Chapter Text
They were walking through the cherry fields when Purple’s phone pinged, and pinged again when he was pulling it out of his pocket. His eager words tapered off, and his light expression hardened with focus at the screen. King turned his gaze away in respectful nonchalance, electing to give the kid his privacy. The youth and their phones—there was no use in fighting it.
The pink-and-white blossoms danced in the morning breeze, dappled with light peering down from the overcast sky. His attention caught for a moment on an unusual knot in a trunk across the path. A darker streak of umber-brown split the wood in two, accentuating its shadow…
“Dad,” Purple said, and the tremor in his voice made King’s stomach drop. His eyes jerked back to the kid, meeting his the second he lifted them from his phone. His face was tight with urgency. “We need to get to the gang’s.”
The statement was curt, abrupt, and final. Emotion overrode reason, for a moment. He didn’t ask why; he didn't think about the implications of his presence at the children’s home. He felt a glimmer of that rage, that cold, shivering fury at the unmistakable thread of fear in his son’s words. He needed to find the source, and he needed to murder it. He nodded in silence as Purple pulled on the glittering silver wings and offered his hand.
Purple had the network of nether portals memorized, streaking across the familiar terrain with no hint of hesitation. And all at once they shot through another wavery field into a crisp, neat open space—all lines and hard edges—and nearly tumbled over somebody standing in their way. Purple weaved, corrected quickly, and landed, both of them juddering to the ground with more force than normal. Yellow—Yellow had been the one at the entrance. The quiet one with glasses, pale blonde hair, the one that looked painfully familiar…
“You’re here,” Yellow gasped, breathless, as though he’d been the one plummeting through dimensions to reach them. King found with another stab of dread that the little one’s expression carried the same shaky, spooked tension as Purple’s. His eyes flickered for a moment up at King’s face—cautious, uncertain—but he caught himself quickly and ducked his gaze. “Thank Alan. He’s—we don’t know what he—he’s—”
“Show me,” King demanded, his voice low and controlled. He didn’t want to scare the kid, but he didn’t feel it wise to take time for pleasantries.
Yellow hurried ahead of them across a platform and down to the floor, walking quickly toward a low but stylized house. He could tell at a glance it was Crafted—a stark contrast against the smooth, clean angles of its surroundings.
A flash of a memory cut through his thoughts, as they closed the distance—the time Gold had fallen off of the swing at the park and broken his wrist, right at the beginning of his missing-front-teeth phase…the sound of his muffled sobbing as King had carried him, cradled against his chest, to the emergency clinic a few blocks down. They had been the longest few blocks of his life.
The atmosphere, the urgency…it was the same here. They moved to the door and another darted up to meet them—mint hair, black jacket, headphones slightly askew around his neck. “He hasn’t—oh, you found them? Good—in here—”
The party ducked inside, passing a pair of rooms with personalized aesthetics King didn’t have time to take in. They stepped up to the door of the third; King heard voices from within as Green pushed the door open, and he stooped to make his way through.
The first thing that caught his attention was the stale quality of the air, the thin scent of mustiness and a lack of ventilation and…something else, something that every parent loathed. Something he couldn’t describe so much as he could sense, and it was enough to make his hackles rise.
There were three figures in the room, crowding the interior of the little space. The closest was Red, huddled on the floor by the bookshelf, hugging his knees to his chest. He raised his eyes to the newcomers, and their bloodshot puffiness made it clear he’d been crying. Then there was Blue, sitting at the edge of the bed along the far wall, turned toward its occupant, whispering something…
King stepped up quickly as Blue pulled away, and his face fell at the sight of the source of it all.
The kid’s raspy breathing, rattling faintly into the quiet, was the first significant cause for concern. His tanned skin glistened with sweat, pale and blotchy, heightening the starkness of the freckles on his cheeks. King cursed under his breath and knelt at the edge of the bed, gently coaxing Blue aside as he took over.
Orange’s chest rose shakily as he drew in another breath, his chapped lips cracking as pulled them back. His green eyes—pale and strange; King had never seen someone of such contrasting eye color before—were dull and half-lidded, glazed pools of delirium that drifted vaguely in King’s direction at the movement from his arrival. They passed over his face with no sign of recognition.
“Kid,” King breathed. He didn’t even need to check, almost, but brushed back the ginger bangs plastered to his forehead—they’d clearly been swept away before—and hissed at the burning he felt beneath.
Orange groaned, tensing weakly at the touch; King shushed him, feeling the knot in his stomach tighten. He tipped the kid’s head back and pressed gingerly against his throat, feeling the undeniable swelling of lymph nodes under the skin.
King cursed again, louder, and Red made a high noise like a dying animal.
“We—we found him like this this morning,” Blue stammered, his voice strained and frantic. “He was quiet yesterday, and he told us he was tired, but he’s always tired—” King felt his frown deepen; what did that mean? “—he didn’t come for dinner, and when he didn’t come for breakfast—which he always does, it’s pancake day—I got worried and came in to check on him, and he—and he—and I couldn’t wake him up, but now he’s kind of awake, but it doesn’t really seem like it—and the potions aren’t working, I tried to give him one but he’d barely drink, and nothing changed, and I don’t—and I don’t know what—”
“Kid, breathe,” King ordered, setting a hand on his shoulder. “Breathe. Has he talked to you at all since he woke up?”
