"Mr. Kent? I'm Dr. Chase. How are you doing?" He looked pretty bad. Well, not bad, actually –- he was probably the prettiest man Chase had ever seen, even with a beard that rivaled House's in its scruffiness and hair that hadn't been tended to for at least a month, but he definitely looked unwell.
Kent smiled tiredly and said, "Not that good, today."
The other man closed his laptop and stood up. "Dr. Chase. I'm Lex Luthor." He extended his hand.
Chase fumbled his clipboard under one arm so he could shake hands with the notorious mastermind, who really knew how to use his gaze and his handshake and, Jesus, his whole physical presence to intimidate a person. Robert knew he always had a head start on being intimidated, anyway. Oh, this was going to work great. "Mr. Luthor," he greeted him, trying not to visibly cringe.
"Call me Lex," Luthor purred, threatening a horrible death with his eyes.
Chase got his hand back intact and turned to the patient. Either House or Luthor must have chased the nurses off; nothing had been done except to get him settled in a bed and provided with an emesis basin. The chart was barely started; the pulse oximeter wasn't clipped on; no IV –- of course not, if a needle would break on Kent's skin. Probably House had gotten rid of the nurses as soon as he'd ruined those hypos. Well, it had frequently been made clear that House mostly kept Chase around to do these mundane tasks for the patients (that and to make fun of his hair and his accent). He busied himself with all the work the nurses should have done upon Kent's admission, ignoring Luthor's reptilian glare as hard as he could.
"There you go," Robert said, comfortingly. "Let's just get your temperature and oxygen level recorded--"
Kent threw up again, just as Chase was trying to get the thermometer in his mouth. "Whoa!" Chase said. "Okay, you're fine..."
To Chase's great surprise, Luthor was instantly at the patient's side, tenderly holding his head, competently cleaning up after him. Chase stood back and let him; he would never be able to stop a guy like that from doing anything, he was pretty sure. Watching them together, he felt jealous. Nobody had ever treated him with such care. They were too occupied with each other to notice his unworthy feelings, even if he might have messed up and left them visible.
Luthor took the emesis basin to the sink. Chase considered stopping him, on the grounds that an analysis of the material might provide some useful information. However, House hadn't ordered anything like that, Luthor might object, Chase wasn't sure it was actually a reasonable idea, and probably Clark would be vomiting again soon anyway. Instead, he went back to the chart and got the temperature recorded. "Thirty-eight point five. That's one hundred one point three, Fahrenheit. Not too bad." Chase wanted to sound reassuring.
Kent blinked big green eyes up at him. Wow. Chase found himself stroking the patient's hair back from his forehead, and quickly turned it into the back-of-the-hand temperature-checking gesture that some of the older, more motherly nurses sometimes still used. He hoped Luthor had missed that. Not only was it wrong to flirt with a patient, and a guy, but also it was dangerously foolish to let the wealthy, powerful criminal see you touching his boyfriend inappropriately. What was wrong with him today, anyway?
"I always run a little hot. My normal is about a hundred point five."
"Don't write that down," Luthor interrupted, unexpectedly touching Chase on the hand. Chase started and dropped his pen. He welcomed the chance to duck down and hunt for it as Luthor continued. "I don't want any permanent records kept of anything that would cause a problem for Clark later. Understand?"
"Yessir," Chase muttered.
"Lex!" Kent protested mildly. "You don't have to--"
Chase surfaced and cut him off. "It's okay. House explained." Those tired green eyes were just –- wow. Chase smiled at Kent again, trying to reassure him. "Your secret is safe. House always pretty much keeps his case notes on the whiteboard anyway, and I don't have to write down anything about what you say is normal for, for you. Dr. Cameron and I can easily work it all word-of-mouth."
"Thank you." Clark smiled, and Chase smiled back. Wow.
He shook himself a little and continued the preliminary examination. "Your oxygen saturation percentage is a little low. Ninety-six. Is that normal for you, too?"
"I don't know." Clark twisted a little, wincing as he moved (abdominal pain wasn't mentioned in any of the original assessments) and looked up at his grim-faced partner standing protectively next to the bed. "Lex? Do you know?"
Luthor shook his head, tight-lipped.
"Okay, then. It's not that low, but it shouldn't hurt any to set you up with a little oxygen." Chase looked over to Luthor for confirmation. "That's okay?"
Luthor nodded once. His eyes looked haunted, and Chase turned all his attention back to his work.
"All righty then." He arranged the lines and the cannula. "Comfortable?"
"Yeah," Clark replied. He looked like the nausea was getting the better of him again.
"How often have you been throwing up?"
"Mmm. It's getting pretty frequent." Clark's forehead wrinkled with the effort of remembering.
Luthor opened his laptop and tapped a few keys. He swiveled the screen around, and Chase saw that he'd been recording all the instances of vomiting for several days. "Can I get a printout of that?"
"No. Just remember it."
Chase ducked his head and looked at the screen again. Luthor had apparently first noticed Clark vomiting four days earlier, and the frequency had increased from once every twelve hours to once an hour since then. "Is there anything else, that you haven't mentioned?" Chase asked.
"Drooling," Clark said faintly from the bed. Abdominal pain, prostration, Chase added silently. Cuddy had told House the symptom had been occasional faintness, not complete exhaustion.
"I have as much of a family history here as I've ever been able to assemble," Luthor said, touching the laptop. "You can read through it, but don't make any copies."
"Dr. Cameron will be in shortly to take the history. I'll go arrange for an MRI."
As Chase had expected, Luthor followed him out into the hall. Whatever he or House had done to get rid of the nurses, it was still working. This whole end of the VIP floor looked abandoned. "Dr. Chase, a word with you--"
Suddenly exasperated, Chase turned on him. "Look. I know you're a rich man without scruples, and that you could destroy my career or kill me slowly or whatever. I don't know how to convince you that ruining that man's life by betraying his secrets to the world is nothing that I would ever want to do! I wish you'd just take my word for it, and I would hope we could skip the part where you slam me into the wall to show how serious you are!"
Unexpectedly, Luthor smiled. The expression completely transformed his face. "Okay," he said, and went back into Clark's room.