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God and Bad Planning
by Martin Ross
New Orleans, La.
Sept. 5
4:37 p.m.
Rose Anne shook the plastic jug in frustration. A small eddy of water glinted at the bottom, in the late afternoon light seeping through the grimy attic window, and memory stabbed at her heart.
She'd been listening to the local weather when the waters hit -- keeping up with the taxes on the house kept Rose Anne tapped out, and even basic cable was beyond the meager paycheck she brought home from the cannery. She'd kept to herself, both at the plant and on the block, and no one had called or stopped by to see to her welfare as Katrina approached.
Rose Anne had stocked up on as much canned meat and snack food as she could swing at the dollar store, and had filled a milk jug with pure Jefferson Parish tap -- not too much Avian flowed in this neighborhood. She settled back and waited for the storm to pass, anticipating at worst a few days without power. The idea of leaving her late mother's home was inconceivable, the logistics of leaving town impossible.
She'd grabbed as much as she could after the levee broke, and Rose Anne had been living on store-brand pseudo-Spam, ranch-flavored tortilla chips, and carefully rationed sips from the jug. As darkness and fear and eventually despair had set in over the last five days, Rose Anne had lost track of the sips, and the water soon would be gone.
She'd heard periodic shots in the darkness, and before the generic dollar store batteries had given out, Rose Anne had listened in horror to accounts of the insanity and chaos at the arena. Like Sodom and Gomorrah, or the End of Days. Rose Anne had lived her entire life in the city, and she'd learned to turn a blind eye to the revelry, the debauchery. It wasn't too tough -- the French Quarter was more concept than concrete reality in Rose Anne's working class world.
This had been all too real -- the wrath of the Lord come right to her doorstep. His vengeance, the scouring of the city from the Earth's face?
"Ma'am?"
Rose Anne jumped at the disembodied voice, and the milk jug sloshed across the rough wood of the attic floor. She crawled to the window, and tears stung her eyes as she regarded the military chopper hovering over the now flooded street. She caught sight of the moon near the horizon - an apparition in the waning daylit sky, a hazy scythe waiting to claim the night. Rose Anne leaned back, gratefully.
"Ma'am, this is the U.S. Coast Guard." The amplified voice brought her back to the dusty attic. "We're going to send a man down to retrieve you. Just stay put -- we'll be back around in a few minutes."
Rose Anne nodded mutely, then slumped against a trunk full of her mother's old dresses. Her dry lips began to move in prayer, as if they were acting autonomously...
Megalomart
Plainsboro, N.J.
Four months later
"Attention, Megalomart customers. Winter's here, and Megalomart has all your automotive winterization needs. Sur-Grip radial snow tires are on special this week with a $40 mail-in rebate, and a gallon of Arctic Fire antifreeze is only $7.99... So make Megalomart your first stop today, before winter stops you."
The robotically nasal Eastern accent of the assistant manager pricked at Rose Anne's brain even as she silently swept cookies, roasts, detergent, socks over the UPC scanner and into the gaping maw of a red recyclable bag.
While few of her customers would've noticed - or indeed might have bothered to - Rose Anne actually enjoyed the comforting repetition and isolation of her new job. While she interacted daily with hundreds of shoppers in the center of a virtual retail circus, only a few acknowledged the non-descript girl, and most of Rose Anne's co-workers were sympathetic toward the world-changing events that had brought her to New Jersey but respectful of her politely reticent nature.
Absently, by rote, Rose Anne spun the carousel another turn, and carefully nestled a bag of hotdog buns into its cocoon before spinning to a new bag.
"Thanks."
She looked up, suppressing a gasp. The woman, in a chartreuse jersey and stretch pants, was as broad as a bus, but her beaming smile was as radiant as a Gulf sunrise.
"I'm sorry, ma'am?" Rose Anne stammered.
"The buns," the customer explained, blushing slightly now. "Most a'the times, you guys just toss `em in a bag and squoosh `em good with a couple cans a' beans. Thanks for taking the time, sweetie."
Rose Anne's hand paused over the scanner, and a smile broke through her customary reserve. The woman blinked at the cashier's transformation. "No problem, ma'am."
"That's a beautiful accent you got, honey," the customer cooed. "It'd figure you'd be from outta town, you not squooshing my buns and all. You from the south, right?" The large woman suddenly paused. "Ohmigod. You're one of them, ain't you?"
Rose Anne's smile vanished, and her gray eyes widened in fear.
Tears filmed the shopper's eyes. "Oh, sweetie, how awful. It musta been awful." Her plump fingers reached over the scanner and seized Rose Anne's. "That gawdammed Katrina." Rose Anne fliched imperceptibly at the blasphemy. "My husband's a trucker - he took a buncha food and shit down there after it happened. You OK, baby?"
Rose Anne's shoulders relaxed. The arrival of the Katrina evacuees had made front-page local headlines for a week, and a well-meaning TV reporter had shadowed several for two more. Rose Anne had declined the exposure - the CNN coverage of her rescue had been enough visibility - but the media spotlight had spurred a flood of offers. Megalomart had provided work for few hundred of the evacuees, and a local developer known (very publicly) for his charitable efforts offered up (very publicly) a bank of temporarily rent-deferred apartments in a reasonably safe neighborhood not too far from here.
"I'm just fine, ma'am," Rose Anne murmured, gracefully wriggling free. "Thank you so kindly for asking."
"Hey, Sally Freakin' Struthers." Rose Anne and the woman turned to a broad bald man in a leather jacket and a grease-stained tee. "I got 20 minutes `til the freakin' game starts. You wanna haul that gargantuan ass a'yours?"
The woman's eyes dried instantly, and she thumped her chest in a common New Jersey gesture. "Fuck you, Easy Rider."
"Hey, you go fu-- Jesus! Lady? Lady?"
Rose Anne's face had grown even grayer as the pair bickered. She'd grabbed at the card reader, and it had uprooted as her body slid to the floor...
"Ohmigod!" the woman screamed, turning to the mob of shoppers. "Somebody call 911, please, for Gawd's sake!"
A petite redhead emerged from the front of the store, where she'd been chatting with the manager and a youngish man in a black suit. "I'm a doctor!" the redhead announced, nonetheless holding up what was clearly an FBI ID. The biker nearly bolted instinctively, then placed himself in check out of a second instinct that had evolved through years of bar fights and drug scrapes. "Get an ambulance!" the small woman barked at the manager, who broke out a cell phone.
