The Cullen Residence, near the Town of Forks, Washington

Dr. Gregory House glared at the suddenly quiet members of his improvised team; after his abrupt demand to be let in on whatever annoying set of secrets they were trying to keep, their only response had been to fall into a sullen silence; the big guy standing in for Foreman had moved a few steps closer to the native American woman who'd been staring at him like he was the second coming.

While it did wonders for his ego, it was a bit disconcerting to have a woman half his age seemingly on the cusp of dragging him off and raping him.

Actually, House eyed Leah speculatively, on second thought that sounds fun.

Leah suddenly opened her mouth to try and speak, and Emmet lunged at her, trying to keep her from spilling the precious secret of the Cullen's vampiric nature to the human.

Leah deftly dodged the lighting fast vampires attack and shouted, "These freaks are vampires! Run!"

The words were barely out of her mouth before Emmet turned and snarled, preparing to attack again; Carlisle threw himself in between his son and Leah, who was starting to wildly shiver, getting ready to phase and attack her vampire adversary with her full lupine fury.

Bella shot to her feet, as if unsure what to do, while Carlisle spoke in mild tones,

"Everyone calm down, please. Leah, we don't mean Dr. House any harm, I promise you."

"Dad, for Christ's sake, she just told him! You know what we'll have to do now!"

"The Quileute's have been telling those they imprint on our secret for decades, Emmet. None of them has told an outsider so far."

"Yeah, but this guy? Come on!"

Emmet turned to look at House, who was staring at the four strange people with a mixture of shock and contempt,

"You people think you're…vampires?"

Emmet and Carlisle exchanged surprised glances. Disbelief hadn't been the reaction they were expecting. Judging by the angry look on her face neither did Leah.

"You idiots!" House raged, stumping away from his ersatz dry erase board on the wall and walking in a long circle around the three vampires, "I guess the fallen daughter upstairs has been snacking on blood, huh? Do you lunatics have any idea how many parasites there are in human blood?"

"We only eat animals…" Bella automatically protested, sounding exasperated.

"Oh well, since animals are so much cleaner than humans…give dear sister some antibiotics and she'll be fine."

"House, they really are vampires!" Leah shouted, moving to his side, "They drink blood to survive; they don't go out in the sunlight…"

"I noticed it's four in the afternoon and they're up and about. Shouldn't they have coffins or something? Or capes? And shouldn't there be a mob of angry villagers on their way to burn the castle down? Oh I'm sorry, we're not in a castle, are we? And they're not vampires because vampires don't exist!" House glared at Leah, who stared back at him in outraged surprise.

Despite the tension in the room, Emmet snickered. He knew Leah well enough to know she wanted to rip House a new asshole right now, but she couldn't because of their imprint.

Leah turned to glare at him, and the snicker became a guffaw.

"What are you laughing at, Ice Cube?" she growled.

"You."

"Oh, if you think that's funny, you should go look in a mirror and think 'wow, if Fred Durst ever dies, I know right where they can find another suburban white boy gangster wannabe to replace him'"

Emmet stopped laughing, while House looked at the strange girl who'd imprinted on him

with real affection for the first time,

"Good one," he said, slapping her on the back. "Now, if we can just get you all to forget the part where you think you're vampires, we can get moving on the whole saving the patient thing, if it's not to much trouble."

"Oh she's not a vampire, doc. She's a werewolf." Emmet said, smiling darkly at Leah.

House sighed in exasperation,

"Alright you lunatics, if you don't…"

Snarling in fury, Bella darted across the room at her full vampire speed and lifted House off the ground by the collars of his jacket with one hand,

"Listen, Doctor," she growled, "Stop slandering my family, and do what we brought you here to do, or I swear, I'll make you pay. You don't think we're vampires? Than how come we don't have a pulse? How come we're all pale as snow? How come our skin is cold as ice…" Bella hauled House a little higher off the ground, "And how come a hundred pound girl is lifting you off the ground with one hand?"

Disbelief and fear washed over House's face, but only for a moment before his blue eyes hardened into his normal implacable glare. "Because vampires aren't real! Psychics aren't real! Werewolves aren't real! You people are just freaks of nature!"

Carlisle and Emmet, and presumably Edward and Jasper as well, had all been frozen in place by Bella's bizarre and uncharacteristic fury. Leah too had fallen into shocked silence. But when Bella raised a hand to strike House after his savage insult, the female shape shifter had snapped back into reality. Phasing in an instant, her grey wolf form shot across the room and knocked Bella off her legs. The young vampire spilled House out of her grip and the human bounced once before scrambling away from the huge grey wolf and her enraged adversary. He tried to pull himself to his feet, but the pain from his mangled leg shot through him, overwhelming his senses and he cried out in agony before falling back to the floor.

