Ela era um bebê bem pequeno e frágil de saúde. Isso não a impedia de ser uma peste, saindo na chuva com sua capinha, botas e guarda chuva pra brincar na grama molhada, para o desespero de Madi que tinha que virar a noite monitorando a febre da menina.
I was gonna post this for Earth & Sky week if I managed to complete it but it’s smol Tracy’s birthday and it’ll probably never see the light of day otherwise so why not :D
I’m always a ho for an AU so here’s one I started over lockdown called ‘Okay but what if Scott really was Alan’s dad’
Long before International Rescue was a thing, the Tracy boys had lived on a farm in Kansas. It’d belonged to their late mother, God bless her soul, and these days it only grew crop for an environmentally friendly fuel because Tracy money came from technology instead of the earth.
The boys’ famous army father was gone for days at a time and there was plenty of rumours why that was. Mrs Wyatt who lived down the lane from the Tracys said she’d heard the man was alcoholic and probably had been for a long time because his teenaged son had been looking after the rest of them since his poor momma died. She saw them troop past her gate every day on their way to school and back, and then to the park on the weekends when their pa’s jet wasn’t on the drive.
Mr Colton, who lived at number fifty-four said he’d taken his son to the pool at the same time that the Tracy boys had been there without their father as usual. He told Vera that he’d overheard the youngest chattering away to the red-headed one about a rocket he’d called the TV21 until the eldest had overheard and shushed them. According to Mrs Johnson who was friends with Ms Hernandez at the school, Col. Tracy had budding engineers, astronauts and a future Olympic swimmer at the home he never seemed to return to. Instead it was Scott and Virgil who took their brothers to swim meets and galas and even to the Cosmosphere. Ms Hernandez could find nothing to complain about because all four of the Tracy boys grades were above average and threw off the teachers’ bell curves when it came to subjects like science and math.
That Scott boy sure had his hands full with three brothers, his own future and a possibly alcoholic father to look after, so the whole town was surprised when he went and knocked up the Austin girl after being crowned king and queen of their grad ball. Not much ever happened in the backwater towns of the sunflower state so everybody knew about it the morning after the night Pa Austin went round the Tracy’s farmhouse to have it out with the Colonel.
The rumour mill had been on fire for months after that because Mrs Johnson had been having her usual perm when she’d heard Ma Austin tell Shirley all about how her daughter’s boyfriend had been going to leave their small town after graduation. She’d seen the way the Tracy boy cared for his brothers and had expected he’d give up his plans to join the military if he had a kid of his own at home with her.
To the town’s surprise, it turned out that the Colonel was actually a long distance father and not an entirely absent one. Pa Austin had stormed to the farmhouse that night with his shotgun in hand, only to be greeted by a hologram of the great Colonel himself, sat eating dinner on a beach somewhere as his boys ate dinner round a table in Kansas. Austin had gone round with the aim of threatening at least one Tracy with his shotgun but hadn’t got that far because Colonel Jefferson Tracy could still dominate a room from over a thousand miles away.
According to Pa Austin, his fancy hologram was just as tall as the real thing and pretty sober which put paid to Mrs Wyatt’s theory that he was an alcoholic. In fact he was a Big Apple businessman now, and a darn good one at that because by the end of the evening it had been decided that his eldest son would join the GDF as planned and the child would remain with its mother but want for nothing. Tracys took care of their own and Pa Austin said he’d realised that when the colonel’s youngest boy had kept interrupting their conversation to show him trash he’d found in the pond at the park and Tracy hadn’t brushed the youngster off at all.
The big holographic man had promised they’d feed the ducks at the weekend, which meant half the town was hanging around the park come Saturday morning.
The youngest had appeared first, full of joy and enthusiasm that his older brother didn’t share as the red-head was dragged across the grass to the pond. The second eldest was close behind them and had a couple of toy boats in his arms which left the eldest Tracy boy and his father to bring up the rear.
They were deep in conversation when they appeared, the Colonel strolling along easily with his hands behind his back like an old fashioned gentleman. Scott was by his side and gone was the little boy always running to catch up. In his place strode a man and it was rather disappointing really.
The Tracys moved away shortly afterwards. Stan the mailman said he’d seen fancy suits taking pictures of the farmhouse and the Tracys had paid for their mail to be redirected but he couldn’t seem to find an address. The Austins had an address for the Tracys, but they also had a pretty hefty NDA in exchange for a very comfortable lifestyle and weren’t much inclined to break it just to satisfy everyone else’s curiosity.
It all died down after a while and people got bored of watching Sophia get bigger. Her old flame might’ve flown out of the picture but his presence sure was felt around town when Sophia got her own car and fancy place on the Tracy’s dime. Ms Hernandez said the colonel had insisted Ms Sophia continue her education alongside being a momma to his first grandchild and Shirley heard there was a job at the Tracy’s family business when she wanted to get out of Kansas.