Blue shook his head, his chest rising and falling quickly. “No…well, maybe? When I first got him up he might’ve said something—like his head hurt or something—but now I don’t think he can. He’s…it’s like he’s not even there, I—”
“Okay. That’s okay. You’ve done well—thank you.” He turned to the rest of them. “It seems like the flu. Have any of you had it recently?”
A pace or two in from the door, Purple grimaced in sympathy, taking a minute step back. The others, however, looked confused. “Um…no?” croaked Red from the floor, his voice scratchy. “What…what’s that?”
King stared at him. “The flu? Influenza cybris? You can’t tell me you haven’t—”
He cut himself off, choking to a halt at the realization. If they all lived here, on an isolated platform, disconnected from the Outernet—Animators, they’d probably never even had immunizations. No wonder this had knocked Orange out hard, and suddenly.
He felt a stab of something akin to horror in his gut. The whole lot of them, these children, were completely on their own, cut off from all society, all resources, all support…
King shook his head, drawing a measured breath through his nose. Another time. The kid was the priority right now. “Never mind. You’ll want to keep your distance, the rest of you, since it’s contagious. This is common—at least, out on the Net. It might seem scary, but it is treatable.”
There was a collective sigh of relief. King turned back to Orange, appraising. “What he needs most now are rest and fluids. Has he been throwing up?”
Blue stiffened a little, to his right. He shook his head again, though, when King turned back to face him. “No, just—he’s just been out of it…”
“All right. Good. He’ll still easily get dehydrated, so he needs water. Does anyone—?”
“Yes—yes,” Blue gasped, rifling through his inventory and pulling out a pair of bottles. He practically shoved them into King’s chest in his haste to hand them over.
King paused a moment as he reached up to take them. There were faint tremors running through the kid’s hands, his eyes round and pleading as he stared up at him. All of them, honestly, were watching with the expressions of people backed into a corner, shaky and skittish and looking for an escape. Itching to fight, itching to protect, but helpless—helpless and horribly out of their depth.
He'd seen them scared before, all those months ago. Animators, he’d been the cause of their fear. But this was different—this was something deeper and more vulnerable, with no clear opponent or source of danger. Where one of their friends was suffering, and they didn’t know how to stop it.
“It’s okay,” King murmured, earnest. “We’ll get him better, I promise.”
King turned his attention back to Orange, setting down the bottles at the bedside table. He pulled out a bucket of water from his own supply. “We need cloths and a thermometer—and ice packs, if you have any. Got to get his temperature down.”
He paused at the silence in the room that followed, and turned to look back at the others.
“Ice packs…”
“Thermometer…?”
“Animators’ sake,” King hissed, and the kids flinched. He cursed himself for his frustration. “No, no, it’s okay. This is new, I get it. Purple—” he fished through his coat pocket and tossed over his keys. “Bring everything you can find from the house.”
Purple nodded and raced off; Green stepped in to take his place. “I think…I’m pretty sure we have cloths in the cabinet—”
“Good—get them.” He gestured toward the window on the wall overhead. “Someone open that—we need airflow in here.”
King heard Red stand up behind him to do so. “Do you have any medication with you?” he tossed over his shoulder, working to untangle the sheets from the ailing kid’s frame. “Painkillers, fever reducers, anything?”
He was met with more silence. Blue shook his head again, looking on the verge of tears. “Okay. Just making sure. Purple’s bringing some, don’t worry.”
King smoothed out the snarls of fabric from around Orange’s legs. He worked an arm beneath his shoulders and lifted him gently to sit; he peeled the sweat-soaked, oversized tee up from his back, working it carefully free over his head. The kid offered minimal resistance or reaction, his body limp and burning against King’s hands.
Orange shivered as his bare skin met the open air, his glazed eyes teeming with feverish confusion. Blue made a soothing noise, hovering close but seemingly nervous to touch, after King’s order they stay away.
“Here, kid.” King kept Orange propped up with one arm, cupping the back of his head as he raised a bottle to his mouth. “Drink slowly.”
King managed to get him to swallow a little, watching the sluggish movement of his throat as he tilted the glass container against his lips. King murmured a few encouragements and at length pulled it away, lowering Orange gently back to the pillow and drawing the sheets up to his stomach.
Footsteps pounded back up from the hall, and Green burst back into the room with a crumpled handful of washcloths. King accepted them gratefully and dipped one in the bucket of water, wringing it out and draping it carefully across the kid’s forehead. Orange drew away with a groan, tensing up in discomfort.
“I know,” King found himself rumbling, his voice soft and distant, worlds away. He smoothed back the kid’s hair again, above the fabric. “I know. Just bear with me. We’ve gotta get you cooler, bud.”
Gold had been a healthy one, growing up. Rambunctious, though, too, and lacking a good amount of forethought—it led to his share of colds and fevers, especially in the winter when he’d tear off down the street without a coat or other necessary protection.
King remembered them holed up every now and then during the cold months, listening to the howling of the wind outside, sweeping back his thick blonde hair as he shivered and sniffled and whined about his throat or headache. King would sit with him and tell him stories until he fell asleep; he would test the warmth of his face with gentle fingers until the sickly heat was gone.
He'd wrung out another cloth without thinking, and reached over to dab it across Orange’s neck and arms. He needed to clean him up a little, then another few to cover his chest. He murmured so to Blue, who stepped over to help prepare another cold towel.
