House's Plan 9 For The Walking Dead

By Herr D

Wilson undoubtedly is digging the current situ. What with this being Chapter 13, I felt the need to reference a couple of the members of House's old teams. No new presences or actions in retrospect. Just some medispeak and referred memories by context.

Come, Convince Him But I Don't Know How

In the divided room, House was shaking his head. "Ophiocordyceps unilateralis is an entomopathogen, or insect-pathogenizing fungus—it just uses what's already there. It DOESN'T break ground rewiring brains, causing cannibalism or dead mobility in ways that can't be explained. I understand your logic there, but it's flawed." House waved a hand dismissively.

Wilson raised a hand. "I . . . don't know this one. There's a vivisecting FUNGUS?"

"No. What it IS is kinda cool, Wilson. But it doesn't qualify as a Dr. Frankenstein. It essentially just drugs the ants that catch it. They cluster at the right height to incubate more fungus and get the ant form of lockjaw, clamping down really good on whatever they're crawling on. Then they die. Their bodies are food for the fungus. The reason it has no bearing is that the 'mind control'—" House rolled his eyes. "—happens before the ant dies. The little buggy MK-Ultra that dies BEFORE it starts acting against its own species; now THAT would be an example. We barely have galvanic activation after death in the natural world, Mr. Tesla. Have you actually WATCHED how the dead move?"

"Of course." The masked man's tea glass was still a third full, forgotten.

"There's a babbling phase to the movement, though shorter than a person—a cross maybe between learning and remembering the movements. There's muscle memory involved, to be sure, but the dead are simply 'acquiring' the information necessary for the task at hand. If you look at it mathematically, it's the human version of a van der Waals machine. This is too elegant a form of human destruction to be an artificial plague, and it's too unique to be a natural plague. So, IT'S NOT A PLAGUE."

"Why does the bite cause a fever then, if it's not an infection?" said the masked man, "I get that people dying of anything turn, bit or not, means that we all already have some inactive form of it. But why always a fever when a bite turns them? And why is there so much range in how long it takes the fever to kill them? Like they're very different in their resistance levels?"

House glanced at Wilson for a half-second. "Actually, I'd be willing to bet that anyone who already HAD a fever would be able to fight off the bite fever for long enough to get over the other fever or die from it. They WOULD still turn. As for why always a fever? Wilson? I never said there are no germs transferred in the mouth. It's Komodo Lite."

Wilson nodded. "Of course. Garden variety sepsis."

"SEPTIC tank variety sepsis."

Wilson made a small smile. "Well, yes. That would actually support House's stance, I mean, the fact that a bite kills people by infection, and so takes time based on the variety of germs available in the mouth of the biter. You can only have one infection at a time, even if you have a variety of differently infected cells."

House brightened. "The variety of Actinomycetes alone was interesting, in just the seven heads we'd collected right there. I mean—they'd eaten food from the same kitchen! The PIG's mouth was a lot cleaner. Apparently Ann was more correct than she knew when she said it had been raised right, Dr. Spock."

The masked man nodded. "So you did study the seven heads. How did you package them?"

"With such a limited sample and no guaranteed refrigeration, examining variety of decomp was going to be very important. I lined them up and used a Sharpie on the forehead."

Wilson nodded, remembering. "Permanent marker, just like regular neurosurgeons. 'A' through 'G.' You didn't bother labelling the pig, I remember."

"I was pretty sure I couldn't confuse him with anyone but Fat Lou, and he was clearly marked with an 'F.' For 'Fat!'"

Wilson looked at House. "Did you choose those letters based on their human identities?"

"Had to keep 'em straight somehow. They were gonna start looking pretty gnarly awfully fast. It was Abel, Bugs, Cherry, Wilma, Emma, Fat Lou, and Gorgon. And of course Hamlet."

Wilson closed his eyes and shook his head. "I remember you told me Wilma was D."

House smiled. "For 'Debut!'"

Wilson didn't even blink. "I knew Emma and Fat Lou. Cherry was the kind of pie the off-duty waitress was eating, I guess. Where did the other names come from?"

"Abel was the guy in the last booth with the Semper Fi tat, badly hungover and moaning about his brother. If he'd been more with it, he might have survived. His brother was what he'd been drinking over—so Abel. Gorgon had dreadlocks and a snakeskin belt. Anywho, I used scented garbage bags around double-corrugated cardboard for all of them, because the smell of rot put Ann Gee off her game. Abel and Bugs—"

"Wait, where did 'Bugs' come from?"

