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Hermann was ill. Not, like, the feeling-kind-of-terrible-after-a-hard-night partying-but-you-can-work-through-it kind of ill but the sitting-at-his-computer-for-thirty-minutes-with-his-head-in-his-hand kind of ill.
Normally, Newt wouldn’t notice that kind of thing. It wasn’t malicious, he just got kind of caught up in what he was doing and the fact that he and Hermann were now having ridiculously hot sex sometimes didn’t mean he didn’t still find dissecting Kaiju organs more exciting then looking at Hermann. Well, most of the time. Thing was, today kind of wasn’t going so well for him either so he kept getting distracted and he kept looking up and every time he did Hermann was sat right there. Not moving.
Something was definitely wrong.
Newt got of his stool and took the time to toss his gloves before making his way over the line to the clean half of the lab. As he got closer he realized that Hermann’s eyes were closed and, hey, he wasn’t reacting to the sound of Newt approaching with the appropriate demand for him to get back to his own half of the lab so it must be pretty bad.
“Hey,” he said, shoving at Hermann’s shoulder. Herman tilted dangerously for a second before catching himself, blinking blearily at Newt but not complaining or flailing so, yeah, major red flags. Newt took advantage of the other scientist's confusion to reach over and lay a hand on his head. He was burning up, hypothesis confirmed.
“Alright,” Newt said, stepping up and grabbing Hermann’s arm. Hermann made a token protest as Newt put Hermann’s arm around his shoulders and hauled him to his feet but it wasn’t exactly heart-felt. He must really be feeling bad.
“You need to sleep, man,” Newt said, pulling them towards the door. Manoeuvring a full-grown man wasn’t as easy as they made it look on TV but Hermann tried to help a little. He seemed to be coming more to himself as Newt pulled him about. Enough to grunt and start putting one foot in front of another anyway. “I don’t know why you even come into the lab when you’re like this. It’s not like you can get anything done and, dude, I know the world’s falling apart right now but the breach is still going to be open tomorrow. You can take a day. Catch up on some sleep, stop passing out on lab equipment.”
“I wasn’t passed out,” Hermann grumbled in protest and it was Newt’s turn to snort in disbelief because he so had been.
“Whatever, man. You’re just lucky I like you, even if you do sometimes try to hit me with your stick. You know most colleagues wouldn’t do this for each other. But, then, I guess we’re not exactly colleagues, are we?”
“Not exactly,” Hermann agreed, leaning into Newt a little more. Newt sighed and took the weight. Not exactly colleagues. He didn’t know what to call what they were. They weren’t friends, not really, though he kind of hoped they could be. They’d been nearly there when Pentecost had dumped the operation to end all operations on their desk and, well, tensions were kind of high right now.
So not colleagues, and not friends, but not boyfriend either because that would involve some kind of dating and they didn’t do anything like that. They did science, and then they collapsed, and then they did science again, and sometimes when things weren’t working or things were working really well or tension got too high they’d stand too close and then someone would touch and then there’d be a rush back to Hermann’s room (Hermann had refused to step foot in Newt’s room and it wasn’t even that messy) and clothes shed and Hermann was really kind of kinky when you got him focused. If Newt’d had to guess before this became a thing He'd have said Hermann was too stuck up to fuck properly but apparently he kept all his pomp in his sweater-vests and when they were gone, he was kind of wild.
So, yeah, they were not-friends and not-colleagues and sometimes there was sex, but a label like fuck-buddies didn’t seem right either because he’d been sharing real estate with Hermann for ten years now and nothing about them could be explained away that easily so he supposed really it WAS his job to drag Hermann’s sorry ass home when he was too ill to do it himself.
Not that he was going to admit that to Hermann.
Hermann’s living space wasn’t too far, one of the perks of having a crappy leg, and Newt dragged them both in, slamming the door behind him and dumping Hermann on the bed. Hermann groaned and rolled into himself which was kind of pitiful. Newt would normally make fun of him but today it just didn’t seem right. Instead he knelt down by the bed and grabbed Hermann’s feet, pulling of his shoes and his socks.
