Authors note: This is for TT who asked me to write it. I hope this was what you meant. Thank you to princessozmaofoz for her knowledge and research help. Of course, any mistakes or anything are mine alone. I have thankfully, never had a migraine so I apologise if this is completely off. But I hope you enjoy it anyway.

James Hathaway didn't feel right. He was trying his best to ignore the feeling, but he couldn't deny that he felt rough. He didn't know exactly what was wrong but his vision kept blurring and he was finding it difficult to concentrate. They were working on a difficult case, involving codes and puzzles written in some undecipherable mix of Egyptian Hieroglyphs and shorthand. He'd been up nearly the whole night trying to work it out and he felt dog tired.

Lewis had to say his name three times before he realised he was supposed to respond.

"Sir?" he said finally.

"Are you ok James? You normally have some glib comment ready when I shout at you more than once."

"Fine sir. Just really tired. Did too much research last night." He saw Lewis' sceptical look, but he was grateful that the older man didn't push the point. He didn't want to admit he was ill, he knew how badly the inspector wanted to get this killer.

"If you're sure lad? Maybe you should go home earlier today."

"I'll be fine sir. I'll go home when we catch this bastard." Lewis gave a soft snort of amusement.

"You won't be any good if you're too tired to run after him sergeant."

"I know sir. I promise that I'll get a good nights sleep tonight." James replied, hoping that this would get his friend to drop it. He watched Lewis merely raise a resigned eyebrow and then look back at his paperwork.

…

It was about an hour later when Lewis decided that he needed some sort of caffeine fix to get through the next part of the day.

"Fancy a coffee James?...James?" The younger man didn't answer straight away, instead rubbing a hand across his forehead.

"What? Oh, er Coffee, er, no thanks sir." Lewis gave him a searching look.

"Are you sure you're ok?"

"Yes. Just got a bit of headache that's all." Robbie shrugged and left the office, deciding that the younger man was in need of some water.

.

When he returned, his sergeant was slumped over the desk. At first Lewis had just thought he was asleep, but the lines of pain on his face told him that something more sinister was going on.

"James? James? Lad, are you alright?"Robbie couldn't keep the worry from his voice. No discernible answer was forthcoming, apart from a mumble from the younger man. Lewis crouched down to his sergeant and laid a hand on James' shoulder.

"Jim, what's wrong? Come on son, how can I help you if you won't tell me?"

"Head. Hurtss." James ground out. Lewis was immediately concerned. Very rarely did James slur his speech like that, and never without the aid of several beers.

He squeezed James' shoulder and attempted to sit him up, but Hathaway cried out and tried to put his head back on the desk.

"Not moving"

"Please James, we've gotta get you home."

"No!...Hurtss to move" Lewis was more than concerned now, he was close to panic. He didn't know what was wrong and James didn't seem able to tell him.

"Ok" Lewis said, mindful to keep his voice low, since noise seemed to be making James worse. "What do you need?"

"Nothing. Just want tto ssleep."

"You can't stay here like this Jim. Come on, let me take you home." James groaned and stayed in the position he was in, hunched over his desk.

"Sir. Can't. Please"

Lewis was at a loss of what to do but he couldn't just stand by and leave the younger man to it. He settled on pulling his chair over to Hathaway's and putting his hand on the sergeants back, gently rubbing circles on it. He wasn't sure if he was doing any good but James hadn't told him to stop and he'd ceased groaning in pain.

That was how Innocent found them when she walked past ten minutes later. At first she thought James was crying, but she dismissed this almost immediately. Even if James did feel safe crying in front of Lewis (which she somewhat doubted), he wouldn't in the station. It was Lewis' look that made her knock on the door though. He looked panicked. Uncertainty and apprehension all rolled into one. Lewis' head shot up, and James' tried to burrow into the desk.

"Ma'am?"

"Lewis. What's going on? You don't look like you're working." She said it softly, she wasn't annoyed with them, evidently something was wrong with the youngest member of the duo.

"S'James Ma'am. He won't say what's wrong. He won't let me take him home I don't know what to do." Jean could hear the fear in the inspectors voice and she smiled to herself. Robbie Lewis cared too much. Not that she'd have him any other way.

"What's he said then?"

"Said his head hurts, and he's been slurring his speech." Jean bent down so she was at eye level to James. Or would have been if he'd had his eyes open and his head wasn't facing the desk.

"James? How do you feel now?" He didn't answer and Jean began to have a sneaking suspicion as to what was wrong. She turned to Lewis.

"He's having a migraine Robbie. That would explain why he wouldn't let you move him." Lewis relaxed a little now that he had some idea what was going on.

"What do we do? I don't know, I've never had a migraine." Jean quickly went into care-mode.

"Draw the blinds Robbie. And turn the computers off. And the light." Lewis quickly complied, acutely aware that James hadn't so much as moved since Jean had tried to talk to him.

