(Author's note: The prompt is "Psychogenic Fever/Stress Induced Illness. I went with the first interpretation. The requester was vodkafolie from tumblr, thanks for letting me write about my blorbo Laurence with such a super fitting prompt for him ^^
This one turned kinda angsty again, but the prompt was angsty, sooo ^^ Please enjoy!)
Laurence awoke with a gasp. The heat of the fire was still lingering. He knew it had been only a dream, but he felt too hot, far too hot.
He groaned as he felt his forehead. Yes, that was not a normal body temperature. Laurence wondered if it was possible to take sensations felt in a dream into the waking world.
He had dreamt of Old Yharnam. A recurring nightmare. The night when almost everyone in the district had turned into beasts. The Hunters had been overwhelmed and the worst thing was, Gehrman was not there to help them anymore. He had already retreated from hunting, but this fateful night, he had vanished right in front of Laurence' eyes.
Shortly after the blood red moon started to hang over Yharnam, the worst Hunt ever had started and eventually, Laurence had told them to burn it all down. There were casualties. They didn't have enough time to evacuate the whole area.
Old Yharnam had been lost since that day. And Laurence couldn't help but feel responsible for its fate. It was him who brought the beastly scourge to Yharnam. He should have been able to find a cure already, or at least the cause. (Some people assumed that the blood may be at fault. Ridiculous.) However, the beastly scourge was still rampant, Laurence didn't have a cure and Old Yharnam haunted him from his dreams into his day to day life.
Laurence peeled himself out his blankets, upsetting one or two of his cats who had slept on him. It was already morning, he could start his day. Laurence always started his day in the bathroom, so he used the time there to let cold water run over his wrists and his forehead. He hoped that the lingering heat would vanish eventually.
His hope was in vain.
As Laurence sat at his desk, brooding over a newspaper and eyeing the stacks of paperwork, the heat only seemed to rise. He stared out of the window. Yharnam was covered in a thick powdery snow. Normally Laurence hated the cold. He froze easily and would always heat his office up so much that everyone else said it felt like the midst of summer, but today the sight of the snow looked more than inviting. Laurence wanted to do nothing more but run outside and roll himself into the snow, to maybe get this oppressive heat out of his body.
No, it was a terrible idea. He would just get a bad cold if he did that. Laurence would always get a cold somewhen during winter.
Oh, that might be it! The heat he felt wasn't actually from his dream, but a fever from the cold that wanted to bloom inside his respiratory system. Well, that was easy to get rid of. Laurence hooked himself on a blood ministration and after the initial rush of it passed, he waited for the healing properties of it to take place.
The heat still wouldn't leave and eventually Laurence just continued with his work, skimming the articles of the newspaper for useful information. It happened shortly after he flicked a page. It was on fire. His body heat had seriously turned so extreme that something around him had caught fire. In a state of panic, Laurence poured his water over the flame, ruining the newspaper in the process.
Once the fire was gone, he looked again, closer. There… hadn't been a fire. He couldn't see scorch marks. He had ruined the newspaper for nothing. He rubbed a hand over his forehead and let out a deep sigh.
"Am I turning mad?", he murmured. Had that been a hallucination? It reminded Laurence of the shadows he would see in the woods. Or the creature that sometimes appeared on Oedeon Chapel. It was only there for a second or two and every time he double checked, it was gone.
However, Laurence could not turn mad. He was the leader of the Healing Church, the Vicar, and he also had a responsibility towards Yharnam, for he practically ruled the city from the background. He simply didn't have time to turn mad. He probably simply was running a fever.
It just would be easier to believe if the Healing Blood would work its magic. Laurence had pumped a whole blood ministration in his veins and he didn't feel any improvement at all.
He would need more. The Healing Blood never had failed him. If one dose wasn't enough, he would need a second one. Laurence was just in the process of preparing it when there was a knock on the door.
"Laurence, I want to talk about my reports from the last hunt."
It was Ludwig. Laurence put the dose away and unhooked himself from the blood ministration. Ludwig always said he shouldn't overly rely on the blood, even though as an active Hunter, he was a heavy user of it as well. Laurence wasn't too keen on a lection though, he could repeat the blood ministration later.
"Come in.", Laurence said. His voice was surprisingly smooth and he also didn't feel any pain or soreness in his throat or stuffiness in his nose. Maybe he was wrong about the budding cold…? But what else could it be?
Ludwig entered Laurence' office and was about to lay the reports on his desk, when he noticed the water spouts. Frowning, he asked: "Laurence, why is your desk and your newspaper full of water?"
"Oh.", Laurence realized that he had completely forgotten to clean up, "I knocked over my water earlier. It was just an accident."
Ludwig frowned some more and looked Laurence directly in the eyes. Laurence shrunk a bit under his gaze. Oftentimes, Ludwig could be very dense, not reading the room correctly or comment something totally inappropriate, but when it came to Laurence' health, he was as sharp as his hunting rifle.
