- After a 200-year-old medicine jar found on an off-shore shipwreck shatters in a teenage girl's palm, she is admitted to Princeton Plainsboro for symptoms closely linked to smallpox. When the Center for Disease Control's Dr. Dave Broda institutes a lockdown on the hospital and suspends House's team's ability to diagnose, Masters is skeptical about Broda's diagnosis and becomes convinced that the patient is suffering from a different disease. The girl's father soon experiences similar symptoms, and House is forced to make a precarious decision that puts his own life in jeopardy. Meanwhile, Wilson and Sam comfort a 6-year-old chemotherapy patient who prompts them to examine their relationship.—Fox Publicity
- We open on a slave ship centuries ago. It seems a section of the slaves have an illness and the some of them are tossed overboard. Eventually the ship is sunk to contain the infection.
Cut to a family on a boat scuba diving. The daughter surfaces with an ancient-looking jar. She drops it and cuts her hand on the glass.
The daughter, a 16-year old, is at the hospital presenting with smallpox. House (Hugh Laurie) calls the CDC and they tell him it is possible the disease could remain active for that long in a sealed jar.
Masters (Amber Tamblyn) and Taub (Peter Jacobson) draw blood from the daughter and vaccinate the rest of the family. The parents are beginning to panic.
Cuddy (Lisa Edelstein) is being nice to House and this worries him.
One of Wilson's cancer patients (Eve) wants a special stuffed animal before treatment. The mother will go home and get it for her. House calls Wilson (Robert Sean Leonard) away to tell him he thinks Cuddy knows he faked the blood test.
Taub tells House it can't be smallpox based on the initial round of tests. House disagrees because she is a diver and the disease could be hiding. He wants them to search her joints and bones.
Cuddy tells House she knows and wants him to apologize for lying to her face. House doesn't think he should because he did it to save a patient. She isn't happy.
While taking samples from the daughter's bones, Taub spots marking behind her knee. "I'm sorry," he tells her. "I have to call the CDC. I think you do have smallpox."
While examining the daughter, they find a rash under her armpit. House says this means it's not smallpox.
Wilson talks to Sam (Cynthia Watros) about House's situation with Cuddy. She seems to agree with House and this surprises him. An announcement says the CDC has locked all hospital exits.
Doctors from the CDC's Infection control show up. House explains he doesn't believe she has smallpox, but Dr. Broda (Dylan Baker) bullies the team away from the area. They will have no more access to the family.
The team is forced to sit and wait. House has access to the captain's log from the ship with the sick slaves. It is in Dutch, so House calls an online video stripper and emails her the PDF to translate. The captain brought his cat. The records say only the slaves had the disease, meaning it wasn't airborne. Masters suggest drinking water differences could mean they had tuberculosis cervical lymphadenitis
House takes Foreman (Omar Epps) outside and says he wants to lie to the CDC in order to test for TB. He didn't want to tell him in there because of Masters.
Foreman talks to Broda, who gets suspicious. During the conversation, the father drops to the floor complaining of a headache before blood starts pouring out of his nose. Broda tells Foreman he's not getting access to the family.
The team still thinks it is TB.
House brings Chase (Jesse Spencer) into the hallway and wants him to go to the CDC with another lie. Masters comes out into the hallway and hears they don't trust her. She thinks they should go to the CDC with the truth.
Sam helps Wilson spend time with Eve, whose mother can now not get into the hospital.
Broda agrees to CT the father's brain.
The CT stops when they find pustules. The doc tells House the father has smallpox.
The consensus is now that both the daughter and father has smallpox.
Masters wants to take a closer look at the rash but the CDC won't let her. She walks to the glass and asks the daughter to show her the rash. Masters notices there are no lesions on the bottoms of her feet.
Wilson visits with Eve, who is getting upset about not having the right stuffed animal.
Masters tells Broda the daughter can't have smallpox. She doesn't have pustules on her palms or soles of feet, but the father does.
This gives House an idea and he runs to the team. He thinks the vaccine they gave the father caused him to get smallpox. The father had kidney cancer six years ago and House thinks it must be back. They still don't know what the daughter has.
Broda still won't open the door, but when House notices red blood in the urine bag, he is convinced this means the cancer is back. House barges in without a suit to give the father interferon. Broda says he hopes House is right "because I can't let you out now."
While House is inside, he and Cuddy discuss their argument further. She wants him to put the suit on, but he feels it's unnecessary. The father calls House over and says "I'm getting worse aren't I." House looks mildly concerned and asks Cuddy to get his team.
Sam explains to Eve that "sometimes adults mess up."
With the interferon still not working, House now has a suit on. The father's symptoms are textbook smallbox and Foreman tells him he made a mistake going into the room.
Cuddy asks House if he has any symptoms. He does not. The father takes a turn for the worse and asks House whether he is going to make it or not. House tells him he should say goodbye to his family and he says his final words to all of them. While talking to his son, the father flat lines. House works on him, but he dies. Broda refuses to let House to another isolation area.
The team talks options. Masters goes back to the stripper for more translation. They learn the captain's cat died and before it died it lost its fur. Masters points out animals do carry rickettsial pox and the guys jump to their feet.
Broda won't let them examine the dead father's body for evidence of the rickettsial pox. Instead he wants to bleach the body for safety's sake, but that would remove all evidence of the pox. Masters runs over to House and tells him he must look at the body himself. At first House doesn't want to go near it, but eventually looks at body over, even taking off his gloves. Just as the CDC guys come in, House finds evidence and they start the daughter on antibiotics.
Eve is released to see her mother. Wilson says Sam was good with her and suggests they have a baby.
The daughter is going to be okay but the family is shattered.
Cuddy still isn't close to forgiving House.
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