble and gut-wrenching crunches of splintering wood coming from another part of the house. After that, nothing but silence. Scott and Virgil shared the same look of horror and fear between them for a few tense seconds, dreading that this would be a fatal blow to the operation.

Breaking their gaze, Scott suddenly tore out into the landing, calling out frantically, "Helen! Fred! Oh my God!" Once at the landing, he saw the scene of devastation in front of him. The last part of the wall of the landing had crashed down into the main hall… crushing the stairs. He felt like swearing, he should have ordered Alan to bring three stretchers and Helen and Fred could have waited in the safe part of the house.

Virgil joined his brother and looked down at the scene. "What are we going to do?"

Pulling himself together, Scott looked once more down at the damage to try to justify an answer. If the whole wall had given way, the internal structure of the house should have fallen with it but the upstairs rooms at the right hand side looked intact, which would mean that Helen and Fred could still be okay in the room below. As soon as he realised this he narrowed his eyes and responded to Virgil, "We're going down anyway. C'mon. We're going to need the mobile elevator."

"On it." With that, Virgil ran back out the skylight.

"Helen! Fred! Are you okay?" Scott shouted.

"M-mom doesn't look too good." Fred's weak voice faintly echoed through the cavern of the hall.

"Don't worry, Fred." Scott called, "I'll be right with you."

Scott looked around to see how he could get down. There was no way to climb. He knew it was nuts, but he only had one other option. No way was he going to leave a four year old boy in despair on Christmas Eve if his mother "didn't look too good". There was only one thing for it: he had to jump.

He surveyed the scene. If he could only get close to some dubious looking banister beneath him, he should be able to make it. Deciding that it was now or never, he made a leap. He landed where he wanted to but a bit awkwardly on his left leg. Although he was able to move it, he felt that it would be one of those things that would smart later. He limped back into the room where they had found the family and Fred came running up to him.

"Something hit Mom."

"Don't panic, Fred. I'll check it out." He bent down to see Helen. It looked like she had taken a good knock on the head from a bit of wall. She needed to get to a hospital, fast.

Fred ran to Scott and knelt down beside him. Scott put his arm around him, "Don't worry, buddy, she's going to be okay. We just need to wait for one of my friends to come back to lift us up. I need you to be brave for a little while longer."

"Okay." Fred agreed weakly.

Scott held him tighter to his side, "Atta boy." Fred wrapped his arms around Scott's middle.

A few minutes later, Virgil shouted, "Scott, where are you?"

"Down here!" Scott shouted, "and hurry it up, Virgil. The mother's unconscious."

Scott knew that Virgil would have no problem installing the mobile elevator by himself so he decided to stay with Fred to help keep him calm and rest his own twinging leg a little bit. Now that the adrenaline had subsided as he knew of Helen and Fred's condition, his leg started to throb from the pain. He hoped to himself that he would be able to move it when Virgil had got down to them.

The clamps were set into place and Scott could hear the mechanical winches lowering Virgil down. This was a handy invention Brains had come up with. It was light to carry, easy to install and could take the weight of an elephant if the ground the clamps were attached to was stable enough.

In a minute or so, Virgil came in with the stretcher. "How on earth did you get down here?"

"Jumped." Scott smiled. "Couldn't leave Fred all on his own."

"Says he who doesn't want kids," Virgil jeered, kneeling down to Helen and checking her pupils. "Right, let's get her out of here." He and Scott lifted and fastened her in the stretcher.

"What's up with your leg?" Virgil asked.

Scott had been hoping that his brother wouldn't notice the limp and tried to sound casual about it to draw the attention away, "Just landed awkwardly, that's all." When that was met with Virgil's concerned look, he responded with, "Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. We need to get her out of here."

"What do I do?" Fred asked Scott.

Realising that Helen had meant to hold on to Fred when she was rescued, Scott realised that they hadn't brought a stretcher for him. Virgil looked at him with deep concern.

After thinking a few seconds, he replied to Fred, "Tell you what, climb on my back. Do you think you will be able to hold on? It will only be while we're carrying the stretcher."

"Gordon," Virgil spoke urgently into his wrist-com, "get back out to the roof of the house. The mother is unconscious and someone needs to carry Fred to the sickbay."

"F.A.B." Gordon replied.

"Okay." Fred agreed.

Virgil took the elevator up with Helen first and then came back down for Scott and Fred. After that, they quickly dismantled the elevator and Virgil packed it into a rucksack, which he then put on his back.

"Right, Fred," Scott said once Virgil was ready, "Here we go." He lifted Fred up on his shoulders. He took pride in the fact that out of all his brothers, he could do a number of things with children on his shoulders through hours of practice when he was younger. Scott put him down when they manoeuvred Helen out the window and handed Fred up to Virgil so he could clamber out. At that point, Gordon was waiting for them and he and Virgil took Helen down to Thunderbird Two while Scott carried Fred.

"How are you doing, kid?" Scott asked him.

"Cold." Fred shivered into him.

"Don't worry, we'll get you warmed up and running around soon."

Virgil wasted no time when everyone was aboard and prepared for take-off.

Fred gave Scott one final hug, "Thanks, sir. Remember about Santa!"

