The Chronicles of Medic Bob

A Tale of Two Sicknesses

Individual Summary: It's always hard when a sickness makes the rounds of the crew. But when it hits both presenters at once, Bob soon finds he has his hands full dealing with two very different personalities.

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The week before the first episode of I'm a Celebrity usually ran by with a frantic vengeance, flashing before everyone's eyes before they'd even finished their morning cup of coffee. Everyone was always so busy; trying to finish off last minute preparations in the camp and for the show itself, going through and finalising the designs for the bushtucker trials and the other challenges, as well as the general preparations for the arrival of the celebrities.

This week, however, the team ran into some problems.

Thankfully, not creative problems or scheduling issues or anything that would jeopardise the show....well, not entirely.

Someone on the crew had brought with them a nasty stomach bug, and it had quickly been spread around among the rest of the roughly 700 people who worked on the show (although thankfully, not all 700 ended up getting sick).

Because of this, by the time the celebrities arrived in the camp on the 16th of November, the whole crew - and Bob in particular - was particularly worn down and exhausted, but at least no one was sick anymore.

That was, until Ant and Dec arrived for the first show the next day.

If there was anything that Bob had learned during the past many years of working on the show, it was to expect the unexpected when it came to the boys, as well as any potential for illnesses or injuries that they may inflict upon themselves.

Of course, he had been mostly lucky in that they had always gone down separately. Now though, that was going to change.

As the two boys had walked onto the tree-house set that Sunday morning, Bob had immediately sensed that something wasn't quite right about them. When he had seen them yesterday as the celebrities had arrived in the camp, something had seemed off about them, but he hadn't been able to work out exactly what that was.

Today though, it seemed to be staring him right in the face. They were both pale, sweaty, and uncharacteristically quiet. Ant - in particular - seemed much more reserved than usual, and their exhaustion was clear in their voices as they greeted the medic on their way past.

But it was just as the show was about to begin that things really became clear.

They were barely two minutes from going live, when he turned around and saw that both boys had disappeared. Head frantically turning on his shoulders, he was relieved to spy them walking back from behind a large bush beside the road.

Bob's eyes narrowed when he took in their appearances, which had - impressively - worsened from five minutes earlier.

"You boys alright?" he asked when they arrived back at the tree-house, concern increasing when they took a few moments to answer.

"Just a bit of an upset stomach - probably ate something funny for breakfast" Dec replied, forcing a tight smile onto his face.

If Bob hadn't spent the entirety of the last week or so dealing with a lot of fellow crew members who had complained of an "upset stomach", he would have been more inclined to let this go.

However, with the knowledge so helpfully provided by that bug from this week still hanging over his head, Bob had a sneaking suspicion it had decided to take a tasty bite out of the boys as well.

He had no time to say anything however, as the call came a second later for the boys to go down to the bridge for the first link at the top of the show.