Chapter Ten

It was too late for them to still be there, way too damn late. Not that, Chase suspected, House or Foreman had much to get to, but he personally was very desirous to make off with his lovely wife and fall into bed, followed by a long, fulfilling night - and morning - of sleep. Allison was holding her head up in a way that suggested she was of like mind. There'd been a face mask on their On-Call Room door again, so they hadn't even been able to duck out for a quick nap.

"Have we ever been here this long before?" he asked Cameron quietly.

"We must have," she yawned, "but I don't remember."

"Latest CT doesn't look good," Foreman reported, leg jittering up and down from too much caffeine. "The tissue around many of his organs is becoming necrotic."

"Between that, the bruising, and the bone deterioration, it's like he's just falling apart." Cameron rubbed her eyes; her contacts must be bothering her after being in all day. Chase squeezed her other hand under the table.

"None of that unless you're willing to share," said House, and Chase jumped. How did he always know? Chase slid his foot closer to Cameron's and nudged it, just to see if House would notice, but his boss was staring off into the distance. "'Just falling apart'," he repeated scornfully. "Animal sacrifice cults. Those really the best you can come up with? I think you three are getting complacent."

"No," Chase corrected him, "we're getting exhausted."

Foreman nodded in agreement and chugged another of the row of espressos in front of him. Chase stared at them longingly. Why didn't espresso places deliver? It just wasn't fair. He wasn't sure how Foreman had gotten them (although he was sure a nurse was involved), nor did he know why his co-worker wasn't sharing, but damn was he jealous right now. He wondered if Foreman would trade one of them in exchange for a ride home. At this point, it didn't seem like Foreman would be able to walk, let alone operate heavy machinery.

He tried to keep his head up for whatever House said next, but his brain was winding down and he couldn't help but let himself slouch a little. He was just dreaming about 13 coming to work with them when he got splashed with cold water.

He gasped and sputtered. "What was that for!" he exclaimed. He wiped his face and hair off on his lab coat. Cameron's bangs were dripping, but she didn't appear to notice.

"You were falling asleep," said House, "and you missed my exciting news. The former I could conceivably let pass, but not the latter."

"Fine. What was your exciting news?"

"Well, since I'm not convinced that my team is bothering, I've decided we need to have a competition."

"What's the prize?" Foreman asked suspiciously.

"Yeah," said Cameron.

"Oh, it's a doozy," promised House. "The next time I notice something I want to question you about... I won't." He looked around the table to catch their reactions. No one's expression had changed. "So when Cameron and Chase start fighting over getting a cat and eventually have a baby instead, one of them won't have to hear from me about it. When Foreman... my God, what do you do?"

"Thirteen," Chase said before realising it; his brain-to-mouth filter wasn't operating so well right now. Judging by the kick he got under the table, he was never going to get one of the espressos now. His posture sagged.

"When I hire her back-"

"I thought that was just a dream! She's coming back?"

"Dreaming about her? Kinky. Yeah, I'm bound to get tired of you guys eventually. When I hire 13 back and she and Foreman circle each other for days, only she will suffer my full curiosity. That is, if he wins."

Everyone woke up a little when it struck them how appreciated the lack of scrutiny would be.

"Wait," said Chase, "so if you redo the team, it would have 14 on it, well, what about us?"

"Not like Foreman has anywhere else to go," said House equably.

"So what do we have to do this time?" Foreman asked through gritted teeth.

"First, Chase has to give me his Supernatural books."

"Done," said Chase, shrugging. The motion shook a little more water off him. "I don't really think they're all that-"

House cut him off with a threatening gesture of the bottle. "Uh-uh! Not a word against them. They're so awful they're fantastic. If I wasn't in withdrawal right now, there would be no prize at all. So - I want you to put those 'caring' skills to work and find out everything you can about the patient."

Chase snorted. Fat lot of good that would prove.

"We've done that already," said Cameron. "Several times."

"Oh, I don't expect it to be true," House said. "His real life is awful. The tales he spins, though..."

"What if we just make something up?" asked Foreman. "How're you going to know?"

"It'll probably lack that certain flavour of crazy. Besides, it's not like any of you have any imagination to speak of. Your comebacks would be a lot better if you did."

