Disclaimer: Don't own House (except on DVD!) Have nothing but piles of ungraded essays, which aren't technically mine, but you can have them if you don't sue me.

A/N: This chapter was very hard to write. I'm pretty sure I've deleted it five times, and I've read it 600 times (at least it feels that way). Your reviews have been wonderful and fun. Thanks!

OOOO

When Greg House had walked out of the radiology department after his "chat" with Randy Crawford, no one tried to stop him. No one stood in his way – at least not on purpose. One poor soul had been rounding a corner at the same time as he had and had run smack into him. He said nothing to her, barely even reacted, but she ran to the break room crying anyway.

The gossips were hard pressed to describe what they had seen. They were used to stories about House terrorizing other doctors. They barely even flinched when he waved the cane around – unless he was waving it at them. The Vicodin had become something they didn't even pay attention to anymore. Although they still never wanted to deal with him, Greg House had become old hat at the hospital. They were used to him.

But they weren't used to this.

He walked through the halls looking straight ahead, with an absolutely controlled expression on his face. He paid no attention to anyone who might be in his way, but he really didn't need to. They moved. As the story made its rounds, some people swore that he had made it from the third floor to the first without even breathing.

That wasn't true, of course. He was breathing. He was trying not to hyperventilate. He was trying really hard not to destroy every person who stood within caning distance of him.

"House!"

Goddammit. Cuddy.

He kept walking.

"House!" She had caught up to him and grabbed his arm.

"What?"

She barely heard him. She had the clinic schedule in one hand and was looking at it instead of the very frightening man she had stopped.

"Do you know where Cameron is? She's supposed to be…" Then she looked up at him.

Lisa Cuddy was not normally cowed by Greg House. He didn't scare her, he pissed her off. This time was different. She let go of his arm.

"Never mind."

He said nothing; he just walked away.

She turned away, a little shell-shocked. That's when she noticed the group of nurses standing a few feet away. They had obviously been watching.

"What? What's going on?"

The nurses looked away.

"Great. Just great." She threw her hands up and let the clinic schedule slap against her hip. "I really don't need House trauma today."

The nurses just scattered.

OOOO

House made his way back to his office where he immediately shut the blinds and turned off all but the smallest light on his desk.

He sat down and popped the cap off his bottle of pills. He took two by swallowing them with whiskey from his desk drawer.

Foreman chose that moment to walk in. "Hey, do you know where…"

"Go."

"Pardon me?"

"Go. Handle whatever it is yourself."

Eric just stood there. "But I'm looking for Cam…"

"Go. Now."

"What's going on?"

No answer.

Foreman took a second to look at his boss. Hands clenched around the handle of his cane. Knuckles white. Face flushed. Breathing shallow. Pill bottle. Whiskey. The doctor in him saw a medical problem in the making; the survivor in him saw the need to get the hell out.

He left.

House sat in the same position for several minutes. He forced his breathing to calm, which became a whole lot easier when the pills and alcohol began to kick in.

He let go of the handle of his cane and moved his hands down the length of it. He flinched slightly when a small splinter from the brand new gouge in it caught on his finger. He looked at it and started replaying the last half hour in his mind.

He had gone to Crawford's office to nail him for slacking off on the job. That was the plan. He had told himself that whether he was getting off on the job really didn't concern him. He reviewed in his mind what he knew of Crawford. Young, but not as young as any of his own staff. Tall. Decent looking, he supposed. Confident. A frequent smiler. That was enough to make House dislike him. The man smiled all the time. No one was honestly that pleased with the world.

He had felt the slightest bit sorry for Cameron for having fallen for the smile – he was certain that was what she had been attracted to – but he thought he was going to have to ride her about it just a little. After he took care of Crawford.

When he had walked in, without knocking, Crawford had stood up from his chair, calmly, which House expected. No stammering and fumbling around for this guy.

"Well, at least you have your clothes on. Otherwise, this would be really gross," started House.

"I've been expecting you to show up," stated Crawford, who picked up a pile of papers in the attitude of someone trying to look calm.

"Spiffy. We can skip the pleasantries." House had to admit Crawford was handling this fairly well, so far.

"I know why you're here." Crawford was obviously intent on facing down Greg House.

"Bravo for you."

"Listen, let's just get this out in the open." Crawford stood up straighter. "I realize that you two used to have something going on…"

"Ah, yes, the glorious PPTH grapevine. I'm sure you think you know a lot, but I'm not here about that."

Crawford waved him off, completely ignoring House's speech. "…but you aren't together anymore. What we do is none of your business."

This guy was a moron. A moron who couldn't stop talking. House was going to have to abandon his vow to not be angry for Cameron's sake if this guy didn't shut up.

