[network] @crescent; to die historic on the furry road [open]

[lancingintherain]

[usually, the worst thing about waking up is remembering how hungry she is. But this morning, as Day 45 breaks cold and overcast as usual, the worst thing about waking up is remembering that last night, her friend got literally eaten by a monster.

She has to warn people. She couldn't save Mami, but maybe she can help others. So once she's mostly talked herself down from numb grief and fear, she turns on her tablet's video function. At first, it's aiming at a wooden tabletop, but she tilts it to show a drawing. For having been drawn last night in the dark in the hazy, panicky aftermath of mortal peril, it's pretty decent:



She clears her throat and starts to speak, her voice low and breaking despite her efforts to keep it steady.]

Four days ago, I was traveling with Alphonse Elric's group. We were attacked by this monster here. [a gray-furred, four-fingered hand moves into the video to tap at the top left of the picture with one sharp claw.] It was... well, if you've seen Alphonse, you know how tall he is. This one was taller. It had... light, instead of skin. Like what we see on the videos, sometimes. I'm not explaining it quite right, but... we got away.

[she swallows, then takes a shaky breath and points to the drawing on the right.]

Mami Tomoe and I—she's a young human girl; some of you have met her—we were on our own, yesterday. This monster attacked us last night. We—I tried to...

[she breaks off, planting her hand flat on the table to stop it from shaking. When she speaks again, her voice is hard.]

...It swallowed her. It ate her whole. That's what they do. Now we know.

[she points to the bottom drawing.]

It said things to me, before it—before it ate her. Spoke right into my head. "I want it"; "I am here"; I wrote down what I could remember. And there's something else. All of the other monsters I've seen have looked, well, they've looked human, or something like it. But this one... oh, it's easiest to just show it.

[the video swings dizzyingly as she picks up the tablet, and she taps on the screen to turn the camera. At once, the view of the tabletop and wall becomes a view of her very inhuman face, framed by her pale, tangled hair and large ears. Her eyes are tired, and her muzzle is streaked with dark, dried blood.]

...It looked like me. Like one of my people. But it... it ran on all fours, like an animal. ...I don't know what any of it means. But one thing's the same—and if anyone who's just arrived is watching this, you'd better listen. [her voice turns cold, and she looks straight into the camera.] If you see a monster, you run, got it? You run away as fast as you can, and get inside, and block the door. There's no fighting them. No fighting them at all.

[OOC: HOT GOLLY DAMN, there are enough threads here to feed a whole village of cute, thread-starved orphans. I'm capping the number of threads where it is. No more replies please, you beautiful people.]

Comments

[lancingintherain]

[she bristles at that—literally. Look at that awesome hyperrealistic fur prickling action. Who would have thought the special effects in a snowy abandoned town could rock so hard?]

I'm not a mutated anything, either. Calling me a—a figment of your imagination is less insulting than that.

[her voice breaks. She's too emotionally exhausted to even feel properly indignant.]

[rubikscomplex]

[That's... fairly disturbing, actually. House squints at the video feed on his tablet.]

Oh, I'm sorry. Genetically perfect lab rat? We've got a genetically perfect chick running around with us. You haven't heard of the Reapers, have you? Maybe you guys are from the same world. Wouldn't that be cute?

You're pretty much there, so unless all of this is a dream, I'll go ahead and assume you're real, and really into your craft. Any time you wanna take off the suit, though. It might help you move faster.

[lancingintherain]

[oh my god, again with the suit thing. She shuts her eyes and clenches a fist in her hair, breathes in deeply, then gives his username the coldest look she can work up. Which means she's looking slightly off-camera, from his perspective, but she tried.]

My "craft!?" I'm not wearing a costume. Are you mad? I thought you were supposed to be a doctor. Surely you know a flesh-and-blood person when you see one, at the very least, even if they're not human.

[rubikscomplex]

[There's something of a pause on his end. Does he really want to indulge her in this idiocy? Well, if she's going to be insistent...]

Open your mouth and stick out your tongue. Don't worry, I'm a doctor. You're sounding a little raw, just wanna make sure it's not strep or something.

[lancingintherain]

I don't buy that for a moment. ...But fine.

[if it will shut him up and convince him, she'll do it, even if this all seems like a kind of humiliating waste of time. She swallows self-consciously, and then opens her mouth, some small, superficial part of her grateful that she'd remembered to clean her teeth this morning.]

