A World More Full of Weeping
Chapter Rating: PG-13
Summary: Baby ducks don't do well in prisons especially not pretty blond ones. How much of his incarceration and the events leading up to it are House's fault? How much does House think are his fault? Case-fic, Post 'No Reason'. Chase/OMC, combinations of Chase, House, Wilson.
Disclaimer: The House, MD characters are not mine. I'm just playing with them. They'll be returned…eventually, not in good condition but that can hardly be blamed on me!
Author's Note: This is going to be a pretty long story, a lot happens so I hope you'll bear with it. About the medical mysteries, I tried to make it as accurate as possible because as much as I like the 'House being a jerk' part of the show, I really like the medical part of the show too. I've used a lot of sources, so hopefully anybody with a medical background won't be too appalled by that aspect of the story. Enjoy!
Chapter 1
Three months earlier
Dr. Robert Chase walked into the patient's private room and wasn't surprised to find Dr. Allison Cameron also residing. She sat facing the prone man, a book hanging precariously from her hand. Her head was tilted forward, chin resting against her chest, fast asleep. Robert sighed silently and let his eyes glance to the older man of whom she was clearly so worried about. His eyes narrowed slightly and a slight smirk pulled at his lips but he wiped it away and approached Allison.
"Hey," he said softly and gently shook her. She jerked awake dropping her book. Prepared for such a reaction Robert plucked it from its descent. "You need to get some rest at home." She'd rarely left the hospital for the past three days while the patient was in the chemically induced coma. If she wasn't in the room, she was wandering the corridors or staring morosely at the spot in the conference room where their boss had been gunned down.
She glanced first to the bed and then to Chase. "I just want to be here."
"I know but you have to take care of yourself too. He's going to be fine."
Allison looked back to the bed. The surgeon had told her the same thing, so had a nurse, which was strange considering she was a doctor and knew more about his situation than she did, but the reassurance had helped. Not enough to keep her away from Greg House's side for more than a few hours on a few occasions but it had helped.
"Alright. Just let me know if anything happens."
You'll be the first person I call, Robert thought sarcastically. She'd agreed to go so easily that he wasn't willing to risk voicing his comment. Plus she didn't really look up to taking any sarcasm. Cameron glanced over her shoulder a few times on the short trip from her chair to the door. Chase pretended not to notice and began checking Dr. House's stats while making some notations in the patient file he'd retrieved from the holder on the wall.
When finally she was gone, no longer peering through the transparent walls of the room, he spoke. "She's gone now. You can stop pretending." He didn't look up from the file.
"Has she been there the whole time?" House asked with a voice that wasn't raspy enough to make Chase believe that he'd just recently woken up.
"Since you came out of surgery. She was really worried."
"And you weren't?"
Chase smiled. "I know you're too stubborn to die." He turned to face the patient and asked, "How do you feel?"
"Like I've been shot." His eyes seemed a little droopy and he was a little paler than usual but Chase attributed that to the trauma of his wound and then the trauma of surgery.
Chase leaned over the bed to shine pen light into one blue eye and then the other. The patient squirmed, as they tend to do, but Chase held the eye open with his other hand long enough to gauge the pupil response. "Any specific complaints?"
"Yes. Stop shining things in my eyes," House snapped. Chase just shook his head. Doctors always made the worst patients.
He watched intently as House brought his left hand up to rub his irritated eyes. The motion was slow but steady.
"Anything else?"
"Just the pain in my neck, the pain in my side and the pain in my ass." He lowered his hand and raised his eyes to meet the younger doctor's.
"Cheeky." Chase let the barb roll off his back like he always did. He considered doing the neurological exam but he didn't feel like listening to the sarcastic comments they would produce. He'd leave that to Foreman. He was the neurologist after all and it would give him a viable excuse to visit House like Rob knew he wanted to.
