Work Text:
Man grows used to everything, the scoundrel.
Philippe sighed into his coffee.
Black drip coffee from the break room, dark as the night sky. Well. Dark as the night sky had been before that rift had opened up over the ruined Prism Tower.
Across the way, Corbeau snuffled in his sleep like a little child. Philippe took a drink of his coffee. Lukewarm, bitter.
Corbeau wouldn't be happy about falling asleep, and he'd of course be snippy with Philippe for not waking him, but he needed the rest. Already, the little cold he'd caught was turning into something ugly and deep. He could hide it from Team MZ. He could hide it from Vinnie, or try to. But Corbeau could hide nothing from Philippe. He wasn't fool enough to try.
But he was...
Philippe sighed and drained his coffee.
He was fool enough to keep working through it. Pushing through fear and exhaustion, running on drip coffee and takeout donburi, all for the sake of Lumiose. Both of them. This routine they'd settled into, all-nighters and catnaps, 4:00 am coffee and cigarettes, it wasn't sustainable. But that was life. Sometimes, the only way out was through.
With a final sigh, Philippe heaved himself up and went over to wake Corbeau.
It took a few tries just to get him to stir.
Corbeau had really been out cold, snoring through congested sinuses, head pillowed on a stack of printouts that were no doubt bound for Philippe's desk.
"Boss." Philippe shook him again.
Corbeau made a small noise and furrowed his brow, then mumbled something unintelligible.
"Boss." Another shake, more insistent. "Wake up. We have work to do." The worst part of this was that Corbeau not only expected this kind of cruelty, but demanded it. Discipline, he called it. A willingness to do what it takes. Philippe shook him harder.
Corbeau woke coughing, shooing Philippe away, covering his mouth with his hand and then his sleeve.
Cruelty. Sanctioned and demanded.
Philippe backed off. Corbeau wrested himself back under control with a visible effort and reached across his desk for a tissue. His hand shook. He blew his nose noisily, squinting behind his glasses. When he surfaced he looked somehow worse for wear: nose red, eyes narrow, lips parted. "How long was I out?"
Philippe checked his watch. "15 minutes," he lied.
"Then that's 15 minutes I can take off my next scheduled break," Corbeau said, looking expectantly at Phillipe.
Wordlessly, Philippe crossed back to his laptop and updated the schedule. Arguing with Corbeau head-on rarely worked, at least not when he was like this. Like a Totodile, when Corbeau bit down on something, really bit down, he rarely let go.
Still...
Corbeau turned away from his desk, breath hitching. A series of sneezes doubled him over: one, two... five, six.
"You're killing yourself," Philippe remarked blandly.
"I'm dead anyway if Lumiose disappears into hyperspace," Corbeau shot back, sniffling. He turned to blow his nose again, his face lined with pain. "Do we have any coffee?"
Philippe closed his heavy eyes. Valuable seconds were slipping away from him the longer they talked. Corbeau was already back to work, but Philippe's break had gone over time. And he'd forgotten to run the coffee machine.
"I'll take that as a no," Corbeau said, and sniffled. The light from his laptop screen put a blue cast over the red on his cheeks, painting him a cadaverous purple. "No rest for the wicked, Philippe. Team MZ is working fast."
Philippe rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Boss, when was the last time you ate anything?"
"You're the one with the schedule."
"Yes, but you skipped your last break."
"W-well, then..." Corbeau broke off with a hitching breath, then sneezed explosively into a tissue. "Then the one before that." His voice came hoarse now, like that last sneeze had scraped off some vital layer as mercilessly as a pumice stone. "I understand your concern, Philippe. Really, I do. But this is a matter that requires sacrifice."
"If you end up in the hospital, I'll eat your laptop myself before I let you do any more work on it."
Corbeau scoffed, looking slightly more hinself for the briefest of moments.
"Charming. Now I really must insist you gst back to work. Or have you forgotten this is a matter of life and death?"
