Back in the clinic, Sykes is gone. House wants swabs for the laundry. Adams wants to know why he lied to her about what he's in for. He doesn't think it makes any difference what he did. She asks why he's in jail for driving a car into a house, what with the no priors and not hurting anyone. She doesn't think that's enough to get some time? He says, "I had a bad lawyer." She says they can't talk about the case anymore. House is let back out.

When House goes into his cell, he's thugged out by a goon. Mendelson enters. House starts making excuses: "I can't get all twenty. But when I get out..." Mendelson tells him he can't give him a pass because it would be showing weakness. He leaves, taking House's cane with him. House is utterly bereft. Poor House! The soundtrack has a fast heartbeat going, to show how bad off he is. He limps up to his chess friend's cell. "I need your help. Got any matches?" Nope. "How about a stick of gum?" House will also need "that" too. It's a pen, which his friend always carries around and never writes with. It's a shiv! That's Plan B, apparently.

STILL THURSDAY, I GUESS

House sticks the foil wrapper from the gum into a plug in the bathroom, uses the spark to ignite a toilet paper roll, and puts it in the sink on a towel. He enters the clinic (where are all the guards in this place?) and Adams asks what happened to his cheek. Just then! The fire alarm goes off and he snags a bottle of pills. Then he returns it, half-empty.

The patient wants to talk to House about the cotton swabs. He won't listen. He's done fixing people. And then he gets distracted by noticing that his patient's lips are swelling. He recently ate meat loaf, potatoes, and coffee. Then he goes into anaphylactic shock. House calls for the guards, but they're never around when you need one, right?. House has to make a hole so he can breathe. He uses the pen-shiv to poke a hole in his throat, and then flushes the blade down the toilet. Alvarez the Guard tells him to back up, but House successfully convinces Alvarez that he's performing a tracheotomy, not committing assault. "What's wrong with him?" "I have no idea."

House is in bed. It's night. There's a cricket chirping. He rubs his leg. Under his pillow, he has a full four-by-five thing of pills. We see that he's written some medical nonsense on the bottom of the upper bunk so he can stare at it while he lies awake and twitches. He pulls out the pills again and takes one. Then two. Then three. He probably should have stolen more than the bare minimum required to get the Nazis off his back.