"Time for a stroll around the nurses station," he announced. It was common to have patient out of surgery take a short walk to renew circulation to the extremities and prevent clots from forming. And given the problem a clot in his leg had caused House before Chase thought it was a wise precaution for this particular patient, even if he'd have to listen to a stream of curses and insults.
In fact they'd already begun.
Chase tuned back in right around the part where House was disparaging his ancestry. "Charming. Get up."
"I'm not going all the way out there!"
"Hyper-bowl, hyberball-"
"Hyperbole!"
Chase snapped his fingers in exaggerated enlightenment. "That's what it's called," he said in mockery of the same act House had given Chase and the others on numerous occasions. His smile vanished and he became serious again. "We just have to make it to the door and back. Get up."
House glared but conceded. Chase retrieved the cane from the corner of the room and handed it to House. Though the older man quashed the urge to hit Chase with it the idea was easily read in the ice-blue eyes.
"Where's the guy I have to thank for this?" House asked as he pressed the button to slowly lean the head of his bed up.
"Another room. Security shot him but he'll make it."
"Wonderful."
Chase ignored the comment and helped him up, much to House's annoyance but he couldn't do it on his own. "What about Mister Swollen Tongue?"
"Allergic reaction."
House rolled his eyes, somehow disappointed that the patient had something so boring. His attention was soon far from Mr…Mr…whatever swollen-tongue-guy's name was. He had to focus on staying upright as trying to walk pulled at his very sore stitches. They didn't even make it to the door before Chase was steering him back.
House was unimaginably grateful for the hard, uncomfortable hospital bed. He was too tired to protest or crack wise about Chase's ministrations. When the heavy fatigue lifted a little he turned to his young fellow who was changing his saline drip. Something had just occurred to him. A request he'd made just before he'd fallen unconscious and the possible consequences.
"The ketamine."
Chase looked down at him after attaching the new bag to the intravenous line. "They gave it to you."
House turned away. Chase finished what he was doing and after a last look at the diagnostician he left. He had nothing more to do, no viable reason to stay and House wouldn't want him around anyway. If there was anything House hated being it was being weak. Well, nobody liked being weak but for House who was already dependent on his cane and his pills this was probably worse because he'd never needed help from any person, just his stick and his meds.
Greg barely noticed his exit. Eyes heavenward he simply lay there and felt the lack of pain from his right thigh. Maybe it was the morphine. He liked to think that it was the ketamine treatment. He'd been reading about it for the past month or so, considering his suitability for the trial. The issue had featured heavily in his dream, especially the loss of the last thing he had left that worked properly. His mind.
If he did have the side-effects he feared, he wondered if he'd blame Cuddy or Cameron or whoever gave him the treatment. After all he'd been barely conscious when he asked for it, had probably lost more than a litre of blood already. He hadn't been in his right mind. He could plead temporary insanity. They couldn't.
He wondered if Moriarty would plead temporary insanity when they finally dragged his ass into court. He could only wondered how much of his hallucination had been accurate. He had no reason to think that any of it was but something drove Jack Moriarty to shoot him. If it had just been his acerbic wit then he would have been shot years ago by some other disgruntled patient. Still, no matter the reason his hallucinatory introspection had left its mark.
He turned his head to the window, to the sun and the blue sky. He would get to see this day and many more after it. Out there somewhere was there a person who wouldn't because of what he had done? Maybe Moriarty could plead temporary insanity, and maybe Greg wouldn't protest.
H
Dr. James Wilson, Oncologist, the label on the wood door read. There was also the alphabet soup of abbreviated degrees but he ignored those. He tapped the door twice before slowly entering.
"Dr. Chase. What can I do for you?" Wilson asked in a friendly tone from behind his desk. He and Chase had developed a moderate friendship over his nearly two years at the hospital and it had grown after an incident a few weeks ago. An incident that had provided depth to the formerly two-dimensional characters that both Robert and James had been to the other due to their limited interaction. They hadn't told House what had happened but he'd quickly picked up on the difference. They didn't intend on telling him what had happened, mostly because it was private and it was fun knowing something that he didn't.