[she'd meant to only open her mouth a little, but she barely slept last night, so that little bit turns into a short yawn. It's wide enough to give him a good look at her teeth: long, sharp incisors, followed by a gap, and then a fun collection of pointed and flat teeth. All of them, and the rest of the inside of her mouth, are very real.]

[and then she closes her mouth and the magic moment's over, and she's back to glaring at his username again, pretending to not feel foolish.]

There.

[rubikscomplex]

[There's dead silence on his end for a good minute as House watches, and then rewatches and rewatches again, looking for the cheat, the point where a human face will be visible, where the costume is imperfect. But it isn't there. It's absolutely perfect. Her mouth, throat, the muscles. House knows rats - he likes rats - and that is the inside of a rat's mouth sized up.

What the fuck? What the actual fuck? Is this... What is this?

It's Clayton's toes and magical shot all over again. It's something that should not be possible. None of this is possible. He's been kidnapped away to some crazy snowhell with a bunch of random strangers from the 'future' and other worlds and... House knows the symptoms of an anxiety attack. His breath is short, he's panicking, his heart's going faster.]

Shit.

[And with that pithy reaction that sounds wholly sincere and horrified rather than sarcastic, House hangs up.]

[lancingintherain]

[after House hangs up, she's left staring at her tablet screen in astonishment. What the fuck, indeed.]

[he hung up on her. He swore, then he just hung up. She should call him back and demand an explanation, but... honestly, she feels too tired to chase after him. Later, maybe... but not now.]

[she puts her tablet down on the table harder than strictly necessary, then settles her face in her hands.]

action!

[dr_unconscious]

[Clayton was going to stop House earlier when he first started skimming through the replies to Freya's message. He was already on his way and bustling through the door, in fact, tablet in-hand while he watched their conversation get progressively more unpleasant--he had a thought to take House aside and quietly divert his attention to something else, maybe give Freya a moment to breathe--but when he actually arrives, Freya is well on her way to resolving this whole argument on her own. And she does, quite spectacularly.]

[He shuts off his own tablet just after House does, stuffs it into his coat pocket, and calmly leans back against the door frame. A spiteful part of him wants to taunt, but the rest of him looks at House and sees a man that is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Don't kick a man when he's already on the floor, Epps. He keeps a level expression.]

...Y'know, I've checked up on her twice already in-person. You coulda jus' asked me.

[rubikscomplex]

[House doesn't reply immediately. He's sitting on the sofa, blanket spread out over his lap. His hand goes to his pocket and he pulls out his Vicodin. Pops the lid and dry swallows a pair of them. He's almost tempted to go for another two. Almost. ODing on his drug of choice would be a great way to end the day, of course. Especially with Epps standing there and watching him. It's also difficult to swallow even those down.

Calm. Calm. Calm.

If this is a real panic attack, he knows this is probably going to last in the neighborhood of the next twenty minutes, which is swell and puts him just the right mood for a chat.]

It's a dream. [He finally says, voice strained. It's not a dream. He's too much of a lucid dreamer not to recognize this for what it is if it's a dream.] Or a... a goddamn hallucination. Or delusion. [Psychosis? Well, talk about one hell of a break from reality.]

This doesn't make sense. It's not real. There's no way in hell she's real. None of this is. Half you people sound insane. The admin- this- it's not real.

[Except that it is. Eliminate all other possibilities, and you're left with the answer. He drops his head down into his hands, breathing hard and wracking his brain for any other explanation. He's starting to sweat and the room seems very much smaller.]

[dr_unconscious]

[...Yeah, definitely a panic attack. Clayton's impulse to give House some distance gives way to his instinct to help pretty quickly. He sighs, clears the room in several strides, and squats on the floor in front of the couch.]

Alright, alright. Deep breaths. Count 'em out--five seconds in, five seconds out. Keep it focused. [He waits patiently to see if House will oblige, but continues regardless of whether he does.] You ain't crazy. You ain't dyin'. It ain't the end a the world. What can I do t' prove it to ya?

[rubikscomplex]

[As reluctant as he is to listen to anything Clayton has to say, it's medically sound advice. House grits his teeth and tries to focus on that, hating that he's taking any sort of assistance from the other man in this particular moment. At least he knows the rest of the routine. He's coached people through it before.

House closes his eyes hones in on Clayton's voice and small physical sensations. He can move. There's no need to stand up and run because he's not trapped here... though there is a strong inclination to lash out at Clayton to move him away. House resists the temptation.]

