Mama said
there’ll be days like this. Symphony Angel decided that whoever had penned
that hoary old melodic chestnut had never written a truer word. Ten days
before Christmas and the Angel Squad were patrolling the heavens in the worst
weather conditions she had ever encountered. Lieutenant Green’s
assurance that they were above the eye of the hurricane and not within
it, didn’t improve Symphony’s mood. Not for the first time, she
pondered the wisdom of her choice of occupation. In another
life, Yoko Inukai would have been an interior
designer. She was clever and innovative, with an endless supply of patience for
even the most delicate of tasks. In dark moments when she questioned her chosen
career path, she imagined herself running a small craft store, happily spending
hours making beautiful objects and furnishings for the discerning buyer.
Nothing mass-produced for her, she decided. The people buying her designs
would appreciate the personal touch, the uniqueness of their purchases.
There might not be a fortune to be made, but Yoko valued peace and contentment
over material wealth. To arrive at a state of serenity in one’s life was
an increasingly rare thing, she believed. Lucky indeed were those who
managed to achieve it. It hadn’t
taken long for her Spectrum colleagues to take advantage, not only of her
creative talents, but of her essential good nature. In no time, she had
become a gift-wrapping service for her hapless male colleagues, who understood
the importance of such tasks, but were incapable of carrying them out
successfully. Responsibility for party-planning and decor advice had rapidly
fallen on her slim shoulders. For the most part, she didn’t
mind. Her hobbies afforded her great pleasure and a welcome release from
the relentless pressures of her job. If that pleasure could be passed on
to others, then Yoko was truly happy. She didn’t
feel happy right now, however. With Christmas less than two weeks
away, she was behind in everything and increasingly anxious. She was also
tired and cranky because she wasn’t getting enough sleep. All because of
him, she thought dismally. Or, to be more accurate,
because of his request. It had come out of left field and stunned
her. Her instinct had been to say no, but to refuse him anything was out
of the question. Her debt was of such magnitude that she could not
imagine a situation whereby it could be fully repaid. Seven months
earlier, he had saved her life. In doing so, he had disobeyed a direct
order without regard for the consequences. She had been at fault – her
mistakes had endangered the entire mission. Yet he had risked his own life to
ensure that she should not pay the ultimate price for her folly. He had
even gone so far as to cover for her, something she knew was crucial in
ensuring her continued position in the Angel squad. During the long weeks
in sickbay while their injuries healed, when the best analgesic was
conversation, she tried desperately to convey both her shame and her
gratitude. He had deftly sidestepped her every effort to thank him, until
eventually, she did what he wanted and gave up. Nevertheless, the entire
episode had earned him her complete devotion. She adored him and
there was nothing she would not do for him. However, she
hadn’t expected this; saying yes had taken some soul-searching. The whole
thing required careful planning. Just getting together all the things
that were needed was difficult enough, without taking into account the fact
that privacy was essential. Secrecy, too, was paramount, something which
made her uncomfortable. There had been times over the past few weeks when
she had lied to her colleagues. She was not a good liar and she wondered
how much she might have inadvertently revealed. The number of occasions
they had been seen huddled together had given rise to curious looks and she
knew it would not be long before the gossip machine began in earnest. To
make matters worse, he had begun to put pressure on her, calling her on her
com-link late at night and even, God forbid, before she got out of bed in the
morning. “Come on,
Yoko,” he would murmur in her ear. “I need you. This has got to happen
soon, you know that. It’s not fair to keep me hanging on like
this.” His voice would be low and seductive, even if it was only because
he was anxious not to be overheard. It still made her putty in his hands
and she knew this was probably his intention. He was a man with a
formidable reputation for getting exactly what he wanted from the opposite sex;
any resistance, however slight, would be expertly overcome. She was going
to be a nervous wreck before this played out, she thought despairingly. Her headset
crackled slightly, as the storm continued to interfere with Skybase’s
communication systems. At least, she thought in anticipation, this might
be Lieutenant Green with a message ordering them to do the sensible thing and
return to base. No such luck. “Yoko.
Yoko, it’s me. Pick up, we need to talk. Are you there?” “Of course I
am here. I am on patrol. Where else would I be? ”
She tried to keep the anxiety out of her voice. “You should not be doing
this, Paul.” “I know, I
know. It’s just that I’m getting desperate. I’ve been hearing the
‘no’ word for too long, honey. I could do with a bit of
encouragement.” “I cannot
have this conversation now. What are you trying to do, get me
fired? If Destiny overhears this.....” “She won’t,”
Captain Scarlet interjected his voice soft and as smooth as silk. “I
picked the most secure frequency I could find. It’s just you and me,
Yoko.” “That’s
precisely where you’re wrong.” Destiny Angel’s icy tones were sufficient
to permanently freeze their headsets to their ears. “I have no idea what
you two think you’re doing, but it’s not going to continue on my patrol.
