The first thing I became aware of was simply that: being aware.

The second thing I became aware of was a scent. A mixture of scents, rather. Amongst the sweet florals there was a floating tang, muted by the other fragrances yet still distinctively pungent. It seemed familiar; I felt like I used to know it in a stronger distillation. It made me recall an empty feeling in the pit of my stomach. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, and accepted that it would likely come to me later, when I was more awake, more collected.

The third thing I became aware of was an all-over soreness.

I opened my eyes.

And shut them again. It was very bright.

I tried again. I squinted, blinking slowly, as the brightness came into focus.

Judging from the gentle, natural light and the pale green, almost white, tiles, I realized I was lying in a private recovery chamber in the infirmary at the Central Administration Building, looking up at the ceiling.

"Welcome back, my old friend," said a familiar voice, soothing and serene. I turned my head slightly towards the source, and found myself now looking up at Seizan.

I considered my surroundings, and soon the events of the incident came to me. I recalled my last action, and conscious thought, was to keep the king out of harm's way.

"Is the king alright?" I asked. The rasp in my voice surprised me, though it really shouldn't have.

"The king is very well," Seizan answered. "Or I should say, he is well now. He was a mess until all your symptoms stabilized. Only then were we able to convince him to leave your side, and only after promising that Touou, Nankai and I would rotate shifts to keep watch over you."

"I see," I said. I lay there silently for a few more moments, vaguely recalling flashes of the king's distressed face covered with blood, and the sound of my name being screamed, then repeated over and over.

I shifted slightly, noting that I did appear to still have all of my limbs. Or perhaps it would have been more accurate to say that I did appear to have them all, again.

"If you wish and are able to," Seizan said, observing my movement, "feel free to sit up. I will assist you if you need it."

I found I did need it, though not as much as I would have thought.

"How much time has passed?" I asked, when I was able to speak again.

"Eighteen days," Seizan informed me. "Most of it recuperation. The king's Spirit Wave minimized most of the internal damage before you were even brought to the hospital, so we were able to transport you to the infirmary here quite quickly. Between the Spirit Wave and the latest T2 regenerative technology, your recovery has been remarkably rapid, all things considered."

I slowly flexed the fingers of my right hand. My king's Spirit Wave technique was truly amazing, I thought. And so were King Mukuro's resources. I was very fortunate.

I soon noticed splashes of vivid colours past the sight of my palm and flexing fingers. I lowered my hand and looked around the room. It was filled, practically overflowing, with cards and flowers.

I took this all in silently, quite moved and not entirely quite sure what to say.

After a few minutes, I said, "Well, as you can see, I'm fully conscious. I suspect there's been some administrative backlog. You can start bringing me reports to complete."

Seizan smiled and shook his head. He seemed amused.

"I am afraid I cannot do that," he replied.

I raised an eyebrow. "Why not?"

"There is absolutely no work for you to do," he said.

I raised my eyebrow even higher. "Of course there is," I said. "Nothing physical, perhaps, but there are documents only the king or I can review."

"Yes," Seizan replied. "And the king is reviewing them all."

I'm sure both of my eyebrows shot up. "What? He can't be. He only gets my briefs. He's never even seen most of the original files."

"Well, he has now, and therefore he is."

I started to remember the volume of work I had ongoing before the incident. Perhaps it was from all the mental and physical strain, inactivity, and sudden activity again, but a completely illogical panic began to settle in me.

"But they're lengthy and dense, some of them run hundreds of pages with complex forms! They have extremely long words!" A mental image was quickly forming of my bewildered king overwhelmed and buried under an avalanche of confusing paperwork. I could hear the pitch and speed rising in my own voice, while simultaneously comprehending how ridiculous I must have sounded. "He won't know what to do!"

"Yes, they are," Seizan replied calmly. "And yes, they do. And no, he asked me, and Touou, and Nankai, and everyone else, many, many questions. Many questions. And I believe for the most part he has figured them out. We will all assist him as needed. And I will double check everything before it is sent out." He patted me reassuringly on the shoulder. "Just because the king abhors paperwork does not mean he cannot do it when he puts his mind to it. He is adamant that you will not lift a finger on the administration of the territory until you are fully well. You, of all people, know how single-minded he can be."

I looked at him. I knew there was truth and logic in what he was saying. I was beginning to calm down and return to my senses.

But I still wasn't 100% convinced. I folded my arms. "What if smoke begins to pour out of his ears," I said flatly, not entirely sure I was joking.

Seizan smiled at me, ever-patient. "Then we will find a bucket, we will fill it with water and ice, and we will put his head in it until his brain stops overheating." He touched my shoulder again. "Hokushin, everything will be fine. The most important thing is that you are fine. That is what everyone, and the king most of all, cares about." He gestured at the gifts lying around the room.

I took a deep breath, and nodded.

Seizan paused, seeming to recall something. "Oh, forgive me, I misspoke. The king did leave you something to do."

I turned my head, curious. Seizan handed me a large, slightly floppy soft cover book, and a box of pencils.

I looked down at the book. Fantastical Makai, it read in elegant letters stamped in gold foil, followed by the subtitle Colour Your Way to Tranquility with Magnificent Demon World Flora and Fauna.

I gave Seizan a look. My colleague of nearly a thousand years shrugged.

"He said this was to help you feel better, because you are a workaholic." He smiled beatifically. "And, quite frankly, I do agree with him. You are a workaholic."

Before I could come up with a retort, there was a series of bangs, the loud slams of door after door being flung open and hitting the wall, and the sound of running feet against the tiled floors. Several cries of "Your Majesty!" echoed in the hallways.

