"GUESSWORK"

- Chapter Forty-Three -

"Square One"

"I can't go through with this!" Gregg House shouted. "I can't! Not like this! Not under these circumstances! It just isn't fucking right!"

His voice rose a little higher in volume and pitch every time he opened his mouth. He was perched on the edge of his bed, eyes wild, clad only in boxer briefs, feet dangling scant inches above the floor. The bandage, half wound around his swollen foot, actually scraped across the wood inlay, and a few inches of white gauze lay pooled beneath his toes.

Around the bed, Wilson, Bernoski, Kirkpatrick, Bernard, Tyree and Shaniqua Tolliver stood poised like orderlies in a mental hospital, prepared to rush forward if he so much as moved another muscle. Gregg was about to lose it again, they thought.

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Kip Bernoski had delivered the bad news in the only way possible.

He'd blurted it out through his tears and sorrow and let the pieces fall where they may. He knew House had seen the look on his face when he'd walked through their door, and he knew Gregg recognized pain when he saw it. The man had been a connoisseur of pain for a very long time, and was well acquainted with all its manifestations.

James Wilson looked up from the half-finished bandaging job on House's foot and turned quickly away from the side of the bed at Kip's stumbling declaration. The soft brown eyes quickly brightened with moisture at the news, and James found himself already misting up in sympathy.

"Oh, God! No!"

Wilson's own voice was barely above a whisper, but in the sudden silence of the room, it reverberated like a shout. He turned away from Gregory House and walked deliberately across the room to the other man, then drew the startled Kip Bernoski into an embrace. "I'm so sorry. So sorry. What happened?" He was afraid to ask the direct question that was already on their minds.

The two men drew apart and stood eyeing one another awkwardly across the small space that now separated them. Kip kept nodding, trying to find his voice. "Thanks, Jim …" he managed, " …for that! I think I needed that more than anything.

"Earl is … was … the person I was talking about Sunday night when I said I had a best friend too …"

"I had kinda figured that out," James acknowledged softly.

On the bed, House cradled his throbbing foot with both hands and stared across glumly at the pair. He was not in the least surprised to see Wilson embrace the other man without compunction. He wished, sometimes, that he were capable of doing the same.

His voice also stretched across the room without its usual caustic edge. "Was it the nanocites?" He asked carefully. "Or something else?"

Bernoski wiped his face on a handkerchief he pulled from his back pocket, and parried his gaze between the two others. "We don't know yet," he said. "It's too soon. We just found him."

"'We?'" House persisted. His interest was becoming professional now, his training taking over. He straightened his leg and moved toward the edge of the bed. His sore foot was forgotten, the puzzle pulling his full attention.

"He was supposed to meet me for coffee in Lab #2 at 5:45," Kip said, "and he was late. He didn't answer his phone. I thought he was either in the shower or on his way. I ran into Neeka and Tyree out front and we went to look for him. He didn't answer the door, so I called his cell phone." Kip's voice hitched, and he stopped in his narrative to wipe his eyes again.

"The giveaway was the sound of the damn phone ringing inside his apartment. I went in and found him right away. He was on the floor between his bed and the wheelchair. He must have known something was happening, and tried to go for help … the dumbass doesn't always remember to take the phone back to the bedroom with him … that'll teach 'im …"

Kip's shoulders were shaking again, and he paused a moment for the grief to ease off. "Shaniqua and Tyree went back out front to call the coroner. There needs to be an autopsy … but we can't do it, obviously.

"I think he had a heart attack, and it took him quickly and, I hope, painlessly. His face had turned dark, and there's edema present that points to coronary artery involvement. The autopsy will tell us for sure … but they can't possibly finish it today. There's going to be an inquiry as well … as soon as the coroner's team comes across the clusters of nanocites. Not everybody knows about this program."

House glared, ignoring that last. "How soon?"

Kip paused for a few seconds and then his gaze fastened on the hard blue stare, which House projected outward from his position on the bed. Bernoski didn't particularly like the way Gregg sat perched precariously near the edge. "Doesn't matter. We can't waste any more time. We've got to get you out of here and down to surgery. If anything happens to you because of what we did here, none of us will ever be able to live with ourselves again!"

