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Briefly, Aomine wondered if he’d died and went to hell.
There was no other real explanation for the suffocating dryness of his throat, or the violent pounding ache against his skull, or the shrill eeeeeeee that rang, scratching and obstinate, in his ears. He wracked his brain to try and remember, through the haze of agonizingly sluggish thoughts, what he might have done to deserve this. Maybe it was punishment for that one time he’d accidentally launched a civilian into the air.
(In his defense, it wasn’t his fault that this asshat had chosen to Apparate in front of him right as he was running a counterspell. Plus, he’d apologized, so who could blame him, really.)
With great heaving effort, Aomine cracked open an eye, only to shut it tightly closed again when his retinas screamed in protest. Too fucking bright.
The ringing in his ears suddenly stopped - belatedly, he realized that the sound was coming from outside - and his environment was thrown into startling peace and quiet. At least, until he caught faint shuffling next to him. Was there someone next to him? He hoped that it wasn’t some demon assigned to torture him for his accidental wrongdoings against innocent bypassers. He’d paid for those blunders well enough after all, when his tyrannical Head of Office confined him to desk work for a week. Imayoshi had looked damned happy about it too - though it was hard to tell with that guy, Aomine supposed.
With delayed curiosity, Aomine cautiously slid his eyes open into a narrow squint.
Light blue, were the first words to form in his head; pretty was the close second. All in all, they were pretty accurate, if he could say so himself. With light blue hair - fluff, like clouds, he thought in a show of astounding lucidity - and that pale skin and those ethereal features and that crown of fluorescent light that shone brightly around him, the figure in front of him could be nothing short of an actual angel.
So maybe he wasn’t in hell. "Angel," he croaked pointedly.
The figure hovering over him paused and looked down at him with wide, curious eyes (they were ridiculously blue, he noticed, with the little amount of sense that he retained). He lifted a hand. "Angel," he repeated, then tried to pat the face above him. Tried being the keyword here. With his strength, he'd gotten as far as one pat - the angel winced back violently - before his hand dropped. Whoops, he might have just slapped an angel. Aomine hoped that wouldn't get him actually sent to hell.
The angel smiled dryly. "Good to see you’re coherent, Auror Aomine."
He'd meant to say, "I feel like death reborn," but all he'd managed was a mournful croak. He supposed that would just have to do, however, when the angel chuckled lightly.
“I’m not quite done working yet,” the angel said. His voice was soft and soothing to the dying man’s ear (he was not being dramatic, so shut up, inner-Satsuki). It rather suited his already delicate features, Aomine thought. Angel, his brain supplied helpfully. “I’m going to need you to go back to sleep for a bit longer, if that’s alright. Stupefy.”
Just for you, he tried to say - or maybe he did manage to say it out loud, who the fuck knows - but before the last word had even formed clearly in his mind, his world was already fading to black.
Everything hurt like a bitch.
Groaning, Aomine attempted weakly to prop himself up on one elbow, before falling back onto the coarse blanketing. He stared up at the ceiling - glaringly white, like everything else in the room, it seemed - while trying to will away the constricting discomfort in his chest. Only, he was in pain just about everywhere else too, from the throbbing of his temples to the soreness in his calves.
"Man, where the fuck am I?" he grumbled out loud.
“You’re at St Mungo’s Hospital in the curse ward.”
“Wha -” Aomine snapped his head to look at the source. He promptly regretted it when it sent white spots of pain into his vision though, and instead settled for an awkward sideways stare instead.
A man - a surprisingly young Healer, if the prim cut of his teal robes was anything to go by - entered his peripheral field of sight. “It’s good to see you back among the living, Auror Aomine.”
“Thanks, errr …” he trailed off, squinting up at the other man.
“Tetsuya Kuroko, curse specialist.” The Healer conjured a rather unassuming stool with an easy flick of his wand - nonverbally, Aomine noted appreciatively - before taking a seat next to Aomine’s bed. “I’m the primary Healer working on your case.”
“Cool,” Aomine grunted before frowning, knitting his eyebrows together. “Uh, so, what exactly is my case?”
The Healer - Kuroko, apparently - conjured a manila folder (what is with this hospital and having everything come in fifty shades of white?), flipping it open. “You’ve been hit with a slow-acting relative of the Transmogrifian Torture curse, and were in the late stages when you were sent here. The Transmogrifian Curse, as you may already know, is a deadly equivalent to the Cruciatus. It’s not a strain of Transmogrifian that we’ve seen before, so I’m assuming whoever cursed you had been doing some experimentative variations of known dark curses.”
Aomine may or may not have completely zoned out approximately ten words in (he was sick, he should be allowed to be inattentive for once), but he was well aware of what the Transmogrifian was, and that was all he needed to know. Aomine grimaced, the dull pain throbbing in his sternum agreeing. “Explains a lot.”
