They had been ordered to Nigeria and gotten their orders once they'd arrived; a particularly nasty warlord named Abiade was wreaking havoc with the country's exports of crude oil, so they had been directed to kill him. Of course, it all had to be kept quiet, the kind of black op that meant the team would be abandoned by the U.S. government if they got caught.

Yep, they were on their own out here, and it was imperative that everything go exactly according to plan. Which would have been easier if Jensen didn't feel like shit.

Apparently, he'd had some "incident" the night before that included being incoherent and having a seizure. Jensen had no memory of anything like that and just woke up feeling crappy, but judging by the way the guys were acting around him, it had freaked them out. Yeah, he'd known something had gone wrong when the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was Cougar's face, too close for comfort, peering at him. It had only gotten worse, with Roque avoiding teasing him (which basically meant ignoring him) and Clay shoving Mountain Dew bottles at him every five seconds (and really, what was up with that?) and Cougar hovering quietly next to him.

And now everyone had gone out to do recon except for him- oh, yeah, and Pooch, who had been left behind to babysit.

"Come on, baby," he murmured, tapping at a few keys on the keyboard. He was currently hacking into Abiade's security cameras, which were frustratingly more complex than Jensen had been counting on. It was clear that the warlord had hired an outside company to handle security, probably European, and it was an unwanted complication that made Jensen's mood even worse than it had been. He swiped at the sweat gathering on his forehead and frowned at it, grumbling under his breath.

He'd had a pounding headache all morning, probably a result of the shit that had gone down the night before, and the heat was only making it worse. Strangely, Jensen had also found his joints tightening up, his knee and his fingers especially. He felt like an old man, and he sure as hell was too young to be doing that.

"How's it going, Jensen?" Pooch asked from across the room. He was poring over maps of the area, trying to find the quickest escape routes, reading the topography and finding the side roads and alleys that could prove central to getting out quickly and quietly. Their base of operations was far enough away from Abiade's house that they would be rendezvousing back there at the end of the operation to regroup and head back stateside. And while Jensen's rational side pointed out that Pooch needed to be at the warehouse to do his job, the other part knew that Pooch would eventually have to drive the routes anyway, and he was just here to make sure the hacker was okay.

"Nnrgh," Jensen mumbled in response, rolling his eyes. Damn it, why couldn't they just leave him alone?

"Same here. It's hot as hell in here, isn't it?"

"Yeah."

Jensen continued to focus on the computer in front of him, but he was sweating profusely and colors and sounds were starting to blur at the edges.

"Hey, you sure you're okay? You're trembling."

"What?" Jensen said, blinking. He held up his hands and noticed that he was, indeed, shaking. "Huh."

Pooch stood up, clearly worried.

"Don't," Jensen said, holding up a hand. "I'm okay." Pooch snorted, clearly disbelieving, but he sat back down. Jensen let out a sigh of relief and tried to focus on the screen, tried to remember what he was supposed to be doing, but he was having a hard time concentrating and was surprised when he noticed that his teeth were chattering.

"Dude, you seriously don't look so hot," Pooch said, and Jensen tried to wave him off again, but was overcome by a wave of nausea. He abruptly turned to the side and vomited loudly, vaguely noticing when Pooch came over and set a hand on his shoulder, but mostly just puking. A second later he fell forward out of the chair, landing on his knees in a puddle of his own vomit. He could hear Pooch talking to him in a worried tone, and then into the head mic, probably to Clay or maybe Roque, but the words didn't really register, and he was feeling hot then cold then hot then cold, and sweat was trickling down his forehead and nothing seemed real…

"Jensen?"

Jensen cracked his eyes open, frowning in confusion for a second before realizing that it was Pooch's voice he was hearing, and that he was on his back and something reeked.

"The hell?" He managed, trying to lever himself up. He failed miserably, dropping back into Pooch's arms. And damn if that didn't make the situation ten times worse. First he pukes all over everything and then he wakes up in Pooch's lap…

"Just chill, brother. The others will be back soon and we'll get this sorted, okay?"

Jensen wanted to agree, but there was something niggling in the back of his mind, something that made this situation even worse than it already was. Oh, shit.

"The mission?" He stuttered, and Pooch was ominously quiet for a minute.

"We'll figure it out when Clay gets back."

"Shit," Jensen murmured, trying again to get up.

"Jensen," Pooch said in that tone he only got with Jensen. It was the big brother, listen-or-die tone. "Sit your skinny white ass down and leave it there."

Jensen did as he was told, as much because he was too weak to protest as Pooch's order. He'd only just settled back in when he was hit by a particularly overwhelming wave of cold, and then he was shivering so much that his teeth clattered, and he couldn't get comfortable and everything hurt, and Jensen found himself praying for oblivion.

xxxx

Clay generally loved being team lead. He thrived on high pressure situations, on the ability to think on his feet and come up with solutions even when everything had gone to hell and it seemed impossible to come out on top. But sometimes, when high pressure situations involved the very real possibility of injuries or death to one of his teammates, he hated his position.

