"GUESSWORK"

- Chapter Twenty-Five -

"In the Gloaming"

James Wilson awakened slowly, blinking sleep from his eyes. The muscles across his shoulders and down his back protested painfully, and an involuntary grunt escaped his lips. He was still cradling House's bandaged hand within his own, and he placed it back on the pillow before pushing himself up straighter. The room's lights were turned low; the only sound a faint murmur from the ventilation system. Wilson rotated his shoulders and moved his head back and forth in an effort to loosen some of the stiffness. A quick glance at his watch told him it was close to 2:00 a.m. If Bill and Bart were still in the room, he didn't see them.

Directly across from him on the bed, blue eyes deep in shadow rested softly on his face, but there was less than softness in the tone of Gregg's voice. "That'll teach ya! Why the hell don't you go and get some decent sleep? If you don't, you're gonna be grumpy and sore all day tomorrow."

Wilson propped his elbow on the edge of the bed and supported his chin with the heel of his hand. "It is tomorrow!" He said sleepily. "I didn't mean to wake you …"

House cut him off. "Wasn't sleeping."

"Not at all?"

"Nope."

"Why? Are you in pain? Do you need something … ?"

"Wilson …"

"Huh? What?"

"I'm not in pain! Trying to sleep with you snoring in my ear is like trying to sleep under the hood of a Model-T Ford!"

"I … oh!" Wilson sat up and leaned back in the chair. "Sorry."

"Not your fault. Your ass is draggin', and I want you to go back to wherever your damn room is and go to bed! I'm fine. Bill is back there sacked out on the couch. Nothin's gonna happen for awhile … and I'll still be here when you get back." House made his point with a stern, but not unkind voice, and Wilson watched his eyes for signs of deceit.

He found none.

He pushed himself further upright and made to rise. "If you're sure … ?'

"Wilson. I'm sure. Go get some sleep."

James sighed. "Okay …" He pushed the chair back to its place against the wall, then looked across to his friend one last time, as though for his own reassurance. "Goodnight, House."

"G'nite, Wilson."

Retracing his steps down the corridor to the other end of the building, Wilson thought about House's options.

Tomorrow … or to be more accurate, later today … they would take House's leg out of the strange contraption in which it had been encased for, by then, close to twenty-four hours. And then what? He assumed that there would be an interval of waiting until it became known whether the pain would come back, and how soon, and how severe. Kip Bernoski had not said it would, but neither did he say it would not.

House was, after all, a willing guinea pig. He had signed his name on the dotted line and ridden 600 agonizing miles on the outside chance that he might finally be free from so many years of constant pain. Might he actually be shed of the mind-draining torment that had held him prisoner? Would he even remember what it had been like to have once been "normal"?

Even the distant thought of such a miracle caused Wilson to mist up when he pictured his best friend with a real smile on his face. It would be so good to see the classic features relaxed and not drawn with suffering that never relented.

Wilson wished he'd had the presence of mind to ask questions of Kip Bernoski and find out as much as he could about the impending procedure. He could also have asked Bart last night while the man was explaining the principles of nanotechnology and the methods they would use to release the nanocites into Gregg's nervous system.

What could House expect in terms of the easing of his pain and the future function of the leg? Kip said he would probably still need the cane, and perhaps even crutches for a time as his body adjusted to the differences in strength and mobility. But would the limb actually strengthen? Or might it weaken even more, making it impossible for it to bear his weight? If it would not bear weight, would Gregg deem the sacrifice worth the cessation of the pain?

Gregory House had some difficult life-decisions facing him. Wilson wondered whether the man, for all his great strength in the face of impossible odds, would bear up as well under the strain of being "patient of the week" when the differential diagnosis had his own name on it.

Wilson keyed the lock and walked into his quarters without turning on the light. A glow from the arc lights in the parking lot threw the shadows in the room into bas-relief against the opposite wall. He set the plastic bags of House's ruined clothing, and the rest of the accumulated debris on the floor.

As an afterthought, he removed the red necktie from the pocket of the backpack. He removed it from its dilapidated gift bag, and, gift tag still clinging, hung it carefully from the top of the dresser's mirror.

He toed off the moccasins and dropped onto the counterpane fully dressed. Thoughts of his friend still tumbled around and around in his mind.

He was asleep before his head hit the pillow …

00000000

Gregg was restless.

He hadn't been totally truthful with Wilson awhile ago. The truthful part was that his crippled leg was, indeed, free of pain. The lie had to do with his state of mind. He was scared out of his wits, and beleagured with "what-ifs".

What if the pain in his leg came back immediately? What if the nanocites ran rampant through his nervous system and destroyed more tissue than they were programmed to destroy? What if he found that, even though the pain was gone after the final surgery, he still could not bear weight on the leg? And what if this experiment turned out to be all for nothing, and his heart stopped and he just up and died? Bought the farm. Croaked …

Any of those things were possible, and not one item on the list of nagging worries could he bring himself to mention to Wilson. What would it do to Wilson if Wilson had to accompany his lifeless body back to Princeton, New Jersey, and then have to be there to explain his friend's death to Blythe and the Colonel? What then? It would kill Wilson. It would kill him!

Did his dark thoughts qualify as self-pity? He feared that they did. Not something the counselors back in rehab would have condoned. They might have suggested that he consult his Higher Power.

Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him …

Yeah. Right!

Gregg closed his eyes and pursed his lips to keep from making a cowardly mewling sound in the quiet room. He could do that at home when he was in agony and alone. But not here. He held his breath as long as he could hold it, then let it escape in a wracking shudder that rocked his entire body. The decubitus ulcer on his foot began to throb, and the sudden severity of it hit him with an impact that caused him to sob with a sense of ironic dark humor. With one pain gone, another one arose quickly to take its place.

