He woke up gasping for breath. This was how drowning felt like, he was sure of it. His eyes opened but focusing on the room around him was impossible, and all he could see was blurs of white and blue.

"Help!" he cried, and thought he heard the faint beeping of a nearby machine. Hands were soon pushing a mask to his face, saying something in a soothing voice, but he couldn't understand the words. He tensed his back so that he arched backward, pushing his neck against the bed and raising his abdomen in the air. The hands pressed against his shoulders, and he felt air start to flow back into his lungs. His back relaxed into the bed and he breathed deeply.

"Just relax." he heard the voice saying, still pressing the mask against his face. No longer in need of it, he pushed it away and tried to sit up.

"Where am I?" he asked. His hands were both covered in thick cotton gloves, and he couldn't put his weight on them, or even move his fingers. "Where am I?"

The woman in front of him came into focus briefly. "You're in the hospital. Be still, or you'll hurt yourself."

"Why? What happened?"

The nurse sighed.

"I'll call the doctor."

He heard her walk away, and immediately his chest tightened. Why were his hands bound? Why was he at the hospital? He sat up again, swung his legs over the edge of the table, and fell down to the floor. The IV he hadn't noticed in his hand was pulled out and started to stain the white glove and drip blood on the floor. He felt his breath become shallow, raspy, and he knew he wouldn't be able to get back to the bed. He crawled towards the exit and his vision tunneled, still unfocused. He only got halfway to the door before he felt his face growing numb and the light become even dimmer. The door opened, but instead of a body coming in he only saw shadows wrapped in eerie light.

"Chase!" The voice called, with fiery red eyes and a face that was a pure black void. He came nearer, and Chase felt his throat closing up and his vision fading, until all he could see was black and red. But he was too tired to escape.

Chase opened his eyes as soon as the alarm rang and let out a sigh of relief. The night had dragged on forever, with him drifting in and out of twisting nightmares of falling and drowning, intertwined with waking up trapped inside his blankets or shivering after pushing them all to the floor. He didn't feel rested at all.

It was the third day in a row that he didn't sleep well, and his face showed it. Even after showering and getting dressed his eyes appeared to be stuck in half mast. He made an attempt at breakfast but felt a bitter taste in his throat after the first bite of his sandwich. His stomach turned. Maybe it was the cold. He'd been suffering from fever and congestion all the past week, but now all that remained was the fatigue and a dry cough.

He had arrived at the conference room and was pouring himself some coffee when Foreman walked in.

"Hey, House not here yet?" He asked. Chase looked around, annoyed that he asked such an obvious question.

"Clearly not," he said, his eyes still on the coffee.

"Ok... could you tell him to give me a call when he shows up?"

"Why, what's going on, do we have case?" he asked.

"Not really. Just let him know I'm looking for him, alright?"

"Fine, whatever," he answered, and Foreman frowned at him for a second before going on his way. He realized how uncharacteristic and full of spite his voice had been, but the words had been out faster than he could control. This was going to be a long day.

"Chase? Chase" he heard a voice calling, but it sounded distant. Then a feeling like his body was being shaken, but everything around him was still dark.

"Chase, come on," the voice said again. It sounded familiar. He looked around, looking for the voice, but then he felt a shove, and suddenly the darkness dissolved. He found himself on his car, driving along a dirt road he recognised from back home. But he turned and the road became strange, unknown. His foot pressed on the accelerator against his better judgement. In front, the road came to an end. And then he was falling. His hands grabbed at the wheel and the seatbelt pressed against his chest and then-

"Chase!"

He woke with a start, immediately rising to his feet in a state of mild panic. Foreman stood in front of him in the lounge of the doctors' rest area. He let out a breath, and felt cold sweat building up in the back of his head.

"Foreman" he said, trying in vain to straighten the wrinkles from his shirt. "Did anything happen?"

"House was looking for you, I think your patient's getting sicker."

"Oh. Ok, I'll be there right now."

"Are you alright?" Foreman said, and took a step forward as if analysing him. Suddenly, a dark, fluttering feeling rose in the pit of his stomach. It was diffuse, unidentifiable, and Chase couldn't pinpoint the cause. He had no reason to be scared.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine, I'm fine" Chase said, with a little more enthusiasm than he meant. "I slept really badly last night, still got this cough, you know, just needed to lie down for a bit," he said, then paused. Foreman just nodded. "Well, I'll be going now."

He pushed the door to the conference room and felt his nerves begin to calm down. It's the lack of sleep, he thought, recalling other times he had been awoken in the middle of a dream, and the feeling of grogginess that usually followed.

"Hey Taub" he called to his colleague, who was passing time making coffee. The rest of the room was empty. "How's the patient?"

"Her blood pressure's way up. She has to have some sort of infection but we haven't figured out what exactly." Taub said. "Where were you?"

"I had to check on a follow up from the clinic." he lied. The feeling in his stomach returned. He felt nervous, like he had done something wrong.

"Oh." Taub said, paying him little attention

"Listen, if House shows up tell him I'm on the clinic. I'm behind on my hours." he said. The need to be doing something was sudden. He wouldn't spend the rest of his day sitting there waiting for stuff to happen. He walked back to the first floor, but only checked up a couple of patients before signing out. As fast as it came, his energy was gone.

That night he dreamt he was back in a car, only this time he was on the passenger seat of an old jeep. It was dark, and his mother was driving through an open plain. She looked beautiful in a silent, eerie kind of way. He rarely looked at pictures of her, and it had been more than a decade since she died, but Chase wasn't surprised to see her.

"Mum, slow down." he said, when the car skidded along a turn. She laughed. The plain transformed, and a mountain rose on the right side and an abyss formed on the left. The road was so narrow Chase couldn't see the edge from the window, except from the shrub that marked the start of the ravine, and then a dark, deep valley. The driving became more and unstable, and Chase felt the car lose its grip on the side of the road, then recover. The gritty road made the car vibrate violently, and with every twist he felt the edge grow closer..

"Phew, that was a close call," his mum said. Her face was no longer beautiful, but rather marred with age lines and dark bags under her eyes, her hair a frizzy mess around her head. The tumble intensified, but this time she wasn't able to get the car back, and they began to fall.

Wake up, Chase thought, suddenly aware, but the car kept shaking violently and the path in front of them disappeared. The car turned sideways, then skidded. When the shock came, he felt it, and found himself hanging upside down with a blinding pain in his head. It was only after he realised he was alone that he sighed in relief, and let himself fall back into darkness.

He spent the rest of the night shifting and turning, but he never fell asleep again.

Thanks for reading! This story is finished so you don't have to worry I'll leave you hanging, I'll just be proofreading. Let me know what you think!