When Max regained his senses, his eyes were shut and his body was being shaken violently. As he came to, he feared the worst.
"Max!" Sam yelled. "Max, wake up! Max!"
Max's eyes opened to see Sam hovering over him in his bed. His clothes were normal, but Max was not fooled. Sam pressed something wet and cold onto his forehead as Max's eyes darted around and his right hand felt around for his luger.
"It's alright, little pal," Sam said calmly. "You were just…"
"STAY THE $*& AWAY FROM ME, YOU PERVERT!" Max's sore voice screamed as he hopped up and pulled his gun in front of Sam's face letting the washcloth fall onto the bed. "I don't want to have to do this, but I will if you give me no other choice. Now, bring Lorne in here and let me finish him off before I have to do the same to you!"
"Max, what in the hell are you talking about?!" Sam yelled back as he straightened himself up on the bed. "What's gotten into you?! You're not still mad about earlier. Are you?!"
"Don't come any closer, you brainwashed zombie!" Max yelled as his whole aching body shook with fear. "I know what you've done to me and I won't let you do it anymore! Try to kiss me again and you're dead!"
"Cool it, Max."
"Stay back!"
Sam fell on top of Max to wrestle the gun away from him. It was easier said than done, but after less than a minute, Sam was sitting on top of Max's legs and held his arms down while Max was thrashing about and screaming with everything he had left in his horrified frenzy.
"I DON'T WANT TO KISS YOU, DUMBASS!" Sam yelled in his face to be sure he got the message.
"What?" Max asked quietly in confusion while Sam got off him and sat up again. "You don't?"
"Of course not," Sam said. "Why the hell would I want to kiss you?"
"But before, weren't you trying to make the moves on me?" Max said noticing suddenly that his head was aching again.
"I'm not sure what you're talking about, little buddy," Sam said pulling a tray of soup up from the floor. "But the doctor said that since you've gone all day without throwing up again, you needed to try to eat. I made you some chicken noodle soup. It's the thin stuff, so it shouldn't be too hard on your stomach."
"But Lorne brainwashed you!" Max said.
"What?"
"It's true. I woke up and I was all better so I went to the kitchen to see you but you were dressed like Dr. Frank-n-furter and all you wanted to do was go all the way with me so I used my telekinetic powers on you to try to break your legs but it didn't work so I took the car and ran away…gulp…"
Sam had taken the opportunity to put a spoonful of soup into Max's mouth since it was open. Max simply swallowed the food and continued as if nothing had happened. He didn't even care that Sam had snuck another pill onto the spoon.
"I used my telekinetic powers to fly the car in the air and called all our enemies but none of them had any clue about what I was talking about then the cops showed up in a helicopter and I threw tear gas at them and tried all my other weapons but it turned into rainbows and other magical, happy crap and they let me go…gulp…I flew the car all the way to Geek's lab and she looked like an anime character and was losing her genius IQ…gulp…I figured out that it was Lorne's fault and that I was the Mary Sue with unlimited power to do anything I wanted like create tears through time and space because he had stolen the Geek's reality-changing machine and changed everything to make the world resemble a bad fan fic…gulp…We went over to his place to kick his ass and I stopped time and tried to shoot him with all the guns I found in a tear I made but it turns out that he made it so guns didn't work and he changed everything else to try to make us more popular with the general public…gulp…so while the Geek tried to fix the machine I gave a badass speech about the value of being true to yourself and then fought him with my mystic powers and it was amazing…gulp…I used my portal gun and earthbending and airbending and my Devil's fruit stretching abilities and my Persona to beat him up…"
"Why didn't you just stop time again and use your telekinesis to break his neck?" Sam asked while filling the spoon with soup.
"I don't know," Max replied before Sam stuffed another spoonful of soup into his mouth. "But it turned out that Lorne had superpowers, too…gulp…He used waterbending to heal himself and bloodbending on me and the Geek while I was distracted talking to her…gulp…Then Lorne used chi-blocking so I was paralyzed and couldn't use my powers and a mind-scrambling kiss to make the Geek his girlfriend and then he opened a tear and brought you in so that you could…romance me into making me your gay lover…gulp…You leaned in to kiss me and I passed out before you could actually do it and now I'm here…gulp…Don't you remember any of it? Where's Lorne? Did the Geek change the machine back…gulp…?"
Sam used his hand that wasn't holding the spoon and placed it on Max's forehead.
"Your fever is starting to go down," Sam said. "Finally."
"What?" Max asked pulling the hand off.
"Little buddy, I hate to break it to you, but none of that happened. Lorne is in a mental institution, the Geek is her normal self, the machine doesn't exist, you don't have any more superpowers and have not left the house since this morning, and I would rather lock lips with the corpse of Bette Davis. At least, I know where that's been."
"So, you're saying that it was all a nightmare?"
