Noceur
(n.) one who stays up late
An Alex Rider Future Fanfiction
A/N: Writing this in between my studies! Please show some appreciation and review.
Disclaimer: I no own anything.
His phone rang and the young man, who was biting onto his red pen while he flipped the answer sheet and script at the same time, muttered a curse for the disruption and took a good look at the time.
01:37 AM
He shook his head and he knew, immediately, who called at such an ungodly hour (even if it was stated "Private Number" on his caller ID).
"Hey."
"What?" He grumbled.
"Where are you?"
"Home."
"What are you doing?"
"Marking."
"Sounds fun."
"Yeah, doesn't it?" He smashed his teeth together and spoke, "Why not you, for once, try to help me mark these papers?"
"Well," There was a minute silence, "I did once before, didn't I? When you were having that hangover?"
"Uh-huh."
"And I marked your scripts!" The man on the other line laughed, albeit sounding forced (He dismissed the fact, pointing it to late night delusions, for the other man on the line would never sound forced).
"Yes, totally," He rolled his eyes, "only you would call 'giving-an-A-for-every-girl-and-F-for-every-boy' marking!" Tom whispered exasperatedly, giving a glance at his dog who was sleeping on his bed.
"Well, I tried, didn't I, Tom?"
"Yes, and failed." Tom shook his head before setting his phone down on his desk and continued marking his papers.
"Tom?"
"What, you're still there?"
There was silence. In that silence, Tom Harris heard deep breathing from the other line. He put his pencil down (for marking with red pens seem to entail the students to incoming blood baths) and picked up his phone, switching it to 'headset' mode.
"Alex?"
"Yeah?" Alex sounded hoarse suddenly.
"Why did you call?" Tom asked, feeling worry bubbling up his chest.
"I jus' wan'ed to.."
"Are you drunk?"
"Wha'? No-no-no-no…"
Deep coughs. Heavy breathing.
"You're slurring." Tom stated the fact. In fact, he asked the question being utterly sure that Alex Rider was not drunk. Tom gets drunk with 3 shots while Alex… He downed at least a dozen before he started saying he felt 'light-headed'—not that Tom was ever conscious to vouch for Alex's tale.
"'mm not dru'k."
Heavy breathing.
"Where are you?" Tom stood up quickly, startling his beagle. He strode over to the nightstand and picked up his coat. He asked once more, "Are you at your house?"
There was silence.
"Alex?" Tom whispered, fear creeping into his voice.
"Ahh…"
"Oi, dude, where are you?"
"Wh'n you use 'dud'', you pr'ck."
"When do you ever slur, Al?"
Tom was getting impatient. Alex was definitely in trouble. Bad trouble, nonetheless. Is he injured? Is he being tortured? Was he tortured and he escaped? Is he escaping?
"Al?" Tom probed hesitantly.
There was silence again and even the ever-so-damn-patient Mr. Harris was getting impatient. He motioned to his beagle – Cucumber—to stay where she was and grabbed his keys. As he turned the key in the lock, a kind-of-static sound rang through the silent house.
"Al!"
"Th—no need t' sh'ut."
"What's happening? Do I need to call an ambulance?"
"No…"
And that was when Tom finally opened his door.
He was met with the sight of one spy, childhood friend, drinking buddy, soldier.
Alex Rider.
"What the f—! Al!" Tom threw his coat, phone and keys on the floor, startling Cucumber, who started barking at the top of her lungs.
"Shut up, Cu!" Tom kicked (softly) his beagle back into the house, because for God's sake, it is fucking 2a.m in the morning and no one will want to be woken up by a dog's bark.
Tom crouched down and hesitantly reached out to Alex's face. He touched the clammy and cold skin of his friend's and softly raised his friend's chin upwards.
"Can you walk or do I have to drag you?"
The other seemed to struggle with his words as his mouth tried opening and his eyes tried to open.
"Well, guess I'm dragging you in, then."
As much as Tom would have liked to drag the other in, he did not know whether Alex was at the doorstep, sitting dejectedly on the ground, because he had drunk so much he forgot his house address, or that he is feeling sad for whatever reason, or worse, that he is injured in some weird and unorthodox way that Tom's sharp eyes cannot discern at the moment.
Untrue to his words, Tom heaved and pulled the blonde man to his feet, where both of them stumbled, and started to take painful small steps into the house. Tom noted, that Alex was leaning heavily against him and that his breathing was laboured. Perspiration rolled down his face and his skin was unnaturally cold. Finally, the two man reached the sofa where Tom, uncharacteristically lowered the other man gently into the couch of cushions. Tom quickly doubled over to the door where he slammed the door shut with the twist of the key and the lock.