"Ohmigod," the large woman whispered.
Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital
Plainsboro, N.J.
FBI Special Agent Dana Mulder eyed the closed ICU door and the doctors and nurses consulting inside. Her partner had gone off in search of the hospital administrator, and she waited tensely, as concerned about the health of the young woman as the continuation of her investigation.
"Got change for a dollar?"
Scully glanced at the source of the query, a thin, unshaven man in a wrinkled shirt, rumpled corduroy jacket, jeans, and sneakers. He leaned on a cane, and his eyes were baggy, protuberant, expectant, and, she thought, somewhat wild.
"No," the agent said simply, turning away.
"C'mon," the derelict sighed. "At least look. I don't have my morning coffee to wash down my drugs, I'm absolutely useless for the rest of the day."
"I'm positive I don't have any change," Scully said icily.
"You must be hellaciously anal retentive, or one heck of a money manager."
Scully whipped out her ID, and flipped it open in the man's face. "I'm extremely busy right now, sir. You'll need to cadge a cup from someone else, understand."
"Well," the man huffed, turning and hobbling off. "Somebody woke up with Mr. Grumpypants this morning."
Before Scully could squelch the response she had yet to formulate, the ICU door whooshed open, and an amiable-looking man in a lab coat approached.
"Agent? Dr. Patel. Your witness, suspect, what? Well, she's stabilized for the time being. But I'm going to ask you to hold off for a little longer, at least until tomorrow. We're looking at, ah, some rather odd symptomology here, and I need to call in a specialist."
The last was spoken seemingly with some reluctance, but Scully pressed on. "What happened to Ms. Boudeaux? I'm a doctor, and from what I--"
"You called him yet?" Scully turned to see an attractive woman in an expensive suit and heels clacking down the hall, Mulder in tow. She extended an exquisitely manicured hand. "Dr. Lisa Cuddy - head of medicine. As I explained to your partner, we want to cooperate fully, but our patient's health is tantamount. I mean, she's not going anyplace, right?"
"Of course," Scully nodded, waving off her impatient partner with a look.
"Great." Cuddy returned to the chafing physician beside Scully. "So, did you talk to him yet?"
"Just about to."
Cuddy's brow arched. "Well, shoo. He doesn't eat attendings unless they provoke him. Ah, there he is. House?"
Scully followed her gaze, seeing only the derelict coffee cadger. The man's eyes popped, and he started to beat a retreat.
"DR. House," Cuddy repeated with a tone of mingled authority and exasperation. The derelict's shoulders slumped, and he pivoted on his cane.
"Great," Scully breathed as she hustled after Cuddy and Mulder.
"It's not my baby, Cuddy," Dr. Gregory House stated. "Guys in the pool think it's the Prince of Darkness."
"Dr. House," Cuddy smiled sweetly. "These are Agents Mulder and Scully with the FBI."
House inspected Scully with a frown. "Ah, yes, the Changeless Woman. If I accidentally slice off a pair of testicles or sew a sponge in a patient today in my stimulant-free condition, it's on you. You two here about my taxes? Cause I promise, I haven't filed any in years."
"House," Cuddy sighed. "Rose Anne Boudeaux, 27, brought in about two hours ago following what appears to be a cardiac episode. There are some curious complications, and I need you to consult with Patel."
"Curious complications?" House waggled his brows. "Why, Cuddy, you do know how to whet the appetite. Get Foreman."
"Two days' clinicals," Cuddy said, flatly. House smiled wolfishly and glanced at the agents.
"What's so interesting about Blanche DuBois, or whatever her name is?" the doctor inquired. "Why're Efrem Zimbalist Jr. and Agent Hypothermia so interested?"
Mulder reached absently for Scully, then withdrew. Scully inhaled slowly.
"Ms. Boudeaux may be an important witness in a series of local crimes," she murmured. "It's essential that we talk to her."
House leaned in on his cane, now intrigued. "Local crimes. What, slugging the parking meters? Check kiting? Rampant buggery's certainly out of the question." His eyes grew intent. "Only series of crimes playing here in town I know of are the road show of Rent and the Ripper Murders." House leaned in further toward Scully. "C'mon, Big Spender, give. You two are straining at your leashes like Michael Moore at a Bush fundraiser. That girl's not just some witness, is she?"
"We're not at liberty to--" Scully said evenly.
"Quid pro quo, Agent," House sang. He frowned. "Or is that tempus fugit? Gee, all that Latin sounds pretty much the same to me."
"There is some evidence Ms. Boudeaux may be materially involved in the murders," Mulder provided, waving off Scully's objections.
"There you go," House smiled beatifically. "That was so tough? OK, lead me to the little homicidal maniac. First, though, I need a cup of java." The doctor reached into his pockets and looked distressed. "Except I don't seem to have any change..."
Scully crossed her arms, her face a blank. Mulder's hand plunged into his pants pocket.
"Oh, they're still there," House assured him, jerking his head toward Scully. "Though I'd think it's only be a matter of time."
**
"Agent Scully," House announced as he hobbled into the room. Two young men and a woman in lab coats stopped laughing and looked up, Scully thought with some trepidation. "Meet Pete, Julie, and Linc."
One of the two men, a goateed African-American, exhaled and stood. "Dr. Foreman. He's Dr. Chase, she's Dr. Cameron. You actually an agent, or did House not get his a.m. coffee yet?"
"Youch," House winced. "Agent Scully's a triple threat. She's a G-woman - is that politically correct? - and a pathologist." The last he pronounced with exaggerated reverence.
The female physician, a pretty brunette, waited, then frowned. "But you said she was a triple threa--"
"Just don't," Foreman sighed. "Rose Anne Boudeaux, right?"
House crossed to a white board mounted on an easel, and he picked up a marker.
"Let's start with cardiomegaly." House scrawled the symptom on the white board. "Ms. Boudeaux apparently has a heart the size of Montana, and blood pressure to match. Periodic heart palpitations...Joint pain...Anemia..."
"Joint pain?" Foreman the neurologist queried. "Is the girl from rural Louisiana? Joint pain and limb weakness present in Lyme disease, and irregular rhythm. Maybe the anemia's actually fatigue."
