#but we shan't dwell! we shall enjoy this part and we shall enjoy the day! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

tracybirds · 6 months

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I know I said this yesterday but it's beginning to feel like Christmas for real with my Sydney family having arrived! I was SO happy to see them last night and we're hanging out all day today and I haven't seen them since before covid so this is the most special thing!! Thank you to @gumnut-logic for reading through the first part of it, although I must admit to running wild this morning with the last part so any weirdness there you can blame squarely on me haha <3

[Day 1] | [Day 2] | [Day 3 - you are here]

Five Days Where Christmas Didn't Seem To Go As Planned

Day Three

Gordon shoved Alan’s shoulder roughly as he walked past, causing Alan to yelp as he overbalanced, nearly falling out of the chair.

“Gordon, play nicely,” said Virgil, frowning.

Typically, Gordon ignored him, tapping his brother’s cheek.

Alan groaned. It had been a long night, called out in the early evening only to return home as the sun peeked over the horizon once more.

“It’s comfy here,” he muttered, turning to nestle his cheek into the curved edge of the chair.

“Yeah, sure bud,” said Gordon, rolling his eyes. “Come on, let’s go Al, those showers have our names on ‘em.”

Virgil yawned.

“I can carry you if you like,” he offered, perfectly earnest.

Alan’s eyes flew open. “I’m coming, I’m coming,” he grumbled. “Kayo laughed at me for a week the last time, don’t you dare pick me up.”

He dragged himself across the cockpit, staring blankly into thin air in a daze. Preoccupied with the thought of a hot shower and a morning nap with the sea breeze flowing through with windows, he hardly noticed the figure waiting for them impatiently as the hydraulic lift lowered them into the hangar.

“Scott?” asked Virgil, and Alan snapped back to attention. He’d expected Scott to vanish long before Two made it back to Tracy Island, with no issues that arose during the mission and debrief scheduled for later that day.

Freshly focused, Alan could tell that something wasn’t right, enough that Scott had waited for them and was now speaking urgently to them all. Alan blinked, trying to shape the sounds into words, and it was only when he yawned widely and his ear popped that things fell into place.

“I just needed to head you off before you head upstairs,” said Scott, looking mildly disgusted. “I got out of the elevator and had to come straight back down, it was only luck that she didn’t spot me.”

“Well, we’re all experts in hiding from Grandma and her baking now,” said Gordon, grinning. “Hey Virg, let’s go crash in Brains’ rooms, he’s been wanting to marathon those old school scifi-horrors.” He wriggled his fingers at Virgil. “Oooh, I’m a space alien here to take over your mind. Go forth, do my laundry for a week.”

“He’ll uninvite you if you’re going to be annoying about it,” said Virgil, with a long-suffering sigh. “Thanks for the warning, Scott. We’ll stay low for a few hours.”

Alan, meanwhile, was thinking hard.

He swayed a little, fighting the temptation to close his eyes, searching every scrap of memory, because something about what Scott was describing sounded uncomfortably close to home.

“Grandma’s been baking?”

Scott and Virgil exchanged a glance.

“Keep up, Al,” said Gordon impatiently.

Only Alan had one piece of information that his brothers didn’t.

When the siren had gone off and they’d gathered in the living room, Alan had been baking cookies for Christmas. He’d meant for it to be a surprise.

And he’d turned the oven off, he was sure of it, even through a distorted haze of exhaustion, he could remember the temperature dial spinning under his fingers before he raced upstairs, but maybe it hadn’t gone all the way and even as they’d flown out, his cookies were slowly starting to brown, then blacken into a crisp.

He could have burnt the house down.

He sat down suddenly, right there on the floor.

“Alan!” cried three voices, and he batted them away.

“You’ve gone white as a sheet,” said Virgil, frowning as he crouched next to him. He reached out a hand, feeling for his forehead and Alan rolled his eyes.

“Get off me, I’m just tired,” he said, feeling slightly sick. He couldn’t let them find out, he needed to get out of here.

“Look, Grandma won’t ambush me like this, she’ll just want me in bed. Which is where I want to be too, so if you guys want to hide away instead, be my guest.”

He wasn’t even lying, and he rubbed at the grit forming in his eyes, allowing a yawn to take over his entire body.

“I’ll take you,” said Scott reluctantly, and Alan felt a twinge of irritation twitching below his eye.

“You don’t need to escort me,” he snapped, getting back to his feet. “I can manage it.”

He scowled at each of them, putting as much fierceness into the glare as he could.

For a second, he thought Scott and Virgil would continue to argue, but Gordon leapt in before they had the chance.

“You guys promised you’d treat him like an adult when he’s wearing the uniform,” he reminded them. “Are either of you going to start volunteering to be supervised in the shower and tucked in tight? I’ll do it, I don’t care.”

Alan shot Gordon a grateful look.

“I’m going to bed then,” said Alan, and he spun on his heel and walked slowly and calmly towards the elevator door.

That is to say, he bolted.

When the doors next opened, Alan found Scott hadn’t been kidding about the smell, the smoke still evident despite the air being cleared.

He ran down the steps two at a time, holding his breath as he skidded into the kitchen.

Kayo looked up from the magazine she’d been reading and put it aside.

“So,” she said. “These are yours. I’m assuming they’re not chocolate.”

She swung around a plate of dark brown cookies, burnt black where the butter had melted onto the tray while baking.

Alan collapsed onto the barstool next to her.

“Is it bad?”

Kayo shrugged. “They’re just burnt. Nothing major.” She grinned, her eyes sharp and mischievous. “I saw Scott making his escape earlier. Did he come down to warn you all away?”

Alan could only nod miserably.

“Do you think it’s genetic?” he asked. “I just wanted to do something nice.”

“The only thing you did wrong was not pull the tray from the oven when you turned it off,” Kayo said cheerfully. She chose one of the cookies and neatly broke it in half. “See? They’re not burnt burnt, they’re just a tad overdone. I spotted them when Grandma was preheating the oven earlier and rescued them for you.”

Alan lifted his head, hope stirring in his chest. “So, the smoke?”

“Oh, that was all Grandma.” She bit into the end of the cookie and pulled a face. “These aren’t that great either, if I’m being honest.”

“Well, thanks,” said Alan, feeling stung. He yawned. “I suppose we should just chuck them then.”

“We can probably save them for something,” said Kayo. “Make them into ornaments or something.”

She jostled his shoulder. “What’s up though, Al? You didn’t come racing up here because of bad biscuits.”

“I kinda did,” said Alan. “I dunno, I thought maybe a fire had started. Like if something went wrong here, it’d be all my fault.” He yawned again. “I guess that seems silly.”

Kayo slung an arm around him, pulling him into a hug.

“We can handle your mistakes, Alan. Best part of being one of the youngest is everyone else has already made them and they’ll help you out. It’s not all on you.”

“Does that mean the others have all nearly burnt the house down?”

She grinned down at him. “Oh, the stories I could tell if I weren’t sworn to secrecy.”

Alan grinned back, a spark of mischief shaking off the bleariness momentarily. “I can keep a secret. Was it Virgil? John?”

“You’re getting nothing out of me,” said Kayo with a laugh. “Go to bed, Alan. We’ll fix these when you can sit in that chair without falling onto your face.”

He slipped down from the stool and stumbled, the sway of exhaustion rushing up to meet him once more.

“I might need a little help,” he admitted. “Promise you won’t tell Scott?”

Kayo mimed locking her lips and smiled at him, fond and warm.

“I promise.”

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