As always, thanks to my brilliant beta: wrytingtyme! Don't know what I'd do without her. And thanks for reading and reviewing...I really appreciate it.

Voice

Cuddy slept from five pm until nine o'clock the next morning following her food poisoning ordeal. She would have slept longer had she not heard the phone ring at her bedside. She lifted the receiver and allowed it to fall back into place, wanting nothing more than sleep.

When the phone rang again, she chose not to answer it, instead allowing it to ring. And ring. And ring. On the twenty-first ring, she answered.

"Hello?"

"Where are you?"

It was that voice. His voice. "What?" she asked, not quite awake.

"Morning. Running. You didn't show."

"Food poisoning. Puking. Sleep."

"I don't have to come drag your sorry ass back to the ER, do I?"

"I'm hanging up now."

"I'm never going on another road trip with you again," he said, in that voice that haunted her dreams as of late.

"No worries. I don't have any grandparents left."

"Goodnight, Cuddy."

"Wait, House?"

"What?"

"Thanks."

_______

Cuddy heard the commotion in the far corner; the neonatal team was furiously working on her newborn son, trying to revive him. It had been at least fifteen minutes since his birth and other than a brief heartbeat shortly afterwards, he'd had no further signs of life. All Cuddy wanted for her little dream was peace. He was gone.

She looked up at House and squeezed his hand, silently pleading with him to make them stop.

"We need an intubatation kit-" one of the doctors said. They'd gone above and beyond in their efforts to revive the newborn; this wasn't just any baby, this was the Dean's son.

That's when Cuddy heard his voice; it wasn't his manipulative voice, his cocky voice, nor the one that emerged when a rare moment of raw emotion revealed itself. Instead, it was a commanding, take-charge voice; it was one she had heard only a few times before.

House made it to the corner in three impressive strides. "Stop. Get out."

The doctor and nurses paused temporarily to look at him before returning their attention back to the small, lifeless form. Cuddy began to cry silent tears of grief for her child and of gratitude for the voice she knew held their son's best interest at heart.

House's voice boomed, "Take your hands off of him right now or you will hear from my lawyer. What's the going rate for malpractice right now? Enjoy your jobs much? Pretty tough to get hired if you get fired for ignoring parental rights." Looking up at the clock, House declared, "Time of death, seven-twenty-eight, am."

The staff backed away as House turned his attention towards the OBGYN who still sat at the foot of Cuddy's bed.

"Finished?"

The doctor nodded.

"Get out and don't let anyone else back into this room."

House waited for the doctors and nurses to leave the before he dimmed the lights. He then made his way to the isolet in the corner where he removed the various wires and tubes from his son's body. He removed the cap that had been placed on his head, smoothing the black hair with his hand, and he cut the remnants of the umbilical cord and cleaned his premature body with a cloth. Finally, he wrapped him in a powder blue blanket, in preparations of taking him to his mother.