Chase felt insulted. He did a mean karaoke performance, and Allison made fantastic scrapbooks. Foreman... well, he was sure his fantasies about being in charge of a hospital were rich with detail.

"You're our boss," he pointed out in their defence. "We're supposed to let you have the upper hand conversationally."

"Not convinced," said House. "You seem to try every now and then, and still fail."

Foreman smirked. "You really think I would let anyone speak to me the way you do if I wasn't working for them?"

"Course not. You'd smack a bitch up." Foreman opened his mouth as if to say something but chose to down another espresso instead. "All right then, I'm ready. Hit me with your best shot."

It was one of those moments you dream of, thought Chase, and plan out perfectly. Unfortunately, they were all too close to dream state themselves to remember any such plans. They passed an increasingly panicked series of looks between them.

"I'm waiting," sang House.

"You're a yobbo," Chase blurted in desperation, though it didn't even fit, it was just the first insult that came to mind.

House raised a brow. Cameron's jaw dropped. Foreman blinked, dumbfounded, and didn't seem to be able to stop, lids fluttering frantically. Chase wondered if he should do something to stop it - in exchange for one of those little cups of liquid gold, of course.

"I don't know what that means, o foreign one," said House.

"Exactly," Chase said with as much smugness as he could muster, taking refuge in unfamiliarity. He hoped against hope that House would forget to look it up; he'd be laughed out of the office.

Everyone was a little lost for words after that, and would have fallen asleep (except for Foreman, of course) if not for House's timely smack of the patient's file on the desk. Foreman jumped about a foot in the air and didn't seem to make it particularly far back down.

"Aren't you going to get started then?" asked House.

"Let me get this straight," said Cameron. "You want us to snoop around the patient and report anything interesting back to you?"

House nodded and leaned back in his chair, staring at them expectantly.

"Yeah?" Chase asked, since House didn't seem about to say anything.

"Oh, I was just expecting someone to yell out, 'That's unethical! We should be treating him!' No?" House shook his head mournfully. "You guys are no fun anymore. So who's going to go and get the head start?"

"I did it last time," said Cameron.

"And I did it before that," said Chase. They turned to Foreman, who shot up, shaky and grumbly, and knocked over his chair.

"Actually, I don't trust you around needles right now," House told him. "I guess it's going to have to be beauty over brawn."

Chase and Cameron exchanged a silent conference trying to figure it out. Course, House always meant his words in the most offensive way they could be construed.

"Fine," Chase said, sighing. "I'll do it."

He walked through the halls on auto-pilot, closing his eyes for several paces at a time. It ended up being the wrong method to follow because it led him not to the room with the ice bath, but the patient's actual room in the ICU.

"Damn," he muttered, but he caught movement in the room and turned on the light.

Sam was huddled as if in prayer, on his knees with head laid upon the bed. He looked up as Chase entered, face flushed and tear-streaked.

"Dean's not here," he said, voice vulnerable like a lost child's. "Did something happen?"

As Chase got closer, he caught the scent of alcohol so strongly you could light a flame off it. He coughed.

"Have you been drinking?" he asked. He probably didn't want to know how Sam had gotten to the hospital.

Sam blinked tearily but couldn't quite focus on him. "I have to see him. Where's Dean?" He raised himself slowly, slanting more and more the further off the ground he got. Chase didn't think he'd be able to trust his balance if he got any higher, and there was still lots of height left to go.

"Sam," Chase said, reaching for him and pulling him into sitting on the bed. "Sam!" He had to grab the larger man in place to get him to listen. "We took your brother to get an ice bath. He's just a few rooms down."

Sam slumped.

"I'm not supposed to be here," he confided. "I promised I wouldn't come."

Chase didn't know what to say to that. He knew he'd been justified in his earlier advice to the brothers to separate and let them have their own lives, but that didn't stop him from feeling bad, at least a little, over how it had turned out. Dean had gone too far in implementing his advice – which he should have expected – and now they were both miserable.

"Why don't you come with me and get a coffee," he suggested. "I can update you on your brother's condition."

