Title: Doppelganger

Summary: Something unknown is plaguing House and things are getting out of control, driving the pessimistic doctor to the edge of his sanity. Can he be brought back in time to save his latest patient? Can he even save himself?

Time Frame: After Vogler, before the Duckling Elimination Game. The time of year is probably completely incorrect, but I don't care. My fanfic, my mess.

Pairings: One-sided Cameron/House relationship (Cameron cares, House doesn't), Chase/Nikki

Author's Message: A filler event at the beginning leading to something more important, this is really going to be the last few moments of humor that I'm going to be able to consciously put into this story without ruining the atmosphere. The horror starts soon, I promise! XD anyway, this is a rather dialogue-based chapter as well as being quite long, so please don't burn your eyes out or something unpleasant like that. And as I have no knowledge of medicine, I have no idea how to administer drugs by IV, so I improvised. If it's incorrect, I take full responsibility for my ignorance XD oh, and beware of naughty word in this chapter. In capital letters. XD

Disclaimer: I own not, I profit not, so please sue me not. I'm fourteen; I can't afford it. However, any characters that you haven't seen before (Nikki, Alex, etc.) are my own creation and belong to me. Hands off please.

It takes a lot to get House into the clinic, usually a lot of persuasion or bribery. Guilt does not usually take him down there because House usually doesn't have much of a conscience. But today is an unusual day. Cuddy's exasperation he enjoys and can deal with, but Cuddy's despair is something relatively new and unexpected and House isn't sure how to cope with it. So instead, he goes to the clinic where he can be exceptionally sarcastic without feeling bothered about it. He walks up to the intern on duty.

"Doctor House signs in at-" he pauses to check his watch "-1:03pm to greet the hypochondriacs."

The intern, a nervous-looking young woman with slightly prominent front teeth, blinks like a startled chick and stares. House restrains himself from rolling his eyes, but it's a close run thing. New interns, they'll be the death of him.

"Doctor House signs in at 1:03pm," he repeats slowly, as though to a complete idiot. "Write that down and we'll be getting somewhere."

"Yuh-yes, Doctor House," the poor girl replies.

She writes the information down, the apparent dismay in her face making her look even younger and more immature. House is practically grinding his teeth.

"Now hand me a file and send one of those apparently sick people in," he says.

The intern nods (apparently to bewildered for speech), hands the top file to him and turns the to waiting masses.

"Mr. Hill?" she asks them. "Is Mr. Hill here?"

A young man, eighteen at the most, with a facial rash that can be a mile away, stands up and vaguely waves.

"Can you go into Exam Room 2 with Dr House please?" the intern asks politely, before turning to House and adding, rather unnecessarily, "Can you please go into Exam Room 2, Dr House?"

"No, I think I'm going to go back to my office and bang my head against the desk," House quips. "Just... shut up, and let me do my job."

The intern looks crushed and shrinks down in her chair until she is almost invisible behind the pile of files. House allows himself the liberty of rolling his eyes before following the youth, Kevin Hill, into the aforementioned examination room. House rather likes exam rooms. When they don't have patients in them, they have a particular aspect that he finds very appealing. As some great thinker should have said: Show me an exam room, and I will show you over a dozen places to hide a bag of peanut M&Ms. So it's really rather lucky that this is a complete open-and-shut case so that he will have plenty of time to eat that bag of peanut M&Ms. It's also rather lucky that he chose to hide the M&Ms in Exam Room 2. House pops a Vicodin and limps through the door. Kevin is leaning against the table, scratching his cheek irritably with a thoroughly miserable expression on his face. Once again, House has to work very hard not to roll his eyes at the completely obvious diagnosis. He says nothing to Kevin; instead, he just stares at him. The stare is phenomenally close to a scowl. Kevin clears his throat nervously and runs his hand through his jaw-length hair. House still says nothing. He opens the file and looks through it. It tells him that Kevin Hill has be diagnosed with acne. He rolls his eyes.