Captain Scarlet, please keep your personal predilections to the confines of Skybase. Symphony, get your mind back on the job and
I’ll see you in my quarters later.” “S.I.G.”
Symphony replied, despondently swinging her Falcon jet back onto its correct
flight path alongside her colleagues. The whole thing had turned into a
disaster. No good came of subterfuge, she reminded herself
miserably. She should not have become embroiled in this. It was certainly
the last time, the very last time she would do a favour for a friend. Two hours
later, Destiny’s anger was still incandescent. It occurred to Scarlet
that if she could have morphed through the door to his quarters without his
actually having to open it, she would have. She stood in front of him,
hands on hips, radiating fury. “Just what
the hell did you think you were playing at?” she hissed, eyes flashing blue
chips of ice. “I know it was just a routine patrol, but for God’s sake, surely
you can be professional enough to keep your assignations off the public
airwaves!” “It wasn’t
the public airwaves – just Spectrum’s,” Scarlet corrected her. “In fact,
it shouldn’t have gone to anyone but Yoko and me. Obviously, I
miscalculated the frequency. I’m sorry about that.” The comment,
both flippant and pedantic, only served to infuriate her more, something he
realised slightly too late. “You’re sorry
about that? So you damn well should be!” She snapped. “Paul,
in the time we’ve known each other, you’ve worked your way through more women
than I’ve had hot dinners. While I find that somewhat questionable, it’s
none of my business. It’s never affected our personal or professional
relationship and I hoped it never would. However, if you are now homing
in a member of my squad, that gives me cause for concern.” Scarlet
raised an eyebrow. “I really don’t know why,” he responded coolly. “It’s
never worried you before.” Destiny drew
herself up to her full five feet nine inches and hoped her slightly elevated
boot heels might give her a little equality in the height stakes.
“Your private life is no concern of mine,” she said icily. “You could
date Attila the Hun and I wouldn’t care. However, I will not, repeat not, have you playing bedroom games with members
of my team when we are working. Is that understood?” “Absolutely,”
Scarlet said politely. “But since you are so off beam in your assumptions
about my behaviour, you clearly don’t realise that I never have.
Besides, don’t you think you’re exceeding your remit, here? Your team are
grown women, Simone. They can take care of themselves,
they don’t need Mother Hen clucking over them.” “I quite
agree,” she retorted. “However, the physical and emotional well-being of
my staff is my concern. Yoko is the least experienced of us all
and she took a hard knock when she was hurt in that accident. She’d barely got
back to full fitness when The Mysterons happened and you know as well as I do
that the pressure has been relentless ever since. Physically, she’s fine,
but mentally.....well, I’m not so sure. I am entitled to be mad,
Paul. We’re five months into the biggest fight of our lives and you’re
hitting on the most vulnerable person I have.” Scarlet
stared at her. “Don’t give me credit for much, do you? You appear
to have forgotten that I was the person who got Yoko out of that particular
hell-hole and that I too, spent several painful weeks in sick bay as a
result. During that time, she and I got to know each other pretty well
and she’s not the delicate little lotus blossom you seem to think. I very
much doubt she regards herself as one of the walking wounded any more than I
do. Maybe you’re having difficulty in identifying the issue here.” “The issue
is that your lack of professionalism could have endangered the lives of my
crew!” she snapped back. Scarlet’s lip curled. “Don’t be
ridiculous,” he said coldly. “You know perfectly well that you’re all capable
of flying those things deaf, dumb and blind. The issue is that you
seem to have a problem with my choice of female companions, something which, as
you have correctly pointed out, is none of your business.” Destiny
glared at him. Scarlet’s ability to turn the tables was immensely
irritating, as was his capacity to wrong-foot her. If she didn’t back off
now, it was possible that she would find herself in the unenviable position of
conceding the argument and, what was worse, in a manner she could never
justify. “If anything
like this happens again, I will have no hesitation in taking the whole thing to
Colonel White,” she said stiffly. “Is that perfectly clear?” “As crystal,”
he replied, calmly. His expression was bland, but his eyes had
darkened from their usual deep blue to almost black, a sure sign of his annoyance.