Philippe sighed. Here he was, arguing anyway. Corbeau was too smart and too stubborn for that. "Will you excuse me for a moment?"
Corbeau went deadly still for a moment, looking Philippe up and down with only a twitch of his irises. Sharp as an Arbok. Sick as he was, he still had that. Faculties and wits, an instinct as keen as a diamond.
Philippe took the pressure and bent under it: "Please, Corbeau. I need a moment."
Corbeau made a face, half-alarmed and half-suspicious. "...Take your moment, Philippe. But don't forget, the world is resting on our shoulders."
—
The cold air bit. Grisham pulled his elbows in against it, drawing the push-cart a little closer to him. The wheels protested. Griselle made a noise of irritation. Grisham glanced at her.
She raised her eyebrows at him. "Well?"
"Well," said Grisham. "I hesitate to speculate."
Griselle punched him in the arm. "You know something. You wouldn't just shut down the shop because Corbeau asked nicely."
Grisham smiled despite himself. "Corbeau didn't ask. Philippe did."
"You know what I meant."
"Who says I did?"
Griselle grit her teeth, looking very much like she wanted to hit him again. "Will you just tell me what's going on?"
"You have exactly as much information as I do." Grisham shrugged, his gaze falling to the insulated caddies on the cart. They'd find out soon enough, after all. But talking with Griselle passed the time. "Philippe called and asked us to come. Very politely, might I add."
"And there's money in it, obviously," Griselle said, eyeing him mistrustfully.
"We're negotiating that." A persistent wind chilled Grisham's hands over the cart's metal handle. He shivered.
"Stop," Griselle said. "We'll switch. Even if you won't tell me anything."
Grisham let her take the cart over and hurried to shove his hands into his pockets. Warmth leached in too slowly. Perhaps he'd been playing a little too coy with Griselle; she looked genuinely frustrated. And still cared enough to take the cart from him. Enough playing for now. "I think something's the matter with Corbeau."
"Speculating," Griselle said, satisfied. "Was that so hard?"
"Philippe asked very politely if we wouldn't mind providing catering service for the foreseeable future, with a very handsome sum up front. He was pacing, I could tell. And I swear I heard someone sneezing in the background."
Griselle sighed. "Sounds like trouble."
"It's the Rust Syndicate," Grisham said, shoving his hands deeper into his pockets. "Of course it's trouble."
Exactly what kind of trouble it was became abundantly clear the moment they stepped out of the elevator into Corbeau's office. The place stank of mediocre coffee, and the room rang with a series of violent sneezes from Corbeau, who sat front and center at his desk.
Grisham caught Griselle's eyes, lifting his eyebrows. She gave an exaggerated wince.
"You might have warned us we were walking into a field hospital," Grisham said by way of greeting.
Philippe entered from the side, a laptop balanced on one wide palm, but whatever he was going to say ended up pre-empted by Corbeau, who didn't look up from his own laptop: "Any particular reason you've breached the inner sanctum, Philippe, or did you just feel like spreading panic?"
"Have a little faith," Philippe said, with an apologetic glance at Grisham. "It's Team Flare Nouveau."
"No," Corbeau shot back, hoarse and irritated. "It's the staff of Nouveau Café."
Grisham smiled mirthlessly. "One and the same," he said, giving a little bow. "We're here to help in whatever capacity is needed. But, if you'll excuse me, I believe Philippe is our customer, not you."
"Hm!" Corbeau dabbed at nose with a tissue. "We don't have time for this."
Philippe stepped aside and gestured for them to enter the spacious office. "Please."
"What is this?" Griselle demanded, passing over the cart to Grisham so he could muscle it through the plush, high-pile carpeting.
"Catering," Philippe said distractedly, already fixated on his laptop again. "Please check in with me when you're done setting up."
Griselle bristled. Grisham caught her eye, mouthing the word money as he took the folding table off the cart and tried it open. Charity didn't pay the bills, after all. They needed this.
