Things were certainly exciting in England. They even had a welcoming committee, which may or may not have been ready to attack them if they turned out to be hostile.

Zephyr had forgotten who she was again, Katrina didn't even bother to correct him this time; he still seemed pretty out of it and probably rightly so. It wasn't every day a guy jumped in front of a moving jet and lived to tell the tale.

With Ghost's help, Katrina steered the once injured air elemental out of the plane and onto his home soil. It was a good thing he was so thin, because if he'd been any heavier the two of them might not have been strong enough to leverage him out of the jet.

“Which... way?” Katrina panted at two someones who had the same face.

“Follow” “This” “me.” “way!” Their sentences overlapped each other, yet the meaning was still clear. They followed: through the door, around a counter, and into the first available chair, which happened to be at the kitchen table. Katrina collapsed into the next available chair. She definitely needed to go to all her gym classes this year. That had been way too much of a workout.

She poked Zephyr in the side, opposite where she had earlier seen his ribs, “You're heavy.”

Regaining consciousness after any significant injury is never a pleasant process; the mind seems to develop an almost masochistic curiosity in swiftly seeking out every ache and pain it can find before then fixating on them to a rather unhealthy and unpleasant degree. If the human body did indeed have a creator then this subsequent torment was all too likely intended as crude reminder to avoid whatever initial idiocy had caused the damage in the first place.

It was perhaps with such a thought in mind that Zephyr’s subconscious fervently struggled against waking, unfortunately the gelid breeze which greeted him as he was half dragged, half carried from the jet rapidly removed the lingering lassitude from his mind, rousing him to full awareness and drawing a pained groan from his throat as his body abruptly tried to cash checks which couldn’t be paid with only a few short hours of rest.

His limbs had the responsiveness and dexterity of wet sand, his throat raw and dry to the point where it seemed to burn and his entire midsection, although healed, was exceedingly sore causing pain to shoot up and down his sides whenever he moved or his stomach happened to issue an audible notice for food. Worst of all though was the incessant pounding coming from his skull as though something was furiously trying to claw its way out of his head. It was far worse than any migraine or hangover had any right to be and rendered the elemental as cooperative as an abandoned puppet.

Eventually though the hessian found himself ushered inside and led to a chair where he all too eagerly collapsed and cradled his head in one hand as he tried to will away the pain whilst glancing blearily at his surroundings and vaguely noting that he had somehow become the center of attention for a fair few unfamiliar individuals. A more cynical and pessimistic part of the mercenary’s mind noted the fact that none of them seemed to be interested in doing a damn thing to help him.

Then he was poked.

It wasn’t a particularly forceful or sharp action but it still caused him to use muscles that were in no way ready to be used. A pained sigh escaped his lips as his side twitched in response and he knocked the offending digit away with his free hand before sending a weary glare its owner, only to blink in surprise as he once again took in familiar features framed with blonde hair. This time however he was lucid enough to properly recognize the girl before him.

“Katrina? Wha- No, never mind.” A partial recollection flashed through his and he dismissed the half formed question with a slight shake of his head only to wince and immediately regret the movement as the ache in his skull briefly intensified. “I need aspirin, or something stronger, could you try and find some please?”

He’d deal with everything else after he’d gotten the pain to a manageable level.

It was strange coming back here. Things were the same and different. Everything was cleaned up now. All the work they had started was now complete. It was a home now. A full home.

"But you look..." "I can't believe." "Ghosty!" "So young."

"Max, can you... give us some space?"

After they had deposited Zephyr in a chair, Kat had taken up guard next to him and Max was just so excited that he split from four to six.

"Maybe you could make yourselves useful and rustle us up some water?" Ghost did not trust him near the microwave or stove. Water was a safe start to getting something in their bellies.

As for Ghost, she made her way over to the sink while the Maxes were each grabbing a cup from the cupboard. She had left her saucy wig on the jet, but the outfit still called for at least a little swagger. The air elemental fished a rag out of a drawer that looked clean and ran the water until it was steaming. She soaped it up, wrung out the excess and then handed it to Katrina. "Can you, uh, clean up his face? It might help wake him up and I don't have the heart to take him home like that."

The first of the glasses of water was set between Katrina and Zephyr. The other 5 Maxes were still jostling for the ice dispenser.

"Give me ten minutes. I'm gonna go see if I can't track down a phone number to call ahead." She waved the passport at Kat. The other X-Force members seemed to either be enjoying the show or had already found something better to do.

The air elemental got a hold of a phone and called information from the back patio. "Hello? I'm trying to find the phone number of a Sarah Smith. I have her address..." The address was wrong. The name was too broad on it's own. Simon and Sarah Smith turned out to be a lovely couple in their late 70's living in the hills of Northumberland which was less than helpful in tracking down Zephyr's family. The passport was expired, but she had hoped it would help somehow. She frowned at the little young Zephyr who frowned up at her.