House nodded. "Interesting, if exotic, choice. But our girl's Nawlins born and bred, her lymph nodes are as smooth as Angelina Jolie`s ass, and you didn't let me get to the excessive urination. You never let me get to the excessive urination, and that pisses me off. Thanks for kicking us off with a laugh, though." House wheeled around to Cameron. "Does our perky little immunologist want to throw in HIV for a few more chuckles?"
"Cardiomegaly is fairly common post-mortem in HIV-infected patients, the infection can cause anemia, and antiretroviral drugs can cause diabetes in HIV-positives, thus the excessive urination," Cameron noted with an admonishing smile. "But you wouldn't have asked if you already knew."
"Ah, science." House waggled his brows at Scully, who stared back blankly, then turned to his third protg, who`d been trying to avoid the attention. "Chase? C'mon, now. Tall, blonde, and stupid`s no way to go through life, son."
"The wild card's the gray pallor," he murmured hastily with an educated British accent. "They thought it was just paleness or cyanosis associated with the heart episode, but the skin discoloration hasn`t gone away, and her sclera and mucus are also gray. Osteogenesis imperfecta would explain the discoloration in the whites of her eyes, but her teeth look fine and her bone structure looks strong. Same with lower respiratory infection for the gray mucus -- none of the other symptoms are presenting."
"History?" House demanded.
"That may be difficult," Scully piped up.
"She speaks," House gasped.
"Ms. Boudeaux was a Hurricane Katrina evacuee," the agent continued. "In a lot of cases, medical records for many of the hurricane survivors were wiped out in the flood. To complicate things, Ms. Boudeaux is poor - she was some kind of factory worker in New Orleans. There's a web clearinghouse set up to share any evacuees' medical records that have been salvaged. But it's questionable whether she's even seen a doctor in years."
"More likely a witch doctor," Foreman murmured.
Cameron stared at her colleague, stunned. "Stereotyping? I can't believe it, especially from..."
"From ?" House grinned. "Because he's an oppressed minority, immune to the sociopolitical feeding chain? Methinks the ugly specter of urban bigotry rears its blow-dried head. Maybe a little residual Northern resentment, just to spice up this festering brew? You think the little cracker caught something from waving a spoiled chicken head?"
"Hey," Foreman objected. "I never called anybody a cracker. Maybe I was generalizing, but don't a lot of folks down there practice some unorthodox forms of medicine?"
Chase laughed. "Maybe we need to look for voodoo dolls under her bed."
"Quit trying to impress the hot little bureaucrat," House sighed. "Actually, Foreman's intolerant little hatefest contains a kernel of truth. A poor woman in a rurally influenced polyglot culture where the lines of science and religion frequently cross."
"Folk remedies," Cameron exclaimed. "Of course."
"I wasn't finished discoursing," he said, witheringly. "But since you enjoy flapping your rose petal lips and playing Margaret Mead so much, you talk to the little cracker, see if she's been self-doctoring lately. Oh, and find out what kind of factory she worked in. Chase, you run down to Megamart..."
"Megalomart," the Brit mumbled, still smarting.
"What-ever. Get down there and check for any possible environmental factors. And grab me a box of Vegetable Thins while you're there. The real ones - not the bloody store brand. Foreman?"
"Let me guess," the young doctor rolled his eyes. "I get to break into her apartment and riffle through her personal effects."
"You're the only burglar on call today," House said apologetically. "Think of it as an exercise in cultural tolerance - see how the crackers live. You might also think about zydeco lessons, study up on your Paul Prudhomme."
Foreman threw up his hands and stalked out of the room. House nodded and turned to Chase with an expectant look. The soap-handsome blonde blinked, then scrambled from his chair and out into the hall. With a patient smile, Cameron shook her head and rose.
"You planned this, didn't you, to get us alone together?" House asked, eyeing Scully with mock anxiety. "You're not going to try something, are you? You got a cripple thing?"
Scully stood. "I think I'll accompany Dr. Foreman, just to keep things legal. If you don't mind."
House stuck out his tongue. "You suck the fun right out of the room."
**
"Contemporary Dollar General," Foreman whistled as the building manager retreated down the hall. "Girl doesn't watch much Martha Stewart."
"The flood left her - a lot of them - with virtually nothing," Scully murmured as she scanned the spare apartment. The furnishings were mismatched and likely had been donated or gleaned from the Salvation Army. The yellow plaster walls were bare, and a pair of disparate end tables held only an anonymous coffee mug, a dog-eared Bible, and a used transistor radio.
"No TV, no stereo," Foreman marveled. "All work, no play, looks like."
Scully studied the young doctor. "If you don't mind my asking, how do you work for that man?"
Foreman glanced up. "House?"
"He's insulting, inappropriate, and unprofessional. He seemed to evince little interest in Ms. Boudeaux beyond her unique symptoms and our investigation. His comments to you and your colleagues were demeaning and borderline actionable. Dr. Cuddy told me you passed up a promising post with John Hopkins to come here. And what was that crack about your being the only burglar on call?"
"Youthful indiscretion," Foreman said simply, with a resigned smile. "Look, House's an absolute eff-up as a human being and a total asshole, but he's also one of the top diagnosticians in the country. Doesn't give a damn about the patient, but he's got about a 99 percent save rate. Never sees one if he can help it, but he's got a supernatural sense about what ails them. Kind of Dr. Kildare meets Dr. Lecter, without the charming Anthony Hopkins demeanor. You know what it's like working with somebody who thinks he's always right, almost always is, and makes you feel like the moron even when he isn't?"
Scully was silent. "I'll check out the bathroom."
"I'll take the kitchen."
The refrigerator echoed Boudeaux' monastic existence: A half-package of bologna, flirting with expiration; three slices and two heels of generic white bread; a half-gallon of milk; a half-two-liter bottle of something called Dr. Popper, dressed uncannily like its more prosperous cousin; and (Foreman chuckled) a large bottle of McIlhenny's Tabasco. Nothing exotic or expensive. Foreman was about to give up when he noted a foil-wrapped parcel on the bottom rack.
It was a cheap aluminum pan - the type you'd get with a $2 apple pan. Foreman's grandmother had always recycled pie pans like this a dozen times, guarding them like Tupperware. Foreman pulled up the top foil, and a wave of chocolate, nuts, and a comforting mlange of spices struck his olfactory glands. A half dozen dense squares were lined up neatly around the pan.
"What in the good Lord's name are you up to, son?"
