A/N: Here it is. The sequel to "Pills, Shots and a Broken Piano" – "The Game of Stone." Please note that this one may have some glaring inaccuracies when it comes to Australia as I've never been and am relying on research and second-hand information. It's pre-"House's Head" and "Wilson's Heart", of course, so out of the arc it's AU.
I'm hoping to tie up quite a few loose ends with this fic. Enjoy!
GHXJW
"I promise," he said. Her last sigh had echoed some time ago, but he felt the need to reaffirm, to give her soul some solace.
It was starting to rain now, rather heavily, with big drops splattering across the windows, paints on a Jackson Pollock canvas, then sliding slowly down to leave a watery trail in their wake. Every invisible drop made a constant noise, like someone smoothing out the kinks in a square of Saran wrap. Gray-white fog tinged the bottom of the windows with opacity, spreading upwards like ivy. The sky was draped with clouds the color of cobalt gunmetal, quiet and heavy.
Wilson sat on the chair, almost shying away from the corpse. In the gray light, she was even more beautiful than she had been under the harsh operating lights, features softened to charcoal. At the same time, there was an unnatural stillness in the room, punctuated only by the machines beeping, that made her frozen figure eerie. He'd seen corpses before, hundreds of them, and the same chill scurried in his veins after every time.
He couldn't bring himself to look away. She almost looked asleep. Her chestnut hair curled softly over her neck, over the bright gold pendant. Remembering that small detail, Wilson forgot his chills and stepped up to the corpse. Against the drab ashen backdrop of her skin, it sparkled with an artificial life.
Anti-Semitism in New Jersey…? House's voice echoed in his head. The natural optimist in Wilson told him that House was misanthropic and hated everybody, and thus assumed that everyone else was the same. Reason told him that 95 percent of the time, House was right.
The nurse had taken away the baby, but chances of survival were slated at roughly 0. Stop with the numbers, House. Stop. Stop. The drops splattered indolently, leaving Wilson to sit there in the muted rush, holding Rachel Weisman's dead hand.
GHXJW
"Aw, you look so maternal," House cooed, limping into the special, isolated ICU room the Weisman woman's baby had been placed in. Pain was flaring in his leg worse than usual; it always did in the rain.
"Yeah. Sticking needles into babies is what every mother's first instinct is, right?" Rurigawa replied, holding the baby carefully.
"Because that's obviously what you're doing," House retorted. "It's obvious by the way you're cradling it." This infarction had to be eating him from inside, God that hurt like a –
Rurigawa bristled. "So I'm holding the baby. And so what?"
"Nothing." It was the most infuriating of House's replies, the 'nothing' loaded with implications of everything, but Rurigawa refused to rise to the bait. House suddenly felt the need to goad him, to get him infuriated and yet uncomfortably helpless. He shouldn't look so happy, so content just to be holding a dead woman's baby – he shouldn't feel such happiness doing this job –
"How's Chase?" House asked, neutral and innocent.
His lips curled in a victorious smile when Rurigawa's shoulders stiffened. "No clue. You should ask him," he answered, voice carefully controlled.
House leaned back, sat on the lab table. "What did you see in him, anyway?" Was the pain subsiding? Maybe. He couldn't quite tell. The sadistic pleasure was making him feel a little happier, though.
"Why do you care?" Rurigawa was putting the baby down, House noted with satisfaction. And taking out the needles.
"I'm conducting a study on why people do stupid things," House said bitingly. "I want to know what made you fall for him."
Rurigawa sighed and pushed his hair back from his eyes, snapped on latex gloves. "I'm not sure. At first, it was just the looks, I guess."
"He does have great hair," House conceded, sarcasm covering his surprise that Rurigawa was actually confiding in him.
With a slight smile, he continued. "But then, there are other things. He's very caring, almost slightly adoring. He's…passionate. He cares. Of course, he's a little presumptuous. Arrogant. But who isn't, right?"
The words were measured. House narrowed his eyes. "You're a complete attention whore," he observed.
"How do you figure this?" Rurigawa rearranged the needles, then carefully turned the baby over, holding it off the table with one arm while the other disinfected a patch on its rear.
"You've set up an equation: You cannot survive without Chase, and Chase cannot survive without happiness. Therefore, in order to sustain Chase and thus your own happiness, you've cut yourself out and put Cameron in because that's what you think will make him happy. The thing is…you've left out the major part of the equation where the only way Chase can make you happy is by being yours. Any other form just causes you pain. You've made your happiness the most minor part of the equations, which is totally anomalous of human nature. So why would you pretend that your own happiness isn't important unless you wanted people to notice that you thought your own happiness was insignificant and thus pity you?" House rattled off discerningly.
