[fic] Simple Things 15
Title: Simple Things 15
Rating: 16
Pairings: 39, 58
Genre: horror
Warnings: cannibalism is discussed, vampirism is in effect
Summary: People want simple things. Sanzo wants his efforts recognised. Goku wants a home. Hakkai wants his friends to clean up after themselves. Gojyo wants beer.
Author notes: This fic is sponsored by Twilight, enabled by moshesque and eyesofshinigami, and also sister (gee_nekoi), for keeping Twilight and sparkly vampires in my head by talking about them. XD For the record, this fic is a sparkle-free zone.
Most of the vampire lore in this fic (extra row of fangs, hidden in the tissue above maxillary teeth, beheading, the fact that they are not technically dead) I stole from Supernatural.
Heh, I was on a roll last night. I wrote upwards of four thousand words! ^_____^ The fic had now officially broken 50k, so yay me! <3
LVII.
Up until the moment Goku collapsed on the bathroom floor, gasping for breath, Pip was having a good time. Sure, the party was lame, but Goku was his usual sweet self, so in worst-case scenario, they would have gone to see a movie.
Now having fun was the very last thing in her mind. Crap, Pip thought, listening to the voice of the dispatcher on the other side of the line. “Is he conscious?” the lady asked.
“No.”
“Is he breathing?” Pip summoned all her brainpower to kneel next to Goku and bend her head to his mouth. Her eyes were drawn to the tiles on the floor - they were so bright, embossed with tiny circles. Pip fought a surprised giggle and then remembered this was not what she was supposed to be doing. She focused on the feel of air against her cheek.
“He’s breathing,” she said, weak with relief. “But not much.”
“The ambulance is on its way,” the woman said. “They should be arriving soon. Stay calm.”
Easy for her to say, Pip thought, snapping the phone closed. She wasn’t sitting on the floor next to an unconscious friend in a bathroom that smelled of vomit and urine. But whatever other thoughts flitted through her mind as she sat on the floor, holding on for dear life, vanished in an instant when Zakuro opened the door and admitted paramedics inside.
“His pulse is slow,” said one of the guys in an orange jacket, looking at his watch. “Miss, what exactly happened?”
“He had a drink,” Pip said. “Vodka and orange juice.” She turned to Zakuro, searching for confirmation. He nodded. “He said he was hot, went for the bathroom and started throwing up.”
“Did he complain of abdominal pains?”
“No, it was all very quick,” Pip said, surprising herself with the calmness with which she could talk. “He did grab his stomach though.”
“Give me epinephrine,” the first paramedic said. He pushed Goku’s sleeve up his arm and pushed the needle of the syringe into the muscle. The other guy fitted an oxygen mask onto Goku’s face. “Let’s move.”
As they loaded Goku onto the stretcher, Pip had the presence of mind to grab his wallet from the pocket of his trousers. Figures Goku would have a girlie wallet. It wasn’t pink, but it did have Hello Kitty on it. He probably thought it was cute, with the little ridges the fabric left on the print of the white blob with a ribbon on its ear. “I’m going too,” Pip called to Zakuro, grabbing her shirt and following the paramedics. “Sorry ‘bout the mess in the bathroom.” Well, she wasn’t but she had a suspicion Goku would be mortified when he found out.
“You coming, Miss?” the paramedic asked, snapping the gurney into place on the floor of the ambulance.
“Yes,” she said, grabbing his rough hand and hefting herself in after Goku.
“You needn’t worry too much, Miss,” said the other paramedic, slapping the glass separating them from the driver. “You friend will be fine. Looks like he has a bad allergy, but the good news is that it’s not fatal. He’s breathing on his own.”
“Allergy? That’s impossible, I’ve been drinking with him before.”
“He didn’t drink much, then?” the guy asked, holding a mask over Goku’s face.
“Don’t think he is. I had the same thing and I’m fine.” Pip examined the inside of her head. “I’m hardly buzzed at all.”
“It’s probably an allergy. Try and get in contact with his family. Maybe they’d know something.” The problem with the advice was of course that Goku had no family. He must have an emergency contact number though. Pip cursed Goku for not owning a mobile phone. First thing after I’m out of the hospital, she told herself, I’m buying the idiot a mobile. She snooped through Goku’s wallet and found a clue in the form of a laminated piece of paper. ICE - Gojyo Sha, 44 607 33 45 87. With shaking fingers she punched the number and waited out the dial tone.