Kevin clears his throat again. House ignores it and limps over to some draws, opening them, looking for his M&Ms.

"Um... Dr House?" Kevin asks.

"What?"

"Aren't you going to ask me what's wrong?"

"No."

"But... why?"

"I already know. It's chickenpox."

"What!"

House sighs. Why do people never believe what they're told the first time?

"You have chickenpox," he says as patiently as possible. "It's a virus, there's nothing we can do for it, it's not fatal and you're just going to have to wait for it to cure itself. And don't scratch; it scars."

"So what are you looking for?" Kevin asks, genuinely interested.

"Candy."

"You keep candy in the exam rooms?"

"Why not?"

House slams the second draw shut. Where on earth did he put those M&Ms?

"Why aren't you telling me to go?"

"Where are you going after this?"

Kevin is thrown by this question.

"I, uh, I have school," he replies. "I got math."

"Do you like math?" House asks.

"Hate it."

"So look at it this way: the sooner I send you away, the sooner I have to get back to work and the sooner you have to get to math. Therefore keeping you here is in both our interests."

House opens a fifth draw to find his bag of M&Ms. It's empty. He pulls it out and glowers at it.

"Somebody ate my M&Ms," he mutters, annoyed.

Kevin looks at the bag in House's hand and his gaze slides onto the hand itself.

"Nice ring, dude," he says.

"What?"

"The ring-" Kevin points at it "-is nice. Did your wife give it to you?"

House almost curses. He'd forgotten about the ring. And then he remembers that he didn't bother to hide it all of yesterday. The giver could have seen him wearing it. The giver could think he cares. Oh shit. He picks up Kevin's file again, scribbles down the diagnosis and limps out of the room, completely ignoring the teenager once again. However, if he'd bothered to look in the trash can on his way out, he would have seen the large pile of brightly-colored candies that are lying on the bottom. His M&Ms.

"My dad's gonna be back soon, Uncle Jimmy," Nikki murmurs. "You'd better go."

Wilson nods, not really happy about it, but accepting of the situation. He can't let his brother see that he was there. Who knows what could happen? Well, somebody could probably imagine, but it wouldn't be pretty. He stands up, ready to leave, just as Cameron walks in through the door. She is holding a pair of syringes containing the medication for the suspected meningitis in her hand. After giving Wilson a brief smile, she crouches down next to Nikki's bed.

"Hi, I'm Dr Cameron," she says.

"Do you know what's wrong with me?" Nikki asks tiredly but with genuine curiosity.

"We're not certain," Cameron admits, "but we think that you might have bacterial meningitis."

"Oh. That sucks. What are you gonna give me for it?"

Cameron disconnects the IV bag from Nikki's hand as she talks.

"We're going to administer two different drugs, Ampicillin and Rifampin, through your IV and they should cure the disease."

"Okay..."

Cameron inserts first one syringe onto the IV needle then the other, squeezing the medication into Nikki's bloodstream. Wilson lingers by the doorway, unwilling to leave, as though a sixth sense was telling him that something was wrong. It is barely ten seconds later that Nikki starts to gasp for air, her every breath wheezing as she struggles to breathe.

"I can't... breathe!"

Wilson and Cameron both snap into action. As Nikki's eyes close and she slips into unconsciousness, Cameron begins chest compressions. Wilson runs to the door and pushes it open.

"Can I get some help in here!" he yells.

A male nurse comes running, but without waiting for him to get into the room, Wilson begins to rummage through the drawers to find some Epinephrine. The nurse takes over the chest compressions and Cameron tries to insert a breathing tube into Nikki's throat. And Alex Wilson walks through the door. He doesn't notice the activity around Nikki's bed; he only has eyes for Wilson. And not in the romantic sense.

"What the FUCK are you doing in here!"

Crap, I just remembered that I hate the next chapter because... well, I'll explain there. Again, sorry about the swear. I'll make sure that this is M just in case.