Rurigawa smiled ruefully. "And the great House strikes again. If you say 'happy' or 'happiness' again, I think you'll have a grand total of fifty times you've ever said it in your life, congratulations, you win. Hold this, don't drop it or I'll stab you too." He held out a syringe. The baby whined softly.
"Now you're just a dominatrix. I like it." House took the syringe grudgingly, sat back down.
"You always had a soft spot for pain," Rurigawa quipped. "All right. Your turn. How are things going with Wilson?" House didn't answer, but drew in a deep breath, twirled his cane. "That good, eh?" Rurigawa pressed with a grin. He took the syringe from between House's fingers and positioned it carefully. The sight of the needle sliding into flesh had always been bizarrely fascinating to House; he watched it whilst studiously ignoring the question. The needle came out, and Rurigawa tossed it into the aluminum bin at his feet. "You don't have to answer, House," he said quietly. "Just one request…"
"Please don't break his heart? Please don't hurt him?" House asked sardonically.
Rurigawa coughed awkwardly. "Erm, no…actually, please make sure you don't spill coffee all over the floor while you guys make out at work."
"Aww. Don't you like to see the evidence of our love?"
"Not all over the carpet and chairs, no."
"You're such a girl."
Cuddy slid open the door smoothly. "Hi, Rurigawa. Immunizations done?"
He checked the chart. "Just about, then it's back into the crib."
She nodded briskly. "House, go see Wilson."
"I promise I didn't hurt his feelings or break his toys," House said bleakly.
"I know. But there's something bothering him."
GHXJW
"Wilson! You're looking fresh as a daisy, my love," House yelled upon entry.
"Afternoon, House," Wilson droned back tepidly.
"What crawled up your ass? Well, aside from the obvious." He flopped down on the couch, twirling his cane and almost toppling Wilson's coffee.
"Not in the mood," Wilson growled, clutching the mug.
"I'll just sit here until you decide talk, then," House said simply, and continued to twirl his cane. Wilson moved the coffee and tried to focus on his paperwork, rearranging some files. There were cases on the left, head of department paperwork in the center, and clinic files on the right, memos and lewd notes from House scattered in between.
"WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
"House," Wilson warned, as House had begun to imitate a siren, at about twice the decibel level.
"Talk," House countered. Wilson sighed, ears still ringing.
Something that Wilson had discovered was that in this newfound relationship, House was about a hundred times more willing to talk about things, for better or for worse. Personally, Wilson didn't want to admit that he thought House might be right. He also didn't want to play any more cagy games with House – he wanted to finally settle, do something right. Telling House he might be right would be like setting gasoline on fire: House would keep burning things in his path until he reached the ashes of truth. What the truth might be was too terrible for Wilson to want to contemplate. Did the fact that he was actually considering it mean he was thinking more like that? 'Prolonged exposure to Gregory House may result in extreme pessimism and the ability to believe the absolute worst in everyone.'
House started to make the siren noise again. "WHEEEEEEEEEE – !"
"Fine!" Wilson shouted against the screaming noise. "Rachel Weisman died this morning." Instant silence.
"So?" House feigned indifference, but the momentary twitch of his eyebrow downward showed genuine concern. "Did you do the autopsy?"
"No," Wilson said, carefully patient. "Don't you want to do it?"
"Why would I want to do it?" House asked sensibly.
"To discover the cause of death," Wilson said.
"Overt stress placed on the body due to brutal injuries," House answered matter-of-factly. "Simple."
Wilson sighed irritably. "You know exactly what I mean. You want to know what caused the injuries."
"Appealing to my natural curiosity will get you nowhere, Wilson," House replied brusquely.
"Appealing to your penis did me good," Wilson said nonchalantly, eyeing House under guise of writing prescriptions. "Figured it might work. Anyway. Do you need more Vicodin, while I'm at it?" There was a long silence in which Wilson knew he was being heavily scrutinized by a pair of sharp blue eyes, and had to resist the temptation to look up. He let the stare itch for a while. "House? Do you need more – "
"I'll do it," House interrupted firmly.
"What?" Inside, he was cheering.
"The autopsy," House snapped, annoyed at having lost. "And I'm going to need twenty bottles of Vicodin."
Wilson nodded sagely until House had finished sweeping dramatically out of the room.