"No!" House yelled. "Earl is dead, for God's sake! You've got to back off from this shit and give yourselves time to grieve. Do the others even know yet?" He leaned forward even further over the edge of the mattress, looking for all the world as though he were getting ready to cut and run out of there.

Wilson gave a startled yelp and made a beeline for the side of the bed.

House stopped him in his tracks with a stiff arm and a pointed finger. "No! Oh no you don't! This isn't right! You can't do this! Not now!"

Wilson sighed, a long shuddering breath. He'd seldom felt so completely out of control of a situation. House's fear was coming to bear in a shocking climax, and Wilson hoped the trembling of his own body was not so readily apparent to his friend, sitting there stiffly, watching him like a mongoose watches a cobra.

James shook his head as though in exasperation, seeking to cause distraction. He leaned his elbow on the curve of metal at the foot of the bed, sprung his left hip and hung there, draped unceremoniously. He raised his head, looking angrily, worriedly, at the ceiling. He could feel trickles of sweat beading on his forehead and running in rivulets down the center of his back.

On the other side of the room, they heard the door close softly. Kip Bernoski had taken a sneak while they were confronting each other. He was going to get reinforcements …

"Ya happy now?" Wilson snarked. "Now he has to break the news to everyone else and then bring them back here to screw with you!"

House was not paying attention. He was tense, agitated and aggressive, and still on guard. He maintained a close scrutiny on the bedroom door, and he did not give ground.

James Wilson put on his best "nonchalant" face and did not try to approach. The two best friends froze in place and glared at each other.

Minutes ticked by.

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It was a Mexican standoff. Five minutes passed in a slow motion of torturous progression. Neither man moved. Neither spoke.

Early morning fog was lifting, and with it the edges of shadow that had filled the dark corners of the room. Wilson looked House directly in the eye, challenging him stare for stare, refusing to back down and allow his headstrong friend to have his way. House was pale. His foot must be torturing the hell out of him.

Wilson knew House intended to postpone the urgent nanocite surgery … if he could … until something proper could be done for the stricken friends and colleagues of Earl Keirkgaard. Wilson also knew House did not have a death wish, or any stupid inclination to commit a martyr's suicide. He was simply proceeding from his own convoluted sense of propriety, which, in his mind, was in the best interests of people he had come to admire and respect.

Wilson could not fault him for that.

The 6:00 a.m. deadline came and went.

Finally the bedroom door swung open again. One by one, Neeka, Tyree, Bill, Bart, Kip and Lillian entered and took their places silently in a ring around the bed. They were cautious and alert. They were expecting Gregory House to have a serious meltdown.

For the first time, House took stock of his situation, realizing that he was suddenly surrounded by people who were very frightened for him. He looked down at himself and his state of almost-complete undress as though he had not been aware of it before. His eyes shifted nervously from one worried face to another, his concentration wavering. He blinked and licked his lips, and no one said a word. Even his nervous movements seemed to be confirming their worst fears. He returned his eyes to Wilson in a silent plea for rescue, but Wilson ignored him and shifted his own gaze elsewhere.

House reached down and pulled the crumpled sheet over his legs, but held stubbornly to his place at the edge of the mattress.

A slight movement near the center of the gathering drew their attention inward. Tyree Tolliver was beginning to squirm, fighting boredom. Fighting something! Perhaps he was finding it increasingly uncomfortable to remain standing with most of his weight leaning forward on his crutches.

The boy sighed, still fidgeting. He reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew his iPod. Turned it on. The tinny sounds of teenybopper music screeched into the air from the dangling ear buds.

Beside him, Neeka made hasty motions with her hands, hissing through her teeth, seeking his attention to put the thing away. Tyree paid no heed. He shifted his weight on his arm canes and inserted the ear buds into his ears one at a time with exaggerated concentration.

Sometimes the very young did not always do as they were told.

Everyone stared at him, including Gregory House.

Especially Gregory House!