"But is he alone right now?" slurred Sam. The tone he took on when drunk was surprisingly youthful. "He never tells anyone when it hurts. You have to watch him."

"What kind of hospital would we be if we didn't?"

Sam shook his head. "You don't know what to look for. I gotta see him. I'll make sure."

"Okay," Chase said to placate him, "I'll take you to him, but let's get you a coffee first, huh?"

"I guess," said Sam. Chase stood poised to catch him if he fell, but despite a stumble getting up and an unsteady gait, he seemed ambulatory enough. At least, until he leaned to the side.

"Oof!" Chase had to will his knees to unbend. His shoulder was going to be sore tomorrow. He dragged himself forward to the other room, Sam leaning heavily on him the whole way.

"I'm not supposed to be here," Sam whispered in his ear.

"You're telling me," muttered Chase, "I haven't stopped working in fifty hours. Did you know it's after visiting hours and you're drunk?"

"I am drunk," Sam agreed readily. "Did you know you're wet?"

Chase clenched a fist. "It would be hard not to." Once they got their coffee, they couldn't get to the room fast enough for him.

Upon seeing his brother, Sam freed Chase from his weighty prison. He bounded unsteadily towards Dean, falling onto the rim of the tub. Chase winced in sympathy, but Sam didn't seem to notice the discomfort of his position.

Chase circled the tub, checking on the ice bath and Dean's temperature. It was going down, at least; another few hours and they could probably pull him out. He didn't like the mottling that continued to form on Dean's jaundiced skin, and how the bones seemed more fragile each time he saw him. Dean didn't respond to them at first, but Sam caught his notice eventually.

"Sammy?" Dean said hoarsely. He raised glazed, unfocused eyes and reached out an arm, which Sam all but fell into. To Chase's surprise, he pressed a sweaty kiss to his brother's forehead, holding him tight.

"He's not usually like this," Sam said, just as stunned. He patted his brother on the back. "I'm here, Dean."

"Remember, we fell on the stairs," mumbled Dean. "Tell them I'm your guardian."

Chase felt troubled. He shouldn't be there, and the brothers, if they had all their facilities about them, wouldn't want him there either. House's challenge meant that his boss would want to hear about it, though. Chase was still checking Dean's vitals, a hand to his wrist. He couldn't go yet. He kept losing count, anyway. Lack of sleep did not improve multitasking, and the task at the forefront right now was eavesdropping.

"That was fifteen, sixteen years ago," said Sam, confused.

Here, he could at least be of assistance. "Dean's fever is making him delirious," he explained. "He might not be aware of his surroundings as they are here; it might be another time or place to him."

"Oh my God," Sam gasped, horrified. "Is there anything you can do so he doesn't have to?"

Chase frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Dean's had a rough few years lately. If he has to go through them again..."

House had said that he'd probably had an awful life. Chase scanned Dean's chart and shook his head.

"Sorry, Sam. There's nothing I can do. It's a thin line between ruining his liver and getting the drugs to cure him right now. Look," he added, trying to reason away Sam's concern, "there's nothing to say that's what's happening with him right now."

"He thinks I'm a kid!" exclaimed Sam. "I think we can be pretty sure."

Chase had to admit, if just to himself, that Sam was probably right.

"I'm sorry," he repeated, "I can't give him anything. He seems to know that you're here, though; why don't you see what you can do to help him?"

"I can do that."

"All right," said Chase, ready to leave. He hesitated. Much as his bed was calling out to him, he really couldn't leave Sam here like this indefinitely. Perhaps he could make up for having listened in on him and Dean for House. "I'm going to send someone in to check on you every so often. When you want to leave, let them know and they'll call a cab for you, okay? I don't know how you got here – don't tell me – but you should have someone else take you back."

He was such a hypocrite to say it, when he could barely stay upright and was going to be driving back himself, but Sam didn't need to know about that. He stifled a yawn to make sure Sam didn't find out, either.

"Okay," said Sam. "Dean probably likes it more if I keep his car here, anyway."

Allison was waiting for him outside the room, which was a relief. He definitely didn't remember the combination for his locker.

"You ready to go?" she asked.

