"You're not an idiot" House stated weakly as he tore out a shakily written note from Cuddy's book. It was an unexpected statement – but not an unwelcome one in her opinion, even if it was completely out of the blue.
"Okay" she replied uneasily, taking the scrap of paper from his hand, "that's probably the nicest thing you've ever said to me" she teased lightly, trying to quench the feeling of impending doom that was floating around in her stomach.
House attempted to shake his head in mock annoyance, but failed miserably as nausea forced him to squeeze his eyes shut before he started retching. Not something he wanted to do in a hurry with his kidney already on the brink of homicide.
He recovered after a few tense seconds of swallowing back the pain; Cuddy kept her mouth shut during the period, silently cursing the ambulance for taking so long.
"You're not an idiot, but…but I need you to do everything on here" he waved vaguely towards the torn out page, drawing Cuddy's attention back to it.
"Err, okay" she looked from him to the page and frowned, "You're not planning on going anywhere are you?" she asked warily, skimming over the top few lines.
"Probably won't be around when the ambulance gets here" he admitted, grimacing slightly at the thought of the EMT's transferring him into it. "Just read it…"
"Possibility of rising Potassium…well, you're the nephrologist…" she muttered, reading through his hastily scrawled note; she then spared him a quick look, not liking what she saw at all.
"House, just take a few deep breaths, okay?" she said calmly, he mumbled something incoherent in reply which wasn't a good enough answer. "Look, I need you to stay with me" she admitted, giving the pretence that she was on the verge of getting angry with him, "don't you dare pass out" she pointed a finger at him menacingly.
He mumbled "Jesus, Cuddy" or something that sounded remarkably similar before painfully taking in enough air to clear his vision. "I just need…" he almost pleaded with her to let him give in to the pain and just drift into unconsciousness, but his pride got in the way, so he trailed off reluctantly and concentrated on regulating his breathing.
"Just stay awake – it's easier to monitor your condition if you're arguing with me" she ordered calmly as she quickly grabbed another bag of ice from the kitchen and pressed it against his sweltering forehead, hoping that it might awaken his senses and keep him from passing out.
She dreaded to think what his temperature was now that he was in even more agony; the ice touching his skin sent a blast through his body and woke him up a little, but also caused him to flinch involuntarily and wince at the action.
"Hold this" Cuddy said, ignoring the wince, as she gave him the second bag to hold against his side; he took it readily enough, but couldn't muster up enough energy to twist, so Cuddy was forced to abandon it because she needed to take his pulse – which she soon found was racing manically.
"Pulse is a little elevated" she lied, smiling at his lazily grunted response and added eye roll; if he could find the energy to talk, no doubt his response would have been something along the lines of 'I know what my pulse is; it's currently deafening me by thudding loudly in my ears – it's so not just a little elevated' but it was too much effort for him to try and politely converse right now.
It seemed like everything in his world was melting rapidly, she was the only thing keeping him grounded; her icy cool demeanour was actually helping him for a change. He briefly considered cutting her some slack over his clinic duty when he got better…although, he primarily put it down to the fever and so decided against it almost immediately.
"House" she snapped him out of his daze and locked onto his blue eyes; "they're here – you ready?"
"No" he croaked, regardless of the fact that it was a rhetorical question and Cuddy had already left him, with both the ice packs now on his lap, to answer the door.
"He's suffering from broken ribs which have ruptured his right kidney and he's also gone into shock – we need to transfer him as quickly and painlessly as possible" Cuddy stated as she led the EMT's through to the patient who grunted in amusement at Cuddy's hopeful optimism. 'Painlessly – yeah, as if!'
"Okay" EMT number one said, "we're gonna lift you and slide you onto the gurney, we don't really want to lay you down if there's a possibility of more damage…so Colin here will keep hold of you as we lead you out to the ambulance" he paused considerately, giving the patient a chance to take the plan in.
The second EMT, Colin, sat next to House on the couch and draped his left arm over his shoulder; the first took hold of his waist, being especially careful of his right hand side.
House gasped as he was pulled onto his feet and deftly slid over onto the gurney; whoever taught these guys to manoeuvre patients was a genius. The key seemed to be speed; get the patient into the ambulance fast enough and they didn't have time to complain at all!
He was vaguely aware of 'Colin' holding him upright; he was pretty content at staying limp and letting his head rest against Colin's shoulder. In fact, he'd be even more comfortable if they'd stop moving him altogether and just let him rest; all this sitting around was making him very, very tired…disconcertingly so.
Cuddy grabbed some essentials, locked the front door and followed the EMT's to the ambulance, ignoring the twitching curtains from House's nosey neighbours. By the time she'd gotten in the ambulance, the EMT's were hooking House up to O2 and an I.V in an attempt at getting his low BP stabilised.
House was still leaning on the EMT; his weight was so unevenly distributed, Cuddy thought that if Colin were to move, House would simply topple off of the gurney completely. Luckily, Colin was taking this all in his stride and seemed to be more than proficient at inserting IV's with one hand.
"We've got about six minutes on the road" Colin said soothingly to House as he adjusted the O2 mask and gave a quick thumbs-up to the second EMT in the driver's seat – their own devised signal for 'lets go'
For once, Cuddy was disappointed not to see any sign of an eye roll or swift jibe from her diagnostician; what she wouldn't give for a sarcastic comment right now…
She positioned herself in the spare seat and belted up, savouring the fact that she was no longer in charge; she still didn't dare take her eyes off of her patient.
'It's not like the weekend could have gotten any worse with you babysitting – you only nearly killed the guy' she thought miserably as the ambulance raced onto the main road.
"Stay awake" she ordered sharply as House's eyes began to droop; he responded by giving her a small smirk, which she just about caught under the O2 mask. Needless to say, it made her a little happier to see that he wasn't completely out of it yet.
"We've got a team waiting in Radiology, so when we get there take him-" Cuddy was cut off with a yelp as the ambulance hit a pothole, throwing Colin over onto his helpless patient.
There was an almighty screech as the driver attempted to keep the van on the road; a burst front tyre was hindering his vain attempt at staying put though and the ambulance eventually crashed down the side of a steep bank…
Author's Note: Sorry, had to throw that little cliffy in, I was getting bored of carting House to and from hospital without any real action…just relax in the knowledge that I'm currently writing the next chapter right now – so there won't be a long wait for it! Enjoy!