A/N Oh wow! I feel stupid; I haven't updated this in practically forever! Sorry about that! My health issues, learning a new department at my job (they like to move the supervisors around A LOT) left me with little energy for writing and then a child in my family got sick with a serious illness. I'm back now though.

Foreman watched as the Australian landscape seemed to move rapidly out of his window. It was a bit strange, being on the wrong side of the road. Or as Chase would correct him, not driving American-style. He wondered if Chase had felt strange when he first moved to the States.

"Hey, you think Chase ever accidently drove on the wrong side of the road back home?" Foreman grinned at Thirteen. He watched as the brunet doctor rub her eyes from where she had lightly dosed off. She too glanced out at the window as she seemed to ponder the question.

"Probably, I guess it would be hard to retrain your brain if you grew up doing something one way and then had to suddenly change the way you were doing it." Thirteen shrugged.

Jordan glanced in the rearview mirror quickly and cleared his throat. "Ah, yeah, he skyped me once to tell me he had pulled out of the hospital carpark and went the wrong way. Apparently he had to do an overnight shift and then got pulled to the ICU for a bit so he wasn't as aware as he should be. In any case, if someone hadn't blown their horn, he would've caused a nasty accident.

"Ha, that sounds like him. His driving, even when he's not distracted, leaves something to be desired." Foreman smirked, recalling the few times that Chase had driven on their B&Es.

After another thirty minutes, Jordan slowed to a stop in front of a hotel near a river. "Here you go, mates, the Crown Towers Hotel. Rather nice place, by the way Nate talks, I expected your boss to place you somewhere far less expensive. He had thought about housing you at Nate's home here, but decided that it wouldn't be a good idea. Whatever "the wombat," as your boss calls him, may have picked up might have started there."

" Ha. For once, I actually agree with House-" Foreman started.

"Do you have a fever Foreman?!" Thirteen mocked.

"Ha. In any case, we won't be here long. We have a flight scheduled to Queensland in a couple of days." Foreman informed Chase's friend.

"All right then. Let's get you settled in at the hotel and then I'm under strict orders to take you two out for dinner. Appearently your boss somehow managed to arrange with a few places for expenses to be billed to PPTH care of Wilson."

"Now THAT sounds like our boss." Foreman and Thirteen agreed.

ACLACLACLACL

Chase was finally sleeping soundly. House studied his fellow who was becoming more than a mere employee, but rather a son to the cantankerous man. House's pager sounded and he hurried to silence it, lest it wake up the Australian doctor.

Cuddy has indefinitely suspended the cafeteria worker who gave Chase strawberry jelly and he is waiting on a meeting with the board to determine his overall employement status." Wilson's message read. House sighed in relief. While he would have personally done something more "permanent," this was admittedly, more legal.

House wasn't a fool. In his opinion, he had never been one. So when Chase firmly stated that whatever was wrong with him, wasn't a chronic disease despite what the ANA indicated, he knew that his Australian doctor was simply grasping for a straw. Despite House's often snide comments to each of his fellows, all three were highly intelligent and more than capable doctors. So with that in mind, the Diagonostian also knew that deep down Robert, himself knew he was dealing with something far worse than a virus.

Push him or let him hide in the security of hope? It was a question House seldom even contemplated. Of course patients shouldn't delude themselves, it only brought bitter disappointment. However this was his fellow. . . his son in all but name. Could he look into those ocean-colored eyes and deny him the right to hope everything would be fine? House truly didn't know.

In any case, results from further testing would be done soon. House was certain the answer lied in those papers rather than Australia, where his other fellows were. He would allow them the search though. If anything, it would give the Aussie time to process his diagnoses before he had to deal with his teammates. So far, Chase had had a full bloodwork up, a MRI as well several hours spent by his team, himself and Wilson on his family history.

"Ah sir?" a nurse he recognized as Alice stood, toeing the floor. "We, uh, we got the results back." She thrust them in his general direction. If it had been any other nurse, House would have scoffed and mocked the pathetic peon. However, this was Alice, the same Alice who had helped his would-be son. So he would let it slide. He graced her with a rare smile.

"Thank you."

She nodded her acknowledgement and hurried out of the glass doors. House took the manila envelope over to the chair by Robert's bed. He paused a moment and took a breath. He knew he was likely being sentimental, but he couldn't help but feeling nervous over what he might learn.

Shaking off the feeling, he unclasped the metal brackets and slid the results out. He skimmed through the results and then he knew.

Sighing as he looked over to the man who's very life was about to change, he picked up his phone to make arrangements.

ACLACLACLACL

After a hearty meal with Jordan the two travel-weary doctors trudged up into their spacious hotel rooms. Tomorrow would arrive soon enough. Though Thirteen was already beginning to wonder if this whole trip would end up yielding anything. She hoped so, but it was more than a long shot. Not that she would admit this to Foreman-the man had a virtual stick up his butt about things and she didn't want to feed his affliction.

She liked both of her teammates. She even liked her boss. Not romantically, no, but rather as friends. Even if House and Foreman, and true, Chase drove her nuts at times. For the Aussie's sake though, she would set aside her suspicions and do for him what she did for all her patients, do anything to diagnose him. She prayed that it would be something completely curable and not something that would be life long or like hers-lead to a horrible death.

Anyways, hopefully, tomorrow would yield some clues-that is, if House hadn't already figured out what was ailing her Aussie teammate.

After showering and changing into her pajamas, Thirteen leafed through the brochures and maps that she had procured earlier at the airport and in the hotel lobby. The maps would come in handy, in addition to GPS, in helping locate some of the places she and Foreman would have to investigate. Hopefully, they would be able to also do some sightseeing, though the priority was to look for medical clues. One couldn't go out of the country and NOT sightsee!

