Just to remind you again, the medicine in this storyline is extremely suspect. I truly have no idea what I'm talking about, so if you know better, please don't tell me ;) just suspend your disbelief, please - pretty please.
And thank you for the reviews, you have been very kind D.
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Having turned his back to Wilson House limped into the conference room where his ducklings were waiting for him with Soo, the littlest duckling.
"So did you get the MRI?" House asked Foreman as he walked in.
"I just brought them with me," Foreman said putting the image up on the light board next to the previous one taken the day before. House walked up to the pictures and studied them. Then he turned to Soo – as everybody had learned to expect after two days.
"What do you see in them then?" House demanded.
Soo took a look, but shook her head: "I don't know. I don't know enough to analyze the differences in the images."
"Ah, yes, I had almost forgotten you were the useless one," House mused somewhat callously. "Any ideas though? What does your gut say?"
"My gut is worried," Soo snapped at him.
"If you insist on treating all patients like they are family members you better get used to that," House informed her.
"I thought your advice was for me to learn not to treat patients like they were family, so why do I need to get used to that?" Soo pointed out.
"Because no matter what I say you will care. I know your type. Cameron is one just like that too and she hasn't learned to be objective. And my advice, if anyone would listen to me, would be to learn to treat family members like patients," House told her.
"That's great advice," Cameron could not help but huff at him. "You never see patients unless you really cannot avoid it!"
"Yeah, and that would work great with family, too," House enthused. "If only you could get the family to co-operate! But back to the subject at hand: what does your gut say Soo?"
"It's still worried!" She sighed. "There is something in the image that I don't like, though I don't know enough to know what it means. That area there is what is drawing my attention for some reason." Soo circled the place in question with her finger.
Before House could say anything the door to the diagnostics room opened – would have opened with a bang if that had been possible – and Cuddy stormed in.
"House!" Cuddy practically yelled. "I want a word. Now!"
"Oh dear," House made a face. "It seems that I have been a bad boy once again. Foreman, explain to Soo the images and what it is that worries her. I'll be back as soon as my Dominatrix is done with me, though if you see her taking out the whips come and rescue me." With that House left the room and took Cuddy into his office.
"I wonder what he has done this time," Chase was the one who voiced the question out loud though all the ducklings thought it.
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"Before you start yelling," House warned Cuddy. "I better remind you that these walls are not sound-proof."
"I can't believe you House!" Cuddy didn't seem to pay no mind to his words, but she was not yelling – precisely. "After I specifically warned you, you still go and do something so asinine I can hardly believe it, even of you."
"This conversation would be a lot more productive if you could be a little more specific about the asinine thing I'm supposed to have done," House pointed out.
"Are you telling me there are several possibilities?" Cuddy looked appalled.
"With you there always is," House insisted. "I have no way of knowing which of my actions you choose to take an unreasonable exception to at any given time."
"Unreasonable!" Cuddy rolled her eyes. "You think it is unreasonable to object to what you did last night?"
"Last night?" House exaggerated his pondering. "Yes, I definitely think it would be unreasonable."
"Have you no conscience? No decency? No ethics?" Cuddy looked disgusted.
"How many times you want me to answer those questions" House asked in turn. "I mean you have asked me at least one of them every week since I started here, I would think you knew the answers by now."
"Apparently I have this insane wish that one of these days you would change," Cuddy fumed. "Though where I got the idea that you even could change, I don't know."
"Nor I," House agreed. "Though would you mind telling me what was so particularly heinous and unusual about last night?"
"Unusual?" Cuddy pounced on the one word. "How many medical students have you slept with then?" She looked totally appalled.
"Oh," House looked up pretending to try and remember while looking nonchalant and doing his best to hide his relief – not busted, after all! "I'm afraid I lost count. I was a bit of a lad those days, you know."
"I'm not talking about the days when you were a medical student, too," Cuddy snapped at him. "I'm talking about how many of MY medical students have you slept with."
"Come along," House said, grabbed her arm and took her back to the four ducklings. "Soo, would you mind telling Dr. Cuddy where you were last night."
Soo looked puzzled but complied: "I was with friends. I was trying to avoid my mother."
"Are those friends medical students too?" House asked
"Yes, they are," Soo looked no wiser.
"Care to share their names with us – and the address where you stayed," House invited. Soo obliged rattling three names and an address to Cuddy, who started to look a little sheepish.
"I'm sorry, but I don't understand what this is all about," Soo wondered.
"Apparently I ought to have followed my normal instincts this morning and not give you a lift to work," House explained with a humorous face.
"You mean people think... Because you ... Just from having seen you drop me off at the door?" Soo didn't quite know how to formulate the thought.
"Yep," House confirmed. "Sorry about that. You may have to put up with some funny looks for a while."
"The looks may be the least of my worries," Soo sighed. "My room mate will want details and she will never believe that I don't have any."