“Yes,” Kuroko agreed simply. “This does imply that many of the symptoms should have begun showing,” he waved his wand in a wide sweep, the gold strands that erupted twisting themselves into a number of dates, before disintegrating into the air, “approximately eight days ago.” The Healer fixed Aomine with a distinctly disapproving look. “Why didn’t you come to us earlier?”
The first sign of emotion Aomine got from this (admittedly cute, praise the lord) Healer, and it was disapproving. He jutted his lower lip out in a bid for pity. “I was, um, busy?”
The corners of Kuroko's lips twitched upwards slightly. “Yes, you were busy dying.”
“I really was!" he wheedled. When he saw Kuroko open his mouth, he hastily added, "Busy, I mean. I really was busy. I had deadlines for all these reports I hadn’t filled out for weeks.”
“Good news for you then," Kuroko said in a tone that really did not sound like it bore good news, "you won’t be able to go to work for at least the next two weeks.”
“What?” Two weeks? "Are you for real?” Aomine stared at the Healer, dismayed. While he was certainly not one to complain about excused leaves from work, he was already on the verge of getting thrown into the sewage system to rot by his boss. Plus, he wasn't entirely sure if he could entertain himself for two whole fucking weeks.
Kuroko shrugged, entirely unsympathetic. “Unravelling curses - especially late stage curses - is a rather lengthy process.”
Aomine groaned. “Oh man, Imayoshi’s going to kill me.”
“At least the curse isn’t going to kill you first anymore.” Bland. If there was one word to describe the Healer’s tone, it was bland.
He did his best impression of an imploring expression up at Kuroko, though he wasn’t sure how close it was; after all, as Satsuki was prone to informing him, he most closely resembled a grumpy raisin with the way he scowled. In his defense, being an intimidating asshole was often a part of the job description. “No, you don’t know my boss, I’m not going to survive.”
Kuroko seemed utterly unfazed with his efforts. He flicked through his folder, commenting with that same mild politeness, “Oh I don’t know, you seem pretty sturdy. I mean, you somehow managed to wake up halfway through treatment - through a number of Stupefies from the Mediwitches, mind you.”
“I did?”
The corners of the Healer’s lips twitched upwards. “You also called me an angel, attempted to slap me, before passing out again.”
Aomine peered up at the Healer suspiciously. He had to be kidding. (Granted, it was kind of difficult to tell though, now that Kuroko’s face had smoothly slid back to passiveness.) “I did not.”
“Well,” Kuroko mused, bringing up a hand to tap at his chin in thought, “I suppose I did have to stun you to get you unconscious again, but otherwise yes. Yes you did.”
No way. Aomine whimpered. “I have to spend two weeks doing absolutely nothing with a Healer that I tried to attack.”
The Healer brought his hand up to his face. Belatedly, Aomine realized that he was being laughed at. “Please get some rest, Auror Aomine,” Kuroko managed after a moment. He’d done little more than bite his lip in a valiant attempt to prevent a chuckle from escaping, but Aomine was beginning to feel distinctly sulky.
At least it was kind of endearing, watching him struggle like that.
Aomine never quite had an adequately functional mental filter, so instead of preventing any further embarrassment, he said, “Well, you are cute, I will give delirious past-me that.”
Kuroko raised an eyebrow.
Aomine would raise his hands in mock surrender, here, but the throbbing in his shoulders told him that was a less than savoury idea. “Hey, I’m an honest man.”
Kuroko coughed softly into his hand - is he embarrassed? Praise the heavens, this man had emotions other than mild amusement - and made to get up, Vanishing the chair with another flick of his wand. “Rest,” he stressed, his face already back to smooth neutrality.
“What, you’re leaving already?” Aomine whined. “I’m here for two whole goddamn weeks, you’ve got to have an obligation to make sure I don’t die of - you know - boredom. Or lack of human contact.” He was being difficult, he knew - he didn’t need inner-Satsuki to tell him that - but two weeks. Two fucking weeks.
“I’ll be sure to send the Head Auror a note to come visit you.”
“I’ll die of something else entirely then. Healer, please.” When Kuroko wordlessly tugged open the door in response, Aomine hurriedly amended, “Kuroko. Tetsuya. Tetsu.”
Kuroko peered back at him, considering. His brows knit together in what Satsuki most likely would’ve deemed ‘hassled exasperation’ (though Aomine much preferred the term ‘fond and doting’ but whatever, Satsuki). The Healer sighed. “... I’ll come back after I do some rounds.”
Victory.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be here all day,” he called at Kuroko’s retreating back. As he watched the Healer disappear from sight, he figured that -- well, all things considered, it could be a hell lot worse.