"Brains just informed me that Selene's car is ready for a test ride and that means someone has to teach her how to actually fly the thing."
"Teaching a Witch to fly, can't be that hard," Scott joked.
John snorted. "You do remember how we met, right?"
"Ah, yeah, good point."
John nodded. "So, who's volunteering? And make sure she doesn't find out, I don't want her panicking and stressing herself out over it, you know what she was like when you were overseeing her gravity training."
"So you're just going to spring it on her?"
"That's the plan."
"You're a braver man than I am, bro."
"Or just stupid," Gordon helpfully added. From where he sat in one of Three's launch chairs he had been invisible to John.
John closed his eyes briefly, oh, this wasn't good. Gordon was usually firmly on Selene's side in almost everything, not always because he agreed with her but because he feared and loved her in equal parts, that and he always found it hilariously funny to watch her exploding at people.
"Gordon, you cannot tell her about this, she thinks she's got plenty of time before it's ready."
"Fine, but let me just say one thing?"
John sighed, ready to promise anything to ensure his silence. "Sure."
"Not it."
Scott, realising that his second youngest brother might actually be the smartest of them all followed his lead. "Not it!"
"Scott, really?"
Scott grinned. "You're the stupid one, not me. Besides, she's your fiancée, you do it."
"Do you think Parker..."
"He and Penelope are attending the opening of that new underwater hotel for the week."
"Virgil?"
"Busy with Two's bimonthly tune up, only leaving for emergencies."
"Kayo?"
"Can you actually imagine Kayo having the patience to teach anyone anything?"
Crap, he was right. That only left..."Alan?"
"Would break if she yelled at him and he'd let her get away with not even trying. Nope, this one is all on you."
Shit. He might be a little inexperienced when it came to relationships but even he knew the two golden rules, never agree that her butt looked big in those jeans even if it appeared she has a beach ball stuffed down her pants and never, ever, teach her to drive. He just hoped he wasn't suddenly single by the end of the lesson.
"I guess I'm on my way, ask Grandma to take over monitoring duty will you?"
***
Selene grabbed her phone when it pinged up a message, surprised but very pleased to read it. John, as always, was a man of few words 'I'm outside'.
She snatched up her jacket as she ran out the door, clattering down the stairs. It had been a long week filled with back to back appointments for her and she was more than ready for a break. She'd been about to call Virgil and request a pickup but it seemed her man had other ideas. Honestly, much as she loved his family, the thought of having a night, just the two of them in her peaceful little apartment seemed like heaven.
She swung open the front door and abruptly stopped. There was her car, her cute little car with its sleek shape and shiny black paint job and her spaceman behind the wheel. That meant...oh crap.
The door opened and he unfolded his long frame from the driver's seat, stepping out of the car.
"Is Brains finished with her, is she done?"
"Hello to you too."
She pulled him in for a quick kiss. "Hello gorgeous man."
"That's more like it.. Now, are you ready to take her for a spin?"
Her eyes widened as she stuck her head inside, checking out the modifications. Where she had previously had nothing more complicated than heater dials and a radio she now had something that looked like it had been ripped out of the Enterprise and shoehorned into her dashboard.
She wasn't a bad driver, just a simple one, and one that was used to roads and signposts, not sky and 'turn left at the third cloud'. She could get lost going to the bathroom, she wasn't good at picking out landmarks. That was why she often drove to her witchy venues and flew the last mile for appearances sake.
How had she ever allowed herself to be talked into this? She glanced over her shoulder at John who was none too subtly checking out her behind where she was bent over. Oh yeah, that was why. She had the sexist Space Hunk who happened to live, part time anyway, on a secret island that could only be reached by air or sea, and she was not that good a swimmer.
"Erm..."
Her face was a picture. She might go out of her way to project an image of being confident and fully in control of everything, but now he knew different. She was sensitive, loving, kind, and strong, but also dramatic with an overly active imagination and a tendency to go with worse case scenario.
He'd also realised that, as much as she tried to deny it, she too suffered from the occasional crisis of confidence and often believed that she would do something wrong. She'd confided in him late one night, while lying close together in his bunk on Five, that an ex boyfriend had managed, over the course of their year long relationship, to convince her that she was pretty much useless at everything she did so there wasn't any point in trying. Much as she was helping him to see that he was more than good enough, he was doing the same for her.
"You can do this."
