A/N: Posting again! Once again sorry this chapter's so short but now that this curve ball's in the mix, Wilson has a choice: save Amber or listen to House? Writing the Child House is fun...Reviews are welcome! characters (C) FOX, Silent Hill (C) KONAMI


IX- Intermission

Wilson was ecstatic to say the least as he and Amber caught up with each other but he had to be careful of what he said to her. She doesn't know she's dead so I have a chance of getting her home, he hoped. "So why are you here?" Volakis asked as they walked along the main street. "Actually, I don't know myself. I simply woke up in a car accident just outside of town; I don't remember much before that," the oncologist replied with utmost honesty; maybe House knew more than what he was letting on.

"And this 'House', he seems like someone who gets his way a lot; how come you two are still friends?" Amber continued, suddenly resembling her old self for a split moment. "Uh, we have a mutual understanding," Wilson answered caught off-guard by the question. Amber rolled her eyes before adding, "He doesn't sound like he agrees with that 'understanding'. My mother told me that if something goes bad, you have to nip at the bud."

"You, on the other hand, sound like a pushover," she shot back snidely, causing James to chuckle. "Maybe I am…anyways, we should try to get out of here before nightfall or the monsters will have a field day with us," he said when Amber suddenly slapped him across the face. Her demeanor had shifted dramatically from blissfully unaware to contempt, "We're facing monsters that can kill us and all you can do is let yourself be pushed around?! This is life or death, James!" she exclaimed while frantically pointing to the shadows that stood against the fog.

"What the hell? Amber, what's wrong with you? We're just making small talk!" the oncologist remarked; the argument had no sense at all. Kutner behaved in the same bipolar manner so it must be a side effect, he analyzed as best as he could. Amber then reverted back into a more civil tone when she said "I'm so sorry…but you don't know what it's like to be here for too long. I've been stuck in this place without so much as a hint as to why for the last few months, surviving as best as I can."

She's afraid of outside contact, James assumed with a heavy heart; acting on the primal instinct to live had done its fair share of blows to his brain as well. "Maybe I can help you; do you know any place with a working telephone?" he requested. "Not really, there's a phone that keeps ringing at all hours over by the Ridgeway Clinic but the road's blocked so the fastest way to get there is to cross the Pet Center store then enter the St. Stella church and cross the Fire Station." Amber replied to Wilson's relief.

"So why didn't you just go in and answer it?" "Trust me, I've tried but the whole building's locked. Plus I heard some weird noises come from inside so I tend to avoid it," the formerly dead woman concluded. I would've done the same, Wilson shrugged, but at least we have a starting point.

As the pair walked down the street, the specter of possible insanity reappeared in the oncologist's thoughts. She's not real…he concluded; people don't come back from the dead just because. Noting his untrusting look, Amber instinctively grabbed his hand, as if to reassure him of her existence throughout the miserable town. "Let's try to get out of here together and maybe we can remember all those things all over again," she said with a calm smile. With a breath of new air, Wilson said, "We'll do that…I promise."

Meanwhile, the eyeless child that was House glared down on the couple from atop a tree, his Abstract Daddy at his side as well as his faithful shadow monsters. "Daddy, why does Jimmy do the opposite of what I tell him?" he inquired with a caustic tone to his voice. The corpse rattled but unlike the last time, House didn't retaliate; he simply grimaced. A lone tear slid down his face as the ghastly boy argued, "But they'll take him and then they'll kill him! If he was going to die anyways, I should have just done it myself!"

The shadows contorted around the sad little boy and asked him what his desire was. The boy instantly snapped back to his cynical smile and exclaimed before he burst into manic laughter, "Bring me their heads on a platter!"