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Summer comes early, almost like an eager bird, sweeping through with thick, hot air for wings, spread wide enough to embrace everything in its wake.
Shinei Nouzen, instead of enjoying the season's bounties, is bedridden.
His head peeks from the gap between his blanket and the pillow — that should've been under his head but was serving a greater purpose by blocking the glaring light. With an aching throat and a raging fever, there's no way he'll gain clearance for leading the training session tomorrow. He sighs dolefully and closes his eyes. His thoughts are muddy, interrupted by a stream of wailing and unable to parse through new information. A sudden shiver wracks his body.
How did he end up in this predicament…
No, he knows exactly why, and thinking of it intensifies the redness on his cheeks. At least, he can silently bask in the belief he's not an idiot, despite feeling like one, as he curls up on his side.
*
Less than a month ago, when springtime bid farewell and dissolved into a spell of never-ending rain, the ground was mushy, overwhelming the pleasant forest floor overrun by beds of mushroom and moss. The river banks would flood occasionally. Alongside the mood, shoes turned muddy and left prints all over. Getting caught in the rain unaware was a staple of the season as well. Rains are calming, even pleasing, but too much of them are irritating. Calling it rain would be an understatement, however. Downpour, too, wouldn't do it justice.
Brightly lit canopies surround the clearing of Rüstkammer base on one side and a shimmering river on the other side today.
The 1st Armoured Division faced the constraints of a terrible rainy season between dispatches, and by some stroke of bad luck, it coincided with their rest period. The beginning of training was still a few days away. The gloom of being unable to leave the barrack for leisure had finally turned the Eighty-Six into zombies.
Not that they hadn't tried escaping the claws of academics in favour of getting drenched. It didn't work.
It wasn't just the Eighty-Six. All other officers were getting antsy, too. So when the sky remains blue for longer than a couple of hours, they spill out of the barrack like fluid spurting from a hole punched into an airtight container.
Plenty quiet turns of the calendar have prefaced this — a free day for those of the Eighty-Sixth Strike Package's divisions stationed at the base.
Nothing can keep them from spending the day outside. Apart from toasting under the harsh midday sun after a period of making do with feeble, strained sunlight, there's a lot to do. Within the hour, those who were more affected by the lack of outdoors were nowhere to be found in the base's vicinity, having promptly taken permission to visit the nearby cities. Soon, a hunting party gathers to invade the forest. Others compete at made-up sports. The ones left indoors are those who genuinely don't enjoy the summer.
Shin, having shaken off Bernholdt successfully, makes his way through all spots of vigorous activity and across the hangar where their Reginleif are on standby, only to join yet another group of Eighty-Six, this time grumbling how it's the worst day for maintenance. He listens silently. What servicing do the rigs need when they haven't taken part in any testing recently — and that's also where he finds his answer. It's precisely because they weren't in use that they need it.
His case is a little different, though. Undertaker was busy until two days ago.
He'd been testing a new update — as he often would because the research and development department never seemed to sleep — and promptly, in between a fast-paced manoeuvre, the pile drivers on his back legs had malfunctioned. Unusual. Updates rarely interfere with existing functions, but sometimes they do, and this one had put an early stop to his testing session. He defers his status query — if Undertaker was fine, what would he do alone, with no sparring partners and the training grounds unavailable this week — and slips away. He can ask someone about that later.
With two of his plans dashed in quick succession, he picks a random book and curls up in the lounge with a cup of coffee-substitute. He's read this one before. Maybe.
The world is never truly silent for him, given the legion's wails reach his ears even in his sleep. He appreciates comfortable silences like this every once in a while. And he thought too soon. A window shatters loudly in the distance. Probably the room next door. It doesn't stop there. Gradually, the lounge fills with annoyed teenagers banned from stepping outside for the rest of the day. Melancholy whirls into aggression. Shin doesn't move a muscle, however, as he continues to read in his corner. He can spend the day like this, simply reading, with nothing else to do and no one available he'd like to spend time with. He's predisposed to living in unpredictability, he thinks, with his mouth set in a line.
