(no subject)
Title: For Every Closed Door (14/14)
Fandom: House MD/Dead Like Me crossover
Author: Starling
Rating: R overall
Characters/pairings: House/Wilson, original characters.
Warnings: Afterlife!Fic. Thus, by necessity, also a death!fic, but not depressing.
Summary: But every heaven that he'd seen had been empty of other people. There was never anybody waiting on the other side.
Obligatory Disclaimer: I don't own, write for, or produce either of these fabulous shows. I'm just a geek with too much time on her hands.
A/N: It's been a fun ride, all. Three months and over 45,000 words! Crazy, I tell you. Thanks for all the fabulous comments, support, and encouragement you all have given me along the way.
Unbeta'd. All mistakes are mine.
Concrit feedback gives me warm fuzzies.
x-posted to housefic and house_wilson.
A/N 2: The Cliffs of Moher mentioned in this chapter are in County Clare, Ireland, and a picture of them can be found here.
You don't mess with fate. People die when they are meant to die. There's no discussion. There's no negotiation. When life's done, it's done. You of all people should know that. -From Dead Like Me
The sun was going down, on both the day and on Wilson's life. How very fitting. Maybe if House was a poet, he could appreciate it more. As it was, the blatant symbolism just enraged him further.
House stood, then crumpled the Post-It note in his fist and tossed it back at Kay, as Ada and Colby arrived at the scene. Ada bent down to help Kay back to her feet, but the other woman shrugged her off.
"Get out," he growled at her, then lifted his glance to include the other Reapers. "All of you."
"Can't," Kay answered.
"You mean won't."
"I mean I can't. I have a job to do-"
"Fuck that," House hissed.
Kay spat and wiped blood away from her swollen nose and mouth. Ada bent down to help her up, and this time, Kay allowed her. "Can you two give us a moment?" she asked, once she'd gained her footing.
"Kay-" Colby began, but Ada hushed him. She tugged on his arm until he reluctantly turned, and they walked a dozen feet away. Far enough to give them the illusion of privacy, close enough to rush back if he tried to hit Kay again.
House was left alone with Kay, who looked wretched. Blood was still dripping down her face from where he'd hit her, and she seemed smaller, shrunken and old. He felt a small flash of pity for her, then resolutely smashed it down. Anger was what he needed here.
"How long have you known?" he asked.
"That Wilson's number was up?" She looked down at the ground, where drops of her blood had fallen onto the sidewalk. "Five days," she said, her voice barely audible.
Five days. That meant two days before she'd even seen Wilson at the bar. House's hands curled into hard fists.
"You know I won't let you do this," he said.
She laughed, a small exhalation without a shred of humor in it. "You know there's no way around it."
"Is that why you brought the reinforcements?" House asked, nodding towards the streetlight under which Ada and Colby huddled. "Two of them to hold me down while you kill Wilson?"
Kay shrugged and sat down on the stoop in front of House's building. "There's that. Also to force me to actually go through with it."
That stopped him. He watched Kay as she dug her cigarettes out of her pocket and lit one.
"You're lying," House said.
Kay shook her head, exhaling smoke. "I don't want to do this. I just..." she trailed off.
"What?"
"I just know that the alternative is worse."
House seized her lapels and dragged her to her feet. "Worse?" he spat viciously, shaking the smaller woman. "Worse than him living? What the fuck are you-"
Kay gripped both of his wrists and twisted them outwards, forcing him to drop her. "He won't live. His number is up, he's going to die in ten minutes, there's nothing either of us can do to stop it. If there was a way around this, I'd have taken it. There's not."
"Then why did you let me fall in love with him?" House shouted. The words were almost as surprising to him as they were to Kay, who stared back in shock.
"You were already in love with him," she said.
House wanted to deny, but couldn't. Not truthfully. He wasn't sure when it had happened, if it had been there before he died or if he'd only realized it after he'd lost everything.
"It's better this way," Kay said, though she sounded as if she weren't completely convinced. "Isn't it? At least you had these few days-"
"Yeah, because what's indefinite grief compared to a few days of bliss?" he hissed. "Don't pretend your motives are pure. You thought that if you could push Wilson and I together, you would make up for seventy years of never making a move on Delia. Did it work?"
Kay sat slowly back down on the step. She picked up the cigarette from the sidewalk, where she'd dropped it when House had grabbed her. She didn't smoke it, just stared at the burning ember. "Nothing makes up for that," she said softly. "I've lived with my regret, and I wanted to spare you the same. I'm sorry."
She sounded genuinely remorseful. House wanted to kick her. But that's probably what she wanted. "Your apology means nothing. You're still going to kill him."
"She's not killing him, House," Ada said. He hadn't heard her come back, but now she was standing a few feet away from them, Colby behind her. "She's doing him a favor. Remember Dana? You want the same thing to happen to your friend?"