Nothing exciting happened in their little backwater until the day a private jet landed on the main street and Sophia was whisked off to give birth at a very fancy hospital. According to Ma Austin, she had a private room and the colonel had parked his jet on the roof since his son wouldn’t make it back in time for the birth.
They did seem to be a good family, the Tracys, even if they’d disappeared off the face of the earth in the past eight months or so. The only trace anybody could seem to find of them was on the Tracy Industries website where each son had a mention in the CEO’s bio but real information was scarce. They disappeared off Ms Hernandez’s records and there was nothing about them on any government website. Nobody was truly surprised that the Colonel had chosen to disappear because they’d come to realise a few things after reading his bio. For one, the fella was a billionaire several times over and two, he adored those four boys of his more than anything because his words about his achievements had been clinical but the paragraph about each of his sons’ achievements had made old Mrs Johnson cry.
Of course everybody wanted to know what happened but the Austins didn’t have a lot to say. The Colonel was a very nice man who didn’t seem to have taken offence to Ms Austin’s actions. He’d offered her further education and employment instead of the lawsuit most men in his position would’ve filed. There were rumours the fella was working on a top secret project that’d change the world, but in their little backwater there were rumours about everything.
Alan Tracy didn’t pay attention to any of those rumours as he grew up with his momma in a sleepy little town in Kansas. The little boy loved many things including his momma and their house that had a big garden with a tire swing and a sandpit he used to re-enact grandpa landing on Mars. He loved ice cream and going to the park and he even liked Kindergarten ‘cause he got to draw pictures of his family and space.
But what Alan Tracy loved most of all was his daddy. He didn’t get to see him a lot ‘cause he was learning to be a pilot like grandpa, but every Friday evening a fancy car arrived to take him a little way out of town where grandpa’s jet would be waiting to take him to the island for the whole weekend.
Sometimes grandpa flew it but he had lots of meetings around the world so other times he’d see Uncle Virgil through the window and squeal with excitement ‘cause his biggest uncle had the best toys. He was gonna be an engineer and could fix any of Alan’s toys, even the one that failed a moon launch. He had Alan’s undying love ‘cause the little boy could hang from his arm like a monkey and he had lots of fun stories about his daddy. They were best, best friends and Alan liked to crawl into that big plaid shirt and bug him ‘til Uncle Virg showed him pictures of when daddy was little.
Uncle Virg wasn’t always around though ‘cause he was studying in Denver but that was okay ‘cause Alan had two more uncles to play with. Johnny didn’t really like to play but when he was home he let Alan play with his telescopes and taught him all about space.
Alan loved his daddy but he thought he might love space even more. He loved it when Johnny took him up to the peak of the island in the dark and they sat for an hour to watch for shooting stars. Alan had fallen asleep once on the big fluffy blanket and the best thing of all was when he woke to find daddy had an arm around Johnny’s shoulders and Alan had been drooling on his shirt.
“Hey, sprout.” Daddy had smooched his forehead when he’d noticed bright blue eyes staring up at him with joy, “I love you. John says you’ve been learning about the stars some more.”
“There’s Ursa Major!” Alan had stood up to be able to point out the little pinpricks of light that made up the Ursa Major Constellation and he still hadn’t been taller than his daddy, “Johnny says Ursa’s a big bear like Uncle Virg.”
“Johnny told you that, did he?” his daddy’s laugh had made Alan feel warm right down to his bones and he’d dived for a hug. Impossibly long arms had folded around him and Johnny, drawing them both into the safest place in the universe for so long they missed most of the shooting stars and Johnny made them go away so he could see the rest. Alan didn’t mind ‘cause dad swung him up onto his shoulders and let him get wet on the rocky beach by the villa since it was bath time anyway.
Alan loved Sunday mornings on the island when daddy was home. Alan liked to wake him up by bouncing on the bed ‘cause the sky was awake so they should be too. And then they’d get dressed in matching blue swim shorts and go for a run around the island and if he ran faster than daddy on the home stretch he was allowed to jump into the pool like Superman. Gordon was usually in there by then and kept an eye on Allie doing the doggy paddle in the shallow end whilst daddy went to get breakfast out the fridge. There was something cool that beeped super loud that time he tried to moonwalk on the bottom of the pool like an astronaut and Uncle Virg had dived in like a bowling ball to fish him out. Gordon had laughed a lot but Uncle Virg hadn’t even smiled ‘til daddy gave him one of those hugs that made booboos stop hurting.
Alan really loved his uncles but he loved his daddy most and it was hard to stand on the runway with Uncle Virg to wave goodbye. Uncle Virg didn’t seem to like waving goodbye either so Alan always held his hand to make him feel better and did his best to be like daddy so Uncle Virg wouldn’t miss him too much.
