Chapter 81 — Immovable Object

A/N: Thank you to Roo12q, HeatherSS1, Awesomerjenjen, hedwigsart, MiaEther, Nina3kPop, WritingUnwritten, SoleFaith, Scarlet Nerd, The Reader of Worlds, Musikrulesok, aesir21, Illand Girl, Yuuki no yuki, DawnneAndSkipper, atomical, Midori Yuki, stiilinsked, and all the guests who commented on the last chapter.

Hey y'all. Sorry, had a nervous breakdown after working in an ER through the entirety of the pandemic and did the whole 'quit my job cut off all my hair and did a year of soul-searching' thing, then decided to pick up and move 2,000 miles to Los Angeles. I'm settling in, working at a new hospital (I decided not to return to the emergency medicine scene, for...many many reasons) and now here I am, hoping to get back to business as usual.

I know people worry a lot that I've given up on Intervention, but I haven't. I don't care if I'm still working on this goddamn fic when I'm 90, I'm sticking with it until somehow, someway, I tell the whole story. Big thanks to all of you for sticking around, too.

"Stop squirming, Foreman."

"Look, I've heard how well this has gone for you so far, can you really blame me?"

"...And thank you for that boost of confidence. Your IV is set, by the way. Jerk."

Foreman looked down at his forearm, bouncing his eyebrows. "No bruising. Nice. Have you managed it on a patient, yet?"

I looked away, trying to hide my embarrassment. "Not exactly."

Paula hadn't given me any other opportunities to set IVs since my last botched one. Whether that was because we hadn't had any patients that needed them on my various shifts or because Paula didn't trust me within ten feet of a needle, I couldn't say. Either way, my ER rotation was starting the day after tomorrow. With my clinicals flying by, I was going to need to cram as many into my ER rotation as was humanly possible. It would be my best chance. The ICU, Pedes, and the outpatient floors would present their own opportunities, but damn near anyone who passed through the ER caught an IV, save for minor bumps and scrapes, or the occasional runny nose.

"You still have time. You just finished your first rotation, right?"

"Yeah, but…" Whatever. I wasn't going to share my deep insecurities with Foreman, though it was kind of him to let me give him the good 'ol stab. The ducklings had all taken a few bags of fluids at this point, and I was mightily grateful. Also, thus far, it didn't seem like any of them had told House, another thing to be grateful for.

House, who was…I mean, we were talking. Things were fine. But they weren't fine, in some unnameable way. He hadn't even messed with me and Cuddy in a few days, not since proving himself right once more with his poisoning victim. Wifey was in jail, hubby was on the mend, and House…

House was distant.

"Earth to Anya?"

Oops. "Sorry, my brain's all over the place. I'll get the IVs done. Mostly thanks to being able to practice on you, Chase, and Cameron. I really appreciate it."

Foreman didn't seem to know what to do with the thank you, but he provided me with a tight, "No problem," before tipping his head at his arm to indicate he didn't actually want to sit there for forty-five minutes getting saline pumped into him. I obliged him.

"Where are the others?" I asked, not wanting to linger on anything too gushy, for both my sake and Foreman's.

"Chase is in the clinic. Or pretending to be in the clinic. Cameron is…" Foreman frowned. "Cameron asked for the day off."

I didn't like the way he said that. I removed his IV with careful hands, trying to focus on that before launching into a bevy of anxious questions. Once we'd trashed the fluid bag, I turned to him. "Is Cameron okay?"

"She and House are at each other's throats. I know you like Cameron a lot, Anya, but…I don't know how feasible it is that these two can keep working together. House is trying to act like nothing ever happened, and it's wrecking her."

Just like I warned House that it would. But why listen to me? Ever?

"She can't quit."

"...She can," Foreman said, scrunching his brow. "Chances are she'll just wait out the last few months for her fellowship to end, but I've seen her on job boards. If she thinks she can get out of this early without hurting her career, she will."

I couldn't blame her, but if Cameron left a season early, we were all fucked. And I couldn't exactly yank Masters out of high school to be the moral high-ground.