Ride-on mower girl. House suddenly felt sick, thinking of her burnt, charred legs. The image of Wilson's legs, the skin pale and smooth, muscles moving liquidly underneath, flashed in House's mind, and he felt his knees buckle. He stumbled, and sat down hard next to Kay on the stoop.
Ada advanced on him, eyes boring fiercely into him. "You want him to wear his death for the rest of eternity? Maybe he won't be burned like she was, but he'll wake up screaming just the same if his soul is still tied to his body when he dies."
"Ada-" Kay said weakly.
"Scars run deeper than just skin," Ada said, cutting her off. "You want that for him? You want his soul to wither and rot inside him?"
"Stop it," House said. Ada's words about scars clanged in his head. The memory of excruciating, searing pain echoed in his leg, and he remembered what such pain had done to him. House glanced at Kay for help, but she wouldn't meet his eyes. Her cigarette was pinched hard between two of her fingers, the filter was nearly crushed. Colby stood a bit away from their group, his eyes nervously flitting between the three of them, then glancing down to the watch on his wrist.
"Six minutes," he said quietly.
"You love him," Ada said, ignoring him, "you'll let Kay do this."
Rationally, House knew she was right, and he'd always prided himself on his rationality. This should be simple as math; damn Wilson to an eternity of pain and trauma, or don't.
But every heaven that he'd seen had been empty of other people. There was never anybody waiting on the other side.
"Do what?" spoke a voice behind him.
House's heart stopped, paused, then started hammering in his chest. He turned towards the door. Wilson was standing there. How long? How much had he heard?
"What happened to your face?" Wilson suddenly asked Kay, whose face was still swollen and bruised, with blood crusted around her lips and still seeping from her nose. Wilson turned angrily to House. "Did you hit her?"
"I-"
But Wilson was just sighing disgustedly at him, and moving towards Kay. House grabbed at him, but the other man pushed him away, reaching towards Kay.
"No!" House shouted. He grabbed again, and managed to get a fistful of Wilson's shirt. He yanked Wilson away from the other Reaper.
"Mika, stop it!" Wilson said, fighting him. "What's wrong with you?"
Over his shoulder, House saw Ada and Colby circling towards him and Wilson. Kay stood swiftly and held up her hand, stilling them. Though Wilson was within her reach, she didn't touch him. She met House's eyes instead.
There was sorrow there in her gaze, a hundred years' worth of it. There was exhaustion, pain and anger, all of which he'd expected, and something else that surprised him. A choice. He remembered her telling him that free will wasn't complicated. He could let Wilson go or try, selfishly, to keep him here. Either way, the other man would die, but that was the choice before him, and the consequences of his actions were immense, looming.
House felt his grip on the other man's shoulders tighten unconsciously. Then he forced himself to let go.
Wilson tore out of his arms. House watched numbly as Wilson put his hands on Kay's shoulders, encouraging her to sit back down on the stoop.
"It's okay, I'm a doctor. Lean forward." He tilted her head gently, putting one hand on the bridge of her nose. "Doesn't look broken-"
"I'm all right," she said.
"I can't believe he hit you-" Wilson said, shooting House a furious glare. House could only stare back, cold seeping outwards from his stomach into his limbs.
"Trust me, I was asking for it." Kay took one of his hands away from her face, grasping it gently. "I'll be all right, really. Thank you, though."
Wilson didn't notice as his soul left his body through that gentle touch, but House saw it, and felt his insides turn to stone. That was it, then.
"Here," Wilson said, repositioning her hand. "Lean forward and pinch the bridge of your nose until the bleeding stops." He stood and turned to House. "I need to talk to you." Wilson grasped him roughly and pulled him away from the stoop, so that they stood on the edge of the sidewalk.
"What the hell is wrong with you? Why did you hit her?" Wilson demanded.
The only words House could force out of his numb lips were, "I'm sorry."
"Don't apologize to me," Wilson said. "Apologize to-"
A sudden roaring sound interrupted him. House started to turn, saw a flash of headlights bearing down on them, then felt hands shoving him away. He fell hard onto his back on the sidewalk, aware of something huge and metallic passing through the space he had so recently occupied. He heard the impact of the car as it hit Wilson's body, and then there was a huge crash. He looked up.
A car, the words Dirty Dave's - New York Style Pizza printed in lurid red letters on its side, was now wrapped around the telephone pole a dozen yards away from him. His eyes found Wilson's body, a broken, bleeding husk laying in the middle of the street. He was unquestionably dead.
The driver's side door wrenched open, and a young man fell out of it. Colby ran over and picked him up.
"What the hell happened?" the guy asked. "I-"
"Are you Tom Kinsey?" Colby said, cutting him off. House suddenly recognized him from his first reap at Dirty Dave's. He was the guy that Susan Manning had said was touching her boob after she'd died.