He seemed to end up being more like John as a couple of years passed and everything in his life changed. Grandpa took him to London to get measured for a suit for daddy’s graduation and he didn’t understand why Uncle Virg kept frowning at Gordon for laughing about daddy’s graduation from big school. He asked Uncle Virg what was so funny, and then Grandpa and Grandpa’s weird professor friend who used big words Alan didn’t know yet, but none of them seemed to know and even daddy missed a step when Alan asked him on their way to the fancy dinner Grandpa was hosting at his penthouse in New York for his newly graduated son. Daddy never ever missed anything which was annoying when Alan was trying to get hold of Gordon’s cookies but he’d breathed air the wrong way and Uncle Virg had to thump his back a few times.
Daddy had talked about how cool Alan looked in his little gray suit and Alan had been so happy he’d forgotten about his question ‘til after dinner when they were still at the table and he’d pulled himself onto Grandpa’s knee ‘cause Uncle Virg and Gordon were being loud and he’d been a tired little boy by then. He’d tried one last time to find out what was so funny about daddy’s last graduation and Grandpa had rested his chin atop Allie’s head.
“Your momma and daddy had you after his last graduation.” Grandpa rumbled, “You were quite an unexpected surprise for your daddy, but a welcome one. Gordon likes to remind your daddy about what a big surprise you were.”
“Your daddy was a surprise too, as I recall.” Grandma Tracy was sat with Grandpa and Alan loved visiting her but sometimes she made him cookies and he didn’t love those.
“I love daddy, not cookies.” he mumbled tiredly and fell asleep right there at the table.
That meant he missed the way his Grandpa coughed to quieten his four boys because he had something real important to discuss with them. Scott knew what it was, and Virg had an inkling because it was difficult to disguise underground excavations from a highly skilled engineer. They were sat together with Virgil’s elbow resting on the back of Scott’s chair and blue eyes softened when he realised where Alan had got to.
Alan had managed to sleep through the inaugural meeting of International Rescue and life was never the same again after he woke up.
Okay but what if Scott rly was Alan’s dad - the sunglasses
So there was a hella lovely reaction to my lil Scott & Alan AU so here’s a bit more that I wrote the other evening.
Alan hadn’t understood why dad gave him his sunglasses after they got out of the bus that’d taxied them several miles away from the launch site. They were the super cool aviator ones like what dad and grandpa wore by the pool on sunny days, but it wasn’t that sunny here. It was just a cold December day in Florida and the sun had barely peeked over the horizon as he watched the rocket rip its way through the clouds.
The sunglasses hid the tears in his eyes as the rocket disappeared into the orange-pink sunrise, taking his mom away to her new job in the sky. The noise of the crowd that’d turned out to watch the launch drowned out his shaky breaths but it didn’t matter. A hand squeezed his shoulder before dad was there with his long coat and aftershave that Alan knew so well. He shut his eyes and buried his face in dad’s side ‘cause he’d known this day was coming but he didn’t think it’d make him feel so sad.
“It’s gonna be alright, Alan.” Scott stooped over to wrap his boy up in a hug like mom used to whenever his own dad launched, “You’ll get to talk to her every weekend and she’ll be able to tell you all about the stars when she gets back.”
“I know…” Alan sniffled really snottily in the way only kids could, “It’s just…”
“I know, buddy. I know.” Scott threaded his fingers through fluffy blonde hair as Alan cried and wondered for the hundredth time how his mom had coped with dad launching into space so often. It hurt to see Alan hurting and there was only so much Scott could do to help. Time would have to do the rest.
Well, there was one thing that’d help but Scott gave it a few minutes before he squeezed the boy in his arms, “How about we get some pancakes on the way home?”
Big blue eyes looked dolefully at him, “Uncle Virg says I’m not allowed to eat on the jet any more.”
“Oh yeah? Why would that be?”
“I ate the last waffle without sharing.”
“Oh boy.” Scott whistled through his teeth at that admission, “I guess we better get him fifty waffles to make up for that cold blooded betrayal. You ready to go home?”
Home would be Tracy island from now on. Alan looked up at the sky one last time and promised mom he’d learn to fly grandpa’s rocket so he could visit all the time. Grandpa was teaching Johnny how to fly it and once John knew, maybe he’d teach Alan like he taught him about the stars and everything mom would see on the voyage.
Then he grabbed dad’s hand and they headed back to grandpa’s jet where Uncle Virg would be waiting to take them home...
Eu resolvi experimentar o Ao3, escrevendo uma alternativa do que eu escrevi para a Madisson por aqui. Porque eu até hoje eu tenho problema com digitação.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Vai ser um pouco diferente do que o que eu desenhei até agora, porque eu resolvi tentar ser mais honesta com minha ideia. Espero que gostem