"Will do." Scott smiled, but now he was blanching. How was Santa going to get to him? He didn't want Fred to go through the rest of his life thinking that International Rescue were liars.

Scott boarded Thunderbird One and headed back to base. In that half hour he thought long and hard about what he had to do, but how to pull it off was a different story.

Once Scott got back, his leg was examined – he had only pulled a muscle – and decided to rest up in the lounge. His grandma had come in with a cup of hot chocolate for her "brave boy". However, he still hadn't come up with a solution to how he could get Santa over to Fred. He couldn't do it himself now that he was injured.

Scott had noticed that Jeff was looking down at him from his desk. His eyes filled with concern, "What is it, son?"

Knowing that he would probably need his dad's help to pull it off, Scott told him the whole story about how he promised Fred that Santa would find him.

Jeff chuckled, "Well, son, that's mighty good of you to think about that. I have a plan…"

Back in Oregon, Fred was lying in a hospital bed being treated for hypothermia. It was Christmas morning. The rest of the children were excited as their parents were coming in with what Santa had brought them during the night. A boy a few beds down from him got the fire truck he wanted. But Fred knew that nobody was going to be coming in for him. His grandmother was out of state and he didn't know where his dad was. Santa's presents were just going to have to wait.

A lot of the nurses looked sadly at him and gave him some candy to try and cheer him up but it was no use. They had a miserable child on Christmas Day. His new friend, Jimmy, said that he could play with his new toys but it wasn't the same for Fred.

Once all the visitors had gone and the ward was preparing for lunch, one of the nurses came in excitedly and went up to Fred. "Well, Fred, it looks like you have a visitor."

And in he came, all dressed in red, rosy cheeked and all jolly, "Ho, ho, ho!"

The rest of the children all buzzed and cheered with excitement. Santa had come to visit!

"Hello, Fred, really sorry I'm late! I couldn't find you because your house was covered in snow, but International Rescue told me that you were here, so I rushed back here as fast as I could to give you and your sisters their presents," Santa said in a booming, jolly voice.

"Wow, Santa! The International Rescue man was right!"

"And I'm very grateful to that brave, young man for telling me, otherwise I might have missed you and we wouldn't want that." He brought out a wrapped parcel out of his sack and handed it to Fred.

Fred tore off the paper immediately and to his delight it was the fire truck he had always wanted. "Wow, thanks Santa!" And he hugged him.

Santa hugged him back, "No problem, young man. International Rescue told me that you had been through a horrible ordeal so you certainly deserved it. You'll need it to be a fireman."

Fred gasped, "How did you know that, Santa?"

"Nothing gets past me," Santa winked, "And after you being so brave, I think you will make a terrific fireman."

"You really think so?" Fred beamed.

"I know so," he replied, "I'm afraid I need to go and see your sisters, but take care and I will come to see you next year."

"Thanks Santa! Bye!"

After he left, Fred still couldn't help but beam. The other kids were jealous and parents all smiled. He noticed that some of the mothers were crying, but why he didn't know. All he cared about was that Santa had come to see him and that he had a fire truck. He was determined that he was going to prove to Santa that he was going to be a really good fireman and just as brave as the man from International Rescue.

"This is Tracy Two calling base, request permission to land." Jeff said down the inter-com.

"Base calling Tracy Two, you're clear to land and you're just in time for turkey." Scott replied.

"Mission was a success, Scott. Santa has visited the younger ones and I made sure that there was a present for Helen as well."

"Gee, I'm sure glad!"

"International Rescue have done it again and I'm glad it was me who helped in this rescue, for once!"

A few days later, Helen Hodgkin woke up to a hospital ward. "Nurse, nurse, where are my children? What happened to Freddie?"

"It's okay," the nurse consoled her; "The kids will all be fine. They're all suffering from hypothermia, same as you, and a bit shaken up but they will all recover. You had a nasty hit on the head but there are thankfully no signs of serious physical trauma. The kids' recovery has certainly been helped along by surprise visit from Santa." She winked.

"Santa… Oh my God, I forgot it was Christmas!"

"Don't you worry, he got here thanks to International Rescue. Fred got that fire truck that's all the rage just now, Kristin got the new Princess Barbie doll and Mel got a blue guitar, which the nurses have to keep telling her off not to play so loud."

Helen laughed.

The nurse also laughed, "Santa also made a delivery for you. He said that it was from International Rescue themselves as he doesn't deliver presents for adults."

Helen smiled as the nurse handed her a square box. When she opened it, inside was a bottle of perfume. An expensive bottle of perfume too… There was a card inside, which read:

To Helen

Just a little gift to make sure that you weren't left out. No one should feel left out at Christmas, especially after an ordeal like that. We wish you all a Merry Christmas, hope you all get better soon and wish you a prosperous New Year.

From everyone on the International Rescue Team

After that, Helen couldn't stop smiling.

The nurse widened her eyes when she caught a glimpse of what was in Helen's box. "Oh my God, they didn't give you the new Givenchy? It's so expensive these days! They certainly go all out on who they rescue, don't they?"

"I wasn't expecting that but I'll always be grateful," Helen beamed, "Not only have International Rescue saved us, they've saved our Christmas as well."