RIDDLED WITH HEAVEN

Part VII

By GeeLadyff

(Sequel to Gone With the World)

Summary: Some will destroy Eden to reach Paradise.

Rating: M for Mature. Slash. Violence. Rape. Themes of prejudice and intolerance. Language. This is an MPreg!!

Pairing:House plus Wilson/Foreman/Chase.

Disclaimer: I manipulate the sexy House and others to my hearts content. No fee's, no earnings,...just fun!

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Since all life is futility, then the decision to exist must be the most irrational of all.

Emile M. Cioran

Hell came to New Dawn.

Foremans' ankle turned under him as he threw open the heavy door of the sedan and leaped from the moving vehicle.

"Ah!" He grunted, biting his lip as a knife of pain traveled up his leg, but it was a small price to pay for knowing inside Hayes was soon to be flash baked like a chicken on a flame-spit.

Remembering to tuck in his shoulder, Foreman rolled once and came to a resting ball. Unfolding his long legs he pushed off with his hands onto to his one good and one newly sore foot, paying no attention to the nearby explosion or the flaming bits that began falling from the sky. The shouts of running men, emerging from their modest dwellings, halted in their tracks to watch the horror show amid the choking smoke.

Foreman skip-hopped away from the consuming fire, ignoring the shouts and gasps of the milling populace who stood awe struck, not knowing what to do. No member of Hayes' collective appeared particularly interested in forming a water bucket line. In any event, trying to douse such an inferno would be like spitting on a campfire. Most of the numb observers simply stood a safe distance from the intense blaze, their bugged eyes fixed curiously on their leaders' home slowly disintegrating before their eyes.

In minutes, the house gave them the show they were waiting for. Nearly engulfed in flames, chemically hot plumes fed by old, lead paint and tar-paper siding ate their way through the dried wood shingles, melting the bitumen sealant and waving their elongated orange fingers at the morning sky. In no time the structure was falling into itself in a fountain of orange sparks, the one hundred year old dwelling collapsing to embers while the belly of the blaze coughed out rolling billows of black smoke that rose and stretched East on the prevailing wind.

Ignoring it all, Foreman began a systematic hobble from the nearest cabin to the next looking for House and the babies, unceremoniously flinging open one door after another without a knock of warning. Each tiny house he found was either empty or contained a frightened person, shock on their face as one who was just rudely awakened.

Ten shacks searched and no sign of anyone he loved - "Dammit!" Foreman said. He limped away in the gathering light to find Chase, Wilson and their new and very useful family friend.

-

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Johnson quickly climbed from the second vehicle when it stopped and headed toward the animal barns, ignoring the shouts of Chase and Wilson urging him to forget about the weapons. No matter what any of them said, without guns their success today, assuming it even transpired, would be short lived. Without weapons to ensure their safe return to their home, and a few loaded rifles of advice for anyone who would in the future presume to come knocking with an agenda, their actions today would be wasted.

Johnson kicked at the dirt and grass between the shabby barns where the gun stash was rumored to be. Looking for a handle, a rope - anything that might hint of a hollow beneath the earth, he got down on his knees and dug frantically.

He found his prize in the form of a chain attached at one end of a flat palette made from a half dozen two by sixes nailed together on two cross boards. He yanked on the contraption and with a few sweaty heaves on the chain, the wooden flat slid aside to reveal a hollow beneath concealing a small cache of guns. Each was wrapped in a sheet and there were not as many weapons as he had assumed would be there, given Hayes' customary bragging. But there was enough that if Hayes, Raithe or any of the faithful survived, they could easily re-arm themselves and take up their heavenly calling with a freshly oiled chamber.

Johnson was not about to let that happen. He gathered in his arms three hunting rifles, stuffed the only two handguns in his pockets, making sure the safeties were on, and began stuffing boxes of ammunition in his shirt front. That done, he swiftly removed all the firing pins from the remaining guns, leaving those behind. Chase and Wilson didn't have many places to search where House or the children might be and once he had stashed the weapons in the car, Johnson climbed back behind the wheel and drove around looking for them.