I know... how to handle a panic attack, Epps. [The words are all but growled. He does feel like he's going crazy, though, like he's the only sane person here now faced with something that's going to drive him over the edge. If Freya is real, that means quite a lot else is. The monsters, people's stories - Jane's 'Reapers' and Tim's 'Operator.']

And I don't... need you to prove any of that. [He's already running through the grim scenarios of everything, of what it means for all of those people who have actually died, if he'll be next.]

Talk about... cases. Talk about your cases.

[Diagnostics can focus his mind, give him a problem to think about while he untangles this more slowly.]

[dr_unconscious]

[Yeah, right, he figured as much. Clayton rolls his eyes in the security of knowing that House isn't looking at him, but has the sense to maintain a calm, level exterior. He'd offer a physical presence for him to latch onto as well--a hand on House's knee or something--but he has no reason to believe that House would appreciate that kind of physical contact. He'll just leave him to his bubble and settle for grounding him through conversation instead.]

Sure thing. Ones from home? [Because while Clayton imagines that some of the shit he's tried to work with in Norfinbury would give House a puzzle worth solving, something tells him that introducing more weird shit to an already massive pile of weird shit will not help things. But hey, maybe...] Or from here? I got plenty a both.

[rubikscomplex]

Home. Anything weird. I don't care... about the common clinic crap.

[Definitely would prefer less weird shit at the moment. Or rather, he'd prefer the weird shit that he absolutely knows how to handle. Diseases that make sense and don't have 'magic' or 'space zombies' or 'the Operator' as the explanation.]

thank u Terri for giving me so many fun things to research on the drive home

[dr_unconscious]

Alright, keep breathin'. Lemme think.

[No "common clinic crap" actually narrows the field down quite considerably. Most of the fun stories Clayton likes to swap at parties would fit into that category--what interesting things he's had to pull out of people's asses this week, how many buttons did the x-ray pick up in that one guy's stomach, what excuse did that couple come up with for what was clearly an overenthusiastic use of a vibrator, so on and so forth. They're straightforward and they have a punchline. These are not the stories House is looking for. He's a mystery novel kind of guy, not the 101 Puns Book aficionado.]

[After a minute or so of quiet pondering, Clayton manages to dredge something up that might fit what the other doctor ordered.]

...Okay, I got one. Stop me if you've heard it before. [He shifts into a more comfortable sit, settling in for the long haul.] Had this old fella brought in by his neighbor, said she found him passed out in front a his house. Fell down the steps t' his porch 'n cracked his head on the pavement. So we start treatin' him fer a concussion when he wakes up, an' he's...damn, he's piss-drunk. Turns out he's got a blood alcohol content a somethin' like...0.3? 0.4? 'Round there--you get that high up 'n roundin' stops matterin' so much.

So we got 'em in recovery, assumin' he jus' got a lil' carried away after dinner, an' he insists he ain't drank nothin'. Had a full meal 'n a glass a milk, he says. But his neighbor says she's seen him wanderin' 'round his yard the week before like he's drank the whole cabinet, y'know? She's thinkin' he's got a history an' he's too embarrassed t' admit it, an' so's thinkin' half the department. But I'm thinkin', what's he lyin' about? How'd he do it with jus' dinner 'n a glass a milk?...

Thank u for making me research in return (and I hope this is right, but House is cleverer than me)

[rubikscomplex]

[House is about to cut Clayton off, to reiterate that he wants interesting cases, but before he can, the story does take a turn for the more intriguing. To Clayton's credit, it takes House roughly half a minute before he replies. He'd blame it on being in the middle of a panic attack.]

Anybody... bother to check if grandpa was a... diabetic?

[Breathing in, breathing out. He's panicking, but he can deal with this. It will be over soon. Just focus on Clayton's cases. He's not going to die. It feels like he's going to die. His hands are shaking, but it will be over soon.]

[dr_unconscious]

[Clayton patiently waits. Part of him feels terrible for just sitting back and watching; sure this is House he's dealing with, he knows showing more concern than he already is would be begging for an invitation to get a cane to the face, and yet everything about what he's going through right now is intensely sympathetic to what Clayton felt in the first moments of arriving here. Without so much of the skepticism, sure, but. He can hardly blame House for having this kind of reaction--for craving something that he's familiar with to ease how bizarre everything else is. Perhaps the argument could be made that Clayton's desperation to help people is one long, extended panic attack of his own.]