“What?” a gruff voice asked, with the implication the call is unwelcome and should be disconnected as soon as this becomes apparent. Pip persisted. She wasn’t going to let some guy ruin her mood, which was fantastic despite the circumstances.
“Hi, I’m Pip- Piper McGee. I’m friends with Goku.”
“And?” the voice said, though there was the suggestion she had moved up in the speaker’s estimation from useless to “depends on what is said next.”
Pip considered her words. “We’re on the way to a hospital now.” The voice on the other side of the line quieted. Pip wasn’t sure if she heard breathing. “Goku’s unconscious, we don’t know what happened, do you know if he’s allergic or-”
“Which hospital?”
“Which hospital?” Pip asked the paramedics. She repeated the name into the receiver. All she got in return was the beep of a connection being severed. “Well, that went well.” Some help this guy was.
They arrived at the hospital in a flurry of siren and rapidly closing doors. Pip jumped out of the back as the paramedics wheeled Goku out the ambulance and into the emergency room. “What happened?” a doctor asked, undoing Goku’s shirt and pressing the resonator of the stethoscope to his chest.
“I don’t know,” she said, shaking her head. She was better now. The alcohol must have kicked in because her head was swimming and she felt light, so weightless she could fly. “We were at a party, our friend from college threw it to celebrate the end of tests, I guess. It’s something to celebrate, you know. Goku got a drink and started throwing up and then he fainted.”
“What was in the drink?” the doctor asked, his fingertips against Goku’s neck. Pip panicked, but the doctor nodded to himself, satisfied. “His throat is swollen, fortunately the airway is not obstructed.”
“We gave him epinephrine,” the paramedic said. “He was breathing on his own when we got there.”
“Good. Thank you. What was in the drink?”
“Vodka, orange juice,” Pip said and repeated what she’d already told the paramedics. “I had the same thing.”
“Are you feeling okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine!”
“You took something,” said a voice. Pip recognised the gruffness even before she started turning. When she did, she found her jaw dragging on the floor. The guy was bloody gorgeous! All pale and blond and dark-eyed… Her heart bounced in her chest, though he barely looked at her. His attention was focused on Goku, prone on the stretcher. “How is he?”
“Who are you?”
“I’m his significant other,” Sanzo said.
Damn, Pip thought. Figures. She wondered briefly why was he the one who answered the phone, when the name on the card was Gojyo, but that was a mystery for another day.
“He’s safe now. He was lucky you called the ambulance when you did,” the doctor told Pip. Sanzo measured her with a glare and Pip felt grudging thankfulness directed her way. “We’re going to keep him overnight observation, but he should be fine.” He turned towards a nurse, who’d appeared to wheel Goku out of the corridor and into a room. “Start an IV, give him diphenhydramine.”
“Thank God,” Pip muttered.
“I find it very odd he doesn’t have an allergy plan though. Has this happened before?”
“No,” Sanzo said. “He’s not allergic to anything.”
“I have solid evidence to the contrary,” the doctor retorted.
“She took something. Might be the same thing.”
“What? I didn’t take anything!”
“You have pupils the sizes of small moons,” Sanzo growled, grabbing Pip’s chin and turning it towards the burning light.
“Ouch!”
The doctor took her hand. “You pulse is very fast. How do you feel?”
“I’m fine!”
“Are you happy?”
Pip blinked. Then blinked again. “Yeah, I guess. Why wouldn’t I be happy?” she asked, then remembered Goku, unconscious on the stretcher. There was a reason right there. For the first time she felt something like fear. Why wasn’t she upset? Why wasn’t she scared?
“Have you ever taken ecstasy pills?” the doctor asked.
“No!”
“Are you sure?”
“I only had one drink, we’d only just arrived, it was ten minutes, tops.”
“You were at a party. Did you make the drinks yourself?”
“No, I…” Pip closed her eyes and swayed. She was hot all of sudden. “Zak brought them. Excuse me.” She had Zak on speed dial under five. Very useful guy when it came to getting discount computer parts. Not so much, as it was turning out, for spending a party without an unscheduled high.
It took five rings for Zakuro to pick up and when he finally did there was the noise of a party in full swing in the background. “Zak, you son of a bitch,” Pip growled into the phone. “Did you put something in the drinks?”
