The next morning was when Talia knew that something was off for sure. She thought Chase was just tired from everything that had happened the day before. but now she was certain that there was something else going on.

The first sign, and arguably the biggest, was that Chase hadn't waited for her to go to work this morning. He had actually decided to drive himself there in his car, which was bizarre, because for the four years they'd been together - only once had they driven separately to work - and it was only because of the situation with Leona and Ryan. No matter what fight they had, no matter who was angry at who, they'd always go together, so that was strike one.

Regardless, Talia swiftly got over it and made her way to work in her own car instead.

But when she arrived, she wasn't expecting those next words to come from one of her favourite receptionists.

Sara, her name was.

"Can I ask you something?" she asked Talia casually whilst she signed in at the front desk. Talia nodded distractedly, putting down the pen and picking up all the envelopes that were addressed to her instead. "Did you two have a fight yesterday?"

"Who? Me and Foreman?" Talia frowned, shuffling all the envelopes together and tapping them down on the counter.

"No, you and Dr. Chase," Sara blinked with her head cocked to the side.

That's when Talia actually gave her full attention.

"Why…why would you think that we had a fight?" she blinked. "Has he said something?"

"Quite the opposite, actually," Sara shrugged as she took the sign in sheet from her. "He came into work at 3am and has been here ever since. That was the shocking part."

Now Talia was really uneasy - she didn't like the sound of this.

"Did you see him yourself?" she asked Sara a little nervously, trying to ignore the anxiety that was already building in her chest.

"No, it was way too early for me to catch him - but Marley the maintenance man did. Said he looked kinda…troubled," Sara answered airily. Clearly she saw no issue with it. "Oh, also…House has a new case, and the Sibiti woman had a successful surgery and is waiting to seek refuge in the US, and there are also talks of what to do with the man who tried to kill President Dibala. They wanna charge him in our courts but Dibala's men still wanna try him in their country. It's a legal issue."

"Right. I get the House thing and the Ama updates but you're telling me the stuff about the attempted assassination guy because…?" Talia frowned, causing Sara to laugh lightly.

"Apparently, Dr. Cuddy wants you to handle it," she whispered. That didn't surprise Talia whatsoever. She had been in charge of a number of bits and pieces that she didn't even view as 'Patient Care' existing outside of House's cases recently - and sometimes it felt as if she was doing some of Cuddy's job for her.

"I bet she does," Talia scoffed under her breath. "I know he's under our hand so it's a form of Patient Care but dear lord, there's a limit to the madness. Anyway, thanks for the chat, hun." She and Sara exchanged little smiles before Talia collected her envelopes and walked to her office, her head now clouded with all this fresh gossip that she couldn't comprehend. So Chase had disappeared for work even earlier than she thought? Why? What the hell was going on with him? She thought he was a little quiet when he came home yesterday, but now it was getting weird.

She knew that she couldn't stress about it too much, though.

For the baby's sake.

Talia walked towards House's office an hour later with the intention of finding Foreman, so that he could sign off on a few things. Of course, before entering, she happened to spot House down the hallway - a very smug looking House, at that. "Uh oh. You look undeniably proud of yourself - that can't be good," she couldn't help but smirk at him as she approached him.

"Why wouldn't I be? Patient wants me to work on him and not Foreman, but the law requires Foreman to work on him and not me!" House announced brightly. "It's…it's like Christmas came early!"

"Ah. So you're basically free of all responsibility and liability whilst your ego is being stroked," Talia muttered, without the smirk slipping from her lips. "How do you keep managing to get away with this?!"

"I'm just that lucky. So, I guess the little pep talk you gave him yesterday made all of no difference."

"Foreman told you about the pep talk I gave him?" Talia scoffed, actually quite taken aback. "Wow. That's actually kinda pathetic-"

"Nope - but you did," House hummed back. "Predictable." Talia rolled her eyes and the two of them made it to the office - just in time to overhear Foreman tell Chase rather firmly that he 'wants to know that he's got everything covered'.

Talia stopped dead in her tracks - and she felt her father freeze too from beside her.

"Got what covered?" House asked abruptly, startling the guys. Talia's eyes immediately flew over to Chase, and she literally watched him squirm in his seat under her gaze.

"Nothing. We're just reviewing Dibala's case, making sure that we didn't miss anything," he answered uneasily, as he stood himself up and awkwardly walked to the other side of the office.

"Well, the man's dead. So we must've missed something," Talia murmured. She quickly glanced up at House to see if he had noticed the strange way Chase was behaving, and from the look in his eyes, he clearly had.

