The faculty wizards of Ankh Morpork's Unseen University had an unspoken rule of thumb when it came to work. It had to be a rule of thumb as sitting down and drafting an actual rule would take far to much time and effort. Regardless, it went something like this. If there was not any work to do, don't go looking for any and if there was, put it off until tomorrow. So when Greg House limped back into his office to find two of his underlings with their feet up reading newspapers, he had to double-check that he had not wound up on the Discworld.
House took in the lazy layabouts and smiled to himself; neither had noticed that he had entered the room. Sliding over to the head of the table he raised his cane and...BANG! The sound of it smacking down onto the tabletop echoed around the room and the sight of his two startled employees made him smirk.
"The two of you have just earned yourselves one mornings worth of my clinic hours each." He dropped himself into his chair, the look on his face daring the other doctors to argue. "I'm going to have to start leaving you kiddies homework. I could almost feel your brain cells die through lack of stimulation."
Chase let loose a breath of air he had been holding and shook his head. "Well, it's not like we've got anything to do. No patients remember," he said by way of explanation.
Foreman nonchalantly folded his paper and looked at his boss, "I assume by your dramatic entrance you've either found something for us to do or you're fed up with the clinic."
House had to resist the urge to make a statement that began with, 'back in my day'. Largely due to the fact that anything he said would most likely be so much of a lie that even these two bozos would see through it. For like the aforementioned wizards of the Unseen University, by this time in the afternoon, he would have most likely already been utterly hammered. Instead, he went with the more truthful, "why has it got to be one or the other? Why can't it be I got bored and found us something to do? But for that matter may I remind you that when we don't have a case, it's your job to go out and find one." He rolled his eyes and popped a Vicodin. "God, you guys suck in comparison to my old team. I'd have already rejected at least seven possible cases by now and that would have been before lunch."
"Well..." Chase began, clearly unsure if he was part of the old team or not. He waited, looking at House for some indication. House stared back with a 'what?' sort of expression. Finally, he continued, "...we assumed that anything good that would come in from the ER Cameron would pick up. Anything in the clinic, you'd pick up. And anything else would be a referral, which would be brought to your office. Better to be here to get it when it came we assumed." He shrugged.
"Wow, it takes two of you to wait for a case to come... does it also take two of you to use the little boy's room? Should I make you both hold hands when we leave the room in case you get lost?" House asked, bating them for a response. He then quickly turned back to Chase, "and for the record, you were the token foreigner on my old team."
Chase seemed to contemplate this and shrugged as it didn't bother him. "So I'm the token foreigner, I can live with that."
"No," House admonished, "you were the token foreigner, past tense. That role passed to Foreman. Now your just the sympathy case."
Foreman sighed and shook his head, unwilling to play the game, "I was born near New York." He looked sternly at House as if this clarified things. "Have you got something for us or not?"
House elected to ignore the New York comment. He did not care where his team came from, so long as they did their jobs and followed his lead. "In case you're both wondering, Cameron's the eye candy." He swivelled his head towards the door as he spoke.
Into the room strode Cameron with a set of folders in her arms. She placed them on the table and slid a copy of the file to each of them. It was very thin. "16-year-old female collapsed in the ER during an asthma attack. Presents with a peak flow of 150 and a..."
"...an asthma attack," Chase asked interrupting as he lifted a page in the file. "You've been there all morning and brought an asthma attack." His eyes flicked to House as if to say 'well this is a bust'. He closed the file and pushed it away.
"Ah Ah ah...we don't berate unless I say so for three reasons. Firstly, she actually did her job and bothered to go looking for a case, unlike you two," House began, twiddling his cane in his hand. "Secondly, as boring as it looks she didn't bring it. I picked out the lucky lady behind folder number one, so watch the attitude and thirdly, she has a symptom so rare it's never before been encountered in the US."
"No." Foreman agreed "I didn't go out looking for a case because I was too busy doing laps of the hospital with a wheelchair on your command."
Cameron frowned at House. "What did you need a wheelchair for? What happened?"
Chase, however, was listening to House. "Which is?" He asked flicking the file back open, looking for something he'd missed. At the other side of the table, Foreman also had opened the file.
"If you allowed Eye Candy to finish, you'd find out," House replied, waving a hand at Cameron to continue.
Cameron dropped into a chair. "House was there when it happened, uhh she also had a fever..."
Foreman frowned. "A fever with asthma isn't normal but hardly an unseen in the US symptom. She probably has a respiratory infection and that's what caused the attack. Steroids. Antibiotics and rest at home."
"She doesn't have an infection," Cameron insisted.
"You missed out one key symptom, Candy."