“I wouldn’t!”
“I don’t care if you would! Did you? We’re in a damn hospital, dickhead, Goku’s unconscious. Did you slip any pills into our drink?”
There was a moment of silence. “I just wanted to get you two to relax! You know how Goku is, too much of a dork to have fun at a party! Shit, he barely drinks!”
“Fuck you, dickhead! He could die!” Pip disconnected and considered throwing the phone against the wall. It was kinda greenish, the colour Zak favoured when it came to hair dye, it might serve as sufficient substitute. Her hands shook when she abandoned the idea and put the phone back in her pocket. She raised her gaze to find Sanzo and the doctor staring at her, the first unreadable the second with some sympathy.
“I don’t mean to speak up in defence of administering drugs to unaware people, but MDMA allergies are very rare. Your friend was just unlucky.” The doctor moved to fetch a form. “Can someone fill this in for me?”
LVIII.
Goku woke to a grey light and an unfamiliar ceiling. He ached all over and had the vague notion that his life was pointless and painful.
“How are you feeling?” a cheerful voice asked. Goku turned his head. Why was there a nurse by his bed? “You had a severe reaction to a pill,” she said, checking something by the bed. It went beep at her touch. Goku took it to mean he was still alive. “You’re just fine, so don’t worry. The doctor will be coming in a short while.”
“Can I go?”
“Wait for the doctor. You’ve been unconscious until now.”
Goku nodded, then reviewed the conversation. “Wait, what pill?”
“Ecstasy,” said a doctor walking in through the door. “The host thought you needed some help with having fun, that’s what your girl friend said.”
“Pip is here?” Goku sat up on the bed, panicked. “Is she okay? She drunk the same thing, is she here too? Can I see her?”
“Relax. She is perfectly fine. No, she is not here, your significant other sent her home to get some sleep. They had a loud argument about it in the middle of the night. Actually, I’d appreciate you telling him to go away, he’s been scaring away people with broken limbs.”
“She’s really okay? Sanzo’s here?”
“I didn’t ask what he was called, he scares me,” the doctor confessed checking his clipboard. “Good news for you. I’d like you to stay for a couple more hours, so send your scary boyfriend away, but tell him to come back with some clothes and he can take you home.”
“Really?”
“You suffered an anaphylactic shock from consuming MDMA pills - Ecstasy in other words. I take it you don’t make this a habit?”
“I didn’t take no pills,” Goku insisted. “I swear I didn’t!”
“Relax. We already know you weren’t aware you took them. Your friend put them in your drink. That was very incautious of you, by the way,” the doctor said, stern for the first time, “to accept a drink you haven’t seen prepared.”
Goku said nothing. He wouldn’t have figured this applied to parties at friends’ place. He stared at the covers and his hands, strangely pale in the early morning light. When he looked up again the doctor had migrated to the other side of the bed, in an attempt to get away from Sanzo, who appeared out of nowhere. “Are you okay?” he asked and Goku looked away.
“Yeah. Can I go now?”
“No. Couple more hours, just to make sure you are fine, and you,” the doctor turned to Sanzo, “will go and fetch Mr Son some clean clothes.” Sanzo glared at the doctor, but nodded. He left the room without a word, to the doctor’s relief.
“No offence, but he is very disturbing. Now, Mr Son, I’ll give you a prescription for a dose of epinephrine, just in case, but it will be for emergencies only. You don’t have any other allergies?” Goku shook his head. “Very well then. Don’t do drugs, and you ought to be fine.”
Goku kept nodding. He wanted out. Hospitals made his skin crawl. At least this was better than the last time he woke in a sterile environment. At least this time there wasn’t a squad of doctors to inform him his loved ones had been killed in a car accident that he’d survived with nary a scratch.
He wanted to go home. Goku wrapped his arms around his knees and didn’t move until Sanzo showed up, carrying a bundle of clothes. Goku looked away as he dressed, starting when Sanzo laid a hand on his back. “I wanna go home,” Goku said. “Let’s go home.”
LIX.
Goku slept through Sunday, waking up only to eat soup Hakkai brought up for him and have a quick shower. He called Pip on Monday morning to let her know he wasn’t coming in, and yes, he was feeling just fine, but Sanzo was being overprotective and dicky, more than usual, so he was staying to prove he could go through the day without fainting. Goku growled and complained and finally yelled, but Sanzo wouldn’t budge.