“You’re quite right, I was out of line. Never again will I attempt a
conversation with one of your team while they are on duty.” “Well, make
sure you don’t!” She flashed back, all the while knowing that his promise
was meaningless. Constant communication between operatives was
essential to the business they were in – there was no way he could carry out
his job effectively by doing what he suggested and Destiny knew he had no
intention of trying. The only recourse now, she thought, was to walk away
before the argument descended from stupidity into farce. She turned
towards the door at precisely the moment his hand shot out to close round her
wrist. His grip was like a vice and he was standing uncomfortably close
to her. “If you’re
through with character assassination, you can at least allow me the right of
redress,” he said, his mouth against her ear.
“In fact, if you shut up and listen for five minutes, you might find I’m not
the unprincipled, amoral rat you seem to think I am.” “All right,”
Destiny said hastily, disengaging her arm and stepping smartly past him.
His nearness was having a disturbing effect on her heart rate, for some odd
reason. She decided she needed to put some space between them. Six
feet was probably not enough, but it would have to do. “Okay, I’m
all ears,” she said grimly. “But what I heard was what I heard – I doubt
you can put up a reasonable defence unless it’s going to be a prize-worthy stab
at fiction.” Scarlet shook
his head. “Maybe you should bear in mind the cliché that truth can
be stranger than fiction,” he replied mildly. He crossed the room
to the cupboard next to his bed and extracted a beautifully wrapped
parcel. Elaborate gold and silver ribbons and bows criss-crossed a box
covered in glittering cream paper. The exterior of the package was in
itself a work of art, she thought. “I know
Christmas is still a few days away, but I’ll have to give this to you
now.” Scarlet handed her the box cautiously. It was still
possible that she might throw it back at him, which would definitely be
disastrous. “I wasn’t
trying to fix a date with Yoko, at least not in the way you think,” he
continued, watching in some trepidation as she slowly opened the parcel.
Her fingers didn’t seem to be moving with their usual dexterity, but he
resisted the impulse to intervene. Eventually, the gorgeous wrapping was
dispensed, to reveal a delicate paper angel, expertly constructed from
shimmering white, gold and silver tissue. In its arms lay an even
smaller, perfect model of a Falcon Interceptor. The ethereal beauty of
the piece was breath-taking and Destiny stared at it in complete wonder. “I saw a
picture of this in a magazine and it reminded me of you,” Scarlet said
softly. “It was part of an exhibition by a leading Japanese artist and I
knew right away that I wanted to buy it for you. Unfortunately, the guy
wouldn’t sell. I told him he could name his price, but he wouldn’t
budge. Then I remembered something Yoko and I talked
about while we were in sick bay together. She told me she loved origami
and it occurred to me that maybe she could help. I showed her the picture
and asked her if she could make something similar. She said immediately
that she’d try, but of course, being the klutz that I am, I had no idea how difficult
it would be. I‘ve been putting her under a lot of pressure to get it
finished without realising how much I was asking of her. Turns out I
needn’t have worried. She brought it along about thirty minutes ago –
right after you’d finished tearing a strip off her, in fact.” “Oh.”
Destiny’s voice was small and shaky. Unusually, she seemed lost for
words. She turned the angel over to reveal a small inscription on the
base, written in Japanese. “What does it say?” Scarlet
shrugged. “Oh, it’s just ‘Merry Christmas’ – assuming I’ve copied it down
right. Japanese isn’t one of my strong points.” “So it’s not,
‘You’re an insecure, jealous bitch with a neat line in paranoia’, then?” The
words were out before she could retract them and she felt her cheeks suffuse
with colour. The tables had indeed been turned and he had trapped her
into revealing more than she would ever have intended. Damn the man, she
thought. “No, it’s
not.” Scarlet replied. “Although I daresay it might have been, had that
occurred to me.” His blue eyes caught and held her gaze. “Do you
like it?” Destiny
carefully laid the angel down on the corner of the cabinet and moved towards
him. She stood on tiptoe to wrap her arms around his neck and lean
against him, resting her forehead against his own. “It’s the most
beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” she whispered. “How do I say thank you
in Japanese?” “Haven’t a
clue, but this works for me,” he replied with a grin. He nuzzled her
neck appreciatively. “In fact, I’d be happy to stay like this all day,
but unfortunately, there’s something we need to do.” “You don’t
have to tell me. Apologise to Yoko. I feel dreadful, Paul. I
was a complete cow to her and she never said a word.” “She’s a good
friend, Sim. She could have spilled the beans,
but she didn’t. I definitely owe her for that.” He propelled
her towards the door, managing to gently squeeze her waist as he did so.
