Author's Notes: I've never had the chicken pox. But I don't envy people who have had them, at any rate. Also, thanks to the lovely Pointyears for touching this up and shining this little coal until it became a diamond. You're the best, dear.
"It is a curious thought, but it is only when you see people looking ridiculous that you realize just how much you love them." –Agatha Christie
"Why do I feel funny?" Dexter asks as soon as he comes back to reality, the words slurring together, the syllables feeling heavy on his tongue and lips.
"Probably because you're all drugged up," Freakazoid informs him, pulling the covers up under his chin.
"Oh," he says, and nods. "…Why am I drugged up?"
"To counteract the pain." Freak murmurs into the boy's hair. "Sort of like when your appendix got taken out."
Dexter frowns, nose wrinkled in confusion. Nothing makes sense. "If my appendix got taken out," the small geek wonders, "then where did it go?"
"It's okay," Freak soothes him, patting the top of his head like he's a child, or a Chihuahua. "It ran off with your left kidney and they eloped."
"Oh. That's sad," he says solemnly, face sobering up.
"And why is that?" The super hero questions him, trying to keep the boy's hands away from his face when they try to scratch, fingers encircling Dexter's wrists lightly, fingertips at his pulse points. "It was a great wedding, I'm sure, really romantic."
"It's sad because my right kidney must be really lonely now," he explains slowly, still frowning. "The poor guy."
"Oh no, don't worry about him," Freak reassures him. "He has your liver to keep him company."
"That's good," he agrees, instantly comforted, shifting on the bed a little so there's more room for Freak beside him. "I'd be worried otherwise."
"Because you have such a good heart," Freak tells him, grinning and kissing the tip of his nose.
Dexter scrunched his nose up with something approaching delirious indignation. "It hasn't failed me yet."
"It's not gonna, if I have anything to do with it, or I'll just have to go in and teach it a lesson." Freak chuckles, climbs onto the bed beside Dexter, nudging his arm so he can slip underneath it, curling up into his side. "So it had better treat you right. You hear that?" He taps Dexter's chest with a finger, as if beckoning the organ to listen.
"You better not break it, though," Dexter muses, softly, shifting closer when Freakazoid drapes a leg over his.
"Not gonna," Freak replies, a smile playing on his features.
It's a nice moment. Dexter realizes, through his ever so slightly delirious haze, that were they in a movie or a trashy romance novel they'd probably be kissing right now but there were More Important Issues to be worrying about. Like how he wanted to bathe in a sea of Benadryl cream.
"I'm itchy…" he whines, squirming in the bed, his knee jabbing into Freak's hip. The slight rasp of the sheets against his body just makes the itch worse.
"You poor baby," Freak says as he holds his face still, fingers splayed across Dexter's jaw and neck so he can place kisses on every red dot he can find. This is hard to do, though, seeing as there are so many of them, but Freakazoid is determined and Dexter likes the kisses. It works out.
"You missed a spot," Dexter mumbles shyly, pointing to a place on his cheek, somewhere close to his mouth. Freakazoid smirks.
"By golly, you're right," he amends, kissing where his smaller half pointed and leaving a few brief, light ones on his chapped lips, the only place unaffected. "How thoughtless of me."
"I don't think you're thoughtless," he says, daringly pulling Freak down to kiss back, wordlessly thanking him for the attention. "It was nice of you to take the day off from being a super hero for me."
"Ah, well," Freakazoid begins, and—is he blushing? Dexter grins. Freakazoid is blushing a darker shade of blue. "I wanted to play doctor."
Dexter licked the taste of his alter ego off his lips, instinctively. "How come I don't get to see you dressed up in a cute little nurse's outfit, then? Like, the candy stripes and all that, and a stethoscope and..."
"Doctor." His blush is replaced with a playfully mocking scowl. "I said doctor," he repeats for emphasis. "Not nurse."
