"And here is your baby." The ultra sound technician said joyfully as she swiveled the monitor around showing the small blob of cells to Cuddy. Her heart was filled with joy instantaneously as she squeezed Rachel's hand lightly and pointed to what would be her future sibling.

"Is it a girl?" She asked hopefully.

"We won't know that for a little while, the baby is still growing." Cuddy said as she moved her hand away from Rachel's and tossed her hair slightly.

"Can I have a picture?" Rachel asked excitedly

Cuddy felt a mixture of relief and terror that her daughter has already taken such a liking to the baby. The thoughts that maybe House was right and she wouldn't be able to carry it to term kept creeping their way inside her head.

As the multiple sonogram pictures printed, Rachel eagerly grabbed the first copy and put it safely in her pocket in the front of her shirt. "Baby will be on my heart."

"I'll give you two some privacy." The technician said as she exited the room.

Cuddy fought the tears building, she could just see House giving his soft chuckle and saying, 'your heart is on the other side of your chest, Rach.' Her mind flashed to all the wonderful times their relationship had and she questioned herself why she broke it off, although she would never admit it. Cuddy then contorted her face as she remembered how he looked when she last saw him, bruised and bloody she closed her eyes tight as she attempted to erase the memory.

"Can we give a picture to Dad?" Rachel asked.

Dad. She called House Dad. Rachel wasn't wrong, House was the baby's father, Cuddy sat Rachel down and explained to her the entire situation, well, not the entire situation but enough of the situation for Rachel to have a pretty good understanding of what is to come. House wasn't her father though, and unfortunately the mind of a three-year-old is hopeful and she believes in all her heart House and her mom will be together again.

"Maybe on another day, House is resting." Cuddy said this to not only prevent adding emotional pain to House's long list of problems but also to protect her daughter from seeing her favorite playmate in that kind of state.

"When will he be all better?"

"He will get better and better each day."

"Then he can come over again, right? Because you love each other and if you love someone you forgive them, right?"

Cuddy hated this conversation, it annoyed her that Rachel had to make everything so simple, too simple. She couldn't wrap her head around the many conflicting emotions. She needed him there, to be here. Of course, even if he wanted to he couldn't be at the ultrasound, but she felt that he wouldn't come no matter what.

[H]

"He's afraid of something," Wilson said to House's team as he entered the office. He was upset that he was still unable to get House to talk. "I'm going to find out what happened." Wilson stated firmly.

"He doesn't want our help," Taub stated as he turned his attention back to Foreman who was busy writing symptoms on the board. It was an observation that needed to be expressed.

"No," Wilson paused, turning to face his friend, "but he's going to get it anyway." There was another pause.

"Do you seriously think there's any way of getting him to open up?" Taub asked, "we've called so many people he knew from college and high school, no one has seen him in years honestly we've reached a dead end."

"A dead end." Masters said softly beginning to develop the famous House stare, "it's a dead end." She stated again causing all eyes to direct their attention to her. "The neighbor said it looked like House saw a ghost, what if this was a person he thought was dead? Someone who faked her death and House swore he'd protect?"

"Who is dead in House's life who is tall, skinny and has black hair?" Chase asked looking towards Wilson.

Wilson shrugged, "no one I can think of." He stated, "the only person I know who matches that description is Stacy and she is very much alive and goes against our 'knew each other from school theory'"

"Maybe we should pay her a visit." Masters shrugged, eager to follow up on her epiphany.

[H]

If House had, had the opportunity to think rationally, objectively, to detach the emotions from his decision-making then maybe he would have played the situation differently from the beginning. If he had the chance to be more objective now, if he didn't have to fight with the pain or the mind-altering drugs designed to ease that pain. If he wasn't overwhelmed by his own betrayal of all of the things that he thought were important to him, then maybe he would have reconsidered his actions, maybe he would have called Wilson back and asked for his help, but for Gregory House none of those 'ifs' featured in his reality. He had chosen his path and now he had to follow it, whatever the personal cost. The only decision he was left with, was what was his next step.

He took some time to think about it, fortunately Cuddy had to go to her ultrasound and it has been a few hours so his team began to lose interest in his actions and were more focused on uncovering the mystery in other ways, so he set his plan in motion.

Before making the call, House had one last moment of self-doubt. Once he made the call there would be no turning back. He hit the dialing sequence. He waited patiently while the answer phone completed its message and the tone sounded. "Lydia, it's me, pick up." He heard the click instantly; barely getting the last word out, she must have been hovering by the phone. Not that he blamed her; he'd promised to call hours ago.