ACLACLACL

Chase slowly became aware as he awoke. The lights were dimmed to just barely on and he could see the shadows filling the room. The standard medical equipment surrounded his bed. The slight pinch as he moved his arm informed him of the IV still present in his hand. There was one shadow however that surprised him, though he belatedly thought that it shouldn't, House was sitting in the chair next to him.

"House?"

"Ah. The Wombat awakes!" House greeted, his voice gruff as it always was but Chase detected more than a hint of gentleness. The Aussie waited while his boss turned the lights brighter.

As his eyes adjusted to the increased lighting, Chase spotted an envelope, a folder that he knew to be his and several books and other materials he couldn't make out from his position on the bed. He knew instinctively that his boss had reached his diagnosis.

"House?" Chase gestured to the pile of medical paraphernalia.

"Are you ready to know?" His boss searched his eyes, looking past the exterior of bravery and into his soul.

"Yeah. I am." Chase's voice was soft.

House gave a rare reassuring pat on his shoulder as the older man fished the results out. With a cough to clear his throat, he began to read. He listed off the normal results and saved the negative for last.

"Your hemoglobin and hematocrit tests indicate that you are severely anemic. You also have a high erythrocyte sedimentation rate as well as a high level of C-reactive proteins." House paused for a moment as he studied his fellow.

"It's…an autoimmune?" Chase blanched. Autoimmune diseases while treatable, weren't curable. Thinking of something, he gave a little laugh.

"I just informed you that you tested positive for an autoimmune disease, and you're laughing?" The older doctor shook his head.

"No…it's just….is it Lupus?" The Aussie asked the often suggested disease.

"Haven't I taught you anything? It's NEVER Lupus." House teased back.

"Going on," House flipped back to the results. "Your tests also showed the inclusion of rheumatoid factor antibodies which as you know indicates-"

"I have Rheumatoid Arthitis?!" Chase yelped as he looked at his boss. "That's inposs-I can't have that!"

"Chase. Robert. I've already done a consult with Dr. Archer, the on call Rheumatologist, he agrees with me. In addition to the bloodwork and MRI which showed significant damage to your feet, hands and elsewhere, we also found RA nodules on your elbows." He lifted one of Chase's arms and pointed out the small rounded bumps that were easy to miss. "All the evidence points to you having RA."

"But…RA is incredibly rare! Only one percent of the population here have it! And then out of that one percent of the people, seventy percent of those afflicted are women!"

"House grasped Chase's hands, "Which means thirty percent of those diagnosed with it are male. Robert, I know this is a big shock to you, but it's not a death sentence. Not anymore at least. Just in the last twenty years, medicines have come a long way in helping to cause remissions of it and to reduce damage. I'm sure you know-I've seen you sneak peaks at your father's last book he wrote before he died, that the medicines can even stop the progression so that it won't affect your organs." House assured him as he knew the Aussie would think of the lessor known result of the disease.

Chase was silent but he looked at House for him to go on. "Since you already have damage to your bones, your RA is classified as Severe. To combat the disease, I'm going to put you on a high dose of Methotrexate, and on Enbrel. You'll also take Folic Acid to help combat some of the side effects from the Methotrexate. House listed the familiar medicines. Chase knew that Methotrexate was used in a variety of diseases to lower the immune system. In extremely high doses, it was even used as chemo. He wondered if he would suffer any of the common side effects of it. Enbrel was a inject he would have to do every week and was classified as a Biologic medicine that sought to change the tumor necrosis factor, a substance found in patients with RA.

"As you know, Enbrel is the number one prescribed medicine for RA, but if it doesn't work within six months, we'll try Humira, another biologic." House eased up on the facts as he saw his patient closing off. Doctor or not, it was always hard to learn that you would struggle with a disease for the rest of your life. He slid over the bedside table.

"Here's your first dose of methotrexate," he gave Chase a little cup filled with ten tiny orange pills that totaled a 25 mg dose of the medicine. You'll take that once a week, same with the Enbrel. Speaking of which, here's the first of those too." Chase swallowed all ten pills at one time with a swig of water and reached for the shot of Enbrel. The auto injected shot was still in the packaging and he removed the paper to get it.

After glancing at the enclosed instructions, he pulled down his blanket and injected the medicine two inches above his left knee.

"Even though most RA patients aren't confined to a hospital when they are diagnosed, I am going to keep you for a few days to see how you tolerate the Methotrexate and to continue IV pain meds." House informed Chase when he was done.

Chase only nodded as he looked at his boss. Even though he hadn't been handed a death sentence, he wondered just how much his life was going to change.

ACLACLACL

A/N Wow! That one was chock-full of medical jargon! Sorry about that! I couldn't help it! As you may or may not have guessed, given some of my other A/Ns, I actually do have RA. I was diagnosed January 2013, but had it for two years prior. RA is a difficult disease to diagnose as it mimics other diseases. I figured I could speed it up though-as House is Chase's doctor! Also, many real-life patients are diagnosed a lot sooner than I was. *shrugs* I actually do take Methotrexate (YUCK!) and Folic Acid. I did begin my RA treatment with the auto-injected medicine, Enbrel, but in my case, it didn't work so I am now on the auto-injected medicine, Humira. I've been on that for a year. It seems to do better, though I still have plenty of pain-filled days. Even after Chase gets on the meds for a while, it's not going to just disappear because that's unrealistic. In other news, one of my nieces was just diagonosed with Type 1 Diabetes-the auto-immune type and it's in the same classification as RA. Poor niece. Anyways, sorry for the long wait.