Neeka backed off as it dawned on her that her son had a plan …

Tyree Tolliver was beginning to nod his head to a rhythm that only he could hear now. Then he looked up and quietly observed House flickering his attention toward him. Curiosity: bane of the genius mind!

The boy frowned for a moment, and then slowly removed the ear buds from his ears again and held them in his hand. He heaved a huge put-upon sigh and clanked his way across to where House still sat, mostly naked, his swollen foot hanging down, bandage dragging … and he offered up the iPod and the ear buds to the cranky doctor from New Jersey.

A smile spread across the kid's face in calculated youthful guile. A large, long-fingered hand reached tentatively to take the small instrument from extended light brown fingers. Other faces froze, eyes watching the byplay with rapt attention.

"Thanks," Gregg House said. The first word he had spoken in twenty minutes. He inserted the ear buds into his own ears and moved the tiny wheel to the next song.

Tyree grinned and clambered onto the bed beside Dr. House. With his right index finger, he pointed to a spot a little further back from the edge of the mattress. House looked at him sternly for a moment, then cocked an elegant eyebrow and slid himself backward until he was no longer in danger of falling to the floor.

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James Wilson felt the cold, solid syringe of … something or other … being pressed into his palm.

Sedative.

He did not dare look to see what it was. To his left, Bill Bernard leaned slightly forward and caught his eye. Bill's head nodded up and down one time. Wilson was close enough to House's left thigh to administer the medication. If he could pull it off, this standoff would be over and they could whisk House away to the OR, perform the necessary surgical procedure and check him out physically to be sure he had been successfully relieved of all the nanocites.

James moved in under a pretense of interest in the screechy teenage music that House loved. House's eyes were closed and he was swaying in time to the baseline …

Wilson reached out and thrust the needle deep into House's thigh muscle, depressed the plunger.

House jerked back as though he had been slapped, and the look he gave Wilson as his friend withdrew the needle, was just short of murderous. They locked eyes in a clash of wills, but House realized too late that he was helpless to prevent the strong sedative from coursing through his veins. He was shortly on his way to oblivion.

His eyes slowly began to lose their sparkle. He blinked and shook his head groggily at Wilson. "That was a cheap shot!" He grumbled. But his voice had already lost most of its strength.

Forty seconds later, the tall, lanky body toppled sideways onto the bed, fading fast, and Tyree Tolliver was frowning sympathetically. He knew he was going to be in the doghouse real good when the grumpy doctor woke up in recovery.

They had intended to transport him in the wheelchair, but now it would be like trying to prop up a two-hundred-pound plastic bag filled with Jell-O.

Kip sprinted away for a gurney and they took him to the OR flat on his back.

By 8:00 a.m., House was hooked into full anesthesia, Foley, IVs and monitors, and the electro-magnet probe was being inserted into the barely-healed wounds in his right thigh.

The machine whirred in Kip's hands, while Bill Bernard assisted. Lillian Chan sat behind the partition and monitored the computers with Bart close at her side in silent support. They both had aching hearts and a sense of purpose.

Shaniqua walked slowly back to reception with her son at her side. "You did good, kiddo … y'awl did really, really good!"

Tyree would like to have smiled at his mother's high praise, but his heart wasn't in it. He had lost two friends, and jeopardized the trust of another. He had nothing to smile about.

Sadly, Neeka signed the forms when the black ambulance from the Coroner's Office came by to respectfully remove the body of Earl Keirkgaard. She and Tyree stood with arms about one another in sorrow, watching the vehicle pull away.

"He's gonna go be with Bobby forever now, isn't he, Mom?"

"Yeah, son … guess he is. An' I can't think of a better place …"

Author's Note:

You've been great! You've stuck with me through the computer glitches and my sad experiences with a machine, which is way smarter than I am! I've been reading your emails and reviews with a huge smile on my face while drinking my morning coffee and listening to the sound of the creek outside the window. My vacation is going great, and I'm in the best of all possible worlds. I appreciate your hanging in there, and I'll be back with you "live" on Monday the 23rd. Thank you thank you thank you …

Bets;)

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