"House, thank God it's you I've been so worried." He could hear the tears in her voice, a mixture of fear and relief and just a hint of panic.

"Yeah, I'm sorry, things were more complicated than expected." That had to qualify as the understatement of the century.

"What's the problem? Is it work? How are you feeling? I knew you shouldn't have..."

"Lydia!" House interrupted sharply, "Look, now don't freak out on me, I need you to remain calm, promise me that you'll stay calm." It was a request that was akin to asking a cheerleader not to get excited, but he tried it anyway.

"But I..."

"Promise me."

"I promise."

"OK, look I'm in the hospital..."

"The hospital! Oh My God House, What..."

Damn she was panicking. "Calm." he injected an even tone into his voice, tried to project it down the line. "You have to stay calm, I was hit a little harder than I told you." No, maybe that was the understatement of the century. "I'm going to be fine, but that's why I haven't been able to call you." There was silence from the other end of the line. It was his turn to ignore his own advice; he panicked slightly at the lack of response, "Lydia?"

"You're really going to be fine?"

He let out a breath. "Yes."

"I should never have got you involved in this," the comment was bitter, self- recriminating.

"Hey, if you hadn't I would have missed out on all this fun," House had to force the lightness into his tone. His own spiraling negative emotions were enough; he didn't think he had the strength to carry both of them, so he needed to keep her spirits up. The sentiment however, came naturally; he'd been putting a light spin on everything when he was around her. But he stopped doing that since... he blocked the memories, he just didn't have the emotional strength to deal with them, he never had, but hey, denial seemed to be working, or at least it had until he'd seen her again Friday night.

"But House..."

"Look, whatever, I'm involved now, it's too late to change that, we just have to move on." House paused for a moment, just running through his plan one last time in his head. "Okay, now there are some things I need you to do..."

[H]

Masters and Wilson hovered around the speaker phone as Chase, Taub and Foreman worked on running tests for their patient. Wilson dialed Stacy's number and couldn't help but hold his breath as it rang.

"Hello?" Stacy answered, Wilson could hear she was in a busy place and he prayed she wasn't in court so she could talk.

"Stacy, hey it's James Wilson, listen, House has gotten himself into some trouble..." Wilson began. He could hear a small scoff from the other end.

"Classic Greg. What did he do this time?"

"Well, we aren't exactly sure. Apparently, he got into some sort of fight and a we know he was last seen with a woman Friday night who was tall, skinny and had dark hair. I was just wondering if you knew anything about it or have seen him recently."

There was a pause as Stacy processed the news, she knew House well enough to know Wilson was drastically down playing his injuries. "I'm sorry." She finally said, "I haven't spoken to Greg in years. We haven't talked since..." she trailed off leaving Wilson to fill in the details of their brief affair and breakup.

Wilson nodded, disappointed that Masters brilliant idea didn't go anywhere.

"I hope he gets better soon." Stacy said interrupting the silence, "send him my best." And with that she hung up leaving Wilson and Masters to stand in silence annoyed at another lead lost.

"Well it's not VRE or MRSA." Chase said as he plopped himself down onto the chair in the differential room, interrupting the silence.

"Nor is it cholecystitis or pancreatitis." Taub mentioned as he entered the room.

"It's also not esophagitis or peritonitis" Foreman said, as he entered right behind Taub. "What did you guys find?"

"Stacy doesn't know anything." Masters said disappointedly.

Wilson slapped the desk startling everyone, he was not known to have outbursts of anger so everyone empathized with his desire to do right by his friend.

"Well, bringing us back to our 49-year-old..." Taub began as he flipped open the chart one more time to go over things he could have missed. "What about a psych disorder?"

"Oh my god. Dr. Nolan!" Wilson said excitedly as he grabbed his coat off the back of the chair and practically sprinted out of the room. The team stared at him for about a minute in utter silence.

"Abusing some of the meds she has prescribed could easily cause psychological issues but, it wouldn't be her main problem." The team continued to diagnose despite the outburst.

[H]

"Dr. Wilson." Nolan said into his office phone, "to what I owe the pleasure of this call?"

"It's… House." Wilson said out of breath from running to grab his address book and fumbling to find and dial Dr. Nolan's number as fast as humanly possible.