"Yep, I came in here to check on you and you were yelling in your sleep. You have clearly been the victim of a nasty fever dream caused by a combination of your high fever and your insomnia."
Max sat there frozen for a second but then his normal psychotic smile returned to his face and he said, "Oh, thank God! I've never been so happy to know that I was experiencing a figment of my demented imagination. That was one of the worst dreams I've ever had…gulp…"
"Worse than the one where I become an elder god?" Sam asked while filling the spoon with soup again.
"I said one of the worst, not the worst…gulp… I mean some parts were alright, but at the beginning and especially at the end, everything went straight to hell. What is that stuck in my arm?"
Max just noticed the IV that was attached to his left arm.
"The Geek thought that you weren't getting enough fluids so in lieu of sending you to the hospital I authorized her to give you this IV of saline," Sam said.
"Oh," Max said before suddenly jumping off the bed and running to the bathroom pulling his IV behind him.
"Max, what's the matter?" Sam said as he got up and followed him.
"I have to go to the bathroom, nosy!" Max yelled before slamming the bathroom door in Sam's face.
Sam walked back across the room and sat back down on Max's bed. He noticed his Kindle sticking out from under the blankets and picked it up to look at it. Sam turned it on and found what Max was reading when he fell asleep as Max flushed the toilet.
"Wash your hands!" Sam yelled.
"Fine!" Max yelled back as he turned on the sink.
When he was done, Max opened the door, rode back to his bed on his IV pole, and sat down.
"I think I know what inspired your dream," Sam said showing the Kindle to Max.
"What?" Max asked looking at what he was showing him. "You mean your collection of bad fan fiction. I wondered what that was doing there."
"I keep a stash of it on my Kindle to read when I'm having trouble falling asleep. Usually, the writing is so absurd and boring that it knocks me right out. It looks like it had bad side effects on you, little pal."
"I guess so. That's the last time I read crack pairing stories while I'm trying to sleep."
"These fans can be so silly with all their preposterous pairings and relationships. It seems that they're so obsessed with sexual intercourse that they don't know how beautiful platonic friendship really is or any other relationship for that matter. It's no wonder they all struggle with loneliness."
"Yeah," Max said not annoyed for once at Sam's tangent. "If it's all the same to you, I would like to take a break from sleeping for a while."
"That is quite alright," Sam said pulling out a large bottle of water for Max to drink from. "You've been asleep since this morning and it is now the evening. Oh, that reminds me! I have a surprise for you!"
"What?" Max said taking the bottle of water from him. "Is this water actually vodka?"
"You don't even drink, dough head," Sam said while Max unscrewed the lid and started drinking. "I found a suspect for the case. Evidently, he's friends with the housekeeper who rearranged the commissioner's sock drawer. I haven't been able to get him to talk yet so…"
"FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, LET ME GO!" a distressed voice yelled from their den. "I'LL DO ANYTHING. JUST PLEASE DON'T LET THAT QUARANTINED RABBIT COME IN HERE!"
"You brought home a suspect for me?!" Max asked as he jumped up in joy.
"Yes," Sam said while Max's smile grew wider and wider and Sam pulled out a surgical mask and tied it around Max's head. "The man's a complete germaphobe, so I told him that if he didn't cooperate I would take him to my severely ill partner. Well, he wouldn't budge so I figured that since you couldn't leave the house to fight crime then we could fight crime from right here."
Max shed a few tears and surprisingly jumped into Sam's arms wrapping his arms around his neck in a big hug.
"Thank you so much! I'm sorry for being a jackass earlier," Max said unexpectedly. "You're the best friend I've ever had. I love you…platonically."
"You crack me up, little buddy," Sam said hugging him back.
The two let go of each other and Max said, "Now, just let me take off this IV."
"Leave it in," Sam said picking up the tray. "It makes you look more deathly ill and ravaged by your illness. It'll really scare the crap out of him. Besides, the bag is only half-empty and those things are expensive."
"Alright," Max said wrapping his blanket around his shoulders and picking up his water bottle as he prepared to get up. "So, what's the plan?"
"No, climb on my back," Sam said turning his back to Max. "It makes you look weaker."
Max climbed on and Sam opened the door and walked out with the tray in one hand and another hand around Max's IV.
"The plan is that if he doesn't answer my questions then you take off the mask and breathe on him," Sam said while Max was shaking in excited anticipation. "I'll go to the kitchen to drop off the tray and you can warm him up for me. I handcuffed him to the couch. You know what to do…Here, he is!"
"No!" the frightened suspect said. "Keep that sick creature away from me!"
"I'm not that sick," Max said before he started coughing extra dramatically.
"You won't catch what he has if you cooperate," Sam said while Max hopped off his back and leaned on the suspect affectionately. "Warm him up for me, Max. I'll be back as soon as I drop off the tray in the kitchen."