“Fuck you,” Goku said at last. “Fine, I’m staying put today, but I swear you get in my way tomorrow, I’m gonna tie you up and stuff your mouth full of garlic.”
“It won’t stop me.”
“I’m gonna try all the same,” Goku grumbled, but couldn’t quite conceal the pleasant tickle in the depths of his belly. Sanzo was a dick, he’d have to buy himself a puppy on a string to kick if it were to be any more obvious, but the fervent concern was flattering.
Goku had nothing but nice things to say about the third cousin who’d looked after him after his parents died. He was a great guy, but he had his own family to care about and he wasn’t a mother hen to begin with. They were both relieved when Goku turned eighteen and proved to be capable of paying his own bills. Goku’s parents were lovely people, and Goku never once doubted their love for him, but they were from the same school of familial relations as the cousin. So long as there was health and general contentment, no one interfered. The feeling of being at the centre of someone’s attention was new and exciting, and on the whole Goku was certain he wouldn’t get tired of it any time soon. At the same time, though, it drove him up the wall.
As if sensing Goku’s discomfort (which they probably did, though Goku preferred not to dwell on it), on Monday Gojyo and Hakkai came up to visit, on the basis that Sanzo deemed the stairs unsafe for allergic people to take.
“I’m beginning to think you have some sort of immortality thing going for you,” Gojyo said. He sprawled on the couch, taking up more space than a single body should. “You live through two vampire attacks, a vampire getaway, and anaphylactic shock.”
“It wasn’t shock.” Hakkai handed Goku a cup of tea. “It was just anaphylaxis.”
“Whatever.” The werewolf waved his hand in the air and sipped the tea. “The point is, dude, you are all kinds of special. If NHS didn’t kill you, nothing will.”
“Sure don’t feel like it.”
“Cheer up, will you?”
But Goku couldn’t. Sanzo was mad, though he sat in the chair, unmoving, giving no outward sign he was anything other than perfectly calm. Goku could feel the fury boiling under the surface, and he had no idea how to defuse it. He had not forgotten how dangerous Sanzo was, how bad his temper was. He wasn’t scared - not for himself, at any rate. Sanzo had been nothing but concerned about his well-being the past two days, so he wasn’t scared. He was worried.
“You are feeling okay, though?” Bless Hakkai and his unending concern.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“You realise that relapses can happen up to a week?”
“I’m fine!” Goku wondered how he ever thought mother-henning was a good thing. He was fine. The allergy was a strange thing, but he was otherwise in perfect shape. He’d never had flu, for goodness sake. One allergy, especially one as obscure, was not going to kill him, not when there were three supernatural entities with teeth made for tearing through human flesh on his couch.
The computer beeped, signalling a new email and Goku gratefully leapt to answer it. Anything that got him out of Sanzo’s range was welcome at this point. He opened the mail program and frowned. It was Pip, writing to announce her arrival. What the hell?
“Hey, Pip’s coming to visit. Ya all mind clearing out?”
“You’ve got a girl visiting you? I’ve got the feeling we’d better stay and see to it that Sanzo doesn’t hurt her.”
“We’ve met,” Sanzo said, crossing his arms. Goku gave him a surprised look, then remembered. He’d been unconscious for a couple of hours and Pip rode with him to the hospital.
“You’ve met the girl?”
“In the hospital, dimwit. She was with Goku at the party.”
“Right, right. Is she pretty?”
“She’s very cute,” Goku said, when Sanzo made no comment.
“Does she have a nice rack?”
“Yes.” Too late Goku realised this wasn’t the right comment to make in front of a jealous boyfriend. Sanzo paid no attention, thank God, unlike Gojyo.
“Is she nice?”
“Yes, why?”
“So let me get this straight, you’ve got a girl that’s nice, cute and I’m assuming with half a brain, if she’s in your classes, and you hang around the winning combo of boring, blond and brooding?”
Goku looked up a little to late to see the beginning of the brawl. He only saw Hakkai pushing Sanzo and Gojyo apart. “Please don’t get blood on the couch,” Goku said. “I like to study on it.”
“I bet.” Gojyo leered, and Goku threw a cookie at his head.
