Authors note: Yippee! I made it to over 100 reviews! This means that, despite my parent's and friends' embarrassed incomprehension, by my own standards I am now a storming success. I would like to thank each and everyone one of you who helped me to achieve this state of nirvana (*sniff*). I couldn't have done it without you! My thanks especially go to Allen Pitt for helping to dig me out of a plot hole!

I am actually ridiculously nervous about posting this chapter as I am terribly afraid of offending people. Hope I've not crossed a line!

Chapter Ten

Exposed

Chase peered out through a crack in the children's ward door, tensing as a familiar lopsided figure lurched into view around the bend of the long, garishly decorated corridor.

"House's on his way" he hissed. "How's the Doctor doing?"

He felt the glare that Foreman sent him set the hairs on the back of his neck prickling.

"Mr Smith is stable for now. His fever's dramatically reduced." Foreman commented, his voice laced with heavy disapproval. "You know we have no evidence that he has any sort of medical qualification? And from the sort of drivel he was spouting, I for one deeply doubt it."

"Damn, I missed the spouting drivel?" Chase jumped backwards as a blow of a cane slammed the door open, allowing House to sweep into the room with a smirk. "Because I don't think I've reached my quota for today. Luckily I have you two here to help fix that."

He paused; glacial gaze flicking between the beads of moisture sparkling in the stubbled hair of Foreman's shaved head to where the damp patches of Chase's blue scrubs clung clammily to his chest. "Well!" he exclaimed, his grin widening. "I always knew you two were a bit wet, but if I'd have known you were going to make a T-Shirt contest out of it I'd have sent Cameron."

"There was ... an incident" Chase muttered, looking anywhere but at House's mocking eyes.

"Yes, through my tremendous powers of investigation I somehow managed to hear about you blowing up a three million dollar diagnostic machine, sending the whole hospital into chaos." House stalked forward into the room, forcing the two damp men to back up to make room for him by the low bed. "So much for the subtle approach." House leant his weight on his cane, both hands clasped over the handle in a clenched grip. "If either of you fancied an alternative career as a spy, I'd advise you to reconsider."

"It wasn't our fault!" Chase exclaimed with some heat. Foreman cut off any further protests with a raised hand, continuing in a more resigned tone.

"The machine was faulty before we got there. It was giving scrambled images even before it ... malfunctioned."

House lifted an eyebrow at him, before glancing over at the paper-gowned figure sprawled awkwardly over the child-sized bed. "It exploded immediately after you began scanning him?" he asked quietly. "Interesting" the word was drawled out in a distracted fashion.

Foreman protested with vehement insistence. "It was just a coincidence; we'd removed any metallic objects from ..."

"Not necessarily!" Chase interrupted eagerly. "The Doctor said ..." he paused at Foreman's glower, then continued defiantly "he mentioned something about a lack of ion chelators. Maybe this is a pre-existing condition he's already aware of. If his body is unable to sequester excess heavy metals it could have led to a build-up of iron in his tissues." Chase shrugged. "Maybe that could have interacted with the magnetic pulses and caused the MRI machine to malfunction."

"Excellent!" House exclaimed in over-exaggerated excitement. "I've always wanted to live in an ACME cartoon! I'll have to practise sticking my eyes come out on stalks for the next time Cuddy bends over."

Chase frowned in puzzlement but Foreman broke in with sarcastic amusement.

"He means that the patient would have had to have swallowed half an anvil's worth of iron filings for there to be enough metal in his system to affect the machine." He continued in a more bad tempered, impatient tone. "Anyway, I don't know why you're listening to anything this guy had to say. He's obviously a raving lunatic."

Chase scowled at him. "I wouldn't say that!" he protested, although his denial seemed to lack force. "Okay, so maybe he came off as a little eccentric, but you can't deny he knew his stuff!"

Foreman's eyebrows arched high as he stared at Chase in horror. "He was talking gibberish!" he asserted, his voice loud and high pitched.

Chase hesitated, then grudgingly allowed "Well maybe, but at least it was intelligent sounding gibberish."

House had been watching their debate with intent eyes but now broke through the staring match by slapping one palm against Chase's wet chest and shoving Foreman a step back with the flat of his cane. "Children, please" he crooned. "Save the fighting for when I have money resting on it." He pushed past them to walk over to the window, picking up the red crayon from where it had lain abandoned on the sill. "In between annihilating an expensive piece of hospital equipment and captivating Chase with his dazzling mumbo-jumbo, I'm assuming that our patient displayed some new diagnostic symptoms during his brief period of consciousness?"