Great.

"Foreman," Talia coughed slightly as she walked over to him with the papers instead. "Could you sign these off for me, please? I need a second signature for Ama's records."

"Sure thing. Surgery go well?" Foreman assumed, taking the papers from her and signing them without hesitation.

"Apparently. I'm going to see her in a second," Talia nodded distractedly, whilst steadily keeping her eyes on Chase.

Something was ringing alarm bells in her head.

"Why…why do you need to go back over Dibala's case?"

"Just wanna figure out where we went wrong and at what point, I guess," Foreman shrugged casually. "You know, the world's eyes are on us and stuff." He passed the papers back to him and Talia took them with a little nod.

"Cheers," she muttered, still a little uneasy. "Well, if you find any new info, just let me know."

"Wait, you're not staying on for this new case?" Foreman frowned at her. "That's kinda…unlike you."

"I know, but I'm choc-a-bloc with stuff to do today. After I check on Ama, I have to sort out this all that drama just because someone tried to kill Dibala," Talia answered with a bored sigh.

Chase's eyes narrowed and his palms quickly became all clammy.

"What do you mean?" he was the one to ask quickly, causing House to peer over at him. Foreman caught House's look at let out a slow sigh. Chase had been too obvious - and now House was onto him too, as if Talia's growing suspicions wasn't enough.

"What do I mean? You should know, Rob - you were there," Talia reminded him with a brief frown.

Chase's face grew even paler - and Talia felt even more lost.

"…were you not there when the guy came in and shot at Dibala? The assassination attempt?"

It was as if something had been lifted off of Chase's shoulders. He breathed out with such relief that it freaked Talia out even more.

"Babe, if you need counselling for the whole gun saga then we can get some for you," she murmured, reaching out for her husband's hand worriedly.

"Counselling? N-no, T, I'm fine. Just a bit…stunned by the whole thing," Chase frowned to her as if she was making a bit deal out of nothing. As if she was the crazy one. Gaslighting her, actually. Technically, a form of focussed his eyes down to the table and House's eyes squinted over at him again. Above all, Talia wasn't pleased. Not only did she not believe her husband, but she didn't appreciate his airy attitude towards her genuine show of concern.

"Fine," she hummed casually, before turning on her heel and slipping straight back out of the office again. Chase watched her go as the guilt began to consume him once more. He knew he had to tell her eventually - but for now, it was borderline impossible. He was almost certain that once he told her, there'd be no consolation and that she'd leave him, so whether he waited for the baby to be born or not didn't even matter - and that was the scariest bit about it.

…

The main problem with Chase's coldness towards Talia and everyone else was that it was beginning to grate at her quite badly, therefore affecting her mental health - which was, ironically, what Chase was originally trying to avoid. Talia was a massive over thinker anyway, and now she was certainly freaking out, especially as she suspected that Foreman knew something that she didn't.

It had been three days of constant strangeness and coldness, Chase working stupidly late nights and leaving so early in the morning that they barely even crossed paths in their own house. There was only one person that Talia knew would tell her the truth, providing he knew what that truth was.

"House?" Talia peeped her head around his office door one evening. He looked up from his desk and raised an eyebrow.

"Wow. You look…awful," he frowned, genuinely taken aback. "And I mean that with full offence-"

"House, this thing with Chase is making me really uneasy," Talia admitted as she walked into his office fully. House could see it in her face - she genuinely was uncomfortable with whatever was going on. It didn't look like she had been sleeping a lot from the deep bags under her eyes, and even her pupils were in a permanent dilated state of fear. She was hard to look at, even for him - and nothing usually made him that uncomfortable.

"You haven't been sleeping?" he guessed quietly. Talia sat herself down opposite him, and held her head in her quivering hands.

"House. You once told me that you wouldn't let me marry the wrong person, right?" she recalled, her voice muffled from where it was barely leaking through her fingertips. House just kept staring at her blankly. "Well, Chase's behaviour is beyond me, now. And I'm not stupid. He's been acting like this ever since Dibala's death. All the whispering, the leaving early and coming home super late to avoid me, it's driving me up the wall. And the only reason that I haven't pulled him up on it yet is because it's gonna send my blood pressure up the wall a-and I don't…I can't put my baby at risk again."

A scared tear dribbled out of her eye and rolled down her pale cheek, leaving House to gulp slightly.

"I'm…I'm relapsing, House. I was able to cope with the depression and stuff but now…I'm just so scared all the time. On edge. Every day. Worrying about the baby and their health is one thing, but worrying about my husband every minute of every hour of every single f*cking day is another."