"What?" he said. "Yeah, that's me. Did I hit-"
Colby pulled the guy's soul out of his body with a touch to his shoulder, dropped him back on the ground, then walked quickly away from the car.
"Hey-" the guy said weakly.
House saw a Graveling jump out of the broken passenger side window. The puddle of gasoline underneath splashed a little when it landed. The Graveling shot House a twisted grin when it saw him watching, then disappeared in a shower of falling ash and sparks.
"Everybody duck!" Ada shouted. He heard twin thumps as both she and Colby hit the ground, and barely managed to cover his face before the car blew up.
A wave of heat and a blast of noise rolled over him, and House felt debris hitting his chest, burning through his clothes. Over the ringing in his ears, he heard something clatter to the ground next to him. When House finally opened his eyes, shielding them from the brightly burning fire, he saw it was a partially melted CD, presumably from the car: James Taylor's Greatest Hits, Volume 2.
"For fuck's sake," he muttered. The irony would have killed him if he weren't already dead.
"House?" The words were soft and unsure. House looked up and met Wilson's gaze.
"Is that really you?" Wilson asked. "What happened?"
House looked away from him, and his gaze fell on the crumpled body in the street. "You died."
"Oh. So that's why you're here," Wilson said in a queer, breathless voice. His brow furrowed, and he knelt down to touch House's face. "You're bleeding," he said.
His fingers passed through House's skin. To House, it felt like snowflakes alighting and melting on his cheek, cold and not quite real.
"What-" Wilson asked, his eyes growing wide.
The delivery driver appeared beside them before Wilson had a chance to finish.
"Duuuuuude," the kid exhaled, looking at the fire. "That was fucked up."
Colby and Ada intercepted him, perhaps sensing that House was about to try and find a way to kill the guy all over again. "Come on, Tom. I'm gonna show you some pretty lights."
"Lights are cool," Tom agreed, letting himself be escorted away. House wondered briefly how much pot he'd smoked before trying to deliver their pizza.
"Why can't I touch you?" Wilson asked after they walked away.
"The reason you can't touch him," Kay said from behind them, "Is that House has a body, and you don't."
Incomprehension washed over Wilson's face. "But he died," he said plaintively. "Like me. Why-"
"I know," Kay said, sitting down on the other side of him. "I was there. House got tapped to become a Reaper, like me. We take the souls of people who are about to die and escort them to the other side."
Wilson turned back to him. "Escort?"
House tried to answer, but couldn't seem to get past the block in his throat. He looked back at the ground.
Kay answered Wilson. "He can't go where you're going."
There was a burst of lights where Tom, Ada, and Colby stood. House heard the crash of waves, and looked up to see Tom moving towards a field full of red poppies, the bright flowers bending and waving in a warm, perfumed breeze. He stepped onto the soft ground, and then the scene dissolved, taking the stoned delivery man with it.
"Yours should be here soon, when you're ready," Kay said.
"I'm not ready," Wilson said violently. He stood and ran a hand through his hair. "This... this is some kind of joke. Right? Or a hallucination? This can't be real."
"It sucks, but it's real," Kay said softly. A massive understatement, in House's opinion.
"It's not fair!" Wilson shouted. He shot House a slightly desperate look. House looked away, unable to meet his eyes.
"Since when was life ever fair?" he muttered. "Or death?"
Wilson looked at him, anger evident in his face. "So you're stuck here? For how long?"
House looked at Kay, who shrugged. "Until he's filled his quota," she said.
Wilson made a face. "That's sick."
"That's how it is." She seemed to realize how cold her statement with, and ducked her head. "I'm sorry," she added. It was genuine, House realized, unlike when she had apologized at his own death.
"I won't go-" Wilson started to say.
House surprised himself by finding his voice again. "You will. You can't stay here forever, waiting for me to kick off."
Wilson flinched at his words and rough tone. "Don't want me cramping your style?" he asked flatly.
House shook his head, but it was true, in a way. To live with Wilson's ghost until House finally filled his quota of souls, in fifty or a hundred years, never being able to touch him; it sounded like an exquisite torture, his own version of Tantalus's punishment. House didn't think he was capable of withstanding that.
Wilson's brows suddenly furrowed. "Wait," he said. "Where's Mika? Is he..." His eyes suddenly fell on House, then dropped down and took in his battered, but still recognizable, T-shirt and jeans.
"Oh," he said, comprehension dawning on his face. "Oh, god. How..." Wilson trailed off.
"It's kind of complicated-" Kay started to say, but Wilson cut her off.
"Of course you would find a way to mess with my head from beyond the grave!" he shouted at House. "You ass. You complete bastard. You couldn't let a little thing like dying stop you from trying to drive me nuts. I shouldn't even be surprised."
He threw up his hands in disgust and turned away. House watched as Wilson put his head down, rubbing at the back of his neck in a gesture that was achingly familiar.