"Ohio."

"No! I mean, where did the nickname come from?"

"He was eating carrot cake and said 'What's up' to me when I sat down."

"Oh, I get it." Wilson shot the masked man a look. The masked man shrugged.

"As I was saying, Abel and Bugs both got potting soil. I used FlexSeal to close their throats and poured their mouths full. I taped about a tablespoon more to each ear. Cherry and Debut got rock salt in the same manner. Emma and Fat Lou got nothing, not even FlexSeal. Gorgon got brain surgery, since the dreadlocks made a great handle. Hamlet got daily infusions from one head a day in alphabetical order. When Hamlet didn't move after two months, I ditched it. They all tended to do nothing but stare if I didn't get them out at least twice a day."

"How did the brain surgery go?" The masked man was very still.

"The brain stem mattered," said House, "I'm not sure what else did. I tried cutting out lobes and severing the hemispheres. That made no consistent difference with any of them till I reached the amygdala. I may have messed that up. I'm still not sure. The heads all stopped moving about halfway through removing that if they survived that long. Later efforts were pretty much the same. Sometimes one lobe or another had something happening in it, apparently. Nothing consistent by structure. A few randomly arranged neurons are apparently a part of it. "

"I went about it a bit differently." The masked man sat forward. "Cutting the face off a dead man while fighting, I noticed it still turned its head to look at me with no eyes left. I realized they don't need eyes to sense motion. I found a school for the deaf. The dead there were just as functional. I tried air fresheners and chemical agents, but nothing disguises the scent of a living person. Because—"

"Because they don't have a sense of smell." House nodded. "Nose is one of the first things to decay."

"I still wonder about that." Wilson finished his tea. "Why turn the head if it doesn't matter? From what House says, there isn't enough brain left working to hold memories of life or understand what it looks like or, well, anything except ravenously eat and grab and walk."

"Could that be a hard-wired instinct or a balance issue?" The masked man turned to House.

"You idiot," House gave the masked man a sour look. "Come on, General Lee. If you designed these, why would YOU have them point the way forward with their head?"

The masked man paused. "Mouth's toward food. Skull's between a fighter and the nape of the neck, the most vulnerable point. Arms to engage—you're saying it's just strategic, House?"

"Orientation accomplishes nothing else. Every aspect of this phenom is elegant, effective. I'm more interested in how they know there's a fire."

Wilson startled. "Wait, what?"

House leaned forward slightly. "Don Quixote here has independently confirmed that the dead are deaf. Without pressure regulation and a functioning inner ear, the dead shouldn't be able to balance to walk. Yet they keep walking. Do germs run gyroscopes now?"

"Quixote actually kind of fits him," said Wilson, turning to the masked man, "But House has a point there. They have balance enough to walk without any balance mechanism. They start toward a fire without sight or hearing or a sense of smell. How do they DO all these things?"

"Something ELSE germs can't do. Metagame like a wombat." House grumbled, staring at the medical mannequin with its back turned to everyone.

Wilson looked annoyed.

The masked man shook his head. "I'm going to have to go with the full understanding that science didn't catch up to why certain home remedies worked or appeared to work for hundreds of years after they were used. I briefly set up a lab off the coast of Delaware two summers ago."

House smiled, "Delaware in Persian means 'Braveheart.' The Delaware Indians would have approved. Pity the state was actually named for some blue-blooded lord. You were there for the seafood?"

The masked man cocked his head. "I was observing coastal behaviors and enjoying the best security I'd had in a while. Rockbound cruise ship. It was easy to clear and build a lab on. I had a sequencer and managed to get to some overdue samples I'd made. I wound up sequencing 16SrRNA to identify 'staphylococcus' among several others, and found an anomaly, according to the texts. There was no Clostrydia. It took me a few days to realize why. You must understand, I've had no medical training whatsoever and no tutor."

"You've done fairly well, Lord Greystoke," House said mockingly, "Why don't you help us pros crawl through your conclusions?"

"It took me a while to realize that the pattern of decomposition was the cause. Aerobic microbes are normally displaced by Clostrydia because it's anaerobic. The good air wasn't getting stirred into graves before this happened. So the microbes don't follow that pattern for chemical reasons."

