Doctor, doctor, gimme the news

[thepull_mods]

Who: Sick people and their well-wishers
When: May 13th-June 4th
Where: Hospitals and clinics all over the Port
Summary: A catch-all log for hospitalized people and their visitors all over the Port during the sickness plot. Everyone feel free to centralize your hospital visit threads here for convenience!
Warning: Please mark your threads if you'll need any.

Comments

/new roomie arriving~

[cracked_container]

[Five days after arrival and Teito's condition was finally considered stable enough to move him from an ICU to a regular room...in the pediatric ward. The hustle and bustle of the nurses around him were enough to lull him back to sleep, though he did wake up once on the elevator and once when the gurney stopped moving.

Sleepy verdant eyes blinked slowly as they settled him in, checked his vitals once again, then slipped out of the room with a few superficially reassuringly words. And then he lay there and stared blankly at the other bed it the room.

A bed currently holding a kid with white hair.

How strange...

Wait...

There's something familiar about this kid..]

Oh.

[Pushing up to an elbow, he tried to lean forward a little bit as he mumbled.]

You're the kid Frau knows, right?

/new roomie glaring~

[icy_heavens]

[He's not paying attention to very much at the moment. Paying attention to things only made him annoyed at these things, and he should probably make some effort to stay calm.

[So he doesn't bother to acknowledge the new roommate at first, just trying to settle into the quiet. But said roommate speaks. And says the magic word that is guaranteed to annoy him.

[His eyes slide over, narrowed and hard. He is not putting up with being called that.] I am not. A kid.

/new roomie's too tired to glare back

[cracked_container]

...

[He'll just blink at you now.]

You look like one.... protein pills? [His voice has that sleepy-thoughtful tone to it.] Mikage says using those for primary sustenance is the reason I'm so short, so that's probably what happened to you. Just have to eat better.

Frau has me drink a lot of milk, too.

[icy_heavens]

[You know? This conversation feels familiar already. Maybe they had one like it the last time this kid was here. Whatever. He doesn't remember for sure and he's too tired to care.]

I eat fine. [When he can keep it all down, which has been a bit of a problem lately.] My power slows my growth, okay? [Bitterly snapped.]

[cracked_container]

[Him too? Teito doesn't even want to imagine food right then. He's just going to settle back down, but on his side so he can see.]

...that doesn't sound like a very useful power. It can't be much like Zaiphon then.

[icy_heavens]

[He's lucky to keep even half of it down. He'll have dropped a few pounds by the time this is over.]

[All the linefacing.] It's plenty useful. [Don't insult his abilities, brat.] The slowed aging is just a side-effect. Lets us live longer.

[cracked_container]

[It wasn't an intentional insult, really. He just misunderstood. Slow blink is really quite sleepy.]

... How much is longer?

[Sorry, he still doesn't believe you're older than thirteen, max.]

[icy_heavens]

[That he can even be thought of as thirteen is an improvement, sadly enough. Before, people would think ten or eleven at best.]

[He's speaking slowly, because he wants to concentrate and make sure he's forming the words properly. Stumbling over what he says would make him sound like an idiot.] I'm nearly seventy. We can live for thousands of years.

[cracked_container]

...

[Teito was giving him the benefit. He knows how being short can be misleading!

Even so.]

...Did you say seventeen or seventy?

[It's the fever - he had to of heard that wrong.]

[icy_heavens]

[It's amazing how he keeps finding the energy to scowl. Why is this so hard for people to get? He explains it over and over, yet hardly anyone ever gets it through their heads.]

Seventy. Seven-zero. Is that really so difficult to understand?

A day or so later

[ibreakrules]

[Frau is still far to sick to actually come to the hospital and check on Teito physically, but that doesn't mean he isn't going to come up with a way to get there. That is why he's no floating into the room in Zehel's form. His body may not be able to make the trip, but his soul, as Zehel, easily could.

He stood looking down at Teito, not liking what he saw. Teito looked better but definitely not like himself.]

Stupid kid...

half an hour (-ish) later

[plum_that_snaps]

Momo had gone out to eat, and when she returned to the room that Hitsugaya and Teito were sharing, it was... occupied. By more than the just the two sick boys.

She peeked warily from the doorway at the skeleton in the room. She had seen enough strange things in the Port to have learned not to judge anything or anyone immediately, but she didn't exactly like the thought of something that looked suspiciously like death anywhere near her Shirou-chan.

"Excuse me," she said, "but— w-who are you?"

[ibreakrules]

Frau turned his head slowly toward her. The deep black cowl only covered the upper part of his face. What was visible was enough to show it wasn't a human face. Or at least not a live one's. While no expression showed there, internally Frau was cursing his luck. Of course Hinamori would be able to see him in Zehel's form. Hitsugaya had been able to.

And Frau would have rather that they hadn't. Explaining what Zehel was, who he was, would take a long time. Plus it was a discussion Frau didn't really want to have. Nobody was supposed to know about the ghosts. If they happened to encounter one, their memories of it were erased. Here it didn't matter as much since nobody knew the Barsburg religion, but still, Frau wasn't used to sharing that detail. So, he remained quiet, just watching her.

