A/N: To celebrate the first flu of the autumn. Yay!

Dedicated to all of you who have already caught it. If you need some more granny-style tips how to get rid of it, you are very welcome to ask in your review. Please forgive me my not-so-perfect English!

It had rained all week. Well, two in fact. Cold, heavy October rain, that soaked through every layer of clothing and flied horizontally in the howling wind. The bladers had stayed indoors, training in the WBBA building, but after too many collapsed walls and broken windows Ryo had forbidden it. All the others had yielded, but not Kyoya. He wanted to train, so train he would, despite the rain and cold. On the very next day he had told Benkei they'd go to a demolition site at the other end of the city where they wouldn't destroy anything too valuable. At first his friend had tried to protest, but the Lion had been immovable. If he could win his natural antipathy towards rain, his comrades could do the same.

So they went, they trained and – got wet. Benkei had found his old rainrock, but noticed it had somehow shrunken in his closet. Besides, as Kyoya had said, raingarments were for toddlers. And have you ever tried to beyblade with an umbrella?

The next morning Kyoya woke up with cold toes, sore throat and runny nose.

Madoka was full of motherly concern when she found him at Ryo's office, sniffing every fifth second. She insisted him to drink hot blackcurrant juice, spiked with several herb-drops she had brought from her home. The smell of them made the others move to another room.

"I don't need any medicine! I'm not ill!" The Lion protested. Yuu had stayed nearby to see how the argument would end.

"Then why are you sniffing all the time? Are you tracking down something?"

"Shut up, kid!"

"I think it really needs a Kyoya to swallow that stuff down. No normal person could have the courage to do it." Tsubasa remarked. He had came back to prevent his "li'l bro" to get into trouble. Kyoya threw a suspicious glance towards him, took the mug and emptied it in one breath.

"You happy now?", he grunted to Madoka and returned the mug on the table with a pang.

"Not until you dress like a sensible person. It's only couple of degrees above zero outdoors."

She handed him a cape and a pair of woolen socks.

"I know you wouldn't accept a sweater, but I want you to wear at least these until you feel better. You should wear the socks all night, my grandma says it's the best way to..."

The Lion had vanished from the room.

Despite the remedies, the next day he was worse.

"I'm not ill!", he insisted doggedly, a feverish glow in his eyes. Madoka wasn't convinced.

"Let's take your temperature, then." Nobody knew why she happened to have a thermometer in her bag that day, but everyone could guess. Also Kyoya.

"Don't you even think about that!"

"If you won't let me take your temperature, I'll tell Gingka never to battle with you again."

Kyoya's thoughts were not proper to say aloud, at least when womenfolks was present (well, with one exception). But he knew the cute mechanic had twisted the poor Pegasos blader round her little finger so tight her threat was a serious one. She neared him with an odd-looking device in her hand.

"Turn your ear towards me and sit still. This will not hurt."

"Turn my what?!"

"Your ear." She answered patiently. "This device is planned for babies, but it works as well for grown up people. I borrowed it from my neighbour, she has three toddlers."

Kyoya swallowed his pride and sat still. In fact, he didn't feel very well. His head ached and he felt both too hot and freezing at the same time.

"39,2! You shouldn't have got up your bed at all! I call Ryo and he'll drive you home at once."

Busily she picked up her cell-phone and called to their boss. Kyoya didn't care. He knew there were moments when it was best to let her do what she wanted and not to interfere. While waiting Ryo's appearing, she made him to drink one more mug of the same stuff he had drunk the day before, despite his mild protest. When finally at home, he just fell on his bed, wanting to forget how to be alive for awhile.

On the third morning the flu was disappeared, taking the fever with it. Or maybe the fever had killed all the flu-gems and taken them where they belonged. (You can imagine what kind of place it is. I won't describe it here, this story is rated only K+.)

Kyoya jumped from his bed and into his clothes. He packed the cape and the socks in a bag to return them to Madoka as soon as possible, not to be polite or grateful to her, but to get rid of them. He was just running out of the door when his cell-phone rang, with Benkei's name on the screen. He lifted the phone to his ear.

"..."

"Hello? Kyoya-pal, are you there? Hello? I can't hear you."

"...!"

"Kyoya, there's something wrong with the lines, I can't hear anything. I'll call you later."

"...! !"

(beep-beep-beep)

Kyoya shut the phone and lifted his hand to his throat. What was wrong with him? He didn't feel a bit sick anymore, but when he tried to speak he couldn't make a sound. With haste he taped a message.

""Can't speak, c u at headq.""

He must find that darned mechanic immediately!

""What have your poisons done to me?! !""

Madoka had about ten seconds to think over the mysterious message before the Lion himself stormed into the room, his face red of rage and running.