I guess I'd just have to convince her to stay.

"Hey Foreman…do you know where Cameron lives?"

I knocked twice on Cameron's door, loud, but not bracing. I heard a muffled, "One second!" and then footsteps. The door opened to reveal Cameron. She wore pajama pants and a tank top, her hair ruffled. She looked rough, but not 'I've been crying since I woke up and plan to continue until I go to sleep' rough. More like, 'I have so much on my mind I feel like it's going to explode' rough.

Relatable.

"Hi," I said, giving her a weak smile.

Cameron returned it, clearly confused. "Hi, Anya, come in."

So I came in. Cameron's place was just as it looked on the show. She kept a clean, comfortable home. A clean, comfortable home that looked like it was barely lived in, something that seemed to be a recurring trend with doctors. Probably the working 90 hours a week thing. There was a bowl of popcorn on the coffee table, and some movie paused on the TV. At least she'd been relaxing. Good. She really, really fucking deserved it.

Cameron shut the door behind me, and didn't bother trying to hide her worry. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, everything's fine, I just—are you gonna quit?" I'd originally planned to navigate much more smoothly to the conversation I wanted to have with her, but now that I was here, I knew I couldn't keep up the illusion that I wasn't panicking. Especially with Cameron doing the Concern Face. It made you want to tell her everything.

Yet another reason why the team needed her so badly.

"I…did one of the boys say something to you?" Not even close to an answer, and yet an answer all by itself.

"No." I didn't need to get Foreman in any hot water. "I just, have a feeling. And you guys have been fighting, and House is acting off, and you're acting off, and…" Come on, where were all my natural powers of persuasion? "Are you? Gonna quit, I mean."

Cameron pursed her lips, thinking for a moment. "Anya, you were there for that blowout in Cuddy's office. House and I aren't the picture of professionalism right now."

"He never is," I pointed out. "I know, okay? And when you guys broke up, and he thought everything was gonna be fine, I told him that's not how people work. I…I knew there'd be tensions, and I told him—" I took a deep breath. "I told him he needs you. The team needs you."

Cameron's smile was soft, and a little bit sad. "House gets a stack of applications each week, from doctors all over the world. I'm not one-of-a-kind, Anya. The department will survive without me. I'm not saying I'm leaving right now—I made an obligation when I took this fellowship, and I plan on keeping it. But…I need to start thinking of the next step."

"The boys are both going to stay."

"I know. And it's what's best for them. I just need to decide if it's what's best for me."

Christ, it probably wasn't, all things considered. The next few years of Cameron's life weren't exactly, um. Good. Per se. Maudlin, gray-soaked shots from The Tyrant trampled through my mind's eye.

But I didn't know what she would be without this, what the department would be, what House, and more importantly, Chase, would be. His future wife vanishing out of his life before they'd even had a chance sounded very distinctly like me not saving them from anything.

Because this time, maybe if I tweaked this, and tweaked that…Cameron and Chase could have a chance.

You're being selfish. You know Cameron would figure things out eventually. You know she'll find happiness, one way or another. It's Chase you're worried about, and what it'll do to the timeline. You're not here for Cameron.

"You are, you know," I said weakly. "One of a kind."

Cameron seemed touched. She beckoned me to the couch, sitting down next to me. "Anya…what's going on? You're…I don't mean this in a cruel way, but you're more upset than I'd expect you to be."

Oh, if only I could explain it to her. But hardcore atheist Cameron was not going to buy the real thing, of that I was sure. And I wasn't sure I was ready to handle the consequences if she did.

"The team needs you. You. Yeah, there's other doctors out there, with good hearts and good heads on their shoulders. But they're not you. And you…House struck gold, okay? You, Foreman, and Chase, you all bring the missing pieces to the table that make up the whole picture. It's insane how well you guys work as a unit. I mean—since House formed the current team, you haven't lost a single patient, besides the ones that were doomed from the start. The department's a damn statistical anomaly."

"That's true, but…it's not realistic to think we'll all stay forever."

