Brought Together Chapter 31:

Fever

Ichigo came back to Kisshu with a plate of fried rice, and said, "I got some for you."

Kisshu tried to sit up, but soon learned that he couldn't even push himself up on his elbows, much less fully sit up. Ichigo put the plate to one side, and helped Kisshu sit up. She then leaned him against the headboard of the bed, and asked, "Do you think you can eat, or should I help you?"

"I'm not sure I can use chopsticks," Kisshu admitted. "Sorry."

"It's fine," Ichigo said. "Open up." Kisshu obeyed, and Ichigo started to feed him the fried rice. About halfway through, however, Kisshu sighed.

"I'm not really hungry anymore," he said. "It was really good though."

"Okay," Ichigo said. "You should get more sleep, it'll help you recover." She helped him lie back down and pulled the covers over him. Soon after, Kisshu was asleep, and Ichigo quietly got up, and took the plate downstairs.

The others were relaxing in the main room, and they looked up as Ichigo came in. "How's Kisshu?" Yuki asked.

"He's asleep," Ichigo replied. "He ate some of this, but then said he wasn't hungry anymore."

"When do you think he'll be back to full strength?" Pai asked.

"I think it's going to be quite a while," Ichigo admitted. "He can't even push himself up right now, much less sit up."

"I told Kuro-sama that we healed his amnesia," Pai said. "He said that you may take as much time as you need to help Kisshu recover."

"That's a relief," Ichigo said. "I'm glad we reversed the amnesia, though, that could have been bad."

"I agree," Pai said.

"I'm going to go check on Kisshu, so I'll see you later," Ichigo said. The others nodded, and Ichigo teleported off to Kisshu's room.

When she got there, what she saw worried her. Kisshu's cheeks were flushed, and as she watched, he started coughing. She went to his side and put a hand on his forehead. She almost immediately took her hand away. Kisshu was burning up.

This is bad, she thought. He's too weak to fight off a sickness. Suddenly she had an idea. She sat down next to Kisshu, and put one hand on his chest and the other on his forehead. She concentrated, feeling how to cure the fever. Suddenly her eyes snapped open. This fever might be more than I can handle, Ichigo thought, worried. She got up and teleported downstairs to find Pai.

He was in the main room, and looked up. "What's wrong, Ichigo?" he asked.

"Kisshu has a really bad fever," Ichigo said. "I'm not sure I can handle it alone. Will you help me?"

"Of course," Pai said. "Let's go."

The two of them teleported to Kisshu's room, and went over to the bed. Kisshu was still sleeping. Pai put a hand on his forehead, and his eyes widened. "We should do this quickly," he said. "He's in very bad shape."

Ichigo nodded, and sat down on one side of the bed. Pai sat down on the other, and Ichigo placed one hand on Kisshu's chest and the other on his forehead. Pai did the same, and both closed their eyes. Then they combined their powers, focusing on healing Kisshu's fever. Suddenly Kisshu started gasping for air. Pai and Ichigo poured more power into their healing, and Kisshu's breathing returned to normal. Then Pai and Ichigo went back to trying to bring Kisshu's fever down, which was proving very difficult.

Eventually they managed to get the fever down a few degrees, but it was still there. "I'm going to go get the medicine," Pai said. "We both obviously don't have enough power to deal with this. Try to wake him up, I'll be back soon."

"Got it," Ichigo said. She started trying to wake Kisshu up as Pai teleported out. After shaking him didn't work, she tried the healing trick Pai had shown her. That seemed to work, but she had to do it twice before Kisshu was actually awake.

When Ichigo saw that Kisshu was awake, she said, "Kisshu, Pai's getting the fever medication for you."

"I feel awful," Kisshu said weakly.

"I'm not surprised, your temperature was nine degrees above normal and it took almost everything Pai and I had to get it down to two degrees above normal," Ichigo said. "That's why Pai's getting the fever medication. We don't have enough power left to completely cure you."

Just then, Pai teleported in with a bottle and a spoon. "Kisshu, I'm giving you two spoonfuls this time," he said. "I think it'll help."

"Okay," Kisshu said weakly.

Pai tipped some of the medicine onto the spoon, and held it out to Kisshu, who swallowed it. Pai then gave him another spoonful. Kisshu swallowed that too, and said, "I'm tired."

"Go to sleep, then," Ichigo said. "You need to rest to recover."

Kisshu was asleep soon after, and Pai left the room, Ichigo following. "After that fever, we're going to need someone to watch him 24/7," Pai said. "Let's go tell the others, and we can work out shifts."

"Okay," Ichigo said. The two went downstairs, and were met by Sakura, Shintaro, Yuki, Hayao, Taruto, and surprisingly, Kuro-sama.

"How is Kisshu?" Kuro-sama asked.

"He's in very bad shape," Pai said. "It took almost everything Ichigo and I had to get his fever down, and it's still not completely gone. He's still very weak, too. He can't even push himself up. I gave him some of the fever medication, and I'm hoping that will help. We need to have someone on call day and night, because he's in such bad shape it's dangerous to leave him alone for too long."

"I understand," Kuro-sama said. "I'm guessing you want people to take shifts watching him, so I'll let all of you who live here off work until Kisshu is better. Please keep me informed on how he's doing."

"I will," Pai said, bowing. "Thank you, Kuro-sama."

Kuro-sama nodded, and the others bowed as well, as Kuro-sama teleported out.

Pai turned to the others and said, "Okay, we need to figure out shifts. I think someone besides me or Ichigo should take the first shift; we just used nearly all of our power to bring Kisshu's fever down."

"That's fine, but where is Ichigo going to sleep?" Sakura asked. "They share a room."

"I'll sleep on the sofa in here," Ichigo said. "Pai, how long should our shifts be?"

"I'd say three hours," Pai said. "Taruto, will you take the first shift?"

"Sure," Taruto said. "Who's after me?"

"I think that we should have an order, so it'll be Taruto, Sakura, Mom, Shintaro, Dad, Ichigo, and me," Pai said. "If Kisshu gets worse or something happens, call either myself or Ichigo."

"Hai," the others said. Taruto then teleported up to Kisshu's room, and sat down to watch him.

"Ichigo, you should get some sleep," Pai said. "I'm going to do the same." He turned to the others. "Wake one of us up if something happens," he said.

The others nodded, and Pai and Ichigo went off to get some sleep.

Well, this isn't good. Kisshu's in very bad shape. Plz don't flame me!