Right. Only one thing left to do. "It's a no go, Kat. We'll just have to surprise them." Ghost announced as she scooped up one of the six cups of water for herself.

Katrina took the rag from Ghosty as she breezed by in the other room to try and make some phone calls. The multiple splitting guys seemed to be arguing over something in the kitchen that sounded like none of them knew who had used the aspirin most recently and had neglected to put it back in it's normal location.

The blonde teen held out the hot cloth, ready to wipe at the marker, but unsure if she actually should. Zephyr was a grownup, after all, and may not really need her help.

“Do, uh- do you want help?” She thought it best to ask first. When he didn't seem to care one way or the other, she wiped at one corner of his fake cat whiskers, trying to make it disappear.

“I know I already said it before,” Katrina started quietly as she started working on the 'M' of his backwards 'meanie', “but I wanted to say it again, now that you're feeling a little more awake. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hit you, and I didn't mean to mess up your healing...” She waved her fingers in the air to indicate what type of healing thing she meant, since she couldn't come up with the proper word for it.

Attempting to form coherent thoughts when the mental equivalent of a wrecking ball continually strives to decimate the inside of your skull is not the easiest of endeavors. A conversation, by extension, is all but impossible, at least, if one wishes to remain polite and avoid littering their discourse with all manner of vulgarities.

Zephyr was well aware of this; however knowing and caring are two drastically different things and were it not for his sisters doppelganger the elemental likely would have been far more… insistent with his requests for medication. As things were though protégé’s presence only served to enforce the hessians naturally taciturn nature and render him all but silent as he shut his eyes and clutched the bridge of his nose with one hand in a vain effort to ignore the jumble of noise and half formed conversations around him.

In the midst of all these unpleasant sensations a damp cloth was abruptly brushed against his head and he instinctively jerked before biting back a curse as a fresh wave of pain surged through his head and threatened to erase the tenuous grasp he had on his growing temper. Fortunately his patience held, and the knowledge that the slightest motion could exacerbate his condition kept him still as Katrina continued her ministrations and stumbled through an apology.

An apology which rapidly brought to the front of the elementals mind precisely what the young gamine beside him was capable of.

Cautiously turning his head to face the Lilliputian illusionist Zephyr grudgingly opened his eyes to mere slits and stared at the girl for a moment before speaking. “There is a time and place for things Katrina.” He stated in a careful monotone. “Now would be an excellent time for you to repeat your last trick.”

Oh. Oh, of course.

Katrina concentrated, remembering the feeling of detachment she had felt the one time she had the privilege of riding in the void. She centered that feeling of nothing into her head, momentarily dulling sounds and sights until she got the illusion adjusted just right.

She whispered as she wiped at another permanent marker whisker, “Better?”

A moment passed, and then another before the relentless hammering in his head abruptly abated and all of his senses seemed to dull by a few slight but noticeable degrees. A relieved breath escaped the elementals lips, his posture fell slightly as he allowed his muscles to relax and he tentatively began to raise his head, quickly gaining confidence as he failed to encounter any pain.

It was as though someone had simply thrown a switch, the pain had all but vanished yet his other senses somehow persisted, if to a somewhat less precise degree. Given the alternative though Zephyr wasn’t about to complain, he’d gladly endure reduced vision, diminished hearing and whatever else in exchange for a clear head at the present moment. In some ways it was actually better than anything he’d managed to achieve with various painkillers.

“Better?”[/color]

“Much, thank you.”

Leaning back to settle himself more comfortably in his seat the elemental took the cloth from Katrina as he reviewed his surroundings properly for the first time. The kitchen itself was rather quotidian but it was clearly filled with individuals who were anything but, half of whom seemed staring at the hessian somewhat curiously whilst the other half, consisting of a number of identical teenagers who couldn’t have been over fifteen and appeared to arguing amongst themselves.

Completing his cursory glance of the kitchen Zephyr briefly returned his attention to Katrina, a number of questions were at the forefront of his mind and though Ghost was just across the table, rapidly reforming memories gave him little desire to speak with his svelte counterpart. That left him with his ashen eyed protégé whose own focus was likely somewhat occupied with providing the elementals anesthetic and could possibly limit her ability to provide answers.

Addressing the room at large the hessian spoke with what dignity he could muster in his current condition. “I seem to have missed recent developments, could someone catch me up? I’ve rather had my fill of surprises.”

His last words may or may not have been accompanied with a pointed look at a certain snow haired sylph.

The way that he looked at her... she squirmed. Where was her saucy wig now that he needed it?

"Zephyr, I'm sorry. When I told Katrina to take you home I... sort of gave her the wrong address." She really, really wanted to get that permanent marker off of his face, but he was holding the rag and he was also very not happy with her. Scrubbing his face would not endear her to him now.