"I just wanted to inform you that House is awake." The blonde stepped further into the room as he spoke. His eyes were briefly caught by the orange 'Vertigo' poster behind the oncologist.
"How is he?" The vitality he'd heard in Wilson's voice a moment ago had evaporated.
Chase responded but watched carefully for the other man's reaction. "He's doing well. He's himself for the most part."
"For the most part?"
"He's just tired. I'm sure he'll be back in top form in no time," he said in reference to House's ability to deride.
The news didn't seem to pull Wilson from his funk and Chase thought he recognized the emotion weighing the shoulders down. He wasn't sure how it was possible but he took a stab at it.
"This isn't your fault."
Wilson looked up at him and leaned back in his chair. "Isn't it?"
"I don't see how. You didn't pull the trigger."
Wilson sighed and seemed to fall in on himself. His comfy leather-backed chair was suddenly too big and the room was too dark. "I let him."
Chase frowned. He sat down in one of the empty chairs across from Wilson. He was willing to listen. House wasn't around for the oncologist to talk to and with this particular topic he wouldn't be able to help so Robert decided he would do it.
"I didn't stop him. I know what he's like. I know how he can devastate people but I didn't do anything."
Chase let a breath out in a puff. "You're not an enabler. And if you are then so are the rest of us. We all know what he's like but because we can handle it, we excuse it, ignore it. I mean, if you want to play the blame game then you're missing some people. Moriarty foremost."
"But it was House who set things in motion."
"Okay, he could stand to be nicer to his patients, nobody will argue that but you can't blame yourself for his actions. Being his friend doesn't make you a co-conspirator." He wasn't even sure of all the details as to why Moriarty hated House so much. The police on the case weren't sharing many details and Moriarty was sedated most of the time so talking to him was out of the question.
Wilson shook his head slowly. He still felt responsible.
"You're his friend, not his keeper," Chase told him.
"With House, I'm not sure there's a difference."
"Well he did ask for ketamine." Wilson stared at him unsure as to what significance Chase was trying to express. "Maybe he doesn't want to be miserable anymore."
The notion brought around a slight nod from Wilson. House would always have that bit of that general distrust of humanity but Wilson remembered what he was like before his leg, before his marriage with Stacy fell apart. It was hard to explain, especially to anyone who'd only met the gimpy Greg. James would welcome the day that a bit of the old Greg awoke.
Chase stood from the chair telling him as he left, "You should go see him."
"I will," he replied to an empty room.
It was two hours later that James finally had no reason to keep putting the visit off. He'd finished his dictations, filed his paper work, and even cleaned his desk. After that he'd meandered through the corridors, speaking with other doctors, nurses and random people as he went. Maybe he flirted with some of the women too but his divorce was pretty much a done deal so he was free to look. He adamantly ignored the devil's advocate played by a part of his mind that told him he was looking for his next wife and his next divorce.
He didn't even acknowledge the voice that said there was a better option. An option that was currently a patient with two gunshot wounds and a bad leg. It was easy to run from that option. He'd had a lot of practice.
House's room had a nice view Wilson noted as he walked in. There were too many rooms in the hospital that were surrounded on all sides by more hospital. You look out the window and BAM! Another sick person. Of course looking out the window to the outside could only remind you on a daily basis what you were missing.
Currently Greg had another visitor that was reminding him of what he was definitely not missing. James had considered walking away unnoticed but Greg really shouldn't be getting so worked up.
"Oh, good –a witness! Now you can testify if she decides to pull the plug," House snapped, feeling somehow validated by the anger and affront on his ex-wife's face. Wilson winced and moved in to mediate. The Keeper of House to the rescue!
"Stacy," he began but she just put up a hand while glaring at her former husband.
"Don't worry. I'm leaving." She grabbed the cardigan that she'd placed on the foot of the bed. She always found the air conditioning in the hospital to be a little too strong. With her item retrieved she did exactly what she had promised.
