Summary: Inspired by the endless birth order debate, and also thunderbirbthor's amazing colour swap photoshopped pics: post/126371195410/this-is-the-closest-i-can-get-with-virgil-before and post/126366970760/if-john-looked-more-like-his-brothers.

~oOo~

At first, they were identical.

Three minutes and seventeen seconds was all that separated them. Their mother and father never let slip who made it out first. So, no one quite knew who was older: Virgil or John. Gordon maintained that Virgil was the elder of the two – he looked older, as he once said. Virg didn't take that particularly well. Alan, on the other hand, insisted that John was older. He knew so much about everything. He had to be older, right? Ever the benevolent eldest, Scott remained tight-lipped on the subject.

At first, the resemblance between Virgil and John was striking. Two pudgy babies, both with mops of dark hair and round eyes of the brightest blue. Everyone said they looked just like Scott had as a new born. Only one picture survived of the three of them together, Scott – all tooth gaps and scraped knees – bundled up on the couch with his two new brothers All three dark-haired and blue eyed, all grinning.

The grins stayed, even if everything else changed. The baby hair fell out and they started to grow.

Virgil's hair grew back darker, thicker, and as the years went by his eyes settled to a liquid amber. John's hair was silky and red, his eyes flitting between green and blue depending on the light. While Virgil joined the high school football team, training until his biceps outshone even Scott's, John focused on track. As he grew taller and his stride lengthened, the gold medals kept rolling in.

Then, when International Rescue was conceived, the two brothers plucked up opposite roles. Virgil was always in the thick of things, bringing the green behemoth of Thunderbird Two to the danger zone. John stayed in his global comms module on Five, co-ordinating from space.

But neither was anything without the other.

"Thunderbird Five, I need you now."

John knew what his brother was thinking; he didn't even need to describe the plan. A man was plummeting to his death and Virg needed to act fast.

"Tracking his descent…" John said, fingers flying across the display. "Co-ordinates are locked in!"

And then he watched on the holomonitor as Virgil's silhouette hurtled out of Two's cockpit, grasped the falling father, then slammed back into the craft again.

John didn't breathe until he knew Virgil was safe.

"This is Thunderbird Two. Mission complete."

"Good job, Virgil."

And so it went.

When they were born, three minutes and seventeen seconds was all that separated them. Now, nothing did.

They were two sides of the same coin: the head and the tail, opposite, yet equal. And neither was whole without the other.