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Silver wasn’t that surprised when she suddenly got a call from Rookie sometime after Protobot was defeated.
She knew this would happen.
She was just relaxing on the couch in her igloo, wanting to destress after the craziness that was rescuing Gary and giving lobotomies to robots or whatever the hell all that was, when she heard her personal cell phone ring. Groaning in annoyance, she reached for her phone to see who was calling and her eyes widened when she saw that it was Rookie. Normally he would text her, so her stomach dropped when she realized what this could be about.
“Hello?” Silver asked when she answered the phone. She was greeted with the sound of labored breathing for a few moments before Rookie finally spoke up.
“Hey.. Silver?” he struggled to reply, as if he was physically trying to hold something back, “Remember how you said you’re supposed to.. boil water that you get from rivers and stuff?” He did not sound well, making Silver’s fear only grow in intensity.
“Yeah?” she tried to say as calmly as possible. Deep down, though, she knew what he was going to say.
“Well.. you were right,” he said, his voice beginning to tremble a bit, “I think, I, uh..” Suddenly, Silver heard the sound of vomiting through her phone’s speaker.
Shit.
Yep, she knew it. He got sick from the river water he drank while stuck in the same wilderness she’d gotten stranded in two years prior. The dates coincidentally almost lined up, November 27th for her and November 25th for him, which made her shudder when she thought about it. She hated anything to do with that area of the wilderness…
“I’m coming over.” she stated matter-of-factly once she heard him stop throwing up. He coughed and mumbled something that she couldn’t really understand, but she knew he wasn’t telling her not to come. She made sure to put on a mask and some gloves (while also getting some extras), not wanting to get sick as well (anything involving throwing up was NOT a fun experience), before grabbing her spy phone and teleporting to his igloo.
When she arrived, she put her spy phone away and took out her regular phone to call Rookie. It rang a few times before he picked up and greeted her with a pained whine that made her heart break.
“I’m here, are you able to unlock the door?” she asked. She felt bad making him do that at the moment, but it’s not like she could get in any other way. Not without destruction, anyway.
“Way ahead of you…” was all he said before hanging up. It took a second for Silver to understand what he meant by that, but then she put her free flipper on the doorknob and tried to turn it. The door was already unlocked. Either he forgot to lock it again or he unlocked it after he called her earlier. She hoped it was the latter, even though Club Penguin was relatively safe most of the time.
She entered the igloo, calling out for Rookie to figure out where he was. She heard him make a noise from his room, so she made a beeline for it and went inside. There she saw him lying in his bed, slumped over on his side and holding his stomach, with a bucket next to him on the floor. Both his hat and sunglasses were on his nightstand, so she was able to see his tired gaze move to her. She never realized it was possible for him to look greener than he normally was…
“Oh jeez, Rookie…” she sighed, waddling over to him and sitting on the edge of his bed. He merely let out a grunt and shifted his gaze to the floor as she put a gloved flipper on his shoulder. Silence filled the igloo for what felt like a few minutes.
“I probably look awful, don’t I?” Rookie suddenly muttered, “You’re probably gonna say ‘I told you so’ or something…” Silver grimaced behind her mask at this. While, yes, it was a little stupid to just drink water straight from a river without thinking, but she didn’t care about that right now.
“That’s not important right now, I just want to make sure you’re okay.” she replied, lightly squeezing his shoulder. He slowly sat up, still refusing to look at her out of embarrassment, and sighed.
“Well, I’m clearly not-” he started before flinching and putting a flipper to his beak. His eyes became wide with panic and he frantically reached for the bucket. Silver thankfully managed to look away just as he began throwing up into it, but she still winced at the sounds.
‘Oh, Rookie… what am I going to do with you?’ she asked herself while rubbing his back. She didn’t mind doing any of this for him, they had been best friends since they were kids and he would always come over to her igloo when she was sick or injured (and vice versa). Not to mention, she had the biggest crush on him. No, it was more than that. She was in love with him. She would literally do almost anything for him. She was even tempted to start preening his feathers to comfort him, but she knew she couldn’t do that.
“Have you been able to keep anything down?” she asked him once he stopped vomiting. He had to catch his breath before responding, but she let him take as much time as he needed.
“Ugh.. not really…” he mumbled, grabbing a tissue from his nightstand to wipe his mouth, “I haven’t been able to keep much up either.” Silver tilted her head curiously at his reply. What was he talking about?
“What do you mean?” she asked. Rookie stared at her for a moment, looking a little uncomfortable, before motioning for her to come closer. She did, though not getting too close, and he whispered something in her ear. A look of realization and slight disgust instantly formed on her face.
“Oh, yikes.” was all she was able to say. She had a feeling that’s what he meant.
“Yeah, sorry for even mentioning it.” he replied, sheepishly scratching the back of his neck. He knew Silver hated that stuff and he felt a little bad for bringing it up in the first place.
“No, no, it’s honestly fine, I should’ve expected it.” she reassured him, “Let me, uh, help with the bucket and then I’m going to get you some water.” She got off the bed and took the bucket from him, making sure she didn’t look inside. Once she disposed of the contents, she brought it back to his room and went into the kitchen. She then changed her gloves, poured some water into a glass, and made her way back to his room. He was still sitting up, but he didn’t look any better. In fact, he looked worse than before and she figured he was forcing himself to stay sitting.
“Here, drink, I don’t want you getting dehydrated,” she gently commanded him, giving him the glass of water and sitting back down on the bed, “and then I want you to lie back down and rest.” Rookie uttered a quick thank you and slowly drank the water, Silver helping him hold the glass to his beak whenever it looked like he was going to drop it. When he was done, the glass was placed on the nightstand and they both sat in silence again. He looked like he wanted to say something, so she held off on telling him to lie down again.
“Thanks for coming over, and, um…” he suddenly said after a while, “thanks for looking for me when I got lost in the wilderness, I know you really don’t like that area, you were probably super scared to be back there again.” Silver smiled sadly at him, though he couldn’t see it because of her mask.
“Hey, it’s no problem, what are best friends for?” she replied, “When I realized it was you who was most likely in some sort of danger, I knew I had to do something, trauma be damned.” She let out a laugh, but there was no humor in it. Her smile didn’t reach her eyes, even Rookie could see that despite her beak being covered.
“But… I’ll be honest, it was scary.” she continued, “That was the third time I’ve been there and it wasn’t any easier for me than the others even if I wasn’t injured or captured by Herbert that time… I wanted to fucking cry when I then had to go there two more times after you were rescued to disable the Snow-Bot and find Gary, what if I have to go back there again for another thing and I just.. can’t do it?” She looked away after letting out a sigh, feeling somewhat ashamed. She knew she shouldn’t feel bad about her trauma, but it was kind of hard not to when she had to face it multiple times while doing her job.
“I think you were really brave.” Rookie told her, making her look back at him. He started rambling about how good of a PSA and EPF agent she was, how strong she was, etc., when he was interrupted by another wave of nausea and he threw up into the bucket again. The tender moment between them was immediately ruined and Silver became alarmed at how sick he truly was. He really couldn’t keep anything down, not even just water.
“Shit, fuck, I was afraid it would be this serious.” she said, getting off the bed, “Come on, you need actual medical attention, like, right now.” She helped him down from the bed, doing her best to hold him up and keep him from collapsing, and pulled out her spy phone to teleport them somewhere where he could get help.
After this, Rookie made sure to always boil any water from the wilderness. He also made sure to never eat O’ berries again, because at least hot sauce on pizza didn’t make him feel like his mouth was literally on fire and that he needed any water he could get his flippers on…