House stayed silent and dropped his gaze to his cool glass desk beneath his fingertips.

"You need to take some time out," he finally stated, ignoring all her other words. Talia sighed and lifted her head. She didn't know what she expected from him, to be fair. He wasn't capable of human empathy and she knew that.

"I know I do. I've put in a request to Cuddy to put me on early maternity leave and I think she's gonna honour it," she sniffed feebly. She laced her fingers together and rested her chin upon them, taking a deep breath before launching into her next explanation. "I know he's done something stupid, House. I don't know what it is but I know…I know that you do. So can you just promise me something? Because I don't have the energy to chase him on it - no pun intended."

"What?"

"Can you promise me that you'll help get him out of whatever tight spot he's in?" Talia practically begged as her voice cracked slightly. House looked her dead in the eye and nodded.

"Already have," he murmured.

His daughter let out a sigh of such heavy relief that it almost made her burst into tears.

"Th-thank you," she breathed. She shakily stood to her feet again and got herself ready to leave. "Is…is what he did bad? In your opinion, o-of course."

"In my opinion?" House repeated slowly. "It was…perfectly fine. Justified. In a way. Kinda. Well - okay it's ethically debatable, but…isn't everything?"

So it was a medical issue. Talia's face went pale before she could stop herself, and she started to cry tears of pure worry.

"No. He's f*cked," she mumbled through the tears.

"Was. Like I said - I handled it," House reminded her quietly, almost sounding somewhat reassuring for once. Talia nibbled her trembling bottom lip before nodding.

"Fine. Thank y-you, House."

…

Once Talia got into hers and Chase's apartment, she immediately pulled out a suitcase from the bottom of the bedroom wardrobe and started packing with the intentions of going to Juliette's for a while. She couldn't do this anymore. Nothing in her life was helping her mental state, and she knew her baby's health came first before everything else. So, even though she knew she'd miss her husband terribly, if staying away from him meant that she could be away from the madness surrounding him, she was willing to do it.

So, Cuddy was right on the day that she'd explained Talia's fight or flight response to trouble in her life.

But when Chase came home unexpectedly early and trudged into the bedroom - he immediately panicked.

"T? What…what's going on?" he rushed out worriedly once his eyes fell on the half packed suitcase. Talia took a steady breath in through her nose and pushed her hair well out of her eyes, trying to keep herself as calm as possible although her heart was genuinely hurting.

"I'm…I'm going to go and live with Juliette for a while. I've…taken leave from work. Early, of course. I just can't do this anymore, Robert, I'm so sorry," she explained weakly, feeling as guilty as anything but also keeping strong in her words. Chase's face crumpled in front of her very eyes, and it broke her even more - but she couldn't stop there. She couldn't continue acting as if all was fine when it simply wasn't. It wasn't fair to herself or him. "I know you're…holding stuff from me. And I don't have it in me to squeeze it out of you. At this point, I choose peace-"

"Talia," Chase finally choked out as he took a step forward, "I o-only didn't tell you because I didn't want you panicking over it-"

"So in order to fix that, you decided to tiptoe around me instead? Knowing that I overthink everything and anything as it is?" Talia scoffed in genuine disbelief as she resumed the folding. "Right."

"You don't understand, it's not something that you can just come out and…tell someone!" Chase blurted out, beginning to run his fingers through his hair in distress. "You don't deserve the stress-"

"Well ya told Foreman," Talia muttered under her breath.

"That's only cos Foreman had to cover for me!" Chase exclaimed exasperatedly. "I wouldn't have if-"

"Cover what though, Rob? God! I'm your wife, yes? This is what we keep having to remind each other?" Talia hissed. But her heart was starting to race, so she knew she had to calm down She lowered her voice again and placed a hand on her bump. "You know what? It doesn't even matter anymore. I can't…I can't risk the stress of this argu-"

"I killed someone," Chase suddenly told her, his voice falling flat.

Talia ran her tongue over her teeth and slowly nodded.

"Hm," was all she said - but she was still packing. That certainly set Chase back.

"I killed Dibala," he mumbled coldly, not looking his wife in the eye anymore as he slumped onto the edge of the bed.

And then she stopped.

"Robert," she sighed lowly. "Rob, look at me." Chase glanced up at her reluctantly, feeling himself finally break as he caught her eye for the first time in days. He just adored her so much, and he couldn't help but feel as if this was the last conversation they'd ever have together as a married couple. "Ya didn't kill the bastard, we all miss-"

But then she realised.