"Kyoya, what's going on? You shouldn't run like that when you're ill!"

Kyoya snatched the first piece of paper he saw (it happened to be the contract with a TV channel for the next competition) and a pencil.

""I'm not ill, why can't I speak? ! ?""

Madoka stared at him and thought the Lion had totally gone insane. "Really, I must check that list of possible side effects of those herbal drops more carefully!", she thought.

"What do you mean?", she asked cautiously.

""My voice is gone ! ! !""

Madoka shook her head.

"Sit down."

If there had been anybody in the room, he would have seen a rare sight: the furious Lion sat meekly down, opened his mouth, let his temperature taken, and did everything his nurse asked him to do, so obedient it would have been worrying if there hadn't been the rage in his eyes.

"It seems you are perfectly well", she finally said. "You just have to be quiet for a couple of days. If that doesn't help, you must go to a doctor."

A furious glance told her that that was not going to happen too soon.

When the others heard about the situation, they didn't find it so very awkward after all. Kyoya had never been much of a talker, so if he uttered a couple of words more or less a day, it didn't make so much difference. The biggest change they noticed was when he got angry, which didn't take long after Yuu's arrival.

To the little boy the situation was extremely interesting. A lion who couldn't roar, that was something you didn't meet every day! He sat on the corner of a table, swaying his legs and looking the sullen beast with cheerful curiosity.

"Yo-yo, can't you really utter a single sound?"

"...! ! !"

"Not even a whisper? Or hissing? I'd like to know what kind of sounds you can do, if you really try?"

Nurse Madoka came to defend her patient.

"Yuu, stop teasing him! He shouldn't try to say anything. Being quiet is the best way to help his throat heal and rest."

The kid sat a moment in silence.

"Maybe he should write some of his most used expressions on paper cards and show them every time he wants to say something? There aren't so many of them anyway. If it was Gingka, he'd need a whole card deck, but for Yo-yo five cards would be enough. You know, words like "Yes", "No", "Thanks", oh, but he never uses that word anyway, "Whatever", "Grunt", "Snort",..."

It was obvious the even though the Lion wasn't able to roar, he still was able to leap. Before Yuu had time even to whine, he was grabbed by his collar and thrown on top of a high – and unsteady – cupboard. Madoka was horrified.

"Kyoya, help him down at once! He'll hurt himself if he falls from there!"

The pencil scratched rapidly.

""He quiet – he fine.""

Madoka run out of the room to get somebody to help.

After a couple of minutes she returned with Tsubasa, who lifted the considerably shaken Libra blader down.

"There's nothing we can do to your voice but wait", he said to Kyoya. "But for today's meeting you should write down the things you think most important so I can read them aloud there."

Kyoya had to be content with that. He knew he could trust the Eagle to be his ally, but it was most exasperating not to be able to defend his opinions by himself.

The following days Kyoya spent mostly by himself.

The meeting had been more successful than he had thought, Tsubasa speaking for both of them. Only twice he had had to bang his fist on the table to make his opinion clear. By and by he noticed there was also advantages in muteness: Nobody didn't expect him to talk, and the few questions they asked him were formed so that he needed but nod or glare. All in all, things could have been much worse, and he was in no hurry to get his voice back anymore.

After a week or something he was sitting on the sofa in Madoka's workshop. The mechanic was doing a quick fix to Leone after a very muddy training in pouring rain (again).

"You catch your death of cold someday if you won't dress like sensible people when going out in the rain!", she scolded him. "I can fix Leone to prevent the permanent damages, but I can't fix you if you get seriously ill. Is your voice any better now?"

Kyoya shrugged and took more comfortable position on the sofa. There was an interesting article in the magazine, and he didn't want to be disturbed by any more questions. Madoka shook her head.

"Really, you should go to a doctor to check your throat."

"Why only the throat? What if the problem is in his ears? Or between them?"

Yuu had materialized in the room, just the distance out of Kyoya's reach, and ready to fly any moment. For once they hadn't heard him from the street. Maybe he had noticed the Lion had lately created a habit to disappear every time he heard his yellow haired nuisance nearing.

This time Kyoya didn't disappear. On he contrary, he made himself very, very noticeable. The roar he uttered made the windows rattle and the birds on the roof fly in panic. Yuu shrieked and tumbled to the other end of the room. Kyoya returned to his comfortable position and continued reading.

"Kyoya, there's nothing wrong with your voice anymore!", Madoka shouted.

"Did I say there was?", he muttered.

Yuu collected himself from the floor and slipped out with kind of shaky legs.

"Kyoya, you are a..." Madoka lifted her hands in despair.

Couple of days later Tsubasa complained that every time he tried to ask Yuu to do something he didn't like, the little rascal pretended he didn't hear because his ears were still ringing.