The silence was almost painful as the six doctors sat and watched the seconds pass by unreasonably slow. With each tick of the hand House became increasingly restless. No one knew what to do. No one knew what to say. Suddenly, Foreman hopped to his feet and snatched the whiteboard marker off the table.
"What do we know about this Michael guy?" he addressed his co-workers.
"We know he's crazy," House muttered.
"We know where he lives," Kutner stated.
"Right. You and Taub go check out his place. Look for anything that could lead to answers or Thirteen and Cameron's whereabouts," Foreman instructed.
"We also know Thirteen's car was run off the road late last night, presumably by him," Chase pointed out.
"Good. You go check the police reports. See if you can find any leads."
"How am I supposed –"
"You care about Cameron right? You'll figure it out," Foreman practically yelled at him.
House, Cuddy and Foreman watched Chase pull open his cell phone as he jogged out of the room. Foreman then dropped the whiteboard marker and plopped back down in a chair, covering his face with his hands.
"So," House said, dumping a few pills into his hand and swallowing them down, "what are you gonna do Mr. Sergeant-In-Charge?"
"Nothing," Foreman answered, sounding defeated.
"But you were so quick to throw orders in their faces. Why not have any work for yourself?"
"Because I'm trying to spare them," Foreman answered quietly. "No one should have to sit and watch as their co-workers and friends get tortured right in front of them. I don't want them to have to see that and go through the guilt later of not doing anything to stop it."
"There's nothing they can do to stop it at this point," House pointed out.
"But I'm making them believe there is though. If they feel like they've done something to help, they won't feel so bad when…" Foreman trailed off quietly.
"Don't even go there Foreman! We're going to find them!" Cuddy shrieked at him.
Just like earlier, the argument was interrupted as the computer screen whirred back to life. The screen was filled with Michael's smiling face.
"Aww, what happened to your other fellows House? Did they realize what an insensitive asshole you are and ditch you?" Michael mocked. He allowed the camera to zoom in on the two women leaning against the wall together.
"What ridiculous thing do you have planned now Michael?" House challenged.
"It's so nice of you to ask!" Michael exclaimed sarcastically. "Well, Susan's heart was okay you thought she was in the clear, but then she got this fever. The fever kept climbing and climbing until it was up in the fatal range. One of your fellows was able to bring it down but she suffered through it for hours before that happened. So to recreate that lovely experience, I'm going to crank the heat in this room to an almost unbearable temperature. I've read that the human body can survive in temperatures up to 135°F. How bout I raise the heat to about 125°F? That would raise our wonderful doctors' body temps to around 108°F. As you all know this will induce delirium, convulsions, vomiting, breathlessness, and increased heart rate. Doesn't sound very comfortable does it? The best part is, I'm gonna let you all watch and listen in!" Michael smiled again.
"How long are you going to keep it like that for them?" Cuddy asked.
"I haven't decided yet. We'll just see how it goes. I'll be back in about a half an hour to give you your second clue." With that, he left, slamming the door behind him.
"Where is everyone House?" Cameron asked.
"Taub and Kutner went to Michael's home to dig up some info and Chase is seeing if the police have any new leads. How are you two doing? Has he already turned the heat up?" he asked noticing the sweat that had already covered her face.
"I'm fine House. I mean we're both pretty dehydrated but I'm fine for the most part. Whatever drug he gave me wore off awhile ago. Thirteen's in rough shape though," she motioned to the younger doctor. The girl's tremors had spread up to her shoulders and it looked like she was using all of the energy she had to keep her body still. Her eyes were closed and her breath came in quick gasps. "She's getting worse. She had a seizure earlier," Cameron spoke quietly.
"I can still hear you Cameron. You don't have to try to keep things a secret, I know how bad I am." Thirteen's eyes were open and she was looking directly at Cameron.
"How's your blood sugar Cameron? Any dizziness or nausea?" Foreman asked, drawing the attention away from Thirteen, for which she was grateful.
"No, it's okay right now. But I haven't had anything to eat or drink in awhile so I can't promise how long it'll stay okay." She was quiet for a moment and they watched her check Thirteen's pulse. "I don't know how long she can keep lasting," Cameron whispered. "It's already really hot in here and I'm sure Michael isn't done cranking it up yet."
As if on cue, the room began spinning before Thirteen's eyes. She clenched them shut and then opened them wide a few times in an attempt to control the sudden dizziness she was feeling. The tremors wracking her body weren't helping the situation either. Instead of trying to stop the whirling, she concentrated on her breathing, which she found had gotten worse since her seizure. Feeling defeated, she let the fatigue coursing through her to take over.
"Thirteen, you okay?" House asked when he saw her head flop forward.
