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He was standing in the hallway. He was standing in the hallway outside the radiology lab he’d just left. The radiology lab where Thirteen was likely dying. He should’ve volunteered at the start, he could’ve taken it. Then she wouldn’t be dying right now.
Then an explosion shook the entire floor. He realized the SWAT guys that had run past him in the last minute he’d been standing there had detonated a frame charge. Blown a hole into the wall. He saw men in armour running. Heard men yelling over walkie-talkies. He rushed back inside. Practically ran, for his standards. Fell to his knees next to Thirteen on the ground. Thirteen who was moving, whose eyes were open, who was reacting to his hand touching her shoulder.
“Why are you still alive?”
Her eyes roamed around the room, “He didn’t make me take it.”
Huh. Then they met his. Two tired, dust covered colleagues. Both alive.
“We’ve gotta get you on dialysis...”
He broke eye contact to take in the chaos of his idiot patient getting put in handcuffs behind him and yell into the hallway.
“Can we get a gurney in here!”
“House... I’m gonna be okay...”
“Mhm”, he had one hand on her forehead, the other taking her pulse at her wrist, “I can tell from the erratic heartbeat, the fever and the fact that you can hardly keep your eyes open.”
“...gonna be... fine...”
“Yeah, sure.”, he muttered absently. She was about to pass out. The room was spinning just a little bit for him. She was alive. They were in a hospital, she would live.
Over the ringing in his ears and the blood rushing through his blood vessels, the unmistakeable sound of squeaky gurney wheels faded in, music to his ears. They must have had it ready to go. He turned to find two SWAT members pushing it into the room, flanked by two nurses he recognized but whose names he refused to remember, who looked, frankly, unaffected by the hole blown into the side of the radiology lab, or the SWAT team shouting and arresting a gunman mere meters away. Just another Tuesday in the ER, he supposed.
Cuddy, heels clicking frantically and hair looking charmingly dishevelled in the I just got hit by a shock wave from a controlled yet supremely dusty explosion chique, emerged from the fog directly following the gurney-and-gang.
“Over here!”, he called through the dust, and shuffled away from Thirteen on the floor, out of the way. The able-bodied in the room could handle this part on their own.
Cuddy’s gorgeous and concerned eyes found his over the commotion between them. Her eyebrows drew together ever so slightly. House blinked calmly in response. Relief joined the worry on her face.
By then, the gurney was on the move again. Damn, these people worked fast! He considered telling them they should consider doing this professionally, but by the time he could convince the muscles in his throat to make the movements necessary to produce sound, the bed, Thirteen, the nurses and the grunts were out of sight and hopefully well on their way to nephrology. He continued to stare blankly at the double doors.
“Need a hand?”, his focus snapped back from the door to see Cuddy, now standing over him, somehow looking amused in addition to everything else, offering to pull him up off the dusty ground. Ordinarily, he’d refuse, but since his last Vicodin had been consumed some time in the morning and he was patiently waiting in line for an adrenaline crash, decided to compromise by taking her hand without a word and avoiding eye contact like a mature adult. One soundless grimace later, he was swaying on his feet, shaking off Cuddy’s worried grip on his bicep.
“Thanks, I’m all good now, mom.”
She scoffed. They began a staring contest.
He started limping after Thirteen, hand on his thigh, other hand bracing on the wall whenever there appeared a wall close enough to be braced on. Even Taub and his short little legs could probably outrun him right now. He felt about ready to collapse.
“I can- I can get you a crutch or something, House.”, he ignored her, “House!”
“Nope! See you later!”
He limped out of the room and to the elevators. Watched her watch him from the doorway until the doors broke their line of sight. Pressed the button to the diagnostics floor. Leaned against the wall to take the weight off his leg and keep his ailing balance from knocking him over during the ride.
The doors slid back open. “House!”, not a moment of peace for a poor old cripple in this fucking hospital. At least it was Wilson who’d called out, Cameron’s girly little voice would’ve just worsened his headache. He looked up to see Wilson and the kids approaching him like they would a frightened, pathetic little stray cat they were trying to catch so they could fix it up and give it to some stupid happy family to keep. Unfortunately, he had more important things to do than getting adopted. Like obtaining drugs and taking them.
He started limping slowly down the hallway, hand on his leg. Cameron, flanked by The Other Ones, quickly blocked his way, “Are you okay?”, he blinked at her.
“Peachy.”, he cheered back and started hobbling unsteadily towards his office with renewed vigour.
His posse followed behind like the frightened little ducklings they were.
The hallway past Wilson’s office, the diagnostics office and to his office had never seemed so long. In fact, it felt like it was stretching out before him. And his leg was screaming louder with every step he took.
When it finally gave out, someone’s hands on his shoulders prevented him from falling on his face.
“House!”, Wilson, “You’re pale! Did you get hurt?”
The spinning was back. For a moment, he just breathed. “No, just... coming down from the adrenaline, I think.”, he closed his eyes. “I’m fine!”
Someone was holding him up, Wilson was taking his pulse at his wrist, “Let us help you.”