She pulled a face, clearly not believing him at all.
"Can you at least get us somewhere far enough away that I won't endanger human lives?"
"There's the confident woman I know and love."
She stuck her tongue out at him and climbed into the back, refusing to give him the chance to argue.
Rolling his eyes he got back behind the wheel. Clearly this was going to be a long day.
***
"It's really simple, Brains made sure to keep it as familiar as possible for you."
Selene had managed to work herself up into a nice panic on the drive out of London, imagining all the horrible ways in which she could potentially kill them both and now she couldn't even begin to think straight. His calm tone,which usually made her feel better, was now sounding patronising and annoyed to her ears and it was pissing her off.
"Nice to know that everyone thinks I'm a complete idiot who couldn't handle anything too mentally taxing."
"No one thinks that, you specifically said that you wanted the flying equivalent of a go cart. Would you have wanted anything as complicated as one of our crafts?"
"Of course not, contrary to popular belief I do not have a death wish."
He wisely ignored that and continued his instructions.
"The pedals work exactly the same as they did before, just stop and go and steer with the wheel."
He leant closer from his seat in the back and pointed to the first of a new row of buttons. "The blue one is drive, the green one is fly, that will realign the wheels and lift her off the ground to a height of around two meters. Only when flight is engaged will the steering wheel allow you to pull up on it to go higher and push down to go lower."
"Does it still turn left and right?" her tone was sickeningly sweet but ever so slightly dangerous. John was a wise man and yet again chose to adopt the mantra of 'if you don't have anything nice to say don't say anything at all'.
"The yellow button engages the autopilot and the course is set by inputting the location into that GPS there." He pointed to the upgraded screen that had replaced her old navigation system. "The moment you press that one the autopilot will take over and all you have to do is keep an eye on the sky and make sure you don't run into anything."
"What does the red one do?"
"That one is multipurpose, it's your stop and land button. If you're landing press it while losing height and the sensors built into the undercarriage will take over, levelling you out and realigning the wheels ready to drive and bringing you to the ground safely. If you want to land and keep driving press the blue button after the red, if you want to stop press the red a second time. That will shut off the engine once you come to a stop."
"OK..."
"That didn't sound convincing, sweetheart."
"No, no I think I've got it. Emphasis on the word, think."
"Want to try just starting her up and cruising on the ground for a few minutes and then we can try the skies?"
Selene visually mapped out the interior again, trying to remember everything he'd said.
"OK."
"You can do this, it's really simple."
"Yeah, so you keep telling me, because that's about all I can handle."
He frowned, where had that come from?
"Of course it's not, you are anything but simple."
"So I'm complicated and difficult?"
"No! You're wonderful and unique." How had it turned into this? She was taking everything he said wrong. "Just give this a try."
She took a deep breath and mentally smacked herself for being such an cow. She wasn't mad at him, although she would have appreciated a little warning before he threw her in the deep end and expected her to swim, she was just so scared of fucking up. They were all so competent, so confident and experienced, in comparison she was, a nothing. Boringly normal family, average childhood and an affinity with nature, not machine. She'd never been one to take to technology easily, machines and how they worked pretty much baffled her on a daily basis. She was an intuitive person, one that interacted with the energies of the earth, and that didn't work with machinery. It had no life force, no energy of its own, no soul.
If she was honest with herself she knew that with very little effort she could easily become a burden and a problem to them all. Only she could manage to find the love of her life by needing rescue. The last thing she wanted to do was become a target for them or to get in the way with her inexperience and lack of skills.
Compared to the other females on the team she was next to useless. Penelope was a brave, beautiful, skilled, connected woman that could handle anything. Kayo was a highly trained, arse kicking machine that had the brains as well as beauty. She flew her craft with the kind of skill that Selene couldn't even begin to imagine let alone pull off. Grandma Tracy might lack culinary skills but she made up for it in a million other ways, strength oozing from her pores. Whereas she was a little too curvy to be fashionable, had no real talents that she could speak of and had never been to university. She was nothing special.
And the boys? They were all high flying, high impact, overly intelligent prodigies and she was a nothing. She didn't deserve any of the help, support and acceptance that they had given her. One day John was going to wake up and realise exactly what he was missing out on. Realise that he had settled for average when he deserved amazing.
He was looking at her so strangely, like he couldn't understand her or her actions, and she couldn't blame him. He'd made the effort to drive her car, pick her up and was trying to help her and she was being a raging bitch.
