This is a crack!AU inspired by DreamsofSpike's "Dark Redux". Assuming I can keep it up, there's going to be one chapter per episode, based on the episode. Whee...
1.3 Maternity
It wasn't often that the Diagnostics slave made the mistake of using the elevators. Lim grinned when he saw him: Greg ducked his head and took a step back into the corner, as if he could hope to be overlooked. "Just what I wanted," Lim said, and caught him by the wrist. "Come on to the Ob-Gyn lounge for a ... consult."
Kubisak was the only other doctor there: he looked up as Lim came in, Greg in tow. "We got him?"
"Clinic hours are over till eight," Lim said. "Diagnostics isn't busy: I saw them all sitting round doing nothing." He took the cane out of Greg's hand and tossed it over towards the door, pushing Greg down on to his knees.
"Let him sit on his ass," Kubisak said. "Last time he wasn't good for more than one round if his weight was on his bad leg."
"Okay." Lim pushed Greg's shoulder: the slave shifted position, looking up at them, until he was sitting down with his legs stretched out in front of him, his hands folded in his lap. "Put your hands on the floor by your side," Lim said, "No copping a free feel." He unzipped his pants, manoevered his cock out, and stood over the man, pushing the hardening length into his mouth. The slave was good at it: tongue and lips busy, pushing his head forward, deep-throating: in only a few minutes, Lim caught at his head, gripping to keep his balance and thrust hard inside, coming with a rush. Kubisak took his turn, not complaining about sloppy seconds. Lim turned away, getting bottled water out of the fridge. He'd never cared for watching another man have sex.
"You want him again?" Kubisak asked: Lim turned back to see Kubisak tidy himself back into his pants. The man was sitting where Kubisak had left him, wet and messy around the mouth, hands still flat on the floor by his side.
"Not right now," Lim said, handing Kubisak a bottle of water. He drank about half of it in a few thirsty swallows, and handed the remainder to the slave, tapping it against the side of his face: "Get yourself cleaned up. So, the Hartigs?"
"Their baby gets a fever." Getting a free blow-job had immeasureably improved the afternoon, but still.
"Wait, don't tell me." Kubisak sounded like he knew the story. "Their kid had a seizure."
"Yep. The parents, of course, start freaking and I have to deal with that for an hour." Then again, if he'd got to leave an hour earlier, he'd have missed catching Greg in the elevator.
"Like it was your fault," Kubisak said sympathetically.
"She was perfect when I delivered her. If you want to blame someone, blame the pediatrician." Of course it was human nature to take it out on the person to hand: Lim understood that, but it didn't keep him from being annoyed about it.
"So, how's the kid now?"
"Bowel obstruction, she's under observation, she'll be fine."
"Pediatrician'll take all the credit," Kubisak said, amused.
They both looked up as the door closed: the slave had left, without asking permission.
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Wilson was not expecting to see Greg in his own office. He glanced at his watch: about an hour since the clinic shift was over. "Hello," he said, as Greg was standing by the door, not moving further into the room.
"I want an escort up to pediatrics," Greg said.
"Isn't that what your fellows are supposed to be for?" But Wilson was standing up. Greg's last whipping had been eight days ago: to Wilson's surprise and disappointment, Greg didn't even seem to react to it. Wilson hadn't witnessed it, of course, but he assumed it had been a judicial twenty lashes, and Greg should have been showing some signs of pain or weakness the next day.
"I just want to check out a couple of babies," Greg said.
"Okay," Wilson said. "And you're okay that we take the elevator?"
"If you're with me," Greg said, very promptly.
Pediatric intensive care had two babies in it, newborns. "I was in the Ob/Gyn lounge and heard them talking about them," Greg said. He barely glanced at their charts, and he didn't touch the baby. "Exhibit A: Baby girl Hartig. Term baby, 42 hours old. Went into seizures 6 hours ago, brought into the intensive care, diagnosed with obstruction of the small bowel."
"I'm still amazed you're in the same room with a patient," Wilson said pleasantly.
"People don t bug me until they get teeth," Greg said, and bared his own in a small humourless smile. "Exhibit B: Baby boy Hausen. Another term baby, 48 hours old. Brought into the NICU before the Hartig baby: fever of unknown origin, 101 degrees, trending upwards."
"Wow," Wilson said. "That is amazing. You hung out in the OB/GYN lounge and heard about two sick babies. It's eerie." He meant to check the Hausen baby's temperature by hand, but Doctor House said sharply "Don t touch that."
"All right..." Wilson drew his hand away.
"We have an infection spreading in the hospital."
"These kids have totally unrelated illnesses."
"They fell sick within four hours of each other. They had the same delivery rooms, maternity rooms are neighboring, so transmission's possible. They have the same symptoms."
"The Hartig girl has a bowel obstruction," Wilson corrected. "No matter how close their beds are, I'm pretty sure kids can t share a blockage." He was fairly sure by now that Greg was making it up to have some excuse for spending time in a doctor's lounge: Diagnostics didn't have one, for obvious reasons.
"What does bowel obstruction on a chart indicate?" Greg asked, in the tone of someone asking a rhetorical question.
"Well, normally, I'd say it indicates a patient's bowel is obstructed, but I'm pretty sure you have some deeper truth to impart." Wilson was more or less amused: he was between appointments, but he wasn't catching up with paperwork.
"It means that some random doctor of indeterminate skill thinks that the patient's bowel is obstructed."
Wilson laughed out loud. "Okay, you re upset because they threw you out of their lounge."
Greg was flicking through the baby's paperwork. "Look at the x-ray. It's a normal gas pattern."