"I assumed."

"House... he..."

"Why don't you take a moment to collect your breath."

Nolan could hear Wilson gasping for a few seconds before speaking again. He relayed all the information he had to Nolan. House's condition, the mystery woman, the breakup, that he's back on drugs, everything. Nolan sat quietly as he listened carefully to each word and occasionally said 'mmm' or 'ahhh'

"So, I guess the real question is, do you know of any woman House would know meeting the description?" Wilson finally asked.

"I'm afraid I don't."

Wilson felt all the hope drain from his body. That was it, there were no more leads.

"But..." Nolan said as he began to think about House's time in the Asylum, "there was one woman who House was quite fond of. She wasn't as tall as him, she certainly didn't have black hair but House and her were intimate during his time here."

"What was her name?"

"Lydia. Lydia Kane. Her sister in law was a patient here so she visited a lot. House really became close with her, infatuated really, Lydia admitted she probably married her husband to be close to her sister in law but then her sister in law got better. House..." Nolan paused trying to think of the proper word, "House cured her. She then was able to go to a rehab facility in Arizona and Lydia followed her there, telling House she couldn't stay and wouldn't break up her family to be with him. House was devastated, he felt lost. I told him there was hope because he was able to connect with another human being but..." Nolan trailed off again lost with what to say next.

Wilson sat completely lost in his thoughts. House never mentioned her to anyone, ever. How could someone he truly loved he never mention once? Wilson was relieved the mystery woman finally had a name and he had enough information now to confront House yet again. "But he still loves her." Wilson finished the sentence.

[H]

House reclined the seat a little more in an effort to take some of the pressure off his breathing, and tried to ignore the pain enough to relax. Every step since leaving his bed in the hospital had been agonizing. His muscles had stiffened in the time he had allowed them to relax, making movement that much more difficult than it had been that morning. Then he had been running on adrenaline and caffeine. He wasn't sure what was keeping him going now. He felt like a moron for forgetting his Vicodin in his rush, but he reminded himself that he didn't need any Vicodin when he was with Lydia. Of course, the blood loss, the shock, the almost dying, and the emergency surgery had all conspired to ensure that he barely had the strength to stand, even without his other injuries. His body hadn't just reached breaking point, it had passed it, and the few hours of rest he'd achieved were woefully inadequate compared to what he needed to injure a punctured kidney and several injured ribs. Still he had some things to be thankful for. If they hadn't been able to repair the damage by keyhole surgery, then he knew that no strength of will would have been able to get him out of the hospital and into the car. The blood transfusion and fluids had also helped considerably, and he'd been lucky that no one had tried to stop them as the pair exited the hospital. In fact, it was more than luck that they had made it out of the hospital at all, more like a minor miracle that no one had spotted them and raised the alarm. Especially with the time they had wasted arguing. Lydia had almost bailed when she had seen him, realized how weak he was. She wanted to leave him there and go, but there were so many reasons why he couldn't let her do that, so he had taken the time to persuade her that he had no choice. He was glad he'd covered the worst of the bruising, he doubted even his powers of persuasion could have got her to take him if she'd been able to see the true extent of his injuries.

Pulling on the clothing that Lydia had brought him had almost been his undoing, only the copious amount of morphine still in his system and her assistance prevented the pain from becoming enough to make him pass out. Still, he had made it. They were away from the hospital; had escaped while he still had the chance. He knew with Wilson, Cuddy and the team investigating, that window of opportunity had a very short span. If he'd stayed then Wilson would have stopped him from leaving, or they would have found him very shortly after. Time was against them now more than it ever had been.

He looked across as Lydia drove, the familiar profile constricting his heart as it ever had. Backlit by the fading strands of twilight, her skin formed a dark outline; her features veiled by shadow. The darkness hiding the fine lines and subtle changes that the intervening years had added. He held his breath as he had so many times in his youth. Staggered by the beauty that nature had designed. The sculpting of her profile was perfect, or maybe perfectly familiar, even after the passage of time. He had known from the first moment he had seen her in the doorway of his apartment building Friday night that he was lost. Seeing her standing there had stunned him, he had lived the moment so often, in his dreams, in his nightmares. He stood and stared, his mouth slightly open. He knew that somehow without speaking he had managed to invite her back into his apartment. Slight gestures, body language had been enough, which was fortunate since the speech centers in his brain were not connected with the part of him that saw her. They were being controlled by someone else. Someone who could think clearly past the tightness in his chest, and the million tiny feet that were pounding through his abdomen. Someone who could make rational decisions. The House who saw her could do none of that, could barely follow her, as suppressed emotion scrambled to the surface.