Jean had returned to her office briefly, to get some pain killers (she kept some in her desk ever since the fiasco Hathaway had created over the Hugh Mallory case), and a cup of water for the young sergeant. So for the moment, Lewis was sat in the office on his own with Hathaway. Even now that he knew what was wrong, Lewis felt uncomfortable. He still didn't know what to do. He wanted to talk to Hathaway, to try and make him feel better, but he couldn't be sure that that would make his sergeant's pain worse. He decided that all he could do was put a hand on the lad's back and be ready to help him if he needed it. For his part, James hadn't moved or made any comprehensible sound since Jean Innocent had left the room. He continued to rest his head on the desk, the odd moan leaving his lips.

Eventually, Innocent came back with the water and painkillers and between them, Robbie and Jean managed to coax Hathaway into moving enough to take them. Robbie had a moment of genuine panic when James carried out an instinctive action and knocked his head back to take the pills, which resulted in him nearly passing out. Rather than try to get James to move, Jean sent Lewis out of the office to find some sort of blanket.

Lewis returned after 10 minutes carrying a two blankets.

"Ma'am? Is he any better?"

"Not really Robbie. He could be like this for 48 odd hours...Why do you have two blankets?" Lewis gazed down at his hands, worry still on his face from Innocent's revelation.

"What?...Er, oh, I thought I could make one into a pillow?" Jean smiled at him, trust the older man to think of something like that.

Ten minutes later and they had James settled, head resting on a folded up blanket, and the other blanket draped over him, to combat the chill of lying on the floor. The combination of tiredness and the medication he had taken meant that James soon fell into a fitful sleep. Lewis and Innocent stayed as quiet as they could, talking in hushed whispers. Innocent sat on the edge of James desk, whereas Robbie opted to sit on the floor against the wall nearby to Hathaway's head. Part of Innocent wanted to gently remind the inspector that his back was going to really hurt when he got up, but she knew him well enough to know that he'd insist he'd be fine. And that when something was wrong with James, the inspector didn't think of himself. That much was evident from the way that he'd run into a burning building to save the young sergeant.

"How long do you think it'll last ma'am?"

"The headache?" Lewis nodded and Jean could see the worry in his eyes. It was sweet, after all, it was only a migraine. Of course they were very painful and they were hellish to go through, but they weren't life threatening. But Robbie was acting as if James was gravely ill. Jean supposed it was one of those things that he just didn't have any experience of, and as such, it scared him more than it should. She however, did have experience of them and could fully sympathise with Hathaway's predicament.

"Yes ma'am."

"I don't know Robbie, it varies from person to person. Hopefully, when he wakes up, it'll have eased off a bit."

"And then?"

"And then I suggest you take him home and make him go to bed. And I mean bed Lewis, not the sofa. Darken the room as best you can and give him some more painkillers."

"Right..." the inspector paused, watching the sleeping man. "Blimey, he could be my Ken lying there like that. He's only a couple of years older and the amount of times I woke up to find Ken asleep on me bedroom floor after he'd had a nightmare...". He trailed off, realising what he was implying to the woman beside him. Not that it really mattered. He did see James as a son, and it wasn't like Jean Innocent would disapprove, she'd probably be the first to agree that the lad needed it. He needed a father figure, needed someone to look after him. It never once occurred to Robbie that there was no one to do the same for him. It never once occurred to him that James Hathaway was trying to do the same for him.

An hour later, Hathaway stirred. Innocent had already gone back to her office, albeit reluctantly. She had wanted to stay and make sure that the man was ok, but she had a police station to run. Lewis was still sat on the floor near to his head and he was instantly watching the younger man.

James shifted slightly as he blinked his eyes open, coming alert when he realised that the ceiling he was staring at wasn't his own. Heavy lidded, he looked around in the confusion that newly awakened people do. Lewis watched all this, smiling slightly at seeing Hathaway at his most...Hathaway-ish. That's when people are most like themselves;when they first wake up, before they project the version of themselves that they want people to see. Lewis couldn't help but think that James looked like a kid when he first woke up. Although Robbie had to admit to himself it was probably Hathaway's cropped hair and the way he was almost curled into the foetal position that did it.

"Sir?", James croaked. Lewis could almost see the rest of the question in his eyes; 'What am I doing lying on the station floor wrapped in a cell blanket?'

"Jim. How're you feeling?"

"Like someone's had my head in a vice for the last 4 hours." Lewis took the fact that Hathaway speaking quietly to mean that he still had a headache. Not as bad as before, because James had moved his head around so that he could see the inspector, and he was no longer slurring his speech.

"How's your head?"

"...Pounding. Could easily sleep another twelve hours." Lewis smiled softly behind him.

"Well lad, you can't spend another twelve hours there. You up to moving?"