"We're in England. I tried to call your folks to let them know you were here, but I guess your passport information is outdated?"

The elemental cleared her throat with a delicate e-hem as she smoothed the surface of the already perfectly smooth kitchen table. "Also, you have permanent marker on your face." No need to tell him how that permanent marker got there or that she had drawn cat whiskers and labeled him a meanie.

Ghost tried to minimize her surface area, as if shrinking in on herself would lessen the rightful tongue-lashing she was bound for. At this moment, she could not have felt more foolish for her childish behavior.

Katrina's face was frozen into one of intense concentration. Everything else around her was a little fuzzy, and not-important. All she needed to focus on was helping Dio. She owed it to him after hitting him with the jet, it was the least she could do to help him feel better.

He was talking, but she wasn't really paying attention. His attention was directed over her shoulder, at Ghost, presumably.

She wasn't as used to this type of concentration as she was to being invisible, or using other regular types of illusions, so it took a little more effort to keep all the correct senses at bay. She focused on focusing, and may or may not have left the very tip of her tongue sticking out in her efforts to keep her brother-substitute comfortable.

Ghost, rather fittingly, was an open book. Guilt and regret were splashed across her features like oil over a lake; The hunched shoulders, bowed head gently wringing hands and partially averted eyes made, in all honesty, a rather pitiful image which at any other time likely would have gone a long ways towards soother Zephyr's rather volatile foul mood. Any chance of that however was swept away the moment the snow haired sylph began to speak.

"Zephyr, I'm sorry. When I told Katrina to take you home I... sort of gave her the wrong address."[/color]

A rather poor start to an apology truth be told. The waif was the reason he'd had to be taken home in the first place. Apparently though she didn't feel there was anything wrong with her earlier actions, only the fact that she'd failed in trying to ameliorate events. Which, in short, meant she was both ingenuous and incompetent.

He decided to let her dig a bigger hole.

"Is that so?" His tone was low and dead though his eyes were anything but as he leveled a barely restrained glare at his counterpart.

"We're in England. I tried to call your folks to let them know you were here, but I guess your passport information is outdated?"[/color]

Utter silence was the only response to this statement as the hessians processed the unpleasant revelation.

Zephyr did not get on well with his family. No, that wasn't entirely true, he'd cared and doted on his step sister when he'd been able to see her and he imagined he might have been at least courteous to his mother had she lived. His father however was another the issue entirely. One which the elemental had previously held no intention of revisiting unless it involved a tombstone and a small plot of land.

Hearing that Ghost had tried to arrange an abrupt family reunion did little for his already poor mood to put it lightly. With that being said he managed to maintain at least an outward appearance of calm as the sylph stuttered off to another awkward silence. He even managed another sip of water when the aspirin was finally located and handed to him.

"Also, you have permanent marker on your face." [/color]

A brief glimpse into his cup quickly confirmed this and the hessians icy demeanor finally began to emerge. Giving everyone else in the room a cursory glance a small part of him abruptly decided to afford the waif some minute degree of privacy as he closed his eyes and raised a hand to the bridge of his nose to partially mask the movement of his mouth before deftly constructing a silenced stream of air between the two and began speaking.

"Let me see if I understand this. You broke into my home, stole my gun and passport then goaded me into a chase around the city when I was less than sober at which point I collided with a jet. Do I have that right so far?"

Not even giving the gamine a chance to respond he continued.

"Then, after I somehow managed to cheat death, you decided it would be better to drag me across an ocean rather than take me to the nearest hospital or healer."

Opening his eyes and outright glaring at the sylph he finished. "What the **** is wrong with you?"

The elemental cringed. In the interest of honesty and full disclosure... "I broke into your home, stole your gun and the passport was there... I didn't intend to find it, but I did. Then when I went to tease you about it, I saw that you were in a drunken stupor and I drew on your face because... because you really shouldn't let yourself get drunk. I worry and... it was juvenile." Now was so not the time to be telling him off for his drug use and debauchery.

His accusation that something was wrong with her only rallied her rebellious spirit and stiffened her spine. "My mistakes are my own. I am apologizing for them and trying to make things right. What are you doing about your own? You wouldn't have hit the jet if you had your head on straight." She did feel the need to point that out even if the timing was poor. And Ghost had no such notions about keeping her lips covered. Even if she could detect his power-related secrecy, she was emotionally invested in this conversation. Everything else fell to the wayside.

Katrina was staring at Zephyr's mouth while he talked, not really paying attention to what he said, just watching the way his lips moved. He shielded his face from the people standing in the kitchen, like he had a secret just for Ghost, but Katrina, being right in front of him, could still see.

Just like a close up of an upset sports player after a fumble, foul, or error, there were certain words, or rather one certain word, that was easy to make out. Katrina was so surprised that she momentarily dropped her concentration on keeping Zephyr's headache at bay to stare at him slackjawed.

