Caring is Creepy – Chapter VIII
Jason waited at the door, bored out of his wits.
Trying to sustain his guard-like composure, Jason gazed down the hallway of the hospital again then looked back in front of him. His suit was starting to itch. Trying to clasp his hands together he cursed in his mind over the clumsy massive gloves. Sighing he glanced behind him through the glass walls were the patient was lying. Turning once again to the wall in front of him Jason breathed onto his plastic screen, fogging up his vision slightly.
As the condensation on his mask began to disappear a brown blob quickly appeared in front of him, holding up something to his mask.
"No admittance." Jason barked as he quickly turned to his professional self.
"I'm the Doctor." The man glared at Jason as he held the paper to his face. "I'm the President of the CDC and this is my secretary Dr House – "
"Hey!"
"We need to see the patient."
Jason stood stern as the cripple began to walk up to them. "You need a suit."
"No suit needed, got my dry wit to protect me." The crippled doctor smiled. "Now, go be a good man and piss off."
Jason glared at the cripple then looked back to the paper that the Doctor held and sighed. Switching off the oxygen Jason took off his mask and plodded down the hall as both men watched him turn the corner and disappear out of sight.
The Doctor immediately turned back round and whisked the screen door open, throwing off his coat and chucking it to the other side of the room as he quickly approached the bed.
House followed slowly and closed the screen door again as the patient began to wake up.
"Hello." The Doctor shoved his hands in his pockets as he stood at the foot of the bed.
"What?" Lauryn opened her eyes and tried to look around the room as she propped herself up on the bed. "Who's there?"
"I'm the Doctor, I've come for a little chat."
House crossed his arms and leaned on the glass wall as he watched on sceptically.
"What do you remember about last night?" The Doctor continued.
"I don't know…I was walking and then it all went black and I was suddenly in an ambulance but I couldn't see."
"Nothing else?"
"Like what, being stuck by lightning? No, nothing else."
"Right then!" The Doctor forced a smile and pulled out his hands from his pockets, moving up to Lauryn and he slowly brought his hands to the sides of her head and looked in her eyes.
"What are you doing?" Lauryn looked at the Doctor strangely as he began to stare into her eyes.
"Nothing, just…try and relax. This isn't going to hurt a bit."
House raised his eyebrows and began to smile wryly as the Doctor closed his eyes and began to hold Lauryn's head tighter. Suddenly Lauryn's eyes began to flicker then close, her whole body going limp as she collapsed back down on her pillow.
The Doctor opened his eyes.
"Here we go!" He stood up from the bed and stepped back a bit, stuffing his hands into his pockets again, staring at Lauryn.
Suddenly her eyes opened again. Eyes flicking everywhere she propped herself up on the bed again. "Right…I can't see."
The Doctor continued to stare at the patient. "Identify yourself."
"Hold on – what?" The patient looked confused.
"Identify yourself."
"Ah, Edosob." The patient rubbed her face with her hand and tried to look around the room again in vain.
"What species?" The Doctor remained still.
"Electrios. From the Sparn Confederation."
"Ah!" The Doctor sighed in understanding. "You're an Electrios."
"Who are you?"
"I'm the Doctor."
The patient nodded slowly. "And ah, where am I?"
"On Earth."
"What's earth?"
"3rd planet from the sun in the Solar System number Square/8 in the Milky Way."
"The Milky Way?" The patient raised her eyebrows. "Ok, that explains a lot."
The Doctor began to tug on his ear lightly as he continued to stare at the patient. "But you're from the Sparn Confederation, that's galaxies away, billions of light years. What on earth are you doing here? Why aren't you back home?"
"I was pronounced terminal."
"What do you mean?" House suddenly piped up as he continued to lean on the wall up the back.
"Who's that?" The patient tried to look at the direction of his voice.
"I'm that body's doctor." House grumbled. "What do you mean by terminal?"
"I mean that I'm sick and dying. The Electrios don't take to sickness lightly."
The Doctor looked confused. "What do you mean? You never get sick. You're an Electrios, you cure each other."
"Ah," The patient smiled wryly. "Not till three periods ago. There was an infection that couldn't be stopped, no matter how much people cared. Everyone gave up, stopped caring for the sick because there was no hope. The contaminated ended up being quarantined. They all died together."
"So why are you here?" House continued to glare at the patient suspiciously.
"Like I said, I got sick. We no longer have the capabilities of a cure back home so they throw patients to random spots in the universe. They say that it's to find the nearest Electrios who has the capabilities of caring, but everyone knows it's so you can die away from the Confederation."
The Doctor bit his lip and crossed his arms as he stared at the patient again in curiosity. "But why transfer into this body? Why are you infecting the others with this…ah! ...You're dying."
"What's your point?" House looked over at the Doctor.
"The Electrios are different to you and me," The Doctor looked over to House. "They don't get cured by medicine or surgeries or whatever, all they need is empathy. Raw empathy in it's purest form can heal anything except old age."
"But after plague, people gave up on this form of medicine." The patient jutted in with a sad voice. "The Electrios stopped caring about the sick."
House looked curiously at the patient and the Doctor. "What do you mean by caring?"
The Doctor looked over to House. "They feed off other people's care. Someone who cares can then feel their pain. Literally."
House raised his eyebrows. "Empathy in its purest form."
The Doctor continued. "The Electrios transfer their sickness to the other person and through that empathy they are both cured. But first you need to find someone who cares."
"Explains why Cameron was infected." House pushed himself off the wall and moved slowly towards the bed. "But you, Electrolux or whatever your name was, why are you in PPTH? Of all the planets in all the solar systems in all the galaxies, why did you have to stumble into this one?"
"I didn't choose it if that's what you mean. The doctors blast you into different spaces all scattered round the universe and your ship is programmed to latch on to the closest form of life capable of empathy. I remember the ship being launched then suddenly I end up here. But you said there were others infected? That shouldn't be so."
"What do you mean?" The Doctor lowered his voice.
"The Electrios only need one infected to get enough raw empathy. I should be cured."
" 'Should' being the operative word." House wandered up to the bed. "What are your symptoms?"
"Blindness, seizures, brain tumour and heart failure."
"Interesting…" House sharpened his gaze. "Everyone infected only have the symptoms associated with a lightning strike. The only one with your symptoms is that body right there."
"Oh," The Doctor sighed in understanding. "The transfer probably can't translate to the human system. The procedure's going haywire."
"So what do I do?" The patient looked over to the Doctor nervously.
"You sit there, try and recover your strength. If we can figure out what you have and find a way to cure it then maybe we can fix this mess."
"Ok then." House smiled wryly at the Doctor. "We need a whiteboard."
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NB: Right, again, sorry for the lateness. So that chapter was a padding out episode, for you know…padding out. Plot setter and all, so I hope you bared with it. Oh yeah, added in the POV of the CDC guard guy. Why? Beacuse every time I see one of those poor guys in radioactive suits or whatever on tv or in the movies (like that Greys ep with the plague) I think Christ they must be bored out of their wits, what the hell do they do for all that time, what the hell would they be thinking? Thus: guard's POV. Anywho, 'twill be a short NB because I think I'm starting to bore you all with my relentless pleas for reviews. Cheers for reading this though – you're all champs! Absolute champs!! Oh and yes, the fic is named after the Shins song "Caring is Creepy" - love that song.