They set up in a silence punctuated only by rapid typing, one-word requests, and the sounds of Corbeau's obvious, miserable headcold. Sniffling, sneezing, coughing. It made Griselle cringe and Grisham want to. Whatever the Rust Syndicate was up to must have been important. He only wished he'd brought hand sanitizer.
It took several tries to get Philippe's attention. Griselle kept trying to shoot Grisham commisserating looks. He kept his eyes downcast. No, it didn't take a superior intellect to guess what was going on here.
Silence, secrecy, that oppressive air of overwork— clearly this had something to do with the rifts and the strange dreams everyone was dutifully pretending to ignore. Blithely trusting that Quasartico would solve it. How little they knew.
At last, Philippe looked up up at them from his rather slapdash looking station. A low couch, a coffee table, several empty and half-empty coffee mugs emitting the odor of stale coffee. Grisham widened his eyes by a fraction.
"My apologies for the wait," Philippe said, and set his laptop aside so he could start marking up a stack of papers covered in printed graphs and data models. "If I haven't made it clear yet, please understand that nothing you see here can leave this room."
Griselle scoffed. Grisham bent forward to take a look at the text printed on Philippe's highlighter. Quasartico Industries. "Hm."
Philippe looked at him and twitched his hand, showing off dark bruises staining his knuckles. "Have I made it clear?"
"That's just about the only thing you've made clear," Griselle snapped. "If this isn't a normal catering gig, then tell us what we're supposed to be doing here so we can start doing it."
Grisham straightened and clasped his hands behind his back. Sometimes Griselle's temper came in useful.
Philippe looked at them again, raising one hand in surrender. "Alright, alright. As you can see, the boss and I are quite busy with... sensitive matters." Corbeau sneezed loudly, inducing a wince. "And as you can hear, the boss has picked up a little bit of cold."
Another sneeze, and another, and a series of raspy coughs.
"A little bit of a cold," Griselle repeated, raising her eyebrows. Grisham nudged her.
But Philippe only looked defeated, running his free hand across his head, fingertips skimming the roots of his fauxhawk. "A bit of a cold. And, as I have other matters to attend to beside data analysis, I was hoping you could keep him alive while I'm out."
"I heard that," Corbeau said, raspy and congested. "I'm not dying."
Grisham turned to give him a good examination. Corbeau had indeed gone rather thin and sallow, in a way that suggested a good few days without substantial food or substantial sleep, and perhaps too few or too many cigarettes. He'd seen that pinched, glassy look in the mirror. He'd seen it on Lysandre. There was no mistaking it on Corbeau. "When was the last time you ate?"
Corbeau waved a hand, stifling a cough into his shoulder. "Philippe has the schedule. Don't waste my time."
"8 hours ago," Philippe said.
Grisham shot a glance at Griselle. She nodded in turn. "This is Team Flare Nouveau business."
"So you'll do it?" Philippe asked, already picking up his papers.
Grisham inclined his head. "We'll do it."
—
This was the kind of thing lesser men had their henchmen killed for. Corbeau squeezed his eyes shut against the dry itch that had been plaguing him for the better part of... a while. There was no point glancing at the clock anymore; the numbers didn't mean anything.
The buzz in his nose had become a constant companion, torturing him with a semi-permanent state of needing to sneeze. The feeling never went away, only his awareness of it as his focus on the data waxed and waned.
Absently, he reached for the mug on his desk and took a sip. The taste, herbal and sweet, jarred him back to painful, unfortunate reality. His sinuses burned.
Had it always been so cold in the office?
It took a few tries to find either Grisham or Griselle and focus his bleary eyes on them. "Didn't I tell you to keep the coffee coming?"
The figure blurred and solidified into the shape of Grisham. "Yes, but Philippe told us to keep you alive, and as it's his name on the check, I'm afraid that supersedes your authority."
