A/N: I just wanna say thanks to all the reviewers. I LOVE YOU ALL. ^.^ Well, here's chapter 3. Like I said, I want to make it as much like the season 4 finale as possible, which includes all medical things. ^.^ So please, keep reviewing while I work on Chapter 4.
DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN HOUSE, M.D., AND/OR ANYTHING ASSOCIATED WITH IT. Please don't sue me.
Wilson sat by House, simply staring at his lifeless form. He reached out his hand and rubbed his cheek. Cuddy was standing nearby, adjusting House's IV and monitors. Her eyes were red and puffy, Wilson noticed, so she must have been crying too. Cuddy smiled sadly at Wilson.
"He's gonna be alright," she whispered to him.
Wilson just nodded. He looked at House again. He really wanted House to live. It should have been him on the bus, not-
"Electricity." Amber said, barging in the room.
Cuddy and Wilson both ignore her, Cuddy attending to House as Wilson put his hand on his and squeezed it.
"I know I saw the symptom. I know the memory is locked in my brain. Now I know how to get it," Amber continued.
"No." was Cuddy's simple answer.
Amber frowned, "You don't even know what i'm talking about." Cuddy walked over and put a hand on Amber's shoulder. "You need to rest. I have yet to hear any study linking electricity and rest."
Amber thought for a moment. "Deep brain stimulation." Wilson frowned in her direction.
"It's been proven. Electrical impulses applied directly to the hypothalamus could evoke detailed memories."
"My mistake, drilling a hole and shooting lightning bolts into an already cracked skill is very restful, not dangerous at all," Cuddy snarked.
Wilson sighed weakly. "She's right. You need to sleep."
Amber sighed. Suddenly, House's EEG started to spike. Wilson half-smiled at House's small improvement. "Brain activity spiked," Cuddy said softly.
"House? House, it's me," Wilson said, perking up a little.
"Random spikes are common," Amber dismissed.
"Shut up!" Cuddy warned softly.
Wilson's hand squeezed House's tighter as he said, "It's gonna be okay. I'm here with you."
Amber's pager chose this moment to go off. Looking at it, she says, "The team has found something. Can you ask him if we can be excused?"
Wilson looked at her, hurt, and Amber immeditatley regretted her comment. Nonetheless, Wilson followed her to the differental room.
The ducklings were crowded around the office. "Well?" Amber asked.
The ducklings stare quietly at Wilson. Amber looked at them questioningly. Foreman spoke up first.
"Coronary angio was negative."
"So was the tox screen," Taub added.
"That's what you found? Negative tests?" Wilson asked. "I could have told you all he does is Vicodin," he said, obviously trying to convince himself that House didn't do any other drugs.
Kutner steps foreward awkwardly, holding out a bottle of pills. He gave the bottle to Amber, "We found these in his apartment. Sorry," he whispered quietly to Wilson.
"Those diet pills could explain the tachycardia," Taub said.
"H-he'd have to be an addict to take enough for it to damage his heart," he said sadly. "I'd know," he added.
Amber turned to him. "Did you know he was hiding them in his vitamins?"
"We have to warm him back up. Get his heart beating so we can do a CT to confirm," Foreman said.
"No, we've been over this," Wilson yelled. "Starting his heart could cause brain damage, could burn out the heart muscle."
Amber thought for a moment. "Test his heart without starting it. Crack his chest open, reach a finger inside the pulmonary vein, run it across the valve."
"That's the safer course?" Foreman asked, confused.
"It is if we're wrong."
"When did we start assuming we're wrong?"
Amber and Wilson stay quiet.
Foreman continued, "If this were any other patient-"
"If the valve is calcified," Amber interrupted, "that's our cure. Go."
Everyone leaves except Amber and Wilson. Amber walked up to him and kissed him. "Everything's gonna be alright," she whispered. Wilson just nodded.
"Yeah."
The ducklings gather around a lifeless House, preparing for surgery. Chase opens one of House's taped down eyelids, only to find that the white in House's eye is now yellow. Taub looks over Chase's shoulder. "His liver's not working."
"Diet pills don't kill the liver," Chase said. "Take him back to the ICU."
"Liver failure means whatever it is, it's spreading, despite the fact that he's frozen," Foreman says.
Everyone is sitting at the glass table in the differintal room, except Wilson, who is leaning by the door.
"Hepatic and heart failure could mean antitrypsinase deficiency," Thirteen says, breaking the silence.
"We can stick a needle in his liver. If we see fibrosis, she's right," Foreman said.
Lost in thought, Amber asks blankly, "Does House drink Sherry?"
Everyone looks at her, but chooses to ignore her.
"And the cardio fits as well. But there's no way we can tell, since we can't take his temperature," Taub said.
"I had a dream," Amber said, remembering her dream. "He was pouring me a glass."
Still ignoring, Taub continued, "If we warm him back up, we could tell if he's got an infection."
"Yes, we can get a diagnosis by letting the disease run rampant until it kills him," Wilson spoke up, frustrated. "If it's spreading, we need to slow this even more. We've gotta cool him down further."
Taub decides to be the voice of reason. "Listen," he says sadly to Wilson, "I know you love him, and, uh.....you're scared he's gonna die, but just making him colder isn't a cure. It's not dealing with the reality." Wilson pinched the bridge of his nose.