It did not take him long to locate his new friends. Chase, Foreman and Wilson were gathered around one side of a small metal shed, like the kind used to store garden equipment, which door had been kicked out from the inside.

Wilsons' hopes soared. "This was where they were keeping him."

Chase nodded. "Let's hope he got away."

"Anyone following you?" Johnson asked. "At the house? Anyone try to stop you?"

Foreman shook his head. "I think the kingpins of this religious psycho-farm are too busy dying to organize a posse." Foreman looked at their young friend with a respectable admiration. "Good cocktail." he said.

"Good delivery." Johnson answered then held up the two rifles he had pilfered. "The ones I left behind won't work anymore."

Foreman limped back to the car. "Come on. Maybe House got away with the kids somehow."

Chase asked reasonably enough, "Where do we look?"

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House felt strangely comfortable. A warm, fuzzy cocoon had settled down on his flesh and though he knew it was hypothermia, he didn't mind. Funny how his brain knew he was going to die but didn't seem worried about it. The other times, like when he almost drowned, was shot or was tossed around a rolling vehicle - all those times seemed a century ago - his body had gone into overdrive racing his heart to keep his blood pressure up, his circulation moving and his brain sparking like a Roman Candle.

This kind of dying had snuck up on him like a cat and was slowly curling itself around his body, giving him a sense of warmth and contentment. Dying of the cold was unlike anything he had experienced before. Alone in the woods he heard his own strange voice burst out in a series of humorless chuckles and, quickly used up, fall to the forest floor. The thing that made him laugh was it wasn't really that cold out. A few degrees above freezing was his tired guess. But it was still too cold, he knew, to be out in it naked, hungry, thirsty and in pain.

Jordan and Reid slept. Every so often, he would check their body temperature and heart-rate by wiggling two fingers inside their wool wraps, laying them on the center of their delicate chests. They were alive and snug, though getting very seriously dehydrated. He had done his best to bring moisture to their bodies by spitting his own saliva into their mouths, but his own mouth had quickly gone dry. House wasn't sure if their repose was from sleepiness or from wooziness because of lack of nourishment. Maybe both.

Warm slickness leaked out between his legs. He was bleeding again. House shifted slightly to ease the ache in his leg. His thigh argued mercilessly over its treatment of late and was now out-shouted almost everything else. Even the pangs from birthing his still-born baby, now lying beside Lee in his own funeral wrap, had disappeared.

House sighed. There was no point in worrying about the leg since he didn't have any Vicodin or even an aspirin in the medicine cabinet back home. His eyes felt very tired. His body felt very warm and other than the leg, was numb. Even the little pebbles and twigs that had scratched at his cheeks so badly when he initially lay down around his kids, had vanished. He was probably dying now.

He was sure going to miss Wilson. House grudgingly admitted he would miss them all, as annoying as they sometimes were. Then he corrected himself and remembered he wasn't going to be anywhere to feel the actual missing part. So they would be the ones who would miss him. But Wilson most of all.

He loved that idiot.

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"Christ- he's shocky."

House hadn't been all that difficult to locate once they discovered there was really only one direction for House to have gone. The woods would be far too difficult for a crippled man, so Johnson suggested they check the path that led to the outhouses. "Eventually, a couple of miles on, it runs into Hayes' property fence. No way could House have gotten over that. Not while carrying the babies."

They had found House laying on his side, his body wrapped around two of their sons. The other, the youngest, was missing. "Quick." Foreman slipped off his coat and wrapped it around Houses' body. "Cover them up."

Chase shed his coat and did likewise. "I wonder how long he's been lying here like this?"

"Check the kids." Foreman instructed. "I'll start looking for Lee. He must be around here somewh-"

"-Foreman." It was Wilson.