"Hokushinnnnn!" I heard the king yelling. He flew into the room with his usual subtle manner, trailed by Nankai and Touou. Unusually, to my surprise, he was sporting his long mane tied back in a rough, messy ponytail. He must have shifted into full battle god state after I went unconscious. It seemed he hadn't even taken the time to get his hair cut since.

He dashed over to my bedside, and crouched down slightly to look me in the face at eye level.

"Hokushin?" he repeated, at a much quieter volume.

"My Lord," I greeted him.

When he saw from my response I most certainly recognized him, a mixture of happiness and relief flooded his expression. He gave me a big, careful hug, then ran around my bed to the other side of the room to seize a chair with one hand. It scraped and screeched across the floor as he carelessly dragged it over and pulled up next to Seizan. He plopped down unceremoniously, then leaned forward, both hands resting casually on his knees.

"They didn't tell me you were awake until just now!" he said indignantly.

My interactions with Seizan couldn't have taken much more than half an hour, unless I was really that disoriented. "I didn't wake up until just now," I replied.

"Tch," he scoffed. "Excuses!" He folded his arms, then noticed the book in front of me. "Oh hey, did Seizan give it to you already? Whaddaya think?"

Before I could answer him, he leaned over and snatched it from my lap. "It's full of super trippy drawings," he said, flipping through it breezily, then opening to a spread and shoving it at my face. "Check out this badass! Whoops, wrong page."

My brain registered an exquisite line illustration of a Shokuyou Shokubutsu with its thick, limb-like roots and drooling, teeth-filled mouths spiraling madly outwards from the centre of the book, just as it was pulled away.

I blinked, and then the book flew back at me. This time the spread was of a monstrous dream-eating baku, surrounded by a kaleidoscope of hundreds of overlapping humanoid forms representing the despairing dreamers who were having their hopes and desires sucked out of them.

"Look! The whole book is like this." The drawing waggled at me. "Whoooooo! Crazy, huh? You could spend days filling in this sucker!"

"Your Majesty," I said stiffly, "I am n-"

I stopped myself. The king had obviously been terribly worried about my condition, and he was clearly trying his hardest to be thoughtful. It would have been unkind of me to dismiss his heartfelt gesture.

"Thank you," I finally said, smiling into the gutter of the book. "I'm fine."

The drawing moved away from my face. The king closed the book and tossed it over to the bedside table. "Well, Mukuro liked it," he said with a shrug. Beside him, Nankai picked up the book and began to flip through it, oohing at the illustrations and showing Touou.

"That was from King Mukuro?" I said, surprised.

"No," the king said, pointing at the windowsill across from him. "The, the - whaddid Kurama call it? - the rotting flesh dwarf rafflesia whatever bouquet is from her." I turned my head to look. "No, not that one, the other one. That carrion flower arrangement is from Yomi. Anyways, I saw the book, and I mentioned it to her, and she said she enjoyed it, so I figured, if Mukuro found it relaxing? It's probably kinda relaxing? Ya know?" He paused thoughtfully, fingers tapping his lips, considering his own words. "Or, uh, really disturbing, I guess. But I didn't think it was too bad."

"Oh," I said, mildly taken aback. I finalized realized what the memory-stoking aroma in the air was, and why my stomach had seemed to ache. I was also having a great deal of difficulty picturing King Mukuro working her way through a colouring book, no matter how macabre the subject matter.

The two challenging thoughts made me realize how thoroughly tired and physically worn out I actually was.

The king eyed me, noticing my fatigue. He pushed his chair back and got up, then placed a hand on my shoulder and squeezed it warmly. "Take it easy, okay? Don't worry, I haven't fucked anything up. If you don't believe me, you can ask them." He pointed at my long-time colleagues and friends. Seizan nodded, Touou quirked a smile, and Nankai gave me a grin accompanied by a thumbs up.

The king lifted his hand from my shoulder, raising it palm out. "And I solemnly swear I won't fuck anything up until after you get out of bed and finish all your physio." He winked at me.

I had to smile at all this support. "I look forward to it," I replied.

"Okay, rest up and see ya!" said the king, and all made to leave.

"Wait," I said. Everyone halted, the king freezing rather comedicly in his tracks. "If you could please take the carrion flowers with you, that would be appreciated." It wasn't that the smell was necessarily unpleasant for demons of our backgrounds - the king excepted, of course, due to his human heritage and upbringing. But since we had all changed our diet a very long time ago, it was probably best not to keep them around.

"Sure thing," said the king, wrinkling his nose slightly before grabbing at the two arrangements.

"I'll take those," said Touou, reaching them first and lifting them up and out of the king's way. They left, leaving me with the calmness of the room and the quiet activities of the infirmary staff just outside.

I closed my eyes and inhaled slowly, deeply, taking in the perfume of the flowers. Then exhaled, equally slowly.

When I opened my eyes again, my gaze fell on the colouring book.

I hesitated.

Finally, I reached over and, with only some difficulty, pulled it to me. I flipped through it, perusing the detailed drawings. After a while of page-turning, I reached over and pulled a pencil out of the box. Idly, I began to colour in the teeth on the Shokuyou Shokubutsu.

Several minutes later, I sifted through the box for another pencil, making each tooth a different colour. Before I knew it, hours had passed.

Author's notes: Shokuyou Shokubutsu is the plant that Youko Kurama grew to terrorize Uraurashima.

I'm not sure how this ended up the way it is, but it started while I was having fun doodling drawings (posted on my tumblr and pixiv, links in profile) of Yusuke and Hokushin after an attack. The story was actually mostly finished about a year ago, I just never got around to cleaning it up and posting it. When I originally began working on it, the grown up colouring books trend was only just getting big. Now they're everywhere!

I enjoyed writing the monks interacting; it'd be fun to further explore them and flesh out the hints we got to see of them if I get the chance.