Corbeau had to turn and cough into his sleeve before he could answer, and the motion jarred his glasses, sending them sliding down the unfortunately damp bridge of his nose. Tears, probably. He couldn't be sweating; it was too cold for that. "Turn up the thermostat, will you? It's over..." He raised a hand to gesture and let it drop to the desk. They could find it. He didn't have time for this. What had he been doing, anyway?
Right, the survey data. He squinted at the screen, the little numbers blurry. No, his glasses. Heavy on the tip of his nose. He pushed them up without a second thought, the nose pads drawing twin lines of pressure, irritating against his inflamed sinuses from the outside. Damn— dammit!
Corbeau doubled forward and sneezed, squeezing the air out of himself through ribs that ached and a throat that screamed. Too much, too much.
Another sneeze, and another. Rough and violent, too quiet and too loud. His throat stung. Even the muscles in his back creaked in protest.
And his glasses had slid down again.
Corbeau let his breath out over bleeding lips. It came shaky and shallow. His temples pounded.
"It's 24° in here," Griselle said, sounding far away. "Are you running a fever?"
Corbeau palmed his forehead, squeezing his temples. Dammit. "Just turn the heat up, okay? It's a simple ask."
"Philippe said keep you alive, not comfortable."
"Did Philippe say anything about brass knuckles?"
"Now, now." Grisham appeared from somewhere off to the side, presenting Corbeau with two pills on a saucer. "Take these and let's have no more talk of murder."
Corbeau took the pills with a few mouthfuls of the tea. It was good. Perfectly steeped, not too much honey. It even made his abused throat feel slightly less like he'd been swallowing razorblades. "That's... nice." Another shudder rippled outward from the base of his spine. Nice, but not what he needed. He braced his hands on the desk and levered himself up. His body moved slowly, despite an enormous effort.
"What are you doing?" Grisham didn't sound alarmed, which of course meant nothing. He could have been on the verge of panic for all Corbeau knew. Hell, he could have found the whole situation hysterical.
Corbeau had to take several deep breaths before he could answer, hands like two stars on the dark wood of his desk.
"S'cold in here..." Not what he'd meant to say. "Coffee..." Not what he'd meant to say.
It's too cold in here, and since you're refusing to follow orders, I'm taking matters into my own hands. Something like that. Coffee was a for-later thought that had somehow slipped in. He didn't need tea. Tea wouldn't help him get through the data any faster.
"Why don't we all sit down for a moment, hm?" Grisham again.
"Gris, he's going down— he's white as a sheet." Griselle.
Corbeau took a deep breath and pitched forward, arms shaking as they took on more of his weight. "Have a little faith."
"Sit," Grisham said, in Lysandre's voice, low and aristocratic. You had to be born into that kind of arrogance, raised in it.
"You're not him," Corbeau said to his desk, and straightened. Tremors ran through his legs. He crossed his arms, staring down Grisham and Griselle, who had both come awfully close.
Grisham raised an eyebrow. "Not who?"
"Never mind." Bracing himself, Corbeau dragged himself to the table Grisham and Griselle had set up. It was a blurry trip with his glasses still stuck firmly at the tip of his nose. He took them off rather than risk another attack of sneezes, re-positioning them delicately.
Griselle sighed, deep and vocal. "This is ridiculous! Just tell Philippe you need backup. You're not the only clever person in Kalos. Someone else can handle this."
Corbeau whipped his head around to glare at her, or tried to, but the room kept going when he stopped. He stumbled and caught himself, but the walls continued to rotate.
Lysandre... Never spoke with entitlement, but always with the gravity of a person who expected to be obeyed. Even when they were negotiating.
Corbeau pressed two fingertips to his temple. "You're not him! You have no right—" His chest hitched and for a moment, he froze in the no-man's-land between coughing and sneezing. His body split rhe difference, slipping three violent sneezes in the gaps of a coughing fit.
"Gris." Griselle sounded very far away now. "Oh, we are so fired."
"Keep your head, Griselle. Philippe will understand."