Hermann didn’t protest and that was...it was really kind of worrying. Not just in the way he’d known Hermann was sick but in a worse way because no matter how ill he was, Hermann normally protested to Newt shoving him around.
“Hey, Hermann,” Newt said, crawling up on the bed beside him. Hermann groaned and rolled away a little but Newt wasn’t going to let him escape. He reached over and rolled Hermann on to his back, leaning in over him. “You’re kind of worrying me here. You don’t need a doctor or something, do you?”
Technically they had a doctor. Technically. It was the kind of facility where people got hurt, after all. Thing was, in reality, medical supplies could sometimes be a bit hard to come by and funding only ran so far and that kind of shared their doctor with a clinic in the local area and, long story short, if you had some kind of illness between 1300 and 1700 Monday and Thursday there was a chance there’d be someone there who could maybe do something for you. Outside of that you were heading out into the city for help and today was Tuesday.
“I’m fine,” Hermann groaned. “It’s a virus, you’re being ridiculous.”
“Just worried about you,” Newt grumbled, shifting so Hermann could roll away from him again. “I don’t want anyone to come shouting at me if your ass turns up dead tomorrow.”
Hermann grunted and Newt shifted off the bed with a sigh. Hermann said he was fine so Newt probably didn’t need to get help, but Hermann was also probably lying because he didn’t exactly like admitting he needed help. Once Hermann’d broken his cane and insisted he was fine for days before accepting a little help to get down into the city to buy and new one and then he’d only agreed because Newt had made it sound like Hermann was doing him a favour.
Thinking of which.
“Hermann, I left your cane in the lab,” Newt said, poking at Hermann’s hip. Hermann grunted but didn’t move. “I’m going to go get it, don’t die while I’m gone.”
Still no response so Newt shrugged and let himself back out, tracing back up to the lab. The cane was lying on the floor down the side of the computer desk which was probably why he didn’t spot it before. He tended not to notice things until they were in front of him, he was kind of ridiculous like that.
He took a few minutes to sweep his side of the lab, putting his samples away and cleaning up. He knew Hermann thought he was disgusting but, really, he tried. Biological samples were kind of messy but he knew aseptic technique as well as the next person. It wasn’t like he wanted to contaminate his samples by rubbing them into the floor or anything.
Once he’d done cleaning he grabbed the cane and headed to his own room. It was abysmally clear he wasn’t going to get anything done today. Not with Hermann lying suffering. Even if Hermann was asleep and didn’t know he was suffering. Newt'd just have to stay the rest of the day and take care of him.
He grabbed his e-reader and mp3 player and an old t-shirt to sleep in. It was kind of weird, he’d never done this before. When he ended up in Hermann’s bed it was always kind of spontaneous, this was the first time he’d planned on being there. He debated a few seconds then grabbed his toothbrush too. Hermann was too ill to throw him out for being presumptuous, it was probably safe.
Back in Hermann’s room, Hermann hadn’t moved, but when Newt went over and climbed on the bed next to him he was breathing properly and he was still burning up but probably not any hotter than he had been before. Hermann shifted as Newt got on the bed and, well, since he’d woken him up anyway Newt slid an arm around him and pulled him into a sitting position.
“Just leave me alone,” Hermann groaned, making a weak attempt to push Newt away. “Let me die in peace.”
“Stop being a drama queen,” Newt grumbled. “If I let you sleep dressed like that you’ll castrate me in the morning. You need to take your jacket of at least.”
“I’m fine,” Hermann protested but Newt ignored him, tugging at the jacket and then negotiation the sweater vest off him. After that the shirt was easy and the undershirt. “You wear too many clothes, man,” he grumbled, dumping the lot off the side of the bed for now. Hermann made some kind of incoherent protest but he was hot and listing into Newt’s side, his head falling to rest on Newt’s shoulder and Newt couldn’t really protest that.
This kind of touching, to comfort, it wasn’t really something they did. Sometimes, after sex, Hermann would let him stay for a while, but that never seemed to last for long and, alright, maybe he wanted this a little. From Hermann.