"No, and I know you won't, but this…it works. And it's good for House. You are good for House, whether you're with him or not. You're the heart of the team, Cameron. You always have been. And…I just…" I sighed. "This is stupid. I'm sorry I'm bothering you with this. You shouldn't stay in a situation you're uncomfortable with. And it's not like I can sit here and tell you that things will get better with House. You're pissed with him, and you have every right to be, and—"

"Anya, say whatever you're afraid of saying to me and stop apologizing." She said it kindly, because she was Cameron, and there was no real impatience in her voice, just a need to dispense with my neuroses for a moment, in favor of honesty.

"I want you to stay. I think…I think it would be good if you did. I came here to convince you to stay, but…now I kind of just feel like an asshole, full disclosure."

Cameron set a hand on my shoulder. "You're not an asshole." She seemed to weigh her next words carefully. "I can't make you any promises, because I'm still mulling things over. But I'm going to consider every angle, okay? I'm not going to make a decision based solely on hurt feelings."

"Foreman said you've been looking at job boards." Fuck. There went the keeping Foreman out of hot water thing.

"Oh did he," she said dryly. "...Yeah. I have been. The problem with that is, I haven't seen a single job that looks better on a resume than this one. And if I leave my fellowship early, that reflects poorly on me. It says that I couldn't…withstand…Gregory House. And if I do finish it out, it says that I can. Which means I will instantly get any job I apply for, probably for the rest of my life."

Tell Foreman that in a few years. "You're in the major leagues as far as withstanding House is concerned. Bet Foreman and Chase couldn't survive dating him."

That earned me a laugh from Cameron. "No, probably dead on arrival."

"Totally."

We chuckled, and then it faded, and then I looked at Cameron beseechingly. "I just…nothing will be the same without you. If you want my ten page essay trying to convince you to stay, just let me know. But…you gotta do what's best for you."

"I think it's very adult of you to understand that. Far more adult than whatever reaction I'll get from your father if I actually do quit."

"He'll pretend he doesn't care," I said dismally, because he would, because he was House.

"Which is not very adult."

"Try telling him that."

"I think both of us have been constantly trying to tell him that for the past year and a half," Cameron said, an expression somewhere between exhaustion and amusement on her face. "I don't think it's sunk in."

"Yeah, not holding my breath on that one."

Silence, for a moment, and then Cameron gestured at the TV. "So…do you wanna watch Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants?"

Wilson and I ran into one another again, both arriving home late. I came up behind him just as he was unlocking the door. "Don't freak out, I'm behind you."

Wilson jumped anyway. "God, Anya, where'd you come from? I thought you were off today."

"I was. I hung out with Cameron."

"That's…interesting. Why?"

"Well, I was gonna try to convince her to stay on the team for another year, so it doesn't screw with the timeline, but…I can't try to convince someone to make decisions against their own interest to make my life easier. I don't know what the right move is for Cameron. I can't tell her what to do." And even if I did know the right move, the twenty-nine year old doctor was unlikely to heed the advice of a nineteen year old nursing student.

Wilson unlocked the door, and the two of us filtered inside.

"Do you think she'll leave?"

"I have no idea."

The house was dark. I heard no signs of life, which meant House was already in bed. With a pang, I realized I missed him. I had to figure out whatever was weird between us. This didn't feel right.

"And if she does? Do you have a plan?"

"Strong-arm House into hiring one of the doctors he'll hire in the future." Which meant Taub, pretty much. Kutner, Thirteen, Park, and Adams were all still in med school. Plus, House knew Taub already, from the whole bribing thing. He was essentially the only option I could go with.

"Do you think you could convince him of that?"

I turned on the living room light, desperate to get out of the darkness. "I thought I might be able to use the 'if you don't do this, we'll all die' defense, or something."

"Is that true?"

"I can't literally see the future. Maybe." I huffed, defeated. "Probably not." Never mind that a season three team composed of Taub, Foreman, and Chase would not necessarily bring forth the same results as if Cameron had been there. I would have to keep a stranglehold on House's cases to make sure nothing went wrong, something that was already becoming difficult for me with all of the stuff I had going on in my own life.