Orange shivered and groaned throughout the treatment, but at length he was arranged with methodical layerings of fabric across his frame. King leaned back and sighed, and the others seemed to relax minutely along with him. “That’ll do for now,” he said. “We just have to wait for Purple.”
It didn’t take long for the telltale footsteps to patter back up to the door, and the kid in question raced inside with his inventory stocked. He’d really brought everything—a thermometer, disposable face masks, more towels, painkillers, tissues, night and day fever reducers, cough medicine, ice packs, a sleeve of crackers, two cups of applesauce, water bottles…King felt a swelling of pride in his chest, giving him a nod of approval as he accepted the plethora of supplies.
He stuck the thermometer probe into Orange’s ear, waiting in tense silence until the device beeped. He pulled it back and pursed his lips at the result.
“What’s it say?” asked Green, stepping up nervously to hover over his shoulder.
“We’re supposed to run a hundred even, when we’re healthy,” King explained, lifting the device for him to see. “105—” he tapped the number on the screen, “—is bad; 108 is when it starts to get dangerous. It’s all right, though—” he added at the nervous murmuring and shifting in the room around them; “it’s all right. We have a starting point now, and we can track if his temperature rises or falls.”
“Okay,” Green breathed, looking rattled. “Okay.”
King shook out a pair of tablets from the capsule of fever medication. “Here, kid,” he murmured, grabbing the bottle of water from before. “Drink for me.”
Lifting Orange again, he coaxed the pills into his mouth and chased them quickly with water. The kid swallowed, once, twice, and sagged back with a sharp breath, his lashes fluttering. “Good,” King whispered, lowering him gently back to the sweat-damp pillows. “That should help.”
He pulled out the ice packs and wrapped them in the cloths Green had brought, pressing them gingerly to the sides of Orange’s chest. The kid groaned again, trying to pull away.
King shushed him softly. “It’s all right,” he soothed.
At length, the kid was settled. “That’s everything,” he sighed, twisting back on his arms to face the others. “We’ve done what we can. I’m staying with him to make sure he’s comfortable. You all get some fresh air—it’s best if you make as little contact as possible. We don’t want anyone else catching it too.”
“What about you?” Red questioned weakly, to his left.
“It’s fine—I’m immunized,” answered King. “Same with Purple.” He waved a hand at their puzzled expressions. “I can explain it later—means we’re less likely to get it. And I’m the one with the knowhow; I should be here.”
“Thank you,” someone breathed. They sounded small and vaguely shell-shocked. The rest of them murmured the same.
King nodded. “Any of you been sick before?”
The kids shook their heads uncertainly, exchanging nervous glances.
“Well…one time Blue ate every brewable item in Minecraft at once, and was puking for hours afterward,” Yellow piped up suddenly. “That sucked.”
“I ate grass and almost puked,” Green offered. He scoffed with a look of derision, suddenly, so sharp that it surprised King. “Which was…so stupid of me. And Yellow gets bad headaches sometimes. Usually when he’s on his laptop too long and doesn’t sleep enough.”
“And Orange’s sleep schedule is weird,” Red added. “He’s tired a lot, and passes out all the time. Especially that one time—just dropped in front of us with no warning. Nose started bleeding and everything. It was really weird.”
King swiveled to stare at him, his heart dropping. “Um. What?”
“It’s fine, though!” Blue yelped on his other side, waving his hands placatingly. “It happens. It’s just an Orange thing.”
King wasn’t so sure that was just an Orange thing. He was pretty sure it was an urgently inform your doctor thing. Which…he realized that they very, very likely did not have. He snapped his mouth shut, though—another time. Everything else was for another time.
Cursors, these kids were going to be the death of him.
“Someone…someone should probably tell Alan what’s going on,” Green ventured, after a moment.
“What? Who’s—” King started, his gaze drifting through the room to the hallway beyond the door, out past the open wall of the building and—
He made a strangled noise, like an asphyxiating chicken. That—oh, hackers. That was an Animator.
Gazing down through a wall of a screen, a gargantuan veil of sorts—something he hadn’t taken the time to notice coming in, too preoccupied with the notion of a threat, a child in danger: a figure like them but massive, hovered in the void beyond. Half-blurry details of a room, one vaguely similar to the one they occupied, filled the space behind him. King made out dark hair and glasses before the rational part of his brain kind of fuzzed over.
That. Was. An. Animator.
“It’s okay,” Purple breathed, putting a hand to his shoulder and stepping into his line of vision, obscuring out the sight of the giant entity beyond. His face was pale, too. “It’s okay. They see him all the time—he’s nice. He’s friendly.”
King swallowed, wordless, and swallowed again. “I…I—”
“It’s okay,” Purple assured him, and the others nodded.
“Usually Orange is the one to go talk to him,” Yellow managed. “He can do that—he can talk to him. Make text appear. But right now…”
“Got it,” King rasped, finally finding his voice. He pushed to his feet. “I’ll figure something out. Purple—you can take things in here.”
The kid nodded, straightening up as King stumbled for the door. Holy Makers of Macintosh—he was about to speak to an Animator.