"I got this shit." She pressed her thumb against the key lock and the car engine rumbled into life.
***
"I really don't got this."
The car's front grill was lodged in the mud and she was ready to give up five minutes into the lesson. How could you get up and down mixed up? Somehow she had managed it.
She'd been driving along the grassy ground of the hillside he'd parked them on and had managed to remember that green was fly only by association of green being the colour of Two and that thing flew. OK, so maybe simple was better for her.
She'd yelped when the cars wheels had shifted and rotated on their axis, just as FAB 1's did, pointing to the ground and each becoming their own little jet engine.
The car had lifted off the ground by a few meters as promised and John had calmly reminded her that now the wheel would work for the up and down not just the left and right and to go higher she had to go up.
That's all well and good, but her version of up was apparently slightly different to his. He meant she should take hold of the wheel and pull it towards her which would lift the wheel up. She in a classic comedy move of not being able to open a door, mistook pull, for push.
She pushed up when she should have pulled down. The result, a less than spectacular nose dive into the ground.
"It's OK, it's fine, you can fix this. Just put her in reverse and she should have enough pull to yank herself out, she's not that deep."
She moved the car into reverse and eased her foot down on the pedal but the car didn't move.
"No, you have to put her in drive mode first."
"You should have said that!"
"Sorry, I thought it was obvious."
"Well it wasn't."
"So I see."
She tossed a glare over her shoulder at him, her hand hovering over the control panel.
"Blue button."
"I knew that!"
"Did you though?"
Honestly she hadn't, she'd been about to hit the yellow. Why hadn't the genius that was Brains thought to label the fucking things?
She pushed the blue button and felt the wheels shift back down.
"OK...reverse." She pushed the gear stick back into reverse and eased her foot slowly down on the pedal. The wheels gripped a little but then span out, sending up a stream of mud and grass behind them.
"Shit!"
"It's OK, lets try to override it. Put her in fly again, green button-"
"I got it, I got it, green like two that flew."
He gave her a look that said he was seriously debating her sanity at that moment. Honestly she was surprised she hadn't seen that look more often.
"Green button, wait until the wheels are up, then shove the steering wheel up as far as it will go and boot it."
"Shove and boot, those are highly technical terms..."
She did as she was told, pulling at the steering wheel, which didn't move.
"It won't pull until the wheels are fully up, just give it a moment, don't be so impatient."
She gritted her teeth and let the wheel go, waiting until the wheels fully lifted, noticing then that a small light above the green button blinked on. Well that would have been handy to know too, why didn't this thing come with a manual?
"Alright, now hard pull and foot down, Sel."
She followed his instructions, yanking the steering wheel hard as she slammed her foot down on the pedal. The car's butt took a dive but it's nose shot up, as did the car, launching itself into the air.
She screamed and he barely resisted the urge to do the same when she panicked and let go of the wheel, which retracted, dropping them sharply.
"Hold the wheel, Selene!"
She grabbed it and held it in place.
"OK, there's no need to yell at me!"
Had he yelled? He never yelled. How did she do that? How did she always manage to make him lose control?
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to shout. Just level out a bit. Follow the Altitude Indicator."
"The what now?"
He sighed.
"You see that thing on the dash?" he pointed to what looked like half a snow globe with a line across the middle and a cross lower down. He waited until she nodded. "That cross is us, so you need to correct her until the cross is in the middle, lined up on the horizon line."
"Again, that would have been handy to know before we took off."
"It's standard in every craft, I assumed you knew what it was."
"Then just keep assuming and assume that I'm dumb and spell shit out like you're teaching the ABC."
He rolled his eyes at her dramatics. "You aren't dumb."
"Dude, did you just roll your eyes at me?"
"No?"
"Don't answer a question with a question, that does not make it better!"
He wisely shut up and simply pointed to the horizon line.
She gave the steering wheel an experimental pull and saw the cross move. When she went left it went left, the same with right, which was so blindingly obvious but she still felt like she had to test it. Following the cross she managed to level it out.
"Good. That's great, but you might want to take us just a tiny bit higher..." the top of a rather large fir tree scraped their undercarriage.
"How the hell am I supposed to know how high to go or when I reach it? What's my limits? I need limits dammit!"