Crawford continued, "This only happened once. And if anyone should be angry it should be her husband, not you. Now, Allison's a nice girl and I'm sorry that she had to…"

House the interrupted. "Her husband? Her husband's …" Wait, his mind screamed. Back up. Husband? House felt his hands wrap tightly around the handle of his cane.

"Yes, her husband…"

This time the cane did the interrupting as it swung out to the right and slammed into the bookcase. Something shattered.

Crawford shut up.

House's mind continued to race. He saw Cameron walk in the conference room and the way she had looked at him when he had teased her about what she had seen. He saw Wilson try so hard to get him to understand what had happened, and then give up halfway there.

And then he saw Stacy's face.

House brought the cane around slowly and pointed it at Crawford's chest. Then he jabbed – hard – sending Crawford off balance and back into his chair.

He waited a beat. "Take a few days off."

"Excuse me?" The cane was still planted on the radiologist's sternum.

The point of the cane moved up and pushed Crawford's chin up in the air. "You heard me. Leave. Another time zone might be a good choice." House was trying not to let Crawford see him shaking.

"You can't tell me that."

House just pulled the cane back and walked out.

Now, as he sat in his office looking at the gouge in his cane, he vaguely wondered what had shattered on the bookcase.

He laughed derisively at himself, leaned the cane against the desk, and rubbed his face with his hands.

Wasn't this just lovely?

OOOO

Cuddy had learned a lot from Greg House in the several years she had worked with him. She knew, for example, exactly how many Vicoden combined with exactly how many shots of liquor would render a six-foot plus man incapable of putting a band-aid on a skinned knee. She knew the numbers of several medical malpractice defense attorneys by heart and had a couple of them on speed dial. She knew where the best places to hide from her were, and she knew exactly how many clinic hours to sacrifice as bribes in tough situations.

She also knew that when no one, literally no one, would complain to her about House that something huge had happened.

She had asked one nurse whether House had been okay in clinic that morning. The woman had said, "Oh, absolutely! Good as gold."

Bull.

She had asked the billing department whether House had filed the correct paperwork for his current patient.

"Yep. No problems at all!"

Give her a break.

They were terrified. Something had happened and rather than letting Cuddy hear it in bits and pieces, which was the norm, she had been shut out of the loop. She could only imagine that they feared retribution – from him, not her.

Well, this had happened before. She knew how to handle this. House had his little trio of apprentices who followed him around and broke into patients' homes for him; she had her own band of minions who told her what she needed to know, for a price, of course.

First there was Charlie, who worked in the maintenance department. He was good for information if she took a bottle of decent alcohol to him. Then there was Miranda, a nurse, who enjoyed trips to a particular day spa. Unethical? Yep. But when it came to finding out what the hell had been going on with House, it was well worth the split second of guilt.

Her last usual source of House-related news was one of his own ducklings. She stayed away from pumping Chase for information because it seemed to her that he was a little too willing to rat out his boss and, therefore, not to be trusted entirely. No, her last resource was Cameron who received no favors for information because she didn't even know that she had been recruited. Cameron was so trusting and (incomprehensibly) worried about House that it took little for Cuddy to get her to spill her guts. The problem was, though, that Cameron was no where to be found.

Not in the lab, clinic, or diagnostic department. No car in the parking garage, either.

This was perhaps more serious than Cuddy had thought. If Cameron wasn't around and House was in such a pissy mood, well, it didn't take much to come up with a theory. He must have done something stupid again. Time to check in with the mercenaries.

A bottle of scotch and a gift certificate for a deluxe pedicure later, Cuddy was sitting in her office stunned. House had done nothing wrong, not anything she'd want to reprimand him about anyway. He had broken a glass figurine that had been a thank-you gift to Randy Crawford from a patient, but Cuddy figured that if that was the only thing House smashed, Randy Crawford was one lucky guy.

Cuddy had also received an email from Crawford requesting a few days off. She hadn't even thought twice about granting it. She wouldn't dare deny anything that kept one of her department heads from being charged with homicide.

Should she get involved otherwise? No, not directly. She needed to be an administrator and do the politic thing. She tapped a patient file that she had picked up on her way back to her office against her desk and considered her next moves.

Step one was already finished. House was in his office – blinds drawn, only the faintest light coming out. She had checked on that after her visit to Miranda. Steps two, three, and four were phone calls. The first was to Cameron – be in Cuddy's office by eight; the second was to Wilson – House knew the whole story and he was holed up in his office; the third was to the other person who probably should have been taking a few days off herself.

"Hi, Stacy. This is Lisa Cuddy. I'd like for you and Mark to stop in tomorrow to go over Mark's progress. I've made an appointment for you both at 9:00am. See you then."

Well, now. As long as House didn't do anything completely stupid, she had everything under control.

Maybe there was someway to blockade him in his office.