Author's Note: Despite the INCREDIBLE Armageddon content (btw- I haven't actually yet watched Armageddon I just saw a handful of youtube clips), writing this chapter was a bit of a struggle. Not super inspired. But it's CHRISTMAS EVE (albeit rather late on Christmas Eve) so I gotta give the people a penultimate chapter ;)

Allegra was roused from a fitful slumber by a knock at her door. She groaned, head pounding behind squinting eyelids. Maybe if she just stayed really quiet and pretended she wasn't home, whoever was at the door would just-

Another knock, this one a bit more confident than the hesitant first. Allegra huffed and rolled out of bed, taking her fleece blanket with her to wrap around her shoulders. Who cared how she looked right now? In fact, maybe she'd look so horrible that her unwanted visitor would be scared away and she wouldn't have to deal with him/her/them.

Allegra lethargically unlocked her door and pulled it open, then blinked in surprise at the sight of Chester. Suddenly, she found herself desperately hoping that she didn't look scare-away-level horrible.

"Allegra!" Chester exclaimed, as if startled to find her standing there, despite the fact that this was literally her apartment. "You, um… are you okay?"

"I'm sick," Allegra admitted, sniffing and then shrugging as if that proved her point. "What's up? What're you doing here?"

"Well, um…" Chester fidgeted nervously. "We, um, well… we had planned… you had said… we'd talked about going to the West's Christmas party together?"

"That's today?" Allegra asked. Her brain was so foggy from fever and recent sleep. "What day is it even?"

"The 24th," Chester said. He let out a sigh. "Obviously I'm not going to expect you to come if you're sick. So I'll just… go. Because you should be resting. Because you probably were resting, before I showed up."

He awkwardly rubbed his hands together and Allegra looked at him blankly, trying to figure out why he wasn't already gone if all he was going to do was talk about leaving.

After a few very quiet seconds had past, Chester nodded a few times and then hurriedly backtracked down the hallway. Allegra slowly shut the door and tromped over to the couch. She was awake now; might as well watch a Christmas movie. How was it already Christmas Eve?

She'd barely sat down and properly arranged her blanket to cover every inch of her but her face when there came yet another knock at the door. Growling under her breath, Allegra stomped back towards her entry hall.

"What, Chuck?" she snapped, glaring halfheartedly at him as he stood in her doorway all meek and flustered.

"I felt bad," Chester blurted. "Just leaving you here. People should- they should have someone to take care of them when they're sick! That's what all the fanfictions say, anyway. Not that I read fanfictions. Which is to say, I do, but not like… weird fanfictions there's just some really good DND stuff and there's-"

Allegra turned and walked away from the door, leaving it open. "If you're gonna stay you have to be quiet," she ordered, deciding that she didn't actually mind the idea of company too too much. "I have a headache and you're making it worse."

"Oh!" Chester cried, still much too loudly. "Oh, can I get you an Advil? Or a Tylenol? Or an ibuprofen? I never remember what people should take when they have headaches."

Allegra waved him off and walked back to her couch, squishing herself into the corner in the smallest lump she could manage. Chester took a careful seat next to her, in the other corner, and drummed his fingers on his knees.

"I was gonna watch a movie," Allegra told him, fumbling for the remote. "Do you… have a preference?"

"No, no, whatever you want to watch," Chester told her.

Allegra nodded and selected the first Christmas movie she saw on her Netflix. Her head was aching too much and her mind was too muggy for her to really take anything in. She'd probably just end up falling asleep, despite the fact that Chester was sitting next to her.

Allegra snuck a peek at him. Chester was slowly starting to relax, letting himself lean further and further back into the couch. He kept darting glances at her and smiling to himself, fingers still drumming away.

"Hey, I just realized," Allegra said after a moment. "You're missing the West's Christmas party."

"Oh, it's fine," Chester deflected, waving her off. He grabbed a pillow and hugged it to his chest, peeking at her over the top. "Wouldn't have been any fun without you there, anyway."

Allegra hid a smile behind her blanket-burrito. It was true that the two of them had started spending more and more time hiding in the corner together at the various parties their friends threw, but she knew that he still would have had a good time chatting with Caitlin or Cisco. And yet, he was here, with her, watching… what were they even watching?

Christmas Drop. He was sitting on her couch watching a so far pretty mediocre Christmas romcom with her sick self instead of getting tipsy on Grandma Ester's eggnog surrounded by laughing, boisterous family-friends.

"Hey, Chuck?" Allegra asked quietly. "Are you really disappointed that I couldn't go to the Christmas party with you tonight?"

Chester hesitated, keeping his gaze on the movie. "I mean… you're sick. It's not like you could help it. But yeah, I was a little disappointed. I had, um…"

He shook his head.

"What?" Allegra pressed, reaching her socked foot out from her nest of blankets and giving his leg a nudge. "Go on."

"It's stupid," Chester sighed. "But I had thought that I might kiss you under the mistletoe." He laughed awkwardly, starting to blush. "Crazy, right? You'd hate a cliché like that."

"I… maybe wouldn't," Allegra shrugged, trying to sound casual. "It wouldn't be the worst thing to ever happen to me."

Chester's eyes flitted to her. "Really? So like… you'd be down? To kiss under the mistletoe?"

"There's no mistletoe," Allegra reminded him with a slight laugh.

Chester hurriedly grabbed his phone and Allegra watched with confusion as he typed at the screen. A moment later he turned it around to show her, revealing a picture of a mistletoe from google images.

Allegra let out a genuinely amused laugh. "Careful, Chuck, you'll start seeming desperate."

Chester shrugged sheepishly, the phone slowly lowering. "Sorry, you know I get overexcited."

Allegra shifted on the couch. She wasn't exactly sure where they should go from here. "Um… I mean, I'd kiss you, I guess, but…" She gestured at her face. "I'd probably get you sick."

"That's a risk I'm willing to take," Chester blurted. "Not to, um, keep sounding desperate or anything."

A little awkwardly, Allegra reached over and grabbed his phone, lifting it in the air over their heads. A grin spread across Chester's face and he leaned in, quickly, like he was afraid she'd change her mind. Their lips met for a moment, and then Allegra pulled away.

"Okay," she told him, giving his knee a pat. "I really don't want to get you sick. But… maybe some other time? Or something?"

Still grinning, Chester nodded and sat contentedly back on the couch to finish the movie.

Author's Note: I'm shocked that it's taken like 5 years to work a sickfic into one of these haha. I just felt like Chester is such a techie that it'd be kinda fun to have him use his phone for mistletoe XD

(and we really didn't need another chapter taking place in the West's kitchen entryway where they hang their mistletoe ahaha)