"You want," Wilson offered, "I can get you a key to the oncology lounge." He liked that idea: Greg off his own territory, in a more relaxing environment. He'd warn the other oncologists to leave him alone. Greg was saying something about air in the column. Wilson looked at him fondly: there was a comfortable couch in the oncology lounge that he could imagine sitting on with Greg, now he thought of it, with Greg tucked up against him and his arms round him. "We re getting TiVo," he offered.
"If it's air," Greg said monomaniacally, "no bowel obstruction."
Wilson sighed and joined in. "Even if it is air, it could have been there before the obstruction."
"No," Greg said. "Something's infected both these infants. Walk me down to Cuddy's office, will you?"
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House was late back from his first clinic shift: this wasn't unusual. Cameron was still responding to his mail. Chase was asleep. Foreman had decided it was a good time to plan out his next neurology paper.
House came in, looking damp and dishevelled, and glanced round at the three of them: Cameron stood up, and Foreman echoed her response. House picked up the book Foreman had been consulting, and threw it at Chase, waking him up. "Get up! We re going hunting."
"For what?" Foreman asked.
"Wabbits."
"Chase, Cameron, you check the rooms on this side: Foreman, you're with me."
In the first room they went into, both the parents were asleep; the baby was in a cot at the foot of the bed. Doctor House picked up the baby, who started to cry - even to Foreman's ears, a healthy yell.
The parents woke up and stared: a dishevelled, collared man dressed like a janitor, holding their baby.
"Hi," House said. "Bye." He handed Foreman the baby. "He's screaming, he's fine," he added, and went out: Foreman smiled awkwardly. "Good looking baby," he said, and put the infant back into the cot.
They visited three more rooms, finding healthy babies and tired parents: outside the fourth room, Foreman nearly bumped into Doctor Kubisak. "Sorry," he said apologetically, until he realised the reason Kubisak wasn't moving was that House wasn't moving, and House wasn't moving because he was backed up against the wall.
"Did you come back for more, Greg?" Kubisak asked. "You left rather impolitely last time." He leaned forward, planting a hand on the wall beside House's head. "Maybe we should teach you better manners?"
"Excuse me," Foreman said, loudly. Not that he cared, but this was even more of a waste of his time than looking for sick babies.
"Dammit," Kubisak said, apparently recognising him. "Okay, Greg. Some other time." He walked off, with an annoyed glance back. House picked himself up from the wall, and gave Foreman a nod. "Next," was all he said.
"That happen to you often?" Foreman asked curiously. He didn't find House at all appealling himself, but some people couldn't resist using a slave for sex: there was something about the inability to resist pursuit, apparently.
"None of your damn business," House snapped.
They met up with chase and Cameron at the end of the hall. "Good news, no epidemic," Chase said cheerily.
"Tragic, huh?" Foreman said. He wanted to be back at his laptop.
"Overflow rooms, third floor," House said, and went into the elevator. He held down the open door button, and waved them to join him,
"This imaginary infection has spread to the next floor?" Foreman asked Chase and Cameron's backs... they were following House in. Foreman sighed and joined them.
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The epidemic that wasn't: Wilson was still contemplating that. Greg had been hanging out in the Ob/Gyn lounge, overheard two doctors talking, figured out two sick babies had been infected from the same source, and saved the lives of all but one of the babies who had been infected. Cuddy had started turning maternity patients away in short order.
"I think I definitely want you to hang out in the oncology lounge," Wilson told Greg, sitting down next to him on the couch in the maternity ward's waiting area. He eyed him thoughtfully. Greg was wearing the polo-neck he was allowed to have in clinic hours.
Greg glanced back at him for an instant, and went on scanning the room. "Cuddy gave me today off."
"Which explains why you're here."
"I'm in the haystack." House didn't take his eyes off the room.
"Ah, because now you know you're looking for a needle," Wilson said, pleased with himself.
"Right."
"If I tell you to 'let it go', it won't make any difference, will it?" Wilson inquired.
"Enteroviruses are spread by humans. Fecal, oral... could be respiratory secretions, though."
"So, Cuddy got stool samples from the whole staff. Just wait until they come back."
"That won't do it."
"Why not?"
"Whoever the shedder is - they're so virulent, the stool couldn't have passed unnoticed." Greg didn't even seem to register a pun. He was watching the room, and everyone passing through, and clearly thinking: Wilson wondered for the first time what he'd been like before he was enslaved. "And the babies didn t share any common personnel," Greg added. He wasn't paying any attention to Wilson, and he evidently wasn't going to. "That's what's weird."
Wilson shrugged. "Yeah, yeah. That's what's weird." He stood up. "I want to talk to you later," he said. "When you're through playing in the haystack."
Someone was coughing. Not far away, not in sight. Wilson might not have noticed, but he saw Greg's head turn and his gaze focus: there was an old lady, one of the hospital volunteers, pushing a cart of teddy-bears. They were small, newborn-sized. Wilson glanced down at Greg, and saw him getting to his feet, angling his cane and moving faster than Wilson would have supposed.
The old lady looked at them, and said to Wilson "Can I help you?"
"I think you need to go talk to Doctor Cuddy," Wilson said.
"Me?"
"Yes," Greg said. He was leaning forward. "Take your bears."
"Well, really," the lady said.
But she went, in the end, after Wilson exercised his best charm. He was about to congratulate Greg, but the man turned round and headed for the stairwell. He was through the doors before Wilson caught up with him.
"You know, you could use the elevator," Wilson began, and met a glare.
"I don't want to use the elevator," Greg said. "I don't want to hang out in the doctors' lounges. I do my job. I just want people to leave me alone."
Wilson stood thoughtfully at the top of the stairs, listening to the cane and the footsteps moving down. He smiled.
TBC...