"He woke up?!" The three men jumped at the piercingly shrill cry of hope from the figure who had appeared in the open doorway. Rose shot past them to fall to her knees beside the tiny bed. "Doctor! Doctor? Can you hear me? It's me... It's Rose!" she called loudly, her lips almost brushing his ear.

"Of course!" House exclaimed, slapping a melodramatic palm to his forehead "That's how we should have been treating coma patients all these years, by shouting at them." He pulled a wry face at Rose's glare "Well now I feel so silly for wasting all that medicine."

Rose ignored him, looking frantically at Chase and Foreman. "What happened?" she demanded. "What did he say?"

Foreman shrugged "Not much! He ran off down the corridor babbling something about attacking Christmas decorations, then collapsed in severe pain."

He ignored Rose's puzzled and worried expression to look over at House. "Said something about his brain imploding. Might have been a cluster headache?"

House scowled in thought before writing 'neurological symptoms' on the window. He hesitated then added ''electric' personality?', pressing down hard with the crayon on the apostrophes to make them stand out in ironic emphasis.

"A subarachnoid haemorrhage could have led to the fever, alteration of consciousness and cardiac arrhythmia" a soft voice came from the doorway. House looked up to see Cameron leaning against the doorframe, carrying a paper plate piled with slices of iced fruitcake. She straightened, walking forward to offer the plate to Chase and Foreman. "Merry Christmas!" she greeted them with long-suffering irony. Foreman ignored her but Chase took a piece and bit into it with relish.

"You could do a CT to confirm but Cuddy wouldn't be too impressed if you blew up another scanner today." House muttered in droll amusement, still staring thoughtfully at the window.

"I thought we agreed that it was a coincidence that …" Foreman broke in angrily. House cut him off with a look, eyebrows raised at the aggressiveness of his tone.

"No, you decided that. And with uncharacteristic vehemence." House eyed him speculatively. "Which makes me think that you are either trying to hide something from me or from yourself." He turned away from the speechless man to talk to Chase and Cameron.

"HFE hereditary hemochromatosis" House stated with finality. "Excessive absorption of dietary iron might have led to just enough of an increase in body iron storage to affect an MRI machine already on the fritz." He pointed his cane at Chase. "What did the blood tests show?" he barked.

Chase's face clouded and he shuffled his feet awkwardly. "The results aren't back yet." He hunched his shoulders under House's interrogatory glare. "We were kind of busy with the MRI so I bribed a lab tech to do some unofficial over-time. I paid him a hundred dollars to keep it off the books" he added defensively.

Foreman snorted. "This case is costing more than some of us, who weren't born with a silver spoon in their mouths, can afford" he grumbled. "If Cuddy tries to take the cost for the damages out of our salaries, our grandchildren are going to be working indentured labour."

Chase just gave him an evil grin. "Plus it'll be worse for you when you owe me that extra fifty."

House cut through the banter with an angry scowl. "If she doesn't have the good sense to fire you then I just might" he exclaimed. "I had thought I wouldn't have to rely on a half drunk, bored incompetent for results." He shot Chase an evil look. "Guess I should have known better." He pointed an implacable finger at the bed. "Get another sample. Do a serum ferratin test yourself, with your own little hands. Twice. Before our patient turns into the Tin Man. Cameron, you get a lumbar puncture to check for hemorrhaging." He barked out the orders to the disgruntled pair, who sighed but moved obediently together to the cupboard high on one wall to fetch the kits.

"Hang on a minute!" Rose burst out in alarm, perching herself protectively on the edge of the bed, crossing her arms defensively over her rather grubby pink sweatshirt. "You were supposed to be fixing him, not just draining all his fluids. What are you, some kind of a vampire?"

House sighed, rolling his eyes at her protective stance. "Cue the cowardly lion" he muttered in disgust, then squinted at her dyed blonde hair. "Or maybe the scarecrow, since you are clearly in need of a brain. Do we really need to repeat the discussion about how I can't diagnose your Doctor just by looking …" He paused, head cocked slightly to one side, his gaze vacant.

Rose stared at him in puzzlement. "Dr House?" she queried uncertainly.

Cameron came to stand by her shoulder, giving her boss an indulgent smile as she handed Rose a piece of cake. "Shhh! He's having an idea."

Rose nibbled on the frosting absently, her face showing some trepidation as House's grin stretched evilly.