"Er...one way to find out?" James did not look thrilled at the prospect. Lewis stood up, groaning as his back protested at being leant against a cold, hard wall for at least an hour and a half. As he went to grab the as yet untouched water, he saw James gingerly sit up. He also saw the colour drain from the younger man's face. Robbie quickly went back to where James was, crouching down and making sure he'd be there to catch James if he passed out again.

"Easy kidda. Take it easy." With Robbie's help, James managed to stand up and sit in a computer chair without passing out.

"Ugh. Feel sick sir."

"Have a drink. Just sip it mind, or you will throw up." James nodded and Lewis watched to make sure he really did drink, before grabbing the blankets of the floor and folding them up ready to be taken back down to the cells. He then waited for ten minutes to make sure that James actually kept the water he'd drunk down.

"Will you be alright James? I've gotta go and tell Innocent that I'm taking you home."

"No need sir. I'm ok."

"You said that before lad, and then you went and pretty much collapsed. Forgive me if I don't believe you" Lewis replied dryly. "Anyway Innocent will want to know you're a bit better. She was worried about you."

"I'm sure I'll be ok for ten minutes sir. There's really no need to take-" Lewis cut him off with a hand in the air.

"There is absolutely no way, I am letting you go home under your own steam." James was just about to reply when Lewis carried on, in a slightly more passive tone. "And besides, what happens if I let you drive back and you black out at the wheel eh? You could kill more people than just yourself."

James clearly hadn't thought that far ahead and his eyes widened a little as he took in what Lewis had just said to him.

"Oh..." he said quietly.

"Oh indeed. Get anything you need to take back with you, I'm gonna go and see Innocent."

.

"Ma'am?" Lewis poked his head around the door as he knocked on it. Jean beckoned him in.

"Robbie. How is he?" She could see from the more relaxed look on the inspectors face that nothing bad had happened since she'd left.

"He's awake. He says he feels sick, but I think the headaches eased a bit."

"That's good. Did he get up?"

"Yes. I mean, he was a little shaky but he is sitting in the chair now. I'm gonna take him home."

"I think that's for the best Robbie. I'm glad he's feeling a bit better though, I've known people to have a migraine like that for over 24 hours." it was Lewis' turn for his eyes to widen.

"Twenty four...bloody hell!"

"Indeed on, go and take that boy home." Lewis grinned and nodded before leaving, closing the door behind him.

.

"Come on champ, up you get." James raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment. He didn't feel up to banter. He was unbelievably grateful for Lewis' steadying hand on his shoulder as he got up, his legs felt like jelly.

"You alright?"

"Think so sir. Feel like I've just run a thousand metres."

"Cuppa tea and bed that's what you need Jim."

"Sounds bloody amazing right now."

.

It had taken them a little while to get to the car. James' headache hadn't been as gone as they'd thought it had. And they had to stop for him to throw up twice on the way home. But eventually they got back to James house. Hathaway leaned against the door frame with his eyes closed as Lewis took his keys off him and let them both in.

James went to sit on the sofa, but Lewis grabbed his shoulder gently.

"If you sit down there, we'll never get you upstairs. Come on." James grinned tiredly and went up to his room, while Lewis readied a cup of water and the painkillers to take upstairs.

When Lewis went upstairs, James was already lying on his bed. Robbie chuckled as he realised that Hathaway hadn't even gotten out of his shirt, although he did appear to have taken his trousers and tie off. When he walked into the room, James stirred.

"Wa'n't 'sleep sir."

"Course you weren't lad. Come on. Take the painkillers and then get some sleep." James nodded sleepily as he took the proffered drink and pills. Lewis pulled the duvet over the semi-conscious young man and then retired to the sofa. He didn't think Jim would mind. And he'd forgotten to ask Innocent if migraines could get better and then worse. He felt it'd be better to be safe than sorry.

.

In the morning, James came downstairs, just as Lewis was starting to make tea.

"Sir, you didn't have to stay."

"Morning to you too" Robbie said, grinning. "Feelin' better?"

"Much better sir...Thank you."

"Don't mention it Jim. Now, get some food into you and I'll give you a lift to the station to get your car." James smiled.

"Thank you sir. Really you didn't have to-"

"I told you. Don't mention it. Just next time you feel ill Jim..." Robbie's face turned serious, and for a split second, James saw the fear that Lewis had felt when he'd passed out.

"Next time, tell me before it gets that bad eh? Too many experiences like that, seeing you slumped over the desk, slurring your speech an' all. Not good for old blokes like me." James nodded, suitably chastised at the worry he had caused by trying to work through a migraine. But a little part of him was staggered by the care the older man had shown for him.

"Promise sir." It was the least he could do. And he fully intended to do more. Namely cook them both breakfast.

"Good lad."

James smiled as he began to make an omelette. He felt better, he was ready for a day at work and he knew he had friends he could count on.

It didn't stop him slipping the painkillers into his pocket though.

Just in case.