Foreman looked behind him. Wilson was on his knees across the dirt foot path. Foreman could just see two small bundles wrapped in dirty linen. One looked like Houses' tee-shirt. "Oh, jesus, . . ."

Foreman scrambled to Wilsons' side. Without looking it was obvious what the bundles contained. One was about the size of Lee, or the size of his body. The other was much smaller. Houses' new-born baby.

Wilson stretched out his hand to unwrap Lee but Foreman stopped him. "Don't. You don't want to remember him like this, man." As calm as he sounded, he was aching inside for Wilson. Lee, though by Wilson, had belonged to all of them. All had come from House, who might be dying.

"We gotta get House to the car and back home."

Wilson seemed to have not heard him. He stayed on his knees, frozen in place and staring at the still forms hoping for signs of life.

"Wilson-"

Wilson turned to look at him in slow motion, as though Foreman and everything around him was unfamiliar. He was just a stranger looking down at some other fathers' lifeless children. He knew why they were dead but he couldn't accept they were dead. Innocent people, innocent children, should not be left to die for no purpose in which they had no choice. It was a cruelty he could not process. Not yet.

Wilson didn't say anything but Foreman urged him. "Wilson. It's House. He's going to die. We have to go now." Foreman took his arm. "And you gotta' carry the babies. Reid. Jordan." He said their names to try and snap Wilson out of his shock and get him to his feet, then directed him to where Jordan and Reid lay inside the curled up form of their hypothermic, unconscious birth-father. "The kids need you."

Wilson recovered his composure enough to obey and once he was occupied with the babies, Foreman himself took just a half moment to look at their mummy-wrapped babies that Hayes had murdered. Even if Hayes had not laid a finger on the new-born, he was guilty by neglect, torture and starvation. By proxy he had murdered Houses' youngest who by his blue pallor, had clearly been still-born. Hayes had starved and abused a pregnant man and as a result House had delivered his son a week early alone, out here in the freezing dark.

Gathering a few rocks - there were not many to be had - and a short section of fallen tree stump that had been torn and abandoned by a hungry bear, Foreman gave his sons the only burial time allowed. He said a quick prayer, the only one he remembered, the one his mother had taught him over and over: "Now I lay me down to sleep." He whispered, "I pray..." His voice-box was pinched off with a tremendous surge of grief, but by sheer will he fought it back until he had gathered back some semblance of control. To arrive at the end of this day with House and the kids alive and well, he needed to keep a level head.

Some day they would mourn. But first they had to live.

It took a good twenty minutes to carry House back to the car where Johnson waited, shot-gun in hand ready to shoot at any threat. Wilson climbed in the front seat and slid over so Chase could hand him the babies and then he squeeze in beside him. Wilson clutched Jordan and Reid to his chest, his eyes on the floor, staring sightlessly as the world sped by outside the windshield, his long fingers wrapped around their tiny heads. Chase, rifle clutched to his chest but the barrel aimed out the side window ready to fire, kept glancing over at Wilson.

Wilsons' eyes were crow-footed with tension.

With Chase riding shot-gun, Johnson floored the gas pedal, kicking up a shower of gravel and twigs as they sped away. Foreman sat in the back seat with Houses' head on his lap, urging the unconscious man to wake up by rendering gentle slaps on his cold cheeks. Around Houses' feet, bloodless from the cold, he had wrapped his coat. Houses' body remained limp and unresponsive and Foreman rubbed his mates' arms to encourage the slowly returning warmth.

Foreman twisted himself around to look back through the rear glass to the compound. Slowly it and the smoke rising above it disappeared between the trees and the curve of the rough, mountain road.

They'd done it. The only catch was, they had no idea if Hayes had actually been inside the house so they had no idea if he was actually dead. None of them had spotted the man elsewhere but then, Foreman reminded himself, none of them other than House or Johnson even knew what he looked like.