Fuck!

His eyes stung with unshed tears. He forgot himself for a moment and clenched his fists at his sides. Both fists! The stitches that closed the laceration in his left hand dug like an ice pick, and he cried out quietly.

"Fuck … fuck …. Fuckfuckfuckfuck …."

"Hey man … calm down. What's wrong? Foot?"

Gregg inhaled a startled breath and jerked his head quickly to the right. Bill Bernard stood at the head of his bed looking down.

Humiliated and ashamed of his lack of composure, Gregg turned his head just as quickly in the opposite direction. "Go-the-fuck away!" He snarled. The pain was getting worse.

Bill was reaching for his right elbow.

"For the pain, man," Bill was saying. He found the vein, jabbed the needle, and in twenty seconds House wilted.

He lay panting, recovering, trying to even out his breathing. He was impressed by Bernard's artificial hand, doing all the busy work that a normal hand usually did. He looked up and met the compassionate dark eyes. "Sorry. Thanks."

Bill shrugged. "That'll take the edge off, Gregg," he said. "You a little worried?"

"Uh … yeah. Guess so. Didn't know I was such a wuss …"

"You're not! But you've allowed your pain to define you way too long. Now you're finding out that it really is okay to be scared. It doesn't diminish you as a man one damn bit." Bernard smiled, stepped back and placed the spent syringe on the bedside table.

There were vials of antibiotics and sterile dressings also on the table. Bernard chose among them as he spoke in a soothing tone to calm House after the trauma of the sudden onset of pain. "I need you to lie very still, Gregg," he said. "The ulcer on your foot is open now, and draining … and it's necessary that we keep it flushed so it doesn't go septic. You'll probably feel some pressure when I change the dressings and clean it … but you're a doctor; you know all this. I'm just reminding you …"

House knew what the man was doing, and he appreciated the diversion. Even with the calming injection, the site was painful, and he knew what was coming. He took a deep breath and forced his body to relax. Bernard's hands, the real one and the artificial one, were exquisitely tender, and the agony was excruciating, but momentary. He rode it out better than he thought he would.

Bill followed the antibiotics with a thick gauze pad smeared with salve that was not only cooling to the touch, but numbing over the area that touched the wound. Bernard wound gauze bandage in a figure eight around Gregg's foot and ankle and anchored it with adhesive tape. "That should do you for the rest of the night. When we take you out of the stringers tomorrow, you may be able to get up in a wheelchair."

"Why a wheelchair?" Gregg asked. "God, I hate those things!"

"You can't try to walk on your foot, and we need to see how long it takes for your pain to come back. If it comes back right away, or if it holds off awhile … and how long the process takes. All of it helps gauge how many of the nanocites we insert. It's a little complicated. You knew the stringers were only temporary, right?"

"Yeah. But why?" Gregg was interested now, and distracted by the opportunity to find out something new. There was a puzzle to be solved, and he was intrigued.

"The purpose of the spikes and stringers is to determine the strength and quantity … bulk … mass … number … whatever you choose to call it … of nanocites we inject into the areas where the spikes were inserted into the muscle of your leg. The insertion points will become the ports from which the little buggers work their way toward the damaged nerves and block off the impulses that cause your worst pain."

Bill Bernard held the four fingers of his biological hand straight up and cupped to resemble the nest of a Baltimore Oriole. With the prongs of the metal hand, he indicated the bottom of the cup and pointed to the fingers one at a time. "The nanocites will be inserted into the wounds made by the spikes and represented by my fingers," he said.

"They will go in and set themselves in a circle at the bottom of the cup. Lillian Chan will be controlling the number and volume from the computers. When the nanocites start to reproduce, they'll move into the nerve fibers and begin their work. At that time, you'll be closely monitored by Kip and me. The pain, at that time, will probably spike for a moment. We don't want you going into cardiac arrest or anaphylactic shock. We'll be right here keeping a close watch on your blood pressure; we'll be ready to flush out your system and to administer epinephrine if necessary."

Bill paused. House's face was dark.

The deep voice came out as a harsh growl. "I'd suggest you pull Wilson in here if you're gonna do that. If you don't, you're gonna have more than one heart attack on your hands." Gregg was only half joking.

Bill Bernard stared down at him, then rested a hand for a moment on his shoulder. "We couldn't do without him, Gregg. We haven't spoken with him about it yet. We knew how exhausted you both were after that 600-mile trek in crappy weather. But when he's fresh and rested in the morning, we'll fill him in on the procedure, and he'll be as much a part of it as you want him to be. He did, after all, care enough to follow you all the way down here. That took a certain amount of devotion … or whatever you want to call it."

Gregg nodded and smiled for an instant. "I wouldn't argue with you about that …"

Bernard grinned. He busied himself about the bed, straightening sheets and blankets, checking the stringers and bedside monitors and straightening House's pillows. He slid a pillow beneath the bandaged foot and covered it with a light blanket. He pulled a second blanket up over House's body and placed the injured hand onto the third pillow.

Lastly, he changed the bag on House's Foley and checked it for leaks. He was very thorough, Gregg noticed. "Guess I'm supposed to go to bed like a good kid now," he remarked sarcastically.

Bill nodded. "Yup. You go to sleep so I can go to sleep. Fershtay?"

Gregg scowled. "Huh?"

Bill grinned. "Pennsylvania Dutch," he said. "I'm from Dutch Country … Lancaster, PA. I just asked you if you understood."

House allowed himself to smile. "Guess so. So go get some sleep. Sounds like it's gonna be an interesting day tomorrow … or today … whatever the hell …"

"I'm gonna! G'nite, Gregg."

"'Nite, Bill. Thanks."

"Back at'cha!"

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