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Kobra lay in his bed doused in sweat, he was sick yet again. Like always, he planned on isolating himself until the illness passed.
The rest of his crew thought Ghoul was the one with a shitty immune system. But that was only because Kobra masked his sickness extremely well. He didn’t need to worry his crew especially when they could be doing other things. So he always locked himself in his room and only came out if he absolutely needed to.
No one ever thought much of it, they knew Kobra got overwhelmed with the chaos of the zones and needed to be left alone. So no one ever batted an eye when they didn’t see him for a while.
Party being someone who was overly empathetic and concerned about everyone’s well-being did check in on Kobra during these days. But Kobra always pretended like he wasn’t ill. So Party took his word for it.
So here Kobra was lying in his bed, baffled no one had heard his constant coughing, and decided to check up on him. Kobra would like to think his weak immune system was a byproduct of the years he spent heavily medicated in batt city. Party hardly ever got sick which would make sense if Kobra’s theory was correct, Party had never been affected by the pills.
Jet and Ghoul were both sand pups, sand pups had an extremely high fatality rate due to not being able to receive vaccinations from various zone-born illnesses. But most sand pups and even most joys’ built up a natural immunity after catching zone flu once. But Kobra seemed to be the exception.
There was a knock on the door, “Yo, Kobes you alright?” It was Ghoul.
The most Kobra could muster was a groan which sucked because that instantly raised concern in Ghoul which was the last thing he wanted.
“Uh, you don’t sound shiny. I’m coming in.”
Before Kobra could make an attempt at protest Ghoul waltzed on in. When Ghoul spotted Kobra laid in his bed, face practically the same color as Party’s hair, and sweating profusely, he couldn’t help but say “Bro you look like shit.”.
“Tell me about it,” Kobra spoke with a stronger hint of sarcasm in his voice than usual.
“I’m gonna stay in here and uh make sure you don’t die, cool?”
No, it was not “cool”, Kobra just wanted to be alone like always. Kobra didn’t want to trouble anyone with his sickness. He hated feeling like he was holding his crew back and if he were fine with having someone with him Ghoul would be his last resort.
“No,” Kobra stated bluntly.
“Well, someone needs to make sure the witch doesn’t take you,” Ghoul argued
“I’m fine.” Kobra coughed making Ghoul doubt him.
“No dude, Party, and Jet are out right now with Girlie. So you’re either stuck with me or I can ask someone at the docs office to come over.”
Kobra considered the offer for a second. Yeah, he didn’t want Ghoul to watch over him but he didn’t want to trouble Cherri and the thought of Newsagogo or Pony watching him was somehow worse than Ghoul.
Kobra shook his head, “you.”
Ghoul stepped up to Kobra and placed the back of his hand on Kobra’s forehead. He winced as soon as his hand made contact with Kobra. “Dude you’re on fire.”
Kobra was always somehow freezing cold despite the fact he lived in a desert. So Kobra having any trace of warmth to his skin was already a sign of concern but this was a whole new level. Even without a functioning thermometer, Ghoul was willing to bet Kobra’s body temperature was over 100 degrees.
“How long have you been sick?”
Kobra shrugged, he wasn’t sure. The coughing began a few days ago but Kobra hadn’t actually thought anything of it. Every city kid had a slight cough, the dusty environment wasn’t easy on their lungs. The headaches, however, started recently.
“you don’t even know when you got sick, fuck.”. Ghoul ran his hand through his greasy hair, “Look man I’m gonna go wet a washcloth then I’ll be back.”
Kobra nodded, fevers were one of his least favorite parts of being ill. The constant flipping between feeling like he was on fire and feeling like he was going to freeze to death was hell. He never had a way to alleviate the heat.
Ghoul came back, he had a wet washcloth in hand. Ghoul sat on the floor next to Kobra’s mattress. The instant Ghoul placed the damp washcloth on Kobra’s forehead he felt relief from the stuffy heat.
“Thanks.” Kobra managed to say, voice scratchy.
Ghoul nodded, “I’d ask if you want anything to eat. But I feel like we both know I’m not the best with food.”. It was true anytime Ghoul so much as touched a can of Power Pup it instantly became foul. Kobra wasn’t sure he’d be able to manage to swallow the disgusting sludge that was power pup right now.
Kobra yawned, he was exhausted already having been up longer than he had all day. “Can I sleep?” He asked, it wasn’t a real question Kobra didn’t actually give a fuck about what Ghoul thought. If he wanted to sleep he would sleep.
Ghoul shrugged, “Yeah whatever. I’ll probably wake you up here and there just to make sure the witch hasn’t whisked you away.”
Kobra was fine with that he just wanted to sleep. His eyes were growing heavy and he eventually passed out.
--
Whenever Kobra woke back up the first thing he saw wasn’t Ghoul sitting by his bed watching over him as he expected. But his sibling, Party Poison was staring at him with an almost creepy amount of focus.
“You’re not dead are you?”
“No.”
“Good, 'cause Jet and I ran by the market when we were out and we managed to find some chicken noodle soup,” Party waved their hands “It’s not super expired and only cost us 4 carbons and Jets soul!” They giggled at their own joke.
“I’m gonna go see if it’s finished and also make sure Ghoulie didn’t burn water again.”