He heard a soft, breathy noise, and his alarm grew. Then he heard Wilson laugh. The sound of it was unmistakable.
"Fuck it. It's kind of romantic, really," Wilson said, turning back to them. He was grinning wryly. "Epic, even. The man who didn't let death stop him from bedding his best friend; that's ballad-worthy. Hell, I'm flattered."
"Flattered?" House said dumbly. "You think this is funny?"
Wilson snorted. "What the hell else should I think? I just died, then found out that the guy I've been sleeping with is actually my dead best friend, only with a different face. I think it's laugh or cry at this point."
House could only stare at him.
"If anybody could have pulled this off, it's you. You never could let anything go," Wilson said, exasperated and amused at the same time.
"Not true," House muttered, thinking of his decision a moment ago.
Wilson knelt in front of him and tried to touch him. His hand passed through House's knee, and House felt goosebumps raise on the skin. Wilson bit his lip and put his hand back down.
"It wasn't a game," House said suddenly. Then he remembered Operation Weasel, which actually had been a game, for a little while at least. "I wasn't only trying to screw with you," he amended.
"Just screw me, period?" Wilson replied with a raised eyebrow, but his tone was light, almost forgiving. He cut off House's protest with a wave of his hand. "I think I knew, sort of. That it was you. I thought I was going crazy."
House watched as Wilson frowned suddenly. "More things to heaven and earth..." the other man said musingly.
He was about to ask Wilson what that meant, when a burst of light in front of them made him shield his eyes.
House couldn't bring himself to look at Wilson's afterlife, but he still smelled the sea, and could hear gulls and other seabirds crying in the distance.
"Is that... it?" Wilson asked.
"Yeah. It'll be someplace you know and love, or that you've always fantasized about," House heard himself saying.
"But..." Wilson trailed off, squinting into the distance of his heaven.
"It's all right," House said. "I'll be okay here." It was a total lie, but Wilson didn't need to know that. House just wanted to get this over with.
The other man shot House an annoyed look. "It's not that. I don't know this place."
That made House look up. He saw a green field with a narrow lane bisecting it, low rock walls on either side of it. In the distance, he saw a series of dramatic, mist-enshrouded cliffs of stone and moss that jutted out into the dark blue sea.
"It's the Cliffs of Moher," Kay said from behind them. House turned to look at her; he'd almost forgotten she was there. Kay stared at the green fields and stone walls hungrily. "They're in County Clare, in Ireland."
"Why would Wilson's afterlife in Ireland?" House asked.
Kay shot him an irritated glance that quickly turned into a joyous smile "It's not his afterlife, dumbass. It's mine. Look." She pointed to a spot on a nearby cliff.
There was a figure there, wearing a plain T-shirt and jeans, with no shoes. House could see that she was, of all things, playing a violin; if he listened carefully, House could just make out the tune of a creaky waltz being played very badly.
"Delia," Kay breathed. "She always wanted to learn how to play, but never got around to it." She turned to House excitedly, grabbing his sleeve. "Do you know what this means? Wilson was my last Reap."
Sudden understanding crashed onto House. He grasped the smaller woman's arm as he stumbled, knees buckling under the weight of his relief.
"They slammed the door in our faces, locked the window, but she found a way through anyway! I should have known she would." Kay laughed, and it seemed like Delia heard her. The other woman stopped playing the violin and turned towards them. Kay glanced quickly away from the cliffs and the woman, back to House.
"Tell them goodbye for me," Kay said, meaning Ada and Colby, he assumed. "No, tell them I said I'd see them later," she amended, grinning wildly.
"Much later, I hope," House said. Kay just shrugged, and on impulse, hugged him.
By the time House remembered that he should respond somehow, Kay had let him go and started running down the narrow road towards Delia. Before they met, the cliffs, the lane, and the green fields all folded up and faded away from House's view.
House and Wilson were left standing in the street, the wreckage of the delivery man's car burning merrily a dozen yards away, and sirens screeching in the distance.
"What just happened?" Wilson asked. "I'm confused."
"You just got conscripted," Ada said, coming up from behind them. House wondered if she was in charge now that Kay was gone, or if Colby would be.
"Conscripted?" Wilson said. He put his hands on his hips, and addressed House. "Pretend I just had something very traumatic - like, I don't know, dying maybe? - happen to me, and that my thought process is still recovering. Now, what the hell is going on?"
Ada sighed. "Let me explain how this works..."
House tuned her out and watched Wilson as he listened to the other Reaper. For the first time since he died, he started thinking about the future beyond tomorrow, beyond his next Reap, beyond the job at hand and the ways he would distract himself from it. Specifically, he started thinking about the day Wilson would become corporeal again. House smiled. His afterlife was suddenly looking a lot brighter.