Master Post :: Next Part
Rating: 16
Pairings: 39, 58
Genre: horror
Warnings: cannibalism is discussed, vampirism is in effect
Summary: People want simple things. Sanzo wants his efforts recognised. Goku wants a home. Hakkai wants his friends to clean up after themselves. Gojyo wants beer.
Author notes: This fic is sponsored by Twilight, enabled by moshesque and eyesofshinigami, and also sister (gee_nekoi), for keeping Twilight and sparkly vampires in my head by talking about them. XD For the record, this fic is a sparkle-free zone.
Most of the vampire lore in this fic (extra row of fangs, hidden in the tissue above maxillary teeth, beheading, the fact that they are not technically dead) I stole from Supernatural.
Heh, I was on a roll last night. I wrote upwards of four thousand words! ^_____^ The fic had now officially broken 50k, so yay me! <3
LVII.
Up until the moment Goku collapsed on the bathroom floor, gasping for breath, Pip was having a good time. Sure, the party was lame, but Goku was his usual sweet self, so in worst-case scenario, they would have gone to see a movie.
Now having fun was the very last thing in her mind. Crap, Pip thought, listening to the voice of the dispatcher on the other side of the line. “Is he conscious?” the lady asked.
“No.”
“Is he breathing?” Pip summoned all her brainpower to kneel next to Goku and bend her head to his mouth. Her eyes were drawn to the tiles on the floor - they were so bright, embossed with tiny circles. Pip fought a surprised giggle and then remembered this was not what she was supposed to be doing. She focused on the feel of air against her cheek.
“He’s breathing,” she said, weak with relief. “But not much.”
“The ambulance is on its way,” the woman said. “They should be arriving soon. Stay calm.”
Easy for her to say, Pip thought, snapping the phone closed. She wasn’t sitting on the floor next to an unconscious friend in a bathroom that smelled of vomit and urine. But whatever other thoughts flitted through her mind as she sat on the floor, holding on for dear life, vanished in an instant when Zakuro opened the door and admitted paramedics inside.
“His pulse is slow,” said one of the guys in an orange jacket, looking at his watch. “Miss, what exactly happened?”
“He had a drink,” Pip said. “Vodka and orange juice.” She turned to Zakuro, searching for confirmation. He nodded. “He said he was hot, went for the bathroom and started throwing up.”
“Did he complain of abdominal pains?”
“No, it was all very quick,” Pip said, surprising herself with the calmness with which she could talk. “He did grab his stomach though.”
“Give me epinephrine,” the first paramedic said. He pushed Goku’s sleeve up his arm and pushed the needle of the syringe into the muscle. The other guy fitted an oxygen mask onto Goku’s face. “Let’s move.”
As they loaded Goku onto the stretcher, Pip had the presence of mind to grab his wallet from the pocket of his trousers. Figures Goku would have a girlie wallet. It wasn’t pink, but it did have Hello Kitty on it. He probably thought it was cute, with the little ridges the fabric left on the print of the white blob with a ribbon on its ear. “I’m going too,” Pip called to Zakuro, grabbing her shirt and following the paramedics. “Sorry ‘bout the mess in the bathroom.” Well, she wasn’t but she had a suspicion Goku would be mortified when he found out.
“You coming, Miss?” the paramedic asked, snapping the gurney into place on the floor of the ambulance.
“Yes,” she said, grabbing his rough hand and hefting herself in after Goku.
“You needn’t worry too much, Miss,” said the other paramedic, slapping the glass separating them from the driver. “You friend will be fine. Looks like he has a bad allergy, but the good news is that it’s not fatal. He’s breathing on his own.”
“Allergy? That’s impossible, I’ve been drinking with him before.”
“He didn’t drink much, then?” the guy asked, holding a mask over Goku’s face.
“Don’t think he is. I had the same thing and I’m fine.” Pip examined the inside of her head. “I’m hardly buzzed at all.”
“It’s probably an allergy. Try and get in contact with his family. Maybe they’d know something.” The problem with the advice was of course that Goku had no family. He must have an emergency contact number though. Pip cursed Goku for not owning a mobile phone. First thing after I’m out of the hospital, she told herself, I’m buying the idiot a mobile. She snooped through Goku’s wallet and found a clue in the form of a laminated piece of paper. ICE - Gojyo Sha, 44 607 33 45 87. With shaking fingers she punched the number and waited out the dial tone.