Leah's head snapped around at House's cry and Bella, sensing Leah's distraction, prepared to strike.

"Bella, what the fuck are you doing?"

The room fell into an abrupt silence. Emmet and Carlisle slowly turned, both of them sure that they had misheard the voice; that it wasn't who they thought it was…but it was.

Edward was striding down the stairs; his every step purposeful and angry.

Bella stared at her husband in shock so deep it was painful to look upon. He'd never sworn, he'd never yelled, he'd never been angry at her… all traces of her fury had been completely erased.

Just for a moment, Carlisle saw agony in his son's eyes, as if every moment he was angry at Bella was tearing him apart.

He guessed it was.

"You were going to kill that man. Do you want that on your soul? Do you want to be completely like me?"

Bella worked her mouth, but no words came out.

Edward reached down and helped House up, scooping up the crippled humans cane as he did so. After steadying Dr. House on his feet and handing him back his cane, Edward turned to look at his wife; his face had lost it's furious expression and had settled on a more sedate anger,

"What's gotten into you Bella?"

The brown haired vampire made a wordless noise in the back of her throat that sounded like pure desperation,

"I just need to be alone!" She shouted, before running at full tilt out of the room and into the kitchen; they heard the back door open and slam shut. Edward immediately took off after his wife, ignoring her plea to be left alone.

House looked shaken, shocked, surprised. And he was staring at Leah's wolf form like it came from his deepest nightmare.

He reached into his jacket pocket for his bottle of Vicodin and popped one of the pills into his mouth. After a moment's consideration, he took two more.

"Well…" House said, his voice shaking, "That's…two emo-tastic teenage vampires down…just two to go."

It was a feeble jest, and he knew it.

Leah moved to his side, gazing into his eyes in concern. House didn't flinch away; instead he reached out to touch the grey wolf as if he was making sure she was real.

Something within him seemed to break, and he took in a great sobbing gasp of air before stumbling over to one of the big white couches and collapsing on it.

After a few moments his eyes seemed to refocus, and he looked over at the remaining vampires and the wolf,

"So, since my world view still isn't completely shattered, why doesn't someone just go ahead and tell me everything?"

In the woods nearby, Edward was in hot pursuit of Bella, finally catching up with her near the small cottage she'd been given as a birthday present.

She had stopped running and was sitting on a moss covered rock, staring into the forest.

He slowed and tried to quietly move to her side, but she suddenly turned to look at him,

"Do you remember the first few times you took me with you into the woods?"

Edward looked at Bella in confusion,

"I was so scared of them then, so scared I'd trip and hurt myself…I used to be so uncoordinated, remember? Always falling."

"Bella…Bella, love, you're scaring me."

"But now…" Bella ran her right hand over the smooth pale, marble skin and laughed nervously, "…now I'm perfect."

"Bella for the love of God, please tell me what's wrong!" Edward pleaded, falling to his knees next to his wife, "Are you sick? Bella do you have what Alice has? Bella, please tell me what's wrong!"

Bella shook her head slowly, and then seemed to focus on Edward, as if noticing his presence just then,

"I'm sorry I got so angry. I'm sorry I made you angry at me."

"It's alright, Bella, it's my fault I never should have…"

"Yes you should have. I was going to…hurt that poor man. I would have."

"But why Bella? Please, please, tell me what's going on. Why are so angry?"

Bella shook her head, "I…it's stupid. And selfish. If I tell you, you'll hate me more than anything in world."

"I could never, Bella. You know that."

Bella shook her head again.

"If you…don't want to tell me, could you show me? Disperse your shield?"

"Sorry. I can't. Could…could you just stay here with me?"

"Of course."

Edward sat down on the stone next to Bella and leaned his head on her shoulder.

"I'm sorry Edward."

"You have nothing to be sorry for. You never do."

Back in the Cullen house, the two vampires were mulling over the best way to tell House their family history while Leah, still in wolf form, stared at the shredded remnants of her clothes in exasperation.

Emmet turned away from Carlisle and walked over to Leah.

"Uh…I know you probably don't want to, but if you really need some clothes and you're willing to ignore vampire scent for awhile, you can run upstairs and grab some of Rose's things."