What he's not used to is incessant prodding on his shoulder. Ignoring it masterfully, he flips a page and reaches out to the side table to grab his cup — when a smaller hand snatches hold of him, depositing a fluffy, blue towel with a baby chicks motif in his hands.
"—nei! Shinei! I said I have a rather vital task for you! It's impolite to ignore a lady in distress!"
"You weren't a lady yet the last time I saw you, Frederica."
"How rude. I'll have you know I'm very much the definition of a refined, young lady. Moreover, I am not the distressed lady in question."
"...What do you mean?"
"I believe if you head to Vladilena's office, you will see for yourself. I have genially prepared this clean hand towel. Deliver it, if you will."
"She's not in her office."
This, he can say with confidence. The first thing he did after breakfast was head upstairs to Lena's office, only to find it empty. He waited, tried to connect to her via resonance, and failed. The Second Lieutenant who assists Lena wasn't around. When she didn't open the door or respond, he presumed she wasn't at the base and left with dampened spirits. Shin had planned to find out if Lena was free and if she was, he would have asked her out. They didn't get to do much of that when dispatched on a mission.
"The room beyond her office, then," Frederica said, turning away with a huff and scrambling out of the lounge. "Don't be indecent at this hour!"
Shin decides against chasing her to ask for clarification, but if Lena was upstairs, and, for some reason, needed a hand towel, he would head upstairs and knock at her door again.
If this turns out to be an elaborate prank… he only hopes it doesn't plunge his mood further.
*
'Idiots don't catch colds.'
—That's what Kaie used to say. If his ears serve him right, Shin's also heard Michihi say the same once. Whether it's something to do with their cultures, he doesn't know, but if the saying is true he can declare assuredly: Lena isn't an idiot.
When Shin opens the door to the office, once again to find no one, he heeds Frederica's words and knocks at Lena's bedroom door. A loud, muffled cough, followed by a sneeze, perplexes him and he slowly opens the door to find Lena hiding under a heap of thin blankets on her bed with a red face and heavy-lidded eyes, with the room imposingly dark and stuffy compared to usual. Her body is quivering uncontrollably, though only visible once he draws close. Shin hurriedly tugs the curtains aside and opens the windows a sliver, allowing for better ventilation. By the time he turns to her, Lena's posture has softened, and she's looking at him with moist, silver eyes.
She has fallen sick.
Even though the much-awaited sunlight streams in through the window, it feels bleak and pale. The crispness of the morning air is also nowhere to be felt.
"...I'm sorry… for not telling you," Lena says between violent coughs that shake her from head to toe.
Her downtrodden appearance stings Shin's heart greatly, but it's her voice — the mellow tone of her voice — unable to leave her throat without causing her pain that finally hammers the nail. Shin's stomach drops and he frowns without meaning to.
She's not wearing her usual negligee. Shin is intimately familiar with all of Lena's night clothes and knows she wouldn't normally sleep in the thick button up she's wearing, even if it was chilly. Maybe she's been feeling like this since night? If Shin was worried a few seconds ago, now his worry hikes to new heights and redefines the word. His eyebrows draw together, contemplative.
Shin sits on the edge of the bed, careful not to jostle her too much, and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.
"Don't be. Just take care of yourself for now. How long have you been feeling like this?" Shin asks.
"Last night." He's correct, then. "I didn't want to disturb you." She whispers hoarsely.
"You're not disturbing me. It's a free day, and even if it wasn't, I wouldn't mind being here."
A spike of irritation pierces him.
How didn't he notice? They couldn't speak last night, but he should have asked if she was alright this morning. Lena's schedule drove her away from Rüstkammer today — she should have been in the middle of an important meeting at the integrated headquarters right now. She is the sort of person to show up to work, no matter how horrible she's feeling. It's the mask of a commander. She places her duties first and herself last. Normally, she would have taken some medicine and gone wearing a mask. If she was here, whatever she'd caught must be terrible.
"It's a… free day?"
"It is. I'm sorry I didn't notice. Please don't speak unless you have to. Your throat hurts, doesn't it?" Shin cups her cheek while he speaks affectionately, thumbing at it. Her skin is hot and sweaty. She's running a fever; that must be what the towel is for.
"...You couldn't have known." She whispers again.