He had somehow opened the door, held it for her to walk through, and followed her into the room. She stopped and turned and looked deep into his eyes, and there it was. The heartache, the pain, it meant nothing, the betrayal unimportant. In that moment he knew that whatever had happened, whatever she had done, whatever she had said to him, he still loved her and he always would. His soul was capable of no less. Besides there was a large part of him that believed she had only spoken the truth; that believed he deserved it. It didn't matter. She was here now, and he knew that he would do anything for her, anything she asked. He took a step towards her and she smiled a weak smile at him. He knew that she had hurt him, knew that she would hurt him again, but he couldn't seem to care, not about himself.

"It's good to see you again," she said.

He nodded; still not sure that he could form words.

She looked around the apartment nervously. "You're doing well for yourself, I'm glad."

He nodded again.

"I dyed my hair; do you like it?"

House still unable to utter a sound nodded once again.

She rubbed her hands together as his continued silence continued to unnerve her. "Look I...er… Maybe this was a mistake, maybe I should just go." She made a move to the door.

House panicked, screamed at himself to say something, to do something to stop her from leaving, to find out why she had come. Adrenaline crashed through his system allowing at least his body to respond in reflex; he stepped into the path that she tried to take around him. His hand raised in a stopping gesture. "No, please," he managed to force out.

She stopped and looked into his eyes once more. They were barely a foot apart now; the air seemed to tingle between them. "Please," he repeated more calmly. "Tell me why you're here." His eyes searched her face for answers.

"I know I have no right to ask, you of all people, after what I did to you" she stated quietly, regretfully. "But you're my last chance, I need your help."

For the first time House saw the fear beneath the beauty, the sadness and pleading in the eyes. If she had been a stranger, he would have agreed to help her. A damsel in distress would always trigger his protective instincts, but this was no stranger. He loved her. He wrapped his arms around her and she moved into the embrace as though she were a drowning man grabbing for a life preserver. He felt her cling to him, felt the warmth and the vulnerability simultaneously, the closeness of the embrace so right. She needed him. She needed him. He repeated the phrase to himself. Suppressed the nagging voice that told him once more that she would hurt him again. He was good at denial; he'd had plenty of practice. "Of course, I'll help you," his reply was almost whispered. "Whatever it takes, I'll help you."

The gentle shaking on his shoulder woke him from his slumber, and it took him a moment to orient himself; the images from his memory falling away to be replaced by the dark stillness of the woodland clearing.

"We're here." Lydia stated. She turned to look at the cabin behind her. "I've parked as close as I can to the door. Do you think you can make it inside?"

House looked at the short distance and almost laughed, or was that almost cried. The distance was ludicrously small, but the truth was he didn't know if he could, and his own weakness scared him. "I'll make it," he said confidently, flashing a smile.

She stared at him a little unsure, but then nodded in acceptance as she moved to help him.

Should have been an actor, he told himself as he positioned his feet outside the door. Even the effort of that left him panting for breath, a thin sheen of sweat covering his skin as he fought to ignore the pain. He took several breaths, as deep as his injured ribs would allow. Tried to prepare mentally and physically for the pain of standing, braced his hands against the doorframe and pushed himself to his feet. His preparation wasn't nearly enough, he made it upright but the pain stabbed through him like sharp daggers, driven in and twisted. The world spiraled into a darkening void and he pitched forward on to the dusty ground. As a doctor one would think he would follow medical advice and know that it takes months of bed rest for injuries like these to heal.

[H]

Immediately after hanging up with Dr. Nolan, Wilson dialed the numbers to reach Johnson, his fingers rapidly tapping his desk as he waited for him to answer.

"Johnson here."

"Johnson!" Wilson yelled, he didn't mean to, he just wanted Johnson to have all the information he had as fast as humanly possible.

"Lydia Kane. Find out everything about her, I have a hunch she is the woman with House on the street camera."

He could hear Johnson scribbling the name down on notebook paper. "Don't you think it's ironic that her last name is Kane when House..."

Wilson cut him off, "hilarious. Look please get back to me as soon as you can." He was in no mood for jokes, he wanted answers and he wanted them now.

"Of course, I'm on it."