Leah looked over at House, who was still sprawled on the couch, staring at the ceiling, and then back at Emmet,

"I swear we won't tell him anything until you get back. I guess you'd be the best one to tell him anyway, right?"

Leah let out a menacing bark of agreement and padded up the Cullen's staircase.

House watched her go, "I could see how ripping your clothes off every time you turn into a wolf could be a bit inconvenient."

Leah made one of those throaty warbling noises the Quileute's used for laughter in the wolf form.

He looked around, suddenly aware of another presence in the room.

Renesmee had appeared in the room, having slipped past Carlisle and Emmet unnoticed and was now sitting next to the curmudgeonly doctor and staring at him, unspeaking.

"Great." House muttered, "Creepy little girl vampire…"

"I could show you." Ness said.

"Excuse me?"

"I could show you everything you need to know about us."

"Fine. That works for me, I guess."

Renesmee reached out and set her hand on House's.

"Oh shit." Emmet growled, as House's eyes widened as his mind flooded with memories that were not his own.

Hunting in the woods, the taste of elks blood, playing with Jacob, listening to stories of the Quileute's from Billy Black, Grandpa Carlisle explaining all the paintings in his room, Aunt Alice looking sad and thinking about her past, Uncle Emmet and Aunt Rose making funny noises all night, Grandpa Charlie glowering at Edward when he thought I wasn't looking, everyone's skin in the daylight, sparkling like crystal, the Volturi marching in perfect lockstep back into the woods, Leah smiling tentatively as she and mommy and Jacob take me to Seattle, Daddy playing his piano and smiling, Mommy laying on the table after I was born, not moving as Daddy pumps her chest and screams at Jacob.

House suddenly broke off from Ness's contact and lurched to his feet. He stumbled slightly before grabbing his cane and looking around the room in a daze.

He looked down at Nessie, blinked once in surprise, and then limped towards the stairs.

"House…" Carlisle said, but the human ignored him as he slowly trudged up the stairs,

"House I know it's a lot to take in, but we need to focus on the problem right now."

House continued to ignore him, and Carlisle and Emmet followed House up the stairs.

"House…" Emmet said, but the human continued to ignore them as he made a beeline for Edward and Bella's room, "House what are you…"

The human doctor slammed the door closed in his two vampire pursuers faces, and they heard the metallic scrape of the lock as House flipped it closed.

"Oh, nice going Leeches," Leah growled, as she came out of Emmet and Rosalie's room wearing a sun dress that didn't quite fit on her. She knocked quietly on the door,

"Doctor House, it's me Leah, could you let me in please?" she asked, her voice tinged with forced sweetness and desperation; she was already suffering from being separated from her imprint.

The only response was a loud scrape of furniture being moved as House barricaded the door.

"Well that's great." Carlisle growled, "He's flipped his lid, hasn't he?"

Leah turned to glare at him, but said nothing. She leaned against the wall before sinking down into a sitting position.

"He'll come out. As soon as he accepts what's happened."

"Well that's great," the Vampire patriarch repeated. "But in the mean time what the hell are we supposed to do?" Carlisle stated, sounding frustrated.

"In the mean time, we go back downstairs and think," Emmet supplied, tugging on Carlisle's shoulder, "We keep…diagnosing. Just because he's flipped out, doesn't mean we can't figure out something to test, right?"

"It more than likely does, actually." House shouted from inside Edward and Bella's room.

Emmet rolled his eyes,

"Let's go."

An hour later, as Carlisle and Emmet argued in the living room and the rest of the Vampire clan sat around watching, Edward and Bella returned to their home.

Edward slipped into the main floor and went up to Alice's room, while Bella, still trying to stick to herself, deftly leapt from the ground up to the window of her and Edward's room and slipped inside.

She'd been distracted, and was therefore surprised to see Dr. House sitting on the leather couch, which had been pushed up against the door, and watching a movie on the small plasma screen TV Edward had bought for their room.

"What…" Bella blurted, surprised, "What are you doing?"

House shifted his blue eyed glare to her for a few moments, then back to the TV,

"Yeah, fine, come right in, no one in here is in the middle of a mental breakdown or anything."

"It's my room."

"Semantics."

House turned up the volume on the TV.

"…keep it quiet." a voice sounded from the massive speakers attached to the flat screen.

Curious, Bella turned to look at the flickering screen.

A unit of futuristic soldiers was picking their way through a bizarre looking industrial setting that was half covered in a black, fungus like growth.

