"Shit," House mumbled to himself, leaning heavily against the wall for support. He wished he had a stethoscope on him. But he'd shed all his even remotely professional clothing and accessories - except the pager, of course - after getting stabbed three hours ago.

In fact, the T-shirt he was now wearing was one that had been stowed in his office. Chase had cut through the first one to get to his wound.

The small stab wound that had required twenty-six stitches, the one that he'd deflected as just a scratch now had the potential to be filling his lungs with blood. The diagnostic level of his mind told him reassuringly that the chances of that were minor, and he would have already noted other symptoms that would confirm it.

Another part of him though, a much simpler, more familiar part, told him that he was in pain. And Occum's Razor told him that the simplest answer was almost always the most likely. Trouble breathing? Just got stabbed? Well, that doesn't take a genius mathematician to work out.

Still, he could just as easily pin the pain and trouble breathing on increased stress and physical exhaustion. So he did, and chucked the rest of his thoughts on that matter out the window.

Popping open his Vicodin container, he swallowed two and hoped all the extra pills he'd taken tonight wouldn't make him too loopy.

A nurse was next on his list of people to boss around. "Brenda!" He called, seeing her a few yards away. She stopped in her tracks, turned on her heel to make her way to him quickly. She might hate House - even House's team - on most days. But today was not most days, and he was pulling rank, with everyone. "I need you to contact Dr. Foreman's next of kin." He instructed when she was in front of him. "Inform him of what's going on. We may need his medical consent."

Of course House knew he was Mr. Foreman, his Neurologist's father. He'd met the man once before - the last time Foreman had almost died doing his job - but now wasn't the time to get personal. In fact, he was detaching himself as much as humanly possible from this and everything else that had occurred tonight, thus far.

Brenda nodded her agreement and went off to make the call. Until the elder Foreman arrived, all medical decisions were technically Cameron's, as the proxy papers he'd issued last year were still valid. But since Cameron was currently incapacitated, all proxy privileges were handed over to his physician on record. House.

Which was exactly why he'd sent Chase to the operating room. The younger man was an Intensivist. Emphasis on intense. He trusted Chase to do his job and keep Foreman alive.

If, of course, that was even possible at this point.

o0oo0o

Officer Hernandez sat patiently, waiting for Dr. Cuddy to gather her bearings. He was polite enough not to mention the yelling match he - and everyone else in the hall - had overheard a few minutes ago. And when the man by her side - another doctor, he'd bet money on - led them to the couch at the end of the hall, they all sat down.

"Okay," the woman finally seemed at ease enough speak with him. "What's going on?"

He wasted no time with formalities. "Your diagnostic department has had a patient for the last week. A nine-year-old girl. Are you familiar with the case?"

"I assigned it to House." She nodded. "Inexplicable migraines. Relatively boring. I made House take it because the girl's mother - before her death three years ago - was a constant volunteer here."

House, Officer Hernandez thought almost fondly. He couldn't imagine what that man was like on a normal day.

"Yes, well, it seems Anna - the girl - Anna's father was physically and sexually abusing her." While he hated cases like these - he was a father of three himself - he couldn't let his personal opinions compromise his objectivity.

"God," the other man, the one in the McGill sweatshirt, hissed a low growl. Obviously he had no problems letting his disgust shine though.

"Apparently Dr. House diagnosed Anna with a type of psychosomatic illness. All her physical symptoms were brought on by the abuse. He also deduced who was causing that abuse."

"House's patient's father attacked him?" The brown-eyed man sounded appalled, but not all that shocked.

"I wish it were that simple." Hernandez sighed. "House confronted Mr. Haring about his suspicions tonight and told him that he'd be calling Child Protective Services and the police. Mr. Haring apparently took the news stoically. He was told to leave the hospital premises and everyone thought he had. Your security guards escorted him out."

This next part, at least, could justify Dr. Chase's accusations about bad security.

"He got back in." Dr. Cuddy didn't phrase it as a question.

"Yes." The policeman nodded anyway. "He went straight to his daughter's room. He had a knife and we believe it was his intent to kill her."

"Only House was in the room." The man, who was looking paler by the minute, took a guess.

"No."

The two doctors - friends, he guessed, of each other's and Dr. House, by the looks they were sharing; knowing, devastated - widened their eyes simultaneously.

"One of House's team, Dr. Cameron, was in the room." He explained. "House said she'd developed an emotional attachment to the girl."

"That sounds like Cameron," Dr. Cuddy said absently, leaning forward and covering her mouth with one of her hands.

"Haring attacked her, attempted to sexually assault her." This, as he'd predicted, got the biggest reaction out of them thus far. But he consciously chose to tune out their emotions at this point. As a cop, he was used to every reaction under the sun - he'd been doing this for twelve years - and he didn't need to read their emotions to know what they were feeling.

"The attack was bad," he went on, "But before Haring could finish what he started, Dr. Foreman came into the room. Then, some short amount of time later, I have to guess, Dr. House and Dr. Chase came in, as well. We think Dr. Foreman may have paged one of them before Haring attacked him. I can't tell you the specifics of what happened during the fight that obviously took place after that, because I don't know myself. That's why we're still here; Dr. House hasn't filled in all the details yet. He was much more concerned with taking care of his team."

"What I can tell you," he added, "Is that Dr. House was stabbed once, but he's declared himself healthy enough take charge of the entire hospital in your absence. And Dr. Foreman's in surgery right now. He was stabbed as well, but several times. He's in critical care."

The two doctors were holding hands tightly now, tears welling in and spilling out of their eyes respectively. Hernandez regretted the last bit of information he knew he had to share.

"Mr. Haring was pronounced dead several hours ago." He took a deep breath and with controlled indifference he divulged slowly, "Initial autopsy reports… indicate that his cause of death… was blunt force trauma to the head."

TBC…