Disclaimer: Fan fiction should be self explanatory by now, yes?

Mini-Summary: Yes, Szayel Aporro makes a mean cough syrup. And yes, he can chaperone sick Espada and shop 'til he drops. He's even pretty good at sorting through human toiletries. Szayel's faced a lot of challenges since being appointed the unofficial Espada medic. But can he make Ulquiorra's cooking palatable? And is it just Grimmjow's guess, or does Ulquiorra have an obsession with matching the colors of his ingredients?

Szayel forced out a deep breath and pushed the door open. If Aizen thought this was a good idea, even after hearing about the side effects, then he would do it. And the medicine would -- hopefully -- work as intended.

Halibel had left a lamp on in one corner, so Szayel didn't have to stumble around or let his eyes adjust. He made a mental note to thank her for that. At the very least, the added light source would eliminate the chance of Grimmjow's eyes glowing at him again. Since first encountering them, Szayel had, on occasion, seen those pinpoints of light in his dreams, and he'd prefer to keep them in his dreams rather than repeat the situation during his waking hours.

Grimmjow himself was loosely curled up on his side, his breathing so soft Szayel had to strain to hear it. Szayel took a moment to listen for a pattern, taking it as a good sign when he found one. Earlier, Grimmjow had simply been sucking in what air he could get, but now he was at least relaxed enough to pace his attempts. Of course, even a single cough was likely to send that pattern to hell.

Clenching a sweaty, gloved fist around the pill bottle, Szayel took the steps necessary to place himself near enough to his patient to nudge a shoulder. "Hey, Grimmjow."

His wake-up attempt was met with unintelligible grumbling, and Szayel sighed, interpreting the response to mean that Grimmjow was in fact awake, but not feeling particularly cooperative.

"Grimmjow, I need you awake so I can give you this medicine." Silence. "So you can breathe again," he emphasized, tapping a finger between Grimmjow's closed eyes. "You do want to breathe again, right?"

"What," Grimmjow muttered, scrunching his eyes further shut, "do I have to do to get people to go away?"

Szayel shrugged, knowing the motion wouldn't register to his patient. "For starters, you can take this medicine."

"And then you'll leave me alone?"

Szayel frowned, rolling the pill canister between his palms. Aizen's orders couldn't have been clearer: Grimmjow was not to be left on his own for any longer than strictly necessary. Still, the Sexta Espada's preference for alone time was well known, and he hadn't gotten much of it in recent days. There was a clear line between obeying his orders and placating his patient, but Szayel decided to straddle it briefly. "For a while, sure, I'll leave you alone. I've got to get you something to eat with the medicine, grab some research to work on, some other things..."

Grimmjow opened his eyes at the statement and stared up at Szayel with an expression that would have been firmly planted in the realm of distrust if the fever hadn't supplied a bright gleam. "Food? Research?" He struggled a moment, but eventually managed to sit up without coughing. "Why food? What the hell kind of research would you," he sucked in a breath, "be working on that has to be done here?"

And here the conversation entered his area of expertise. "This," Szayel said, holding up the bottle, "will likely send sharp, shooting pains through your stomach unless you eat something with it. Medically speaking, the food isn't requisite, of course. But with food, we're dealing with general nausea instead of acute pain. The obvious preference, then, is to take it with food."

Hopefully, Grimmjow would not follow up with a demand for information on the research portion of things. Szayel found he always did better when his subjects were unaware of their status as such. Especially when said subjects were as volatile as Grimmjow. The best way to avoid follow up questions was to confuse the issue and then move ahead before there was time for them.

Szayel pulled up one of the chairs in the room and sat. "So. Let's discuss side effects, yes?" He took Grimmjow's silence as an affirmative, though he could tell the semi-delirious Sexta Espada was still working his way through the earlier statement about food and pain. "This medicine will kill the bacteria making you sick. For it to do that, you are going to have to take it exactly the way I tell you to. It's going to stay in your body for a long time, and each dose will build on the previous ones. In a week, you'll have the equivalent of--"

"I don't care," Grimmjow interrupted with an irritable head shake.

"What?"

"I don't care how it works, Pink. You lost me on 'bacteria.'"

Szayel smiled, and started to explain. "Bacteria are microscopic--"

"You don't have to go back and catch me up. I really don't give a shit." Grimmjow drew in a breath a little too quickly and winced as it caught in his throat.