"Yeah I'm just feeling a little heavy headed is all. It'll pass," she reassured him quietly.
"Cameron help her lay down. Her thinning blood caused by her withdrawal is making her head dead weight on her shoulders," House instructed.
"Why's everything always about her!?" Cameron suddenly snapped.
"Whoa Cameron, calm down," Cuddy said softly.
"Don't tell me to calm down! I want an answer! Why the hell is everything always about her!? What about me!?" she asked, standing up and raising her voice as she got closer to the camera. "I'm a better doctor than she is, I care more about my patients than she does, I don't have a drug problem like her, and I definitely don't sleep around like that little slut!" she yelled.
"Cameron –" House began but was cut off by the outraged doctor.
"You don't get to talk Greg. You want me to help her lay down? Here," she grabbed a fist full of Thirteen's dark hair, lifted her slightly, and threw her to the ground causing Thirteen to gasp in pain.
"Cameron stop. You need to just relax," House commanded.
"I don't need to do anything you say. Do you like her more because she's prettier than me?" she asked. "I can change that," she said as she began a ruthless attack on Thirteen's face and body.
The doctors watched in horror as Cameron pounded on Thirteen relentlessly. Her foot slammed into the other girl's face and stomach over and over again. Breathing deeply, Cameron stopped and grabbed Thirteen's shoulders, pulling the younger doctor to her feet. She then spun around and slammed her into the stone wall. Thirteen cried out as her head collided with the wall in a dull thud. Cameron pulled her back and repeated the action with a little more force and threw her back to the floor, delivering another powerful kick.
"You think you're better than me?" she asked driving yet another foot into Thirteen's temple and spitting saliva at her body. Dropping to her knees, she wrapped her hands tightly around Thirteen's neck and squeezed with all of her might. Cameron laughed as the taller doctor gasped and clawed at her hands. Just as Thirteen's body started to go limp, Cameron let go and stood back up. She placed one foot on top of Thirteen's chest and pushed down. "You'll never be better than me," she whispered.
Suddenly, Cameron began to sway on her feet. She stumbled backwards a few steps and leaned against the wall for support. With one last burst of energy, she slammed a punch into the wall and dropped to her knees, leaning on her hands and letting her head hang low.
"Cameron! What the hell is going on?" House asked desperately. She didn't answer right away. Instead, she just sat on her knees and took deep breaths.
"House? What just happened? Why am I breathing so hard?" she asked wiping sweat from her face and looking at the camera quizzically.
"You just went crazy and attacked Thirteen," Cuddy explained.
"No, I couldn't…" she said looking over to the motionless doctor. "Oh God."
She quickly crawled over to where Thirteen lay unmoving. She put two shaky fingers to the girl's neck and was relieved when she felt the dull thump of her heart. She then leaned over the woman's face. Her eyes suddenly widened in panic. She went into automatic doctor mode as she tilted Thirteen's head back, pressed their mouths together, and blew two deep breaths into her unconscious body.
"Cameron?" Cuddy questioned.
"She's not breathing. I think her lung has collapsed," Cameron answered before blowing two more full breaths into Thirteen.
"You need to find a way to re-inflate it," House commanded the panicked doctor.
After giving Thirteen two more breaths Cameron instantly jumped up and began pounding on the door. When her right hand made contact she shrieked out in pain. Upon further inspection she saw her fist, bloody and mangled. Knowing Thirteen needed help, she pushed the pain aside and continued pounding. After about 20 seconds of this, Michael burst through the door, shoving Cameron to the ground.
"What the fuck do you think you're doing?!" he yelled outraged.
"Please, I need a syringe. I know you have one. Please I need to use it! She's gonna die if I don't!" she pleaded, tears rolling down her cheeks.
Hesitating for a moment, Michael threw the door shut and ran off down the hall. Cameron continued to push air into Thirteen's broken body, praying every second for her to just wake up and be alright. Michael soon flew back into the room with a syringe in hand. He slid to a stop on the opposite side of Thirteen and handed the syringe to Cameron. As soon as it was in her hand she stopped her rescue breathing and began feeling around Thirteen's chest. House and the others held their breath as Cameron's hand found the specific place she was looking for. In lightning fast speed she used her teeth to yank the plunger out of the syringe. She then let out a shaky breath before jamming the syringe into Thirteen's chest. After a few agonizing seconds, Thirteen's chest rose and fell slowly.
"How'd you do that?" Michael asked incredulously.
"Her broken ribs pushed against her lung causing it to collapse. The syringe," she motioned to the medical instrument still stuck in Thirteen's body, "helped push air back into the lung, allowing it to work on its own. But it's only a temporary fix. She needs real medical attention soon," she explained, wiping tear off her cheeks.
"Why did you help her Michael?" House questioned. "You could've just let her die and been done with it. So why save her life?"