Blackness.
—
Really, it was kind of impressive Corbeau had lasted so long. Griselle had kept one eye on the clock the moment his knees had locked. If it was possible to stay conscious out of unadulterated force of will, Corbeau had done it for several minutes.
Unfortunately for him, unadulterated force of will didn't pump blood to your head.
Grisham sighed, crossing over to Corbeau's body with a few long strides. He bent and picked up Corbeau's feet by the heels. "Is there anything you can put under his head?"
Griselle surveyed the room. As magnificent as the office was, it had very little in the way of comfort. "Just paperwork."
"Take my apron."
"No."
"This," said a voice from the floor, "is ridiculous." Corbeau, whiter than cream and glaring fiercely, jerked his legs free from Grisham and sat up. He opened his mouth as though to continue, but drew in on himself and shivered.
Griselle's heart began to pound. Ridiculous? They were ridiculous? Corbeau was the one talking nonsense and running himself to the brink of destruction. "It is ridiculous! You need to stop trying to be the hero—"
"I'm not trying to do a-anything, other than save Lumiose—" Corbeau broke off with a choking noise and doubled over in a coughing fit.
"Oh, I'm sure." Griselle crossed her arms. He looked terrible. He'd broken out in a sweat. "And the martyr complex is just for fun, is it?"
"I didn't ask you to come here. You can kindly see yourselves out."
Grisham raised his hands, heavy lids rising in an intense stare. "Enough! Griselle, I'll thank you not to speak to a customer like that. Corbeau, I'm saying this as your comrade: you *need* to let this go."
"Comrade, hm?" Corbeau squinted, shivering harder.
Griselle sighed. Leave it to Grisham to always get his way. Honey, vinegar, et cetera.
"Griselle and I are worried about you," Grisham said, lowering his voice and flashing Griselle a look.
"Yes," Griselle admitted heavily. Because as obnoxious as it was to watch Corbeau self-destruct over a problem that didn't belong to him... Well. Maybe some of that irritation was borne of concern.
But the rest was because he was an idiot.
Corbeau muffled a sneeze into his sleeve. "...Help me up."
Griselle occupied herself getting out of the way so Grisham could be the one to get his hands dirty. Like hell was she getting sick helping Corbeau of all people.
The two of them shuffled to the couch where Philippe had been working, and Corbeau settled into a reclining position, frowning. "Is there any more of that tea?"
That, at least, Griselle could handle. The ritual of it calmed her, steeping the tea bag and stirring the honey.
When she brought it over, Corbeau wrapped his hands around it like he was freezing, despite the neon flush on his cheeks.
Grisham seemed to read her mind: "That's quite the fever, my friend."
Corbeau waved a hand. "You gave me meds. It'll pass."
"Now, the matter of your paperwork?"
Griselle sighed, bracing. "I'll text Vinnie."
The argument she'd been expecting never came. Corbeau made a face, but kept his mouth shut, somehow managing to sip his tea irritably.
Silence fell as Griselle sent the message, stretching into something not quite companionable, yet not wholly awkward.
Grisham was the one to break it. "You know, Corbeau... I don't mean to read too much into it, but I couldn't help but notice that you told both Griselle and me 'you're not him.' I'm curious. Who might that be?"
"Hm?" Corbeau looked up, obviously startled, but too tired to flinch properly.
"Oh. You reminded me of someone I used to know, that's all."
Whatever that meant. Grisham flashed Griselle a Look, like she was supposed to divine something from a phrase so innocuous as to be unremarkable. "Both of us?"
"Mm. Later." Corbeau sighed into his tea. "You can... you can tell Philippe he's won. I'll go to bed soon."
"As you please." Grisham smiled and gave an obsequious little bow. Griselle frowned. Why would he mock Corbeau like that? "If there's anything you need in the meantime, please don't hesitate to ask."
Griselle plastered on her best customer service smile and nodded. Whatever Grisham was getting at, she'd have to find out later.