Szayel found himself at a momentary loss at the notion that someone could be less than fascinated by bacteria, but swiftly recovered. "Okay then. We'll move ahead to the part where you swallow one of these pills twice a day and then eat a meal of some sort." And, he thought, we'll skip the headaches, dizziness, and nightmares. Really, it would all go so much more smoothly if Grimmjow didn't know about those until they happened. If things started going right for once, they might not even encounter some of those side effects.

"Fine." Grimmjow held out a hand. "Let's get it over with so you can get the hell out of my room already."

"Ah, well..." Szayel got up and poured a glass of water. "I don't know about actually leaving for the evening or anything. You still need the food. But yes, let's start this course of medicine."

Grimmjow followed him with his eyes, still maintaining strict control over his breathing to avoid a coughing fit. "What if I'd rather just skip the food? Will that get you out faster?"

Szayel handed him the water, and then shook a pill out of the container. It was probably best to delay telling Grimmjow that he would have constant company for the next two weeks. "I'd recommend you eat with this."

"That's not what I asked."

"I know. But you really want to eat something after taking this." Szayel clamped his fingers around the pill and reluctantly held it out to his patient.

"What are my options?"

Szayel brought the menu to mind. "Ulquiorra said something about cucumbers and wasabi. I didn't get the details. You'd be eating whatever he cooks for the prisoner, though."

"Yeah," Grimmjow muttered, before downing the pill and half the water. "I'll pass."

"Suit yourself," Szayel said. "If it's about the taste, though, I'd go ahead and eat. The medicine will make everything taste like pocket change."

"That so?"

Szayel nodded. "Want some soup, then?"

Grimmjow shuddered. "Cucumber and wasabi don't go together in the first place, and he's going to turn them into a soup? Is it because they're both green?"

"I wouldn't presume to know. Should I assume you're going without the soup, then?"

"Could you catch him before he destroys the cucumbers?"

Szayel paused. "I could try." He got up and moved the chair back near its table. "I won't be gone long, Grimmjow. But I don't know how quickly that medicine is going to work, so if you see anything that doesn't make sense... or hell, if you hear, smell, taste, or feel it, just ignore it. It probably isn't real."

Grimmjow shot him a dirty look. "Just what the fuck is this shit, anyway?"

"It's good for you," Szayel reassured him as he slipped out into the hallway.

The next morning, Szayel leaned his shoulder against the kitchen door instead of mustering the effort it would take to actually press it open with a hand. The only sleep he'd managed during the night had been shattered by panicked mutterings about burnt toast and something called fish pies. To be honest, he'd expected any nightmares Grimmjow encountered to be based on actual, terrifying events, and not on culinary disasters. It was no less alarming, however, to be jarred awake by shouts about pastry. If anything, it was infinitely more disturbing.

"Good morning, Szayel," Ulquiorra intoned, keeping his attention fixed on the skillet in his hand.

Szayel grunted in response, flinging himself into a seat and putting his head down on his arms. After a moment, it occurred to him that Ulquiorra might know the answer to the question that had been bugging him since near midnight. "Ulquiorra? Humans don't actually bake pies with fish inside, do they?"

Ulquiorra set the skillet on an unused burner and reached into a cabinet for a golden bottle. "Would you like me to try?"

"Uh, no. Not actually. I was just wondering, is all." Szayel watched uneasily as Ulquiorra upended the bottle over the skillet and squeezed roughly a cup of honey out. "Does the prisoner like your cooking?"

"I believe so. Though it hardly matters to me if she does not." Ulquiorra stirred the contents of the skillet a few times and emptied it out onto two plates. Lumps of mostly cooked egg swam in a sticky mixture of honey and butter. "It doesn't look as though you slept well," he commented as he slid into a seat across the table.

Szayel rubbed his eyes under his mask. "I didn't. I think I got an hour or two in, but not all at once. It doesn't help that the chairs in Las Noches are uniformly uncomfortable."

"Hmm." Ulquiorra nodded in understanding, the closest he ever got to agreeing with a complaint about Las Noches or Aizen. "And his fever? It must have gone down by now."

"Yeah," Szayel grumbled. "It broke around dawn. Or what would be dawn if we had such a thing. I sometimes envy the humans and their little world." He leaned back in his seat, letting his form slump a bit. "I don't know whether it was the medicine or the fever, Ulquiorra, but I don't ever want to deal with a delirious Grimmjow again."