Bella vaguely remembered having seen the movie before,

"Aliens? Why are you watching Aliens?"

House held a finger to his mouth and made a shushing noise, before growling, "Just making sure this movie hasn't been ruined for me."

On screen, one of the soldiers approached a woman who was dangling from a wall and began to lift her head up.

The woman's eye suddenly snapped open, accompanied by a loud squeal of music; Bella leapt backwards and snarled; she'd forgotten that part.

"Top, get over here we got a live one!" the soldier shouted

"Please…kill me…" the woman on the wall begged."

Bella looked away, and saw that House was watching the movie with intense scrutiny.

The action grew ever more frantic, until the woman attached to wall started to scream and an alien burst out of her chest.

House paused the movie, staring at the screen for a few moments.

"Okay. Still good." House said, before hitting play again and tossing the remote aside. He fixed Bella with his blue eyed glare, "You're kind of insane, you know that?"

"Look," Bella whispered, sitting down next to House, "I shouldn't have done…what I did earlier. But I…"

"I wasn't talking about that. That I understand. I was thinking more along the lines of your utter lack of any instinct for self preservation."

Bella stared at the bizarre human, "What do you mean, you understand that?"

House narrowed his eye's and spoke in a harsh whisper "Pardon my language sweetheart, but you're a bit of a selfish bitch."

"What?"

"You grew up in a broken home, right?"

"No. My parents were divorced, but I always had a family."

"Daddy never knew how to be a father, mommy treated you like a best friend, doesn't sound like much of a family to me." House began ticking points off on his fingers, "You sat in the background as a kid, never knew how to interact with strangers, never had any friends except the one's that you stumbled upon; the ones you did have you threw away at the first sign of something better…"

"That's not true!"

"Oh really? When was the last time you talked with any of those old high school buddies your daughter showed me?"

"Wait, Renesmee used her gift on you? When?"

House shrugged, "There's no telling what shenanigans your little half demon spawn could get up to when you're hiding in the woods, huh?"

Bella growled, but House forged on, "But all of a sudden the worlds greatest, most perfect and happy family wandered into your life…" House voice filled with mocking anger, "And you knew what you were missing out on. You took one look at Sulky and his happy family and that was all she wrote." House started to spin his cane around in his hand, "Not only did you have an in, you had a perfect in. To the thing you always wanted the most; a happy little family of your own." House shook his head, "Poor little Eddie, he didn't stand a chance after you saw him, did he? But now this perfect little world you thought was going to be yours for eternity is falling apart, and you're ready to do whatever you have to protect it."

Bella's eyes widened, but she didn't voice any denials. Instead she sank down on the couch next to the human doctor and stared blankly at the TV screen.

"That isn't how it happened." she whispered, voice thick with tears she couldn't shed. "That isn't all I wanted…I wanted to be loved. By someone who could show me they meant it."

House looked over at her, a perfect target for his rapier like cynical wit to reduce to a puddle of emotionally destroyed goo, just like it did whenever he saw the opportunity to ruin someone's day for his own amusement. He saw his target, bare and open…and didn't strike.

"Like I said. I understand."

Bella looked over at him in confusion.

"I understand because I was in your exact position. I know what it's like to have a magic hall pass to a perfect world, a perfect family. And then you get to watch it melt away before your eyes."

"What happened?" Bella asked.

House shrugged and got to his feet. Bella stood up and set a hand on his back as the doctor turned to start pushing the couch away from the door.

" Dr. House, I want to know."

"The exact same thing that's happening to you. Only I couldn't stop it," House said, without turning. "But lets not let that happen here, shall we?" he strained to move the couch, which gave way slowly until Bella gave it a firm shove, sending it sliding into the far wall and away from the door.

"You go…I'm not ready to face everyone after they heard all that."

House shrugged, "So the super hearing vampire thing isn't a myth? Thought so. Well, in case you didn't notice, I was whispering. Pretty sure not even you vampire relations could hear me over the sound of Sigourney Weaver battling the world's nastiest termite infestation." House pointed at the TV, where the embattled colonial marines were blasting away at their fearsome but apparently not bullet proof alien enemies.

"So, She Hulk. You ready?"

Bella glowered back; the emotional connection did not seem to proof against House's attitude.

Not bothering to wait for a reply, House unlocked the door and swung it open,

"Lets go, Lover Girl!" He barked as he stumped past Leah, who jumped to her feet and rushed after him, "Time to see how big a mess Pretty Boy and Eminem have made."