Hi everyone, thank you all soooo much for your reviews they mean the world!

Seriously, you spur me on with your support, thank you very, very much! :D xxx

PS I've added to the ending of this chapter to avoid confusion... I hope it makes

more sense for you all! Just to reassure you - House is most definately NOT the

attacker! Re-read it to get rid of that horrible thought! :D xx

'I hurt myself today…to see if I still feel.

I focus on the pain… the only thing that's real.

The needle tears a hole… the old, familiar sting.

Try to kill it all away… but I remember everything…'

{Leona Lewis: Hurt}

House only just made it out of Wilson's bedroom into the shadowed hallway before he had to stop, breathing deeply past the overwhelmed hammering of his heart and closing his eyes as he leant back against the wall, feeling utterly useless.

He wasn't used to this.

Wilson was usually the reasonable one, the silently strong one, the one who worried constantly over the enigmatic man-child that was his best friend, not the other way around.

That was just how it was, how they worked.

But right now, and with the image of Wilson fumbling so frantically with the handle of his bathroom window seared guiltily onto his tired brain, House really wasn't sure he could step into Wilson's shoes and do what his friend did so willingly, so naturally, for him every minute of every day.

Hell, House hadn't even been able to bring himself to let Wilson know he was there as he'd quietly opened the bathroom door to find him checking that damn window so bloody thoroughly, the disconcerting sight of his usually assured best friend so obviously insecure in himself and his safety quite heart wrenching to discover, hence House taking the coward's way out and leaving Wilson's pajamas on the floor for him to find when he was finished, silently closing the door over again.

He was ashamed.

How the fuck had it come to this?

'Hey… thought you could do with a drink.'

At the sound of Cuddy's weary voice, House opened his eyes, his troubled gaze falling first to the similar turmoil swirling in her shimmering grey eyes and then down to the generously poured scotch proffered in her left hand, before coming to rest at the Ibuprofen and Paracetemol pills sat in the palm of her right.

It was a heavenly sight, despite the distinct lack of Vicodin.

'Thanks,' muttered House gruffly, gratefully downing the four pills with his scotch, his grip on the now almost empty glass white-knuckled as he collapsed back again to the wall, simply staring at the wall opposite while he focused wholly on waiting for Wilson.

Cuddy didn't miss the telling tension in his grip, nor the slight shaking of his hand, taking a small step forward to take House's free hand in hers, gently squeezing it as she similarly leant back against the wall next to him with a soft sigh.

It was a mark of just how uncharacteristically scared House was too that she felt him first freeze slightly before deftly squeezing her hand back a few seconds later, that one simple, most definitely unHousian gesture giving away just how little he was actually coping here, neither of them willing to let go as they stood there, side by side in the hallway that was lit only by the dim light of the living room, thinking only of Wilson in the room behind them.

'I took swabs from the floor and I've cleaned up as best I can,' said Cuddy absently, more to break the heavy silence than anything else, a nausea induced grimace clouding her pale face as her numbed brain replayed that process in a barrage of stomach-turning images, her marigold-gloved hands having seemed to work on autopilot as she'd gotten down on her hands and knees, baulking for her abused friend as she'd scoured the door and floor clean, Wilson's soiled bedclothes now shoved into a trash bag ready to be disposed of.

'And I've left the back of the couch soaked with bleach… there wasn't any other way. I don't know if it'll work, but-'

'I don't care about the damn couch,' interrupted House tiredly, suddenly acutely aware of just how much he hated this loft now, this supposed home that had utterly failed to keep Wilson safe… now, it was nothing more than a crime scene, nothing more than the tortured setting in which his best friend had been cruelly subjected to one of the most horrific experiences he could possibly go through. Now, the tainted place served only as a constant reminder that some sick bastard had marked what was House's as his own, claiming what wasn't his by brute force, and leaving House now aching to wrap his hands around the scum's throat and make him suffer as Wilson had done, and was going to for a long time to come.

Without knowing it, House had instantly made a decision as soon as he'd squeezed through the front door for Wilson a few hours ago, a decision that, really, was the only logical step for the pair of them to take next in preserving what was left of the battered Oncologist.

'I'm taking Wilson back to my place as soon as he wakes up in the morning. He can't stay here. We can't stay here, not after this. I don't care what he says… we're going. And you're not going anywhere till the morning either, not when there's a fucking rapist running round the place. You've been out there once thanks to me, you don't need to be out there again.'

Cuddy could only nod, holding his hand that bit tighter, not entirely surprised at either suggestion. What had happened tonight… it was enough to make anybody protective of those close to them, even House, as uncaring as he usually appeared to be to those who didn't know him so well.