The kitchen door swung open and Stark stumbled into the room, blundering over to the counter for a cup. "Damn Ulquiorra," he muttered with a glare. "Lucky-ass bastard doesn't have to sleep in the east wing." Stark set his mug of juice down on the table with a dull thump and joined them with a yawn.

"Is it actually that bad?"

"Bad?" Stark scratched at his head with his ungloved hand, his motions slow enough to display the fading scar from the ill-fated round of hide and seek. "Who knows. It's loud is all I can tell."

Ulquiorra looked at him blankly.

"You'd think a guy who can't breathe wouldn't be able to get much volume, but you'd be wrong." Stark let his head fall onto the table before finishing in a mumble. "Bastard's loud as fuck."

Szayel sighed, and reached for Stark's mug. "Half of what he's yelling about is in French anyway." He took a gulp of juice, regretted it, and set the mug back down in front of its rightful owner. Orange, yes. Citrus, no. Beyond that, Szayel was content to be ignorant on the matter.

The Cuarta Espada cocked his head to the left, as though weighed down by his mask. "I hardly equate Grimmjow with the French language."

"Neither did I," Szayel agreed. "But it's pretty hard to mistake the words as anything but French. I mean, 'pâté en croûte saumoné' can only be French, right?"

Stark lifted his head from the table. "Don't forget 'pain grillé.' He was big on that, too."

Szayel nodded. "From the context, I think that one means toast."

"It means lost sleep. That's all." Stark's forehead rejoined the table, narrowly missing the orange mystery juice.

Ulquiorra got up and placed one of the plates onto a cart along with a mug of juice and a pair of bananas. "For the time being, perhaps it is better if I leave you to care for Grimmjow without the added task of feeding Inoue Orihime."

Szayel looked up, fighting back the giddy grin he felt spreading across his face. "Really?"

"It doesn't sound as though Grimmjow is fit to be left alone or to accompany you. Therefore, it is more sensible that you concentrate your efforts where they are most needed."

"Yeah," Stark mumbled. "You should probably get back there, anyway. He was saying something about the walls moving when I left."

Szayel turned his eyes up towards the ceiling and sighed again. "Shit."

Ulquiorra handed him the spare plate of honeyed eggs. "I'll ask Zommari about the French. From what I hear, he is quite fluent."

"Thanks."

Szayel returned to Grimmjow's room to find the Sexta Espada hidden beneath a mound of blankets, the edges all precisely tucked under to avoid even the tiniest crack of light. He paused a moment to wonder just how Grimmjow was managing to breathe under there, but then shook his head. Either he was hiding from the walls or just wanted it darker, but it hardly mattered which.

He nudged the table over closer to the bed and set the plate down on it. "It's time for round two, Grimmjow. Get up."

"Go to hell." The response was muffled by the blankets, but still clear enough to be understood. "You're not getting anywhere near me with that shit."

Szayel sighed, and pinched the bridge of his mask. "Grimmjow, we went over this. Sit up and take the medicine."

"No."

"You need to, Grimmjow, or you'll get even sicker." Szayel felt his patience running out like sand from a broken hourglass. He could understand the reluctance, but really, an Espada should suck it up and do what was necessary. "Come on, Grimmjow."

"Not. Gonna. Happen." The lump didn't so much as twitch.

Szayel let out a frustrated sigh. "Aizen said so, it's an order!"

"I'm the last person that'll work on," Grimmjow muttered. "Get that shit out of here. It reeks."

"Please," Szayel tried. "You can't just skip doses like this. It's a process, like I told you. It'll build on itself." Of course, Grimmjow hadn't been interested in learning about the process, but that was immaterial at the moment.

Szayel reached out and took hold of a corner of blanket. He tugged. The blanket tugged back. "Grimmjow, stop being a baby. Just cooperate for once in your life, would you?"

"Go the fuck away." The blankets pulled themselves tighter.

"Grimmjow..." Szayel debated his strength relative to the Sexta Espada's in the current situation, and decided he could probably best him this once using the element of surprise. He wrenched at the sheets, his leverage giving him even further advantage.

The exertion of fighting back sent his patient into a coughing fit that was more worrisome for its weakness than any of the previous ones had been for all their strength. Shit, Szayel thought. He should have more energy than this. We're losing ground if he can't even cough properly. Still, the path to recovery lay in the very thing Grimmjow was being obstinate about. Szayel gathered the blankets up while keeping a close eye on his patient as the coughs subsided.