"Right, yeah, of course," he says, blushing too like he didn't really mean to voice that thought out loud. He sinks lower into the bed, and his hand is slowly creeping back towards his neck (where the concentration of red dots seems the most severe), sneaky, as stealthily as he can manage, as if he thinks Freak's eyes won't detect the cautious movement.
"Stop it," Freak orders him instantly, smacking his hands away from his skin. "Tell me, Dexxy, how did you manage to not get chickenpox until now?"
"Pure skill," he says with a small grin. "But obviously not enough skill to keep me from getting it forever."
"Few are so skilled." Freak rewards him with a pitying look. "Don't be so hard on yourself."
He blinks. "I'm not." He blinks again. "It's not my fault. Steph gave it to me." His fingers are wiggling against his palm, trying so hard not to succumb to the urge to scratch like a maniac.
"Here." And Freakazoid takes Dexter's hands in his, and kisses his fingertips one by one, just because he knows he loves when he does this, and because Freak likes to. Dexter's hands are smaller than his—slim typist's fingers nimble and talented. They deserve the attention, and Freak is always careful to give them the affection they deserve. He nuzzles briefly into Dexter's palm before settling them back down. "If you're scratching in the Freakazone then you're scratching outside, too."
"Why can't I scratch?" he whines, and his hands twitch with the effort it takes to keep them in place.
"You can, I suppose," he replies offhandedly. "If you want to be scarred for the rest of your life, that is."
The hands still in a heartbeat, resting stationary at his sides. "...Why do they call it chickenpox?" Dexter suddenly wants to know, a big yawn stretching his face.
His yawn is contagious, as most are, and Freak finds his mouth opening as well. "Because you get it from being allergic to chickens."
Dexter thinks on this for a moment, rolling this over in his mind, before turning his calculating eyes to Freakazoid. "That is so not true."
"Oh it isn't, is it?" Freak challenges and raises an eyebrow that draws up his whole mask. "Why not?"
"Because I'm not allergic to chickens," Dexter states, sure of himself.
"That's what I thought too," Freak says, rubbing his foot against the comforter of his bed. "Until you got chickenpox. See, point proven."
Dexter decides it's not worth it to argue. He settles with a snort of protest, and then moves closer. "...I'm really sleepy," he tells his partner, nuzzling into the crook of his neck, where his throat meets his shoulder.
"The drugs must be kicking in full effect now," Freakazoid informs pretty much no one since Dexter is half asleep already. "Okay, hold on."
He mumbles a quick protest when Freak untangles himself from him to get off the bed, hand closing on air as he tries to grasp his super suit to keep the hero still.
"I'll be right back," Freak whispers and presses a kiss to his other half's cheek. Freak gets a blanket from the closet, mentally shutting down their joined mind, the Freakazone falling into a hushed sort of silence at his command.
Freak returns to Dexter's side and wraps the blanket around him, tucking it under his sides so all that can be seen is his head. "You look like a taco."
His eyes open to look at Freak, blinking quickly as they are met with darkness. "Thank you," he mumbles groggily, voice soft. "Would you like to share this taco shell with me?"
"But of course," Freak whispers back even though there's no need to and slides under the covers next to Dexter, arms wrapping around him almost instinctively.
"Mmm…" he mumbles, face buried half in Freak's shoulder and half in a pillow.
After a moment, Freakazoid brushes Dexter's hair away from his eyes even though they are closed and place a few kisses on his forehead, unable to stop because he really wants to kiss every sore spot of skin, wants to make his human feel better, because Freakazoid knows what being sick is like, he's had viruses before and it's not fun. But it can't possibly be similar to what Dexter is experiencing and he wants to make it stop.
"I love you, Freakazoid," Dexter sighs into the air, and the words aren't necessary because Freakazoid knows, but they like saying the words anyway no matter how obvious it is.
"Love you too," The blue hero confesses, stealing one last kiss that really won't be the last, only the last one until they wake up again. "And that's Dr. Freakazoid to you."