"It's the new gauge next to your upgraded speedometer. You see the numbers there?" She did, they were high, scarily high. "That's in feet, 5 thousand each line. Commercial planes and our crafts aim for between 35 thousand and 40 thousand feet. Anything about 50 is in the red line there and too high. You need to go between 10 and 15, higher if you're going long distance, maybe around 20."
"That's...that's seriously high. Very very scarily high." according to the new needle they weren't even registering as having left the earth and it already felt too high for her. She'd never be able to do this on her own.
"You've been higher."
"Not when I'm not in your tin can or with someone else driving. On a broom we barely clear the treetops, it's too cold, too windy and too exposed."
"Well you're about to go higher now, because if you don't pull up we'll hit that Tor up ahead."
The mass of rocks, piled high, had come out of nowhere and she jumped, yanking on the wheel, just managing to miss crashing into them like a bowling ball into pins.
"I can't do this. I can't do this..." she chanted under her breath, knuckles white in the wheel. She needed to get down. She pushed forward on the wheel, dropping their nose sharply and punched at the red button. Red meant stop. Stop was good. Stop was needed.
The wheels came down and thankfully the sensors took over as she smacked at the button again. They hit the ground with a teeth jarring bump as she had forgotten, or never been told, to slow down.
As soon as the engine died she threw open the door and hauled her shaking self out of the car.
John followed straight after, catching up with her.
"Selene what's wrong? This isn't like you."
"Yes, it is! This is totally like me. I freak out over unfamiliar things, things that I can't control and don't understand."
"What's not to understand, it's simple-"
"No. It's not simple. Not to me anyway. Maybe to you because you all grew up like this. But I didn't, I'm different, I'm not part of your Tracy life where you have to pull out a plane to go to the shop! I am not a part of this!"
"Of course you're part of our life."
She closed her eyes, praying for patience. It was freezing cold out on the moors of Yorkshire, the wind howling across the hillside to whip the hair back from her face and she huddled into her coat, arms wrapped around herself, for comfort as much as warmth.
"I didn't mean it like that." She knew that she was a part of his life, or all their lives.
"Then what did you mean, I don't understand?"
"Of course you don't. Because you can't imagine what it's like to not know all of this stuff. If you've never flown before, never had anyone show you all that you need to know, never had someone actually instruct you on it, you don't know. It's not an automated download to your brain. It might come naturally to all of you, but let's just face facts here, I'll never be like that. I'll never be one to hop into a craft and instinctively know what to do or how to even start the thing. I'll never be good enough."
"Never be good enough?" Her last words stuck out to him more than anything else she said.
"You really do focus on the most insignificant parts, don't you?"
He felt like he should be insulted by that. To him, her feeling like she wasn't good enough was the most important thing. Thankfully he wasn't one to react to a negative situation without assessing everything first. He mentally rewound her words and realised that she was right. He had just expected her to know what to do. He was used to working and interacting with people that operated their kind of machines on a daily basis, they were all trained in each others crafts, at least the basics enough to get them out of trouble. He had forgotten to tell her what most of the instruments were because they were second nature to them. A five minute run down of any new modifications Brains made to any of their crafts and they were good to go. Learn by doing, that was the Tracy way. Sometimes he forgot that she wasn't a Tracy, she hadn't been brought up the way they had been. She was different.
He didn't know what to do or how to handle this situation. He could clearly see that she was struggling, likely on the verge of a full meltdown. She was always so good at comforting and helping others but didn't seem to be able to be kind to herself.
He couldn't leave her like that, he had to do something. He knew that whenever she didn't know what to do she deployed her secret weapon, a healing hug.
He approached her like one would a scared dog, avoiding the teeth, and enfolded her in his arms.
"I love you."
She remained stiff in his arms for a few moments but then sagged into him, her arms going around his middle.
"I love you too, but you're annoying."
"I know. So are you."
She didn't dignify that with an answer, just let him hold her for a few minutes.
"Selly, talk to me. Why would you think you aren't good enough?"
She sighed, nuzzling her cold nose into his neck, feeling him shiver in response.
"I don't know. You're just all so perfect at everything."
He snorted at that, they were far from perfect, especially Gordon who managed to find the widest range of ways to screw up.
"Go on."
"I just...i just don't get how I'm your type of person. We have zero in common, I don't fit into your world, I'm not a super spy or an awesome astronaut, I have no skills to offer the team at all. I'm the definition of dead weight."