He hurried back to Alex and shook him slightly on the shoulder as he lowered himself down to face Alex's face.
Tom was worried. He could see that Alex was exhausted and whatever he was doing did not do well to him. Alex's eyes were sunken and eye bags marred the area under his eyes. His complexion, though tanned, was rather pale compared to his heathy tone. Clammy skin met clammy skin when Tom reached forward to brush away the perspiration beads that were lining the other's forehead.
"Hey… I don't swing that way…"
Tom chuckled at Alex's feeble attempt to joke before turning serious.
"Your forehead is burning up here and I want to know what is happening!" Tom almost yelled and noticed Alex's wince, "Like excuse me, Mr. I-know-my-best-friend-is-probably-marking-papers-so-i-should-show-up-without-notice-half-dead, you look horrible."
"I know. I feel it too."
There was a pregnant pause and both of them stared into the painting that covered the wall.
"Do you have water?"
Tom's eyebrow rose and wanted to reply with some snarky remark—'so you treat this like a hotel and I'm your maid, huh'—but went against it and simply sighed before muttering "hold on".
He proffered the cup to Alex—his own personal cup because he is often here than at his own flat—but Alex shook his head and asked Tom to do something he really wanted to do.
"Pour it on me."
Tom took pride in giving Alex the best-ever-wake-up call by moving back into the station to get some ice.
Alex relished in the ice cool water that now streamed down his body while his shirt clung onto his well-toned body.
Ah, like I ever will have that type of body.
"Stop staring—you'll turn gay."
"Pfft! For you? Don't make me laugh."
"Who'd you rather do it for, anyway?"
"No one. Not interested in the same gender."
"Ah…"
Another pregnant pause. Alex had his eyes closed and his breathing was laboured once again.
Damn! I thought he was getting better!
"The irony seems to be that you have yet to get laid, huh?"
"Fuck you, Alex. Whether I get laid or not, does not concern you."
"Uh-uh. I don't swing that way." Alex turned slightly and out of Tom's peripheral vision, he saw a feeble wink. "And anyway, of course it concerns me."
"Uh-huh…" Tom rolled his eyes.
"I saw that." Tom rolled his eyes.
"I felt that."
Tom was getting slightly irritated. It was a good (Tom checked his watch) 3AM in the morning and his first lesson starts at 8AM.
"I'm going back to mark my papers since you refuse to tell me what is happening-" Tom stood up and stalked towards his room—"so goodnight."
There was no reply and the only sounds was the light snores from the couch.
/
"FUCK!" Tom shouted before throwing off his covers and making his way to the bathroom. He glanced at the time again and decided to forgo the morning showers. By the time he was finished, he still have a solid 45 minutes to before his first lesson starts.
The only problem was: It takes him 50 minutes to get to the school.
"This is not funny… What the shit!"
Tom yelled when he saw a lump of blankets on the couch and a brown furry solid on top of it.
"Damn it, Cucumber! What did you-!"
The entire 2 hour fiasco in the wee hours came rushing into him and he scowled.
"I… Argh! Fuck you, Alex."
Tom grabbed a piece of cold plain bread from the fridge and was about the close the door when he heard Alex speak.
"I told you, you'll turn gay for me."
{2}
Tom was completely annoyed: he was about to enter la-la land and the incessant ringing stopped him. He was all for ignoring the stupid call and jump into the bed and cover himself, but his conscience stopped him. After all, he was pretty sure that it was Alex calling.
He slid out of his comfortable bed and grabbed the phone.
"Hello, Mc-delivery. How may I help you?"
"Can—can you come—co—come over?"
Three things happened at once: Tom grabbed his coat that was lying on the floor; Cucumber was kicked out of the way (who barked at the 'abuse'); Tom tripped over his school bag.
"Ow…" Tom nursed his butt and got off the floor, trying to search for his phone that had left his hand a few seconds ago.
"What's wrong?" Tom asked, as he struggled with the door. (Cucumber was still barking, and Tom really wanted to give his beagle a sleeping pill… Like can you please not bark like you are super excited…)
"Just—come quickly." The call ended with a soft beep and Tom hurriedly rushed down to his car.
/
It took Tom 45 minutes to get to Alex's flat. It took him another 5 minutes to get pass the security ("Hey kiddo, do you have a pass?" "No…but my friend called me here…" "Who's that? I'm sorry though, kiddo, if you don't have a pass, I'll need to call the resident down."… "Is this fine though?" "Ah, if you had the resident automatic card, you should have said so!") and another 5 minutes to pick the second lock Alex had on his door (because he is so damn paranoid).
"Al, where are you?" Tom threw his coat onto the couch before he heard the sounds of the toilet flushing.
He strode over to the toilet door and knocked, "Al?"