****
"That's the thing about life, isn't it? How can something be so boring and extraordinary at the same time?" -From Dead Like Me
Fandom: House MD/Dead Like Me crossover
Author: Starling
Rating: R overall
Characters/pairings: House/Wilson, original characters.
Warnings: Afterlife!Fic. Thus, by necessity, also a death!fic, but not depressing.
Summary: But every heaven that he'd seen had been empty of other people. There was never anybody waiting on the other side.
Obligatory Disclaimer: I don't own, write for, or produce either of these fabulous shows. I'm just a geek with too much time on her hands.
A/N: It's been a fun ride, all. Three months and over 45,000 words! Crazy, I tell you. Thanks for all the fabulous comments, support, and encouragement you all have given me along the way.
Unbeta'd. All mistakes are mine.
Concrit feedback gives me warm fuzzies.
x-posted to housefic and house_wilson.
A/N 2: The Cliffs of Moher mentioned in this chapter are in County Clare, Ireland, and a picture of them can be found here.
You don't mess with fate. People die when they are meant to die. There's no discussion. There's no negotiation. When life's done, it's done. You of all people should know that. -From Dead Like Me
The sun was going down, on both the day and on Wilson's life. How very fitting. Maybe if House was a poet, he could appreciate it more. As it was, the blatant symbolism just enraged him further.
House stood, then crumpled the Post-It note in his fist and tossed it back at Kay, as Ada and Colby arrived at the scene. Ada bent down to help Kay back to her feet, but the other woman shrugged her off.
"Get out," he growled at her, then lifted his glance to include the other Reapers. "All of you."
"Can't," Kay answered.
"You mean won't."
"I mean I can't. I have a job to do-"
"Fuck that," House hissed.
Kay spat and wiped blood away from her swollen nose and mouth. Ada bent down to help her up, and this time, Kay allowed her. "Can you two give us a moment?" she asked, once she'd gained her footing.
"Kay-" Colby began, but Ada hushed him. She tugged on his arm until he reluctantly turned, and they walked a dozen feet away. Far enough to give them the illusion of privacy, close enough to rush back if he tried to hit Kay again.
House was left alone with Kay, who looked wretched. Blood was still dripping down her face from where he'd hit her, and she seemed smaller, shrunken and old. He felt a small flash of pity for her, then resolutely smashed it down. Anger was what he needed here.
"How long have you known?" he asked.
"That Wilson's number was up?" She looked down at the ground, where drops of her blood had fallen onto the sidewalk. "Five days," she said, her voice barely audible.
Five days. That meant two days before she'd even seen Wilson at the bar. House's hands curled into hard fists.
"You know I won't let you do this," he said.
She laughed, a small exhalation without a shred of humor in it. "You know there's no way around it."
"Is that why you brought the reinforcements?" House asked, nodding towards the streetlight under which Ada and Colby huddled. "Two of them to hold me down while you kill Wilson?"
Kay shrugged and sat down on the stoop in front of House's building. "There's that. Also to force me to actually go through with it."
That stopped him. He watched Kay as she dug her cigarettes out of her pocket and lit one.
"You're lying," House said.
Kay shook her head, exhaling smoke. "I don't want to do this. I just..." she trailed off.
"What?"
"I just know that the alternative is worse."
House seized her lapels and dragged her to her feet. "Worse?" he spat viciously, shaking the smaller woman. "Worse than him living? What the fuck are you-"
Kay gripped both of his wrists and twisted them outwards, forcing him to drop her. "He won't live. His number is up, he's going to die in ten minutes, there's nothing either of us can do to stop it. If there was a way around this, I'd have taken it. There's not."
"Then why did you let me fall in love with him?" House shouted. The words were almost as surprising to him as they were to Kay, who stared back in shock.
"You were already in love with him," she said.
House wanted to deny, but couldn't. Not truthfully. He wasn't sure when it had happened, if it had been there before he died or if he'd only realized it after he'd lost everything.
"It's better this way," Kay said, though she sounded as if she weren't completely convinced. "Isn't it? At least you had these few days-"
"Yeah, because what's indefinite grief compared to a few days of bliss?" he hissed. "Don't pretend your motives are pure. You thought that if you could push Wilson and I together, you would make up for seventy years of never making a move on Delia. Did it work?"
Kay sat slowly back down on the step. She picked up the cigarette from the sidewalk, where she'd dropped it when House had grabbed her. She didn't smoke it, just stared at the burning ember. "Nothing makes up for that," she said softly. "I've lived with my regret, and I wanted to spare you the same. I'm sorry."
She sounded genuinely remorseful. House wanted to kick her. But that's probably what she wanted. "Your apology means nothing. You're still going to kill him."
"She's not killing him, House," Ada said. He hadn't heard her come back, but now she was standing a few feet away from them, Colby behind her. "She's doing him a favor. Remember Dana? You want the same thing to happen to your friend?"