"Cause I'm not done with her yet," Michael simply replied before standing up and leaving.
"How is she?" Cuddy asked after the door had slammed shut.
"She's breathing on her own again but it's shallow and she's still unconscious. I can't believe this is all my fault."
"It's not your fault, it was the drug he gave you before," Foreman rationalized.
"Doesn't matter. It was my hands that did this to her. She's like this because of me," She swept Thirteen's hair out of her face and saw the yellow bruise beginning to form around one of her eyes and the read hand marks around her neck. The sight made her start crying all over again.
"Yes, she is like this because of you, but you need to pull yourself together if you expect either of you to get out of there alive," House stated sternly. "Now quit crying over spilt milk because what's done is done. Your job now is to clean up the mess."
Knowing that what House was saying was right, she couldn't very well rewind time, she wiped her tears away for a second time and removed the green sweater she was wearing. The action inched the pain in her hand back to life. She ripped off a strip from the bottom of the sweater and wrapped it tightly around her hand, wincing as she did so.
She then ripped off another strip and drug the bucket of water over. Looking inside, she saw that the water was already tainted with blood. Ignoring the bile rising in her stomach, she dipped the fabric into the water and wrung it out. She started on Thirteen's face, wiping the blood away from her nose and from her split lip. Then she moved lower, lifting the girl's black t-shirt and seeing the trauma she had caused to the already torn up skin. The gashes from earlier were all ripped back open and bleeding freely. She slowly wiped the blood away and began silently praying.
"Please God, let her be okay. I never meant to…and if she dies…I…I could never forgive myself. She doesn't deserve this. She's such a good doctor."
When she finished cleaning her stomach Cameron gently pulled down Thirteen's shirt and rocked back on her legs. She rolled up the rest of her green sweater and placed it underneath Thirteen's head.
"Now what?" she asked the doctors on the other side of the camera.
"Now we just wait," House said.
After about five minutes of silence, Cameron was once again sitting against the wall with Thirteen's head resting in her lap. Suddenly, her head snapped to look at the screen when she heard Kutner's voice as he burst through the door of the diagnostics room followed closely by Taub.
"We found some stuff," Kutner said, dropping an armload of papers on the table.
Taub pulled a blue folder out of the pile and opened it up. He took out a few papers and laid them out in a line for the others to see.
"This guy is up to his eyebrows in medical bills. He's in debt at least ten grand if not more. He was bound to crack eventually," Taub said, leaning on the back of one of the chairs.
"As we've seen before, broke – pissed off guys take hospitals hostage, not just two specific doctors and not with the intent to only torture them," house pointed out. "Yes he's insane, but he's doing this for pure vengeance.
Taub swept the papers up and crammed them back into the folder.
"Michael lives with his brother, Ralph. He owns a green Chrysler Jeep and Ralph is leasing a red Dodge Intrepid. Their father, Patrick, died about five months ago," Kutner reported.
"So what did daddy leave for his boys?" House asked.
"Chase is getting the inheritance records right now. He gave us the info he got from the police."
"Thirteen's car was run off the road obviously sometime last night. There was red paint scraped along the driver's side door as well as around the rear driver's side panel. Most of the windows on the vehicle were smashed during its roll and there was blood found on both the passenger's seat and the driver's seat. The police have absolutely no leads right now," Kutner rattled off everything Chase had told him.
"So we're basically at a stand still yet again," Cuddy concluded.
"But good information guys. Good work," Foreman added.
They nodded in acknowledgement and plopped down in chairs.
"How are they doing?" Kutner asked looking at the computer screen.
"He turned the heat up to an ungodly degree just to make them suffer," House sighed. "And the drug he gave Cameron before kicked in and she went berserk on Thirteen. Beat her up pretty good."
"Is Thirteen okay?" Kutner asked with concern.
"She's still unconscious so we don't really know the true extent of the damage yet," Cuddy answered.
"I see," Kutner responded leaning back in his chair slightly.
Everyone kept their thoughts to themselves as they silently watched the computer screen. Thirteen remained unconscious in Cameron's lap and Cameron had her head laid back against the wall. House had no idea how long he sat there, just staring at the unchanging scene. He finally tore his eyes away when he heard Cuddy's stomach growl quite audibly from beside him. He glanced around the table at the other doctors and noticed how dreary and exhausted they looked. Yeah, watching two of your good friends and co-workers get tortured relentlessly really took it out of you.
"You know, there's really not much going on right now, so why don't you all go down to the cafeteria and grab some food," he addressed them, breaking the silence. Everyone just sat staring at him blankly. "Seriously, go. I'll stay here and page you guys if anything changes."
