Here is your next chapter! Sorry to leave you all on a cliffhanger...heh, no I'm not really! Come on, cliffhangers a rather fun as you chew on your fingernails wondering what's happened. ducks quickly to avoid the response from the readers
Arnie walked along the corridor with his arms full of notes and papers that the police had turned over to him. They all came from Armitage's house and both he and the police hoped that there might be some answers to what the scientist had done with the virus he created. He knew that Mark and Terry had nearly finished sequencing the virus but with any luck these notes would make sorting everything out a whole lot easier.
He hitched the papers around as he reached the lifts and rather awkwardly pushed the button with his elbow. He waited patiently and looked around, quite relieved to see that the normal daytime bustle had died down. The chime of the lift arriving caught his attention and when the doors slid open he walked in, nodding to the little nurse who was inside. He shifted the papers around to press the button for his floor but lost control and dropped half of them.
"Dammit!" he said with frustration as the little nurse leapt forward to help him pick them up.
"I think you should have got some help with this," she said kindly as she gathered notebooks and papers.
"I think you're right," Arnie replied with a charming grin as he did the same. "I wanted to get it all up in one go."
"Men," the nurse chided with amusement. "You really must learn to do things the easy way. Oh!"
The nurse paused and Arnie saw that she was staring with surprised recognition at the photograph of Armitage that the police had given to him.
"You know him?" Arnie asked carefully.
"I…I was talking to him today," the nurse said slowly. "He was visiting a friend and was just walking around. Said his friend was down having an MRI. We got talking."
She blushed and wouldn't meet Arnie's eyes.
"What did you talk about?" Arnie asked gently.
"Oh, nothing much," the nurse said, looking at Arnie with curiosity. "How frustrating it can be for the patients to be stuck in hospital, what it's like being a nurse. He asked about some of the doctors." She smiled indulgently. "I think he wanted to be sure his friend was getting the best possible treatment."
"Which doctors did he ask about?" Arnie asked with a feeling of trepidation.
"Oh, just a couple of the orthopaedic surgeons," she said in an offhand manner. "Though he did ask about the collection of doctors in Diagnostic Medicine. We were standing outside there while we were talking and it's quite unusual to see so many doctors in there."
"What did you say?"
"What does it matter?" the nurse said with a frown. "It was just small talk."
Arnie swallowed hard as he finished gathering up his papers and stood. The nurse handed him the ones she had gathered and Arnie pushed the button for his floor.
"I know it seems odd for me to ask you all these questions," he said patiently. "But trust me, it is important."
The nurse stared at him for a long moment. "And who precisely are you that I should tell you this?"
"My name is Dr Arnold Patterson. I'm with the CDC. I was in Diagnostic Medicine while you two were talking outside. This man is…someone we need to talk to."
The nurse looked shocked. "I…oh…well, I said that the CDC was here at the request of Dr House. That he had some terribly sick patients though I didn't know the details."
"Did he seem particularly interested in Dr House?" Arnie asked.
"Well, he asked what the Diagnostic Medicine department did," the nurse said slowly. "I suppose he did ask a few questions about Dr House." She looked worried and rather pale. "Did…did I do the wrong thing? He didn't ask anything personal that I can remember."
The lift came to a stop and the doors slid open. Arnie stepped out of the lift and looked back. "No," he said as reassuringly as he could. "No, you didn't do anything wrong."
The lift doors closed on the nurse's dubious expression and Arnie made his way to the Diagnostic Medicine conference room as fast as he could. The others saw him coming and Dr Fitzgerald was holding the door open for him when he got there. She raised an eyebrow at the tense expression on his face and shut the door behind him.
"I think we might have a problem," Arnie announced as he dumped the papers he was holding onto the table.
"What kind of problem? And what is all of that?" Dr Martinson asked.
"Uh, it's notes from Armitage's home," Arnie said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "But that's not the important thing right now. Armitage was here."
"What? At the hospital?" Martinson said with concern as the others exchanged startled looks.
Arnie nodded frantically. "Earlier today and he was asking about Dr House."
For the first time since they'd arrived at Princeton-Plainsboro, Dr Martinson lost his slightly absent-minded air and became intent and focused. He turned on one heel and picked up the nearest phone.