"Anya…this is what House is trying to get through to you. You can't control all of this. No one person can manage this many lives, this many personal decisions. And if you try, you're going to drive yourself insane."

"What would you do?" I countered, a flash of irritation. "You both want me to step back—okay. And what if me stepping back means someone dies?"

"That's a little fatalistic."

I deposited myself on the couch, deflated. "It's realistic. I have to try, Wilson. I can't stop trying. If I do, and things fall apart, I'll never forgive myself."

"You can't survive six more seasons of this. You're only human."

"I don't have a choice," I said, still frustrated. Not at Wilson, but…at the world. At God. At everything. "I've never had a choice, okay? I didn't choose to come here, but I am here, and I know the future, and I can't in good conscience do nothing. You couldn't either. Maybe House could, but I'm not House."

"You do have a choice," Wilson insisted, sitting next to me. He hadn't even bothered to take his coat off. Come to think of it, neither had I. "You can choose to stop looking at this like a God-given mission, and start looking at this as…your life. I'm not saying do nothing, I'm saying…" He didn't even seem to know what he was saying.

"Que sera, sera?" I offered. "Again, the people dying thing, though."

"Will anyone die directly because Cameron isn't around?"

"She diagnoses patients just as often as Foreman and Chase do. So, yeah."

"But you remember most of the diagnoses from the show. If a bad one is coming up, you tell House. I'm not telling you not to try to save people, I'm telling you that it is okay to just worry about that, and not the minutiae. So much has to have changed already from the original timeline, right? And nothing horrible has happened?"

"Yet. Yet," I spat. "Any second I could find out that I said or did something in season one that caused some catastrophic series of events that ends in God only knows what happening."

"Remember that 'driving yourself insane' thing I said?"

"Look, look, I know what you're saying. I know what House is saying. And it's not—it's not even that you two are wrong, but that's not me. Okay? I…" I laughed, a little bitter. "I care too much to stop. I feel like I'm in too deep already to stop."

"Anya…" He took a deep breath. "I want you to be happy. This isn't going to make you happy. It's going to make you afraid, all the time."

"I also don't want to be doing what I'm doing," I responded dimly. "But, here I am. And I can't change. At least, that's what House would tell you."

"House wouldn't berate you about these things if he thought you couldn't. You're young. The way you look at the world now, and the way you might look at it in a few years…they might be very different views. And I don't want you to look back and regret that you spent what should be some of the best years of your life worrying yourself sick over infinite possible outcomes, every moment of every day."

"But what kind of person would I be if I didn't? And again—what would you do?" I challenged. "Look me dead in the eye and tell me you could step back."

He couldn't.

"I'll call that argument won, then." I rubbed a hand over my face. "I'm sorry I'm being a brat about this. I just…it's exhausting having people tell you what to do to make yourself happier, when you know it's not something you can do. I don't have it in me to do anything less than what I'm doing right now."

"You're saying there's no conceivable way I can convince you to put yourself first?"

For one moment, I desperately wished I could say yes. I desperately wished I was the kind of person who could. It would make my life so many degrees easier. And yeah—I'd be happier. I'd be so much happier.

That way lies madness. I'd probably be so much happier in my own universe, playing Scrabble with my mom and telling my dad to remember to leave his work boots in the mudroom. But I couldn't waste time on what ifs.

"No. I'm sorry. The people-pleaser in me wants to tell you differently, but…I have to lie to everyone, all the time. I don't want to have to lie to you, too. You're the one person I try to be completely honest with."

Wilson softened dramatically at that, but still looked several different flavors of worried. "Just…be kind to yourself. When you can. Is that too much to ask?"

"No. And I'll try. I promise." I didn't know how much that trying would yield, but for Wilson, I'd at least make an effort. Searching for a segue, I couldn't find one, so I just said, "How's Grace?"

He visibly tensed. "Sick."

"I'm sorry."

"You don't need to be."

"I am, anyway." I looked at him, feeling like I was looking for forgiveness in his eyes, even though I knew I was the only one who thought I'd done something wrong. "You know if I could possibly save her I would, right?"