Foreman's heart jumped at the stern demand, and he nearly dropped the pie pan. The blocky old woman - a short, square-jawed septuagenarian of indeterminate race - stepped up and pried the pan from his hands.
"I asked you a question, young man," she repeated with a thick southern patois.
"I'm a doctor," Foreman stammered.
"Rosie's doctor?" The old woman abruptly transformed from gargoyle to grandma. "How is my little flower?"
Foreman had found the reticent girl more weed than flower, but he knew an opening. "She's really sick, ma'am. Are you family?"
The senior frowned distastefully. "Only family she got isn't hardly worth speaking of. I'm Lorena deMoray, Rosie's neighbor down the hall. We came up together after the flood. How's she doing?"
"I'm really only supposed to talk to family..."
"She's the only family I got these days, and I'm hers. Don't you go all official on me, young man."
"All right - maybe you can help me." Foreman sat on the arm of the threadbare couch. "Has Ms. Boudeaux been ill lately? Any infections, aches or pains she can't explain?"
The woman squinted. "Nooo, not that I can recall. And we see each other almost every day. She helps me with the trash and the shopping, and I bake a bit for the girl. Rosie's come nearly to skin and bones since they dropped her here, and I'm trying to fatten her up."
"That your cake I found in the fridge?"
DeMoray beamed as if she were at the county fair judges table. "That's Rosie's favorite. You go on, help yourself to a chunk now."
Foreman smiled indulgently. "No, thanks." He looked up as Scully reentered the living room, staring from him to Ms. deMoray.
"Special Agent Dana Scully, FBI," she drawled. "And you are?"
"FBI?" the old woman breathed. "You think somebody tried to hurt my Rosie?"
Scully relaxed. "No, ma'am. I'm simply investigating a series of murders in the area over the last few months, and..."
"That sweet child wouldn't hurt a fly if it landed on her last scrap of bread." The transition again was jarring - deMoray's face had turned to stone, and her voice was icy and unwavering. The old woman turned to Foreman. "Y'all let me know how my Rosie's doing, you hear? I got to run."
"Well," Scully concluded as deMoray's apartment door slammed.
"Yeah," Foreman agreed. "Little defensive, don't you think?"
"Could merely have been maternal instinct kicking in," Scully suggested, though she didn't sound entirely convinced. "Ah, I found something that may be interesting, though probably more to you than to me. C'mon."
Foreman followed, and paused curiously in the bathroom doorway as Scully slid open the medicine cabinet and the shower curtain.
"Hmm," Foreman pondered with the sly smile of a kindergartner ready to ace Show and Tell.
**
Rose Anne was silent but polite and compliant as Cameron checked her IV, but the presence and interest of the soft-spoken woman soon put the displaced Louisianan at ease.
"And there's no family we can call?"
The gray-skinned girl looked up cautiously. "No, ma'am. Closest thing is Miz deMoray -- she and I kind of keep an eye on each other, and..." -- a dazzling smile materialized -- "...and she makes sure I `keep a little flesh on my skinny bones.'"
Cameron smiled back, then turned serious. "It must have been horrible, waiting in that attic for help to arrive."
"I knew God would see after me, and I had plenty of water. Even though if them folks hadn't come in a couple of days, I'da probably been in trouble."
"Rose Anne, did any pigeons ever nest in your attic? Sometimes, the dust from dried bird droppings can get into the lungs and cause histoplasmosis. That might help explain the strain on your heart."
"Mama always kept our house spotless, and after she died, I always tried to do the same."
"OK," Cameron sighed. "Try to keep your eyes open." She flashed her light into the girl's blue-and-gray eyes; dilation was normal. "How about work? I understand you had a factory job before you came here."
"Iberian Queen Soup. I filled the cans with shrimp bisque, oyster stew, terrapin stew and the like. Money wasn't too hot, but the family in charge, they were good people."
"Ever feel ill, tired at work or when you quit for the da--?" Cameron paused, clicking off the light and examining Rose Anne's face. Frowning, she gently lifted the girl's chin and brushed her cheek with a finger. Rose Anne pulled back.
"Rose Anne," Cameron asked, "how did you get those scratches?"
**
"Hypertrichosis." House added the symptom to his growing list. "Cracker Girl's developing a five o'clock shadow, but going a little weedy on top."
"Facial hair growth, patchy scalp hair, plus the high blood pressure," Cameron noted. "I checked her clitoris -- it was significantly enlarged."
"Always go right for the naughty bits," House tsked. "And how long since the Menstrual Fairy's come to call?"
"She thinks at least five months. It`s happened before, she thinks. She has to shave and use depilatories periodically."
"Amenorrhea," Chase concluded. "It fits with the facial hair and the thinning scalp." He turned to Mulder, who'd been silently absorbing as much medical jargon as he could process. "In secondary amenorrhea, a patient who's been having regular or irregular periods suddenly stops having them for several months."
"Me," House stated. "Him, you don't need to brown-nose."
"There was the stress of the flood and the hurricane, and she looks fairly emaciated," the chastened Chase continued. "All of that could've brought on the amenorrhea. Now she's storing up testosterone."
"Or maybe she's got polycystic ovary disease," offered Foreman, still smarting slightly from Cameron's jumping the gun on his revelation about Boudeaux' armory of hair removal products and tools. "But that doesn't explain the discoloration or the joint pain."
"Could be multiple conditions. Maybe Cracker Girl's just a modern gal, wants to have it all," House suggested, twirling his cane.
"Stop it," Cameron demanded sternly. "This woman has lost her home, her life as she knew it. She's suffering from a life-threatening illness -- maybe multiple illnesses -- and you've reduced her to some snaggle-toothed cultural stereotype. Her name's Rose Anne."
"Uh oh," House sighed. "We've got a bleeder."
Mulder coughed. House turned, frowning. "Yes?"
"If it helps, I found a CNN interview from after Ms. Boudeaux' rescue," the agent reported. "That grayness in her eyes and lips, it wasn't on the tape. Whatever's happened apparently's happened since she came to New Jersey."
The diagnostician nodded thoughtfully and turned to Foreman. "See if the air conditioner guy's still working upstairs. I want a second, private sector opinion."
"Man's just trying to help," Foreman pointed out.
"Et tu, Foreman?" House asked. "Cameron, take a gander at Cracker Girl's -- oops -- Betty Lou's ovaries."
