A/N: Okay, so I thought that I was going to be able to get a fairly detailed, long piece uploaded for this target, but seeing as my course load is still rather unpredictable, and my promised limit for an update is looming, I figured that I'd post this part and get you lot thinking about the story a little bit. I'm in the process of writing out the second chapter (getting somewhere too, with much relief), but in the meantime, here's a short bit to tide you over until I can get that together.

Last thing; a warning…. DO NOT READ THIS FIC IF YOU HAVE NOT READ THE PREVIOUS TWO PARTS! You will be both epically confused and will have just spoiled things for yourself, do you wish to read this arc in its entirety. I'm weird for separating this, I know, but just bear with me. Heed all warnings in italics and bold, they mean something, 'kay? ^_^

Disclaimer: If not for Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

Also, in addition, any references to medical information is only found on the web, and any errors and discrepancies in the items used are purely my own.

Enjoy. Xx

Space is immeasurable and endless, but is also finite and wholly intrinsic in how we live our lives. From birth we are perched upon a set of scales; the tiniest, most insignificant details are often the ones that create the fine line between life and death. The greatest fear we have is knowing whether or not the odds will stay within our favour. That is something I know only too well.

Unless you can truly comprehend how frightening it is to know that you're living on borrowed time; that the second chance you got earlier in your life might just have used up all of your luck, then you've no idea how it feels to know you're dying, and there's just not one damn thing you can do about it.

You hear all this hippy-dippy crap about being strong, and focusing on the positives rather than the negatives, and just believing you can do it, but let's see you try it when you're scared shitless and so frigging sick of being tired and sore and ill that you actually want it to end just to get relief from the never-ending misery.

I hate psychobabble for a reason. It always comes from the people who don't have the faintest idea of what it is they're rambling about, or if they have had the misfortune to have experienced an illness such as this, they've been able to forget through time and dulling of knowing exactly how scary it is to be in this sort of situation, to know how Goddamn annoying it is. It's not that I'm begrudging them their triumph or that feeling of euphoric success, not in the slightest, but it's just that you actually have to be living in the moment to truly appreciate exactly how a person is feeling when they're fighting a war for their life.

It sucks.

##

This is so great!

Seven weeks following my relapse diagnosis, three weeks after being admitted for surgery (plus a potentially lethal infection), and three days after being informed of the tentatively-approached, positively frightening news of a possible cure, and I'm finally being sprung from the hospital.

Sure, it's a half-victory at the most, seeing as I'll be returning in two weeks' time to undergo the irradiation chemotherapy to prepare me for transplant, but it is a fortnight of time where I'm going to be free from feeling so damn sick.

I'm still far from a hundred per cent; more like seventy-five-and-counting (and that's subtracting the underlying cause for all this stuff in the first place), but at the same time, I'm feeling better than I have been for quite some time. I've still got a fairly barking, deep cough, and I'm apparently running a low-grade fever, but all in all, it's accumulated enough of a good tilt to my state of health, that I'm being allowed to head home.

My side is almost completely back to normal, aside from the occasional deep pull if I twist too sharply, and the throb that emanates from the surface along the line of the scar, but I'm particularly surprised at how eager I am to be getting out of here, really… well not completely, as I'm looking forward to being home at the farm and actually being able to do something besides sleep and rest.

I'll still be doing a fair bit of resting, because I'm still recovering from major surgery, and I'm pretty bone-tired from the radiation therapy I started the day before yesterday, but I don't currently have a headache, nor am I puking. I consider the fact I'm going home (with the anticipation of a fortnight's equal to a holiday from school (in Alan's eyes at least)), a pretty big deal in the grand scheme of All That is Awesome.

The only issue is getting Doctor Kingston and my dratted discharge papers to actually make their way to my room.

I've clearly been hanging around with both Alan and Gordon for far too long, because I'm swinging my feet rather over-enthusiastically. I'm doubly pleased, because I'm actually wearing something other than socks or slippers for once, and in my distracted excitement, what makes me even giddier, somehow, is that for some reason, I'm over-examining them rather intently.

Odd, yes I know, but what would you be doing if you were staging what was the (least subtle in history) equivalent to a prison break? I'm a little bored, and more than overly keyed up, okay?

I've got my old Harvard sweater on, (it's more than a mite too big, considering how tiny an a amount of mass I've got on me at the moment, but I don't care, because it's comfortable and warm and I don't like the cold), and a pair of jeans that Dad went and bought me, along with a whole bagful of other clothes, because even with the teensy amount of weight I've managed to gain while in here, I'm much too far below the level I should be for someone of my height. It's good, the sense of normality the clothes are giving me, like the shoes.

I sigh. I'm stuck back on them again, but it's funny, because unlike the jeans, or even the hoodie, which I got my third year at college, the Keds I'm wearing are at least six years old, and well-worn. I guess I'm not the only Tracy to hang onto items of clothing, but damn I love these shoes.

They're rather cleaner than they've been in the entire time they've been in my possession, but they're still fairly raggedy and faded; the dark-grey washed out to a dirty-dishwater colour and the laces rather frayed and cut-ended. Unlike my brothers, who wore (wear) holes in their footwear so fast they need(ed) a new set every two months or so, I didn't play sport or rough-house as much as them, and so was (and am) able to hang on to my stuff for longer.