Ride-on mower girl. House suddenly felt sick, thinking of her burnt, charred legs. The image of Wilson's legs, the skin pale and smooth, muscles moving liquidly underneath, flashed in House's mind, and he felt his knees buckle. He stumbled, and sat down hard next to Kay on the stoop.
Ada advanced on him, eyes boring fiercely into him. "You want him to wear his death for the rest of eternity? Maybe he won't be burned like she was, but he'll wake up screaming just the same if his soul is still tied to his body when he dies."
"Ada-" Kay said weakly.
"Scars run deeper than just skin," Ada said, cutting her off. "You want that for him? You want his soul to wither and rot inside him?"
"Stop it," House said. Ada's words about scars clanged in his head. The memory of excruciating, searing pain echoed in his leg, and he remembered what such pain had done to him. House glanced at Kay for help, but she wouldn't meet his eyes. Her cigarette was pinched hard between two of her fingers, the filter was nearly crushed. Colby stood a bit away from their group, his eyes nervously flitting between the three of them, then glancing down to the watch on his wrist.
"Six minutes," he said quietly.
"You love him," Ada said, ignoring him, "you'll let Kay do this."
Rationally, House knew she was right, and he'd always prided himself on his rationality. This should be simple as math; damn Wilson to an eternity of pain and trauma, or don't.
But every heaven that he'd seen had been empty of other people. There was never anybody waiting on the other side.
"Do what?" spoke a voice behind him.
House's heart stopped, paused, then started hammering in his chest. He turned towards the door. Wilson was standing there. How long? How much had he heard?
"What happened to your face?" Wilson suddenly asked Kay, whose face was still swollen and bruised, with blood crusted around her lips and still seeping from her nose. Wilson turned angrily to House. "Did you hit her?"
"I-"
But Wilson was just sighing disgustedly at him, and moving towards Kay. House grabbed at him, but the other man pushed him away, reaching towards Kay.
"No!" House shouted. He grabbed again, and managed to get a fistful of Wilson's shirt. He yanked Wilson away from the other Reaper.
"Mika, stop it!" Wilson said, fighting him. "What's wrong with you?"
Over his shoulder, House saw Ada and Colby circling towards him and Wilson. Kay stood swiftly and held up her hand, stilling them. Though Wilson was within her reach, she didn't touch him. She met House's eyes instead.
There was sorrow there in her gaze, a hundred years' worth of it. There was exhaustion, pain and anger, all of which he'd expected, and something else that surprised him. A choice. He remembered her telling him that free will wasn't complicated. He could let Wilson go or try, selfishly, to keep him here. Either way, the other man would die, but that was the choice before him, and the consequences of his actions were immense, looming.
House felt his grip on the other man's shoulders tighten unconsciously. Then he forced himself to let go.
Wilson tore out of his arms. House watched numbly as Wilson put his hands on Kay's shoulders, encouraging her to sit back down on the stoop.
"It's okay, I'm a doctor. Lean forward." He tilted her head gently, putting one hand on the bridge of her nose. "Doesn't look broken-"
"I'm all right," she said.
"I can't believe he hit you-" Wilson said, shooting House a furious glare. House could only stare back, cold seeping outwards from his stomach into his limbs.
"Trust me, I was asking for it." Kay took one of his hands away from her face, grasping it gently. "I'll be all right, really. Thank you, though."
Wilson didn't notice as his soul left his body through that gentle touch, but House saw it, and felt his insides turn to stone. That was it, then.
"Here," Wilson said, repositioning her hand. "Lean forward and pinch the bridge of your nose until the bleeding stops." He stood and turned to House. "I need to talk to you." Wilson grasped him roughly and pulled him away from the stoop, so that they stood on the edge of the sidewalk.
"What the hell is wrong with you? Why did you hit her?" Wilson demanded.
The only words House could force out of his numb lips were, "I'm sorry."
"Don't apologize to me," Wilson said. "Apologize to-"
A sudden roaring sound interrupted him. House started to turn, saw a flash of headlights bearing down on them, then felt hands shoving him away. He fell hard onto his back on the sidewalk, aware of something huge and metallic passing through the space he had so recently occupied. He heard the impact of the car as it hit Wilson's body, and then there was a huge crash. He looked up.
A car, the words Dirty Dave's - New York Style Pizza printed in lurid red letters on its side, was now wrapped around the telephone pole a dozen yards away from him. His eyes found Wilson's body, a broken, bleeding husk laying in the middle of the street. He was unquestionably dead.
The driver's side door wrenched open, and a young man fell out of it. Colby ran over and picked him up.
"What the hell happened?" the guy asked. "I-"
"Are you Tom Kinsey?" Colby said, cutting him off. House suddenly recognized him from his first reap at Dirty Dave's. He was the guy that Susan Manning had said was touching her boob after she'd died.