"Lena."
"..."
She glares at him — tries to — insinuating she's not in pain; yet she doesn't utter a word. She nuzzles into his palm and shuffles out a hand from beneath her blanket to grasp his wrist. Her breath is far hotter than normal.
"Let me get you some warm water."
Lena nods and Shin squeezes her hand once before getting up and heading out. After acquiring flasks of both boiled and room temperature water, and a cup from the kitchens, he returns to see her sitting up, propped against her pillows. She's patting her chest — with the buttons of her night shirt popped open — with the chick-patterned towel. It strikes an overwhelmingly domestic image. Something in Shin melts.
He pours her a glass, and she sighs in between sips. A note of her full voice slips into the sigh. That brings calm to the tumult prancing in Shin's chest. The warm water helps. It won't help for long, though. Without a second thought, he decides then to spend the day with her and catering to every need as swiftly as possible. A mission worthy of a vanguard.
"I didn't know it was a free day," she says. Her throat is clearly sore and will remain so for a couple of days.
It's because you're so busy you're going to overwork yourself and fall sick, Shin thinks.
He doesn't say it.
"It happens once in a while. Don't worry about it. I'll be right here. If there's anything I can do, tell me, okay?"
"Shin, you do—"
Shin covers her hand with his own and looks into her eyes. They're tired but still concerned for Shin.
"I'm going to be here because I want to, so whenever you need anything, just tell me."
She nods. When she's done drinking, Shin finds a shallow plastic bucket in the bathroom and fills it. Lena seems ready to urge him to sit down and not move around, but he pointedly ignores it. Setting the bucket on the bedside table, he plucks the towel from her and wets part of it, then squeezes it dry.
Back in the Eighty-Sixth sector, where medical support was non-existent, fellow Eighty-Six used to fall sick. Plagued by many illnesses, the most rampant symptom was fever, giving all of them sufficient practice at looking after them. Shin hadn't attempted nursing often. He's seen others do it.
Sweat forms a sheen over her neck and pools over her collarbones. Shin pats her skin with the hand towel as gently as possible, testing the waters, and Lena's eyes flutter to a close, with visible relief tiding over her face. She mouths a thank you and relaxes into the pillows with a gracious smile on her lips. Shin pats the cloth over her temples, and under her ears, then softly down her throat, tugging aside the hair sticking to her skin. His fingertips drag along her damp skin when he does so. To keep his heart rate from spiking, he counts backwards from a hundred in his mind. He has, for lack of a better word, an obsession with how pretty the colour of her hair looks on her. Silver. Redolent of the tail end of a sparkle, or a streak of light refracting through mirrors. Precious, and only on her. He circles back to her forehead, holding back her fringe, and dabs at the sweat there. He's left with no choice but to avert his eyes from her flushed face and parted lips. His gaze lands on the line of her exposed throat.
She angles her head backwards to take the backrest's support. He has an unobstructed view of the stretch of collarbones peeking out from beneath the shirt, and further of her cleavage.
Shinei Nouzen is going to die — not at the hands of some legion, but his girlfriend's.
The counting doesn't help. He needs to control his thoughts. Lena is sick. She trusts him to look after her. That's it. That's the sole reason he's here, sitting on her bed, wiping her body—
Being decent is easier said than done.
Honestly, he thinks controlling such thoughts about Lena used to be easier when he wasn't her boyfriend yet. As the stack of his lovable memories with her grows, he finds it tougher to control the feelings he has for her. The rare times he's not preoccupied with the state of the war, in some capacity or another, he is thinking of Lena or things related to the both of them. No. Even then, he's fighting because of his selfish wish to spend the rest of his life with her.
But it's precisely because he loves her he's willing to care for her in any capacity he can.
Shin turns her face towards him, with his fingers threading through her hair, and he tries his best to reach all the spots he missed earlier. Lena's breath is still hot. It grows somewhat ragged. Attributing the change to her condition possibly worsening, Shin firmly aims to reorient himself. He won't move past her neck unless he's cleared himself of all questionable thoughts.
Quickly dipping the towel into cool water and squeezing it again, he uses the chance to take a deep breath and cleanse his mind. Lena is sick. He wants to help and he will with the purest of intentions.
