Only the dumbest of the dumbs would catch a cold in the middle of summer, they say.

Lu Han couldn’t agree to this. He is, or was (if that mattered), a student of Yonsei University of South Korea. They say those who study in Yonsei University are clever. He is not by any means a bookworm, but he is clever.

I can even solve a rubik cube in less than a minute!

He just couldn’t be a dumb, could he?

Nevertheless, his body was hot and the weather was hot and Tao forced him to just cuddle under the blankets and sleep tight, gege. Sleep will make you feel better. He felt good the next minute and about to drift off but Tao’s who did turn on the air cooler? Gege is catching a cold. Don’t worry Lu Han ge, I’ll just turn it off so it wouldn’t be chill here and you can sleep tight.

Minutes onwards, Lu Han was in dilemma of throwing his blankets off his bed and put them back on just because. Finally he could sleep in the next hour due to exhaustion and frustration.

He woke up in sweat and wow, he did feel better. His headache was subsiding but his body smell like sweat, his sweat, so he didn’t mind. However, Tao came to his room (apparently he came every 15 minutes after he fell asleep just to check on him) and shrieked then dragged him to the bathroom to have cat-bath. How the hell do I do this cat bath? But he shrugged and just proceeded to clean the sweat off his body and changed into clean clothes. Tao smiled and patted his head and he sighed in relief.

He really didn’t know how or why, but he got worse the next day.

Lu Han thought, maybe the viruses were female, thus they chose his cells as their host cells to do replication or multiplication or whatever they call that activity is as a substitution to their inability to kiss him, as a form of sulking to their fate to being viruses, not being human so they would be able to kiss him.

Lu Han was a very vocal person, hence he told his thought to his best friend of the millennia, Zhang Yixing.

“How would you know?” came Yixing’s answer, Lu Han shrugged.

“I don’t know. I….” cough, “wait,” his throat felt so itchy that he almost asked Yixing to help him to scratch it. He opted to satiate his throat’s desire to cough for two minute-long. Yixing was being a good best friend for bringing him warm mineral water from the kitchen. Lu Han muttered a muffled thanks before chugged it all down his gut. His throat felt itchy no more. Oh holy healer unicorn.

 “Okay, where were we?”

“How would you know?”

“Oh,” Lu Han shrugged. “I don’t know. I am suffering flu right now, don’t give me difficult question.”

“Well, in all I know, those viruses could be male, you know, mistaken you as a female.”

“But Yixing, male viruses do not replicate. I won’t be lying here right now had those viruses been male.” Cough cough.

Yixing thought, Lu Han was not aware of being dumb. But being a polite person that he was (the truth is, he was just in polite mood at the moment), Yixing could not voice it aloud to Lu Han because he is younger, and Lu Han is older, so he sought a medium to voice his thought out loud to Lu Han. Only one person on entire EXO planet that could help him, named Kim Minseok. His face was as deceiving as Lu Han’s and they were only a month apart, but that would do.

Yixing called Minseok over to their room—his and Lu Han’s, and asked the deer to repeat what he had told him before. Lu Han deadpanned.

“…forget it.”

“I insist.”

Lu Han reiterated his sentence because he loved his best friend of the millennia so much, but that didn’t stop him from throwing a pillow or two or one more straight onto Yixing’s goofy face. Before Yixing could whisper his remarks to Minseok’s ears, though, the eldest of the three face-palmed, not sure who was the dumb and who was the dumber. He so desperately wanted to tell the dumb and the dumber that virus has no gender and they can multiple all they want. Being the eldest, he opted to calm himself with a long sigh.

“That’s it. We’re back to Korea. You are on your way to delirium.”

Щ(•д•Щ

Apparently, Influenza virus was attacking Lu Han, rendered him sneezing twice on the first day, sneezing multiple times and coughing on the third day, wearing a masker by the fourth day, and finally unable to fill everyone’s ears with his melodious voice starting from the sixth day of suffering the flu. EXO was in a big trouble, especially EXO-M. Some schedules were delayed, some were even canceled due to Lu Han’s condition; not being able to perform on stage. Their managers received countless calls of complaints and protests, but not all of them were harsh and bitter words, many people called to express their concerns and wishes for Lu Han’s well-being, too.

“Hyung, you came.” Sehun’s voice penetrated his ears faster than his eyes could catch the crescent eyes that now zoomed in his view. Sehun was stepping closer. Lu Han panicked and jumped a few steps out the door, knocking a dazed Yixing in the process.

“No, don’t!” his words were muffled by his masker—not the masker with leopard print in it, but the one for infection-prevention purpose. Kris was persistent in making him wear those breath-taking maskers. Seriously, they were breath-taking, they made him hard to breath. Do not spread the infection, he remembered Kris had said. That was why he was now hiding behind the wall, only his head with his infamous apple hair jutting out the doorframe. His hand closed around his mouth to prevent the virus from flying out on every occasional cough. A masker and a hand, having two protections was better, just in case.