“Sorry,” she mouthed immediately and turned away to stare at the wall or something, because it didn't seem like she was supposed to have heard that.

She also reached down and grabbed Zephyr's free hand (or rather relatively free, because it was still holding the rag) and gave it a small squeeze of comfort. She would have done the same for Ghost, but she was too far to reach from where she sat.

Zephyr was generally a rather reticent individual, a trait largely attributable to being raised in a strict environment. As he'd matured though he'd come to appreciate his taciturn nature and the nigh perdurable control it granted him over his composure. It was almost a point of pride for the elemental that he rarely lost his temper and was usually aware enough to take his leave whenever he happened to come close.

That being said however recent events had tested his limits far beyond anything he'd previously experienced, and although Katrina's ministrations allowed him to at least dissemble an air of normality he was still quite shaken. The reality of how close he'd come to death was still sinking in and it was proving a bitter pill to swallow.

Then, on top of it all, Ghost's revelations had proceeded to make an already poor situation all the worse and thus made herself a target for the hessians yet barely constrained anger. Once he'd started on the waif though he'd quickly lost his pretense of calm; there had been a vindictive sort of satisfaction to watching the waif cringe under words, an odd sense of vindication which crushed any murmurs of guilt he might otherwise have had.

Then the pain returned and the next few moments were a blur as he struggled to cope with the thunderous hammering in his skull, oblivious to everything else.

Just as quickly as it arrived though the sensations subsided and the elemental found himself breathing heavily with his head cradled between his hands and eyes clenched shut. He could hear Ghost talking, and from the sounds of it he'd missed a good deal of what she'd said yet the sylphs acrimonious tone was more than enough for the hessian to grasp the crux of her response and it only fanned his anger. He hardly even noticed Katrina's mumbled apology.

"My mistakes? From where I'm sitting my only mistake was ever letting you into my home! None of this would have-"

He broke off sharply as he felt Katrina hesitantly wrap her petite hand around his own. causing his irate gaze to break away from Ghost and settle on the illusionist for a split second, almost daring her to say anything. The young gamine wasn't even looking at him though, but was instead staring resolutely at the nearest wall with her shoulders hunch and her head duck as she gently squeezed his hand.

A silent moment passed during which Zephyr remained visibly tense as his hands tightened into fists and he struggled to regain his temper. Eventually however he released a deep sigh and his posture relaxed as he turned back to the snow haired sylph and spoke in a far lower tone.

“I nearly died today Ghost, nothing you can say changes that. I nearly died because you wanted to play a bloody game, and you have the gall to say it's my fault? I may have my flaws Ghost but at least they don’t threaten anyone else.”

He regretted ever trusting her? And he still thought it was all her fault?

What an absolute, nearsighted jerk. He hadn't even listened to half of what she had said, did he?

Ghost stood suddenly. She didn't have to sit here and listen to this. She had been over his reasons and he hadn't deigned to hear any of them. "Passing the blame will never help you solve anything."

Some nearby snickering let her know that their privacy bubble had somehow popped. She hadn't been paying much attention to it in the first place, but now that it was gone she was embarrassed that Zephyr had gotten her so upset. Her cheeks colored and she snatched up his passport and turned to march away.

Ghost nearly marched into Maggie, Gary's wife, who had a stack of folded men's clothing.

The childish part of her wanted to slap them onto the ground and stomp on them. He was such a jerk!

"Are you alright?"

It was probably written all over her face. Stupid face, stupid betraying every stupid emotion. "Gary?"

Maggie pointed upward and back over her shoulder. That would be in the general direction of the team meeting room. "Thanks." Ghost eked out a smile so she would know that she wasn't angry at her and headed that way.

Surely Gary would have a way to find Zephyr's parents. Or know someone who could. Because at this point, re-introducing him to his parents was about the meanest thing she could imaging doing to him. The meanest and possibly most beneficial for getting him to see sense. If anyone could talk him out of throwing away a perfectly healthy life on drugs and alcohol, wouldn't it be his Katrina look alike sister?

She could almost feel the wind rush by as Ghost stormed out of the room. Slowly, Katrina turned back to face Zephyr now that he wasn't doing his silent yelling thing, or at least faced his chest. She spoke slowly, so she could still concentrate on keeping his headache at bay.

“Don't blame Ghost. It was all of our faults. If you want to be mad at someone you can be mad at me.”

The words were painfully slow, to try and keep her concentration at the same time. It may have slipped at times, but only for fractions of a second and only partially, if at all.

She was frowning, too, concentrating on the air elemental's chest. Then because it seemed like the right thing to do next, she let his hand slip out of her grip and put both her thin arms around his shoulders. She wasn't even sure if it was him that needed the hug, or her. She was feeling guilty about her role in the accident, and he was right, he had almost died and it had been at least partly her fault.