AN: Was at a con from Friday-Sunday, hence the lack of updates but I'm finally back! And with a lot of characters that hopefully people will enjoy. Thanks as always! Hope you enjoy this and hope you have a good day (or night depending on when you read it ^-^).

While Alastair was still healing, he'd thought Kenton was already back in the Middle East. He didn't know why he had thought that. Perhaps he'd gotten hit upside the head harder. Either way, at one point he was alone in his apartment stretching when he suddenly heard his buzzer. He knew it couldn't be James because he was out on a mission so Alastair almost thought of ignoring it until he heard it again.

It became clear they were the type to continue ringing until answered so Alastair finally went to go see who it was, and upon seeing them, answered without a single thought.

Kenton's happy face immediately went from pleased to shocked and then extremely worried. "Holy shit! What happened to you?!"

It took quite some time for Alastair to realize what Kenton was on about. The swelling was gone and the bruises had all eased, changing to yellow tints in some areas, and all cuts had scabbed while bones mended. Compared to how he had looked, he looked like a million bucks now but for someone without that prior knowledge, it was obvious he still looked like shit.

"Right," Alastair said slowly. "Forgot about all this."

"Forgot! How could you forget?! Who did this to you? Is this work related? I swear if this is work related I'll go down there and beat up those guys myself!"

"I'm assuming you're talking about my other job and not the tailor job which, if I'm right, you don't even know where it's located."

"I don't care I'll find them!" cried Kenton as he pushed his way in. Immediately pulling and prodding at Alastair, picking up his arms and moving his face back and forth, Kenton added, "I cannot have my baby brother getting beat up by conmen and murders and terrorists and who knows what. I'm going to—"

"Kenton, first off, don't ever call me your baby brother again. I was never your baby brother before and I certainly am not now. Second, you do realize that no matter what you say you cannot actually do anything, right? I know I can't stop you ranting, especially since you've allowed me to rant to you in the past, but all actions you'll come up with can't actually be taken," Alastair said with a sigh.

"Oh I know! I mean, shit, I work for the military. But you're also right that I am extremely disappointed with how they are treating you and I sure as hell get to baby you right now because like we've already discussed, you look like shit. Now I'm calling Nnenna cause she knows this great recipe for soup and she'll know exactly what to do!"

"What?! Kenton don't-oh Christ!" groaned Alastair as he doubled over at the hit to his midsection. Despite the talk of babying him, Kenton took full advantage of Alastair's condition to keep him away from the phone as he talked to Nnenna and she agreed to come over immediately. It wasn't until after his brother had finished the phone call that Alastair was finally able to get a proper breath out. "You probably broke another rib."

"Oh we both know I didn't," Kenton said with a laugh that stopped abruptly midway. "Wait! You broke a rib? How many? Which sides? What about—"

And then the buzzer was going off again and before Alastair could stop him, Kenton was answering the door. Thinking it was much to quickly for Nnenna to get there, Alastair was right as instead, Lily stepped through the doorway instead.

"What are you doing here?" wheezed Alastair.

"James asked me to double check on you and clearly his concern was well placed. You can barely get a breath out."

Rolling his eyes, Alastair turned to make leave of everyone as he growled out, "That's because of Kenton."

"Whatever, you clearly need a nice sit down, a cup of tea—"

"And soup!" Kenton added with a grin.

"No, not really. Honestly, I was just stretching and getting ready to work out before you two just ran on in!"

"First off, you invited me in," said Kenton.

"No, I opened the door. You came in on your own, pulled at my skin until it felt like putty, and then punched me in the gut," Alastair deadpanned.

"Well if it's any consolation, I didn't punch you in the stomach."

"That's not a consolation!" cried out Alastair just as the door buzzed again and instead of anyone answering it, the person just walked in on their own. "And you didn't lock the door!"

"My word, Kenton was right," Nnenna spoke as she walked forward, firmly grabbed Alastair by the shoulders and steered him to his bedroom.

He went along with it, more out of shock than anything else, and silently wondered how she knew where to go. Granted, his apartment had a very simple and regular layout but still.

"Now sit here and I'll be right back."

"Nnenna, you don't actually have to do any—"

"It doesn't matter what you say. I am doing this because you are my brother-in-law and this is simply what family does. It takes care of one another."

"You may want to tell your husband that then."

"Believe me, I'll make sure to," Nnenna said and after leaving the room, a loud cry brought on by surprise and pain was heard.

