Foreward

Disclaimer: I do not in any way own or profit from the characters or settings of Thunderbirds. They were created by Gerry Anderson, and the copyright is held by Granada. Nor do I mean any disrespect whatsoever to the astronauts, living or dead, whose names I have borrowed for my fiction. This story is for my own entertainment and that of others.

Many thanks to Elizabeth Beers for betareading and to Lisa Bauer and Eugene Koberle for their help. All original pictures are by Christine Shultz, and are used with her kind permission.

Author's Note: This story was first published at fanfiction.net on June 30, 2004, and was completed on January 9, 2005. The original inspiration was found on some Thunderbirds web site whose name I can't recall, where someone asked, "What if Lucille was in charge of IR, and all the boys were girls?" This story was my answer to that question. In the original format, the first chapter was written such that the gender of the characters would come as a surprise. In this format, you can see what the surprise is just by reading this foreward, and by viewing the lovely pictures that Christine Shultz drew for me. The story is more than a genderbender; it's an alternate universe where I kept some characters as is, and twisted others. I did try to keep Brains's gender a secret until the end--and recently edited one particular spot that revealed it. Let me know if I was successful.

In the original, I identified the the astronauts whose names I borrowed for the story, one or two per chapter, starting with the very first pioneers. I'm reprinting those here as well.

Valentina Tereshkova--THE pioneer, the first woman in space. Flew into space as a cosmonaut for the Soviet Union on June 16, 1963

Jerrie Cobb--Selected as one of the first thirteen U.S. women to undergo the same training as the Mercury 7 astronauts. Alas, she was never able to travel into space.

Sally Ride, America's first woman in space. She was a nationally ranked tennis player, but she decided that science and college were more important than a tennis career. On an impulse, she applied for NASA's astronaut training program in 1978. She was one of six women chosen from the thirty-five who applied. Sally became a member of the space shuttle's seventh mission in 1983, thus becoming America's first female astronaut to actually fly into space. She flew on the thirteenth mission of space shuttle Challenger and was training for a third flight when the Challenger exploded in 1986. When she left NASA in 1987, she taught at Stanford and the University of California in San Diego.

Christa McAuliffe, the first teacher in space. She was a junior high school teacher who taught history, social studies, and civics and beat out over 11,500 applicants for the privilege of being the first teacher in space. She was scheduled to teach two lessons from space shuttle Challenger, but 73 seconds into liftoff, the shuttle exploded, right before the horrified eyes of millions of schoolchildren who were watching on television. Her alma mater, Framingham State University, in Framingham, Massachusetts, has established an educational center in her honor, the McAuliffe/Challenger Center.

Dr. Mae Jemison, MD, the first black female astronaut and the first black woman to fly into space. Dr. Jemison graduated from Stanford in 1977, then attended medical school at Cornell, graduating with her Doctor of Medicine degree. While at Cornell, she traveled to Cuba, Kenya, and Thailand, providing medical care and after graduation she spent three years as a medical officer in the Peace Corps, serving in West Africa. In 1987, her application for admission to NASA's astronaut training program was accepted and when she completed the training, she was the first black female astronaut. She flew into space on September 12, 1992 as part of the Space Lab J mission, where she served as a Science Mission Specialist.

About Mateo Island: According to the comic books, Mateo Island is one of Jeff Tracy's many small islands and atolls. It's located 60 miles southwest of Tracy Island, and it was used to build and test the Thunderbirds until similar, permanent facilities could be built on Tracy Island. Now it's used primarily as a fuel depot for Tracy Island and a Tracy Industries flying tanker is kept there. There is one particular hangar with automated repair facilities for larger craft (like Thunderbird Two) but is camouflaged so that the inner walls would look like any old cavern.

About the Hood's Temple: My information and descriptions of the Hood's temple base come from The International Rescue Book of Thunderbirds FAB Cross-Sections; by Alan Fennell and Graham Bleathman, Ravette Books, Ltd., London, 1993, pp. 24-25. The only addition I have made is a very sensible ladder in a pagoda. The name of Kyrano's wife comes from my fiction, The Retainer.

About The Eagle: The USAF plane, Eagle, mentioned in chapter 20, is from the comic book story, "Talons of the Eagle", printed first in TV Century 21, issues 66-72, weekly April 23-June 4, 1966, and reprinted in Thunderbirds: The Comic, issues 10-13, bi-weekly February 22 -April 3, 1992, and in Thunderbirds: Classic Comic Strips from TV21, compiled by Graham Bleathman and Sam Denham, Carlton Books, Ltd., 2002, pp. 123-137.

I hope you will enjoy this bit of "what if?" fluff.

Tikatu