“Don’t come close, Sehuna.” Cough cough

Seeing crestfallen expression on Sehun’s face (not really, because Sehun was a forever-and-ever poker-face. Lu Han was seeing the inner face of the maknae), he quickly added, “It’s,” Achooo “infectious.” And that glimmer was back in Sehun’s eyes.

Needless to say, Sehun was touched. His every cell trembled with warmth and goosebumps make an appearance all over his body. From now on, a promise was made, and he was in for a mission.

Щ(•д•Щ

Step one.

Lu Han woke up to an unusually quiet room. Like yesterday, he was in sweat and thirsty and his throat was itchy. Glancing sideways, he eyed an empty glass on the bedside table. He groaned and tried to climb out of bed to get a glass of water in the kitchen. The closer he got to the door, the more he realized that not only the room was quiet, but also the dorm.

“Huh why is it so quiet?” He checked at the alarm clock. It was only 1 pm in the afternoon. He had gone straight to dreamland not long after their arrival, avoiding his bandmates so they wouldn’t get infected.  But it was far too quiet at this hour.

Are they already taking a nap? No, Yixing and Minseok don’t usually need a nap, so there should be their uproarious laugh somewhere.

Shrugging, he proceeded to open the door and turned the knob when he found that it couldn’t be opened.

“Huh?”

He tried to turn the knob twice more.

“What the hell,”

He tried harder, but it wouldn’t budge.

“Oh no,”

He knocked on the door hard, no response. He banged the door harder, and all answered him was silence.

He tried screaming his friends’ names. “Minseok! Yixing! Kris! Sehun! Joonmyun!” by half the members, his voice was starting to come hoarse and disappear two seconds after, his desperate scream of “I need water...” couldn’t be heard even by himself.

Two hours later, gasps echoed throughout the room brought him back to consciousness and the last thing he saw before falling asleep again was Sehun cowering behind Kris and backing off to his own room.

Step two.

“Hyuuuuuuung~~~ Look! I made porridge for you!” Sehun stomping into his room didn’t help his aching skull at all, but a wide grin and his eye-smiles did make a smile form on his face nonetheless.

“Oh, really?” Lu Han gulped. Was his voice like this for a while? Huh, it was horrible.

“It’s okay if you didn’t want to talk for a while, Hyung. You need to take care of your voice.”

Lu Han just smiled in gratitude. “I’m okay.”

He stared at a bowl of something in Sehun’s hands. Curious, he pointed at it. “What is it?”

Sehun’s grin was back. “This is rice porridge! I made it myself.” Sehun grinned proudly and took a spoonful of porridge to Lu Han’s mouth. “Here, say aaaah~”

Lu Han obliged and slowly opened his mouth, welcoming the warm food, his first food for today.

“How is it? How is it? Is it nice? Is it bad?”

Lu Han chewed the food slowly, he couldn’t really tell how it was since his nose was obstructed thus he couldn’t smell anything to rise his appetite. It tasted slightly weird actually, but he didn’t have the heart to tell this excited boy in front of him. Forcing the object into his esophagus, he asked Sehun one thing he was wondering about.

“Um, Sehun, how did you get the rice?”

Well, it was still 7 am for God’s sake and he had never seen Sehun cooked rice or anything in his entire life, except this one. Sehun never woke up before 8 am, never cooked rice, nor would he.

“It is yesterday’s leftover! I kept some for you to make this today! I looked for the recipe-”

Lu Han didn’t hear the entire words as soon as the word leftover left Sehun’s mouth. He stared at the bowl in horror, those traumatic episodes including leftover foods coming back to him. Ignoring his pounding skull, he stormed to the bathroom and there went all contents of his stomach.

Step three.

He felt like burning. He knew he was sleeping and having a nightmare right now. Being restless, hard to breath and endlessly coughing and sniffing were exhausting him. He was having a dream of, as ridiculous as it sounded, being in a large microwave. Then he was being transferred to the earth core where he thought he should have been dead by now because how on earth he could resist six-thousand degree of heat. Then there was a snowflake on his forehead and a moment after it was snowing, and strangely enough, it brought a great comfort and made him serene again.

Some moments later, he woke up on a damp pillow and bed, trembling out of cold. Inspite of his chattering teeth, he smiled when a wet towel fell off his forehead.

Щ(•д•Щ

Sehun was frustrated. They couldn’t go to a doctor because those sasaeng fans weren’t going to leave their dorm anytime soon nor could they bring a doctor in because of some stupid privacy reasons. Lu Han’s condition didn’t get any better and there was a big concert abroad EXO-M had to attend in a week. He stared at his list of Lu Han Hyung Healing Mission wordlessly.