**
"Dr. House!"
"Cane, don't fail me now," the doctor murmured, stepping up his pace.
"Dr. House!" Mulder repeated. House bee-lined for the stairwell.
"House," Cuddy called sourly as she turned the corner toward him.
"Sorry, FBI," House told Cuddy, swiveling toward the agent. Cuddy glared and corralled another staffer, and House smiled at the amiable young man in the suit. "Bet she calls you Mulder in the sack, right?"
"What?" Mulder choked.
"Your pitbull partner. I can't see her shouting, `Fox, baby!' Too seventies, too Boogie Nights." He leaned in with a lascivious wink. "Oh, come on, Mulder. When Cuddy introduced you two and Agent Scully took her customary umbrage to me, you didn't stand back and smirk like one of the good old boys. You didn't leap to her defense like the loyal and supportive fed that you so obviously are. You started to reach for her in that intimate, protective way that says you sip from the same milk carton. Then you backed off, respecting her `space' - possibly a habit cultivated from cohabitating with Agent Scully and her monthly visitor. "
Mulder's face had drained of blood. He blinked at House, then burst into laughter. "Actually, she calls me her undercover mole. Truce, Doctor - you don't try to profile me, and I won't try to profile you. I just want get your gut reaction to something. This amenorrhea - could it cause any kind of mental delusion or psychotic behavior?"
"Amenorrhea itself's generally a symptom of some larger problem, like polycystic ovary disease. In and of itself, I don't know it could cause our hairy little gal to mutilate and partially masticate a drug dealer and a frat boy. That is where we're going with this, right?"
"Hypertrichosis's often caused by an adrenal malfunction, though," Mulder persisted. "Couldn't whatever's behind this also be spurring her adrenalin levels into the red?"
House signed, unshaven cheeks puffing. "Why do they always watch `E.R.'? I'm missing my afternoon coffee-and-Vicodin break, Agent Mulder. Can we fast-forward to the wow factor here?"
Mulder's hand plunged into his pocket and emerged filled with currency.
**
"Lycanthropy." House nodded as he sipped at his tepid vending machine coffee. "Of course, the answer was staring us in the face all the time, and I was too foolish to see. Cracker Girl's a werewolf." The diagnostician slapped his forehead.
Mulder smiled, ignoring his sarcasm. "You ever heard of the loup garou? French explorers along the Mississippi and eventually Cajun populations in the South told of shadowy half-men, half-dogs or wolves attacking livestock and even settlers. Some Louisiana oystermen even describe benign werewolves that shucked oysters in the night, while they were asleep."
"I'll have Foreman check to see if Rose Anne's been hitting the raw bars heavy lately."
"I'm not necessarily suggesting Ms. Boudeaux is a lycanthrope." House smirked at "necessarily." "But the delusion, whatever you want to call it, of becoming a werewolf has been documented regularly since the Middle Ages. Scientists have speculated the delusion was fostered by the prevailing folklore of the times combined with conditions such as hypertrichosis or other endocrine disorders such as adrenal virilism, basophilic adenoma of the pituitary, masculinizing ovarian tumors, or Stein-Leventhal syndrome. In some cases, the rye bread eaten by medieval serfs may have been contaminated with the ergot fungus, which causes hallucinations and could encourage supernatural delusions.
"I'm not asking you to buy into some wild horror movie scenario, Dr. House. But isn't cultural orientation and superstition part of the patient's history?" Mulder began to tick off his fingers. "Ms. Boudeaux suffers from hypertrichosis. She's always been something of an outcast, a loner with low self-esteem. Maybe imagining herself a werewolf both feeds into her sense of alienation and her need to be special. Add to that her erratic emotional state, and her concern about the full moon -- a pop cultural symbol in lycanthropy. If this ammenorrhea of hers has surfaced only recently, it stands to reason that she may have had other menstrual abnormalities in the past, right? Maybe more severe periods, marked by depression, anger, intense pain."
"Voice of experience?" House posed, tipping his cup.
"The menstrual cycle has long been tied to the lunar cycle, just like the tides and many animal and human behaviors. Here's a poor, uneducated girl raised in a culture where science, religion, and magic have been closely tied together, even today. Ms. Boudeaux' always felt strange and emotional at the arrival of the full moon, and now, she's sprouting hair and her skin is turning gray. What if she's somehow embraced the delusion that she's a werewolf, a loup garou?"
"Roaming the moors and the Safeway parking lots in search of human flank steak," House extrapolated in Karloffian tones. "Look, Agent, if that's really your name. Even if Cracker Girl's suffering some kind of severe menstrual psychosis every full moon and feels like ripping into human flesh -- no offense to Agent Scully -- I'm not sure her enlarged heart could take the stress of tearing apart New Jerseyans. Unless..." House's eyes popped, and he looked at Mulder in stark terror. "Unless she actually is a werewolf. Jeepers."
The agent peered around the cafeteria and leaned toward House. "Doctor, I'm going to share some information the media hasn't been given about the Ripper Murders. I'm going to ask you to keep it to yourself, though."
"That's a mistake."
Mulder smiled. "OK. You know the victims were mutilated and semi-cannibalized. We found DNA in the victims' wounds. Not unusual, except the results of the lab screen were, uh, inconclusive."
"Roger Ebert was wrong. You're the true master of suspense. Inconclusive how?"
"Well, the analysis identified both human and animal DNA. Canine or lupine DNA, to be precise."
House nodded. "Sure. And how does this implicate Cracker Girl?"
"The night of the first murder -- the frat guy -- a witness saw a young woman in a Megalomart smock near the crime scene, which was in a really marginal part of town. We think the frat guy went there to score some pot. We checked the work schedule at the Plainsboro store for the night of the killing, and the assistant manager said Ms. Boudeaux received a call in the middle of her shift. He said she seemed agitated, upset. Ms. Boudeaux has a nearly perfect work record, so he let her go without any questions. She came back an hour later and told him it had been a wild goose chase, or words to that effect.
"We checked her out -- it's like an old Dragnet episode. She keeps to herself, is friendly but doesn't socialize with her coworkers, has no boyfriends or, from what we can see, any real friends beyond Ms. deMoray. No connections we can find between her, the dead college kid, and the drug dealer, and the drug dealer appears to have no connection to the kid -- he deals in meth, harder stuff. But here's the kicker: We were able to secure a DNA sample from Ms. Boudeaux--"
"Do I want to know how?"