And yet, even as she thought that, she knew the one, lone person that every member of staff at PPTH would immediately name as being the only individual House ever displayed any genuine emotion for if asked, James Wilson being the one aspect of House's life that the Diagnostician, sometimes not so obviously at times, cherished above all else.

Of course, as cherished as Wilson was, that also automatically made him the one hidden chink in House's armor that made him surreptitiously weak when he otherwise seemed invincible, the one thing that, if harmed in any way by someone other than himself, could strip House of any of his usual defenses in a stricken heartbeat to reveal him in his most vulnerable, human light.

The same went for Wilson – ask either man who lectured, nagged and berated House the most for being, well, House, and both would answer Wilson. Because that's who he was, openly human and consequently fallible to the daily frustrations and ordeals that life threw at him, most of which usually came his way due to something totally idiotic that his best friend had dragged him into, guilt being one emotion that Wilson wasn't unfamiliar with. He couldn't hide every aspect of himself from the world as well as his friend could, it just wasn't as natural for him, and his best friend knew it better than anyone. And yet, years after learning just who Gregory House was, knowing even back then what a walking mind game he could be, James Wilson, for some unfathomable reason, was still happily there at his side. Why? Why, when Wilson's very nature dictated that he retain some sanity in removing the main worry in his life, did he so decidedly go against that self-preserving instinct to stick so closely to it? He would always come back for House, no matter how far they drifted apart, that was a given, that was his responsibility.

And that right there was Wilson's weak point.

They brought out a side in each other that made them practically co-dependent, a quirk in each of their personalities that, when aggravated ever so slightly, could see them go completely against the grain, shattering any ill-made assumptions others had made about their characters to fight tooth and nail for what they had.

The flip side to that observation was that both friends could inflict hurt on each other like no one else could, both having done exactly that at times, both quite aware of the profound relationship they had even if they very rarely voiced its complex magnitude.

To have the enormity of what had taken place tonight pierce right through the center of that, hurting Wilson so badly in a manner that, understandably, could see him completely withdraw into himself, that could see him completely withdraw from House… well, the repercussions could be potentially devastating for both of them. And so it was that Cuddy knew, with some certainty, that she would not be in the least surprised by any of House's, or Wilson's, actions tonight, or for the foreseeable future.

The one thing she could see happening quite easily, however, was House relapsing and going back onto the Vicodin thanks to a leg that was at the very least going to be aching for some time to come, and was, she suspected, doing so right now.

'Is your leg any better?'

House nodded quickly, despite the constant ache that still pummeled his thigh. For once though, his leg wasn't the primary source of the crushing dread weighing his chest down so heavily. He wasn't so immune to Wilson's psychology crap that he couldn't work out that his paining leg was most likely simply a manifestation of his fear, cold fear for his friend pulsing through him with every heartbeat as he contemplated the unfathomable journey that lay ahead of them, praying to a God he didn't believe in for something of his and Wilson's relationship to be salvaged from the wreckage.

He was about to derogatively say something to that effect, probably concerning the unspoken truth that lay in the inanity of Wilson's constant psycho babble, when a faint noise stopped him, Cuddy anxiously taking the unnerved question that had formed on his parted lips right out of his mouth.

'What was that?'

House looked at her for a split, panicked second before he turned, half limping and half running back into the bedroom and towards the bathroom door, his heart nearly stopping when he heard that chilling noise again, much louder this time; a low, keening wail echoing hollowly from the bathroom, a hopeless sound of such anguished despair that the hairs on the back of House's neck stood on end.

Wilson.

He couldn't give a crap about Wilson's privacy then, slamming into the door to barge straight in and over to his struggling friend, the bath water Wilson was sat in having taken on a watery, bloody hue as he scrubbed and scrubbed in a tormented frenzy at his now thoroughly excoriated thighs, still sobbing that harrowing sound with every inch of him still crawling disgustingly despite the blood he was horrifically drawing from his own skin, blood that he could see, feel, but just couldn't stop for, not until he was clean-

'Wilson, no – don't!' panted House as he reached down to roughly pull Wilson's shaking hands from the water, ripping the sopping cloth from his fingers to fling it away somewhere before wrapping his arms tightly around Wilson's heaving chest in a restraining hold, trapping his wet arms under his own, that awful sound still resonating through the now near hysterical man as he gave it all he had to escape House's imprisoning grip, thrashing helplessly against the force that had seen him trapped against his will once already tonight – he was not about to let that happen again.

House could do nothing but grit his teeth, feeling his burning eyes spill over and concentrating fully on holding onto his feral friend as he fell to his good leg at the side of the bath, grunting with the pain and only holding Wilson tighter still through the frantic fight he was trying to put up, his stricken sobs bouncing horribly off every wall as he grew slowly weaker.