"...Shin."
He stiffens.
Lena grabs onto his sleeve tightly, sniffles, and lowers her head, looking away from him. Perhaps he's just imagining it, but her cheeks and ears look redder than before.
"Can you fill the bath?"
*
By the time the bath fills, Shin confirms Lena's seen the doctor stationed at their base, has been to the washroom earlier, brushed her teeth, taken medicine — so her fever should break in a while — and eaten some breakfast. He feels relieved hearing that. She's been taking care, all by herself, des[ite lacking the strength to leave her bed. This only serves to firm his resolve to stay with her all day.
Does she mix scents into her bath water?
The question comes too late. Shin folds his sleeves up to his elbows and tests the temperature. More than lukewarm, less than hot. She prefers steaming baths, if he remembers correctly, but she's sick and he doesn't know what to do if she falls unconscious out of dizziness.
Not wanting Lena to walk to the bathroom — even when she insists he can do it and ends up coughing her lungs out — Shin places one firm arm beneath her knees and one on her back, then lifts her. He carries her to the bath and is not interested in letting her down on her feet. She mewls in embarrassment, hiding her face in the crook of his neck. So warm and delicate. He wants to keep her in his arms forever.
Still, she needs to undress.
Shin looks away when she unbuttons and peels off the sleep shirt — but why does he feel so guilty for standing there when he's seen it all before? He busies himself with taking off his boots, having nothing else to do.
He extends his hands, and she takes them, intertwining their fingers. The water splashes around as she steps in, her weight still leaning on Shin, and it's only when she's finally seated, her knees and shoulders peeking past the shimmering surface, that he allows himself to breathe. Skin. So much flushed skin. His blood thrums with energy — but most of all, it thrums with love. Lena pulls her hair over her shoulder. It floats, turning a dark, metallic grey. Under the fluorescent bathroom lights, she looks pale and his worry returns. Shin perches himself on the side of the tub, looking over her with fondness, uncaring if he gets wet when Lena scoots close and leans her cheek against his thigh, staring up at him with a tiny smile.
Her gaze is teasing.
"I won't leave you here by yourself," Shin clarifies, not breaking eye contact.
"...I thought you didn't appreciate this," she mumbles.
He catches it in the bathroom's silence, where their voice carries an impression of reverberations. He recalls the last time he'd talked to Lena as she entered a bath — over a year ago when they weren't together yet, over the Para-RAID — and bites his lip to keep from laughing. The water sloshes. Shin notices redness spreading over her chest and ears again, even though he made sure the water was just tepid. That happened just earlier too…
"I'm only making sure my sick girlfriend doesn't faint in the bath," he says, "It really isn't a matter of talking while you are bathing or not… and you shouldn't be talking at all."
Lena trusts him, while she's in the bath, allowing him to help in any way when she's sick and weakened, so vulnerable. He appreciates it so much that he's afraid he'll end up saying something very embarrassing and wanting to disappear from this world. He loosens his tie and throws it to the floor next to Lena's clothes.
"Mhm. Will you" — she coughs mid-sentence, a thick, wet sound — "shampoo my hair...please?"
Who is Shin to decline her request?
Lathering is easy. She wets her scalp, and he massages a few dollops of shampoo into it with careful circular motions. He's thought of Lena bathing before… but he'd never imagined doing this. She hums every few seconds and Shin focuses on those little noises of comfort. He's careful not to soap her hairline and slicks her hair back, covered in white foam. Her slender neck… so inviting… But always so stressed and tense. He rubs her nape and works upwards tenderly. Is he supposed to shampoo the rest of her hair separately from the scalp? Won't it get tangled? What if he pulls too hard by accident? His touch lightens as such thoughts race through his mind.
"Shin," she says, "I love you."
And even though Lena is the one with a fever, Shin is set aflame. He smiles, as pleasant as the beautiful, glowing sun smiling in the heavens today.