[House comes back before Clayton has time to feel really disturbed about this revelation.]

Heh...funny you should mention that. [He smiles thinly and leans back.] Checked his records, 'course, t' make sure he weren't takin' nothin' that might be interactin' weird. Nothin' long-term--had a staph infection 'bout a month 'fore we got him an' was finishin' up his antibiotics. We ended up checkin' his blood sugar after we kept 'em under watch fer the day after, since he started actin' up again after we gave 'em some toast 'n orange juice fer breakfast. Insulin levels fine, blood sugar pretty low, BAC 'bout 0.1 an' not a drop a alcohol in the whole place. Real stumper, that.

[rubikscomplex]

And no one... was into visit him. [House closes his eyes again.] Had a headcase in once - schizophrenia - her 15-year-old kid was taking care of her ever since she had her break. [His breathing evens out as he explains.] Used to slip her alcohol to keep her calm. Deep vein thrombosis and cirrhosis from that and a Vitamin K deficiency. She wasn't eating anything but frozen burgers. Boring. What wasn't boring was that she was aware. Ended up calling CPS on herself. Got junior dragged away and out of her care. Thought that was strange. Schizophrenics aren't really known for their selflessness and rationality, but she wanted to get her son out of a bad situation.

Great thing about junior was, he took good notes. Literally everything was documented. Every time she even had a runny nose. Turned out mommy was having vision problems, none of the psych meds she was taking had ever worked, and she presented really late for a schizophrenic, 36. Had my team check her eyes for Wilson's Disease. Viola! Copper rings meant no more schizophrenic mom. She was a lot less fun when she was sane, but they usually are. Think junior's still got a grudge against me, too. Mommy didn't tell him she was the one who called CPS, so he assumed I was. Didn't see a reason to tell him otherwise. Kids! Always assuming.

[He's been mulling the old man and the BAC over in his head while he speaks, his mind going to the tumor they'd pulled out of that woman, injecting it with ethanol to shrink it. Unconventional things. Also unethical and illegal, but so it goes. And this case is unconventional. Clayton wouldn't think about common things presenting with odd symptoms - he doesn't know House well enough for that. So it's something uncommon presenting with odd symptoms.

Alcohol after eating foods heavy on the carbs. That's a detail Clayton's provided that House hadn't missed. Milk, toast, orange juice...

His eyes open and there's a small smirk on his lips, even as his heart is still battering too hard and everything is a little too loud.]

You seriously had a case of gut fermentation syndrome? The medical condition envy of every fratboy ever.

[dr_unconscious]

[Clayton, ever the patient man, is unsurprisingly an excellent listener and an attentive audience. He leans forward with his arms on his knees, nodding along, looking appropriately curious then inspired when House solves the mystery for him (Wilson's disease--now there's something you don't hear about every day). It's a good story on its own, sure, if a little odd on the tangent, but more importantly just telling it seems to be putting House at ease. He would have listened even if House was just talking gibberish.]

[It also gives Clayton an interesting view into House's diagnostic process, or specifically, how he deals with problems, more or less unfiltered by his usual layers of sarcasm and bitter antagonizing. He could have very easily ratted out the kid's mom to save himself the effort of having to deal with the aftermath once his fun was over with, but he made the obvious choice not to. Being the bad guy because it's expected of him. Sounds familiar. Clayton can't help but smile, although it's rueful, a little knowingly snide. He's on to you, House.]

[That turns into something more genuinely amused when House turns around, back to Clayton's problem. He flashes his teeth in a wide, playful grin.]

Ain't it? Couldn't hardly believe it myself, 'til we stopped givin' him carbs 'n put 'em on anti-fungal meds an' he stopped gettin' smashed every meal. We're thinkin' the antibiotics he was takin' fer that staph infection gave the yeast room t' take over things in his gut. He was fine after that, far 's I know...

[Clayton pauses, absently threading his fingers.]

How 'bout you tell me another one? I'd talk about the fella who was tryin' t' hide his lady's jewelry, but that's gettin' more into the clinic side a things.

[rubikscomplex]

Ever had a guy stroke out on you after yelling at him? Reason #67 not to be on clinic duty. [House has an idea what Clayton is doing. There's a part of him that wants to resist, to avoid giving the other man insight and leverage, but he loves talking about medicine, his cases. The interesting ones, those are worth sharing. Still, better to pick one of the awkward ones, see how Clayton reacts.]