Head tilted down in a vague manifestation of guilt James watched her from the corner of his eyes.
"You know," there was an expectant pause, "you aren't on life support. And they don't pull the plug, they flick switches and push buttons."
"I'm sure she got the idea." Greg's retort was unapologetic. James could only imagine what had set the grumpy doctor off. With House you never know what it might be. Maybe he'd be more stable when he was off the morphine.
James glanced up to the smaller of the two clear IV bags.
A second thought had him shaking his head slightly in denial of his hopeful conclusion.
Off the morphine and back on the Vicodin.
"Wasn't expecting you," Greg eventually said into the silence. The fatigue in his voice was in harsh contrast with the sharp words he'd thrown out a minute ago.
"Well, I was passing by. Wanted to see how many bullets it took to take you down."
"More than two apparently."
James smiled and took up the recently vacated chair. He didn't like visiting patients, at least not when the patient was a person he was close too. It was the same reason he hadn't done more than stop in a few times during Greg's infarction. Sure he'd worked on his case behind the scenes, trying to determine what could have been causing the pain but as a cancer specialist the idea of a clot starving the tissue downstream of oxygen and all the other stuff it needed had slipped his mind.
"How's your leg?"
"I wasn't shot in the leg." He purposely gave an obtuse response.
James tilted his head forward a little and rephrased. "Does it feel any better? Did the ketamine work?" He wasn't familiar with the treatment. Didn't know how fast it was supposed to take effect but if it was just a mental rebooting like Cuddy and Foreman had claimed then he didn't see why it shouldn't work right away.
"It's…not as bad. But the morphine is probably helping."
James's shoulders dropped a bit. Of course the morphine –how could he have forgotten about that? Maybe this was why he didn't hang around sick or injured friends; they made him a head-case.
He looked up as he heard Greg release a tired sigh. "I could really use a drink," he grumbled.
Mentally Wilson seconded the motion but he wouldn't encourage it.
"So what have you done now? You didn't get married while I was sleeping did you?"
James stumbled over the apparent non-sequitor. "What? No, of course not!"
"Then what's with the guilty Jewish boy look? All you need is the yarmulke and you'd have the whole set."
"It's nothing."
Greg was too tired to push the subject so he settled more comfortably in the bed. "I'm sick. I'm in pain. I'm bored. Cheer me up."
"Well…I hit a puppy with my car today."
House laughed, it was shallow but real and James smiled in return. They'd joked for years about the kitten-eating, puppy-murdering image that Greg seemed to have fostered throughout Princeton. The reputation preceded him just about everywhere he went too but few people honestly saw the humour in it. James did and he thought that Cuddy and Chase did too but humour was only a small part of the diagnostician's prickly demeanour. The cutting barbs and insults, the inappropriate comments and just plain rudeness put him on just about everyone's bad side, even James's on occasion. But he always came back. So, too, did Cuddy, House's three fellows and even Stacy. Either there was something else to House that drew them back or they were all just crazy. Folie à deux was one thing, but folie à six?
H
"You can't say you didn't expect it. Just look at the man! One week with him and I wanted to shoot him."
"So he's a jerk. You deal with jerks everyday." Mostly in the clinic they both agreed without having to say it. "But people are willing to put up with his attitude if it saves their life."
"So, just because he's smart he can do whatever he wants? I should try this."
Chase paused with Foreman just before the glass wall of the man in question's room and patted him on the shoulder. He shook his head. "You're not that smart, mate."
Foreman's expression was unimpressed as he watched the Aussie walk down the hall. Shaking his head the neurologist steeled himself to enter the lion's den.
"About time you got here!"
Eric rolled his eyes and began the neurological exam.