Still remembering, Amber says, "Sherry means something."
"House doesn't even drink Sherry," Wilson humours her. "Can we get back-"
"If he did drink Sherry," Amber interrupts, "it would mean nothing. Since he doesn't, my subconsious is obviously trying to make some other point."
"There's a Sherrie's bar on Third right off the bus route," Kutner tells her.
Amber's subconsious suddenly did a flashback, as she remembered a glass of scotch being placed on a bar. She jerked back into reality, and everyone stared at her, confused.
Amber got up, "Wilson's right. We need to make him cooler." Wilson smiled sadly at her, nodding.
"Putting more ice on him is just delaying the diagnosis," Taub argues.
As Amber starts to leave, Kutner asks, "Where are you going?"
"Taking Wilson out for a drink," she deadpans.
Amber walks out, with a heavy sighing Wilson following her.
Amber and Wilson enter the bar, and found that it was currently empty. Amber scanned the room, while Wilson just looked downcast, frowning heavily.
"Is this the place?" Wilson asked.
"Maybe," Amber said, looking around.
"Hey," Wilson and Amber look toward the bartender. "I suppose you are here for these," he said, throwing Amber her car keys.
"Did you see me here with a tall crippled man?" Amber asked, catching her keys.
"Yeah, I think he joined you after scotch number seven," he mocked her.
Ignoring his comment, she asked, "Did he seem sick?"
"He sneezed, I gave him a napkin," he answered, confused.
"Did you see the color of the sputum?"
"I assume sputum means snot," the bartender looked at Amber awkwardly. "Look, I see alot of drunk men in here. I didn't have time to analyze the color of your boyfriend's boogers."
Amber looks at Wilson, who looks both hurt and suprised at the same time. She turned back to the bartender.
"He's not my boyfriend, genius," she spat venomously.
"He was good looking, you seemed into him, and he bought you drinks. Last night, he was your boyfriend."
She ignores him, turning to Wilson. "Blood in the sputum could mean parasites. Any recent travel?"
"You seemed into him?" Wilson asked, suprised.
"If he had a brain, he wouldn't be tending a bar," she said, pointing to the bartender. He looked at her, annoyed.
"Sneezing is a new symptom. Let's assume the runny nose means an infection," Amber said, walking past Wilson and out of the bar.
Kutner and Thirteen stand on eithier side of House. Kutner decides to gently squeeze House's hand before turning back to the task at hand.
Kutner suddenly notices that Thirteen was about to stick the wrong tube into House's tube, and says, "Ooh, not that one. The slurry one."
Realizing her mistake, Thirteen shudders. "Oh, sorry." She pauses and sighs, leaning on the bed.
"I know this is different, but it's not. Everyone dies," Kutner sighed.
Thirteen looks at him, suprised. "He's not dead."
"You're acting this way cause he might be," Kutner replied. "Soon."
"Yea, why aren't you?" she asks him, still suprised.
"Do you know what happened to my parents?" Kutner asked.
"I'm sorry, I didn't-"
"It's okay. So you gonna help me fill his lungs or not?"
Thirteen nods, and they pump cooled fluids into House's lungs.
As Taub and Foreman conduct tests, Amber walks in, a bit fatigued.
"Please tell me that the liver biopsy showed infiltrates, minor inflammation-"
"Yeah. How-"
"Snot on a napkin. Add the heart, infiltrates-"
"Hep B," Foreman nodds, understanding.
"Start him on IV interferon. I'll go tell Wilson."
As Amber began to leave, a hand on her shoulder stopped her.
"Yeah, and i'll go nap because I had a conciousson yesterday," Foreman mocked her. "You go rest. I'll tell Wilson."
Foreman walks past Amber, who seems a bit grateful, but never showed it.
Amber entered House's ICU room, slowly walking toward an unconsious House. She leaned over him, studying him. Suddenly, House's eyes snapped open. Amber stumbles back, startled. He looks at her.
"Hepatitis B is a lame diagnosis."
"Oh, god, I get less rest when i'm asleep," Amber whines.
House arises, his back facing Amber, and starts removing the monitor leads on his head. "I rise from the dead, and that's the reaction I get?"
"I'm sorry. If I had known, I would have started a breakaway Jewish sect. Hep B fits." Amber spat at him.
House opens the back of his gown, revealing his lower back to Amber. "Why are you doing that?" Amber asks, confused.
"Because Hep B doesn't fit," House deadpans.
Amber frowns when she analyizes the small of his back, finding something there.
Amber jerked awake from where she was sleeping on House's chair. She hurries off to House's ICU room.
She finds Foreman and Taub tending to him. "Turn him over," she adresses them.
"We're about to start him on his second course of interferon," Taub said.
"Which he might not need, once you turn him over," she argued.
Knowing it was useless to argue, they go over to House's right side, and slowly turned him onto his side. Taub undoes the gown velcro, his back bruised courtesy of the accident.
"He's bruised. Why is that so signifigant?" Taub asked.
"Look closer," Amber orders.
Foreman and Taub lean in for a closer look. "A rash. How'd you know what was on the small of his back?"
Amber turns to them.
"Well, eithier i'm still asleep, or i'm starting to remember."