After talking to Pooch, he had decided that this particular situation definitely fell into the latter category.

"What was that about?" Roque asked, and Clay sighed. He knew better than to try and hide anything from his second; he could read him like a book.

"Jensen's worse. He started vomiting and his fever's high and he's shaking."

"And you want to go back to the warehouse," Roque said. It wasn't a question.

"Hell yes I want to go back. Something is way the hell wrong with Jensen, and he's going to need some help." He stopped talking for a second, trying to avoid Roque's gaze. It was as if the other man were waiting for him to continue.

"But we have to finish recon for this damn mission," Clay said finally, and Roque nodded.

"Think about it Clay. Cougar will be done any time, and we'll be another two hours at most. This mission is a priority, like it or not, and we have to finish this today. Jensen will be okay."

Clay nodded, running a hand through his hair and sighing.

"I know. He'll be fine. Let's get to work."

If neither of them sounded confident in their own reassurances, neither of them mentioned it.

xxxx

Everyone finally met back in the warehouse; Cougar had sighted out the spots with the best visuals of Adiabe's structure and Roque and Clay had figured out the timing and patrols of his security guards. Pooch had figured out escape routes and backup escape routes, and Jensen had sort of managed to hack the security feed.

Mostly, he had managed to purge his stomach of seemingly every meal he'd had over the past few days.

"I think it's malaria," Pooch said as soon as Clay and Roque entered the warehouse. Cougar had returned earlier and was wiping down Jensen's forehead with a damp cloth. Jensen, for his part, was thrashing and moaning, mumbling something about zombies.

"Malaria? Who the hell gets that anymore?" Roque demanded, and both Pooch and Clay shot him looks of disbelief.

"Dude, we're in Africa," Pooch said, and Roque rolled his eyes.

"Okay, okay, but don't we have, like, preventative crap or something?" He asked.

"Well, obviously Jensen missed a dose. Or something," Clay said.

"It's not contagious, right?" Roque said, shooting an uneasy look toward the ailing hacker.

"It's transmitted by mosquitoes, dumbass," Clay muttered. "Look, however Jensen got it, he has it now and we need to get him well enough to finish the mission. As soon as we're done with that we can get him to a hospital, stateside."

"I don't know, Clay. He's hardly been lucid since this afternoon. I'm not sure that he'll be able to do much of anything."

"Damn it," Clay muttered, and Roque was shaking his head behind him.

"How the hell can we do this without Jensen? He's in charge of our comm. lines, not to mention that he has to hack into the security cameras."

"Do we have any kind of medication we can give him, just to alleviate his symptoms until we can get him to help?" Clay asked. Pooch looked doubtful.

"I can give him some fever reducers, maybe some anti-nausea meds, but we don't have anything malaria specific. It might help, but not for long, and ultimately he's still going to need more help than we can give him."

"Fine. Let's give him some of those meds tonight and see if they help. If we see some results, we'll proceed tomorrow as planned. If not…we may need to consider forfeiting."

xxxx

Jensen was shivering uncontrollably, teeth chattering as he moaned under his breath. Pooch came over quietly, standing next to the thrashing hacker and Cougar, who was squatting silently next to the cot.

"Is he any better?" He asked quietly. Cougar shrugged.

"His fever seems to have dropped some," he said.

"That's good," Pooch said. He and Cougar both stood up when Jensen started to stir slightly.

"Jensen? Can you hear me, kid?"

Jensen groaned. "Not a kid," he murmured, his voice thin.

"Whatever. How you feeling?" Pooch asked with a smile.

"Like shit," Jensen answered. "Haven't felt this bad since I came down with chicken pox my junior year of high school."

"Junior year? You got chicken pox your junior year?" Pooch asked incredulously.

"M' mom gave me chocolate milk. Let me watch cartoons all day."

"Cartoons? Jensen, how old were you, 16?"

"Yeah. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, man. Always a win."

Pooch couldn't help but laugh, patting the hacker on the shoulder.

"Okay. Well, you're way more lucid than you have been most of the day. You should get some rest. Big day tomorrow."

Jensen sighed in obvious relief.

"We're still on, then?" He whispered. Pooch nodded.

"If you're up to it. Otherwise we'll have to-"

"I'll be fine, Pooch. It'll work out."

"Okay, kid. Get some sleep."

"Not a kid," Jensen muttered, before drifting off to sleep.

xxxx

A/N: So, mad props to Mahiri Chuna for correctly guessing Jensen's malady! Also, I am not a doctor, nor am I in the military, so sorry if some of this stuff seems illogical.