He made his way out of the room, crossing the open hall stiffly to the opposite end of the building from which he and Purple had come. And there it was—hovering a few paces to the left, in front of a platform—a tab—a cursor, the fabled icon of the Animators. Small and white and oddly…mundane, it floated unmoving beside the white swathe of the platform. He froze, watching it closely, feeling the eyes of the entity on him.
A jolt of fear stabbed through his chest as the cursor shot up. It went from zero to 100 in an instant—there was no inertia to break, no slow-in, slow-out to its motion; it just moved. It grabbed the edge of the tab—a blank page, a Word document—and pulled it down to King’s level, casting him suddenly in its stark illumination. The cursor sank somewhat more slowly toward the center of the screen, shifting into a new form—an Ibeam—and clicked, spawning a blinking black line on the top left corner of the page.
The cursor vanished, and there was a brief, odd series of resounding clacks somewhere nearby and below. A handful of letters appeared on the tab.
Hello
King stared at the brief, neutral, semi-formal salutation, and swallowed. Now was not the time to back down. He raised an arm weakly to reciprocate the greeting.
The clacking and the letters continued. Do you know what’s going on with The Second Coming?
King blinked, confused. With…The Second Coming?
Sorry – introductions. You must be a friend. What’s your name?
“King,” he said, then paused. The Animator couldn’t hear him. Thinking quickly, he stepped toward the left side of the page and scanned the letters for any to recycle.
king, he snatched and spelled out in a rush.
Oh, cool. Hi, King. Nice to meet you. My name is Alan.
Interesting. A very…polite god of creation and destruction, then. King lifted his hand in another half-aborted wave.
To business, though—he stepped between the lines of text, snatching letters and words. The Second Coming, he repurposed, and beside it cobbled together – orange?
Yeah – that’s his official name. Wasn’t sure how you knew him.
King nodded in understanding. is sick, he spelled out, then, and flu.
Alan shifted, suddenly, leaning away from the screen-veil. King froze, staring at him with wide eyes. His massive form had almost appeared to reduce in size, but he knew he simply retreated a little way into the Space Beyond. He caught a glimpse of the Animator’s expression: something like surprise, and worry.
Oh dang, Alan typed quickly, returning to the keyboard. I didn’t know you guys got that too. That’s awful.
King nodded again, vaguely. That too filled his veins with an odd sort of numbness.
Anything I can do to help?
don’t know, King scrapped together after a couple of moments. will tell if so. am on it.
Thanks, Alan answered, and it looked like he was smiling. We owe you, King. We were all kind of freaking out this morning.
King scoffed a laugh; he’d bet they were. He nodded again.
Do you have any idea how long this might last?
King considered this. some days? don’t know, he repurposed. hard guess.
Alan tipped his head, shifting over a little in relation to the veil. Got it. These kinds of things are unpredictable.
King hummed in knowing solidarity. Wow. He was in knowing solidarity with an Animator.
My daughter was sick a few months ago, Alan told him, suddenly. Always scary, but it happens. Sounds like you have experience?
King stared, shocked. He stepped slowly to arrange an answer. yes.
I’d love to keep talking, but I don’t want to keep you forever. Thanks for coming, King. We’ve really needed your help.
King nodded again, throwing a salute as he stepped to the edge of the margin. He moved away from the page and raced back for the house, his heartbeat pounding in his ears.
Oh, hackers. Oh, hackers. He’d just done that. He’d just talked to an Animator.
The thrill was somewhat dampened by the fact the kids did so often, if not every day. And apparently Orange—The Second Coming—could form text by himself? How strange; King wondered what other oddities the kid was capable of. He shook his head and tried to quell his rampant emotions as he stepped back into the house.
The kids moved dutifully aside as he made his way into the room, nodding at Purple to relinquish the role of closest watch. He knelt by the foot of the bed again, gathering the arrangement of supplies around him.
“I’ve let him know,” King told them, addressing the whole group. “I’ll tell you when Orange is up, and when he’s ready to see you. But you need to be. Careful. The flu spreads like wildfire, and you’re all especially vulnerable if you haven’t had it before.”
The gang nodded wordlessly, expressions of anxiety and relief in varying measures on their faces. King shot his best consoling look back at them. “I know you’re worried, and you want to see him better. But the best thing you can do for him right now is give him space. And I need you telling me, or telling Purple right away if you start feeling sick. Exhaustion, soreness, headache, stomachache, fever, anything. I mean it. And you should be careful around each other, too.”
“Okay,” one of the kids whispered, and another voice chimed in, “thank you.” King nodded and turned back toward the bed.
“Come on, guys,” Purple murmured after a beat, his voice slightly muted with his back turned to the room. Slowly, a pattering of footsteps started drifting toward the hall.
“Feel better, Orange,” someone called. That, King reckoned, had probably been Red. He didn’t look back, but suppressed a smile as he reached for the stack of towels on the bookshelf.
…
It was easy to lose track of time, in this sunless domain of the kids’ home. King crouched at the foot of the bed, stripping the hand towels from Orange’s chest and replacing them with fresh ones. He could hear the sound of movement from the hall, a few footsteps shuffling outside, maybe peering in through the door. No one entered, though. He winced at the ache of his knees as he shifted back.
He paused as the kid started to move against the mattress. Orange tensed, his face tightening in discomfort; he swallowed painfully, his throat bobbing, and after a moment or two his eyes cracked open. King felt his heart twist; Animators, the kid looked miserable.