He swept her into a kiss. She tasted like tea and aspartame. "Am I ever!"

There was someone in his room. Dean struggled to open his eyes, to wake up and maybe attack, but the first step alone seemed beyond him. Through his closed eyelids he could see flashes of lightning. Cool fingers brushed against his sweaty forehead and his eyes shot open.

He blinked, kept blinking, but the silhouette before him didn't go away. He started breathing again.

"Adam."

But of course it wouldn't really be, it would be another ghoul or shapeshifter, although it couldn't be a shapeshifter, but there would be something it could be, and that would be what it was. Where was the silver when you needed it?

"Christo," he croaked.

The thing in Adam shook its head. "Invoking that name fills me with love, not hatred," it said in a remote voice that suddenly made it all make sense. The last time he'd heard that tone it had been coming out of young Dad. Now it was somewhere even more extreme.

"Michael."

"You know you can't go on like this, Dean, you're nearly gone. I can't let you go on like this. Are you ready to have me?"

"No."

Michael's lips thinned, and suddenly all of Dean's aches and pains were magnified. He wrapped his arms around himself, trying to hold it all in, hoping that if he didn't move it wouldn't get worse.

"What did you do?" he rasped, and oh every word hurt. Tears started to prickle in the corners of his eyes.

"You thought I would inflict pain upon you like the others? No, Dean. But I need you pure as I can get you. I took the drugs out."

"I liked them where they were, thanks."

"It is hard to have such a recalcitrant vessel."

"Yeah, speaking of vessels, what are you doing with Adam? He was fine where he was, dammit!"

Michael stared at him through his half-brother's eyes, the ones he'd never seen Adam looking through. "He was willing to help, with the right incentive. I brought him back."

"And that's what you're going to do to me, too," spat Dean. "Lucifer told Sam that if he died, he'd only be brought back. How is this any different?"

"I'm not waiting for you to die, am I? I'll lift your suffering now. Although," Michael continued, moving closer, "I would caution you against your foolish insistence on dying. Once in Hell, you are under Lucifer's domain, not ours."

Dean laughed from nervousness, sending waves of pain through a splintering rib. "So am I still not out of the Hell deal yet, or am I just 'destined', as you angels like to say, to always go back?"

Michael stared at him implacably. "You know what you would have to do – and so does Peter."

Dean almost offered to kick St. Peter's ass. "So my choices are hell or you? Even if that sends me into Lucifer's clutches?"

"He too knows what is fated. Rest assured your role as my sword would still fall to you."

They say when you are about to die, your life flashes before you. That had never happened to Dean, but now, as he prepared to be healed, all the deaths he could've had flashed before his eyes. There were a heck of a lot of them, almost all of them painful, but any one of them would have been preferable to any of the ones that seemed to lie before him.

"If you know I'm here, you probably know where the others are by now. What about them?"

Michael shrugged, though he wasn't very good at it. "They are not my vessel."

"But I am, and I need them, so why don't you get your buddies to back the hell off us with the hard sell already?"

"Done," said Michael, sounding a little bored. "I don't know what the others are bothering with. There will come a time when there's no other recourse ahead of you but to say yes. I look forward to it, but I can wait."

"Good thing it's not today," said Dean. "You'll be waiting a long time, just so you know. All-righty then. Hit me with your best shot." Fire away, his mind continued, and he let out an exhalation of unamused laughter.

Michael lifted his hand to Dean's forehead and they looked at each other for a moment. A glow surrounded them.

The last thing Dean heard was the rumbling of thunder.

For most people, not being able to turn on a light was a slight annoyance that needed fixing. Lisa Cuddy knew it could mean the difference between life and death for a number of people. She took blackouts seriously because she had to. Something always went wrong on backup power.

So when she woke up to the ground rumbling and realised neither phone service nor streetlights were working, she went into a bit of a panic. She knew she should have insisted on a nanny that lived in the house. As it was, she stubbed her toe on Rachel's crib, defeating the purpose of tiptoeing in, and had to bundle a screeching toddler into a carseat with only the SUV door light to see by. She nearly tripped over its charging cord - hybrid had seemed like a good idea at the time - sending half the boxes in her garage flying as she grabbed onto them for balance.