Biting my lip in amusement at myself, I shake my head. Here I am, musing about the average length of time for possession of shoes per Tracy, when I'm supposed to be getting out of here!

I've obviously let off a rather more expressive sigh than the ones beforehand, because Dad, leaning with his arms crossed at the foot of my bed, talking with Scott, who's standing propped against the wall, one foot up behind him to brace himself, looks over at me with a half-confused expression on his face. It clears up instantly as my eyes dart back towards the door, and Scott lets out a chuckle.

"Hey, John?" He snickers. "You heard of the phrase 'a watched pot never boils'? Try 'an anticipated doctor never arrives.'"

Cute Scott. I've had the opposite and it's not so hilarious then thanks.

I roll my eyes and ignore my idiot of an older brother, who has only recently managed to locate his sense of humour. Why me, again? Big brothers suck.

I have to second-think my first thought there though, because of the way the past few weeks have been for my father and brothers, I'm lucky that I'm even here for him to poke fun at. And as far as what it was they'd experienced while I was near-comatose with fever, I'm inclined to let them joke as much as they like at my expense, much as it drives me crazy.

I've been determinedly ignoring the reasons why I'll be coming back here in a couple of weeks' time; the base reason for the return is so we can hopefully address the relapsed original cancer, but also in order to combat the secondary cancer that necessitated the surgery I'd undergone. When I'd been at a state of function that enabled me to absorb more complicated information and conversational nuances, they'd taken the chance to explain in a bit more depth about the mass that had rested behind my lung for God-knows how long before it had been discovered.

It's still a form of Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma, but thankfully, though it's fairly fast growing, it's still a more-treatable type, compared to the base disease I'm already suffering from.

I was still in a little bit of shock that the initial scans and the intensive barrage of tests I'd undergone back in March had missed the tumour, and I was also fairly confused as to why I'd not shown any symptoms until it was nearly too late. When I'd broached the subject with Doctor Kingston though, he'd explained to me that there was no way it could have been found unless we'd begun the tests with the knowledge to look for it.

The absence of symptoms in particular was (and still is) puzzling to me, but my doctor explained that due to the anomalous effects my tenures in 'Five's artificial atmosphere have on my body, coupled with the injuries I'd suffered in the missile blast, my system had had no way to tell me that there was something wrong. He had also said that bodies just react in different ways to one another, and my nerves and pain reactors might have just been so muted that they had at first thought that there was nothing there to respond to. He'd said that it could be a possible side-effect of my first course of chemotherapy as well. I understood.

It's given me a sense of relief that it was nothing I or my medical team had done to miss it, but it was still a small comfort when it had hit me how doubly hard this stage of the war was going to be.

It probably sounds pretty silly; me referring to the disease and the opposition it's putting towards me as a war for my life, but it really makes me feel that though it could appear that I may appear to be losing, that should this treatment not work, I can still try and convince myself that I've done the best I can to get past it.

It's the whole psychology of the thing, really, and through my life, I've become a pro at being able to convince myself for a temporary time to pretend that nothing is happening in order to cope. It's why I've had so many scattered episodes of emotion, that and you very quickly get used to these sorts of situations.

I've gone back to staring wistfully at the corridor beyond the door; freedom, finally, still awaiting. My family haven't had to wear the masks around me for the last day and a half, but I'll be wearing one anytime I venture outside the house (or hospital for that matter; there's one sitting on the nightstand right now), for the foreseeable future to prevent me from getting sick with anything before I'm due to come back in.

I'm so eager to get home, dammit, but of course; time is going ever more slowly than usual just because John Tracy wants to hurry up and get somewhere! Five minutes until I can leave!

I can see Scott and Dad exchanging grins over my impatience from the corner of my eye; I've finally regained my glasses, permanently (they don't want me wearing contacts because they're afraid they'll pose an infection-risk), and so it's much of a relief to be able to see my surroundings clearly without them swishing blurrily along like I'm trying to focus underwater.

Let them laugh. I know that they and the others are just as eager to have me back as I am to be escaping. They might try to deny it, but I know better.

I'm packed and everything; my small kit-bag settled on the bed at my hip, my Grandad-painted MENSA cap on my fuzz-balled head, and my hands tucked deep in my sweater pockets.

I grumble beneath my breath and flop backwards on the bed, with no heed for my aching-but-no-longer-seizing back, and roll my eyes at the ceiling, wanting very much in my really weird but amazingly centering mood to stamp my feet and grump like a little kid.

A smirk crosses my face at the imagination of the look on my father and brother's faces if I am to actually to do that, before I peer around my own skinny chest and folded arm to peer at the hallway, again.

Nope, still empty of all Doctor-kind.

Dammit.

Waiting really sucks.

A/N: Reviewsies for this new instalment? Please? I'll try extra hard for the next chapter. I know this was short; I'm still fleshing out intermission-airy scenes for later on. :D

Thanks for reading, you lot. I really appreciate it.

- Pyre. Xx