It all added up, and it was as if life had suddenly settled properly onto her shoulders, too heavy for her to bear.

"Ohhhh…my god. What, the hell, did you do?" she murmured, backing up slightly until she was against the wall. Chase was beside himself with nerves, unable to believe that he was now officially exposing himself for what he had become. "ROBERT?!" Talia shouted at him impatiently.

"I swapped the bloods so that we ended up treating him for something that…that he didn't have," Chase admitted as quietly as he could.

The colour drained from Talia's face completely.

"You swapped- Chase? Whose BLOOD did you swap his for?!" she groaned loudly as her hands flew to her forehead. She begun to pace the room. "No, in fact, don't answer. I don't actually want to know because it's too-"

"Talia, you don't understand. I had to do it! He was gonna massacre hundreds of thousands of the Sibiti people," Chase insisted croakily, although it felt pointless defending himself at this point.

"Ohhhh babe I know! I know, I get it, but that was so f*cking stupid!" Talia hissed as she spun herself round to face him again. "You've done some dumb sh*t before but this? What if they get you for this?!"

"They won't," Chase sniffed quietly, dropping his gaze again. Talia stared at him and let out a short snort of disbelief, crossing her arms.

"Let me guess - House?" she muttered thickly. Chase said nothing - he just gave a singular nod. "He did tell me he got you out of it, but I never thought it was this bad. Bloody hell, Chase, above the immoral and ethical sh*t, this was the riskiest thing you have ever pulled. WHILST, by the way, preparing to be a father for the first time! Like, there's stupid and then there's recklessly stupid-"

"Alright Talia, I get that what I did was nuts, and wrong, depending on who you are - but if you had the chance to put an end to further suffering and save hundreds of thousands of lives instead of sitting there and watching the massacre from your comfortable 1st world home, are you telling me that you wouldn't even consider it?!" Chase barked up at her suddenly. Talia clenched her jaw. "If you had a chance to put an end to someone's pain-"

"If I had the…Chase, I did have the chance! I had the chance to put an end to my own suffering when my abuser ended up in our damn ward but I didn't even-" Talia broke off, unable to continue any further as her chest started to heave.

An awfully tense silence fell between them, and neither one of them knew what else to say.

Finally, Chase spoke up.

"I'm…I'm sorry that I disappointed you, T. I…don't know what else to say. All that that I ask is that you let me see our child at least once a week and we can…alternate with the holidays and all that sh*t," Chase finally spoke, his broken voice now barely above a whisper.

Talia's head jerked up to face him again.

"What…what the f*ck are you talking about?" she croaked out as her stomach twisted and turned in knots of anxiety. "You wanna…you wanna get a divorce?"

"Don't you?" Chase muttered back, unable to look her in the eye.

"No?" Talia stated obviously. She didn't know whether to be offended or heartbroken that he would even suggest that. Chase looked up at her and gave a one shouldered shrug. He had completely given up on himself and it was obvious.

"You don't need this hanging over you, T."

"Ohhh shut the f*ck UP, Chase!" Talia finally screamed. Chase fell silent obediently and continued to stare at her through tearful eyes. "For the love of GOD! Stop dictating what I do and don't need to handle! You have been doing this since the day we met and I know it's from a good place but lord knows I'm getting tired of it. I'm a grown woman who's preparing to be a mother - I might be slightly damaged but I know what to do for my own mental health and our baby's wellbeing so would you relax with the micromanaging as if I'm a danger to myself?!"

"I'm sorry," Chase mumbled out ashamedly. "I didn't mean to m-make you feel incompetent. I just worry so much about you. I do everything with you in mind and if I had the chance, after what that bastard did to you, I'd do it again."

Talia's shoulders dropped immediately and she chewed the inside of her cheek, unable to keep this argument up any longer.

"I love you more than anything, Robert," she sniffed weakly, walking up to him and holding his shaking head securely in her hands. "I love you so much that it hurts. And I'm not about to leave you because of this. I p-promise. You just need to…you need to let me get over this a bit at a time. So I'm still going to stay at Juliette's and…I'll be back when I'm back, okay?"

"I understand b-but…don't know what I'll do if…if I lose you," Chase told her shakily as his first tear fell down his stony cheek. "It's why I didn't wanna-"

"Yeah, but you won't lose me, baby," Talia firmly spoke over him instead, looking dead into his eyes. "I swear. I just need space to breathe. You need space to breathe. So let us have it, okay? I swear that I'll be back before the baby's born. It won't be long, nor will it be permanent."

So what else could Chase do…but nod?