A/N – I wrote the first little drabble and realised I never really include Alan so decided to do four more, one for each Tracy!
Disclaimer: I don't own the Thunderbirds or any of the music, well I own the CDs, but you know what I mean.
(Aerosmith – Cheese cake)
"How old are you, Scott?"
"What?" Scott tapped the beat of his music out on the steering wheel as they waited in traffic.
"I mean, seriously," Alan flicked the mp3 player. "Your taste is sooo ancient."
"Classic," Scott corrected him.
"Old," Alan rolled his eyes. "I mean, was dad even born when this stuff came out?"
"That's not the point…"
"No then," Alan grinned smugly.
Scott scowled at him and turned the music up as the traffic started to move. "Classics are great. Proper musicians, proper music, real instruments and awesome lyrics."
"In what way are the lyrics 'awesome'?" Alan asked. "Which is such an old word by the way."
"They sing about real things, real emotions and stories. Important stuff, not the artificial crap you listen to."
Alan opened his mouth to reply just as the music came to the chorus.
Cheese cake…
Alan started giggling. "Real deep, Scott. Cheese cake!"
Scott went a bit pink. "It's not actually about…" he protested and then broke off, not wanting to get into a discussion about what it was about. He reached over to flick tracks but Alan stopped him.
"No, no, I want to listen to the deep emotion over cheese cake. Mind you, for you, porky, I suppose this is the love of your life."
"Shut up or you can sit in the back."
"Ha, that is such an old thing to say, Dad. And you don't even have back seats!" Alan pointed out, smirking.
"The trunk will do," Scott said through gritted teeth, but Alan just laughed.
(Billy Idol – Dancing With Myself)
"Quiet again," John sighed, switching the monitors back to their normal purposes. He didn't know what to do with himself, it always took him a couple of hours to come down from the heightened awareness of rescue tension, even though all he was doing was monitoring on Five.
"What shall I do now?" he said standing up and wandering around the huge circular room. "Talking to yourself, not a good sign, Johnny," he told himself.
He looked down at the earth, he couldn't see Tracy Island this far away, but the Pacific Ocean was spread out before him.
"They're probably all asleep, apart from father, he'll still be coming down from the coffee." He paused. "Again with the talking to himself, and now talking in third person." John shook his head rapidly to clear it. "Right, what to do?"
There were books he could read, logic puzzles to solve, a computer to beat at chess and poker and a variety of other games.
He thought he heard a click quietly, but among the humming and beeps of the monitoring system he couldn't be sure.
He kept staring out at the galaxy and found he was tapping his foot.
He cocked his head to listen, yes music, faint but there. He darted to the music system and glared at it, why would it just start on its own?
He turned it up slightly… dancing with myself… he rolled his eyes, did they really think he was that easy to trick? He pretended he was about to start dancing, then spun and hit the two way button on the comm.
"Damn!"
"Nice try, Alan," he said to a very disappointed younger brother.
(AC/DC – Cover You In Oil)
"Put some music on will you," Virgil called to Alan who, as punishment from Dad was helping him clean out Thunderbird 2's med bay.
Alan sighed and went over to the stereo, Virgil's mp3 player sitting in its cradle on top.
"Can we put my music on?"
"Nope, you know the rules, driver picks the music."
"No one is driving!" Alan said in exasperation.
"But if someone was, it wouldn't be you," Virgil said firmly. "I wouldn't subject you to that, darlin'," he said, patting the metal wall of his hulking 'bird.
"Ha ha, very funny, but please can we not listen to classical music."
"Did I say classical?" Virgil asked reasonably.
"No, but…"
"I do listen to other stuff, you know," Virgil rolled his eyes. "Just hit the rock playlist."
Alan picked up the mp3 player to set the music and scrolled through to find the list. It was labelled, as Virgil had said, as ROCK. Good old Virgil as literal and to the point in his writing as in his speech. Unlike John, whose playlists had names like Orion and Andromeda, or Scott whose mp3 player contained a long list of girls' names.
Alan scrolled through the list of tracks. "Jeez Virgil, is this your dirty list or something?"
"What are you on about now?" Virgil sighed.
"Cover You In Oil?" Alan read out the first track.
Virgil just frowned at him in confusion.
"Caught With Your Pants Down, Touch Too Much, Got You By The Balls, Mistress For Christmas!" Alan laughed. "And those are all just one artist!"
"It's rock, Alan, you know: 'Sex, drugs, rock and roll'."
"No, I'm pretty sure this is just sex, what sort of filth do you listen to?"
"Just put some music on, I didn't know I could offend your delicate sensibilities with my music choices."
"No, I just realised why you don't have a girlfriend."
"What?" Virgil frowned at him again.
"Well, she gets in your car, turns on the stereo and decides you are a pervert."
"Thanks for your opinion, Alan," Virgil said with forced calm, "I'll remember to share your internet history with your next squeeze."
"Squeeze? Who did you learn slang off of? Grandma?"
Virgil just closed his eyes for a few seconds then pressed the comm switch on the wall.
"Dad, please can we just drop Alan in the sea next time for punishment."
(Marillion – Hooks In You)
Gordon swam lazy lengths of the pool, just thinking.
He looked up at the end of length number 29 to see Alan looking down at him.
"Why are you swimming?" his younger brother asked.
"What an odd question." Gordon kept swimming, Alan jogged along to pool side to reach the other end before he did.
"Gordon, I want to talk to you."
"Shoot." Gordon touched the end of the pool and turned, swimming back along the length.
"Gordon!" He smirked in the water, he knew exactly what expression Alan would now be sporting; 'Sulky Pout' as he and John had dubbed it, to go with 'Sad Pout', 'Smug pout', 'Stupid Pout' and 'Sentimental Pout'.
"Okay," Gordon reached the edge of the pool, put his hands on the side and launched himself out of the water using his arms alone. He always did that little stunt in front of Alan just to remind him who was the fittest.
As usual, Alan scowled and 'Sulky Pout' became more pronounced.
"What did you want to talk about?" Gordon asked.
"Tin-Tin," Alan said shortly.
"Ah."
She's got her hooks in you,
She's got her hooks in me too.
(Yello – Oh Yeah)
Alan turned on his music and started that odd dancing that people do while seated. His older brothers glanced at each other, this was an opportunity not to be wasted.
"Could you copy this from Five's communication cams?" Scott asked John quietly.
"Already doing it," the blond said smugly, his fingers flying across the keyboard of his laptop.
"Shame there's no sound," Virgil said sadly as Alan started bobbing his head in something midway between chicken impression and nodding.
"I'm trying to fix that," John muttered.
Gordon just had his hand pressed across his mouth to try and stop the explosion of laughter threatening to escape. His face was slowly going purple.
John pressed something on his keyboard and with a triumphant grin, turned up the speakers.
…The sun… even more beautiful… Oh Yeah…
"He's listening to Duff-man music!" Gordon sniggered uncontrollably.
"Should we all pop up on the screen and scare him?" Scott said gleefully.
"And now we know where Gordon gets it," Virgil said shaking his head.
"Let's leave him to it," John decided, flicking off the screen.
"John!" the three others complained.
John tapped his laptop and smirked, "It's still recording, all the better for blackmail. Do I look stupid?"
"No," Gordon grinned and pointed at the now blank screen, "but he does!"