"Is Dr Cuddy still here?" he barked into the phone. He waited for a moment then continued. "Dr Cuddy, we may have a situation. Could you please come up here immediately and bring any contact information you have for Dr House?" He paused and listened. "No, no time to answer questions. Just come up here."
With that he hung up the phone and turned to his team. "I assume at least one of you got the phone numbers for Dr House's team?"
Arnie nodded. "I've got them."
"Good," Martinson said. "Call them. Get them back in here. But don't tell them what's happened. I don't want any of them going over to Dr House's home. If Armitage is there, that could make a bad situation worse." He drew in a deep breath. "But call the police first, Arnie. Tell them what you found out and let them know we might just have a hostage situation. Tell them we'll get the address details to them as soon as we have them."
Arnie nodded and grabbed a piece of paper off one of the desks. He thrust it at Dr Fitzgerald. "That's the numbers for Cameron and the others," he said abruptly before disappearing into House's office to call the police.
Dr Fitzgerald sat down at one of the desks and started calling while Dr Martinson walked over to the door and waited for Dr Cuddy. She came striding down the corridor with a file in her hand and an irritated expression on her face. Martinson held the door open for her and she walked in.
"What's this all about?" she demanded.
"The scientist who developed this virus was here at the hospital earlier today," Martinson reported soberly. "He was asking questions about Dr House. We need to get hold him and I forgot to get his contact details. His team have been calling him in prior to this."
Cuddy paled. "No one at this hospital would give out a doctor's home address," she said stiffly.
"They don't need to," Carl said grimly from the table where he was reading some of the notes Arnie had brought in. "He could have just followed Dr House home."
Cuddy swallowed hard and opened the file. "Do you want me to do it?"
Martinson nodded. "Please."
Cuddy walked over to the free phone and quickly dialled House's home number. Her shoulders were stiff with tension as she waited and she did not even twitch when Arnie emerged from the office.
"Do we have his address?" Arnie asked quietly.
Martinson gestured to the file in Cuddy's hand. Arnie looked over her shoulder and quickly wrote it down before disappearing back into the office. Shortly after he did, Cuddy put the phone down.
"He didn't answer," she reported stiffly. "It rang out."
"Arnie's on the phone with the police right now," Martinson said and he and Cuddy walked into the office.
"Yes, sir," Arnie was saying into the phone. He looked up as his boss and Cuddy walked in and his face cleared. "Hang on a minute," he said into the phone then he looked at Cuddy. "What kind of car does Dr House drive?"
"Uh, he…drives a red '65 Corvette," Cuddy said with surprise. "Oh, and Dr Wilson is staying with him at the moment. He drives a blue Mercedes."
Arnie gave her a nod of thanks. "A red '65 Corvette," he said into the phone. "And there should be a blue Mercedes there as well. Yes…yes…I'll wait." He covered the mouthpiece with one hand and looked at Martinson and Cuddy. "They're sending a car around to do a look-see. They'll check if the cars are there and if Armitage's car is in the vicinity. They're not going to approach the apartment though. Not without taking proper precautions. Were you able to get hold of Dr House?"
"The phone rang out," Cuddy said tightly. "But I'll go and try again. It wouldn't be out of the realms of possibility for House to ignore his phone."
Cuddy strode out of the office and picked up one of the phones in the conference room while Martinson leaned against the desk and kept his eye on both Arnie and Cuddy. The tension built in the room as they waited. After about fifteen minutes Cuddy came back into the office.
"No answer," she reported tersely. "He didn't pick up the phone and he didn't respond to his pager."
"That last one is very worrying," Martinson said, his attention still on Arnie. "What doctor would not respond to his pager?"
House looked back at Armitage and wondered if he actually was smart enough to talk his way out of this. He really wanted to get that syringe away from the scientist first; while Armitage had that they couldn't really do anything without risking a rather unpleasant death. He took a deep breath and shot a quick glance at Wilson before concentrating his attention on Armitage.
"So how did you find out about me?" he asked with affected idleness.
"I was at Maria's house this morning," Armitage said as he stood and started pacing around the living room, peering at House's belongings. "I overheard those two doctors talking about you."
House's eyes narrowed as he remembered something. "You were at the hospital today. I saw you talking with that nurse."
Armitage smirked. "I like hospitals. They talk about security but how can you secure a place that has hundreds of people walking in and out every day? It was easy to find where you worked. Oh, and you ought to tell your personnel department that their security is pretty lax as well."