Before Laurence could utter another word, Ludwig's hand was on Laurence' forehead and he muttered: "Yeah, you have a high fever. Why aren't you in bed?"
"Well…", Laurence tried to come up with an explanation that sounded better like "My bed feels too hot." and "I thought that I caught the newspaper on fire." All he settled on eventually was: "I am probably due for my yearly cold."
Ludwig's brown eyes drilled themselves into Laurence and he felt very small again. Even though he was the most high ranking member of the church and Ludwig was something like his personal knight, Laurence knew that working while he was feeling unwell was out of the question.
"Without a stuffy nose or a hoarseness?", Ludwig asked, "And even if you get your cold, it surely won't get better by sitting at the desk. Let me get you to bed."
Laurence really didn't want to get back into bed, he felt like he would ignite if he would be tucked into a myriad of blankets. He had to swallow his concerns and tell Ludwig the truth. Well, a part of it. He wouldn't tell him about the fire hallucination.
(He probably should. He should tell Ludwig about everything, but he was too afraid. Too afraid that Ludwig wouldn't believe him, that he truly was turning mad.)
"...I had a dream about Old Yharnam last night.", Laurence admitted, gaze on the desk, not being able to withstand Ludwig's gaze any longer. "And since then, I've felt so hot. It is as if the flames are still within me…"
Laurence managed to cast his gaze back at Ludwig for a second before he looked downwards again. "But it can't be. Dreams are not real. The fever I have… can't be from the dream…"
iCan it?i Laurence swallowed the rest of the sentence, not wanting to worry Ludwig even more. He had seen the concern in his eyes. The shining worry in his big puppy eyes. Laurence didn't want to see Ludwig worry over him.)
"Old Yharnam…", Ludwig murmured, "I remember this day. I had been a Hunter for a few years already, but I always had worked under G… under others."
Ludwig knew that Laurence hurt whenever someone mentioned the name of his missing best friend. He appreciated that he didn't spell it out.
"We were truly overwhelmed back then. There were so many beasts. I did my best to fight them, but we already had lost so many Hunters. We were missing the help of our best. I coordinated the rest as well as I could, planning to even give my life protecting the city. When the order came. The powder kegs ignited the district. We were saved, but Old Yharnam was…"
Ludwig trailed off.
"I'll still see it in my dreams… just as you, right, Laurence? The fire… the mess… the heat… It's still there…"
"But…", Laurence started, "It doesn't make sense. It's just a dream. This fever… can't be…"
Now it was Laurence who trailed off.
"Laurence, I know that I am not as smart as you or the choir members or even the church doctors.", Ludwig said, "But… do you think it is possible that… your head makes you believe that something is real that isn't real?"
"...Are you implying that I convinced myself that the heat of my dream is real?", Laurence said, "That the fever I feel is not from a physical illness, but…"
No, he couldn't turn mad. He had so much work to do.
"When my sister died…", Ludwig said, "I kept hearing the beast that killed her. Even though I knew it wasn't there. I, of course, went to get a blood ministration, but it kept happening. I talked to many doctors and eventually I learned that I convinced myself that a beast would be there, because I feared that it would happen again. I feared so much that I could lose another sibling or my parents. It was all just in my head."
Ludwig stopped for a short while and then continued: "But shortly after, I found the Holy Blade in the tombs, and that definitely wasn't only in my head. So maybe… maybe what you feel might be in your head, but also it could be a sign. Of something. Anything."
"I don't know if that makes me feel better…", Laurence sighed, "Fact is, my fever feels rather real. If I really am sick or just… convinced myself to have it… I don't know…"
"It is a good opportunity to rest.", Ludwig smiled, "Come, let's get you to your room and see if we can get your body temperature down somehow. Maybe with the snow from outside."
"Actually.. earlier I thought how heavenly it would feel to roll around in the snow.", Laurence murmured.
Ludwig's eyes widened: "Laurence willingly going into the snow?! Now I am convinced that your fever is real." He stood up and lifted Laurence like it was nothing. "We can think about the cause later, for now, we should do our best to make you feel better, hmmm?"
"Yes… yes, of course.", Laurence murmured, pressing himself against Ludwig. Suddenly, he didn't feel that hot anymore, but weak and sore. As if he had only kept himself together because he wasn't allowed to falter, "And I would like to have some of your bread as well. Didn't you recently make a new bunch?"
"You will get as much bread as you want, Laurence.", Ludwig smiled, carrying Laurence off, taking care of him for the whole day. In the end, the oppressive heat left Laurence and coming the next day, his fever was gone.
He still wondered if it had all been just in his head though…
(Author's note: Will I give Laurence a break one day? Probably not ^^ He also has at least one more sickfic coming up ^^
Next one will be posted tomorrow and will be for one of my Dark Souls AUs.)