"No -- we were told to move carefully since she was a Katrina victim who'd been highlighted in the media, so we were legal but creative. Thing is, although as I said the lab findings on the crime scene DNA XXXXXXXXX
House`s pager sounded, and the physician consulted its readout.
"Been fun, Circus Boy," House muttered, using his cane to lever himself out of his chair, "but I got a date with a bearded lady."
**
"I need outta this place!!" Rose Anne wailed, sweeping her lunch tray to the floor. "Where`s Miz deMoray! Get her here, now! Tell her to take me home!"
Eyes wide, Cameron turned to House, who was poised in the doorway. "It's like Jekyll and Hyde," she breathed. "She was all sweetness and light just an hour ago. You think she's presenting some kind of manic episode or dementia?"
"That's not all," Foreman warned, displaying Rose Anne's chart as Chase and an orderly tried to calm their thrashing patient. "Her kidneys are shutting down -- already some necrosis starting. She`s going to need a new kidney fast."
House eyed Rose Anne. "Who's this deMoray? Her boss?"
"Neighbor lady, sort of surrogate grandma from the old 'hood," Foreman supplied.
"Rose Anne said she was the closest thing to a real relative she had," Cameron said.
House turned abruptly, expression thoughtful. "That's what she said? Exactly?"
"Yes..."
House pursed his lips and nodded. He shoved past Cameron and Foreman.
"Oh, this oughtta help," Foreman moaned.
"Rose Anne," House said, limping to her bedside. The girl fell silent, eyes narrowing.
"Who're you?" she asked, suspiciously.
"Paul Prudhomme -- I've been on the Palm Beach Diet. Look, we need to contact family -- your brother, father, whoever."
Rose Anne's gray face went paler. "I got no family -- just Miz deMoray."
"Yeah, yeah. She's `the closest thing to real family' you've got in this world of misery. Which suggests there's a cracker in the woodpile, a sheep in black clothing."
Rose Anne stared hostilely at House.
"C'mon," he murmured impatiently. "Your kidney's on the fritz, and we need a spare. So spare me the southern melodrama and give with a name. I assume he or she must still be in town." He leaned expectantly on his cane. "OK, then. I'll give you another 24 hours, and you can give me a next of kin."
"House," Foreman gasped.
Rose Anne's jaw quivered, and her eyes began to fill. "Y'all don't understand. I can't..."
"Fine." House turned toward the door. "Been real, y'all." He halted as he spotted Scully, her eyes filled with fury.
"Dr. House, a minute, please," the agent said through her teeth.
House shrugged at Rose Anne. "The old ball and chain."
"What the hell kind of doctor are you?" Scully demanded in the hallway. "That girl in there is terrified, and you bully her?"
"Ah, yes, that's right. You're part of our little Hippocratic community. Mind if I talk to Dirty Harriet for a minute, Dr. Scully?"
Scully's stone expression softened microscopically. "What?"
"Think like a cop for a second. Why else would Cracker Girl have been hanging out in the `hood in her spiffy Megalomart jacket when those guys got processed into Alpo? Why would an otherwise robotically loyal worker abandon her cash register to troll those mean streets?"
Scully inhaled sharply, and she looked into House's face with fresh eyes. "To protect someone."
"Now that's the feisty little bichon friese we all know and cross the street to avoid. And I'm gonna guess that with her little monochromatic complexion problem and personality, our blue collar belle probably isn't burning up the romantic court. Assuming Auntie Lorena hasn't been chugging Geritol and steroids, that leaves family of the probably lowlife variety."
The agent whipped out her cell phone. "FEMA or the city should be able to get me a list of Katrina evacuees in Plainsboro."
House nodded and turned back toward Rose Anne's room. "Just do me a favor. You decide to blow this guy away, aim high. I need his innards."
**
"Robert Thibodeaux," Special Agent Monica Reyes supplied as Mulder flipped open a pad. "Thirty-two, relocated in Plainsboro following the hurricane. He has a lengthy but generally boring yellow sheet going back to 1989. One assault -- a bar brawl in the Quarter. Family includes one Rose Anne Boudeaux, a half-sister."
"Yes," Mulder murmured into the cell phone. "I appreciate the fast work, Monica."
The agent was based in the now-recovering Big Easy, specializing in ritual and cult crimes. She'd helped Mulder wrap up an unsolved child murder the previous spring. "Hey, happy to help. The only reason Thibodeaux had a Bureau flag was an interstate beef about four years ago."
"What was the beef?"
"He got caught transporting pitbulls from Louisiana to Mississippi. He rolled over on a dog fighting ring and didn't do any time. Agent Mulder? Fox? Hello?"
"Yeah," he mumbled. "This may be it, Monica. Thanks. And, um, sorry, you know..."
"Oh, I'll be fine," she sang. "I temporarily started smoking again, and the guys are still trying to get their bearings, but once those billions of your tax dollars start rolling in, we'll be back in business." She laughed. "I guar-on-tee."
Mulder chuckled and said his goodbyes. Scully arched her brows expectantly.
"C'mon," he said, jerking his head toward the hotel parking lot. "Gotta see a man about a dog."
**
"I should have known," Wilson said, finishing off his second beer. "`Let's pick up some chicks and howl at the moon.' Right."
House shrugged and grabbed the last slice of pizza as the creature on screen . "I'm reasonably sure I said `flicks.' Besides, you`re married, remember. Not happily, obviously, or you wouldn`t be here watching Howling I through III with a cripple."
"Don't start," the oncologist mumbled. "Why the horror fest, anyway?"
"Research. Agent Mulder's incipient schizophrenia whetted my appetite for '80s lycanthroploitation cinema. If you'll call us in sick with Cuddy tomorrow, we can rent American Werewolf in London and Bridges of Madison County. No werewolves, but bone-chilling nonetheless."
"Why's the guy bug you so much, anyway?" Wilson asked, propping his feet on the arm of the couch.
"Shh, the alpha wolf's about to dismember the nosy cancer doctor."
"It's an authority thing, isn't it? Or is it just the idea of someone possibly being a little further outside the box than you? Actually, Mulder's theory sounds like something you`d come up with when your Vicodin`s wearing off."
"Thanks for reminding me." House riffled through the jumble on his coffee table, and retrieved an amber bottle. He shook out a pair of pills and downed them dry.
"All right, that's it," Wilson concluded, stumbling to his feet. "Call me a cab. My miserable marriage is preferable to this."
"Hey, you're gonna miss Teen Wolf II."
The oncologist toasted with his Coors. "This is the only Silver Bullet I need tonight. Later."
"Buzz kill," House muttered as the door closed behind him. As he propped his infirmed leg on the table, one of Wilson's depleted beer cans rolled onto the carpet. He stared at it for a second, then clicked off the onscreen carnage.
**
"Robert Thibodeaux?" Plainsboro P.D. Lt. Frank Delman called, rapping on the warped apartment door, .38 clenched in his free hand. Mulder and Scully and two Kevlar-swathed uniforms flanked the detective in the dim, urine-perfumed hallway. "Plainsboro Police -- would you please open up?"
They heard a sudden shuffling beyond the thin door. Delman looked to Mulder, who nodded. A heavy cop shoe pistoned against the doorknob, and the door cracked and surrendered. After a second without gunfire, the uniforms rushed the apartment, followed by Delman and the agents.
"Don't fuckin' shoot!" a skinny, shirtless man with a thick beard yelled in a thick southern patois as he displayed his empty hands. A mouthful of brown teeth emerged in a reptilian grin as one of the uniforms braced him over a wobbly linoleum table. "What the hell? Rosie give me up or somethin'. Stupid girl don't have the brains God give her."
"Your sister didn't roll over on you," Scully informed Thibodeaux. "Though it was sweet of you to let her take the rap for a couple of murders."
"Hey, those weren't no murd--" the Cajun transplant objected before clamping his cracked lips shut. "I want a fuckin' lawyer."
"Absolutely," Mulder said pleasantly. "Perhaps he can explain `mitigating circumstances' to you."
Delman glanced curiously at the agent.
"I know what happened, or at least I think I do," Mulder continued. "You willing to go to prison for this?"
"Mulder," Scully murmured. "Are you saying he's protecting someone else?"
"Not exactly, Scully."
"Hey, Loot," one of the uniforms shouted from the filthy hallway. "Gonna check out the bedroom."
"Yeah -- don't touch nothing, though," the detective responded, eyes shifting from Thibodeaux to Mulder and back.
The agent began to speak, then froze, blood draining from his face as he spotted a wet, brown object on the floor next to Thibodeaux' ancient stove. The meaning of the dehydrated, mangled pig ear shot up Mulder's spine.
"NO!" he shrieked, breaking into a flat run down the hall. "Don't op--"
Too late, the uniform swung open the door, and a large, white missile flew at him. The cop tried to gurgle for assistance as the dumb, brutish pitbull seized his throat. Mulder leveled his weapon.
"You drop that gun, man, or I swear I'll give him the order!" Thibodeaux yelled, grinning. "Rest of you, too! Or your friend there, he's gonna be ten miles of bad hamburger."
A sharp crack shattered his bravado. Plaster dust snowed from the hall ceiling. Rose Anne's half-brother jumped. The dog, jaws poised around the cop's trachea, appeared to pay no heed to Mulder's shot.
"I thought this was what you've been trying to avoid, Mr. Thibodeaux," Mulder said with steely calm. "I'll take him out with one shot to his tiny little brain. You want that?"
"Motherfucker," Thibodeaux muttered plaintively, regarding Remy anxiously.
"That's why we found human DNA in the victims' wounds," Mulder continued. "He got away from you -- twice -- didn't he? By the time you called your sister to help you find him and located him yourself, he'd already killed that college kid. You figured it was an accident -- just Remy doing what instinct and a lifetime in the ring had taught him. But you love him, don't you? You knew we'd put him down, and you had to protect him.
"You watch a lot of C.S.I.?" Mulder smiled grimly at the skinny felon, whose eyes popped in surprise. "I figured. You thought that if somehow you contaminated Remy's DNA on the bodies, we couldn't prove he mauled those men and have him euthanized."
"Christ," Delman snorted. "Dumbass."
"Your choice," Mulder offered, cocking his trigger for a second shot. "Or should I say, his."
Thibodeaux glared through a miasma of tears. He regarded the tautly muscled primitive beast, which stared back with something he read as love.
"Release," Thibodeaux snapped, slumping against the table.
**
"We've ruled out neurology, immunology, parasites," House announced, tapping the white board with his cane. "Just for kicks, how about toxicology? Oh, I don't know, maybe heavy metals."
"Makes sense," Foreman said. "The kidney overload, the compromised liver, the sudden rage. Run a tox screen?"
"Wait," Chase protested. "We didn't find any environmental contributors either at her job or her apartment."
"Noo," House said. "Your colleague failed to find the source of the toxin. Sentimentality and misplaced respect for his elders fogged his occasionally facile instincts."
Foreman sat up. "Hey, there were no special household chemicals, the fridge was virtually bare--" The doctor closed his eyes, exhaling slowly.
"Great watching an acute deductive mind at work."
"Hold on. You think Boudeaux was poisoned?"
House considered. "I'd rather say she was nearly misdiagnosed to death."
**
"I hope y'all like your coffee," Mrs. deMoray purred. "I tend to make it a might stronger than the custom for northerners."
"It's fine," Mulder smiled graciously, taking a sip to demonstrate. The muted sounds of traffic leaked through the thin apartment house walls, diluting the antiquarian time capsule the displaced senior obviously had attempted to create for herself.
"And how is my little Rose today?" the tiny woman inquired, folding her spotted hands in her lap. "Them doctors taking good care of my little flower?"
"They're doing their best," Scully began. "But they need more information before they can treat all of her symptoms. We were wondering if you might shed some light on her illness."
Mrs. deMoray's company smile vanished, then reappeared. "Whatever you mean, child? I'm no doctor."
"Mrs. deMoray, we found some sweet bread in Rose Anne's apartment, and we sent it to the lab. You want to know what we found?"
The old woman was silent.
"Silver, and reasonably high concentrations of it," Mulder continued. "You've heard of the loup garou, haven't you, ma'am?"
"I've heard the stories, of course."
"It's more than a story to you, isn't it, Ms. deMoray? I checked up and found you and Rose Anne's grandmother had grown up in the same rural parish. From what I've been able to glean from some of the folks in your old hometown, your childhood friend created quite a sensation when she became pregnant with Rose Anne's mother."
"They were hard times for Ruth and hers', and I find it unseemly to bring it up."
Mulder smiled sympathetically. "I can imagine what the times were like, especially in a rural town in the South. Telling her parents she'd been attacked, impregnated by a loup garou, a werewolf, was clearly a desperate move."
"It wasn't any `move,'" deMoray hissed. "Nobody but a few of the old folks and myself believed the poor child. I suppose that was a blessing for her baby."
"Because if people had suspected her lineage, they might have went after the girl."
"Don't you mock me, son."
"Believe me, I'm not. Whatever the truth of your friend's condition, you believed her. You also feared what might be in her daughter's blood. And her granddaughter's blood.
"You watched over Rose Anne in New Orleans, watching for any sign she might not be `right.' When the flood hit, you came with her to New Jersey, I think to safeguard her as much as her potential victims. When the murders started occurring here, you recalled Rose Anne's increasingly agitated behavior with the passing of each lunar cycle. Her stress, her drastic loss of appetite had pushed her into amenorrhea, a condition that causes excessive facial hair production. You feared that somehow, the trauma of her move here had brought her lycanthropic blood to the surface. You had to act, to protect her and the people of the neighborhood."
Scully leaned forward. "The most popular notion of killing a werewolf is with a silver dagger or bullet - it's the stuff of old horror films, but it was the only option that appeared open. Except you didn't want to kill Rose Anne - you simply wanted to `cure' her, or at least deal with her `symptoms.' You reasoned that if a silver bullet would kill a werewolf, daily trace amounts of silver might suppress the werewolf within Rose Anne. You've been dosing that girl with silver. Ms. deMoray, I understand you were only able to save one personal item when you were evacuated from New Orleans. Your sister told me."
The old woman was a statue, skin pale, lips pursed.
"May we see your grandmother's silver, please, Ms. deMoray?" Mulder asked calmly. "We can get a warrant to confiscate it, but I'm hoping that won't be necessary. I know you didn't mean to hurt Rose Anne."
Ms. deMoray inhaled sharply. "Hurt her? Whatever do you mean? I was trying to help that child."
Scully looked helplessly to Mulder, then reached for the woman's gnarled fingers. "Unfortunately," the agent said softly, "you didn't."
**
"Cadmium," House announced as he entered the element on the white board with a flourish. Cameron and Chase appeared puzzled, but Foreman grinned with realization. "The symptoms of silver poisoning alone generally are harmless enough - gray discoloration of the sclera and the skin, occasional emotional flare-ups which in Cracker Girl's case amplified the effects of her amenorrhea. Silver toxicity used to be a lot more common when colloidal silver was used as a home remedy and there was no OSHA to watch over industrial working standards.
"Alone, the silver Witchee Woman filed off Grandma's cutlery and mixed into her `special brownies' might only have left Rose Anne in a colorless state and a blue funk. But, Cameron, quick, what do old spinsters do with the family silver? Hey, I said `old' spinsters."
The young woman sighed. "I don't know... They store it away somewhere, maybe bring it out and holidays, polish it, I suppose..."
House's cane cracked down with a triumphant thump. "They polish it and polish it and polish it, like a myopic high-schooler without a prom date. And the older you get, the less painstaking the polishing is. The ornate crevices of each knife and fork - don't tell Cuddy I said ornate crevices - were virtually caked with years of accumulated silver polish."
"Polish loaded with cadmium," Foreman finished. House tapped his nose in approval. "The renal failure, the cardiomegaly, the joint pain. Read a NIOSH study on worker cadmium exposure last month -- pretty serious stuff. So the old lady didn't realize she was dosing the girl with cadmium as well as silver, and the girl had no idea she was being dosed."
"This is positively medieval," Chase breathed, shaking his head. "Boudeaux had to have wondered about her symptoms. She could've saved that kidney."
"She's poor and she didn't trust doctors." House shrugged and considered. "Maybe Cracker Girl's not so dumb after all."
**
"Dr. House."
House turned on his cane to face Agent Scully, trailed by Mulder.
"Sorry, Clarice, I'm stalking somebody else these days. You and Dr. Van Helsing heading out?"
"I hardly know why I bothered," Scully began tersely, "but I wanted to thank you for your role in resolving this case. And congratulate you for saving that young woman's life. I have to be honest -- I'd considered lodging a complaint with Dr. Cuddy about your conduct throughout this case, but in all good conscience, I can't bring myself to do it."
The doctor smirked crookedly. "Nothing a modern-day Dr. Schweitzer couldn't have done, at least with the help of a redneck sociopath with two good kidneys. As for the case, well, why don't we just keep that our little secret, huh?"
Mulder shook his head. "Why is so hard for you to accept that there's more to this universe, to the human condition, than what's in the Merck Manual and Gray's Anatomy?"
"Well, Horatio," House smiled mirthlessly, "science saved Cracker Girl's life -- superstition almost killed her. The problem is, true believers like you never know when to stop believing and start reasoning." He started toward the hospital lobby. "Get the kosher meal on the plane -- you'll eat better."
"Dr. House." Scully's voice was low, but the intensity of her tone stopped the diagnostician. He turned back, expectantly.
"And just what do you believe in, Dr. House?" the agent murmured, evenly. "God? The beauty of this universe? The fundamental value of each human life? Your patients?"
"Scully," Mulder warned.
Scully crossed her arms, eyes locked on the doctor. "No, I'd like to know. How about yourself? Do you believe in that? Or is this all just some glib, bitter pastime for you?"
House stared mutely at the agent, his expression blank. "I believe," he finally started, "in the fundamental restorative powers of a good cup of java. I'm gonna guess, though, that you don't have any change on you."
Scully waited for her answer. Then Mulder stepped forward and faced House. He extended four quarters. House accepted them and looked around Mulder at his partner.
"Didn't think so," he grunted, and limped away.
*end
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Legal Disclaimer: The authors published here make no claims on the ownership of Dr. Gregory House and the other fictional residents of Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. Like the television show House (and quite possibly Dr. Wilson's pocket protector), they are the property of Fox Television, David Shore and undoubtedly other individuals of whom I am only peripherally aware. The fan fiction authors published here receive no monetary benefit from their work and intend no copyright infringement nor slight to the actual owners. We love the characters and we love the show, otherwise we wouldn't be here.
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