“Hey,” King whispered, setting a gentle hand to his arm. A thick heat still emanated from his bare skin. “Hey, kid, you with me?”
Orange made a quiet noise, something thin and noncommittal. His head lolled against the pillow, and his cloudy gaze drifted; it wandered over to King, and seemed to struggle to focus on him. The kid’s breath trembled, his eyes glazed and exhausted and in pain.
“Hey,” King murmured again. “Orange. Second Coming. It’s okay, kid. You’re okay.”
He lifted a hand to Orange’s bangs, brushing them carefully back above the cold compress on his face in a calming, familiar motion. Heat was still blazing there, too. Orange groaned and shifted again, his eyes slipping shut beneath King’s hand.
“Shh,” whispered King. “It’s okay. Just relax, kiddo. Just rest.”
Orange lay there, his breathing shallow and uneven. He drifted back away in a couple of minutes, after King had finished changing the cloths and coaxed a little water and painkillers into him.
King leaned back and sighed, once Orange had gone still again. Motherboards, but the kid was sick. Fully out of it sick, helpless and wordless and floating in abject misery. No wonder the others had panicked.
King set his jaw. It was nothing, he resolved, that he couldn’t handle.
…
“Everything going okay in here? I brought food,” Purple’s voice called carefully from the hall. “Blue and Red and I made it.”
“Yeah—thanks,” King rasped, running a hand over his face, standing up and shuffling for the door. Cursors, but his legs were stiff. He shook them out and turned the handle, and found Purple standing there with a facemask on and a pair of bowls of soup—ramen—in his hands. King’s eyes widened in surprise—they looked good.
“I know,” Purple said at his expression, and King could hear his smile. “They’ve figured out a whole bunch of crazy recipes. Said this would be lightest on the stomach.”
King accepted them gratefully. “Tell them thank you,” King murmured to him, genuinely grateful. “I’ll bring the dishes out when we’re done.”
He doubted Orange would be able to eat for a while, but it couldn’t hurt to try. “How is he?” Purple asked, that note of worry creeping back into his voice. He craned over King’s shoulder to peer into the room, his eyes anxious.
“He’s sleeping—still out of it.” King sighed. “Hopefully it’s just a twenty-four-hour virus. I’m glad it’s only him so far. How are the others?”
Purple tilted his head in a so-so gesture. “Not great, but not sick, I think. They don’t really know what to do with themselves. Blue’s pale, but he’s probably just nervous. Red’s still an emotional mess…none of them are really doing too good.”
King grunted in sympathy. “I can’t blame them. The food’s a good idea, though—you can tell them to brainstorm the lightest meals for Orange. It’ll be a good way to pass the time.”
“Got it.” Purple straightened up; he seemed invigorated by the order. “Let me know if you need anything.”
“Will do. Thank you, kid.”
“’Course,” Purple called as he shut the door between them. “See you.”
…
“Kid,” King soothed, reaching for the bed as Orange whimpered, twisting restlessly under the sheets. “Kid, hey, just relax. You’re okay.”
Orange’s eyes were squeezed shut, his face twisted as he curled onto his side. He mumbled something slurred and incoherent, shivering—
King settled a hand on his shoulder. “Easy, easy. You’re safe.”
Orange whined, his breaths coming in rattling gasps. His arms twitched and he flinched, shying back from the touch; King pulled away, taking a moment to assess.
Could he be contributing?
“It’s okay,” he rumbled, a sinking feeling in his chest. “It’s okay. It’s just a dream, I promise. It’s not real.”
Orange couldn’t seem to hear him, or to process the words. He kept whimpering, shifting incessantly against the mattress—pushing out and away, like he was trying to break free of something. King pulled the sheets carefully from his sweaty limbs, peeling them away from his skin—so hot, still too hot.
“No, please—” King made out, suddenly, through the breathy whines of pain. They were the first clear words he’d heard from Orange the whole time, since he’d arrived, he realized. “No—stop it—stop it—don’ hurt them—”
King’s heart plummeted. “Oh, kid. I’m so sorry. They’re safe. No one’s gonna hurt them.”
“No—no—” Orange’s words devolved into ragged gasps, sweat and tears streaking his face. King’s heart burned in a silent rage—burned at the virus running rampant in the kid’s body, making him miserable and aching and confused. He burned at himself for bringing the kid pain—this kid, the one so small and fragile right in front of him, the one sweet and caring and unbelievably kind. The one who’d given King a chance, after everything he’d done to them—after he had every right to be hated.
King could only sit there, his heart burning, and do his best to bring him comfort. He shushed the kid as he trembled and cried, stiffening sporadically against the mattress. King dabbed at his face with a fresh cloth and whispered quiet words until Orange exhausted himself, slumping back into the bed, his whimpers fading away into silence. The kid’s fitful twitching slowed, and King shifted him slowly onto his back. Animators, but the kid was so hot—his ginger curls darkened with sweat, sticking in clumps to his pale skin, the blotchiness of his cheekbones shining starkly against the white of the sheets.
King pulled the thermometer from the bookshelf and stuck it in Orange’s ear again—106.1, even warmer than before. He hissed, his mind racing. The medicine should be working, why wasn’t it working?