“What?” a gruff voice asked, with the implication the call is unwelcome and should be disconnected as soon as this becomes apparent. Pip persisted. She wasn’t going to let some guy ruin her mood, which was fantastic despite the circumstances.
“Hi, I’m Pip- Piper McGee. I’m friends with Goku.”
“And?” the voice said, though there was the suggestion she had moved up in the speaker’s estimation from useless to “depends on what is said next.”
Pip considered her words. “We’re on the way to a hospital now.” The voice on the other side of the line quieted. Pip wasn’t sure if she heard breathing. “Goku’s unconscious, we don’t know what happened, do you know if he’s allergic or-”
“Which hospital?”
“Which hospital?” Pip asked the paramedics. She repeated the name into the receiver. All she got in return was the beep of a connection being severed. “Well, that went well.” Some help this guy was.
They arrived at the hospital in a flurry of siren and rapidly closing doors. Pip jumped out of the back as the paramedics wheeled Goku out the ambulance and into the emergency room. “What happened?” a doctor asked, undoing Goku’s shirt and pressing the resonator of the stethoscope to his chest.
“I don’t know,” she said, shaking her head. She was better now. The alcohol must have kicked in because her head was swimming and she felt light, so weightless she could fly. “We were at a party, our friend from college threw it to celebrate the end of tests, I guess. It’s something to celebrate, you know. Goku got a drink and started throwing up and then he fainted.”
“What was in the drink?” the doctor asked, his fingertips against Goku’s neck. Pip panicked, but the doctor nodded to himself, satisfied. “His throat is swollen, fortunately the airway is not obstructed.”
“We gave him epinephrine,” the paramedic said. “He was breathing on his own when we got there.”
“Good. Thank you. What was in the drink?”
“Vodka, orange juice,” Pip said and repeated what she’d already told the paramedics. “I had the same thing.”
“Are you feeling okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine!”
“You took something,” said a voice. Pip recognised the gruffness even before she started turning. When she did, she found her jaw dragging on the floor. The guy was bloody gorgeous! All pale and blond and dark-eyed… Her heart bounced in her chest, though he barely looked at her. His attention was focused on Goku, prone on the stretcher. “How is he?”
“Who are you?”
“I’m his significant other,” Sanzo said.
Damn, Pip thought. Figures. She wondered briefly why was he the one who answered the phone, when the name on the card was Gojyo, but that was a mystery for another day.
“He’s safe now. He was lucky you called the ambulance when you did,” the doctor told Pip. Sanzo measured her with a glare and Pip felt grudging thankfulness directed her way. “We’re going to keep him overnight observation, but he should be fine.” He turned towards a nurse, who’d appeared to wheel Goku out of the corridor and into a room. “Start an IV, give him diphenhydramine.”
“Thank God,” Pip muttered.
“I find it very odd he doesn’t have an allergy plan though. Has this happened before?”
“No,” Sanzo said. “He’s not allergic to anything.”
“I have solid evidence to the contrary,” the doctor retorted.
“She took something. Might be the same thing.”
“What? I didn’t take anything!”
“You have pupils the sizes of small moons,” Sanzo growled, grabbing Pip’s chin and turning it towards the burning light.
“Ouch!”
The doctor took her hand. “You pulse is very fast. How do you feel?”
“I’m fine!”
“Are you happy?”
Pip blinked. Then blinked again. “Yeah, I guess. Why wouldn’t I be happy?” she asked, then remembered Goku, unconscious on the stretcher. There was a reason right there. For the first time she felt something like fear. Why wasn’t she upset? Why wasn’t she scared?
“Have you ever taken ecstasy pills?” the doctor asked.
“No!”
“Are you sure?”
“I only had one drink, we’d only just arrived, it was ten minutes, tops.”
“You were at a party. Did you make the drinks yourself?”
“No, I…” Pip closed her eyes and swayed. She was hot all of sudden. “Zak brought them. Excuse me.” She had Zak on speed dial under five. Very useful guy when it came to getting discount computer parts. Not so much, as it was turning out, for spending a party without an unscheduled high.
It took five rings for Zakuro to pick up and when he finally did there was the noise of a party in full swing in the background. “Zak, you son of a bitch,” Pip growled into the phone. “Did you put something in the drinks?”
