Disclaimer: I don't own House, and this is where the edges may blur.Things are gonna get smoother from here.

-Chapter Five-

Rationality is Fungible

"I thought House was trying to kill the kid! I said before that I thought he might."

Chase frowned at Foreman. "Well, you could at least try to make it less obvious. He was checking the lymph nodes. You definitely got his attention with the way you reacted."

Foreman sped up his pace, walking down the hallway a few steps faster than the other two. "I reacted to what I thought was happening, okay?" He turned a corner, and stopped, as Cameron stepped in front of him.

"I told you that House wouldn't do something like that. He cures patients. He wouldn't intentionally hurt someone simply because they attacked him during a fit of psychosis. It's illogical to even try and twist it to your 'House is insane' theory. He's sane."

Both Chase and Foreman scoffed, and Chase looked directly at her. "Sane? Well, I suppose he isn't mad… He's not always rational, but then rationality depends on your point of view. Now could you please move?"

Cameron did so, and they continued their way to House's office in silence. The room was in sight when Foreman spoke again. "Something's up. Maybe it's the pills, maybe it's the kid, but House isn't acting normal, even for him."

"Could it possibly be,"said Chase, "that he's in pain?"

House saw the other doctors approaching, and stood, wobbling uncertainly without the aid of his crutches. He swore softly, then picked them up off of the ground, using them to propel himself across the room and into the hallway. He would take the elevator down to the clinic, where Wilson was, and maybe check in on Kevin on the way back, if he was still unconscious.

He was only three steps down the hallway when Cameron and the others stopped him.

"Dr. House. It's Kevin. The fever's up again. Mild, but rising. And he's bleeding into his urine, "

He gave a short, almost imperceptible sigh, and opened his bottle of Vicodin. He removed two, and swallowed them before returning to his office. Entering the workspace, he snagged the dry-erase marker as Foreman reached for it. "Nuh-uh… Cameron, you're in charge of the marker today." As he made his way over to a chair, he tossed the marker to Cameron. "Write those up there."

"The respiratory arrest could have been caused by-" Foreman began.

House interrupted him. "-Sorry, could you talk a little louder? My ears are ringing."

"-Could have been caused by-"

"-Talk louder."

"-CAUSED BY FLUID AROUND THE LUNGS!"

"Wow. You are angry at me."

"Of course I'm angry. I'm trying to help save the kid, and you're just messing around with me!"

"No, see, it's hard to hide emotions. Some people do a fair job of it, but if you get them to yell, it usually breaks out. You don't get mad for something so simple as an interruption. You get annoyed, and defiant, and vent behind my back, trying to find some way of discrediting me. You're past that already. Then there's also your inexplicable reaction to my checking of Kevin's lymph nodes. Now why would you react so violently to what I did, a routine test? You were fine with it two days ago. And your terrible impromptu lie… Though I will give you credit for coming up with it in record time, the delivery was awful. You were scared. You saw my hands close around his throat, and jumped to a conclusion that you wouldn't have come to so readily if you hadn't had it on your mind previously. You thought I was going to kill him."

The room was silent.

"I'm a doctor. I get paid to heal patients. If I killed someone by some medical accident, I'd need to go in front of the Board, explain it to them, and probably pay malpractice, and that's hell. If I killed someone on purpose, I'd have to go in front of a court, go to jail, and probably be killed by lethal injection. I'd say that's worse. So tell me why you think I'd do something that's illegal, immoral, and by all views, just plain bad? Besides, that thing I had to sign, to become a doctor, it said I couldn't do that. Having grown up learning not to make things die, I think it would take a lot more that a kid with psychosis and an illegal weapon to change my mind."

Cameron gave a meaningful stare at Foreman, who chose to ignore it. He instead, looked away. "I'm sorry."

"Yeah." He paused for a minute, and looked up. "So, what about Kevin? You people came here for a reason, right? Cameron, write that down. Pleural edema, and blood in urine. What's he have?"

"Um… The blood in his urine could be caused by an internal infection. It would explain the fever and the other symptoms. If he had temporal swelling or maybe edema, it could cause the psychosis."

"The problem is that 'infection' applies to a lot of things."

"Maybe it's a tumor then?" Cameron continued.

Chase looked up, struck by sudden inspiration. "About the bloody urine. What if it's glomerulonephritis?"

"Inflammation of the glomeruli in the kidney. Rare. I like it.Makes sense to me.It can alsobe triggeredbyan infectionlike Cameron said earlier. It would explainalmost some tests for strepand the other usual upper-respiratorybacteria, and get a liver biopsy."

The other doctors stood, and prepared to leave.

"Foreman."

He gave a furtive glance at the door, where Chase and Cameron were leaving the room, before walking over to where House stood.

"Check his O² SATs and find out how soon he can be extubated. I need to talk with Kevin."

Foreman stood there for a moment. "Wait. You're not going to yell at me?"

"Not unless you want me to. I figure you'll have enough of the guilt and self-doubt, later. You made a mistake. Good for you that you cared enough to act on it. You were wrong though. Stop punishing yourself, and go check on the kid."

Chapter ten! OMH, my little story is ten chapters old! Yay! I feel so happy! My muse is treating me to dinner tonight. (Too bad it's muse-sized portions) I'll be posting another chapter soon, too! Thanks to all who take the time out to read my little story, and especially those who review! It makes me so happy to read all of your comments! Read on!

P'Bantonox