"I'm so sorry, baby," she fretted, driving as fast as she dared with Rachel next to her. Good thing there weren't too many people up at this time, or the roads would be absolute chaos. That factory explosion had screwed things up enough as it was. "Mommy just needs to make sure everyone's good, then we can get you back to beddy-bye." If House could hear her right now! The thought of what he might say brought a slight smile to her face, even amidst the chaos. He was probably the only person who could look in that adorable little face and not lapse into baby talk.

She began to feel even worse about the situation the more she thought about it, and the closer she got to campus. Her GPS kept going in and out, and anything that could take out not just power but GPS and phone service was serious.

Nothing, however, could have prepared her for what had happened to Princeton itself. If someone had been behind her, she would've definitely had a collision to deal with as she screeched to a halt at the sight.

"What the-?" she breathed as Rachel wailed in protest at the jerky stop.

Every building, every street light, had the glass completely blown out of it. The bedraggled remains of a bird, head exploded, lay on the sidewalk next to the road.

Dean Winchester is dead was the first thought that came to mind to explain it. He'd been on the brink last night and everyone involved had known it, hadn't been able to do much about it. She had been given one task to do, cure him, and she had failed. Failed God. Cuddy wasn't a woman used to failure, but this had to be the worst possible way to do it. She sunk her head against the steering wheel. The wrath that had followed had probably destroyed the hospital, if the blast had struck this far. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away.

Really, what did one do after something like this? Lie down and wait for judgement to be wrought?

Rachel cried for "num-num" and Cuddy straightened. What she would do was feed her daughter.

The time it took to feed Rachel let Cuddy steel her nerves enough to head towards the hospital. She had to prepare herself to sacrifice her tires to do so, but what good was an SUV that couldn't be driven through a road of broken glass anyway? Hopefully she wouldn't have to find out.

She took a circuitous route to avoid as much debris as possible, not even touching the accelerator. The tires crunched sickeningly against the shards scattered over the road.

She was conscious of Rachel's presence the whole time, and not just because Rachel had yet to quiet after being displaced the way she had. The moment it seemed too unsafe, Cuddy resolved, they were turning back. The fear of what could happen to Rachel overpowered her anxiety over the hospital's fate, and the latter had already been proven to be nothing good. There were already helicopters hovering, and she could swear she saw a tank rolling across the football field.

It finally occurred to her to check for other signs of life. Her satellite radio hadn't been coming in, so she focused on local stations. She regretted doing so almost immediately as a squeal echoed through the car.

Never had Cuddy felt more afraid. All contact except face-to-face had just been cut off. If this was a divine undertaking because of her screwing up, her fate must be inconceivably terrible.

You didn't hear about people turning into pillars of salt nowadays, she reasoned, or their cities being annihilated by Heaven. Surely that meant she was safe from something like that?

That line of thought quickly turned sour when she realised that you didn't hear about people being visited by angels and given missions from God, either. She started to tremble.

Her terror mounted as she caught sight of the hospital grounds. The parking garage had completely collapsed in on itself and all the trees were completely uprooted and on their sides. She was stopped in the middle of what was left of the parking lot by a soldier. Torn, she looked back and forth between him and Rachel.

"Sorry, Rach," she said, unclipping her. "Can't leave you alone here, bunny."

She climbed out of the car with Rachel in her arms. The soldier was not impressed.

"That baby better be dying for you to come here," he barked. "No one gets past this line."

Cuddy hugged Rachel to her protectively. "She's perfectly fine!" she said indignantly. "I'm Dr. Cuddy, the Dean of the hospital. I had to come and check. I thought it was just an outage. I had no idea it would be..." She gestured at the shell of a building in front of her. "...this."

The soldier glared. "Next time, wake up a neighbour," he said. "Hospital's no place to bring a child."

Cuddy felt irritation flare up and indulged it. It was either that or fall to the ground in knee-knocking fright.

"Who are you to tell me how to raise my child?" she snapped. "Now, I am the boss at this hospital, and I need to talk to whoever has taken charge here!"