"We don't see you that way, you're one of us now. You don't need to be like everyone else, we have enough spies and rocket flyers, your skills are so much more important."
"Yeah right."
"Yes, right." He gave her a small squeeze for emphasis. "I like that we don't have the same interests, the same hobbies and job, it means we have something different to talk about. And as for not being my type, well I've been with my type and it didn't work out, as I'm sure you have."
She had to agree with that, sticking to your own kind often left a lot to be desired.
"But then, if a beautiful, loving, highly skilled woman isn't my type, then I don't know what is. I might not have been looking for you, but I think you fit me perfectly."
"And I might not have been looking for a gorgeous, intelligent and highly skilled spaceman, but I think you fit me too."
"Often what we want and what we actually need are two different things, but I know I'll always want and need you."
"So you don't think I'm stupid for not getting this whole flying thing?"
He shook his head. "Not at all, it's not your fault if you don't already know how to do it. We just need to start with the basics and this time I'll make sure I explain everything I'm doing and you need to make sure you ask about anything you aren't sure of."
"I can do that."
"Let's try this again, shall we? But this time we'll do it a little different."
***
"I can't believe I'm actually doing it!"
Selene was perched on his lap, both of them sharing the driver's seat. It was unconventional but was working well.
He'd been great at explaining everything once he realised that she knew next to nothing about any of it. He'd gone through every instrument on the panel, explaining its use and when to use it, including the silver button that would cloak the car should she ever be followed or need to be invisible, something she insisted on calling Ghost-mode. The black button was there to activate a protective shield around the car should she ever need it. Brains had also resprayed the car with anti-scratch, extra tough paint that would stop most damage aimed her way.
He'd then started the car and talked her through everything as he did it, so she could see it in action, making sure that she understood. They were both controlling their moods and had managed not to snap at each other again.
He'd taken the car up and down twice, slowing down his actions so she could register them, then he'd made her try, covering her hands with his for support and reassurance. She'd talked her way through everything, and he found that he only had to correct her once before they were safely up above the tree line.
Now that he was right there with her and able to take over in the event of an emergency, she had relaxed and felt confident enough to climb higher, reaching the desired altitude and begun to cruise.
Once she was comfortable with that he had encouraged her to have a little fun, moving this way and that, feeling the air currents and working with them rather than fighting against them.
He'd then instructed her on landing, which she managed to do the second time as smoothly as if she'd been flying all her life.
Next he taught her how to program a route and engage the autopilot once they were high enough. That had been easier for her and she had relaxed back against his chest, keeping an eye open for any potential obstacles or dangers though there was nothing of note.
They'd picked a route that was less than three hundred miles, something that took a matter of minutes with her upgraded engine, and had looped them in a big circle to come back to their original spot. Once again she landed perfectly, having gotten the hang of the controls now. It really was quite easy once she had gotten over her fear of the unknown and had it explained to her in a way that made sense.
Their last lesson was to use the GPS to get them back to her apartment, which she followed easily now she was on the ground again. He had vacated the driver's seat and sat in the back for the return journey, content to simply watch her and ponder over her words.
He didn't understand how she could possibly think she was stupid. She was a fast learner and had gotten into the swing of things quickly once she had felt supported and everything had been explained to her. She was very much like him in the fact that she liked to know everything about it before she even started, knowledge made her feel more comfortable. He could kick himself for not having noticed that about her before and not realising that it really was all new to her.
They pulled up outside her building and she slid into her designated space, hitting the red button to shut down the engine.
"You did amazingly well."
She turned to smile at her love. "Well, it turns out that I had a good teacher."
He climbed out of the car and took her hand when she joined him.
"Quiet night in?"
He nodded. "Sounds perfect, then tomorrow we'll head to the island, I think you can handle that with the GPS and autopilot, don't you?"
She took a deep breath but then nodded her agreement. "As long as I have you, I can handle anything."
***
The palm trees didn't need to fold back for her dinky car, and it was kinda scary waiting for the cliff face to open enough to let her in, making her think that it wouldn't register her cars signature and open in time, leaving her driving into solid rock, but she needn't have worried. Brains, as always, had thought of everything.
John directed her to a spot off to the left of Two's hanger. Someone, likely Virgil, had painted on the wall in big purple letters the words "Thunderbird Witch".
"I told you you're one of us."
And that was when she burst into tears.