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I personally don't consider them 'sidekicks' but I still thought the prompt was cute.
-OZ-
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CRASH
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Malik
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There were very few things that frightened Altair. On this short list, right below dogs, and above fire, was illness. Not his own, he tended to heal at a surprising rate, and had yet to fall ill for more than two days with anything more severe than vomiting and explosions in his bowels. No, when Altair feared illness, it usually dealt with another person. More specifically, it dealt with Malik.
When Malik fell ill, which was rarely, it was a life threatening affair, centering around either his lungs or an injury he'd been too stubborn to have checked by a schooled healer, because he'd developed a fear of his own, and tended to panic a little when one came at him.
So, when Altair found the man curled in his bed shivering, he expected the worst.
For the next four days he sat by the other man's side, bathing his brow, neck and chest when his fever peaked, tucking blankets around him when he chilled. Spooning broth between his lips then cleaning up the mess when the man's stomach rejected it, trying again and again and again until he kept it down, feeding him bits of tonic from the healers in hopes that it would help. Washing him, changing the sheets, holding him when he became delirious and called to people who weren't in the room, conversed with the ghosts of those long dead…
On the afternoon of the fifth day, Malik's eyes opened to slits and he hissed out in a dry rasp of a voice, like stones grating together; "See? I told you I didn't need healers… I'm fine by myself."
And Altair just nodded and brushed the hair from his face as he slipped back into dreams.
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Leo
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Leonardo didn't get sick. Sick implied listlessness, implied foul moods and foul bodily excretions. And even when he wasn't feeling well, even when he was fevered, he was not listless, and although his mood may not be light, he was not bad tempered.
"You really should rest," Ezio was standing behind him, rubbing his back, trying to ease the tension radiating from the blonde in thick waves.
"I cannot… I have to finish the painting. It must be done tomorrow." His voice was muffled in his arms, where they were up, pillowing his head against his workbench.
"You're ill, amico." The back of Ezio's hand pressed lightly against his forehead. "The doctor said you were to be in bed."
He shook his head, the tail Ezio had tied his hair into flopping weakly across his shoulders. "It's just the flu… I'm fine."
"Oh, just the flu… Idiota, people die of this, please, PLEASE, Leonardo, go to bed."
"I feel fine."
"You feel as if you're on fire."
He lifted his head, propped his chin on his palm and stared out at the windows. "You seem to be more worried over my condition than I am."
"That is because you're not in your right mind!" He tugged impatiently on the artist's arm.
"Ezio, you cluck over me like a hen her chicks, I am not so ill as I cannot decided if I should be resting or working, now I have to finish that portrait before morning."
"Your mind is too heated, you're not thinking, you can't possibly concentrate in such a state… Please, Leonardo, go lie down. I beg you."
He grunted, dragged a bit of paper toward himself, plucked up a worn charcoal nub, and began sketching chickens.
"Leonardo—"
"If you keep pawing at me like that, Caro, I may be forced to drag you to bed with me… And I doubt having me on top of you is what the doctor meant by 'resting'."
"If it kept you there, I might be convinced."
He sighed, "You'll end up infected as well."
Ezio flinched backward a little.
"Ah, don't want that now do you… You might catch my dripping nose and fever, what a terrifying concept." He turned and looked up at him with a terribly serious expression on his face; "You could die from that, you know!"
After a moment of silence, Ezio spoke up again, scoffing; "I thought you had to finish your painting?"
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Shaun, Rebecca, and Lucy
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There were splatters of sick in the hallway, and gently, his brow and nose wrinkled up in apprehension, Desmond tiptoed around them. Then fearfully, he pushed open the bathroom door.
"The-uh- the girls finally got it under control… H-how are you doing?"
Shaun was in an awkward position, pants around his ankles, sitting on the toilet, while at the same time holding the bathroom wastebasket between his knees, his head leaned over it.
He was terribly pale, his cheeks flushed, sweat matting his hair and beading on his forehead.
Slowly, his head turned and he stared at Desmond as if the young man had sprouted horns and a pair of glittering fairy wings.
"Never again…"
Desmond gulped.
"I am never—" He dry heaved and caught his breath with a grunt. "Never e-eating your cooking again… In fa-huuur-nnnngh… In fact, if I ever catch you n-near the kitchen stove again… I'll kill you."
Desmond shifted nervously on his feet.
"I guess I should just throw out the leftovers then, huh?"
And with a gag Shaun smacked the door with an open palm and slammed it in the younger man's face.
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(Yes, people die of the flu every year, I'm not making light of that fact, Leo just wasn't that sick Ezio was blowing it out of proportion.)
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