Raithe was another problem. Had he been inside the house too? Or was he still at large, hugging his beloved gun to his chest, on the hunt for the so-called devil-conceived likes of himself and his companions?

He hoped not. Maybe God, if he was anywhere at all, would this time rally to their court, strike down any surviving bring-ers of destruction and leave them to their hard-won peace. But somehow he doubted it.

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"We need to stitch him up." Chase was examining the ragged tear House himself had obviously made to accommodate the early arrival of his still-born baby. "Let's flush it while he's still out." He let his eyes fall gently on their unconscious, abused mate. "He's been through enough pain."

Chase scrubbed in and he, with Foremans' assistance, made short work of a wash of bicarbonate of soda and salt water, finishing up with a few stitches. All they had to work with was ordinary sewing thread but a few loops and a small bandage and Chase was done. Foreman washed up the wound, applied a folded bandage and together they ran a war, soapy cloth over Houses' body to clean off days worth of sweat and grime. Laying him down on the kitchen floor, the warmest spot in the house, they covered him with thick quilts and let him rest to awaken on his own.

With his circulation approaching normal House began to shiver. From his head to his toes his autonomic system shook him like a maraca, expediting the process of bringing his core temperature up.

After a half hour House finally stirred and awoke on the hard floor, a roaring fire in the black furnace not three feet from his back. Waves of delicious heat filled the room and him with healing warmth. His first clear thought was he wanted to stay there and never have to move. He wanted a years' worth of lazing right there where the fire didn't die and food was just a demand away. But his second thought was -

"Where's the kids?" He tried to sit up but was stopped by Chase with hand on his shoulder, forcing him to lie still. "They're fine. Wilson's feeding them right now. They got chilled and a little dehydrated but they're okay." He moved his hand to lay it against Houses' forehead. "You on the other hand, damn near froze to death."

House struggled to sit up and this time Chase did not stop him. "I want to see them." House said, struggling to get his legs under him.

Chase stood and helped House to his feet. House wobbled on his good leg and, realizing he was still naked, wrapped his grey blanket around himself.

"Wilson has them in the next room." Chase said, resigned that his stubborn lover was not going to listen to good sense and stay warm and still for a while. Chase retrieved Houses' cane from behind the kitchen door and handed it to him. House took it without a word and limped into the living room.

Wilson had Jordan in his arms and the baby was sucking contentedly on one of the two baby bottles they had brought with them from New Jersey. Reid was fast asleep beside Wilson on the couch, wrapped in a wool blanket, his exquisitely tiny face the only part peeking out.

House sat beside Wilson and motioned to take Jordan from his arms. Chase cleared his throat quickly and House caught the tiny head shake Chase threw him.

That's when House clued in that Wilson had not looked up from feeding Jordan, that Wilson was acting a little weird actually, like a man sitting alone in his livingroom feeding his son, very still and quiet as though there was no others present.

House felt a shiver go up and down his spine at Wilsons' dull, empty eyes that looked down on Jordan. His stony look said more than any shirt rending weeping would have. House knew it wasn't his fault Lee was dead and if he questioned Wilson on it, he knew Wilson would say the same. But it still hurt to see Wilson so shriveled by it, like his soul had dried up inside.

"I tried to save him." House said. When Wilson didn't answer, he wondered whether Wilson had lost a part of his mind too. His own heart ached for his dead children but he had cried already himself out over Lee out in the forest, and decided to leave his grief there. To leave it behind and survive or carry it with him and die.

Now he had just strength enough to live for his two remaining sons and just power enough in his soul to empathize for his mate. Because, as the birth-father House understood like none of them ever could what it was to lose a child. His grief had not only filled his world, it had stripped it of all meaning. Out there, circling his freezing body around his still breathing babies to block out the cold, he had discovered new meaning through them. Applying that meaning to living and to himself once more, it was only for Jordan and Reid that he choose to keep fighting and not lie down die beside his dead children and cease all effort. Again, he had chosen meaning and with it had come purpose.