"How big are your boyfriend's testicles?" he barked at her.

Rose choked on the cake, crumbs flying across the bed as she bent over in a paroxysm of coughing. House raised one eyebrow at her, smirking at her as Cameron slapped her repeatedly on the back. "Hmm, I guess for once 'just friends' isn't a euphamism" he mused, then limped forwards towards the bed.

"Sexual disorders such as small genitalia are symptoms of iron overload disorders." He explained, pushing her off the side of the bed with his cane so that she had to stand hurriedly. "Come on!" he exclaimed cheerfully. "Let the dog see the rabbit!"

He grasped the hem of the paper gown, pulling it up, but his eyes were fixed on Rose's bright red face as she stared determinedly at the ceiling. He grinned as he spotted her eyes flick downwards, almost involuntarily before snapping back up again, her face burning even hotter. At this point House let his own eyes drop down, then blinked.

Cameron's voice came out rather weakly from beside him. "That's … not hypogonadism."

Chase snorted, his Australian accent twanging dryly. "I'll say! It seems the Doctor has some real cojones!"

Rose snatched the thin fabric from House's hand, smoothing the flowered gown down over the Doctors knobbly knees. She glared at House, although he noticed a slight flicker of a grin around the corners of her mouth as she muttered to herself "Well that answers that" in a thoughtful tone.

House harrumphed, taking a step back from the bed, before commenting irritably. "It's not conclusive. Take the samples."

Rose bristled again. "I don't think they'll help you" she protested, hesitantly. "The Doctor's ... different. He's not ... built like .. normal people."

House snorted and Cameron groaned, trying to smother whatever comment was brewing with the force of her glare. Chase just nodded absently. "He did say he had a lot of allergies" he inserted helpfully, barely looking as he drew a new sample of blood with the ease of long practice.

House shot him an impatient look, train of thought derailed. "So run an allergen specific IgE test on his blood while you're at it!" he snapped brusquely.

Chase withdrew the syringe then retreated as Cameron moved forward, urging Rose gently to one side and deftly rolling the Doctor onto his side. She cut away a square of the paper material from over the Doctor's lower back and, with a quick motion, swabbed the skin with iodine. She looked up with kind eyes and asked "Do you want to hold his hand? This won't take a moment."

Rose looked on in alarm as Cameron picked a wickedly long needle out of the surgical kit she'd laid open on the bed. "Where are you going to stick that?" she squeaked, swallowing hard as she stared at the three inch long steel spike with wide eyes. "I'm not sure this is ..." She broke off as, without pausing to listen, Cameron inserted the needle with a smooth motion and drew back the plunger. She held it up to the light, one thumb pressed over the yellow stained flesh of the puncture site.

"Give me that!" House snapped, snatching the syringe from her and the three doctors clustered round to examine the quicksilver liquid that shimmered within.

"It's supposed to be clear!" Chase muttered in disbelief.

"But it's clearly not!" House retorted distractedly. "Interesting." He fixed his eyes on the flickering ripples as if hypnotized, then blinked and shook his head sharply, thrusting the syringe back at Cameron.

"Test it" he snapped. "Check for mercury levels" he added thoughtfully.

Cameron nodded, heading for the door Chase on her heels, when Rose's voice cracked out in firm authority.

"Wait!" she hesitated, turning to roll the Doctor onto his back and reaching one hand out to softly brush a few strands of brown hair from his pale forehead. Then she straightened purposefully and turned to the pair with determination. "I'm coming with you" Rose stated. Chase opened his mouth to protest but Rose ploughed on. "I'm only going to allow these tests if I can ensure that his ... samples ... are destroyed afterwards" she announced, chin firm, before adding quietly "It's what he would want" with an anxious glance back at the bloodless face.

House waved them away impatiently with one hand, his eyes still fixed on the Doctor thoughtfully. "Fine, fine! Take Dorothy with you" he muttered distractedly. "I want some time alone with my patient."

The exodus towards the door paused and three sets of eyes fixed on him in deep suspicion. He looked up, rolling his eyes. "It's okay!" he exclaimed in exasperation. "Foreman can stay and chaperone to ensure I don't do anything too despicable!"

He waited whilst Chase held the door open for Cameron and Rose, who both left still looking deeply dubious. He waited until the door had clicked shut before launching into a high pitched manic cackle, fingers dancing in fluttering claws at either side of his face. "Ah, ha ha ha haa! I've got you now, my pretty!" he screeched, turning to loom over the still figure in the bed with an evil grin.