"What?" he said. "Yeah, that's me. Did I hit-"
Colby pulled the guy's soul out of his body with a touch to his shoulder, dropped him back on the ground, then walked quickly away from the car.
"Hey-" the guy said weakly.
House saw a Graveling jump out of the broken passenger side window. The puddle of gasoline underneath splashed a little when it landed. The Graveling shot House a twisted grin when it saw him watching, then disappeared in a shower of falling ash and sparks.
"Everybody duck!" Ada shouted. He heard twin thumps as both she and Colby hit the ground, and barely managed to cover his face before the car blew up.
A wave of heat and a blast of noise rolled over him, and House felt debris hitting his chest, burning through his clothes. Over the ringing in his ears, he heard something clatter to the ground next to him. When House finally opened his eyes, shielding them from the brightly burning fire, he saw it was a partially melted CD, presumably from the car: James Taylor's Greatest Hits, Volume 2.
"For fuck's sake," he muttered. The irony would have killed him if he weren't already dead.
"House?" The words were soft and unsure. House looked up and met Wilson's gaze.
"Is that really you?" Wilson asked. "What happened?"
House looked away from him, and his gaze fell on the crumpled body in the street. "You died."
"Oh. So that's why you're here," Wilson said in a queer, breathless voice. His brow furrowed, and he knelt down to touch House's face. "You're bleeding," he said.
His fingers passed through House's skin. To House, it felt like snowflakes alighting and melting on his cheek, cold and not quite real.
"What-" Wilson asked, his eyes growing wide.
The delivery driver appeared beside them before Wilson had a chance to finish.
"Duuuuuude," the kid exhaled, looking at the fire. "That was fucked up."
Colby and Ada intercepted him, perhaps sensing that House was about to try and find a way to kill the guy all over again. "Come on, Tom. I'm gonna show you some pretty lights."
"Lights are cool," Tom agreed, letting himself be escorted away. House wondered briefly how much pot he'd smoked before trying to deliver their pizza.
"Why can't I touch you?" Wilson asked after they walked away.
"The reason you can't touch him," Kay said from behind them, "Is that House has a body, and you don't."
Incomprehension washed over Wilson's face. "But he died," he said plaintively. "Like me. Why-"
"I know," Kay said, sitting down on the other side of him. "I was there. House got tapped to become a Reaper, like me. We take the souls of people who are about to die and escort them to the other side."
Wilson turned back to him. "Escort?"
House tried to answer, but couldn't seem to get past the block in his throat. He looked back at the ground.
Kay answered Wilson. "He can't go where you're going."
There was a burst of lights where Tom, Ada, and Colby stood. House heard the crash of waves, and looked up to see Tom moving towards a field full of red poppies, the bright flowers bending and waving in a warm, perfumed breeze. He stepped onto the soft ground, and then the scene dissolved, taking the stoned delivery man with it.
"Yours should be here soon, when you're ready," Kay said.
"I'm not ready," Wilson said violently. He stood and ran a hand through his hair. "This... this is some kind of joke. Right? Or a hallucination? This can't be real."
"It sucks, but it's real," Kay said softly. A massive understatement, in House's opinion.
"It's not fair!" Wilson shouted. He shot House a slightly desperate look. House looked away, unable to meet his eyes.
"Since when was life ever fair?" he muttered. "Or death?"
Wilson looked at him, anger evident in his face. "So you're stuck here? For how long?"
House looked at Kay, who shrugged. "Until he's filled his quota," she said.
Wilson made a face. "That's sick."
"That's how it is." She seemed to realize how cold her statement with, and ducked her head. "I'm sorry," she added. It was genuine, House realized, unlike when she had apologized at his own death.
"I won't go-" Wilson started to say.
House surprised himself by finding his voice again. "You will. You can't stay here forever, waiting for me to kick off."
Wilson flinched at his words and rough tone. "Don't want me cramping your style?" he asked flatly.
House shook his head, but it was true, in a way. To live with Wilson's ghost until House finally filled his quota of souls, in fifty or a hundred years, never being able to touch him; it sounded like an exquisite torture, his own version of Tantalus's punishment. House didn't think he was capable of withstanding that.
Wilson's brows suddenly furrowed. "Wait," he said. "Where's Mika? Is he..." His eyes suddenly fell on House, then dropped down and took in his battered, but still recognizable, T-shirt and jeans.
"Oh," he said, comprehension dawning on his face. "Oh, god. How..." Wilson trailed off.
"It's kind of complicated-" Kay started to say, but Wilson cut her off.
"Of course you would find a way to mess with my head from beyond the grave!" he shouted at House. "You ass. You complete bastard. You couldn't let a little thing like dying stop you from trying to drive me nuts. I shouldn't even be surprised."
He threw up his hands in disgust and turned away. House watched as Wilson put his head down, rubbing at the back of his neck in a gesture that was achingly familiar.