“I wouldn’t!”
“I don’t care if you would! Did you? We’re in a damn hospital, dickhead, Goku’s unconscious. Did you slip any pills into our drink?”
There was a moment of silence. “I just wanted to get you two to relax! You know how Goku is, too much of a dork to have fun at a party! Shit, he barely drinks!”
“Fuck you, dickhead! He could die!” Pip disconnected and considered throwing the phone against the wall. It was kinda greenish, the colour Zak favoured when it came to hair dye, it might serve as sufficient substitute. Her hands shook when she abandoned the idea and put the phone back in her pocket. She raised her gaze to find Sanzo and the doctor staring at her, the first unreadable the second with some sympathy.
“I don’t mean to speak up in defence of administering drugs to unaware people, but MDMA allergies are very rare. Your friend was just unlucky.” The doctor moved to fetch a form. “Can someone fill this in for me?”
LVIII.
Goku woke to a grey light and an unfamiliar ceiling. He ached all over and had the vague notion that his life was pointless and painful.
“How are you feeling?” a cheerful voice asked. Goku turned his head. Why was there a nurse by his bed? “You had a severe reaction to a pill,” she said, checking something by the bed. It went beep at her touch. Goku took it to mean he was still alive. “You’re just fine, so don’t worry. The doctor will be coming in a short while.”
“Can I go?”
“Wait for the doctor. You’ve been unconscious until now.”
Goku nodded, then reviewed the conversation. “Wait, what pill?”
“Ecstasy,” said a doctor walking in through the door. “The host thought you needed some help with having fun, that’s what your girl friend said.”
“Pip is here?” Goku sat up on the bed, panicked. “Is she okay? She drunk the same thing, is she here too? Can I see her?”
“Relax. She is perfectly fine. No, she is not here, your significant other sent her home to get some sleep. They had a loud argument about it in the middle of the night. Actually, I’d appreciate you telling him to go away, he’s been scaring away people with broken limbs.”
“She’s really okay? Sanzo’s here?”
“I didn’t ask what he was called, he scares me,” the doctor confessed checking his clipboard. “Good news for you. I’d like you to stay for a couple more hours, so send your scary boyfriend away, but tell him to come back with some clothes and he can take you home.”
“Really?”
“You suffered an anaphylactic shock from consuming MDMA pills - Ecstasy in other words. I take it you don’t make this a habit?”
“I didn’t take no pills,” Goku insisted. “I swear I didn’t!”
“Relax. We already know you weren’t aware you took them. Your friend put them in your drink. That was very incautious of you, by the way,” the doctor said, stern for the first time, “to accept a drink you haven’t seen prepared.”
Goku said nothing. He wouldn’t have figured this applied to parties at friends’ place. He stared at the covers and his hands, strangely pale in the early morning light. When he looked up again the doctor had migrated to the other side of the bed, in an attempt to get away from Sanzo, who appeared out of nowhere. “Are you okay?” he asked and Goku looked away.
“Yeah. Can I go now?”
“No. Couple more hours, just to make sure you are fine, and you,” the doctor turned to Sanzo, “will go and fetch Mr Son some clean clothes.” Sanzo glared at the doctor, but nodded. He left the room without a word, to the doctor’s relief.
“No offence, but he is very disturbing. Now, Mr Son, I’ll give you a prescription for a dose of epinephrine, just in case, but it will be for emergencies only. You don’t have any other allergies?” Goku shook his head. “Very well then. Don’t do drugs, and you ought to be fine.”
Goku kept nodding. He wanted out. Hospitals made his skin crawl. At least this was better than the last time he woke in a sterile environment. At least this time there wasn’t a squad of doctors to inform him his loved ones had been killed in a car accident that he’d survived with nary a scratch.
He wanted to go home. Goku wrapped his arms around his knees and didn’t move until Sanzo showed up, carrying a bundle of clothes. Goku looked away as he dressed, starting when Sanzo laid a hand on his back. “I wanna go home,” Goku said. “Let’s go home.”
LIX.
Goku slept through Sunday, waking up only to eat soup Hakkai brought up for him and have a quick shower. He called Pip on Monday morning to let her know he wasn’t coming in, and yes, he was feeling just fine, but Sanzo was being overprotective and dicky, more than usual, so he was staying to prove he could go through the day without fainting. Goku growled and complained and finally yelled, but Sanzo wouldn’t budge.