Wilson blinked. "I suppose the soil will be a little less fertile from now on. Without that gas release, Clostrydia won't do its part. Won't that throw things out of balance, House?"

House shrugged. "Humans aren't the only things dying, Wilson; besides, normally don't people use embalming fluid? Congratulations, Doolittle; you figured out that the average cadaver decomposition island has become a cadaver decomposition Sea Star Island. Anything else?"

Wilson looked about to ask about that reference. The masked man nodded. "Out of nine species of microbe and three species of fungi, only one bacteria wasn't significantly altered in population size on sampled cadavers! I compared the mobile dead humans to fifteen dead animals of different species, all mammal, reasoning that mammals should have the most chemically in common. Obviously we can't do without it, since we need it just to survive. E. Coli didn't vary twenty percent. Not once. I don't know how to tell one strain from another—"

House rolled his eyes. "You idiot! E. Coli can breathe in AIR!"

"It's listed as anaerobic."

"It's . . . no, FACULTATIVELY anaerobic. It's optional!" House turned to Wilson and smiled, "It's the 'Thirteen' of germs! Goes either way!"

Wilson sighed and then smiled. "I don't think you've made a single point in this debate, Mr. Quixote. Maybe you prepared that thing you mentioned?"

The masked man nodded. He stood and walked to the left edge of the observation glass.

"Watch it now, Miggs likes you." House smiled broadly.

Wilson blinked, then shuddered at House's latest movie reference. He turned to watch the masked man remove a tarp. Under it was a conveyor belt, enclosed in a tunnel two feet high, suitable for passing fairly large objects. Large, thick, wooden doors closed at three points on the way through, clearly rigged to not let anything as big as a human pass. The masked man wheeled a covered cart into House's view. "I have two gifts for you. One is technically me giving you back something you said you valued. The other is proof that the animation PHENOMENON is actually a germ. The big package is fragile. Don't shake it or turn it too far sideways. Both were right where I thought they might be, as soon as I could travel for them. I should inform you that Pete was killed. Shot. I'm not sure who did it or why. I can tell you the dead have thinned out considerably around here and some large numbers have gone in Negan's direction, and that I lost contact with a bug I planted on our recent visitors' transportation. Come join me when you're finished in here, Wilson. I may have fixed the bread maker."

House perked up. "Where are you growing grain, old MacDonald?"

The masked man paused. "I've planted window boxes in easily-missed locations in several places. I'm afraid several of my caches were found and taken, but none of the window boxes. I've also found that grain products, such as cornflakes and other cereals, can be ground up if they haven't molded. It makes an odd flour, but recipes can be adapted."

House stood and pointed at him. "That was Rice Chex bread on my fish sandwich, wasn't it?"

"Very good. Enjoy your gifts." The masked man walked out a door out of House's view. Wilson pulled the tarp off the cart to reveal a very small package wrapped in blue paper with pink cupcakes on it and a very large package wrapped in paper with red and green stripes on it. Wilson put the small gift on the conveyor and cranked it through.

"No bows?" said House.

Wilson shook his head quietly, turning to the large package as House tore open the first. House opened the old Vicodin bottle to see the plastic cigarette pack tear strip inside. Wilson lowered the large package to the conveyor gently and began to crank it through. "What is that, anyway?"

"This bottle of Vicodin is the only one Cuddy ever paid for. The date on it is a typo, completely wrong. I put it in the drug store cart of stuff and she paid for it without hesitation."

"And the cigarette thing?"

"Ann Gee had been saving her last pack of cigarettes, planning to quit when we met. She tore it open after our first time together. I asked her why, and she said I wasn't just a john. I'd pleased her. Women lie about that sort of thing all the time, but when they use a resource they have to conserve to celebrate you, you know you're special to them. That it's not just a lie."

"That's more sentimental than I expected. Here it is," said Wilson. He passed it through the enclosed conveyor. "He's right, you know."

"No, Wilson, Mr. GermFan6969 is NOT right. It's not an epidemic."

"Well, it doesn't matter who he is or what he believes. What matters is that this gets done. Since this may be the last time I'll see you, I should tell you—well. . ."

"What?!"

"I've been sleeping with Ann Gee."

House blinked; he shrugged. "Weren't you doing that out on supply runs from our last group?"

"No! . . . You're okay with this?"

