Title: Cold Warmth

Author: Tigris Lilium

Rating: K

Summary: Sometimes, all you need is a little bit more of something you don't want to help break the barriers. KanaSous.

Disclaimer: I do not own Full Metal Panic or any of its associated, only the idea of this story.

Kaname curled up on the couch, a cup of hot chocolate in her hands and a thick, heavy blanket over her shoulders. It was cold in her apartment. She was cold. She had a cold, and it was horrible. Her nose was red and stuffy, there were dark circles under her eyes and she looked overtly pale quite like her silk white bed sheets.

The movie wasn't particularly doing anything for her headache, but it was something she could do without really concentrating. She had already tried to read a book, but her eyes got fuzzy and she got dizzy. So instead, she plugged in a classic movie so that she could fall asleep to. The sound prevented it, but she didn't want to turn it off.

She sighed. She hated being sick, which largely had to do with missing school classes and the day-to-day mistakes of Sousuke. And she definitely didn't want to be sick around either of those problems. But for some reason, the flu hit her with a vengeance.

As much as she tried to, she tried to concentrate on her studies two days ago but come three o'clock at the afternoon bell, she felt ready to collapse and permanently fall asleep. She immediately went home, not wanted to wait for Sousuke and his discussion with the Student Senate, and immediately went to bed. It was then that sleep totally eluded her and she just laid there with a cold cloth over her forehead. It'd been like that ever since.

In times like these, she wished she had a family to take care of her.

She was watching some old American movie, translated into Japanese. She didn't particularly watch the mouths, especially due to the fact that neither aligned. It wasn't a problem because she wasn't particularly lucid either.

She couldn't taste the hot chocolate – which now had turned lukewarm – so she put it on the table in front of her and stretched out on the sofa. It was still cold. How was she supposed to get warm when she was so cold? And how was she supposed to get rid of the horrible aching in her stomach? How was she going to eat?

Kaname groaned. She hated colds and she didn't want it at all. And all it did was get increasingly worse.

Her eyes drifted closed as the sound drowned out behind her plugged ears. Sleep was coming. Finally.

"Miss Chidori…?" Unbidden and unwanted. Please don't wake me up. "You are still sick."

"Duh." She mumbled into her pillow. She was breathing heavily, simply due to the fact that she couldn't breathe through her nose. "What do you want Sousuke?"

He didn't answer for a while, so she had to make herself open her eyes. Her eyes were scratchy and dry, and most likely blood shot. She didn't want to chance looking in the mirror. In fact, she hadn't looked in the mirror since coming home two days ago. After she saw that reflection, she didn't want to see anything else. Most of all, she didn't want Sousuke to see her like this: at her complete weakest.

He was standing over her, well it seemed that way at least, with a bowl of something steaming in his hands, "I brought soup. Leiutenant Mao said the best way to inoculate influenza is to treat the patient with chicken soup."

"Oh geeze," This time she did bury her entire face into the pillow, "I'm not hungry. I just want to sleep."

"Miss Chidori, I recommend you eat the soup in order to get some of your energy up. Then you can go to sleep. Improvement on your immune system is imperative." He stood there, waiting. He wasn't going to move until she did as he said. So she sat up, took the soup and proceeded to eat it.

It didn't do anything for her besides making her nose run even more, and she couldn't taste it, which made the texture weird. It looked good though. So she polished it off. Okay, so the only reason she completely finished was because Sousuke was staring her down.

Once she was finished, she slouched on the couch and closed her eyes, "You can leave now, Sousuke."

He didn't.

"Why are you still here?" Her eyes were oddly heavy and she was feeling incredibly relaxed, "What was so special about the soup?"

He bent down and picked her up in his arms, "I put a sedative in the soup to help you sleep. You'll wake tomorrow refreshed." He said to her as he laid her down on the bed, underneath the silky white covers, which were magically pulled back and tidied. "Go to sleep. When you wake, you'll know where to find me."

Was that a little show of concern behind his carefully hidden eyes? "Sousuke, why are you doing this?"

"Just close your eyes." He said, with eyes averted from hers to look out the window. He then moved and closed the blinds so that it was incredibly dark in the room. Heaviness and exhaustion overtook her, mixed with medicine and sedative and her eyes drifted closed.

She quickly fell into the most comfortable sleep for the first time since getting sick and missed when Sousuke climbed behind her, put his arms around her and rested his eyes.

Ironically enough, a week later, he was in bed with the same flu bug as her.