"Yes, ma'am." The soldier saluted her, which was kind of gratifying, she'd admit. She opened the door of her SUV and sat on the step.

"Bed," demanded Rachel.

"I know, baby," Cuddy said soothingly. She rocked Rachel as they waited. Soon, she spotted two figures moving towards them. As they got closer, she could make them out better: a grizzled man with dark grey hair and a small woman with hair that shone red like a beacon.

"Chief Girardi," said the man as they approached, "Will. I'd shake, but I see you've got your hands full. Got three of my own."

"General Beckman, National Security Agency," said the woman in a clipped tone that made Cuddy wonder whether she was supposed to salute her. She allowed herself the slight satisfaction of finding another woman at the top before introducing herself to them. She was conscious of the contrast between Beckman's perfect coif and her own snarled curls, pulled back into a ponytail that Rachel was investigating to the fullest extent.

She introduced herself and added, "And, uh, this is Rachel. I'm not usually this... informal, I swear, I thought I'd just be getting people to dust stuff off from the basement. This is a complete disaster zone! Does anyone know what happened?" An icy chill crept into her heart that somehow everyone would know that there was a reason behind the catastrophe.

And that reason is you, she told herself. She just hoped House would be safe. She'd dragged him into it, knowing how big it was, without letting him know what he was getting into. It would be unfair to hold him accountable for what was going on.

"I got Forensics on it," said the Chief, "and the General has a bomb squad here to investigate too."

"Our surveillance managed to pick up that there was a commotion of some sort but picked up nothing beyond that," added General Beckman, her face pinched tight with censure. "Actually, it measured off the charts in every way, up to the point where it blew millions of dollars worth of instruments. We came to see for ourselves when we couldn't reach our on-the-ground operatives. You could say that the hospital is Ground Zero."

"Best guess so far, based on the damage, is some supersonic thing. We think we have it traced to ICU." Cuddy froze. That's where Dean was (had been?). Girardi shook his head. "Couple of staff there said - wrote, really - they saw a flare coming out into the hallway, heard a loud noise, and... well, they're not seeing or hearing any more. Eyes burnt out and eardrums burst. You'd understand it better than I would, doctor."

"We understand you've had several tremors in the area lately with similar effect?" questioned Beckman.

Cuddy nodded in answer to Beckman and breathed a sigh of relief. She'd forgotten about that; so it had started even during the time when the patient was confirmed to be alive. She wasn't so silly to think that the disturbances had nothing to do with his presence at the hospital, not knowing what she knew, but maybe there was some hope and the universe wasn't just out to punish her.

"I have to go in there," she said, "I need to see what's going on, but-" she squeezed Rachel- "I can't yet. I don't think my nanny will even come in today."

"Find someone to look after her and come back," said Beckman. "We're clearing a route that you can come back by."

She went through prospects in her head. Until she adopted, she had never realised how hard it was to make friends within the city. Asking people to babysit for her had proved the ultimate test. Her mind skipped to what needed to be done for the hospital, delegating automatically.

"Do you want any help here?" she asked. "I can stop by some of the division heads - janitorial, hospitality - to keep them from sending staff in, but you're going to need more medical backup."

"The more skilled help you can get, the better," said Girardi. "The streets are going to fill up soon, and then no one's moving anywhere for a few hours."

"Our first step is to get the patients out," said Beckman. "My people are working on that now; we need them out to comb the building and do the necessary cleanup."

The list of things she needed to do was growing exponentially. Without phones working, she sensed she might have a lot of driving ahead of her. At least her tank was full.

"There's a patient of mine that needs checking on," she said before she left. "VIP, very special case. I don't want anyone except medical personnel getting near him because he needs very careful handling." And because the police were already after him, but she tried to infuse her voice with as much medical confidence as she could. She drew out a map of the hospital for them, as much as she could, and pointed out his room.

"His room's along that corridor," Girardi observed. It was as she had suspected. "Someone may have looked at him already. We'd better get on this quick."

Once safe in the knowledge that someone could resolve the Dean situation, her first move was to head to Wilson's.

"So," she said, a huge desperate smile on her face, "you remember Rachel, right?"

He rubbed his bleary eyes.

"I want a raise," he said.