“Fuck you,” Goku said at last. “Fine, I’m staying put today, but I swear you get in my way tomorrow, I’m gonna tie you up and stuff your mouth full of garlic.”
“It won’t stop me.”
“I’m gonna try all the same,” Goku grumbled, but couldn’t quite conceal the pleasant tickle in the depths of his belly. Sanzo was a dick, he’d have to buy himself a puppy on a string to kick if it were to be any more obvious, but the fervent concern was flattering.
Goku had nothing but nice things to say about the third cousin who’d looked after him after his parents died. He was a great guy, but he had his own family to care about and he wasn’t a mother hen to begin with. They were both relieved when Goku turned eighteen and proved to be capable of paying his own bills. Goku’s parents were lovely people, and Goku never once doubted their love for him, but they were from the same school of familial relations as the cousin. So long as there was health and general contentment, no one interfered. The feeling of being at the centre of someone’s attention was new and exciting, and on the whole Goku was certain he wouldn’t get tired of it any time soon. At the same time, though, it drove him up the wall.
As if sensing Goku’s discomfort (which they probably did, though Goku preferred not to dwell on it), on Monday Gojyo and Hakkai came up to visit, on the basis that Sanzo deemed the stairs unsafe for allergic people to take.
“I’m beginning to think you have some sort of immortality thing going for you,” Gojyo said. He sprawled on the couch, taking up more space than a single body should. “You live through two vampire attacks, a vampire getaway, and anaphylactic shock.”
“It wasn’t shock.” Hakkai handed Goku a cup of tea. “It was just anaphylaxis.”
“Whatever.” The werewolf waved his hand in the air and sipped the tea. “The point is, dude, you are all kinds of special. If NHS didn’t kill you, nothing will.”
“Sure don’t feel like it.”
“Cheer up, will you?”
But Goku couldn’t. Sanzo was mad, though he sat in the chair, unmoving, giving no outward sign he was anything other than perfectly calm. Goku could feel the fury boiling under the surface, and he had no idea how to defuse it. He had not forgotten how dangerous Sanzo was, how bad his temper was. He wasn’t scared - not for himself, at any rate. Sanzo had been nothing but concerned about his well-being the past two days, so he wasn’t scared. He was worried.
“You are feeling okay, though?” Bless Hakkai and his unending concern.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“You realise that relapses can happen up to a week?”
“I’m fine!” Goku wondered how he ever thought mother-henning was a good thing. He was fine. The allergy was a strange thing, but he was otherwise in perfect shape. He’d never had flu, for goodness sake. One allergy, especially one as obscure, was not going to kill him, not when there were three supernatural entities with teeth made for tearing through human flesh on his couch.
The computer beeped, signalling a new email and Goku gratefully leapt to answer it. Anything that got him out of Sanzo’s range was welcome at this point. He opened the mail program and frowned. It was Pip, writing to announce her arrival. What the hell?
“Hey, Pip’s coming to visit. Ya all mind clearing out?”
“You’ve got a girl visiting you? I’ve got the feeling we’d better stay and see to it that Sanzo doesn’t hurt her.”
“We’ve met,” Sanzo said, crossing his arms. Goku gave him a surprised look, then remembered. He’d been unconscious for a couple of hours and Pip rode with him to the hospital.
“You’ve met the girl?”
“In the hospital, dimwit. She was with Goku at the party.”
“Right, right. Is she pretty?”
“She’s very cute,” Goku said, when Sanzo made no comment.
“Does she have a nice rack?”
“Yes.” Too late Goku realised this wasn’t the right comment to make in front of a jealous boyfriend. Sanzo paid no attention, thank God, unlike Gojyo.
“Is she nice?”
“Yes, why?”
“So let me get this straight, you’ve got a girl that’s nice, cute and I’m assuming with half a brain, if she’s in your classes, and you hang around the winning combo of boring, blond and brooding?”
Goku looked up a little to late to see the beginning of the brawl. He only saw Hakkai pushing Sanzo and Gojyo apart. “Please don’t get blood on the couch,” Goku said. “I like to study on it.”
“I bet.” Gojyo leered, and Goku threw a cookie at his head.
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