"Ye—yeah?" A weak voice sounded from the other side of door.
"Are you ok?" Tom asked worriedly before glancing at his phone. His eyes widened fractionally in alarm when he saw the time.
04:43 AM
God damn this friend.
When there was no reply, Tom's knuckled rasped on the thin wooden door again, "Hey!"
"Wh—what…" Again, that weak reply.
"I'm asking whether you're alright."
"Define 'alright'."
"Alright, that's it, I'm coming in." Tom turned the knob easily, because he started picking the lock the moment Alex did not reply the first question.
Holy shit.
Even that's an understatement.
The wrenched, sour smell of vomit wafted into Tom's nose and he almost gagged.
"What the shi—!"
"Ah, that sounds like apt description…" Alex replied, voice hoarse from the vomiting.
Tom made a disgusted face before looking into the toilet bowl, spotting the vomit which was coagulated with blood, and flushed it. He thanked the gods that he had been working out, despite becoming a full-time teacher and lifted the well-toned Alex up easily. Tom could feel the waves of heat rolling off the pale man and Tom half-dragged the spy into his own bedroom (which Tom still has disgust over as they was absolutely no personal flavour in it).
He dumped the spy unceremoniously onto his own bed and dragged the fallen covers over the perspiring man.
"You look like shit."
Alex gave a weak smile (which said a lot about how Alex was exactly feeling) and closed his eyes; lips thinned into a grimace.
Tom reached over and felt his forehead: Fever.
"Did you get a cold?"
Alex opened his eyes, "No…"
"Did you get poisoned like the last time?" Tom asked again, preparing a cold flannel as he re-entered the room.
"Huh… No…"
"Then?" Tom raised his eyebrows, while squeezing dry the flannel and placing it on the other's forehead.
"Food poisoning."
Tom glanced at Alex again before chuckling, as he placed the next two flannels under the underarms of the sickly man.
"That's so ironic. How does the spy, who was ever so paranoid, gets poisoned?"
Alex gave a weak squirm when he felt Tom's feather-like hands brush past his groin area as Tom placed two cool flannels there.
"Hate it when you place the flannels down there; aren't you supposed to ask me to do it myself or something?"
Tom's eyebrows raised again while he set the timer to countdown 5 minutes, "Don't be silly. We've seen everything of each other. In any case, you did it to me the last time as well; this is simply revenge."
"Huh… revenge on a sick man… evil evil."
"You did that the last time too." Tom stated before scrolling through his Instagram.
4 minutes was up when Alex suddenly bolted up, running naked into the toilet. It would have been extremely funny if Alex was not sick (although Tom did chuckle a lot before following the man to the toilet).
Tom saw the other man wrapping around the porcelain toilet bowl as he thrusted his head down again, heaving as the contents in his stomach were spilled. He dry-heaved again. When Alex thought he was done, his stomach had obviously disagreed when it cramped up and he thrusted again into the toilet.
Tom placed a soothing palm on the back of Alex as he rubbed the other man's back in circles.
After a few weak coughs and splutters, a few tears and heaves, Alex slumped. However, his legs were too weak and his knees buckled. Tom was quick, thank the bloody gods, and he caught Alex before a concussion was added into the list. Tom quickly wiped the sick man's face with a face cloth and helped him to spit out all the disgusting taste he had in his mouth.
Not caring whether Alex could walk, Tom lifted the other man with a fireman's lift, taking care of his head and quickly placed Alex onto his own bed.
"Th—thanks."
Tom sighed as he wet the flannels again and placed them onto the same spots as before.
Just then, his phone rang and he saw the time (Oh shit… it's 6AM), "Hello?"
"Tom Harris. Where are you?"
"I'm taking an off day, is that ok?"
"No? Of course not! You have class later at… (some weird sounds) and there's no substitute teachers!"
"Ah, then make it happen."
"No! You know I can't just make it happen!"
"Thanks, darling."
Tom hung the call and gave another glance to his sickly friend, "how did you even get sick, huh…" Tom sighed as he removed all the flannels, feeling for the fever again. Satisfied that his forehead was no longer as hot as previously, he helped the sleeping man into his pullover and berms.
"My stomach lining is still healing from the poison…"
Tom was startled and almost dropped Alex. Alex gave a weak smile, "And when I eat the oily food in the fast food restaurants…"
Tom sighed before tucking the man into bed and started combing Alex's hair.
"Rider, please stop getting into these situations."
"I know you still love me…"
"Go to sleep, you prick."
The sounds that was left were the soft snores from Alex, mixed with soft wheezes.
And Tom was okay with it, because he knew that the day Alex did not need will be the day Alex dies.
And he knew, Alex would do the same for him.
Fin.