The next morning Wilson awoke with a crick in his neck and a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. The heavy patter of rain against the living room window only added to his sense of foreboding. At first he wasn't sure where the feeling of dread was coming from, but then he heard House's voice from behind the couch and he remembered.

"Get up, you big, lazy oaf," said House, jabbing Wilson in the tush with the end of his cane. "It's duck-hunting season."

Wilson groaned and dug his face into his pillow. "Five more minutes," he mumbled. But House yanked the blankets off of him, exposing him to the cruelly cold morning air. "Hey!" Wilson shouted.

"Get up--you overslept," said House and stumped off to the kitchen, whistling a tune that Wilson thought he recognized as `Sunny Side of the Street'.

Wilson looked at his watch and realized that House was right. For the first time in years, his internal alarm clock had failed and he'd overslept. He grumbled and sat up, feeling muggy-headed and drained. The couch was really starting to take its toll on him. More and more he was waking up feeling more tired than when he'd gone to sleep.

Wilson dug through his suitcase and pulled out the only clean shirt he had left. It was as wrinkled as most of House's clothes, and he bemoaned the fact that his friend didn't even own an iron. He got dressed quickly, and headed off to the bathroom to get ready for the day.

When he came out, house accosted him with a plate of food. "What's this?" asked Wilson.

"What does it look like?" said House. "It's toast."

"No. Toast, by definition, has to be toasted. This is just bread that got a little too close to the toaster and got a bit warm."

"Well it's your own fault," said House. "This is what happens when you sleep in and leave the cooking to me."

"I'll keep that in mind," said Wilson as he took the offered plate and lifted a piece of soppy, butter-saturated bread to his mouth. It was better than nothing, he told himself...but not by much.

The work day had scarcely begun when Wilson's balcony door swung open. Wilson and his teary-eyed patient turned in unison to face the limping madman who'd intruded on the private and painful moment.

"We need to talk," said House, heedless of the crying woman seated opposite his friend.

"Can it wait?" asked Wilson, his eyes shooting daggers at him. "I'm with a patient."

House looked down at the woman as if he honestly hadn't noticed her there. When he turned back to Wilson his expression was dead serious. "I'm in the middle of a personal crisis, Wilson. I need your help."

Wilson's eyes softened somewhat as he took in his friend's obvious distress. "I'm very sorry," he said to his patient. "Would you excuse me for a minute?" The snuffling woman nodded and poked around in her purse for a Kleenex.

Joining House out on the balcony, Wilson gently closed the door to his office and turned to him expectantly.

"I need you to talk to Chase; find out what it is they're planning," said House.

Wilson's jaw dropped open. "I can't believe you interrupted me for this," he hissed angrily. "You said you were having a personal crisis!"

"Did I say `personal'? I meant to say `personnel'. My staff are plotting against me. I think that qualifies as a crisis."

Wilson shook his head and rubbed the back of his neck with a sigh. "It's not like you weren't planning on pulling a stunt of your own against them."

House looked offended. "Yes, but nothing on the scale of what they're planning."

"You don't know what they're planning," said Wilson, pointing out the flaw in his logic.

House's face lit up in victory. "That's exactly why I need you to find out what they're up to."

"Why can't you do it yourself?" asked Wilson.

"Busy."

"And if I say `no'?"

"Dear Diary... Greg was being such a brute to me today..."

"Fine, I'll do it," said Wilson sourly. "Now can I go back to my patient?"

"Knock yourself out," said House, making his laborious way back over the dividing wall to his own balcony.

House was a firm believer that luck was nothing more than a person's innate ability to correctly read a situation and to take advantage of whatever opportunities it provided. And if the situation yielded no opportunities, then it became necessary for a `lucky' person to manufacture them to suit his purposes.

As luck would have it, House managed to scrounge up a patient whose symptoms were marginally interesting enough to warrant his attention, and who also happened to be an eleven year old boy who'd been deprived of his Gameboy by his overprotective parents. It was a bribe opportunity waiting to happen.

House slid the patient's door open with his cane, all the while focused on the PSP in his other hand. It wasn't easy to play while walking with a cane--in fact, it was pretty much impossible--and as he entered, the game made a sad, dying noise.

"Damn," he muttered. "Any idea how hard it is to play this thing one-handed?" House finally looked up from the game to see the boy practically salivating at the sight of the PSP.

