13.

Alarms sounded, bells and buzzers went off as House let go his grip on life.

Cuddy staggered backward as the team of doctors and nurses surged forward, wasting no time engaging in their desperate battle to save House's life.

Cuddy's backward progress continued toward the door until she bumped into something solid and warm. She spun in place to find Wilson standing there, looking at her with a tear-filled gaze.

"Wilson?"

"Clear!" one of the doctors shouted. Cuddy turned just in time to see House's body jerk violently as the defibrillator paddles were applied to his chest.

"No," she sobbed.

Wilson's arms wrapped round her, supporting her, holding her up physically as well as emotionally.

Cuddy and Wilson watched from a distance as the team continued CPR on House, intubating him, injecting him and shocking his heart again.

"No," Cuddy repeated softly as she listened to Wilson sobbing quietly against her ear, his chest pressing into her back with every intake of breath.

Through a haze of tears and regrets, Cuddy watched as House lay dying. Her mind numbly filed through the patients she'd lost over her years as a physician, her protective cloak of medical objectivity clasped so close and precious to her heart.

But this experience was altogether different. For here, now, it was her heart that was dying. House would take everything with him, all her hopes, her dreams, all her passions, all of her love. His death would extinguish the whole, his last breath blowing out her most profound soul's desires as easily as a candle's flame.

Cuddy continued looking on helplessly as House, for the very first time since she'd known him, gave up without a fight.

Or was he? House had always been a fighter and he also nearly always won his battles, whether verbally or physically due to his reliance on his intelligence and his willingness to use outright treachery to outwit his opponent.

Was House giving up or was he actively fighting? Fighting against life and the heartbreak of their failed relationship and the pain that would never loosen its hold upon him? Was House being the supreme stubborn ass one more time to have the ultimate last word? Would he leave her there alone with nothing but her memories, her guilt and remorse for the mistakes she made, for driving him away, leave her with her sorrow for what might have been if either one of them had been willing to surrender to the love they both felt for each other?

House's body leaped from the table once more. Cuddy could see it, could see it all. She saw it in the eyes of the team whose quick movements began to be less hurried, who were willing to concede defeat against this obstinate man. They were going to prove House right. They were going to let him die.

From somewhere deep inside, Cuddy girded herself with the armor of her pain and her fear of losing the one man she knew she loved just as she'd found him again. She squared her narrow shoulders and pushed Wilson's arms away from her as she strode forward into the fray.

Picking up the paddles, she began issuing orders, increasing dosages and voltage. Cuddy would brook no opposition, immediately taking the reins of hierarchy over the entire team.

Wilson remained where he was, his eyes wide with awe and admiration as he watched his one friend fight desperately to save the life of the other.

When Cuddy wasn't yelling directions, a constant stream of angry words and curses began to emanate from her mouth directed at the unconscious, prone form of House.

"C'mon you stubborn bastard! C'mon! Clear!"

House's body jerked again but the monitors refused to show a response.

"Dr. Cuddy, I think . . ." one of House's attendants began.

"Don't think! Just do as I tell you!" Cuddy screeched at him before turning her full attention back to House.

"You stubborn, arrogant ass! You're not getting out of this that easily. This is one argument I'm NOT letting you win you son-of-a-bitch bastard! Clear!"

Once more, House's body rose away from the table.

And then the heart monitor came alive again.

Cuddy laughed, the tears shining in her eyes as a general sigh of victory and relief passed through the occupants of the room.

"Let's make sure he's stable and then get him into surgery as soon as possible," the first doctor said.

"You're not doing an amputation," Cuddy rejoined as her eyes looked up from House into the other doctor's.

"He'd never survive a longer surgery! He's too frail as it is! He's . . ."

"What good is it to save his life now only to have him die in a few days? If you remove his leg, you'll kill him just as surely if you stabbed him in the heart." Her eyes flicked down to House and back to the surgeon. "I won't let you do it. I didn't just win this battle to let you lose the war. I won't let you kill him. I won't let him kill himself. He's not going to die. Not on my watch."

"Dr. Cuddy. This course of treatment is ill advised."