“I will not be treated like an invalid”, he said without any malice, letting Wilson prop himself under his right shoulder without resistance.
“Where are you even trying to go?”
“My office. Got some paperwork I’ve been meaning to get to, and the life-or-death situation just now really made me shift my priorities.”, he nodded at Wilson mockingly.
“...Right. You love paperwork. And now is the time.”
“Also, it’s where I keep my stash of meds that haven’t been stolen by crazy gunmen.”
Wilson’s eyebrows shot up, “He took your Vicodin?”
House shook his head regretfully, swayed his palm in the air to imply not quite, “Didn’t let me take any in Cuddy’s office, left my jacket behind when we took our little field trip to radiology.”
Cameron spoke up, outraged, “He take your cane, too?”
“Yeah, he was quick for a sick guy”, the fellows exchanged some meaningful looks with each other, the meanings of which House chose to not think about, “also, he had a gun”, more looks. None from Foreman or Chase, as they – he’d just noticed – were not even present.
He raised his eyebrow as Kutner moved to support his other side, “Alright, let’s go.”
Wilson and Kutner took more and more of his weight during the last few steps towards the office, despite House’s (failed, pathetic) attempts to break free and walk by himself. One of the kids held the door for them, and Wilson deposited him unceremoniously (carefully, with care, like he cared) in his lounge chair, where someone, he didn’t care to identify who, only that they were beneath him, helped his feet onto the matching ottoman.
“Where’s your Vicodin?”
House moved to get up, he didn’t need Wilson rummaging through his stuff, “Just let me get it...”, several hands easily pushed him back down into the chair.
“Just tell me where it is and I’ll get it for you.”
“In the drawers.”
He turned his attention to his (former and current) fellows, who were, frankly, hovering in the doorway quite pathetically. “Don’t you guys have stuff to do?”
Cameron spoke up, “We’re worried, we just want to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m fine, nothing happened to me. Thirteen almost died.”
They all just stared at him. He sighed, “Daddy’s okay, go check on your sister. Shoo!”
After they’d shuffled out of the room (with some reluctance that all of them except for Cameron had surely faked for Brownie points) and gotten a reasonable distance towards the elevator, House let himself deflate, closed his eyes and rested the back of his head on the top of the Eames chair’s backrest.
Wilson cleared his throat. He reluctantly cracked open one eye. Wilson, apparently having pulled up a chair next to his at some point since he’d closed his eyes, gave him an unimpressed look, an eyebrow raise, and held out a hand with two Vicodin already out of the bottle. House let him dump the pills into his own shaking hand and swallowed them dry, then accepted the orange prescription bottle they had presumably come from from Wilson and put it in his pocket.
“Quite a lot of these in that drawer”
“Get off my ass, mom, I was just held at gunpoint, what if I’m traumatized?”
“Are you?”
He scoffed, incredulous, “What, you think a little threat of death is enough to give me PTSD? I’ve been shot for real, if you remember.”, and that had been fine. Well, not the shooting itself, that had low-key sucked. Him. He’d been fine, after, and in the time since then. Never any issues.
“I don’t know, we had to put your feet up so you wouldn’t pass out.”, he was sure Wilson was being dramatic. He was just a little tired!
“Okay, much as I’d like to deny it, I do, on occasion, exhibit human physiological responses, such as, producing a shit ton of adrenaline when there is a deadly weapon waved around threateningly in my face.”
“Right.”, Wilson got up.
“Where are you going?”
“To get you some water. You know, for your adrenaline crash, or whatever.”, his raised eyebrows spoke of a different reason. Maybe Wilson had inferred from his Vicodin-abstinence during the day that he’d neglected less important things like ‘Water’ or ‘Food’ and was being caring. How disgusting. Although his mouth felt very dry. And like he’d inhaled a bunch of building dust. Which he had. From when they exploded part of the building next to him.
Wilson came back from the outer diagnostics office with House’s red mug, filled with tap water, and a snickers bar that looked suspiciously like the one House had gotten himself from the vending machine in the clinic with Wilson’s lunch money that morning, and left on his desk to save for the next boring differential of the day before going downstairs to rummage through Cuddy’s desk and then getting stuck in a hostage situation.
He accepted the offerings with a raised eyebrow and opened the wrapper with only minor difficulties.
He had to admit (to himself, not out loud) that he felt significantly less inhuman after he’d eaten the whole thing and drank the mug of lukewarm (apparently Wilson couldn’t be bothered to turn the tap to cold) water. His hands had stopped shaking; the room wasn’t spinning anymore. Wilson looked annoyingly pleased.
He had to get out of here before the man started singing him a lullaby or something equally as terrifying. Heaving himself upright, he waited for the light-headedness to fade, ignored Wilson’s protests, and started back down the hallway.