He checked himself, and drew in a measured breath. Sliding off of the bed, he reached for the assortment of capsules on the shelf and assessed them. Twenty minutes until Orange could take another round of fever reducers…and he could double the dose if he felt necessary—good. And about half an hour before he was due for more painkillers.
King just had to sit and wait, one of the hardest things in the Net. He reached over and set to work rearranging the cold towels, lying them out over the kid’s frame from where they’d been scattered across the bed. The ice packs could use refreezing—he should task the others with finding a way to cool them off.
“Come on, kid,” he murmured, almost to himself. “You’re gonna be okay.”
…
King could have sworn the hairs on his neck stood up, an indeterminate amount of time later, as he sat in a sprawl on the floor with his back against the edge of the bed. Like some kind of Animators-cursed sixth sense. He straightened up, shaking off the mild sleepiness of a thought-consumed trance, and couldn’t help the involuntary groan of dread that crawled up his throat at the sound of vomiting somewhere nearby—muffled by the walls and the distance between them, but unmistakable nonetheless.
Animators…not another one.
He heard panicked voices and movement as he pushed himself hurriedly up, gathering a few supplies around him—a bucket, a handful of fresh towels, water. He’d only just started for the door when rushed, shuffling footsteps pounded up from the hall, and a gaggle of little ones burst through the threshold.
King took in the sight quickly. Purple, still masked, clothing rumpled as though he’d been in a fight, or had taken part in a hasty operation to grab someone and escort them over. He and Yellow, similarly disheveled, glasses missing, were toting a panting, nauseated-looking Blue between them, who seemed to still be catching his breath from the ordeal King had just overheard.
King grimaced; it made sense, considering things. He’d been the closest to Orange when they’d come, and by their report likely for the greatest length of time.
“Okay, kid,” he sighed, stepping forward to the trio. He took Blue’s face carefully in his hands, tipping it upward to look at him—a little warm, sweat on his temples, eyes glassy. That distant look of misery with which King had gotten all too familiar in the last number of hours. There was a faint smear of something watery and…unpleasant against the corner of his mouth. “Okay. Yes. You too.”
Blue just whined, the sound thin and pitiful. King’s hands on his shoulders steadied him as he swayed, the other two pulling away to give them room. “What should we do?” asked Purple, anxious.
“Let’s get him settled here,” King answered. “We can set up a quarantine, to try to contain the virus in one place.”
“It’s gonna be okay, kid,” he added, softer, addressing the trembling little one as he guided him further into the room. “I’ve got you. We’re gonna make you comfortable.”
Yellow sidled forward, cautiously, a few paces in from the doorway; he raised a block in his right hand—the block, King realized—and placed a new bed on the left-hand wall of the room, perpendicular to Orange’s. King nodded his thanks and coaxed Blue over.
Blue complied without a fight, sinking miserably onto the mattress. “Whyyy…?”
“You were nearest him, kid,” King explained ruefully. He proffered a towel for Blue to wipe his face and hair. “Made you most vulnerable. And the flu can hit people differently, which is why you’re throwing up. You did mention he wasn’t hungry, though.”
King took the towel when Blue handed it back, and gave the kid water to rinse his mouth. Blue sipped at it shakily, seemingly too nervous and nauseous to swallow much but eager to rid his mouth of foul taste.
“Good, kid.” King took the water back and helped Blue shrug off his jacket, supporting him as he tipped to lie against the bed. He heard the thump…thump of his sneakers against the wood floor as he pried them off with his feet. King guided his knees up, keeping him turned on his side. “Tell me everything you’re feeling.”
Blue groaned, his glassy eyes drifting shut. “Mmm…head hurts. Stomach hurts. ’m kinda dizzy…n’ it’s too hot.”
King hummed, pressing the back of his hand to Blue’s forehead. The kid groaned again, but this time the sound carried a note of relief. His skin was hot to the touch—not burning with the violent heat of Orange’s, but too warm to be healthy. He’d need to take his temperature for a clearer gauge of just how much so.
King exhaled through his teeth. “Tell you what, kid,” he rumbled, brushing back the dark locks spilling over the little one’s face. “I’m staying here with you and Orange until you feel better. For now, you can take it easy. You just rest, okay?”
The kid sighed miserably. “’Kay…”
King squeezed his shoulder once before pushing up to stand. “I’m getting you some meds. Let me know if you feel like you’re going to throw up again.”
Blue wrapped his arms around his stomach, pressing his face into the pillow. “Mm-hmm…”
King looked back at the pair in the doorway, and nodded. I’ve got this. Purple seemed to take the hint and backed up, coaxing Yellow to follow. The latter seemed more reluctant to leave, eyeing Blue remorsefully, but gave way and let his friend guide him into the hall.
“Sorry, Blue,” he called softly over his shoulder. He got a low hum, a vague affirmative, in response. “Feel better…”
King knelt back down beside his bed as their footsteps retreated, shaking out a pair of fever reducer and painkiller tablets into his palm. “Okay, kid, I’m gonna need you to sit up for me again. Just for a moment, I promise. Then you can rest.”
Blue groaned and complied sluggishly, pushing himself up against the mattress. King handed him the pills and grabbed the same bottle of water, advising him to swallow quickly. “It’ll help with your head and your stomach. Okay? Just to get you a little more comfortable.”
Blue did as he was told, chasing the pills with a sip or two of water and a grimace. He handed back the bottle, near-empty, as King took his temperature; 102.2. As he expected; too high, but nothing overly worrisome—at least, nothing like Orange.