At his gentle words Wilson nodded. "I know." He said. "I know. No one could have done anything. But I don't want to hear about Lee again. . ." He sighed heavily.

" . . .ever."

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One night, weeks later, Foreman and Chase made it clear how much they had missed House. And House was pregnant by sunrise the next day to which he complained loudly.

Wilson was happy for them all but declined their suggestions to join them in pending fatherhood and even Houses' attempts to entice Wilson to bed were met with polite excuses.

"Lee is dead." House took him to task over it. "I'm not." But the hurt look on Wilson's face made House ease back and give it up. It was difficult to know why but as hard as it had been to lose Lee and his new-born, the children in his belly were almost enough to help him forget. Enough to give him reason to be content again, to be joyful over the presence of their growth inside him. House had discovered it was the weirdest but most wonderful source of happiness.

House smiled at Jordans' round-as-a-cats' green eyes looking up at him with delight from above chubby cheeks. He was alive and his children were safe. That meant today life was good.

Chase was busy with the animals and Wilson and Foreman were off on a berry finding expedition. Jess' was somewhere outside he thought. Helping Chase probably.

Jordans' pink, puckered mouth laughed at him in a babies' un-ashamed, honest way. House smiled back though his five month old could not possibly have understood the joke of his one daddy being pregnant by two of his four other dads, which House had spent a few moments explaining to his son in so many words. "Two wee-wee's, and those not so "wee", equals one pregnant daddy and two more brothers for you.

"So daddy's funny?" House asked, adjusting the bottle and encouraged Jordan to take the nipple again. The baby forgot his funny daddy and sucked contentedly.

"Are you laughing at me kid?" House shifted Jordan to the left side of his lap. His right thigh ached. Once the kids were asleep, it was time for a hot water soak. "I'll make a House out of you yet."

He felt a tiny kick in his belly and was reminded that soon his days were about to grow longer with formula making and diaper changing. He would have four kids and so four potential delicate patients' with all the colds, measles and other common childhood maladies that would inevitably strike each one. But with four dads all pitching in to spoil them and him, it wasn't such a bad way to spend a life.

"We'll have to tell Chase and Foreman to milk the goats twice a day as soon-" A strange sound behind him cut off his one-sided conversation and he turned, expecting to see Danny or Chase in for a drink and a rest but instead he got an eye full of black rifle barrel and a grey haired man standing in the living room doorway with it resting on his shoulder, the sight trained directly on him.

"I missed getting burned in the hell fire your cock-buddies made." The man explained. "I was out on a hunt."

House sucked in a breath. The checkered coat around the mans' shoulders made it clear who was behind the words. Though he had not clearly seen his face that day in the forest, Raithe, by his hate-filled frozen words, was easily recognizable.

Raithe stared with dead, grey eyes at House, the suckling child in his lap and his swollen under-belly. "Thought so." He sneered contemptuously. "A goddamn mutant Blue. I knew you were one of them from the start. I could smell it that first day. I could smell the men on ya'. I could smell thestink ofsin." He said, spitting the words out like misshapen icicles. "Hayes didn't believe me at first but he was fool. That's why he's dead. God choose to cleanse him by fire."

House himself was filled with a whole lot of hate. "I notice how dirty your nails are, asshole. I've got lamp oil and some matches if you'd like to wash up."

Ignoring the macabre joke, Raithe waived the barrel of his gun at House. "Move away from the spawn."

House felt his heart in his throat and the fear in his gut but all he showed to the murderer was his hatred. "No chance in hell."

Raithe frowned, apparently un-used to being disobeyed, especially when he was holding his very convincing bullet powered friend. "I said move, or I'll shoot you where you sit, and the babies go by collateral damage - slowly - instead of quick with a bullet to the head."

House moved his body to the right slightly to shield Jordan and Reid from Raithe and to protect his growing belly. "Fuck you, psycho."

