House, Wilson, Cuddy, and other characters from the series House M.D. are not mine, and this fiction is not intended to violate the owners' copyrights. This is AU, several years after Season 8. House is finishing up his second prison sentence, but is in a minimum security, treatment setting. This is a sequel to "Another Day in Court" and "Visiting Day."

The Logical Thing to Do

Chapter 1

House lurched awake at the sound of his door opening. His new pain management regimen mandated sleeping medication, but it left him feeling as if he were trying to swim up through molasses. "House," the guard called.

"Too early," House muttered. The minimum security prison routine rarely required rousting prisoners out of their rooms at odd hours.

"That's the problem," the guard said. "Your wife is in labor."

"Fiancé," House corrected him, automatically. He snapped awake. "It's six and a half months. It's too early."

"That's what I said. A friend of yours is waiting. You have a forty-eight hour pass."

House climbed to his feet as fast as his crippled and sleep-fogged body could manage. He pulled on his prison uniform over the underwear he slept in and groped for his glasses on the bedside chest and his prison-issue cane leaning against the chair. He grabbed his coat from the hook in the corner. His roommate had been released to a halfway house the day before, so at least no one else was startled awake at this hour. He slid on his Nikes. He grabbed his briefcase with laptop, textbook, and journals. "I'm ready."

The guard opened the door and gestured for House to go ahead of him. The prisoners' quarters were more like a college dorm than a cell-block. Nonetheless, there were several locked, heavy doors in dimmed night light to go through until they reached the front office. House retrieved his own clothes and cane and slipped into a changing cubicle. He had left his cell phone and wallet with Cuddy, so it was just a matter of getting dressed. He realized that his hands were shaking as he pulled his jeans on and fastened his belt. He pulled his coat on. It was midwinter and icy cold in the New Jersey night.

Like his release from prison the first time, Foreman was waiting for him. The mood was very different this time, friendship and urgency. After a quick handshake, House limped after him to his car, slowing to negotiate the icy coating on the parking lot. "What is her status?" he asked Foreman, as he slid into the passenger seat. He snapped on his seatbelt as Foreman started the car.

"They think the contractions are slowing. The amniotic sac hasn't ruptured and the cervix has only started to thin. Fetal heartbeat is strong. No preeclampsia. So there is a chance of holding childbirth off for a few days or weeks. Cuddy is alternately calm and terrified. She needs you."

House nodded, finding his own terror wasn't abating. Funny when it was your family, how hard it was to find his objectivity. He took a deep breath. "Are they giving her corticosteroids?"

"Yeah. Fluids and tocolytics."

House nodded, afraid to say anything else. That was standard treatment for preterm labor. The car hurtled on through the darkness. House had not been isolated this time in prison. Foreman, along with Wilson, Cuddy, Chase, and others, had visited regularly. Even his mother and her husband, his not-father-either, had come to see him. The silence in the car had the comfort of old friendship, mixed with urgency. "She has a topnotch OB-GYN," Foreman reminded House. "A neonatologist is standing by. It helps to be the director of the hospital when you're hospitalized. Everyone is jumping to help her."

"Where's Rachel?"

"She's staying with Cuddy's sister tonight."

House grimaced, not sure he could deal with Julia in the midst of a crisis, but Rachel probably was frantic too. He wanted to talk to Wilson, to unleash his worry, and yes, his guilt for getting Cuddy pregnant. She was too old. They were both too old to have a baby… And he stopped, recognizing the destructive thought pattern that Nolan had been trying to help him overcome.

"I can hear you worrying," Foreman commented gently. He touched a couple buttons on his phone and handed House the Blue Tooth.

Wilson answered. "Foreman?" he asked.

"House. How is she?"

"They think they've stopped the labor. She might be looking at a few days or weeks of bed rest. Where are you?"

"I'm calling from Foreman's car. We should be there in an hour. Tell her I'm on the way."

"I'll do that. You two be careful. The roads aren't good tonight."

"No traffic at least. See you."

House disconnected the call. He turned to Foreman's profile in the dark car. "Thank you," he said, unaccustomed to social niceties and tongue-tied with worry.

"It's the least I can do, for friends," Foreman said.

Foreman dropped House at the emergency entrance and went to park his car. House hobbled as fast as he could to the desk. "Lisa Cuddy?" he asked.

"Only family is allowed in there, Sir," the receptionist told him.

House held on to his fraying temper. "I'm her fiancé," he barked. "I'm responsible for this mess…"

The receptionist's eyes widened. Apparently she had been warned about the legendary and cranky diagnostician. "I'll buzz you in," she said.

The first figure he saw in the emergency area was Wilson, disheveled in a sweatshirt and jeans. Wilson ran to him and gripped House's arms. "She's okay," he assured House. "She's okay, and the labor is stopped, at least for now."

House was agitated past worry. "Where is she?"

Wilson led him about halfway down the area and pulled a curtain open. "Lisa," he called, as House rushed past him.

Cuddy reclined on the hard emergency room bed, IVs in both arms. She simply raised her arms to House. He leaned his cane against the bedside chair and folded her in his arms as she burst into tears. He rested his face on her neck. "It's okay," he murmured. "It's okay. The labor's stopped. The baby's all right."

"I'm so glad you're here," she said, voice broken.

"Me, too," he murmured against her hair. He rested a hand on her swollen stomach and could feel the baby kicking in her womb. "Move over," he told her. Cuddy slid over the few inches the narrow bed allowed and House climbed on. He stretched out next to her, arm over her swollen stomach and around her back, and held her. "It's going to be all right. It's all right." Her tears soaked his tee shirt as her sobs slowed.

Cuddy was moved upstairs to a private suite. As hospital director, she had accommodations normally reserved for dignitaries and wealthy donors. A cot was moved in for House. Dawn was beginning to lighten the window through the closed blinds when both fell asleep for a short time before hospital routine disturbed them.

-tbc-