Raven's eyes snapped open, the dark shadows of her room dancing in her vision.

Something was amiss.

She rolled over and peered at her alarm clock, blinking at the bright LEDs that stung at her retinas. It was two-thirty in the morning, far too early for her to actually be awake. With a groan, Raven sat up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Why'd she wake up? Did a teammate have a nightmare? Her emphatic walls dropped, and she searched the tower.

Robin? Asleep. Starfire? Sleeping, though with Robin again. Cyborg? Dull, so sleeping. Beast Boy? His aura's light shimmered with wakefulness, but something was off. It was paler, weaker, as though his aura was tempted to blink out for a bit. Troubled, Raven tossed aside her sheets and padded out of her room to find him.

She found him curled up around the toilet in the bathroom, shaking like a tree in a hurricane. Her emphatic eye was overloaded with Beast Boy's intense nausea, and Raven had to slam her wall closed. She leaned against the doorway for a moment, steadying herself as the sick feeling dissipated. "Beast Boy?" she asked, her voice rough with sleep. The changeling stirred at his name, but simply whimpered in response.

Raven stepped over to his side, leaning over to feel his forehead. His skin was like fire, burning hot and clammy to the touch. She sighed. Well, this wasn't good. She contemplated getting Cyborg, when Beast Boy lurched forward and gagged, though nothing came up. She wasn't sure how long he'd been sick, but apparently his stomach was empty. Absently, Raven rubbed his back and waited for the spell to end, before she phased into the kitchen to grab a cup of water. She returned and knelt beside the sick shapeshifter, and nudged him.

"Drink."

Slowly, Beast Boy took a few sips. She tried to get him to drink more, but he refused, whimpering again. Raven sighed. He couldn't stay here. For one thing, his current position looked incredibly uncomfortable. Two, it was a little hard to look after him in the cramped bathroom. He was too big for her to carry, as the boy had hit a rather impressive growth spurt a few months prior, and was now taller than her. She thought about teleporting him, but typically teleporting sick people never went well. Teleportation was rather abrasive to a person's body, and Raven didn't want to make Beast Boy suffer more than he was already. Instead, she encased him in dark energy and carried him to the ops room that way.

She settled him on the couch, fetching a pillow from his room as well as a light blanket, to help quell the shivering. Once he was all wrapped up, she teleported to the med bay and snatched a thermometer to take his temperature. It took a minute to coax Beast Boy to let her do it, as he stubbornly buried his face into his pillow and groaned. Eventually, she won out and stuck the thermometer in his mouth, waiting for the device to get a reading. It beeped, and she gently plucked the thermometer away, holding it up closely to read the digital display.

One hundred and three degrees Fahrenheit.

Well, he definitely had a fever. She set the thermometer on the coffee table, and disappeared into the kitchen. Finding a towel, she ran it under cold water, rang it out, and brought it back to the sickly changeling. Raven carefully folded the rag and placed it onto his hot forehead. Beast Boy shivered, whimpering again.

"Oh, Garfield." The name slipped past her tongue almost reflexively, surprising her. She usually only called him that to tease him; he hated it after all. And yet, it slipped out in a strangely comforting manner. Raven sighed, and fetched a trashcan, just in case, before settling into a lotus position.

This was going to be a long night.

"Raven?"

A hand shook her shoulder, snapping her into wakefulness. She bolted up, her gaze meeting the confused stare of Robin as he knelt beside her.

"Why are you and Beast Boy sleeping out in the ops?" he asked. Raven's brow furrowed in confusion, and she glanced around her to confirm that yes, she was in the ops room. Suddenly, images from the night prior tumbled to the surface, and she scrambled to her feet.

"Shit."

Bleary eyed, she stumbled to the couch, where Beast Boy lay sprawled out in a sweaty, feverish mess. His blanket was on the ground, forgotten in a bout of a hot flash. Raven felt his forehead. It was sweaty and hot, maybe hotter than last night. She swiped the thermometer off the coffee table, and gently roused the changeling to take his temperature.

"One hundred and four," she muttered. Raven wasn't well versed in medicine, at least from an illness standpoint, but even she knew that was bad. At least, for a normal human. She wasn't sure how bad it was for Beast Boy, and was all the more angry at herself for falling asleep.

"Want me to get Cyborg?"

Robin's voice interrupted her train wreck of thoughts, and she glanced up to see him hovering by the couch. With a sigh, she nodded. Cyborg was better at this stuff anyway, and she probably should have gotten him in the first place. Robin dipped his head and disappeared, leaving her alone once again with the ill changeling. She gently picked up the now dry washcloth and wet it down again, draping it onto his forehead once more.