Kobra managed to prop himself up against the wall. Kobra hated the city but he could confidently say the one thing Batt City had going for it was the food. It may have been drugged but Kobra remembered it tasting amazing. Anything probably tastes better than literal dog food.
Kobra reached for his favorite out of the pile of blankets he kept in his room. He was getting chills again and needed some sort of warmth. He wrapped it around his shoulders and patiently waited for Party's return.
However, the next person Kobra saw in his doorway wasn’t Party, it was The Girl. She seemed hesitant to come in as she was barely peeking her head through the doorway. Kobra motioned for her to come in.
She skipped in happily, now that she was given permission to enter the room. Kobra spotted a piece of paper in her hand.
He pointed towards it and the girl understood. She sat across from him on his bed pushing the paper in his face. “Look!”
It was a drawing of Kobra and the girl, you could obviously tell it was made by a five-year-old but Party’s little lessons had led to some visible improvement. In the drawing, Kobra was holding a snake and the girl was petting it. Kobra was smiling in the drawing which would be inaccurate in any other situation but for this it was accurate. The two things that could get Kobra to show something other than complete neutrality were the girl and the snakes.
“Do you like it?” The girl questioned.
Kobra nodded and gave the girl a thumbs-up to emphasize how happy the drawing made him. His day had been shit what with feeling like he was gonna die at any moment, so seeing the drawing uplifted his spirits.
“Yay!”
“Kay Kobes, Ghoulie didn’t burn water and the chicken noodle soup is done!” He heard Party announce as they walked into the room.
“Hey!” Party shouted when they got sight of The Girl, “I told you Kobra was sick and that you should leave him alone.” Party scolded.
“I wanted to show Kobra the drawing I made!” She whined.
“Well, you showed him didn’t ‘ya? The food is done anyways, go out into the main room ‘kay?” Party ruffled the girl's hair a little as they said the last bit. The girl pouted a bit but complied.
“You think you can manage to stand? Ghoul said you looked pretty rough earlier.”
“Yeah.”
“Shiny, now come on.” Party reached a hand out towards Kobra who grasped it and allowed Party to help him up. Being in bed all day meant his legs were a little sore. It was a similar feeling to being trapped in the trans am going from zone 6 to zone 1.
When they got to the main room of the diner Jet and The Girl were sitting in a diner booth Ghoul was across from them.
Party sat down next to Ghoul, Kobra sitting beside Party. Kobra instantly dove into his soup, he hadn’t realized how hungry he was until food was in front of him. It tasted grand then again anything that wasn’t Power Pup tasted heavenly.
“So Kobra,” Jet began, “Ghoul said you’ve been sick for a bit, you could have told us.”
Kobra looked past Party and gave Ghoul a venomous glare, Ghoul shrunk back into the diner booth avoiding Kobra’s glare.
Kobra shrugged, now swirling his spoon around his bowl uninterested in the unfolding conversation. “I always do this.”
Now that piqued Party’s interest, “What?”
“I never tell you all when I’m sick,” Kobra said nonchalantly like this wasn’t news to the other three.
“Why not?” Jet asked.
“Dunno,” Kobra was growing irritated, damn Ghoul for being so nice. If it weren’t for him deciding to check on Kobra he wouldn’t be in this mess. But no Ghoul had to be attentive.
“Kobes,” Party was pinching the bridge of their nose and sighing “You know we wouldn’t be mad at you right?”
“don't want to hold you back,” Kobra confessed, “there’s more important things than me.”
Jet was taken aback by Kobra's words, “No,” he waved his finger “Crew comes before anything else. No matter what that ‘else’ is.”
“Everyone gets sick Kobra, look at Ghoul, he's a walking disease and we keep him around for some reason.” Ghoul playfully swatted Party on their shoulder and they giggled.
“You aren’t holding us back by being sick.” They assured him.
Kobra felt slightly better after hearing what Jet and Party had to say, he was so wrapped up in his feelings of inadequacy that he hadn’t once considered that maybe his crew wouldn’t actually be annoyed by him. But if Ghoul's eagerness to care for him earlier showed anything then he knew he was in good hands.
“Thanks.”
Party huffed and shook their head, “Now, are ‘ya done eating? Cause I can see the way you’re shaking from here. You should probably get back to bed.”
Party was right, Kobra hadn’t even noticed himself shivering, he felt like he was gonna freeze to death. Kobra nodded, feeling a bit too tired to actually speak.
“Well, let's go.” Party ushered.
Kobra got up from the booth and after Party had to explain to the Girl that because Kobra was sick he couldn’t play with her (it was her bedtime anyways!). The rest of the crew said goodnight and Party gently led Kobra back to his room.
Kobra laid down in bed wrapping himself up in his many blankets. He knew he would wake up sweating to death but at the moment he was freezing and didn’t care.
Party sat beside Kobra and they had a hand on his mattress “I just want to be really sure that you understand that you aren’t a burden to us. We just want you to get better.”
Kobra nodded, knowing that Party meant what they said, everyone had been much kinder than Kobra had expected. Ghoul took care of him and tried to ease his fever, Jet reassured him that he wasn't a nuisance, and Party hammered in what Jet had already made him aware of.
“Now go to sleep so you can work on sweating out this Witch awful fever!” Party spouted.