They looked around at one another before standing slowly from their chairs and filing out the door. After they had all gone, House resumed his empty stare at the computer screen.
Back in the room, things were as calm and quiet as they could possibly get.
"Cameron?" Thirteen said quietly coming out of her unconscious state and startling Cameron.
"Yeah Thirteen?"
"It's hot," she stated.
"I know. How are you feeling?"
"I hurt. Everything hurts. Breathing's a little easier now though." She reached up slowly and her hand came into contact with the syringe jutting out of her chest. "Oh, desperate times call for desperate measures huh?" she asked dropping her hand back to her side.
"Yeah, you stopped breathing there for a little bit," Cameron replied, absent mindedly running her hand through Thirteen's dark hair. "You're gonna be okay Thirteen. Don't worry, I'm not gonna let anything else happen to you, I promise."
"You can't promise that," Thirteen whispered.
Cameron clenched her eyes shut for the umpteenth time in a futile attempt to stop any more tears from escaping her already dry eyes. Her mind flashed back to her assault on Thirteen and she felt bile rising in her stomach. She quickly but gently lifted Thirteen's head off of her lap and laid it on the ground. In three long strides she was in the corner, wretching warm stomach acid onto the floor. She stayed there, knees bent and heaving for a good two minutes before standing up straight and wiping her mouth to cross back across the room, a sudden wave of dizziness struck Cameron and she lost her footing, pitching forward and landing on her face. Unable to rise back to her feet, she crawled the rest of the way to Thirteen and laid down beside her.
"Cameron what's the matter? Do you have the flu?" Thirteen asked sounding concerned.
"No, I'm just catching a little heat stroke."
"Why don't we move out of the sun then. I told you the beach would be too hot today," she responded, pulling herself up into a sitting position against the wall.
Looking up at her, Cameron noticed that her eyes drooping halfway closed and there was a thick sheet of sweat covering her face. Her breathing had become quick and heavy again and she looked about ready to collapse in exhaustion.
"Sweety, we're not at the beach, we were kidnapped, remember?" Cameron asked pulling herself up as well. "You were driving me home and another car ran us off the road," she tried to explain, hoping something in Thirteen's delusional brain would click.
Thirteen's head tilted to the side in confusion before she let out a roar of laughter. "Wow, you really are getting heat stroke. You're starting to sound loony!" She continued laughing wildly until she was overcome with a fit of coughing. "Eww, and I think I'm catching your flu," she said between coughs.
"Thirteen, I don't have the flu! Look around, does this look like the beach to you? No. We're locked in a hot room, being terrorized relentlessly by a crazy man looking to get even with House for supposedly killing his wife," Cameron said, losing her calmness.
Hearing Cameron's words, Thirteen lifted her head and let her eyes roam the empty room. She glanced from the dirt floor to the grungy walls and to the shut door. Cameron saw panic in her eyes as she ripped the syringe from her chest and ran to the door, banging on it loudly.
"Let me out! Let me out!" she screamed at the top of her lungs.
Despite her overwhelming dizziness, Cameron jumped to her feet and wrapped her arms around Thirteen's frail form. She held her tight enough for comfort until her movements began to slow and eventually halt all together.
"It's gonna be alright Thirteen, but you gotta relax okay. If you don't calm down you're gonna end up hurting yourself," Cameron soothed quietly to the frantic girl.
Just as she thought she had things under control, the door swung open and an angry looking Michael stepped into the room.
"What's all the damn commotion!?" he roared.
"The heat is making her delirious! She's just gonna keep acting like this until you turn the heat back down," she yelled, trying to sound stronger than she actually felt.
"Don't you tell me what to do girl, or I'll put you in your place!" he stepped menacingly toward her.
"I'm not afraid," she lied.
"Really?" he taunted stepping closer still.
There was a brief moment of nothing before Michael reached out and ripped Thirteen from Cameron's arms, throwing her to the ground. He then grabbed her shoulders and shoved her backwards until she was pinned between the dirty wall and his large body. He brought his face so close to hers that she could feel his hot breath on her cheek.
"You scared now?" he asked, his voice a low growl.
When she tried to answer, she realized she couldn't find her voice so she resorted to a timid nod. Upon seeing the hesitant motion, Michael leaned back a little bit and let out a chuckle.
"Good," he said before slamming a fist into her stomach causing her to curl into herself and fall to the floor. "Don't ever forget who's in charge here!" he boomed before leaving the room again.
Thirteen, who had come out of her stupor, crawled over to a whimpering Cameron.
"You okay?" she asked, then chastised herself for asking such a ridiculous question to a girl who was obviously in pain.
"I'll be fine," she said as she recomposed herself. She looked up at the window, back to the door, then at the window again. "We're getting out of here before he kills one of us," she stated as she rose to her feet.