At the same moment, Lily was coming in (honestly, where were these people's manners?) and asking, "Did this all happen because of work? You know, like work work? The work that you and James do but no one knows you do because it's all secret and special and great but also dangerous and—"

"Yes Lily!" Alastair cried out, simply to stop her from talking. "And as I pushed onto my brother, you can't do anything about it so you may as just leave it."

"Wait? Kenton knows? How much does he know? Does he know about—"

"Later," stressed Alastair.

"Right, yes. Of course. Glad that's straightened out," muttered Lily. She sighed, looking a bit annoyed that she couldn't go on and get proper answers to her questions but bounced right back and onto Alastair's bed.

"Have manners simply disintegrated with the beginning of the twenty-first century?"

Lily completely ignored the question and instead said, "Alright, so have I ever told you about my horrible creepy ex?"

"What? Why would I care? Why are you talking to me?"

"Because James isn't here right now and I would talk to Kenton because he'd probably be more interested than you but Nnenna is more than likely still beating him with a ladle and making soup. I swear, that woman knows how to multi-task," Lily said with an approving nod. "But anyways, there's this guy Vernon who I dated for a bit but he turned out to be a real ass and a creep. And he wasn't even that good looking so I don't know why I did but—"

"Why was he a creep?" interrupted Alastair. He wasn't interested per say, but if he was going to be forced to hear the story he might as well understand what was going on.

"Well he started showing up everywhere I went. It wasn't even really endearing at first, just odd. And like, he didn't even try to make an excuse or sound surprised. It was obvious he knew where I'd be. And then finally when I tried to tell him he needed to back off, and this was without blankly telling him it was over, and he got really physical and violent. To make the rest a bit shorter, basically more shit was broken, I got a black eye for my troubles, Vernon got a punctured rib thanks to James, and I got my restraining order."

"So why are you bringing this up now?"

"Because he showed up again at work! Not the ice cream job but one that I've started at the library. I'm actually thinking of making it a full time job. Like an actual life time thing. Being a librarian is awesome! Except the quiet part, but anyways he showed up again, tried to drag me off, and this beautiful Viking goddess knocked him out!"

Alastair couldn't help but chuckle at that as the line was completely unexpected and very ridiculous sounding. "Excuse me?"

"Yeah! She's like, shorter than me, and she's utterly adorable but damn she's strong as hell and has this perfect pixie cut and blonde hair and blue eyes! Oh! And after she knocked him out, it was one punch, just a single bam! He was down! But afterwards she says in this amazing voice 'Figured you could handle yourself but I haven't saved anybody as good looking as you and I just couldn't pass up the opportunity of saying hello.' Is that just amazing or not?"

He couldn't help but laugh as Lily finally took a breath. He decided that it wasn't because he really enjoyed listening to Lily and that it was just nice having someone else who got really excited about things like James did since he'd been gone for a while (though that was of course a lie) and asked, "Do you even know her name?"

"Of course! Her name is Susan and she's American. She's over here for the week though because of this heavy weight lifting competition that I am totally going to go see tomorrow," Lily responded. "And you know what the most exciting bit is? I think I'm going to try for the other team."

It took Alastair a moment to get what she meant, but when he did he gave her a rather curious look which she readily waved off.

"Hey, don't matter what you look like. Nothing is as sexy as chivalry and a good haircut. Besides, seeing as the only intelligent man on this planet is you and James and you guys are definitely not up for grabs, I figured it might be time I dated someone with some form of sentient thought."

"Seeing as I have a brother, I should probably be offended by what you just said but it's just to true to argue with," Alastair responded as Lily grinned and laughed.

"Hey, what are you two doing?" asked Kenton just as himself and Nnenna walked in with four bowls of soup.

"Just your unevolved brain," responded Alastair.

"My what brain?"

"Exactly my point," Alastair replied as the two women laughed and Kenton just shrugged and handed his brother his soup.

"Whatever, just be healthy, get better, and eat your soup," Kenton said as he also found room on Alastair's bed to sit down.

Nnenna on the other hand asked, "Is it alright if I sit here or would you prefer it if I got a chair."

"Seeing as you actually know the meaning of manners, you have free range of the house. Do with it what you will," Alastair responded, the words starting up an argument with Kenton and Lily as they fought over who had more say over the flat while Nnenna and Alastair just silently watched, amusement in their eyes.