Sighing, he brought a pen to his mouth and opened the cap (yes, he had a slight swag like that) then unwillingly scratch one line of “Make the fever disappear!” over another eight. He scrunched up his nose. Lu Han nearly had frostbites because of that.

First try of “Give the sufferer a rest as much as possible!” was a big disaster. He had tried kicking the members out of the dorm by luring them to a bubble tea treat and even locked the door for Lu Han so that he could rest in peace without the loud members bothering him.

“Give hyung healthy food!” He scoffed. The porridge was even worse. He could have made Lu Han died in poisoning. He shuddered.

Another tries of sneaking Lu Han to the doctor and sneaking a doctor to Lu Han ended up as failures too.

The line “Buy medicine for hyung!” was quickly scratched off after he looked up in the internet about medicines for flu and immediately gave up. He wasn’t very good with medicines and his pretty little head couldn’t accept difficult information like the names, the brands, the effects, the side effects, the ones suitable for Lu Han... meh.

He glared at his list again then spitefully jabbed the poor paper with the pen. His hair already looked like a bird nest from countless scratching and ruffling out of frustration.

He really didn’t know what else to do. The members seem really laid-back about this and Lu Han himself didn’t really seem to mind. But Sehun did mind. Lu Han was his most favorite and precious person to him and he just couldn’t sit back while Lu Han was in great suffering. They couldn’t have bubble tea together (with the members) and play soccer together (with Minseok hyung) and eat together (with Tao) and have a walk together (with Tao again) and everything together. For now, he only could think of one way. And it made him giddy and excited just to think about it.

Seeing Joonmyun was already asleep eons ago, he quietly slid off his room. It was 2 am in the dawn. Lu Han should have been asleep. Alone. The mere thought squeezed Sehun’s chest. Silently, he entered Lu Han’s room and tip-toed to the sleeping figure on the single-sized bed. The table lamp was , and Sehun could make out Lu Han's features in the dim light. His breath was slightly short and seemed restricted. Sehun was torn in guilt. He should have tried harder. What if... What if Lu Han hyung... his Lu Han hyung... (his face heated in his own possessive thought).

“Hyung...” He whispered to the night silently in fear of waking the sleeping deer.

“I’m sorry... I should have tried harder.”

Taking in a deep breath to calm his speeding heart beat, he leaned in, studied the face in front of him for a little while and whispered “please, please get better,”

He then shut his eyes and leaned forward to softly press their lips together.

Щ(•д•Щ

Lu Han woke up the next day with a surprisingly light head, no pounding skull, no itchy throat, no ache, wow. The medicines Minseok brought for him finally did their wonder, and excellently too. He stretched his limbs, feeling like it had been years since he last felt having them. Being in a good mood, he made his bed, humming to Let Out The Beast all the while. A grin crept its way to his face when he heard his voice as clear as the blue sky.

He looked outside, morning dew was still perched upon the leaves outside his window, and the sun was shyly peeking through the buildings outside. He was surprised to see that it was still 7 am in the morning, and seeing it as good as time to work his body, he quickly washed his face, brushed his teeth and changed into sweatpants and a training jacket over his shirt. Just add a cap and he would be all done.

With a happy whistle, he strolled down the hall to Joonmyun and Sehun’s room to drag the maknae out of his slumber. He wanted to make it up to Sehun for avoiding him these past few days and that kid had been really sulky lately so he thought Sehun might cheer up if he showed up to his room and ask him to run together like any other fine days.

Before he reached the room, however, he found a slumping figure on the couch. Out of curiosity, he approached the said figure, tangled in a bundle of duvet. He jerked in surprise and took two steps back when the said figure kicked the duvet angrily to the floor only to wrap it around his body again not more than five seconds after.

He would recognize that angry poker face anywhere. “Sehun? Why are you sleeping here?”

Hearing that soft voice he so desperately wanted to hear since day one of M’s arrival made him sit up in excitement but his throbbing head dragged him to lie back down.

“Ugh," He pressed his fingers onto his temples. "Uh, I was afraid that I'd bother Joonmyun hyung so I slept here. It's really hot in the room anyway, and Joonmyun hyung wouldn't want to turn the air cooler on.”

“What’s wrong?” Lu Han’s voice was thick with concern because Sehun's voice sounded heavier than usual and he rushed to Sehun’s side but the latter quickly jumped off the couch, hiding behind it.

“No! No! Don’t come close! ” Sehun stopped for a while. Staring into Lu Han’s confused orbs in front of him. Despite his hot breath and throbbing head, he felt really happy and relieved and proud. Lu Han did get better. It worked. He did it.

Covering his mouth with the duvet, he looked somewhere else. Cough cough. “Don’t come close, Hyung. It’s...” Achooo! a sniff, “infectious.” His cheeks were flushed behind the duvet remembering that that theory was true.

Momentarily, Lu Han felt like Déjà vu.

***

A/N OMG I'm so happy this fic is finally out sobs