He heard a soft, breathy noise, and his alarm grew. Then he heard Wilson laugh. The sound of it was unmistakable.
"Fuck it. It's kind of romantic, really," Wilson said, turning back to them. He was grinning wryly. "Epic, even. The man who didn't let death stop him from bedding his best friend; that's ballad-worthy. Hell, I'm flattered."
"Flattered?" House said dumbly. "You think this is funny?"
Wilson snorted. "What the hell else should I think? I just died, then found out that the guy I've been sleeping with is actually my dead best friend, only with a different face. I think it's laugh or cry at this point."
House could only stare at him.
"If anybody could have pulled this off, it's you. You never could let anything go," Wilson said, exasperated and amused at the same time.
"Not true," House muttered, thinking of his decision a moment ago.
Wilson knelt in front of him and tried to touch him. His hand passed through House's knee, and House felt goosebumps raise on the skin. Wilson bit his lip and put his hand back down.
"It wasn't a game," House said suddenly. Then he remembered Operation Weasel, which actually had been a game, for a little while at least. "I wasn't only trying to screw with you," he amended.
"Just screw me, period?" Wilson replied with a raised eyebrow, but his tone was light, almost forgiving. He cut off House's protest with a wave of his hand. "I think I knew, sort of. That it was you. I thought I was going crazy."
House watched as Wilson frowned suddenly. "More things to heaven and earth..." the other man said musingly.
He was about to ask Wilson what that meant, when a burst of light in front of them made him shield his eyes.
House couldn't bring himself to look at Wilson's afterlife, but he still smelled the sea, and could hear gulls and other seabirds crying in the distance.
"Is that... it?" Wilson asked.
"Yeah. It'll be someplace you know and love, or that you've always fantasized about," House heard himself saying.
"But..." Wilson trailed off, squinting into the distance of his heaven.
"It's all right," House said. "I'll be okay here." It was a total lie, but Wilson didn't need to know that. House just wanted to get this over with.
The other man shot House an annoyed look. "It's not that. I don't know this place."
That made House look up. He saw a green field with a narrow lane bisecting it, low rock walls on either side of it. In the distance, he saw a series of dramatic, mist-enshrouded cliffs of stone and moss that jutted out into the dark blue sea.
"It's the Cliffs of Moher," Kay said from behind them. House turned to look at her; he'd almost forgotten she was there. Kay stared at the green fields and stone walls hungrily. "They're in County Clare, in Ireland."
"Why would Wilson's afterlife in Ireland?" House asked.
Kay shot him an irritated glance that quickly turned into a joyous smile "It's not his afterlife, dumbass. It's mine. Look." She pointed to a spot on a nearby cliff.
There was a figure there, wearing a plain T-shirt and jeans, with no shoes. House could see that she was, of all things, playing a violin; if he listened carefully, House could just make out the tune of a creaky waltz being played very badly.
"Delia," Kay breathed. "She always wanted to learn how to play, but never got around to it." She turned to House excitedly, grabbing his sleeve. "Do you know what this means? Wilson was my last Reap."
Sudden understanding crashed onto House. He grasped the smaller woman's arm as he stumbled, knees buckling under the weight of his relief.
"They slammed the door in our faces, locked the window, but she found a way through anyway! I should have known she would." Kay laughed, and it seemed like Delia heard her. The other woman stopped playing the violin and turned towards them. Kay glanced quickly away from the cliffs and the woman, back to House.
"Tell them goodbye for me," Kay said, meaning Ada and Colby, he assumed. "No, tell them I said I'd see them later," she amended, grinning wildly.
"Much later, I hope," House said. Kay just shrugged, and on impulse, hugged him.
By the time House remembered that he should respond somehow, Kay had let him go and started running down the narrow road towards Delia. Before they met, the cliffs, the lane, and the green fields all folded up and faded away from House's view.
House and Wilson were left standing in the street, the wreckage of the delivery man's car burning merrily a dozen yards away, and sirens screeching in the distance.
"What just happened?" Wilson asked. "I'm confused."
"You just got conscripted," Ada said, coming up from behind them. House wondered if she was in charge now that Kay was gone, or if Colby would be.
"Conscripted?" Wilson said. He put his hands on his hips, and addressed House. "Pretend I just had something very traumatic - like, I don't know, dying maybe? - happen to me, and that my thought process is still recovering. Now, what the hell is going on?"
Ada sighed. "Let me explain how this works..."
House tuned her out and watched Wilson as he listened to the other Reaper. For the first time since he died, he started thinking about the future beyond tomorrow, beyond his next Reap, beyond the job at hand and the ways he would distract himself from it. Specifically, he started thinking about the day Wilson would become corporeal again. House smiled. His afterlife was suddenly looking a lot brighter.
****
"That's the thing about life, isn't it? How can something be so boring and extraordinary at the same time?" -From Dead Like Me