*
The most fascinating part of drying Lena is this: he gets to experience a silky, fresh, insanely lovely smelling Lena firsthand. For now, he kicks his lustful brain aside and only marvels at how close they are. He pats her legs dry, and moves up to her stomach, where it tickles and she laughs — at the cost of coughing and sneezing non-stop for a minute — and when her arms are done and her hair is covered by the towel, he helps button up her fresh sleep shirt and wraps her in a blanket.
Sitting on her bed with the blow dryer plugged in and whirring away, Shin wants to eat her.
Sometimes, he has the inexplicable urge to nibble her. He leaves more love bites than he can count when they're having sex. However, this urge differs slightly from that. More than the groundedness of them belonging to each other, this need to have his lips on her — on her ears, her neck, her cheeks, thighs — stems from beyond that. Like now, when she looks like a rolled-up ball of sweetness… he can't explain it. He floods with sparks.
Once her hair is dry and brushed, it's time for bed. He changes the sheets, something he's not usually eager to do in his own bedroom and tosses them into the laundry.
If you think of it logically, cuddling with a sick person is bad. The chances of you falling sick increase exponentially.
He doesn't understand what spurs him to consider it — it's Lena's quiet, stuttering breaths and her pleading eyes asking for comfort. Shin doesn't think holding her hand will cut it.
"Do you also want to shower? Your clothes are wet..." Lena whispers.
"Is it alright if I borrow yours?" Not like he hasn't before, but it doesn't hurt to ask.
She sighs.
"You don't need to ask."
He bends down and drops a soft kiss on the tip of her nose.
*
Shin is confident in his immunity, granted he rarely catches colds and his physical health is as good as it can get at his age, so he's not worried when he slips into Lena's bed and she presses up against him. He doesn't have any clothes in Lena's room, so his uniform has to suffice.
Showering has the magical quality of refreshing everything, like infusing mint into time, but lying next to Lena, Shin is lulled into a dream-like state by her warmth. She fell asleep quickly and Shin doubts she'll wake up easily now. She continues to cough and sniffle, but as her sleep deepens, her chest heaves with less struggle.
He places a palm on her forehead. Her fever has waned for now.
The pillow they share is more comfortable than the one in his room, perhaps because it's Lena's and in his mind, all things related to her bring about positive change.
Ah… He'd give anything to assure she wakes up healthy. Shin bites his lip and runs a hand through Lena's hair, then over the small of her back in soothing motions. It's just a cold. Chances are she will recover by the next morning. But having lost comrades to illness before, Shin can't help the tightness in his gut. With her hands clasped over his shirt and her legs entangled with his, she's warm. So warm and welcoming. Being next to Lena is equivalent to being home for him. She smells like it, too. Like home… This is where he returns — undoubtedly, whenever all seems lost, he finds solace here — and will continue to. He wants to be home for her, too. He already is. Yet, there's no quelling the fears gripping him. He gathers her in his arms, savouring their closeness and wishing Lena recovers soon.
Lost in chasing threads of hopes and concerns, Shin falls asleep.
*
Shin coughs. He'd been decent — he can't get the image of her in the bath out of his head, yet he tries because being sick and horny will end him — but even now, he craves to hold Lena in his arms again. Drifting off to sleep is the most comfortable when she's lying next to him.
Luckily, she recovered soon after that, but Shin caught whatever she was suffering from.
Urgh. A headache builds in his temples, throbbing lightly at first, then incessantly with great intensity, and refuses to leave. Closing his ears doesn't help — the cries of the legion, the officers scuffling about, the clashing of metal ringing in the distance... it thrashes against his eardrums with no sympathy. Shin is no stranger to fainting or experiencing vertigo strong enough to pull his organs taut and turn them inside out. Feeling crushed because of a simple cold takes the cake. He's positively useless. At this rate, he will throw up. That will make him feel gross and then, if he slips in the bath—
The door closes with a thump.
He can't smell who it is, courtesy of a stuffy nose, but a soft hand touches his forehead as if to measure his temperature and before the touch lifts, nimble fingers run over his cheeks lovingly. Lena.
"...You'll fall sick again," he croaks.
"If it's while taking care of you, it doesn't bother me, Shin."
His heart squeezes.
Shinei Nouzen really will die because of his girlfriend — after all the effort he puts into staying alive with her.