It didn't take long for the exhausted man to finally give in and collapse into House's hold, curling into himself and clamping his mouth shut in an attempt to block the raw, guttural wails that were coming from the very depths of him, simply containing them to reverberate violently through his body anyway as he shook hard in House's arms, rocking in his torment and drowning in that terrorized feeling of disgusted self-loathing that had him now completely destitute from his own body.

'It's alright, just let it all out,' whispered House into his ear as he lessened his grip on Wilson to just hug him, closing his eyes as he felt Wilson instantly turn to bury his face into the warm darkness of his chest, giving in to just unleash those primitive, guttural screams that were all he had left now, muffled by House's chest as his hoarse voice resonated sickeningly through the Diagnostician, stealing the very breath of him.

Cuddy could only watch helplessly from the doorway, completely taken aback and wanting so much to run in there and give Wilson a hug herself but loathe to cause him any more distress than what he was already going through, able to see for herself that House was clearly the one Wilson needed here as she watched him press his lips to the top of their friend's head, mumbling a string of soothing words through the struggle that only Wilson could hear as his screams slowly began to die off into ravaged moans.

His torment was still evident even as House subtly retrieved the discarded wash cloth from the water to ever so gently start sponging some of the blood away from Wilson's face, softly shushing him and still uttering those comforting, indecipherable words as he worked, the tenderness with which he treated Wilson so genuine that Cuddy couldn't help but feel like she was intruding on something she shouldn't, silently leaving them be to make herself useful in the kitchen.

She had to look twice at the clock when she got there, not quite able to believe the time the hands where stuck at.

03:32am.

She'd been here for over four hours, and yet it felt like only five minutes ago that she'd knocked on that front door, the night having passed in a horrible blur.

And as she stood in the kitchen now, suddenly freezing and taking in the dead of night stillness that shrouded the ill-fated living room, Cuddy still couldn't quite get her head around the sordid reason for her being here, her heart sinking when her eyes came to rest on the wasted Chinese takeout that hadn't even seen the light of day in the end. She could see where this night was meant to have gone for Wilson, turning round to spot the dirty dishes and mugs that had barely been touched still sat haphazardly in a sink full of greying, cold water, looking for all the world like they'd just been chucked in there out of pure frustration for the man he lived with.

Her smile at the knowledge that that was probably true was bittersweet, knowing now that what had once been a boys' night in watching crappy TV had horrifically morphed into something so appalling that it didn't seem real, her sigh shaken as she loaded bread into the toaster and switched the coffee maker on.

What was she going to say to everyone at work? Or more specifically, what the hell was she meant to tell House's team, both old and new, all of whom Wilson was closer to than the majority of his Oncology colleagues? For Cuddy, like everyone else at the hospital, knew the many layered dynamics of the Diagnostics team, the friendship between her, House and Wilson forming an almost three-way parenting of whichever fellows happened to be in their care at any one time, with House at the helm. And as much as House headed the team, guiding them on a daily basis, it couldn't be denied that without Wilson's and Cuddy's inevitable input to offer some level of normality and familiarity with common law abidance, the so called 'ducklings' could potentially come out the other side of their fellowships with varying degrees of Doctoring attitudes that were most certainly on the wrong side of healthy.

For his part, Wilson was the unassuming lynchpin that, in his unique relationship with House, very subtly held the team together, acting as the go-to guy next door for all of them with any issue that was remotely connected to his best friend, offering advice where needed on how to handle the perplexing Diagnostician, and there to sensitively pick up the pieces when House went just a little too far in testing both his fellows' and Cuddy's emotional, and ethical, limits.

Without Wilson… well, you didn't really have a fully functioning House either. Cuddy knew that what they'd be left with would be House minus the safety net he'd never realized was always there until it was suddenly whipped out from beneath him and his team, the reason for Wilson's inevitable sick leave that would unwillingly have to be taken surely one that would splinter through the makeshift little family, knowing all too well the respect and genuine affection that all of them, even Foreman in his grudging admiration for Wilson's House-handling skill, held for their endearing Head of Oncology.

'He needs Midazolam.'

'Christ, idiot,' hissed Cuddy breathlessly, having jumped out of her skin at the sudden, grave voice in her ear before closing her eyes briefly and opening them again to the now cool toast that had cheekily popped up some time ago while she'd been miles away, turning next to said idiot who stood quite innocently beside her, the incredulous look on House's face almost comical if it hadn't been for the obvious distress there.

'I know you haven't been a proper Doctor for some time now, but calling patients 'idiots' for needing sedation after going through a psychologically traumatic event just isn't the done thing anymore.'