[plum_that_snaps]

And she stared back. It occurred to her that maybe he couldn't hear her—skeletons don't have ears, right?—or maybe he couldn't talk. But maybe they could communicate anyway.

The important question had to be asked. "Y-you're"—she points at Frau—"not"—she shakes a finger back and forth—"here"—she points to the floor—"to..."—she hesitates, and makes a grabbing gesture—"take anyone, are you?" She indicates the two boys in their beds, and gives Frau a worried look. That's all she's worried about, really. Don't take them away from me. Please.

[ibreakrules]

Frau had to strain not to break out into a fit of laughter of that. He could understand Hinamori just fine, but her pantomime was hysterical. It took all of his willpower, but he managed not to laugh and instead watched her passively.

She would probably recognize his voice if he spoke. Even so, he wanted to reassure her somehow that he wasn't here to cause any harm to either of the patients. He did, however, find it incredibly amusing that Hitsugaya and Teito were sharing a room. Even better, they were in the kids' ward. Restraining his laughter yet again, he slowly reached out a hand for Hinamori, intending on resting it on her head if she'd let him.

[plum_that_snaps]

The hand on her head made her pause in surprise. It was something no one had dared to do in a long time. No one except... her captain. Her stomach turned at the familiarity of the gesture, but she looked up at Frau and smiled gratefully. She understood. Or at least she hoped she did. In fact, she wasn't sure she understood at all. If being a death god herself had taught her anything, it was that death could be kind at the same time it was cruel. She hoped, prayed that that wasn't why he was here.

"They're not getting better," she said, looking at the two boys. "They just stay the same, fade in and out, come back and go away again."

[ibreakrules]

Frau's gaze turned once more to Teito. The kid looked better to his eyes, but of course that didn't mean very much. When Kevin had taken Teito away, Teito had looked terrible. At least he had to Frau's own fevered eyes. Either he looked better now because he was actually better, or he looked better simply because Frau was seeing through eyes clear of illness.

In the end it didn't matter which was the right answer. He couldn't do anything to help Teito besides be here for him and hope the kid could pull through. Labrador was the healer. Frau was the destroyer.

[plum_that_snaps]

"I'm worried," Hinamori mused, stating the obvious. "I— I thought no one could die, here, not us, not from a disease. But then... Captain Kuchiki..." A captain, someone so strong she considered them on another level, one step away from gods, had fallen ill to a simple flu and died. And just like that, her worldview was shattered. Here, it seemed, all bets were off, and it would be all too easy to lose the last remnants of home she had left.

"And that boy—Teito—he was kind to me, and he doesn't deserve to die either. No one deserves to die from this. Someone should do something." There was no one to look up to, here. No one to ask the answers. After enough time living among souls who were thousands of years old, she had begun to assume that there would always be someone to explain things to her. It was comforting, that knowledge, but it no longer applied. And it made her feel helpless.

[cracked_container]

...Frau?

[With a yawn, Teito uncurled from where he'd fallen into another light doze and dropped the blanket from his face. When he blinked open still-fevered eyes to see the black robes of Zehel, his expression only grew more somber.]

What happened? Why are you here like that? [Aaaaand then his breath caught and he bolted upright in the bed. An act that got extreme protest in the form of a roiling belly and a sharp wave of dizziness. Even so, he had to ask.]

Is your body alright?

[ibreakrules]

[Frau immediately reached out with a skeletal hand and pressed Teito back into the bed. He didn't need the kid passing out on him.]

It's fine. Just not strong enough to make the trip over here.

[In reality, Frau's body was far from fine. Being in Zehel's form was the only way Frau could eve be conscious. His body was too heavy to move, not that it would have mattered anyway. Being within his body left him feeling confused and disoriented. And heavy. Very heavy. It was like being in a deep pool of mud that continued to drag you down no matter how much you struggled.]

[cracked_container]

[There was a token groan of protest at being pushed back town, but it was a rather weak and pathetic sound.]

So you're not getting any better?

[A beat, before Teito catches that skeletal hand (after a failed attempt) then lifts it to press hard bone to his forehead.]

If your body can feel whatever illness this is, then why can't this place treat it?

[ibreakrules]

They probably could, but it's best not to get involved here.

[While this hospital would be more open to the idea of treating someone that wasn't entirely human, Frau didn't want to open himself up to the danger that could bring. He'd seen what Sero was capable of, and he wanted no part in it.]

[cracked_container]

Well then... [He'll just start pushing right back up out of this bed right now.] I'm not waiting here when you're still sick there, stupid bishop.

[ibreakrules]

Lie back down before I knock you out.

[It's a very real threat. Frau will do it without a second thought.]

[cracked_container]

[He almost ignores the command - but he knows that tone from Frau and he's really too weak to sufficiently fight it to begin with and so he does exactly at that.]

You better at least have some way to take care of your body here or I really will leave.

[See that look, closes thing to a petulant look he'll ever deny making.]