“Okay, kiddo,” King soothed. “That’s good. Shirt on or off?”
“Off…” Blue raised his arms halfheartedly, with a surprising lack of hesitance. He let King grab the hem of his tee; the cerulean cloth by his waist was tacky with sweat. The fact that they were so physically and openly trusting with him, of all people…it likely spoke to the true severity of their circumstance, and the extent to which the virus was wiping them out.
“Ready? One, two—” King pulled the fabric up from the kid’s back and over his head, prying his arms free, and oh.
That was scarring. That was all scarring. The kid was lanky but well-built, scrawnier-looking without his top, and…swathes of darkened skin, thick tissue grown over at the site of what had to have been excruciating burns, smothered his stomach and lower chest. They looped all the way around his body, as if he had been burned from all sides. King couldn’t even imagine their appearance when fresh—glistening, blistering, sizzling from contact with something far too hot for any living thing to touch…
King choked wordlessly, appalled, still gripping the hem of the shirt in both hands. “Kid, what—you—”
“Mmm,” Blue hummed, his gaze drifting vaguely downward at himself. “Lava.”
That…nothing about that word was reassuring. “What did—are you—?”
“S’fine,” Blue slurred, shifting over to lie back down on his side. He didn’t tense up or arrange himself awkwardly to accommodate the wounds; he didn’t seem to be affected at all. “Long time ago. ’m okay now.”
King stared at him in silence as he settled again. He wracked his brain, perturbed, trying to remember any moment of seeing the kid in pain, aching, sore, shying away from physical activity or exertion—playing with his friends, laughing, brewing potions, crafting new items…fighting desperately against King and Purple, getting hurtled behind electric bars…
King pushed the thoughts away. He couldn’t help the hand, he felt, that settled against the kid’s arm again, carefully away from the darkened blotches all over his body. “Get some rest.”
Blue sighed, his eyes half-lidded and distant. King made sure to stay very quiet until he was certain he’d drifted off.
…
“Shh, kid,” King breathed, pulling back the towels from Orange’s side. The ginger locks glistened as he groaned, his breaths hitching in a cough that crackled in his chest. King winced at the sound and ran a comforting hand down his arm. “It’s okay. Just relax.”
Beside them, Blue made an unhappy noise, shifting restlessly in his sleep, almost an objection—he nearly seemed to be pained at the sound of Orange’s discomfort. King shushed them both, working to replace the cloths. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”
Orange coughed again, jerking against the bed. He groaned, and after a moment or two his strange, verdant eyes drifted open—still muddled, but seemingly a little more coherent. He squinted up at the room, his expression laced with discomfort.
Relief flooded King’s chest at the sight of the kid’s eyes open. He brought a hand to Orange’s shoulder. “Hey, kiddo,” he whispered, mindful of the other little one in the room. “Can you hear me?”
Orange didn’t respond for a moment, but eventually hummed a vague noise. He tensed again, suddenly, whimpering, and King froze, all that concern rushing right back. “Hey—hey. Are you in pain? What hurts?”
Orange closed his eyes again, his breathing uneven. He made no answer that the older could discern.
“Are you sore?” King pressed gently into his closest bicep and Orange groaned again, shifting weakly beneath his touch. “Oh—yeah, kid. I’m sorry. This is common for the flu.”
After a moment of deliberation King reached down to strip the cloths from his chest and stomach. “Just take deep breaths. We’ve got to get you some water, and some more painkillers to help you sleep. You’re gonna be okay.”
With the compresses removed he slipped his hand beneath Orange’s back and coaxed him gently up to sit, as slow as he could manage. Orange whimpered again and pressed his shoulder to King’s chest, curling minutely into the fabric of his sweater. King froze at the contact—so warm, so close…
“Shh,” he found himself soothing. “Just a little to drink, and then you can go back to sleep.”
It took a bit of effort, but King managed to get the kid maneuvered around enough to have him sip at the water and swallow the pills. He did so without complaint, though he was so clearly out of it that King wasn’t sure if he fully registered what was going on.
“Do you think you can manage some food?” King asked, regardless, once he had set the bottle aside. He watched the kid sidelong through his sweaty mop of hair. Orange made a quiet noise, which King took as a negative; he moved to shift him back down to the mattress when he heard the noise again, and again, the small body stiffening sporadically against him, and King realized with a stab of dread that Orange had started to cry.
“Hey, hey—it’s all right,” King crooned, an unnameable emotion surging up in his chest. He ran his fingers soothingly along the blazing skin of the kid's arm. “Oh, kid, it’s all right, you don’t have to cry…”
But Orange was too far gone to be comforted. His eyes glimmered with overflowing tears, bright and green and delirious, as he gasped for air between sobs.
The kid broke, and King felt his heart break along with him. “Oh, sweetheart,” he whispered, pulling the little one more fully to his chest, wrapping him up in his arms. “I know. I know you don’t feel good. But it’s going to get better, I promise. Just breathe…”
Holding the wrist still; feeling the displacement of bone. Feeling his son’s frame shaking against him. “It’s okay, sweetheart—you’re going to be okay. The doctors will make it better. Just breathe…”
Orange trembled, his burning face pressed into the crook of King’s neck. He wheezed out a breath, sobbing and miserable—
“Shh,” King soothed, rubbing circles between the kid’s shoulder blades. He lifted his free hand to cup the back of his head, burying his fingers into his hair. “It’s okay. I’ve got you, kiddo. I’m right here with you.”