Raithe steadied the rifle on his shoulder and bent his eye to the sighting, though he need not have since he was only standing fifteen feet from his target. "I'm warning you, mutant. Move or I'm going to kill all of you right now."

"Then shoot, you cock-sucker, but I'm not moving. I'm doing nothing - nothing - for you." House couldn't help himself, he was suddenly screaming at Raithe, gun barrel lined up with his right eye or not. He didn't care because he was seething, so violently angry at Raithe and Hayes and their self appointed, self righteous crowns; saviors of Fuck-all.

House wanted to kill the man with his bare hands, but Jordan was sucking from his bottle, unaware of the violence that was occurring in his little house by the mountains and when House looked down at him, all the rage drained from him like scummy water, leaving him feeling the only real love that had survived the end of the world: love a person and make a person to love. His lovers, his children. Nothing else remained.

But his feeling for Raithe and his kind - "You murdering fuck! A god-fired, glowing maggot on a pile of shit is still a maggot on shit. Fuck you and the donkey you rode in on." House didn't turn another eye his way, ignoring Raithe altogether. Maybe Chase had heard him yell and maybe not. But if Raithe shot him, then he was shot. If he died with his kids, it was better than living without them or them living on with the kind of pseudo human Raithe just barely passed for.

A shot was fired and Raithe jerked from the kick-back of the powerful rifle in his hand.

But when he felt no impact, House turned to look and though the loud noise had set the babies crying, he found himself un-injured. When the smoke cleared, he understood why.

A growing circle of red seeped through Raithes' shirt front, quickly soaking it through. Raithes' body fell like he'd been axed to reveal Jess Johnson standing behind him, a hand-gun raised to the level of where Raithes' beating heart used to be. Like a man in an unpleasant dream, Johnson watched him fall. When Raithe jerked for the last time and finally lay still with the blood pooling on the floor beside him, Johnson walked the few steps over to toe him with his boot. Then he did it again just to make sure.

Tossing the gun aside, he held his own hands out in front of him, watching with fascination as they shook like fall leaves in a storm. "Oh, jesus . . ." Johnson said.

House lay Jordan on the couch and went over to Johnson, poking Raithes' flabby stomach with his cane as he went. The enemy didn't move. All the enemies were now dead.

Johnson ran fingers through his uncombed hair, trying to brush it (and perhaps his own part in the death of a human being), aside. "Jesus," He said again "I - don't know - I mean it's - I just . . .never killed anyone before."

House poked the body again. "Well," He jabbed it once more. It was best to be absolutely certain. "I'm glad it was this one."

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Raithe was not buried. He was dragged to the fields and left for the coyotes.

Chase complained that it was a fate far too good for him. "New Dawn." He sneered. "What a joke."

"One more man-made paradise," Was Houses' comment, "shot all to hell."

-

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Later that night, "Johnson saved Houses' life. He should stay here with us." Foreman said to Chase and Wilson.

Johnson was grateful. "I'd like to. I don't want to go back to New Dawn. No one would want me there now. And my name isn't Jess. It's Danny. That was my given name. Jess was just a name Hayes stuck me with. You know, to make fun of me - "Jesse' James". I always hated it."

Danny. It suited him. He was, after all, so young.

"How old are you anyway?" Foreman asked. "Really?"

"Nineteen."

Chase was curious. "Why can't you go back to New Dawn? Hayes and Raithe are dead, and the towns' people were never the problem. Or were they?"

Danny looked a little uncomfortable. "Well, no, but I'm tired of hiding and some of the people there looked up to Hayes. I don't think they'd appreciate my part in his death. And this sheriff thing - I just took the job so I'd be safe."

"Safe from what?" Wilson asked.

The young man looked at each of them in turn, as though unable to decide on an answer. Finally, using his index fingers and thumbs, he fumbled delicately at the front of his eyeballs. When his fingers came away, they each held a thin, brown colored, convex membrane with a tiny clear circle in the center.