I tell you what happened... you play my game if you're going to stop... telling me about your cases. I give you symptoms. The facts we had as we went on. You tell me what you'd do... how you'd guess.

[It's a test, as well, to see just how useful Clayton is. The fact the guy managed to get to gut fermentation syndrome is impressive, but one instance of an odd disease does not an ideal diagnostician make. Not for House's team.]

[dr_unconscious]

Yeah, but you don't hardly gotta yell at 'em.

[Clayton chuckles through that same knowing grin. He's pretty sure he understands why House isn't fond of clinic duty, and it definitely isn't to do with unexpected patient deterioration. But he'll keep that to himself.]

[Time for the next round instead. Clayton shrugs and slowly shakes his head.] Only fair t' give it a shot, I suppose. Can't promise I'll be any good at it--my job's jus' t' patch folks up as they come in. I don't know what t' do with 'em, I send 'em off t' your team, y'know?

[Okay, so maybe he's underselling himself a little bit. He figures House's ego won't be offended by it.]

[rubikscomplex]

Oh, please. 'Just a simple ER doctor, huh?' One who sees things other people don't. [He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes again. Heart rate still elevated, still sweating, partial tinnitus. But it doesn't feel quite like he's about to have a heart attack anymore. He's coming down from it.] I have a team to stroke my ego, Epps. I don't need a referral to.

[His eyes open, focusing in on Clayton.]

Patient is a 21-year-old male. Asian. Patient was in the clinic due to excessive grinding of the teeth. He seemed like a nervous guy. Seeing as teeth grinding isn't a leading cause of stroke in 20-somethings, we thought there might be a little more to it. Stroke initially presented with a blown pupil, left eye. [House's voice becomes progressively stronger, more confident as he speaks.]

Guesses from the peanut gallery?

((ooc: And just so you don't have to go digging excessively to put medical clues together, friend, here is the guy's case.))

[dr_unconscious]

[Clayton huffs a laugh but doesn't argue. Hey, if House wants to pay him compliments, he won't deny him. Part of him wonders if House realized he did it. If he didn't, Clayton's too interested to watch him figure it out himself to interrupt.]

[Besides, there's a case to worry about. He leans forward, chin in hand, brows arcing high into his ragged hairline as House explains the situation to him. Clayton gives it a few moments afterwards to process.]

...An' he didn't go straight into a coma after it? [Not by the way House is describing things, like he's leading up to something else. There's clearly more to this than just the stroke. If not some kind of massive intracranial trauma--or imminent intracranial trauma--then it's probably localized. Clot in the optic nerve? Maybe...]

[...Too little information. After another decent pause, Clayton speaks up again.]

Assumin' y'all took an MRI. What'd that show up?

[rubikscomplex]

Nope. Totally conscious. Well, I mean as totally conscious as most people are after a stroke, [House shrugs.]

And the MRI showed nothing. Metal plate in the guy's jaw from reconstructive surgery months ago prevented it. Damn those reconstructive surgeons. We ran an angiogram, EMG, echocardiogram, and tox screen. No vasculitis, peripheral neuropathy, cardiac embolism, or drugs. I really thought we were gonna get lucky on that last one.

While we're having our fun, the kid's dealing with aphasia and we learn a little more about his medical history... from his dominatrix.

[He goes quiet for a moment and lets that sink in with a smirk at Clayton.]

Annette. Mm... I'd've let her whip me, too. Turned out our polite and quiet little Asian bro was into a total BDSM lifestyle.

[dr_unconscious]

[With the exception of chuckling and waving House off when he starts going on about Annette, Clayton patiently waits through his explanation. This is a lot of new information to sort through. No MRI makes things a lot more difficult, and the alternative tests run on him basically covered all the bases Clayton would have thought of at the time. Aphasia sounds like worsening damage from the stroke--or continued minor strokes, whichever way he looks at it doesn't seem good. The BDSM angle is...interesting, but not immediately informative. More of a personality angle than a diagnostic one; he was probably pretty tolerant of discomfort, so--]

[--actually. Hm.]

...Did he bring himself in fer the teeth grindin'?

[rubikscomplex]

Yep. It's been going on for six months. And this guy's tried everything to deal with it. And I mean everything. Except, y'know? Real medicine. He'd been to an acupucturist, a shen balancer, a homeopath, a chiropractor, and a naturopath. All that was missing was the partridge in the pear tree, really.

So that gave us about ten different possibilities. But let's hear yours.