"Bit hard since you're apparently planning on killing me," House replied calmly.
"Your…friend can do it," Armitage smirked as he gestured towards Wilson.
House felt something inside him that he didn't want to think about too much relax at that statement. Even if things went the worst possible way, Wilson would still live.
House opened his mouth to respond but was interrupted as his phone started to ring. He shot a curious look at Wilson that was returned. Not that many people ever called him; not that many people had his home number. The list was incredibly short; Wilson, Cuddy, his ducklings and probably Julie. And Wilson was really the only one who ever used it.
"Don't answer that," Armitage barked, his hand slipping into his pocket.
"Because that's not going to raise suspicions," House said archly. "A doctor not answering his phone."
Armitage snarled and leapt at House, backhanding him across the face with his free hand. House's head was snapped back again and his whole body jerked. When he looked back, there was a trickle of blood coming from a small split in his bottom lip and pain echoed through his eyes from the jarring of his leg.
"You're misanthropic son of a bitch according to that pretty little doctor of yours," Armitage said snidely. "I'm sure they won't be surprised if you choose to ignore them."
House didn't react but he saw Wilson grimace on the other side of the room. That was a fair description and ignoring the phone was something House had done before.
The three men sat or stood in silence and listened to the phone ring out. When it finally stopped Armitage jerked and started pacing. House watched him for a moment then looked over at Wilson. The younger man was watching Armitage warily and House could see he was flexing the hand that was handcuff to the chair. He twitched his good leg and when Wilson looked over he shook his head warningly. Protest flared in Wilson's eyes then he nodded once reluctantly.
Armitage whirled around and advanced on House. "So…"
Whatever Armitage was going to say was interrupted by the phone ringing again. The scientist whirled and glared at the phone. Once again they waited in silence while the phone to rang out. A few moments after it stopped, House's pager started beeping and the phone rang again.
"Why are they doing this?" Armitage snarled.
"I'm a doctor," House sneered. "I have these funny things called patients and sometimes when things go wrong with those patients the hospital calls me in. I'm not answering my phone or my pager. That's the sort of thing that sets off alarm bells in a hospital."
An animalistic rage flooded Armitage's face and for a brief second House wondered whether he'd just pushed the man too far. He could see Wilson looking at him with a mix of worry and exasperation and made a mental note that perhaps sneering at psychotic scientists wasn't a good idea.
The scientist pulled the syringe out of his pocket and stalked towards House. "Let's finish this," he snarled as he tugged the cap off the syringe.
House tensed and gathered himself; he knew his limitations and knew that he'd have one chance here and one chance only. If he failed then his body, particularly his leg, would not allow him a second chance. And neither would Armitage.
"I've got better things to do," he said archly. He pushed himself to his feet and leapt at the scientist, nearly all of his impetus coming from his good left leg. His hands closed around the scientist's wrists and he wrenched the man's hands down. That was when his lack of balance came into play. His right leg collapsed under him, sending sharp pain up his hip and back. As he fell painfully to his right, he dragged Armitage down with him and pushed the man's hands and the syringe up and away from him as best as he could. He heard a crashing sound on the other side of the room then the syringe was being pulled out of Armitage's hand and thrown across the room.
Armitage howled and lashed out with his feet. He connected with Wilson and sent the man crashing back into the chair he was still handcuffed to. House dimly heard his lover swearing but had no opportunity to do anything. Pain was still radiating out from his leg and he almost involuntarily let go of Armitage's wrists. The scientist took the opportunity that he was given and raised one fist, slamming it down onto House's ruined thigh.
House let out a strangled scream as pain all but overwhelmed him. He forgot everything else as he curled up instinctively around the injured limb, his eyes tightly closed against the pain. He barely felt the blows that landed on his chest and head and certainly did not feel the kick that landed on his ribs.
He did however very dimly hear the door crash open and a loud banging noise but everything else was just a blur underneath his harsh gasping breaths. He flinched when someone grabbed his shoulders and pulled him onto his back.
"House!"
House heard his name being called through the rushing noise of the pain and thought that the voice was very familiar. He slowly pried his eyes open and saw Wilson's worried and frightened face hovering over him through the grey haze of the pain. That was when he realised the hands on his shoulders must belong to the younger man and he willingly succumbed to the pain, trusting Wilson to keep him safe.