"Just tell her I sucked," House shrugged. "That ought to end that conversation."
"She'll never believe me," Soo was still shaking her head at the idea of the third degree she was sure she was going to face. "She thinks you're hotter than hell." Having slipped that out of her mouth, Soo suddenly remembered where she was and who she was talking to. Her appalled gaze flew up to House and she put both her hands over her mouth.
"Really," House leered delightedly. "You think you could introduce us?"
"House!" Cuddy growled at him.
"Ok, ok. Medical students are a no-no," House sighed with deep disappointment. "It will be my new mantra, though I don't know why. It's not like they are underage or anything."
"Age is not the only factor that comes into it," Cuddy was almost incoherent in her indignation. "Your position in this hospital, your role as a possible mentor and teacher... Why do I even try?"
"Come on, Cuddy," House decided to have mercy on her. "Do you really think I would go for a medical student?"
"Who then?" Cuddy didn't seem to be willing to be convinced. "Wilson told me you had company last night. If it wasn't Soo, who was it then?"
"Soo has already told you where and with who she was," House stated icily. "Apart from letting you know that it was not a medical student of any kind, I have no obligation to tell you who the Abyssinian maid playing her dulcimer in my pleasure dome last night was. And you most certainly do not have the right to ask."
Cuddy had the sense to look a little ashamed: "You are right, I'm sorry. Your private life is none of my business as long as it doesn't interfere with your work or this hospital. And since we have cleared that up, I'll leave you to do your work." She left them to it.
"Abyssinian maid?" Foreman repeated questioningly breaking the silence Cuddy had left behind her.
"It's from The Ballad of Kubla Khan," Chase revealed.
"I thought our Brit would recognise Coleridge," House lightened up some.
"I'm Australian," Chase repeated once again, knowing full well that no matter how many times he said it, House would ignore it.
"Right," House agreed unconvincingly. "But back to work. Did Foreman have time to explain the images to you before you were so rudely interrupted?"
"Yes, he did," Soo said.
"Ok, so what we have here is a bit of a dilemma," House sat down at the desk – the others followed suit. "Your father refused surgery, which is why we are trying this treatment. These images, however, give us new information and we – or more precisely you, since you have his medical proxy – have to decide what he really meant. That area, which worried you, is the part where the damage is its severest and the toxins from it may be fatal to your father. My suggestion is that we remove it surgically. Just that area, which is less than ten percent of the muscle, not the whole damaged muscle tissue as the conventional recommendation is. If the rest of the treatment goes as we want, he ought to be able to overcome that loss with physical therapy and other treatments. It will take some time, but that is the case anyway, no matter what we do."
"Are you saying that removing just that part would not leave my father crippled and it would increase his chances of surviving his chosen treatment?" Soo asked.
"That would be my estimation," House nodded. "As long as the rest of the treatment works and as long as the nerves are not too damaged."
"The nerve damage has been the big question all along, no matter what treatment your Father chose," Foreman reminded her. "We really have no way of knowing for sure how much damage the blockage did until we have finished the treatment and the rehab."
"So no matter what we do, no matter how well this treatment succeeds, he may still be crippled by the chronic pain?" Soo repeated.
"We did discuss that with you and your Father," House said. "He is aware of that risk as well."
"But this operation you are now recommending would not in itself increase that risk?" Soo wanted to be sure.
"To the best of my estimation: no." House promised.
"Would you have chosen this operation, yourself?" Soo asked. She was a little afraid to ask, but this was her father, so she had to be sure.
"I don't know for sure, but I think I would have," House mused. "It is possible that I would not have trusted a surgeon not to cut more than agreed once he had the chance, but that is not a problem here as you and I will both scrub in to observe, as will Foreman."
"I think my father would accept this surgery," Soo did her best to assess the situation. "What he wanted to do was to fight to the end against becoming a cripple and this would not change that. Besides he trusted you, Dr. House. One of the reasons he wanted to give me the proxy was to make sure that you will stay on as his doctor. Yes, I will agree to this surgery you are suggesting."
"Ok, then. We get a surgeon and prepare your father for the surgery," House nodded. "This will also have the advantage of getting your mother off your back. We are doing a surgery, after all. Once this is done, I think we can wake him from the coma the day after tomorrow. He will still be in pain, but we ought to be able to control that with normal medication."
"Good. Are you sure I can come into the OR?" Soo wanted to know.
"My patient, my ducklings," House shrugged. "I don't see how the surgeon could refuse."
"But I'm really not one of your ducklings," Soo hesitated.
"For the time being and for all practical purposes you are," House stated. "Sure you are the littlest of them, but a duckling is a duckling."
House stood up and went into his office leaving Soo sitting stunned at the table. She felt like she had passed some strange test or initiation process and come through it with honours. And the other three people in the room were looking at her smiling like they, too thought the same thing. The littlest duckling, Soo couldn't help, she smiled from ear to ear.