Beast Boy shivered, his eyes cracking open. They were glazed and unfocused, far duller than usual. He mumbled something incoherently, shaking and shivering once again. Raven plucked the shed blanket off the ground and draped it over him, gently tucking him in. The shivering ceased for the most part, and Beast Boy drifted back into his fevered sleep.

Raven sighed. Beast Boy didn't get sick often, and this was the worst she'd ever seen. Usually, he was quite over-dramatic, whining and pretending to be pitiful to get attention. This time around, he'd barely uttered a word, and seemed way out of it. Raven almost felt bad for all the times she snapped at him in the past while he was sick; if this was what truly ill was for Beast Boy, she'd much rather put up with his whining.

At least then, it wasn't too serious.

The ops doors flew open then, and in strode Cyborg and Robin. She could immediately feel the cybernetic teen's worry clouding the air around him, only for it to thicken as his gaze landed on their green friend.

"You said his fever was one hundred and four?" he asked. Raven nodded, stepping aside as Cyborg knelt down beside the changeling. He stuck a finger in his ear, glancing at his arm to check the reading. "Damn. Let's get him to the med bay, I'll set up an IV." Not waiting for her response, Cyborg scooped Beast Boy up and started off towards the elevator, leaving her to trail behind them.

It was the flu.

A pretty nasty case, since that was the strain going around this season. Raven had nearly rolled her eyes back into her head after listening to Cyborg rant and rave about how Beast Boy had refused to take his flu shot. While she agreed that they wouldn't have been in this predicament had he complied, Raven sympathized with the shapeshifter after experiencing his near panic attack at the sight of a needle.

Needless to say, they'd managed to get his fever under control pretty quickly, Cyborg's ranting aside.

Raven flipped the page of her book, lost in a world of fantasy. They were taking turns watching over Beast Boy, and it was Raven's turn. Or at least, she'd volunteered to take Starfire's so she could help get Cinderblock back in his cell again. Raven wasn't entirely sure why she'd volunteered, but the thought of being very far from Beast Boy while he was in this state was overwhelming. Maybe she was just being protective. He was her friend after all.

Either way, here she was, sitting in a chair beside his cot, reading.

Luckily, Beast Boy slept for the most part. She was only interrupted occasionally by a whimper or groan, though those had become infrequent. Mostly, Raven would pause every now and again to check his temperature or refresh the wet rag on his forehead. She tucked her bookmark into place and set her book aside, swiping the thermometer to check his temperature, as she hadn't checked in awhile.

"Hey, Rae."

The scratchy voice caught her off-guard, and she dropped the thermometer and whirled around to see Beast Boy very much awake and smiling tiredly at her. Immediately, she was at his side with her hand glued to his forehead.

"How do you feel?"

"Like shit," he said, "but better."

Raven hummed, absently noticing he still felt warm to the touch. She abandoned her seat to scoop up the thermometer from the floor and shoved it into his mouth, after wiping it off of course. Beast Boy's face screwed up at the action but he complied and waited for the device to beep so she could get a good reading. Raven plucked it from his mouth and held it up. One hundred degrees Fahrenheit.

"Well, your fever's gone down. Which is good." She set the thermometer down and shot him a glance. "Do you want anything?"

Beast Boy leaned back into his pillow. "What are you reading?"

Raven blinked. "Pardon?"

"What are you reading?"

She glanced at her book, confusion spreading across her features. "Uh...A Wrinkle In Time." Raven wasn't sure if it was the fever, or if he was actually blushing, but either way Beast Boy's face was flushed.

"Could you read it to me?" His voice was small, and seeing him so pale and pitiful wrapped up in his blankets, Raven couldn't say no. So, she pulled her chair up close and cracked open her book, quietly reading the words aloud. She wasn't sure how long she was reading, she got rather lost in telling the story, but the next time she glanced at Beast Boy, he was fast asleep.

He looked surprisingly cute, curled up in a ball with a very peaceful expression on his features. His hair was all sorts of messy, sticking up in odd places from all the tossing and turning. Raven hesitantly set her book down, leaning forward to plant a gentle kiss on his forehead. She could have sworn she saw Beast Boy smile a small smile, but it was so fleeting she thought she'd imagined it.

With a small grin of her own, she picked up her book and began reading once more.

Author's Note:

I wanted to write about Raven taking care of Beast Boy, and this came about. Maybe I'll so the other way around. Who knows? Either way, enjoy!

Thanks,

-vixensheart