"What do you want me to say? 'Bros before hos?' She's a prostitute, Wilson. So you 'played House' a bit, eh?" He waggled his eyebrows.

"That's not funny. I'm just glad this is going well."

"Oh, wait; I forgot—what's the phrase?" House looked puzzled for a moment. He snapped his fingers. "Oh, yeah! Wilson? You're – a – horrible – person! " House made a fake shocked expression and held his chest. Then he rolled his eyes. "At least your conscience got a workout beating you up. Have you seen the gym here, by the way? Prince Charming's got enough attendees of the sort MY conscience would fit in with."

Wilson made a face. "He showed me. Good metaphor actually. Just when I think your conscience is dead it gets up and comes at me. So you were okay with me sleeping with her all along? You didn't want Pete to sleep with her."

"You idiot! SHE didn't want Pete to sleep with her! You never wondered why Ann and Mary never made trouble for me keeping Ann Gee around? No cattiness, no fighting?"

"Well, no."

"I played to their sympathies, telling them that being with just me kept Pete's hands off her. That I was being gentlemanly by pretending to be possessive."

"You lied to them."

"Of COURSE I lied to them! I figured when you turned down my dating proposal that you'd taken the hint and shacked up with her downhill every chance you got."

"Finding undead Sofia Vergara isn't my idea of a real date. I'm not into necrophilia or extremely risky behaviors."

"No, ex-TREME-ly risky would be to try to get a blowjob. With the right dental tools, I don't know—maybe it could work. She was the hottest Mexican I remember."

Wilson stopped cringing and shook himself. "I don't think she was Mexican."

"And things like THAT will no longer offend her!" House beamed.

Wilson shook his head. "I'm going to help Don Quixote any way I can. And I'll be asking Ann Gee to stay with me. You LOVE puzzles. Why don't you want to help? If you're sure it's not germs, why not figure out what it REALLY is? What are you afraid of?"

House looked suddenly serious. "It's not fear so much as certainty. I know this one is beyond me. I would really rather focus on what I MIGHT succeed at. Like getting my hands on more Vicodin."

"How can you be sure you won't succeed?"

"This, since it's not germs, is supernatural."

Wilson looked at him warily, "You're not afraid religious people were right all along?"

House grimaced hard, "No, Wilson, I'm afraid they were wrong."

Wilson studied him for a moment. "So you're saying, this is 'end of days,' and you think it's Revelations time, but the religious groups were still wrong? How does that work, exactly?"

"My way was perfectly safe, Wilson. I stay a selfish bastard, and if there's no God, I get more of what I want than other people. If any of the major religions was right, God is some wonderfully forgiving father figure who'll bend over backwards to save everyone. Like YOU would be if you were God."

"House—"

"HE would find a technicality to save me with! But THIS?! This is God like MY father. I save you from dying with a brilliant treatment solution, and the dead start walking to be more like YOU. We leave the medical profession and suddenly there ISN'T one anymore. The oldest profession will be the last! I hide from technology to avoid the law, and technology revisits the dark ages. I run from the law, and there ISN'T law anymore. I got over on Cuddy and the police and the Fucking-B-I, and THEY'RE all dead! I was resigned to not having any more Vicodin, and when I got Vic killed, there it was, right where it should be? Unpilfered? All I had to do was throw a hint so Ann and Mary would throw their LIVES away, and I could be more like Negan for a moment. Now the people in charge are people like Vic and Negan, and I get over on them, and what happens? The Man In Black comes galloping in to save the day and KIDNAPS US ALL AWAY FROM MY VICODIN?! You realize it's a lot more likely that my head's lolling on the ground somewhere having a delirious nightmare because I'm dead and this is hell on Earth!"

"This is not some dream, House. No hallucination. Tell me it's not germs again, and open your stupid gift." Wilson's mouth was a hard, thin line.

"IT'S NOT GERMS!" House seized a corner of the package and tore a large swath away from it. He blinked. He cocked his head. His eyebrows furrowed. "OOoooh!"

Yeah, he's looking right into the camera again. Now what could the gift be? What could be so earth-shatteringly important? Also of note, I figure the fact that the food truck Jesus battled Rick and Darryl over started awfully easily for having been untended for years. It MUST have been left by someone . . . As for House's meltdown, this is more or less what happens to most people when their faith (or absence of faith) is shaken, or worse, shaken and not talked about for way too long.