Author's Note: This story idea came out of nowhere. So, here goes nothing.
Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to House M.D. and this story is just a product of my imagination.
He lurked about the shadows in the day. He came forth to taunt her at night.
Her parents had always dismissed her sightings as the product of either a far-fetched invention from an attention-seeking child or a rich imagination from a bored child.
"Dad, who's that?" She would ask, pointing with her tiny index finger at the dark figure standing in the corner of the living room.
"What are you talking about, sweetie? There's no one there." He would reply, staring down at the wide-eyed little girl attached to his side.
He had followed her, haunted her for as long as she could remember. He was the constant reminder of something she could not escape.
"Is there something interesting in your mug?" The sound of a familiar voice pulled Thirteen out of her spiral of thoughts.
She looked up to see Taub staring inquisitively at her.
"No, I was just... daydreaming."
He always had a way of invading her mind, with a hypnotizing dream or a horrifying nightmare. She set down the cup of coffee in her hands onto the glass table and grimaced as she pushed it aside. The colour of the beverage reminding her of him.
"I sure hope it involves some hot girl-on-girl action." House said as he hobbled through the door.
Everyone in the conference room perked up once the great diagnostician announced his arrival.
"So do I." She breathed out.
"Why? Not getting any lately?" House mocked. His facial expression was one made of artificial sympathy.
She merely stared at her boss with a blank expression as if she had her soul sucked out of her.
"Do we have a case or what?" Foreman asked impatiently. His facial expression was one made of artificial intelligence.
House narrowed one of his eyes at Thirteen, waiting for a response that never came. After about five seconds of a stare-off contest, he gave up.
"12 year-old boy with spiking fever, congested chest, coughed up green sputum, pain in breathing and an odd little rash, a papular lesion on his arm. Go." He said as he wrote down the list of symptoms on the white board.
"Pneumonia." Kutner suggested.
House stopped his writing and turned to stare at him with a look of disbelief plastered all over his face. "Yeah. Like I would take a case with a diagnosis of pneumonia. Next."
"Pneumonia wouldn't explain the lesion anyway. Could be Legionnaire's disease." Taub chipped in.
Thirteen shook her head. "What if we're thinking about this backwards? The rash could have come first, caused the pneumonia. Tick bites. We're in New Jersey so it's most likely Lyme disease."
House nodded in accord. "Give him fluids and cefuroxime. And biopsy that rash."
His team of do-gooders then shuffled out of the room to carry out his orders.
As they strode down the hallway to their patient's room, several nurses rushed past them into another room and they struggled to get out of the way, with Kutner narrowly avoiding the one pushing the crash cart.
Thirteen glanced into the room out of curiosity and she stopped dead in her tracks.
There he was again.
He was standing by the bedside. A nurse was standing in that exact same spot, but she overlapped his presence.
Thirteen stared at him, spellbound by the dark figure.
Her surroundings had gone quiet and everything was happening in slow motion. She felt herself drawn towards him.
She heard her own heart pounding hard against her chest. The only difference from usual circumstance was that the sound of it was amplified a hundred times. Her ear drums vibrated painfully with each thump.
He reached his arm out, summoning her forward.
She tried to resist the beckoning call, but he was getting closer and closer and closer...
"Thirteen!"
She staggered back a step as if reality was slammed right back into her. She stared wide-eye at Foreman, who had just shouted her nickname, as she tried to get a grip of herself.
Suddenly, the mess of noise from her surroundings reverberated into her ears all at once, like waves of sonic boom. She pressed her hands against her ears, trying to block them out. Her features scrunching together in agony.
Her eyes shot opened when her hearing had reverted back to normal and came upon the concerned faces of her fellow team members.
"Hey, are you alright? What happened?" Kutner asked, frowning.
"Yeah, yeah. I'm okay." She replied, panting heavily.
Thirteen snapped her sight back to him, but he was gone.
The monotonous sound of a heart monitor flat-lining resonated from the room. She squeezed her eyes shut in exasperation.
There went another one.
"Are you sure?" Taub asked, utterly unconvinced by the assurance.
"I am." She said as she nodded. "Let's go. We have a rash to biopsy."
She stepped out of the small crowd and moved towards their patient's room in resolution. But when she noticed only her shadow following behind, she turned back.
The other three doctors were standing rooted in their spots, staring at her in incredulity.
"I think maybe you should rest for a bit, get yourself check out in the ER. We don't know what happen to you. It could be serious." Foreman spoke.
"I've already said I'm okay. I don't need to be check out."
She knew exactly what had happened to her.
"You don't know that. Why don't just get yourself down to the ER and get an all-clear from one of the doctors, then I'll let you continue working. Otherwise, go home and get some rest." Foreman replied in full authority mode.
"Fine." She stated simply before turning on her heels and made her way down to the ER.
Thirteen sat on the bed in the ER, waiting impatiently for one of the doctors to tend to her.
She hated being in the ER. She just wanted to get the hell out of there as soon as possible. And fortunately for her, she knew there was nothing physical wrong with her, so getting the all-clear was not going to be that big of a problem.
As her mind drifted back to the incident earlier, she mentally reprimanded herself for putting herself in such a vulnerable position again. She should have known better.
She clearly remembered the first time she felt the unnatural pull towards him. It was the day her mother died.
Her father was holding her close to his side as they stood by the door of her mother's room in the care facility.
Doctors and nurses were rushing in and out, trying to delay the inevitable.
He was standing there by her bed, looking down at the woman.
"Dad, it's him again. Right there, by mum's bed." She said, pointing in the direction of the dark figure.
"Remy, would you just stop your nonsense! Your mum is dying for god's sake!" He yelled, tears streaming down his cheeks.
She stared at him, wondering what he was going to do.
In a blink, he had turned towards her. She didn't even see him move.
She continued to stare straight at him, unable to look away. Her surroundings were disappearing, noises were fading away. She felt herself slowly floating up into the air, losing all control of her body.
Then, bam!
She was back in the room again. Only this time, her mother wasn't. She was lying still on the bed. No flailing. No screaming. No thrashing. Nothing. She was dead.
Remy caught a final glimpse of her before she and him disappeared together. Vanished into thin air.
She was happy. The person she hated the most in the world gone along with the thing she hated the most in the world, or so she had thought.
Thirteen realized now that her mother had probably saved her from him.
The Grim Reaper.
Yes, that's right. The Grim Reaper.
Now that this is out of my system, I can turn my attention back to my other story. But do let me know what you think!