He wasn’t sure how long he stayed there, holding Orange gently as the sobbing continued. Time didn’t matter; only that he sat there, and that he stayed with the kid. King threaded his fingers through the curls at the nape of his neck, whispering soft things until he felt the ragged breaths along his collarbone smooth out into a steadier rhythm. Orange's connection with the waking world seemed to fade, slowly, and he lapsed back into an uneasy doze. His fever-hot body went limp against King’s chest; King held him a while longer than that.
The kid’s eyes were closed, and stayed that way, as King lowered him back to the bed. He scarcely reacted as King rearranged the cloths against his chest and face. “Get some rest, kiddo,” murmured King, sweeping back the kid’s bangs with the pad of his thumb. “Let the medicine work. It’s going to be okay.”
…
King looked up at the sound of shifting from across the room to find Blue sitting up on his bed. The kid’s face was pale; his hair was disheveled, sticking to his neck and cheeks in sweaty clumps. He hunched forward and wrapped his arms around his stomach.
“’m gonna throw up again,” he groaned.
King was on his feet in an instant, hurrying over to sit at his side. “Okay. Okay, kiddo.” He grabbed the bucket from beside the headboard and placed it into the little one’s lap.
Blue raised shaking hands to clutch at the rim, his chest rising and falling quickly, unevenly. King gathered up Blue’s hair with his free hand, pulling it gently away from his face.
“Breathe, kiddo,” King coaxed, his voice hardly a whisper. “Don’t fight it. Just take deep breaths, and let it happen.”
Blue shivered, his body taut and trembling. He fought for air, his face voiding of even more color as he curled around the bucket.
King shushed him, his heart hurting for the kid. “Just relax. You’ll feel better when it’s over. I promise.”
Blue whimpered, and King saw the muscles of his back spasm with a dry, warning heave. He murmured gentle nothings as kid struggled desperately against the waves of nausea almost visibly crawling up his throat. At length a thin whine broke off into a retch, and Blue jerked as his body rebelled completely against his wishes.
“Okay. Okay, sweetheart, that’s good. Get it all up.” King lifted his bangs gently from his eyes, still securing the majority of his hair at the base of his neck. He clearly didn’t have much left in his stomach, so his efforts were only minimally fruitful—mostly acid and bile, which King knew stung all the more.
The little one’s gasping devolved into sobs. King clicked his tongue in sympathy; he held him steady as the heaving continued, rubbing slow circles into his back—feeling the scars, sweaty scars, his skin too hot. His own gut knotted up at the sight of the tears streaking the kid’s face.
Animators, but they were both so sick…
He was glad the gang had reached out to Purple. To picture them trying to deal with this on their own…
What felt like ages later, the retching abated and Blue gasped for breath, leaning back and away into King’s touch. He pulled away from the bucket, shivering and panting, his face a mess. King reassured him quietly and moved to clean him up—dabbing his chin with a cloth, giving him water. “There you go—it’s over, kid, it’s done. Feeling any better?”
Blue hummed, the sound vague and distant. All of his energy seemed to have leached away; he remained mostly unresponsive as King tended to him, lying back down in a miserable sprawl by King’s guidance. The older paused a moment to brush back his hair again, pressing a careful touch to his face. Still warm. “You did so well. Now you can get some rest.”
“Mmm…”
King pulled up the thermometer again, wiping it off with a cloth, and stuck it carefully into Blue’s ear. 102.7, it read after a moment. King worried his lip in his teeth as he set the device away, pulling up another towel to dampen and drape under the kid’s fringe. “Shh, kiddo,” he breathed at the little one’s quiet groan of protest, his flushed face contorting at the contact with the cold. “It’s all right. Just get some rest.”
Blue mumbled, the words unintelligible. He shifted uncomfortably and wrapped his arms around his stomach again.
…
“Kid, I’m sorry, but I’m going to need you to take these,” King whispered, rueful. He rattled the cup of ice chips softly.
Blue groaned, blinking blearily up at him, his face screwing up at the prospect of putting anything into his stomach. Sweat still beaded his forehead, but he looked marginally more comfortable—enough to have dozed off for a little while, anyway.
“I know,” said King. “I know. But between the fever and the vomiting, you’ve lost a lot of fluids. We need to keep you from getting dehydrated.”
Green and Yellow had the idea of cutting up ice blocks, which King gladly accepted from Purple a few minutes after Blue had gone to sleep. King had checked the time then, too—approaching 8:00pm. They’d been there nearly all day.
“Mmm,” Blue hummed at length, seemingly resigning to his fate. He shifted a little and raised a shaky hand to accept the cup.
“That’s it, slowly,” King encouraged, helping him up to sit. Blue lifted the rim to his lips and sipped at a couple of frozen slivers.
King sat with him patiently through it, then accepted the partially-empty glass when Blue handed it back to him as a wordless indication that he couldn't take any more. He set the ice chips aside and helped Blue shift back down into a curled position on the bed, burrowing into the blankets with a miserable noise. His hair flopped unceremoniously in a knotted shroud across his face.
King sighed. By the looks of it, they had a long night ahead of them.