Her lack of resistance made him decide that there was more mileage to be had
out of this particular skirmish. “Did you really think I was trying
to get Yoko into bed? And if I had been, why would that make you
jealous?” “It
wouldn’t,” she retorted, entirely too quickly. “If I implied that I was,
I didn’t mean it. We’re platonic, Paul, we always have been. I’ve
never been jealous of your girlfriends, so why should I start now?” “I have no
idea,” he replied blandly. “But it’s an interesting concept, don’t you
think? Particularly in light of your delightfully warm response to my
Christmas present. Definitely an area we need to explore, I’d say.” “There’s
nothing to explore,” she said swiftly. “It was.... it was just my way of
apologising, that’s all. Now can we please put an end to this and go talk
to Yoko?” She was practically squirming with embarrassment, he noted. “Certainly.” He
opened the door and allowed her to pass in front of him, but not before he had
slid his fingers underneath the blonde ponytail and lightly caressed the back
of her neck. He felt her muscles jump and realised she too had
experienced the current of sexual electricity flowing between them. “If this is
what happens when we fight, I will definitely have to annoy you more,” he
breathed in her ear. She couldn’t
afford to allow him any more leverage, she thought desperately. The
situation was already completely out of hand and too dangerous to
cultivate. The man had more of a magnetic pull than Saturn and the weird
bit was that she had never realised it before. Shielded by the love of
his best friend, Destiny had been secure of her place in Scarlet’s heart.
Her role as friend, confidante and sisterly female advisor, elevated her to a
unique position in his affections, one that she knew could not be occupied by
any of the countless women who fell into the category of mere sexual conquests. But in that
one careless, heart-breaking moment when the world had been plunged into war
with an alien species, the bedrock of their relationship had shifted. In
the catastrophic fallout of the Mars mission, they had clung together, growing
closer in the face of both separate and shared tragedy. Now, to her
horror, she realised that emotional need was merging with physical desire in a
manner which threatened to overwhelm them both. It couldn’t
be allowed to happen, she decided. The humiliation of becoming just
another metaphoric notch on Scarlet’s bed post was eclipsed only by the risk
posed to a friendship that meant more to her than any other. She would
have to wrest control from him and make sure he didn’t get it back.
Destiny habitually dealt with emotional trauma by putting it on the back burner
of her mind. She would simply ignore the signals her body was sending
her. If she didn’t pay attention, she decided, it would all go away,
along with the guilt which flooded her heart at the mere thought of another
man. “Don’t push
your luck, Metcalfe,” she murmured. “The next time you pull a stunt like you
did today, I shall enjoy testing your retrometabolic abilities to the
limit. Got that?” “You know
your trouble? You’re no fun anymore,” he said mournfully. “You’ve
turned into a work-obsessed control freak. What you need is chill-out
time. Candles, music, good wine, followed by a warm bath and someone like
me to scrub your back. Okay, okay, don’t give me that look. I was
just kidding. We can swap the bath for a shower if you prefer. Ouch!
That hurt! You never told me you’d taken up kick-boxing.......” The door
closed slowly behind them. In the sunlight, the angel’s wings glistened
in a shimmering prism of colour. It might, of course, have been down to a
certain oriental inscrutability, but it seemed that the faintest hint of a
smile lay on her perfectly formed lips. The End Montage
created from original images from Dao
Cuong Quyet/Viet-Nam
Origami Group (Angel figure) And
the London Origami’s Annual Challenge 2005 (Falcon Craft) Acknowledgments This
piece originated as a poorly written, first effort, flashfic,
a couple of years ago. The “occasion” then
was a birthday, but I thought the theme was better suited to Christmas.
That’s my excuse, anyway, for not having produced anything more original! Thanks
to Hazel Kohler, not only for her swift and accurate beta-reading, but for her
perspicacity. She does what only the best editors can – shows you exactly where
you have gone wrong, even if it’s the last place you thought
! Thanks
to Colonel Chris – it always amazes me that I send her the usual basic internet
attachment and she transforms it into a thing of beauty to be posted on the
net. I have no idea how she does it, but I am so grateful. The
‘hoary old chestnut’, “Mama said,” was in fact, written by the late Luther
Dixon, producer of the Shirelles, among others.
“New
Captain Scarlet” is the property of Gerry Anderson and Anderson
Productions. My interpretation of the characters is non profit making and
wholly in a spirit of loving respect. I hope
2010 will be a happy, healthy and creative year for us all. Skybase
Girl 11th
January 2010
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