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“Tsukishima!”
It was times like these that Kei realized that turning his music up to max volume really wasn’t the most effective way to ignore his stupidly hot-blooded teammates. Case in point, Hinata barrelling into his side with the force of a small canon and latching onto his arm.
“Oi! What—are you…okay?”
He hasn’t seen Hinata looking that rattled since the time he served into the back of Kageyama’s head. He was pale and trembling faintly, his hand like ice where it gripped his wrist. Unwittingly Kei found himself allowing his teammate to drag him forward.
“I don’t know what happened,” Hinata cried, “We were practicing receives and he just, he—”
They round the corner of the gym and without consent from his brain Kei found that his legs have carried him forward to the crumpled figure on the grass without any further prompting.
“What happened?” he snappped sharply, dropping to his knees.
“I don’t know!”
Kei couldn’t see any obvious injuries, and Kageyama was still breathing. But he was also limp and pale and unconscious, lying prone and vulnerable.
“He collapsed right? Did he make a noise? Hit his head? What?”
“I don’t know!” wailed Hinata, “I made a bad receive and he didn’t even yell, the I turned around to ask what was the matter and he just went ‘fwoo’ and—”
“Whatever,” Kei said, shaking his head, “Help me get him on my back, I’ll take him to the nurse’s office and you go get Takeda-sensei and Ukai-san, understand?”
“R-right!”
Kei levered himself up into a crouch and helped Hinata drape their unconscious setter over his back grimacing at the weight of him. For all that Kageyama looked slight and willowy he was densely packed with muscle and it was a struggle to stand up and get him settled securely.
“You’ve got him?” asked Hinata practically vibrating as he fluttered from side to side, “You won’t drop him?”
“I’ve got him, just go already,” Tsukishima ordered.
Hinata started at the sharpness of his tone but squeaked a shrill, “Yes!” and dashed off.
After that it was just a matter of putting one foot in front of the other even though his back was outright begging him to stop his foolishness and the stairs into the school looked endless.
Of course, because that would have been too easy, the nurse was out when Tsukishima finally got there and collapsed the both of them into the nearest bed.
“Tsukishima?”
Still out of breath Kei huffed a bit and mustered the will to turn over. Too close, he thought immediately.
Kageyama had shifted onto his side and in the narrow hospital bed they were practically nose to nose, their legs still entangled. It was quite possibly the closest he had ever been to Kageyama in terms of the actual molecules of air separating their bodies.
Kageyama’s eyes were very pretty he found himself thinking, the iris a shade of blue so dark it was practically black…
“Where…?”
“Nurse’s office,” Tsukishima said shortly, trying to ignore the way his face was heating up.
“You carried me?”
“I’ll expect some sort of ‘thank you’ from you, King,” he said by rote, “This commoner doesn’t work for free.”
Kageyama frowned at the use of his little moniker, but it wasn’t quite as forboding a scowl as usual as his nose wrinkled cutely and he struggled to push himself up on his elbows.
“Oi, oi,” he said, pushing the stubborn setter back down and frowning himself when it took him almost no effort, “I didn’t carry you all the way here to watch you collapse before you even—”
Kei froze as Kageyama reached out and tangled one long fingered hand in his hair and dragged him down to his mouth, missing it completely and dragging his impossibly soft mouth over the arch of his cheekbone.
“Thanks Tsukishima, you’re a pretty good guy for such a jerk,” he muttered resting their foreheads together and letting his eyes slip shut again suddenly as if the effort of holding them open was just too much.
“Y-y-you—you—” Kei sputtered and then he registered the temperature of the forehead pressed against his own, “Your burning up.
“Nnn, nn, s’cold,” Kageyama protested, snuggling closer.
“It only feels cold cause you have a damn fever, you idiot, why are you even at school?”
“Volleyball,” Kageyama said sleepily as if that should be obvious. “Your hand feels nice…”
“Idiot,” Tsukishima said emphatically, ignoring the stuttering of his stupid treacherous heart, “I am going to hold this over your head for a thousand years.”