"You ever play one of these things, Johnny?" asked House.

"Mike."

"Whatever. Have you?"

"My friend Tyler's got one. He lets me play it sometimes," said Mike. "What games have you got?"

"Hmm? Oh, I dunno," said House distractedly. "They're all the same to me--a lot of fighting...a bunch of explosions...scantily clad women wrestling... You know; the usual."

"Can I see?" asked Mike, his eyes wide.

"I don't think your mom and dad would approve. Waaaaay too violent."

"Pleeease?" the boy begged pitifully.

House seemed to be thinking it over carefully, humming and hawing until beads of sweat popped up on the kid's forehead. "What the hell," he said at last and tossed the game to Mike.

"Aw! Wicked!" Mike exclaimed. "Mega-Death 3000!" His fingers had already expertly set to work on the controls.

"You know it?" House asked innocently.

"Are you kidding? Tyler nearly got grounded for playing it, and his parents let him do anything!" The look of sheer glee on Mike's face was such that House knew he'd just surpassed Santa in the `cool gifts' department.

House let the kid play while he pretended to be busy with doctor stuff, checking charts, fidgeting with the IV, poking around the equipment. He let him play for about five minutes, and then he snatched the game out of Mike's sweaty little fingers.

The kid looked like a puppy that'd been kicked to the curb, which suited House fine. "Sorry, kid--too violent. You'd be in soooo much trouble if your parents found out you were playing this." He waggled the game tauntingly in front of sad, desperate little Mikey.

"They wouldn't know," said Mike.

"Unless I told them," House admitted, switching roles from Santa to Grinch in the blink of an eye. "Tell you what, though--do me a little favour and I'll keep my mouth shut. And I'll even let you play with it tonight after visiting hours."

"Really?" asked Mike hopefully.

Kids were such pushovers, House thought, as he deftly manufactured his opportunity.

Half an hour later, as Wilson grilled Chase in the hallway outside diagnostics, House paged Foreman to come to his office. Foreman arrived moments later and eyed the confrontation between Wilson and Chase suspiciously before entering House's lair. House was leaning back in his chair, his bum leg propped up on his desk, and his fingers steepled in the universal gesture used by evil geniuses the world over.

Foreman raised an eyebrow at him and folded his arms. "I take it this means Dr. Wilson told you about our little meeting last night?"

House grinned an evil-genius grin and said nothing.

"Dig around all you like," said Foreman. "You won't find anything. There's nothing to find."

"Oh relax. I never expected you to spill the beans," said House. "However...it looks like Bruce out there is ready to crack." House nodded his head in the direction of Wilson and Chase, who were visible through the glass walls of his office. Chase did, indeed, look like he was about to rat out his fellow conspirators.

Foreman seemed unfazed, however, and House decided it was time to play the Mikey card. "Well this has been fun, but it's not why I called you in here. Johnny's overdue to be pestered by his doctors--I want you and Chase to go back in there, kick out his folks and find out what the kids been hiding from his parents."

"It's Mike. And why do you need both of us to do it?" asked Foreman.

"Intimidation. Give him the old `good cop, bad cop' routine. I bet he'll fold."

"He's eleven!"

"Then if should be real easy," house argued logically.

Foreman shook his head and left House's office, practically ploughing into Chase in the process. "You're with me," Foreman said to the startled intensivist, and marched down the hall towards Mike's room.

The kid was sleeping peacefully when Chase and Foreman entered the room, and his parents were gone; probably taking advantage of their son's nap time to grab a bite of lunch from the cafeteria. Chase was about to walk on over and wake Mike up, but Foreman stalled him with a hand on his arm.

"What did you tell Wilson?" Foreman asked, keeping his voice low.

"What did you tell House?" Chase countered, looking pleased with himself.

"Nothing," Foreman answered. "You?"

"Nothing," said Chase. "This is gonna drive him nuts."

"It's already driving him nuts," said Foreman with a sly grin. "Now all we have to do is sit back and watch him self destruct trying to figure out what we're up to."

"Brilliant," said Chase. "Like watching a dog chasing its tail."

"Foolproof," Foreman agreed.

Lying in bed, Mike feigned sleep, keeping an eye cracked open just enough to make out the two doctors at the foot of his bed. He couldn't help but smile just a little, as visions of `Mega-Death' danced in his head.