"If I didn't think you'd choke on it, I'd force this down your throat," he muttered, tossing the balled up sheets on the floor next to the bed.

Grimmjow's response, for all it was as worn out as the rest of him, still had some bite to it. "It's fucking eggs and honey," he gasped, holding his chest with a grimace. "I'd rather cough myself to death."

Szayel sat down in the chair he'd left by the bed earlier. "You will cough yourself to death if you don't take this medicine. Just eat the food and take the medicine, Grimmjow." He rubbed his temples and sighed. "I don't know why you're being so stubborn about it. It's one meal."

"That's not a meal. It's not food, even," he muttered. "My stomach's dodging blows and I haven't introduced the enemy yet."

"Just try it."

"You try it," he spat.

Szayel gritted his teeth. "I don't need to eat it because I'm not taking this medicine because I'm not sick!" He recalled having, if not this exact conversation, then a very similar conversation earlier. He was getting nowhere with this. He'd been unable to convince Grimmjow to take the cough syrup, and history was repeating itself. Well fine, then. Let history repeat itself.

"You know what?" he asked, getting to his feet. "Fuck it. I'm getting Stark."

"What?"

Szayel shook his head, looking at Grimmjow with scowl. "He's stronger than you are on a good day, and you are not having a good day." He spun on his heel and walked toward the door.

"Hey," Grimmjow weakly called after him. "Wait. Pink! Hold on."

His hand on the door, Szayel stopped, listening to the Sexta Espada gasp for the air to keep arguing. Szayel wasn't sure what Grimmjow was upset about now, but he sounded just a touch desperate.

"Okay," he panted, still fighting for air as he leaned back against the wall. "You win, you win."

Szayel turned to face Grimmjow, struggling to keep the disbelief from his face. Anxiety was a possible side effect, but this didn't seem right. Still, he was an opportunist if nothing else. "You agree to take this medicine, with food," he emphasized, "as directed, until it's all gone or I take you off of it?"

Grimmjow eyed Ulquiorra's meal with a great deal of hesitation and seemed about to refuse, but a shrug from Szayel changed his mind immediately. "Sure. Whatever. Just..." He scooped the pill from the table and swallowed it with the water. "...you don't need backup, okay?"

"Why?"

It took Grimmjow over a minute to respond, even after he got his breathing back under control. "I ain't too keen on being held down."

"Stark seems to think you took the cough syrup without a struggle." The higher ranking Espada had, in fact, been quite clear on that point. All it had taken was the prospect of winning a game.

"I don't even remember cough syrup," Grimmjow muttered.

"You don't..." Memory loss was common with high fevers, but it wouldn't explain this instance. That he knew of, Grimmjow hadn't even had a fever then, just the cough. "You don't remember it at all?"

Grimmjow folded his arms over his chest and glared at him. "I know I refused to drink that shit when you brought it."

Szayel returned the glare, and shoved the plate nearer to his patient. "And now look where we are." When Grimmjow made no move to take up the spoon, Szayel raised an eyebrow. "You said I won, Grimmjow. You said you'd follow my directions." Szayel paused, and found himself unable to resist getting in a jibe. "Or don't you remember?"

OMAKE:

Thirty minutes later...

Grimmjow wiped his sleeve across his mouth before shoving the plate back into Szayel's hands.

"That's only one bite, Grimmjow. I'm impressed that it took you so long to manage it, but the plate is still full."

"If--" Grimmjow choked back a gag. "If that shit goes down, it ain't staying there."

Szayel sighed. "Oh, come on. We've both got better things to do with our time."

"It's eggs and honey, Szayel," he whined. "Ulquiorra should be shot for creating this."

"Well how about I go get you something else. Then when I come back, you'll eat and try to keep it all down longer than thirty minutes. Sound good?"

Grimmjow shook his head, still holding his stomach. "Not really."

"Fair enough. But you'll do it anyway."

Notes: Yeah, this took forever to update, didn't it? My semester features a writing class this time around, and we've got to write a story every week. So naturally, most of my available writing time is devoted to the stuff that gets graded. Many apologies. Also, many thanks for the reviews that keep me wanting to hoard time for writing this piece. They are all very appreciated.