He got to the Elevator with Wilson on his heels and pressed the button. Wilson had realized he was being ignored and shut up somewhere on the way here. And so, they waited in a silence that couldn’t be called tense but could probably be seen as judgy or perhaps annoying, for the elevator to arrive. When the doors opened, the cabin was already filled with its weight limit in SWAT guys. House squeezed on past a few of them with some misplaced scusees and turned around to shrug smugly at Wilson as if to say what a shame, you’ll have to get the next one, Jimmy, as the doors slid shut again in front of his friend’s raised eyebrows.
Arriving on the ground floor, the sea of heavily armed men carried him into the lobby. He briefly caught a glimpse of Cuddy hovering at the reception in her perfectly ironed skirt suit with her perfectly curled, no longer dusty but still attractively dishevelled hair. He popped another tablet from the prescription bottle in his pocket. Wilson really thought two were enough for the day he’d just had.
He heard the other elevator open and turned around expecting Wilson to step out surrounded by another flock of SWAT guys, but to his surprise, it was his Florida man idiot of a patient who did. Surrounded by a herd of SWAT guys, of course.
He looked... better. As the SWAT guys were handing him over to some regular cop guys, House caught the guy’s eye, put his hand on his diaphragm and pointedly took a deep breath while maintaining eye contact. Florida Man followed his lead and drew in a deep breath. His eyes closed in relief. They’d been right. Well, the guy would soon be able to enjoy breathing in prison. He watched the cops escort him out the front doors with a blank expression. He was tired.
After he’d watched them and around two full floors of guys in helmets and bullet proof vests leave the building, he turned back to the reception to make some clever remarks to Cuddy about the hostage situation and/or her appearance, but she wasn’t there anymore. Oh well, he had come down here to get his cane from her office anyway, so that is the direction he began to stumble in, before being held up by Wilson actually exiting the elevator doors this time and yelling his name.
“House! I got your coat.”, he accepted the garment with a nod and began to shrug it on while continuing his limp towards the clinic doors and Cuddy’s office.
“I’ll go get my cane; you wait in the car.”, he didn’t wait around to see if Wilson obeyed him.
He found Cuddy staring despondently at her destroyed office.
“Tests confirm melioidosis.”, he announced, “Easy to miss on the stain.”
“Scans and X-Rays- “, he bent down painfully to pick up the discarded cane from the floor where Florida Man had thrown it, “-vary widely...-”
“Is that all you care about?”, oh, she was mad, lecture probably incoming. He inspected his cane for damage while she said various other sentences he let wash over himself without listening.
“If he hadn’t done what he did, he’d be dead.”, he shot back. It probably was a fitting reply to whatever she’d said, “good thing you enabled my every medical move.”
That made her visibly insecure, “You think I handled this differently because you were in here?”
He played dumb, “I dunno. Let’s try it again without me.”
She looked upset, “This is why you and I can’t be a thing.”
“If you’re suggesting that you screwed up because of a non-relationship with me, I dunno how I can help you.”, honestly, what did she want from him, it wasn’t like this situation was going to happen again, “’Cause the only change you can make from a non-relationship is.......”
Did she look kind of horrified? “You want a relationship?”, was that really a surprising revelation to her?
“God no”, he deadpanned, “just trying to follow your logic.”
They stared at each other. He turned to leave.
“House?”, he looked back at her over his shoulder, “Is someone making sure you get home alright?”
“Oh, I’m sure Wilson’s around here somewhere.”, he mimed looking around searchingly.
She gave him a pained smile and a nod and sat down at her desk. He lingered outside her door so he could witness her set off the trap he’d set that morning before the man with the gun had shown up, then fled before she could process what had happened and yell at him some more.
Wilson, trusting fool that he was, was probably waiting by his car by now, but House had to check on one last thing before he called it a night. He limped back to the elevator and took it to nephrology. Walking was easier again now that the Vicodin had kicked in, he had his cane back and wasn’t dehydrated and hypoglycaemic anymore, but it still wasn’t exactly a joyride. Once he found the room that housed Thirteen, he sat down on a conveniently placed bench opposite the glass doors. The blinds were open, and he could see the dialysis machine and hear its pumps working. Thirteen was awake and quietly talking to Foreman, who was by her bedside. Kutner and Taub were lingering in the visitor chairs, playing a video game and reading the newspaper, respectively. None of them noticed him. Cameron had to have gone home, or back to the ER, her domain.
He watched the curves on Thirteen’s heart monitor for a long time.
“Hey”, oh great, Wilson had found him.
“She’s going to be okay.”, yeah right. The woman had less than ten years to live and was risking her life any chance she got. Sure, she’d be fine. Not that he cared.
“She almost wasn’t.”, not that he cared.
“Sure, but she is going to be okay!”
“It was my fault she almost died.”, he didn’t care.
“Well, then I guess you learned your lesson for the next time a patient points a gun at you”, Wilson was getting impatient, “C’mon, let’s get you home.”
“Seems like it’s becoming a regular occurrence at this hospital, doesn’t it?”
Wilson snorted. He pushed himself up from the bench and started limping slowly back towards the elevator. Wilson fell into step beside him.
“You got any food at your house?”
“Do you even know me at all?”
“Alright, I’ll pick up some Thai on the way.”
“My hero.”