The reports had come back from all corners. According to Wilson, Foreman, Chase, Cameron and the kid, his team was planning something...and yet they were planning to do nothing. House had to appreciate the beauty of it. All they had to do was make him think they were planning on pulling a prank on him, knowing that he would work himself into a tizzy trying to figure out what it was. But what the kiddies always seemed to forget was that they were messing with the master.

As he sat at his desk, his iPod blaring, House began formulating a plan of his own. Occasionally he would glance through the blinds into the conference room, where his underlings sat hunched together conspicuously, and throwing the occasional glance his way in return. They were playing with fire, he thought, and they were going to get burned. Oh, yes...they would see the error of their ways, he thought, and looked through the glass wall at his poor, unsuspecting victims.

For once Wilson found himself completely caught up on his paperwork, and after one last round of his patients, he decided to call it an early day. Even if he hadn't finished his paperwork he might have left early--he was tired and he had a splitting headache. He wouldn't be much good to anyone in the state he was in. What he needed was a couple of Tylenol and a few hours of uninterrupted sleep.

It felt a little strange walking into House's condo alone, and even stranger making himself at home without his friend there to act as host (or anti-host, as was usually the case). He dropped his satchel by the couch like he did every night, and was about to flop down on the couch when he had an even better idea.

House wouldn't be home for at least another couple of hours, and in the meantime, there was a perfectly good queen-sized bed going to waste. His aching muscles cried out at him to take advantage of the opportunity to stretch out and have a nap. Just a quick nap before House came home.

He didn't need a lot of convincing. And so, kicking off his shoes along the way, Wilson padded through the apartment to House's bedroom. The bed was unmade, which was good, because that way House would never find out he'd crashed in it. And that was exactly what Wilson did. He crashed onto the bed, rolling over until his face was buried in House's pillow. He breathed deep, bringing his arms up to hug the pillow closer, and with one foot still dangling over the edge of the bed, Wilson fell fast asleep.

His condo was dark when House got home, and his first thought was that Wilson had gone out for the evening, which meant that, once again, he'd have to fend for himself for dinner. Screw it, he thought, and picked up the phone, hitting auto dial #3 for his favourite Chinese delivery.

It was then that he noticed Wilson's satchel propped up against the couch and Wilson's shoes lying discarded on the floor leading down the hall to his bedroom.

"Noodle Palace, how can I help you?" came the sing-song voice of a young lady over the phone.

"I'd like to place an order for delivery," House said as he followed the shoe trail down the hallway.

"Hello, Dr. House," the girl chirped, recognizing his voice. "The usual today?"

"Nope. Better make it a double--I've got company tonight," said House quietly.

"Sure thing. It'll be forty minutes."

"Fine," said House and hung up. With his cane in one hand and the cordless phone in the other, House snuck into his own bedroom. Sure enough, he found his friend sprawled belly-down across his bed, arms wrapped tightly around his pillow. House stood in the doorway for a while, watching Wilson sleep. It was a sight he'd imagined, but never thought he'd actually ever see, and he indulged himself with an eyeful of his friend before tucking those thoughts neatly back into their closet.

A part of him was tempted to shake Wilson awake, just for the shock value, but luck had once again presented an opportunity that he couldn't pass up. Leaving his friend to his dreams, House retreated to the living room, where Wilson's satchel sat by the couch, beckoning to him. He `accidentally' knocked it over, and Wilson's journal `just happened' to fall out. What kind of friend would he be if he didn't tidy it up?

Whatever.

House dropped the pretences and grabbed the burgundy, leather-bound journal. Burgundy--the guy's version of pink. And the teasing potential just kept on coming.

Settling in for a good read, House cracked the journal open. Skimming through the boring work-related stuff, House searched out the juicy passages, trying to find something that would help him figure out what made Wilson tick.

Sadly, it turned out that Wilson was as cautious a man in private as he was in public. Still, there was enough telling evidence to reveal the hidden Wilson, and it was...enlightening...to say the least.

"House? What are you doing?" Wilson asked, standing rumpled and groggy at the end of the couch.

"Do you trust me?" asked House.

Wilson rubbed a hand over his face and stared at his friend in disbelief. "You're sitting there reading my secret diary, and you ask me if I trust you?"

"I thought it was a `personal journal'," House countered.

Wilson glared.

"I've got a cunning plan," said House.

Wilson sighed.

"And you're going to help me," House added.

Wilson groaned.