"Contacts?" Foreman asked though he could see for himself. With the contacts out Danny's eyes were the color of a Blue Jays' wing.

"Yeah. I wore 'em for years after Outbreak. Too scared not to. I knew I wasn't sick or a mutated Blue - 'least I don't think I was - er - am." Danny pulled a tiny jar with a lid from is pocket. "I kept them in here at night in salt water." He said, shaking it a little. "And then when Hayes started up with his religion to eradicate all Blues and any who slept with them . . .but now I guess I don't need 'em."

Wilson stared at the sparkling color in the young mans' eyes. Almost as blue as Houses', he thought. Two blues equal a blue. Of course, they'd all want the kid to bed House as soon as possible to bring another Blue eye into the world. But Danny was just a kid. Wilson felt it wasn't right. Not yet it wasn't. It was too soon.

Wilson went to look for House and found him upstairs in the larger bedroom on the softest mattress with the babies wrapped in their fluffy blankets. House was sleeping on his left side, Jordan was deep into an afternoon snooze and Reid was lying on his back, kicking his legs and playing with his tiny, milk chocolate fingers.

Wilson lay down and let Reid grab his own large finger, letting his son examine it the only way a baby knew how - by putting it in his mouth and having a taste. Wilson laughed a little. It was the first time he had felt any mirth since discovering his son dead and his lover almost.

Suddenly House was looking at him. He hadn't moved or spoken, he'd just woken up and was watching Wilson play with the baby.

"Danny's staying." Wilson announced.

"Danny?"

"Jess. Danny's his real name. He's staying here with us."

House nodded. He knew Wilson better than he had his own mother. "For some reason that bothers you."

Wilson looked insulted. "No it doesn't."

"Give me a break." House huffed. "You're an open book. You've got jealousy written all over your face which begs the question: Jealousy over what?"

Wilson lay on his back, one hand above his head. "His eyes are blue. He's not mutated, but he needs an examination to be certain. Anyway, his eyes are blue. He wore contacts all this time, to protect himself."

House didn't have to guess from whom. "Smart kid."

"He did what he had to do to survive, just like you did."

"Now because he's staying you're trying to find a reason to like him. And because he's a blue eye, naturally he'll have to hump me somewhere along the line to make a blue eyed baby. That's why you're having to try to find a reason."

"You should. I mean he should. It's good. Another blue. Means you can have blue eyed children. It's a really good thing-"

"-He says while he grinds his teeth to a nub. If you want another baby, all you have to do-"

"- Lee's dead."

House took a deep breath. "You're not the only one who lost him."

Wilson leaned over and kissed House on the lips, but it wasn't enthusiastic. "I know."

"I'm still here. You plan on avoiding me until my do-abilities' worn out?"

"He's a nice kid. Danny I mean."

"And you're a nice idiot. And yes, just you." House grabbed Wilsons' hand and lay it, almost roughly, against his distended stomach, taut with two babies. "I'm due in eleven days. Chase and Foreman'll be daddies again, then it's your turn, pops."

Wilson let a tiny smile lift one corner of his mouth. They could try again he supposed. He wanted to forget and remember Lee all at the same time. Wanting another child had felt like a betrayal at first. But the desire to plant another baby in House was too strong to ignore. Plus, he had been thinking of a name lately, like Paul or Peter. He liked David too. Yeah, probably David. David James Lee House.

"Okay, dad."

"But all the kids get my last name. I'm the birth-dad. You guys might get to name them, but my name goes on the bank accounts."

Wilson smiled and kissed his lover. "Whatever you say, dad."

-

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House yelled in his agony to push out baby number eight. Tiny, blue eyed Seamus Drake Johnson House set up a wail and after a thorough examination by Foreman, he was declared healthy. Though Lee had been murdered and House's still-born buried without a name, they still had six living healthy children.

Twenty year old Danny held his first born with shaking hands and staring at the baby like it was a Martian, until Chase showed him how to hold him and dry him off. The new dad was sweating more than House.