H
Nighttime had laid its shadows across the time zone obscuring details and putting restless minds to sleep. At PPTH the night shift and the on-call doctors fought against their circadian rhythm to maintain an appropriate level of consciousness and alertness with varying levels of success. At the nurse's station in the recovery wing an older lady was nodding off but jerking awake when her head dipped too far. Her sleepy eyes and ears didn't pickup the quiet and relatively uneven sound of steps as one of the patients hobbled past when her back was turned.
Greg had made it as far as the intersection of corridors when a familiarly accented voice interrupted.
"You're going to pop your stitches."
House turned his head in the direction of the voice and found Dr. Chase standing in the doorway of another patient's room. "Midnight visits on the recovery floor? How sexy. Do you dance too? I want Springsteen and do you have a dominatrix costume?"
Chase sighed. "He's in four-oh-two."
House didn't look away and didn't say anything. As Chase walked away he mumbled a low thanks that he hoped the younger doctor didn't hear. He modified his route to take him to his shooter's room –time for another confrontation. If there was a security guy posted outside the room House considered how to get the man to give him his weapon. It was only fair that he have a gun this time since Jack Moriarity had one the last time.
To his disappointment there was no security guard outside room 402. At least he wouldn't have to talk his way into the room. Moriarty was handcuffed by his right wrist to the bed and was fast asleep when Greg limped in. Well, that wouldn't do. Greg took a scene from his dream and used the man's IV drip to coax his body into an abrupt wakefulness.
"Why did you shoot me?" He demanded, nary a note of distress or upset in his voice. He did anger and annoyance so well, why break with tradition?
As the words left his mouth an intense sensation of déjà vu flowed over him only to be washed away by the crude words of his would-be-murderer.
"You bastard! I wish I had killed you! I wish they had let you die!"
House's frowned deepened as he considered his error. He'd expected the far more eloquent and insightful Moriarty of his dream. The dream-Moriarty however had just been a figment of his imagination, an honest and profound figment explaining to him the error of his ways. Showing him that those little details did count even if he couldn't quantify or sell them. The personality he'd in error attributed to the gunman in his mind clearly didn't match the reality of the shooter.
Unable to separate dream and reality, a possible side-effect of ketamine his mind warned. Well there was one thing he knew for certain was real and he used it to regain his grasp of the situation.
He pressed a button on the IV infuser control and watched with satisfaction as the man tensed. "Let's try this again. Why did you try to kill me?"
"I thought you deserved to suffer after what you did." Moriarty squeezed his confession through his clenched teeth. "It's your fault and you're not even sorry."
"Hey, you didn't even ask me."
Moriarty's hands clutched at the sheets as he tried to think through the discomfort and through his hatred. The consuming need to make this man suffer had given him balance before but with his apparent failure the need grew to desperation. "I know enough about you! You can't pretend to have compassion. You're a butcher masked as a healer. Can't bring yourself to care about the consequences of your actions. Well, it's about time you felt them!"
Moriarty lunged for him and House staggered backwards falling against the other bed and then to the floor. Suddenly there was a body between him and his assailant, a blond man in a white lab coat. The Jack Moriarty's curses and struggles died down until there was silence only intermittently punctuated with the beep of the heart monitor.
Chase turned around and carefully recapped the now empty syringe. He'd gone to the nurse's station to grab a sedative and then followed House here. He hadn't been sure who he'd need to use it on but better safe than sorry.
"Stay down," Chase ordered as he crouched next to the heavily breathing older man. He probed at the wounds making sure that he hadn't begun to bleed out.
"I'm fine," House said weakly.
"I know," He responded in a placating tone, reminiscent of the time House had tried to stay off his Vicodin for a week. Chase helped him up and into a wheel chair. House glared at the mechanical contraption but he wasn't up to the walk back to his room.
He was grateful for the silence as Chase wheeled him back to his temporary abode. With his usual clinical detachment and gentle hands Chase helped the sullen man back into his bed. He was sure there was a lot of thinking going on behind the vacant, cool-blue eyes.
