I am not even remotely happy with the end of this chapter... I had one of those delightful computer glitches the erased this entire story from my laptop, including the two chapters after this and then a certain someone started to piss me off more than bloody Druitt does (I watch too much of this show) and so then I was in a s**t of a mood, making the light and fluffyness I previously had in this chapter, unattainable...

But, here we are, many swear words later, praising the fact that I have a four hour gap in the middle of my timetable and thus had the chance to write this again...

Thank you to everyone who favourited/alerted/reviewed :) I kept going with this chapter for y'all!

Oh, and FYI, the out of character-ness does increase and will be explained in due course...

Enjoy

xx

(Sorry about the rant)

"Helen," Nikola called out, his eyes searching the bed.

"What's wrong?"she asked again, struggling to get out of bed. She threw back the sheets with her good arm and they all gasped.

"Where are you?" he called out again, stepping forward tentatively. Fighting against the heavy sedation running through her veins, Helen pulled herself out of the bed. The fact that no one tried to stop her alarmed her even further. Instead they all made strangled, startled noises as she threw back the covers.

Pulling out the IV in her arm, Helen's feet hit the ground and she began to make her way over to her team.

"Nikola," she said slowly, coming to stand in front of him. His eyes flicked to her face but then slid away again as he tried to find the source of her voice.

"Helen!" he called again, a little too loud.

"I'm here," she said, reaching her hand out to him. He flinched away from her hand before his eyes opened wider with understanding.

"Helen," he called again, softer this time as his hand started to reach out to her. His hand bumped into her bandaged shoulder and she let out a yelp. "Sorry," he mumbled, hand moving down to what he assumed would be safe territory.

"Nikola!" she scolded grabbing his hand and directing it away from her chest. Realising his mistake, Nikola smirked at her, reaching out his other hand to cup her face. Or at least try. It took him a few moments to find her, groping thin air for a minute until brushing against what he thought was her hair.

"What is it?" she asked as his finger hit her eye. Dropping his hand, she used it to push away the hand cradling her face. Cradling was a lose definition, she decided as his thumb hit her nose.

"We can't see you," he answered, looking into what he hoped were her eyes.

"My eyes are up here," she instructed firmly, a hand lifting his chin so they were looking eye to eye.

"Which is exactly my point," he said, ever so slightly smug.

"Where are you?" Kate asked, breaking into their conversation.

"Right here," Nikola said, placing his hand on her back as he spun around to face her confused looking team. Slowly, his hands began to inch down her back and she had to suppress a groan.

"Unerring," she muttered at him, moving to cross her arms before realising just how much that would hurt her bandaged shoulder. With a sigh, she turned back to Nikola's smug face.

"What is going on?" she demanded. He looked back to her his eyes staring into her forehead.

With a smug chuckle he reached out and grabbed her shoulders and she flinched.

"Sorry," he said, as he moved his hand further down her arm. He spun her around and then began to push lightly at her back, moving her over to the mirror.

"There is no need to shove me," she insisted, walking a little quicker to avoid his hands. She came to a stop in front of the mirror he was directing her to, eyes widening in horror as she took in the empty frame. Nikola, not realising that she'd stopped moving, ran into her and Helen let out a hiss of pain as the action sent bolts of heat straight through her shoulder.

"But I can see myself," she said with wonder, looking down at her bare hands, trailing her eyes down her own body to make sure it was all still there. "I can see myself but not in the mirror," she said, spinning around to look at Nikola who was still staring into the mirror. With a sigh she reached up and pulled his face towards her.

"But how can you be invisible?" Will asked, glancing at the space in front of Nikola that the vampire was staring at.

"Maybe she's not even here," Kate mused, eyeing Nikola with distrust.

"I am most certainly here," Helen said loudly. Henry, Kate and Will all looked in the direction of her voice but still looked confused.

"I'd guess it has something to do with that beast you had us fight," Nikola said, shuddering at the memories.

"Perhaps its bite was poisonous," she theorized, turning around to study her lack of reflection.

"But why can't you see yourself? And why can't we see your clothes? Or the bandage on your shoulder?" Nikola asked, his mind whirring.

There was a pause.

"You are still clothed?" he asked.

His startled cry and the slap the resonated around the room came as an answer. "I was just wondering," he whined, rubbing his cheek gingerly.

"Stop," came Helen's instruction.

"We need to know if you're affecting other things," he argued feebly. They all knew that was not the intent of his statement and Helen's noise of disgust confirmed Will's belief that she was glaring at him angrily.

Will, Henry and Kate looked at each other uncertainly. Nikola muttered to himself in a language none of them could understand. "And mind your mouth," came Helen's disapproving voice, seeming to move towards the mirror again.

Helen stared, confused at her lack of reflection. She thought back over every creature she'd ever encountered that had this gift but nothing matched up. Even Nigel, the closest to her biologically couldn't make anything but his own person disappear and here she was, able to look down at her own body but not see it in a mirror.

"But why did it wait until now to kick in?" Kate threw out. Nikola rolled his eyes at her but she shrugged, holding her ground.

"Another good question," Helen said, placating both Kate and Nikola at once. Everyone was glancing around the room uncertainly, only Nikola managed to keep an eye on her, seeming to study the empty space before him. "I need to see the creature, immediately," she decided, looking between her confused team. There were a few moments of tense silence before Kate found the guts to talk.

"I'm sorry Doc," she said, looking apologetically at the space three foot to Helen's left. "But we had to kill it, it was the creature or you and…" she trailed off with another apologetic smile. Helen let out a sigh of annoyance and sent a glare at each of the guilty looking people in front of her. And a particularly nasty one at Nikola.

It was only afterwards she realised the futility of the action.

"And what of the corpse?" she asked, working to keep her voice unemotional.

"It'll be here in the next few days," Henry supplied. "I called the guys in Brazil just before you woke up and told them to ship it up. They were having some trouble locating it but last I heard they thought they were getting closer."

"Good work, Henry," she responded, more than happy to praise him. At least one of them were able to keep a straight head under pressure. She wasn't quite sure when she had become so judgemental of her team, she knew they were trying their best. She decided then and there to blame Nikola. He was physically capable of stopping the abnormal and hadn't and he was a lot easier to be mad at than her team.

"What about the blood work?" she asked, gesturing ineffectually to the small piece of cotton attached to her arm.

"Your blood work should be back in a few hours," Nikola supplied, placing a hand on her unbandage shoulder. He was getting better at that, she mused. A tense silence fell over the room and Helen almost let out another sigh

"Well…" Will started nervously to the space above her head. "What now?"