Wilson wiped the sweat from Houses' face and neck. Already Houses' eyes were closing of their own accord to pull him into twelve hours of healing sleep. "I love you." Wilson whispered into his ear, quietly enough that the others didn't hear. He still liked to say things to House that was for them alone. He wondered if it the same was true for the others.

House was almost out. "You too . . ." He said inside a sigh. "How's the baby? How's Seamus?"

Wilson stroked Houses' temple with two fingers. "He's fine. Healthy."

"Stupid name. It sounds like a dermatological rash. Remind me to tell Danny that I'll be calling my son Drake."

Wilson laughed a little. "Sure."

Jordan and Rowan by Chase, Reid and Gordon by Foreman, David James by himself and now Seamus by Danny. Six beautiful sons and Wilson knew he already wanted at least one more. Probably all the fellows felt the same. They would all be hungering after House in turn and they would all be taking on more work as a result. Being a daddy was a twenty-four-seven shift but somehow that didn't matter.

"And get in the kitchen." House ordered. "Make me some formula. With this many kids you'll be on formula duty from now on, pops. And Danny's my new baby-sitter. Look at him. Scared, dumb kid." But the words were wrapped in affection.

Wilson assured him. "Whatever you say, dad."

"I wanna' see'im." But Houses' eyes were closed now and seeing his new son would have to wait.

"Go to sleep. He'll be here tomorrow."

House fought against his bodys' demands and lost. He was out.

Wilson kissed his forehead. Life in the new world was so strange. It was always new and changing. It had shocked them to action and nearly struck them down. But with House it was still acceptable. The kids, the fellows, the new world, probably everything would be all right. And if not, some-damn-how they'd make their small corner of it all right.

No one owed it to them but they did owe it to each other. It was the only good way into the future, really.

"We'll all be here, babe', . .

. . . tomorrow and tomorrow."

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END

How beautiful maleness is, if it finds its right expression.

I am planning a second sequel to Gone With the World; to continue where Riddled With Heaven left off. As soon as time permits.

*You may be interested to know that scientists have discovered a species of ant that reproduces asexually and in which the entire colony is not only all female but all clones of the ant queen! Read below:

""Scientists Discover Asexual Female Ant Colony

Posted on: Wednesday, 15 April 2009, 15:05 CDT

A species of tropical ant appears to have done away with sex altogether. Instead, the ants now only produce females through a process of cloning.

These Mycocepurus smithii ant species have been discovered as the first ever to reproduce without sex, said researchers in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Anna Himler, a biologist from the University of Arizona’s Center for Insect Science led the study in which researchers used “fingerprinting” DNA to show that each ant was in fact a female clone of the queen.

Upon further investigation, Himler and colleagues discovered that the female ants were physically unable to mate due to a missing “mussel organ,” which is essential for breeding.

This asexual form of breeding is extremely rare among female ants, researchers said.

"In social insects, there are a number of different types of reproduction," said Dr Himler. "But this species has evolved its own unusual mode."

Her team is unable to tell why, and at what point in history the ants began to reproduce asexually. Future investigations will be aimed to providing more answers to those questions.

Dr. Himler explained that there are advantages to the ants’ unusual method of reproduction.

"It avoids the energetic cost of producing males, and doubles the number of reproductive females produced each generation from 50% to 100% of the offspring."

"If we're more diverse, we're more resistant to parasites and disease," Laurent Keller, an expert in social insects from the University of Lausanne, told BBC News.

"In a colony of clones, if one ant is susceptible to a parasite, they will all be susceptible. So if you're asexual, you normally don't last very long.

"But in ants we're seeing more and more reports of unusual methods of reproduction," added Professor Keller, who was not involved in this study.

"When we started to study this species more closely, we just weren't finding any males. That's when we started to look at them in a different way," said Dr. Himler.""

On the Net:

University of Arizona Center for Insect Science

Source: redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports