Summary: House finds the Death Note. He uses it for the benefit of the population, but who really knows what justice is? Future HW slash.

OoOoO

When Wilson finished work for the day, he was incredibly glad to find House asleep. Not only was it the altogether healthier option for his sleep-deprived friend, it also meant he got a little time to himself, to suppress his more violent emotions and allow him to get his head a little straighter.

He didn't think he'd ever been more… conflicted. The new developments of the previous day were fighting against the overwhelming desire to protect his best friend from this new danger, but so far neither of them had won out in any significant way.

The human whose name is written in this note shall die.

The words just had a horrible resonance that he couldn't stop thinking about. He spent over an hour on House's couch, just sitting there, reading the rules over and over and wondering how such a thing could have come into existence. A God of death was mentioned, but while Wilson was convinced of the book's powers, since House had already shown him pretty clearly that it worked, the existence of these… shinigami, as they were called in the manga, challenged everything he'd ever believed in. He'd never been the most religious of people, but he had always thought there was something, a greater force out there. The idea of these Gods of death killing humans simply in order to extend their own lifespan, humans selected at random, put a spin on things he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to acknowledge.

He had to be careful, though, he knew, not to take too much of the manga to heart. It was fiction, after all, and although details about the note itself bore a certain resemblance, more were added as the story continued that Wilson didn't know they could rely on.

They, he'd thought. He was including himself in the whole thing, because of House and… because maybe he wanted to see that justice was brought to those who so clearly deserved it. Unlike Kira, thought, who had thought that killing people by heart attacks was enough and thus drawn attention to himself, House was enjoying coming up with deaths that were as imaginative as possible. They weren't all broadcast in the news; most weren't local, and House worried about researching too much on his laptop because he knew perfectly well than an unhealthy interest from a single IP address would attract attention. But nobody seemed to have made a connection; House was using his medical knowledge to his advantage and many of the deaths had been blamed on worsening prison conditions.

Wilson switched the TV on, too much thinking beginning to make his head hurt, and the worry that somebody would notice something about the hundreds of criminals dropping dead in a week nagging at the back of his mind.

Nobody had, or course. The statistics were ridiculous, he knew, but the deaths were so common, so accidental, and so untraceable that of course nobody would think even for a moment that they were being killed. Nobody would want to.

A 24-hour news channel mentioned a name Wilson recognised, and a quick flip through the Death Note told him why. The man had committed arson on 4 proven occasions and had killed 7 people, so House had made him kill himself by pouring a jug of water over his head and sticking an aerial he'd snapped off a radio into an electrical socket. The news, of course, spared many of the details and mentioned only that he'd committed suicide.

The programme was interrupted, though, by a breaking news broadcast. A paedophile who had unsuccessfully attempted to groom a thirteen year old student had taken said student's entire school class hostage, armed with an assault rifle.

Wilson cursed himself as he allowed his eyes to flick to the notebook that lay nest o him. He couldn't, killing was wrong… but those children. Twenty of them, their lives for that of this sick pervert.

And then they showed a photograph of the man, who had been arrested but not convicted for assault just a few months previously. Wilson looked into the cold, dead eyes of a killer, turned the notebook to a fresh page with shaking hands and wrote the name they'd mentioned earlier, unable to keep the man's face from his mind even if he'd wanted to. He couldn't bring himself to add more details, though, and simply left the name, shaking more and more as he waited for the 40 seconds to pass with no further updates.

And then the woman on the screen stared in surprise at the laptop on the desk beside her, and the screen switched once more to outside pictures of the school, surrounded by police who thankfully weren't sufficiently alert to shoot the twenty children who came running out of the building, all crying, some screaming and a few, Wilson noticed in horror, with torn clothes and bruises.

He watched no more, though, because the full extent of what he'd just done suddenly hit him, and he barely made it to the bathroom to retch violently in an action he almost savoured, a sort of purging. He was repenting, suffering for his mortal sin. He sat there for a while on the tiled floor, forehead resting against the cool porcelain of the toilet bowl as he tried to even out his breathing and stop the tingling feeling in his fingers that he knew was a result of his beginning to have a panic attack.

When he returned to the living room, he avoided looking at he book, instead fixing his eyes on the television, watching the families reunited, crying, sobbing with emotion. They featured a relieved parent for a moment:

"Never thought I'd have McDonalds to thank for saving my baby's life."

Wilson couldn't help but roll his eyes. People were so fucking stupid.

Pretty soon, though, as the crowds began to dissipate, and he channel began to repeat the same segments over again, Wilson knew he couldn't procrastinate any longer. He picked up the book, looked at those two works on the otherwise blank page, written in his shaky but forcibly legible writing, and swallowed as his stomach attempted to rise again.

He'd killed someone. He was really involved in what House was doing and although he couldn't see the blood on his still-shaking hands, he could feel it. And he had nobody to turn to except House, who would understand but probably not care. Still, he needed to do something.

"House," he was in the bedroom before he'd even really thought about it, poking House repeatedly and rather violently in the arm.

"What?"

House swatted his arm away, refusing to open his eyes because if he did that, he'd be acknowledging that he was really awake, and then he'd never get back to sleep. But Wilson couldn't say it. Couldn't say that he'd killed someone and so just kept poking, until House sat up, opened his eyes and glared at him, his expression telling Wilson that what he said had better be pretty damn important. Wordlessly, and without looking his friend in the eye, Wilson showed him the book. Showed him because saying it would acknowledge it and he wasn't sure he could do that just yet without hyperventilating.

And then Wilson knew he wasn't the only one whose life had completely changed because of that one object. He knew because House did something then that he couldn't remember ever seeing him do before. He hugged him. Although hug didn't seem like quite the right word; House embraced him tightly, pulling him firmly against his chest as though he was trying to pull Wilson right into his skin. And Wilson knew why, because he felt it too. They'd both been so alone, dealing with their use and avoidance of the Death Note respectively. But suddenly they were united in their fear, of the world and of their own capabilities and the possibility of being unable to suppress the urge to misuse it.

And Wilson needed that, to feel there was somebody who understood and shared what he was going through and feeling, and the way he clung to the other man would have been embarrassing if House hadn't been doing basically the same thing. But it was comforting to know he was there. And he was going to be there in the future and maybe together they could get through it all. And they could make the world a better place.

Yeah, the chapters are short. Thought I might as well give you something to tide you over until my inspiration comes back.