By Montykins
House claims to be taking a Spring Break vacation, which means that he has no interaction with his team for the entire episode. Instead, he spends the whole time administering dangerous levels of chemotherapy to Wilson in his apartment. There are many highly emotional scenes, and if you're a fan of people waking up in a cold sweat, this is the plot for you.
Meanwhile, House's team has to deal with a girl named Emily who has an incredibly rare genetic problem. But it has nothing to do with her mystery disease. It's really just an excuse for her mother being a doctor who specializes in this particular genetic problem and gets in the way of the team. She's overprotective and the father wants his little girl to have fun, so that naturally results in the two of them fighting a lot. Anyway, Emily has a tumor in her heart and her parents seem to sort of get back together at the end.
A birthday party! Kids riding bikes and swinging on swings! A man slides down a slide with whom I can only assume is his daughter. She wants to go on the merry-go-round without him, which he doesn't like the idea of. She insists that she's six, so it's fine. They stop by the pinwheel stand and he makes her promise not to tell mommy. On she goes! She holds on tight and gets belted in. He gets out a camera, which I think will give away the fact that he's not on the ride with her. She starts to look weird. I think she's trying to convey queasiness. And there's blood coming out of her nose. The time her horse comes around, she's not on it. Daddy freaks out, shouts for the ride to be shut off and runs on. She's lying down unconscious on the inner ring. "Help me!" he shouts. Her name is Emily.
Wilson looks at his own brainscan. House has snuck into wherever he is and explains that he followed him. He exposits that Wilson has frequently not let him be alone, so now he's turning the tables. But he promises not to say a word. So he breaks out a drink with a teeny umbrella on the grounds that he's on vacation. House is on spring break! Whoo!
Taub thinks it's bad that House is taking time off. Foreman brings a case into the team. Emily is a six-year-old with a nosebleed. And she has a rare genetic disorder called "AT." This is explained by Elizabeth Lawson, who is an expert on the condition and also, coincidentally, Emily's mother. She examined Emily's lungs two days ago and is very quick to shoot down diagnoses before they're fully out of people's mouths. She claims that she was told this team was very good. Park: "We are. Have you considered Wegener's granulomatosis?" She has not, but it's a good fit. But the genetic anomaly means Emily can't have X-rays. Dr. Lawson leaves and everyone glares at Foreman. He says they have to use her.
A doctor tells Wilson he wants to shrink the tumor with radiation and chemo. Wilson knows all this and doesn't like his odds. He wants the radiation and chemo concurrently. He rejects the treatment plan and goes off to find a doctor who agrees with him. House is also there and he does nothing to get Wilson to agree.
The Lawsons are arguing about whether it was irresponsible to allow Emily to ride the merry-go-round on her own. Mr. Lawson's name is Simon. He had her all week. Dr. Lawson wakes Emily up and tells her she's going to be taken for an MRI. Adams claims that it stands for "Magic Really-Cool Images," but Emily is just confused by that, since she'd been told it stood for Magnetic Resonance Imaging. She's got a super-rare genetic condition -- of course she's familiar with the MRI.
By Montykins
House plays Battleship with Wilson. He's very good. And it involves taking shots. Also, they're using pizza boxes instead of playing actual Battleship. House takes the opportunity to interrogate Wilson about why he freaked out about the proposed treatment plan. He should be in radiation right now! Wilson walks off.
Adams and Taub monitor the MRI. From inside, Emily admits that she was only pretending to be asleep while the Lawsons argued. Taub says that his daughters do that sometimes too and Emily asks if his wife ever wants a divorce. He's not very convincing as he claims that everything's fine at home. "Hold still now! No more talking!" Adams wants to talk about Dr. Lawson's tendency to call Emily "The patient." Just then! Emily starts crying out in pain! And she won't say where it hurts! She just wants her daddy!
House's office. Taub says they were able to return circulation to Emily's hands and feet. Adams speculates that it was stress. Dr. Lawson shuts that down since Emily's heard the Lawsons fight a lot. She also rejects lupus. And she's shown no signs of immune activation. She suddenly decides that it could be heavy metal poisoning because Simon just moved into a new place and hey, maybe it has lead paint or something. Chase says that lupus is a better fit. Dr. Lawson says, "I don't mean to pull rank here, but I am her mother." Chase says she was supposed to be here as a doctor. But she claims that parental consent is needed for any treatment, so she gets final say on everything. She leaves to go do tests on pain and orders the team to start on whatever it is you do for heavy metal poisoning. When she's gone, Chase says they should treat her like any other mother.
So naturally, the scene is Chase nosing around Dr. Lawson's place. He calls it "the environmental mother lode" because it's full of medical stuff. Adams is there with him and she doesn't think Emily would get to come down to the medical basement. Well, there's a playpen right there. They find some Lex-2, which is an experimental antibiotic that can overrule DNA. Adams isn't convinced it's being used on Emily, but who else would be appropriate?
House walks into Wilson's office, ignoring Wilson's claim that he has a headache. House has researched Wilson's activities and he's learned that Wilson has had five opinions already. Wilson wants a chemo dose so high there's a one-in-three chance it'll kill him. And why didn't he tell House? Because he knew House would interfere. But that means he's already found someone to prescribe it. And House knows who would do that: Wilson himself! There's a bag of chemicals right here! Wilson admits that he's been stockpiling equipment at his apartment. House wants to attack the bag with a knife, but Wilson thinks he might as well just do the extreme treatment right away. He's got a series of stories about people who died of cancer when they had good survival chances. "I promised him he'd be fine. Eight years old. I am not going to die slowly in a hospital bed under fluorescent lighting with people stopping by to gawk and lie about how I look. Even a small chance of that happening is too big a chance for me." House puts away his knife and calls Wilson an idiot who's probably going to die. On his way out of the office, he says to do it at his place.
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Chase tells Dr. Lawson that they think the environmental factor was her own drug. Foreman dismisses her claim that she tested it on herself. She says that Emily wouldn't have survived the winter without it. You can't test something on yourself! Foreman tells her that he's talked to the people who are officially testing Lex-2, and it's linked to renal failure in rats. Chase goes off to see if it's reversible.
House's place. Unauthorized treatment. House pours himself and Wilson martinis. "To stupidity. To muscle aches. Spasms." And on and on. I'm sure Wilson knows all the unpleasantness that comes with chemo. Wilson's on my side on this, pointing out that he's an oncologist. House describes everything in horrific detail and ends with, "Now. What are we doing here, Wilson?" Wilson gives him a bag of chemicals.
Chase uses what I think is an ultrasound to look at Emily's kidneys. He lets her use it, but then BEEP BEEP BEEP! Emily's chest hurts. Chase: "It's definitely not her kidneys."
House gives Wilson some soup and promises it'll taste as good coming up as coming down. Wilson has a bandage around his arm. Wilson starts to tell House something and I suppose I have to transcribe House's response: "If you're going to say that you've always been secretly gay for me, everyone always just kind of assumed it." Very droll. Wilson appreciates the risk House is taking, since if Wilson dies in House's apartment, it wouldn't look good to his parole officer. They chat about where House should dump Wilson's body. Then Wilson's hand twitches a little, which lets House diagnose the muscle twitches that normally come only after the second bag of chemicals.
Wilson is wrapped in a blanket and doesn't look good at all. He tells House that he always thought he'd get sick with a wife and kids taking care of him. House asks if he was in this fantasy. "You have everything you need right here." Specifically, an extremely powerful painkiller. House injects himself too. Wilson: "Oh! That is nice."
Back to Emily's case. The Lex-2 is off the hook. Maybe an embolism caused by falling off the merry-go-round? But before they can get to the treatment, everyone's beepers go off. Simon is taking Emily to a different hospital! He's decided that because this legendary diagnostics department hasn't been right yet, he'll just take Emily to the hospital down the street. He and Elizabeth shout at each other until Chase points out that they're stressing out Emily. He takes Emily for some ice cream so Taub can tell Simon they think Emily has a clot in her lungs. She could die during the trip to the other hospital. "From the AT?" he asks. Taub explains that their current theory involves the fall. Simon gets mad at Elizabeth for not knowing Emily's best friend's name or that she's been having nightmares about penguins. But she fires back that he doesn't know her blood type. She's more interested in the thing that's killing their daughter. Simon, defeated, says, "Just make her better."
Wilson is a wreck. Some kid tells him he doesn't look too good. Wilson's hooked up to about a dozen tubes. The kid claims to have come in through the door and doesn't explain where his parents are. Wilson tries to stand and calls for House. Oh! It's the kid who died. The one that Wilson promised would live. "Why did I die?" "I don't know!" It's that sort of thing. There's a lot of acting going on. Wilson wants to know if he's dead. The kid turns into House as he says, "Not yet."
MRI tube. Dr. Dawson, Taub and Park monitor things. Park announces that Emily's lungs are clear and Taub says that Emily's eyes are jaundiced. "Her liver's failing."
They found a blockage in Emily's hepatic vein. Dr. Lawson's fists are clenched and she suggests that there's no hope thanks to the unique genetic disorder. There's a pause, then Taub gently suggests they stick with their process. Dr. Lawson decides she shouldn't be there and leaves. She's right; she absolutely should not be there. Taub seems to be guessing when he comes up with advanced Lyme disease. Park says it should show up in her blood. But Chase says that it could be so advanced that it's in the organs and not the blood. It fits everything but the nose bleed. Park asks why it would attack everything all at once. What's changed? Adams says that what's changed was Elizabeth. "She stopped giving Emily the Lex-2." And that's what was holding back the Lyme disease. Chase goes off to start some amoxicillin.
Wilson is still a wreck. He wakes up and House is there with a bucket for him to vomit into. Apparently the soup doesn't actually taste that good coming back up. Wilson wants to know his white blood cell count. Down to 1000. Still dropping. Wilson wants more morphine, but they're out. Wilson's been on House's personal Vicodin supply, but House claims he's got plenty stashed around the place. Wilson has trouble swallowing. House goes into the room and determines that he has only six Vicodins left. He grabs some booze instead.
Both adult Lawsons are at Emily's bedside. Dr. Lawson thinks it can't be Lyme because Emily's never been in the woods. Emily says that she has, in fact, been in the woods. With her father. Simon says he grew up hunting. Dr. Lawson takes it surprisingly well and says they can't protect Emily from everything. "I assume you'll need a lumbar puncture to confirm," she says, going out to get, um, a lumbar puncturer.
Wilson forces himself off the couch and disconnects all the tubes. He crawls with great effort toward the bathroom. House tells him he's got adult diapers. Wilson has already used them and does not wish to be changed by House. He rolls onto his back and calls himself pathetic. He objects to the inevitable irony of being an oncologist with cancer. "WHY ME?" he asks. He has a crisis of conscience for all the times he told patients not to try to make sense of things. Then he insults House for a bit, because that's always fun. House says that even if he'd acted like House, he'd still have cancer. "Yeah. But at least I'd feel like I deserved it!
Emily is in position for the puncture. She wonders if, when she dies, maybe her parents will get back together. Chase and Adams don't like the sound of that. And then Emily's arm stops working. BEEP BEEP BEEP! She's having a stroke!
More beeping in House's apartment. Wilson is vomiting. The situation is critical and House feels that Wilson needs to go to the hospital. "You can't win this." "I'd rather die here. Not in an ambulance. Not in a hospital." Wilson sobs as he begs House to promise that he won't do that to him. House promises. Wilson takes some more oxygen as the beeping continues.
Chase runs through the various symptoms as the team stands in the hallway. Park thinks it still sounds like textbook pulmonary embolism, although they've already ruled that out. Taub suggests a fungal infection. Nope. And House isn't answering. Park suggests a cancer, which Taub rejects as not fast-moving enough. Chase gets Epiphany Face and says a tumor could act like a clot. Nitro-Myxoma. A primary heart tumor. He explains the details in voice-over as we see some inside-the-body shot. He tells the family they'll remove the tumor and hope it's benign.
Morning. Wilson wakes up and House is there to give him a glass of water. House is limping more than usual and says it will be seven to ten days for the swelling to go down, and then they'll rescan and schedule the surgery. He opens the curtains to let daylight in. Wilson starts to apologize for the mean things he said last night and House tells him to "tone down the bromance" because his leg is killing him. House helps Wilson to the bathroom. "I thought you said you had plenty of Vicodin." "Everybody lies." Wilson asks if House feels like this all the time. "It really does suck being you, doesn't it?" "At least I don't have cancer."
The tumor is out and was benign. Emily is hoping she's not sick anymore. Well, she still has a genetic anomaly, but she gets to go to the aquarium with her parents.
Wilson and House enter the hospital. Wilson says he'll see House at lunch. House watches him leave and smiles a tiny bit.
Wilson goes into his office and looks around. He turns on his computer, which plays Journey's "Any Way You Want It." It's also showing a slide show of sexy ladies playing on his unconscious body, which has been dressed up in a variety of silly Hawaiian shirts and novelty sunglasses. He laughs and laughs. Which is fair, because it's pretty funny.
Follow Monty on Twitter at @monty_ashley and read his blog, Mysterious Exhortations.
By Montykins
Morning. Wilson wakes up and House is there to give him a glass of water. House is limping more than usual and says it will be seven to ten days for the swelling to go down, and then they'll rescan and schedule the surgery. He opens the curtains to let daylight in. Wilson starts to apologize for the mean things he said last night and House tells him to "tone down the bromance" because his leg is killing him. House helps Wilson to the bathroom. "I thought you said you had plenty of Vicodin." "Everybody lies." Wilson asks if House feels like this all the time. "It really does suck being you, doesn't it?" "At least I don't have cancer."
The tumor is out and was benign. Emily is hoping she's not sick anymore. Well, she still has a genetic anomaly, but she gets to go to the aquarium with her parents.
Wilson and House enter the hospital. Wilson says he'll see House at lunch. House watches him leave and smiles a tiny bit.
Wilson goes into his office and looks around. He turns on his computer, which plays Journey's "Any Way You Want It." It's also showing a slide show of sexy ladies playing on his unconscious body, which has been dressed up in a variety of silly Hawaiian shirts and novelty sunglasses. He laughs and laughs. Which is fair, because it's pretty funny.
Follow Monty on Twitter at @monty_ashley and read his blog, Mysterious Exhortations.
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