Wilson's face did several things that made me want to cry, and then he reached up a hand and scruffed my hair. "I know."

"You start in the ER tomorrow."

I flicked my eyes up from my computer. Cuddy stood before my desk, a manila folder tucked under one arm, cup of coffee held aloft in her other hand. "Indeed I do."

"It will be hard. More nurses wash out during their ER cycle than any of the others by a wide margin."

"Cheery."

She was trying to offer me advice, but didn't seem to know what she wanted to say. "You'll see a lot of difficult things. Empathy burnout is a real threat."

"I'm aware."

We both stared at each other for a moment.

"If you need someone to talk to," Cuddy said at length. "I'm not too busy for you. You've done an incredible job so far. And I know House is not a font of emotional support."

That…was actually incredibly dear, so far as Cuddy went. "Well, I already have you on speed-dial." I gave her a tight smile, knowing in all likelihood if I needed comfort from whatever was going to occur in the ER, it would be Zach or Wilson's door I was knocking on, but nevertheless, she'd extended a hand to me, and I didn't intend to just swat it away.

Cuddy returned the smile, equally tight. "Go to lunch early. I don't have any appointments for another hour, anyway."

"You sure? It's a Monday."

"Positive. Go, eat, stretch your legs." I was waved off, and I heeded it, scuttling out of Cuddy's office and heading for the elevator bank. I needed to talk to House anyway. I was fairly sure Safe had started, and given that Melinda was a kid, I didn't want her to go through the entire length of the episode. She didn't need that trauma, nor did House need the optics of him seemingly assaulting a teenager in an elevator, even if it did save her life.

I found House where I expected him to be, leaning back in his desk chair with his feet up on his desk, bouncing his over-large tennis ball against the wall.

"Hi," I said.

"Hi," he echoed, not looking at me.

I couldn't think of a lead-in. "Your patient has a tick in-slash-on her vagina."

That made him look at me. "I've had her case file for all of four hours. And unless she's got Super Turbo Lyme Disease, it doesn't kill that fast."

"It's tick paralysis, and she's a child. She doesn't deserve this."

"Because of course, you get to be the one and only arbiter on what people do and do not deserve."

I rubbed a hand over my face. I knew House wouldn't react well to this. I often tried to at least let him have the appearance of a case, if I didn't prevent it before it even happened. Which is what I would be doing with All In, if I could swing it. Ian was Cuddy's patient, I could just feed her the diagnosis somehow. Erdheim-Chester coming from House sounded like House maintaining his vendetta, coming from me…

Well. Maybe it wouldn't hold much weight coming from a nursing student, actually. Problems for later.

"House, we can fight about this until the end of time, and it's not gonna change my mind."

"It won't change mine either."

An impasse. It wasn't our first, and it wouldn't be our last. "I know this is your weird way of telling me you care, and that you don't want me to put this kind of pressure on myself—"

"Or I'm just annoyed at you relentlessly inserting yourself into—"

"House. Please," I cut across him. "I'm not gonna change. You're not gonna change. But we're in this together, like it or not."

"Together implies someone other than you gets to make decisions," he said, sharper than his usual snark, and I shrunk into myself. "Together implies you don't think you're some kind of savior."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Stay out of my cases!"

"I can't do that."

"And if I barred you? Like I should have done from the start?"

My heart clenched. "You…House, I've been here the whole time, what's the difference now? What changed? Why is it suddenly a problem?"

House finally stood up from his desk, discarding his ball to the side. He wrapped his hand around his cane, and I could tell from how heavily he leaned on it that his leg was still on a downward trend.

"It's always been a problem."

"It's been an annoyance. Now it's a problem, and I don't…" I found myself fiddling with the edge of my scrub shirt, stomach in knots. "Things feel bad. With us. And I hate it."

"Things are the same as they've always been. Shouldn't you be bothering Cuddy, instead of me? Apparently I have to go tick-hunting." He trudged past me, pace slower than usual. I wanted to stop him, but felt reluctant to touch him.

House left his office, the door swinging shut behind him, and I felt very, very alone.