House – Finding Judas Tag

AN: I do not own House MD or anything that has to do with it. I wish I did (I wouldn't mind having Chase to myself ;) but I don't.

Please Read and Review! This is my first House fic, so it might be a little OOC.

Chase looked down at the beer clenched in his fist, the chill from the glass spreading slowly through his fingers, wet with condensation. He thought about the dull ache that was, he hoped, spreading through House's knuckles right now and absentmindedly reached up to rub his jaw. He'd always thought that he'd left all of this back Down Under. The addiction. The beatings. The fear and the denial and the guilt. But somehow House had managed to bring it all into his professional working life. And just like with his father, Chase knew that nobody would say anything, nobody would do anything.

The worst part was, he understood. He didn't hate House. He had been in withdrawal and Chase just happened to be pissing him off at the wrong place, wrong time. He had always kept trying to convince himself that House was different. That, yes, he had his issues, but that somewhere behind the ice blue eyes and the grey scruff, he really did care. Well, everybody makes mistakes. Throwing back the rest of his beer, Chase tumbled into bed, his cell phone set to wake him up several hours later.

Beep-Beep. Beep-Beep.

Chase blinked groggily, disoriented. He peered at the glowing blue screen of his cell phone.

HOUSE. 5:30AM.

Beeeeeeeeeep.

He groaned and rolled over, his toes curling as they met the cold hardwood floor. He sat upright, the ache in his jaw returning full force. He considered taking an Advil as he padded to the bathroom, but decided against it. He didn't want to forget. He wiped the cold water from his eyes, his face drawn and pale in the mirror. The bruise had turned an excellent shade of dark purple overnight. He glanced down at his phone. If he was quick about it, he could make it to the hospital by 6. He knew there was no way the others would be there before 6:30 or 7.

~Princeton-Plainsboro Hospital~

Chase was half glad that House had paged them this early. The hospital wasn't very busy, although he still got the stares. They all thought this was his fault. Either that or they thought he was stupid for coming back. Hell, House thought he'd betrayed him. Chase didn't even want to think about the smug, self-serving looks he'd see on Cameron and Foreman's faces later. But first, he had something he had to do.

He paused when he reached the corner before House's office. A thousand thoughts ran through his head. He considered turning back, having a shower, crawling back into bed, even if it was empty. But he wasn't a coward. Fixing his eyes straight ahead, Chase pushed through the glass door into House's office.

"Helloo there, little wombat." House spun his chair around to face Chase. "What took you so long? I paged like 3 hours ago."

"Half-an hour ago. And what is this exactly? I mean - " Chase started.

"Booty-call." House retorted immediately. "We have a case. 32 year old Jane Doe with unexplained blackouts, skin lesions, and a particularly lovely rash in the nether regions." He finished with a wink.

"At 6 AM? Did you even go home last night? Come on House…" Chase rolled his eyes and turned to leave, freezing as House stood up, leaning his weight onto his cane.

"That's a pretty shade of purple you've got going there." House said, putting both hands on his cane and leaning forward. His voice had the usual jilt of sarcasm, but his eyes were serious. "Chase –"

"House." Chase interrupted stepping forward, leaning forward, as if straining towards House would make him believe him. "I know you think I betrayed you to Tritter. I didn't. He set me up, House I swear I'm telling the truth."

"Yeah, because we're all so touchy-feely, declare our undying love here. Everybody lies."

"When I took this job, Cuddy told me I would never be the same. She said I wouldn't belong to myself anymore, not really. And I shrugged it off. I thought that after my mother. And after my father... Well, I thought that I was immune." His accent got thicker the more he spoke, and House found himself wondering if this was what a young Chase would have sounded like.

"Immune? Is this a disease? Or should I be concerned about the water?" House interjected; his eyes wide and head cocked to the left, in a futile attempt to bait Chase.

"This was different. You own me, House. Not like my mother, with the obligations and empty bottles and depression. Not like my father, with his money and his choices and his belt." He spat the last part out so bitterly that House could have flinched. "You own me because you have my loyalty. Maybe I gave it to you, maybe you stole it. All I know is that whatever you're going to give out, I'll take it. I am a good doctor. And I was right about that little girl. So yeah, I think you screwed up. But I never said a word to Tritter."

Chase exhaled heavily, done ranting, and was busy looking anyywhere but at his boss's stony face. House straightened up suddenly and snaked forward with surprising speed, causing Chase to stumble backwards until his back was being pressed into House's bookcase.

"What the hell are you doing, House?" Chase snapped in anger, his eyes flashing. He could feel the edge of the shelf digging into his back, but it was like he was paralyzed. He couldn't move, but he could feel House's breath on his face.

"Huh." House smirked, leaning back. "Would you look at that."

"House…" Chase growled.

"I move towards you, you move away. Cause and effect." He closed his eyes for a moment, then popped them open "You think I'm going to hit you again."

"I do not. This is ridiculous." Chase tried to move forward, but he banged back into the bookcase as House slammed his palm onto the wall, next to Chase's face. He did it again -Bam- and Chase flinched, hard.

"Yes." House brought his cane up to rest on the wall on the other side of Chase's head and dragged it slowly down the wall next to him. Chase tipped his head up and swallowed hard, looking at the ceiling. "You do."

Stepping back, House shrugged. "No worries though mate. I'm pretty sure wombats are an endangered species. And I was never one for animal cruelty anyways." His fake Australian accent was worse than usual.

Casting his eyes down to the floor, Chase turned to leave; hitching his leather shoulder bag higher up, his shoulders slumped. House watched him take a few steps, wondering if the look Chase had given him after he'd punched him was the same one Rowan Chase used to get. He knew that Chase had bounced right back up, continued spouting the diagnosis, like this happened every day. Maybe it used to, House thought, hating himself a little bit more. It was like kicking that puppy that was always following you around, albeit a man-whore puppy.

"Just because you were the first duckling to join the flock, doesn't mean you should be the first one to leave. We have a case, so get your ass back in here and put a pot of coffee on." House called over his shoulder as he limped into the conference room, tossing a pile of folders onto the glass table.