'Shut up,' muttered Cuddy distractedly, not missing for a moment the pained waver in his voice despite his goading and already making her way over to the supplies bag to dig through its contents, finally discovering the coveted vials, needles and syringes packed in at the bottom amongst other meds she'd prescribed and picked up for Wilson on the off chance he might need them.

House slowly made his way over to Cuddy as she swiftly snapped the top off the vial of Midazolam, watching her prepare to draw up a minimal 2.5mg in 0.5mls of the clear liquid into the syringe, neither quite able to believe that they were about to inject their friend with a drug they'd each used hundreds of times on distressed patients, quite routinely. Patients, however, were one thing, their wellbeing obviously important to both of them but not in a thoroughly personal way. Wilson, on the other hand…

'You're Wilson's medical proxy,' pointed out Cuddy softly, the sentence more a statement of assuming fact than a question, her concentrating gaze flitting to House for a moment as he nodded his head in affirmation before going back to the drug she was drawing up in her hands.

'He's just… numb. Totally numb,' sighed House sullenly, scrubbing the palms of his hands into his tired eyes before taking the syringe that Cuddy passed to him and quickly checking it, not wanting to sedate his best friend in the least, no matter how small the dose, but knowing in his heart that the poor man wasn't going to get the sleep he so desperately needed otherwise.

House had left Wilson tucked up in his bed before coming out here to Cuddy, having dutifully done what he could for his listless friend to quickly finish up in the bathroom before taking his hand to lead a now practically stupefied Wilson through his own bed-clothes stripped bedroom and next door into House's. At that point, Wilson wasn't even making a noise anymore, remaining completely unresisting to House's will as he lay down on the cool mattress, curling up in the middle of the bed and hardly feeling the covers that House tucked in around him, hardly feeling anything at all but the harsh stinging of his self-harmed thighs through the thin material of his pajamas.

He barely noticed House leaving his side and coming back five minutes later with Cuddy in tow, their distant, somehow stifled voices seeming like they were miles away through the icy fog that Wilson had found himself swirling in, clouding his eyes and muting his ears to everything but the dull throb of his heart as it beat wearily on.

He was cold… so, so cold…

That was all Wilson could faintly comprehend, the quick pinch of the needle that seemed to come out of nowhere to suddenly puncture his arm a welcoming flash of light in the darkness, that spot in his neatly torn skin growing slowly warmer to finally begin to spread through his worn body, enveloping him entirely in a heavenly glow that he gladly sank in to, totally open now to the vile hiss that suddenly roared through his head, screaming a sentence that would haunt him forever more, its echoing memory now no less frightening than when it had first been spat at him a few hours ago…

'Are you fucking stupid?'

The flecks of still-warm saliva were repulsively spraying his cheek as the knife edge pressed harder into his bared throat, and he couldn't help sobbing now as he still struggled desperately against the calloused hand that yanked unforgivingly at his trousers and boxers, forcing them down past his knees, the panic choking in its hold as he felt himself going under, drowning in it-

'No, no, you c-can't… please – no, NO!'

And then he was screaming, fiery pain billowing mercilessly through him, excruciating pain that seemed to rip him from the inside out over and over again, the suffocating hand that slammed into his face to cover his mouth muffling any tortured plea that a neighbor might have some small, slim chance of hearing, the powerless tears that he could feel streaming down his bloodied cheeks seemingly never ending, his throat raw as he swallowed the waves of nausea amidst tortured cries that he just couldn't force past his lips…

He wished he were dead, even now, with the sudden presence of these memorable azure blue eyes that were swimming in front of him to break up the nightmare, piercing through the terror to pull him back from the brink-

Wilson knew those eyes.

Even now, in this shattered, terrified, and surely drugged state, Wilson knew those eyes. He knew their comforting depths, pleading to him like they always did, pleading with him now to please, just let go, just let go of the horror, just give in to the dizzying warmth and sleep… their message was clear:

I need you to sleep.

I need you to come back for me.

I won't leave you.

He caught only a lasting glimpse of these familiar blue eyes that he suddenly realized were actually just inches from his own, not quite able to remember just who they belonged to, not quite able to remember anything, the tear-glazed fear, and dare he think it, guarded love that shone there causing a pang of something oddly reassuring to flash through him as he still tried in vain to mumble against the sedating effect of the Midazolam, feeling the warmth of the trembling hand that stroked his cheek and wanting so much to reach up to tightly hold whoever's hand it was, this familiar stranger's grief evident even in the roughened fingertips that were drifting ever so lightly down his cheek, gently lulling him off into the drugged haze as he finally let his world slowly, slowly fade to black, hanging onto one utterly grateful thought only as he floated away from the blue eyes before him, knowing they'd be there waiting for him when he came back:

Thank you.