He couldn't put his finger on it but somehow House seemed different. His presence wasn't as sharp as it once was and he hadn't asked about General Hospital or the OC once. Contemplating the notion that this shooting had somehow fundamentally altered the man that was Greg House was saddening. Given how often Chase was at the butt of his boss's jokes a change in him probably could have been viewed by most as something to be celebrated. Then again if it really bothered him, the way House treated him, he would have left long ago.
There was something unique in House. His honesty though often caustic and uncaring was still honesty and maybe it was the only way he had left to show that he could still care about some things. Chase held back a sigh as he re-attached the IV.
"No morphine."
That didn't stop him. He reconnected the second line to the port but rolled the blue dial up to pinch the tube shut. He might be feeling okay now but when the excitement wore off his injuries would ache again. "Just in case," he told House. The man had his eyes closed and was rubbing his right thigh. "Leg bothering you?"
"A little." There was something that Chase hesitated to label as wonder in House's voice. He thought his boss had been walking with a less of a limp and with a little less of his weight on his cane. Foreman had reported that the ketamine treatment seemed to have worked without any side effects so far. He'd repeat the exam daily for the next three days and then once a week from then on.
"What's the number to your masseuse?" Chase asked as he observed House rubbing the leg more vigorously.
"I don't know. Wilson has it I'm sure." His leg was beginning to cramp providing pain of a different kind than the one he was used to. Overexertion, the analytical part of his mind deduced and Greg smiled just a little even as the cramp intensified. Overexertion hadn't been possible before.
His hand rubbing up and down his leg providing minimal amounts of comfort was replaced with pair that immediately began to work magic. The spasm began to ease and the muscle relaxed as firm deep strokes eased the tension.
Chase's hands ran up and down the marred thigh. He knew he'd be able to provide some comfort to the aching muscle even though he gave the massage through the fabric of his hospital pyjamas. He could feel the uneven remnant of the infarction where a large portion of muscle had been removed. He was careful not to dwell on any particular part, though the slight changes in the feel the remaining muscle under his hand drew his curiosity about the injury. Right now though, House was his patient.
"I'd ask how you got so good at that but I'm not sure I want to know," he mumbled with his eyes still closed. He heard Chase snort in response. Practice or talent House couldn't be sure of which (he also didn't care). If there was any weirdness associated with his fellow massaging his injured leg it was easily obscured by the genuine pleasure his attention created.
"I'll get Wilson to call your masseuse in the morning. You'll probably need her every once in a while when you start your rehabilitation."
Greg's eyes snapped open. "Who said anything about rehabilitation?"
Chase met the suddenly hostile eyes. "It's part of the treatment." Ketamine, evaluation, rehab, evaluation, repeat last two steps as necessary.
"We'll see about that." House closed his eyes and leaned back. Just from the tone of voice Chase was already thankful that he wasn't House's physical therapist. There was no telling how far he would go to get out of it.
The massage continued for a few minutes more until Chase thought that what remained of the thigh muscle was suitably relaxed and the spasm was passed. He covered him with the thin hospital sheet and made a note in the file before heading out.
"You give me a massage, you tuck me in, but no good night kiss?"
"Only in your dreams, Dr. House." Chase walked out without a glance back. House smirked and layback trying not to think. He just wanted to rest. He'd think later, when the sun was up and Cameron was trying to suffocate him with her concern.
He closed his eyes.
Things would look worse in the morning. They always did.
H
End Chapter 1
Hello! Sorry for the delay in updating but I wanted to finish writing the story before I posted it. I was going to post this chapter a month ago but then I realized it needed some touching-up (a lot of it). So it was either post what I had or wait, do a better job and post now.
Updates should come pretty regularly now. The story is written just some revisions required. It's long. I won't say how long since I don't wan to scare anyone off.
Minor spoiler warning for the next sentence:
And how pissed was I when House called Wilson an enabler in that episode! You know the one I mean. Anyway thanks for reading and thanks for your patience. Hopefully this story will be worth it. Let me know if the chapters are too short.
Sagga.