Cuddy and House's surgeon stood glaring at each other from either side of the table where House was lying. After several tense moments, the surgeon sighed. The only person in the room more stubborn than his patient was the fiery Dean of Medicine with whom he was engaged in a standoff. Eventually, he nodded his head once in compliance.

"The best orthopedic surgeon we've got is Henreid. But I don't think . . ."

"Get him here. Now."

"I'm on it," Wilson said as he took his cell phone out of his pocket before turning and leaving the room.

When Dr. Henreid arrived, he quickly reviewed the scans, concurring with the other doctors that amputation was the safest course of action to save the patient's life.

House himself seemed to support the decision as he coded again. Even though he was brought back faster this time, this second event lent even more credence to the idea that he would never survive the hours-long surgery it would take to try and rebuild his mangled leg.

But Cuddy was adamant, had never, in fact, been more unyielding.

Except, as Wilson sadly reflected, when she refused to give House another chance at their relationship.

Like his colleague before him, Dr. Henreid also came to see the futility of arguing with the immovable Dean of Medicine. So he set to work.

Screws and pins to hold together bone, staples and stitches to suture sinew and flesh, so very much blood spent on House's part, so very much sweat on the part of the surgeons epitomized the long hours the team spent saving House's leg and life.

House coded again twice more during the surgery as if to let it be known that he would have the last word. But Cuddy would not let the team, nor even House himself give up.

When House was finally wheeled out of the operating room, a full, solid cast spanned the length of his entire right leg from hip to ankle.

Dr. Henreid advised both Cuddy and Wilson that in his opinion, House's leg had been the worst injury of its kind he'd ever attempted to set. House's leg, horribly shattered and held together, as Dr. Henreid said with "glue, chewing gum and bailing wire," was so fragile that any further injury, no matter how slight, would force the delicately constructed house of cards to come crashing down. In that instance, there would be no other option except amputation.

All in all, Dr. Henreid remained dubious regarding a full recovery on the part of the patient.

House was wheeled into the ICU, under heavy sedation with Cuddy still at his side. She walked next to his gurney, holding his hand.

Now that he was finally out of surgery, Cuddy relinquished her overwrought control on the OR and collapsed in upon herself once more, numbly stroking House's hand as she stationed herself in a chair positioned as close as possible to his bed in the ICU.

Wilson offered to give her a break but she adamantly refused, continuing to gaze blankly at House's sleeping form, unconsciously stroking his hand back and forth, back and forth. Her lips moved continuously as she silently cursed, chided, rebuked, comforted and promised to forever love and cherish the man who lay before her.

Arlene Cuddy finally arrived and made her way to the ICU. Once there, she sat quietly with her daughter as she continued her vigil at House's bedside. Arlene saw the sheer exhaustion in her daughter's body, mind and heart but knew that she would have to wait for the opportunity to convince Lisa to rest.

Cuddy never let go of his hand, stroking down from his wrist to the familiar, long fingers and speaking to him in a voice that only he could hear.

She needed him to wake up. She needed to look into his eyes. She needed to reassure him that she had kept her promise, that she had saved his leg. That she still treasured his life. That she still needed his love.

Cuddy didn't realize that her eyes had closed until she felt her mother's hand on her arm.

"Lisa. You're not doing anyone any good by exhausting yourself like this. Go. Get changed out of those scrubs and get some rest. I'll stay here with Greg."

After so many hours, Cuddy was too tired to argue. "Call me if he wakes up?"

Arlene nodded. As Lisa stood, Arlene kissed her daughter on the cheek.

Cuddy's eyes filled with tears. "Thanks mom," she said. "Thank you for everything."

Arlene smiled. "We'll talk later about how I'm always right. You get some rest now."

Cuddy nodded and dragged herself out of the room.

Arlene turned and took the chair that her daughter had vacated, closest to House.

She watched as his chest rose and fell, the machines continuing to do their work in forcing the air and life into his battered body.

"You're a lotta trouble. You know that? VERY high maintenance," she said to him at last.

"I know what my daughter sees in you and you ARE cute. But cute only gets you so far. Because you're still the biggest pain in the tuches I've ever seen."

House quietly moaned as if in response. Arlene leaned in closer and saw his eyelids flutter.

"Nurse! Nurse!" she called into the hallway. "Come in here! And get my daughter back in here now!"