"What other symptoms...that's it, "she rolled her eyes at him but didn't object to the new pet name.
"She's the first person in American history to decline a lawsuit after getting somewhere over a barrel... If that doesn't say serious I don't know what does," House finished and waited for the usual collection of looks he received after one of his more interesting notions.
Cameron and Foreman exchanged a look. "What?" They both asked in unison. "If this is one of your metaphors I don't get it," Foreman said with a frown, Cameron merely stared at her boss as if this would make him elaborate.
Meanwhile, not paying a blind bit of attention to the discussion on lawsuits, Chase scanned the papers in the file. "It's not a lot to go by is it?" he asked lifting the paper and looking mildly perplexed. "One history questionnaire and a basic ER admittance physical... where's the rest of it?" He shook the file in Cameron's direction and she shrugged looking at House again as if waiting for his reaction to this news.
"That's literally it, that's her whole medical record."
House rolled both his eyes and entire head, apparently, Foreman had been idle for so long that he now lacked the ability to tell metaphor from reality. "The lawsuit thing's a true story, just ask the Dean." He then picked up the file. It really was tiny. A quick flick through confirmed Chase's assessment. He turned to glower at Cameron, and repeated Chase's gesture and question "where's the rest of it?" He shook the thin file at her.
Patiently Cameron waited then repeated, "that IS the rest of it. There are no other medical records for this kid."
Foreman now too was looking at the file. "That can't be right. Pediatric records, vaccinations...her birth for god sake?"
Glancing at him Cameron said, "no pediatrician, no vaccinations. She was a home birth with two of her mother's friends acting as midwives, so we have a certificate then there's a report from a health visitor five days after the birth but that's it. No school records except for one page of A4 when she transferred to the UK for a year and even that's basic...eye test, hearing etc. Nothing in-depth and nothing of note reported."
House frowned at the file, tossed it onto the table and picked up his marker. He ignored the conversations of the ducklings as he pondered then wrote, 'Respiratory distress, fever, tachycardia, dizzy spells, anxiety, head wound, concussion,' on the whiteboard.
Chase considered the markings. " You've got more up there then we have," he commented.
Without looking House tapped the pen to his lips. "Yes, because some of those symptoms are ones I noticed when we first met one another. The asthma attack and fever came later."
"It is possible..." Foreman began, "...that she has an infection which caused the fever and the asthma attack. Would explain everything else not explained by her head wound."
House glanced at him then wrote 'Flaming underwear'. He capped the pen and turned around. All of his team looked confused. The greying older doctor smiled to himself as he saw Chase mouth the words and Cameron and Foreman frown. He picked the file up and waved it. "If she's claiming this is all she wrote she's a liar liar..." he waved his hand in the air in a rolling gesture to symbolise the rest of the turn of phrase.
His team frowned at him but didn't buy-in. He was forced to sigh at their disregard for his wit and continue.
"Since Cameron can't seem to find it, Foreman, get the rest of this kid's records. Chase, P and H and full blood workup. If this is an infection I want to know what and where." He paused, considering the board once more. "And since I'm not sure I like the look of the Tony Hawke wannabe as a key witness, do a lung function test. Once you have an accurate reading give her a bronchodilator...wait 15-20 minutes and test her again."
Turning House watched Cameron wait for an instruction. "And you...the caring one, see to that head wound. If she resists, sedate her. She's getting it treated whether she likes it or not." He muttered the last part to himself as the ducklings rose as one from their seats and left the office.
"Oh! And under no circumstances is my name to be mentioned to her or any of this to Cuddy. I am to be the unknown attending for now. He who should not be named as it were! " he called, stopping them in their tracks. The team exchanged a look and a sigh but continued down the corridor.
Standing in front of the board House uncapped his pen and wrote 'Miss Money Penny/ Kiddo" above his new list. He considered it a moment then as a thought struck him abandoned the board, limping quickly to the office door.
Glancing up the corridor at the backs of his retreating team he yelled, "and for god's sake, someone get her cleaned up, hosed down and properly disinfected." He considered for a moment, "... and into a gown. Those mall fountains are full of chemicals and god knows what."
With his bidding underway, House retreated back to his desk and lowered himself into his chair. He rocked back and forth for a few moments ponderously watching the ceiling tiles. After a time where his brain categorised and considered he righted his chair and turning to the computer brought up a google search bar. As he typed his query in he thought about the rest of the afternoon, Wilson was likely to be narky and not much fun, the clinic was a definite no go and there was time yet till prescription passion. He clicked search and waited. The page loaded after a few seconds with 2,353 results for 'Arin Rae, New Jersey.' House's brow lowered in concentration as he began to read.