It wasn’t bad to want whatever it was they were to involve cuddling. Lots of people cuddled. He’d suggest it if he wasn’t sure Hermann would laugh him off.
With a sigh he pushed Hermann out of the way so he could retrieve the other man’s pyjamas from his drawer. Because Hermann slept in honest to god pyjamas. Not an old t-shirt and underwear or sweat pants but blue stripped cotton pyjamas which he ironed creases into. It was kind of adorable.
Hermann protested a little when Newt put clothes back on him but Newt did it anyway. He’d only get complained at in the morning if he didn’t. Getting Hermann’s trousers off and the pyjama trousers on was a complete pain as Hermann had given up any pretence at cooperating now but he did it anyway because he was the best not-colleague in the world.
Hermann cooperated a little again to help Newt move him up the bed and get him settled then Newt stripped quickly and changed into sleep clothes. It was too early to sleep, yeah, but he was going to stay here and, well, there wasn’t really anywhere to go but the bed (and the desk chair but he wasn’t thinking about that) so he was going to be comfortable. He took a few minutes to hang Hermann’s jacket and put the rest of his discarded clothes in the wash and then crawled into bed, e-reader in hand.
He settled in on what he always kind of thought of as his side of the bed and, after a few minutes, Hermann apparently summoned the energy to roll over to face him, blinking up at him in a way that should have been ridiculous but was, right now, kind of endearing.
“Don’t you have work to do?” Hermann grumbled.
“Nah, today wasn’t working out so well for me either,” Newt said with a sigh. He reached down to thread his fingers through Hermann’s hair, which was damp with sweat and kind of disgusting but, well, maybe they were the kind of not-colleagues who could pet each other’s hair when they had fevers and look after each other. He’d like that. “Besides, don’t want you to die in your sleep.”
“Won’t,” Hermann protested, but his eyes were already closing and he obviously didn’t try too hard to fight sleep and make Newt leave.
Newt stayed just like that for quite a while, his e-reader forgotten and his fingers running through Hermann’s hair.
***
Newt woke up to someone moving, which was pretty weird for a second until he remembered Hermann and fevers and eventually drifting off to sleep in Hermann’s bed. He lay still, eyes closed, as Hermann shifted on his side of the bed. He must be better if he was getting up for the day, that was good.
He knew he should get up for the day too. Go out and face the world again but, well, couldn’t blame a guy for wanting to stay in bed a little longer, could you? Not when the sheet were still warm and Hermann was humming quietly to himself.
He let himself drift as Hermann showered, thinking about what to do with his day. He really should set up some sections of the liver sample he’d got, he’d never really had a Kaiju liver to study before. He thought it was a liver, anyway. It would make sense from where in the body it was meant to have come from but still. He had that segment of larynx still too, he should be sections on that to see if he could trace any viruses, upper respiratory tract was good for them. So far he'd found nothing which was less than perfect in the Kaiju, which was kind of awesome but it made biological warfare harder if you didn’t have any kind of bacteria or virus to act as a vector and he hadn’t found anything yet that’d interface with the Kaiju’s silicon-based biology.
Hermann came back intobthe room and Newt listened to him dress, still humming to himself as he did. It was strangely relaxing, therapeutic. Trousers on, undershirt on, shirt on, vest on, jacket. Hermann sat on the edge of the bed to put on his socks and shoes and Newt knew this would be a good time to ‘wake up’ but, well, he’d waited this long. He wanted to see what Hermann would do.
What Hermann did was sit there for a minute or so. Newt wished he could see what he was doing, could see the expression on his face as he apparently sat there and contemplated Newt in his bed. He was just about to give up and open his eyes when Hermann lent over, quickly, and placed a soft kiss on Newt’s forehead, whispering a thank you against his skin and pulling back.
A few second later Hermann woke him up properly by jabbing him in the leg with his stick, but Newt didn’t let it phase him. Hermann had said thank you.
Maybe the name for this thing they had was something like love.