This begins DURING the final episode, Season 8 Episode 22, Everybody Dies.
Prologue
Everybody Dies
"He is dead."
"Are you certain?"
"Yes. I was just at the funeral."
A deep breath and a sigh of relief.
"How did he die?"
"He was in a burning building. The patient that he had been treating was a junkie and he fell asleep while smoking. And then I snuck in and proliferated the flames with some gasoline. All the evidence is gone."
"Thank you. I have transferred your payment."
"Got it. Our work here is done then?"
"Yes." With that, Lisa Cuddy hangs up the phone and unleashes a massive scream into the air.
The birds outside screech and fly away in horror at the inhumane monstrosity of a sound coming from the house.
"Yes! Hooray! I am free! I am avenged!" Lisa Cuddy pumps her fists.
Nearly two years of misery has come to a close and this calls for celebration.
As she pops open the champagne, Lisa Cuddy looks over to the wall and then steps forward to stroke her fingers through the pictures.
Her mother, Arlene, dead of a stroke shortly after Season 7. Her sister Julia, husband and kids, killed in a massive car crash on the way to Arlene's funeral.
All of these tragedies transpired the week after Cuddy resigned from PPTH.
She moved to New Mexico with Rachel and then her life turned upside down even more.
"I have every right to take her!" Simon, Rachel's biological father from Season 5 Episode 11, asserts.
"No you don't!" Cuddy protests. "Your parents and Natalie's parents signed the paperwork for…"
"They all died!" Simon snaps back. "They all died and so did my brother. So no one is going to stand in my way. I have a lawyer, so get #$%"
At the sound of the f word, Cuddy loses it and smashes her fist into Simon's face. There is a loud snap and his nose cracks open, oozing out a river blood.
"I am taking my daughter. Stop me and I will press charges." Simon grabs Rachel and leaves.
Cuddy washes her hand clean of his dirty blood and proceeds to the phonebook. Got to find a good lawyer, one who will be able to bring Rachel back.
"Hey Lisa."
Cuddy freezes as her bodily organs cease to function. That voice...it is…
"Lucas Douglas. You remember. The guy who you dumped. You cancelled our wedding like the dog that you are." Lucas actually used the b word but Cuddy has censored it in her mind.
"Lucas…" Cuddy gulps and backs away.
"Lisa Cuddy was sad because Rachel got taken away by her biological father and so Lisa committed suicide." Lucas points the gun directly at Lisa Cuddy's face.
Before he can pull the trigger, Lucas Douglas lets out a faint gasp and crumbles on the floor, lifeless.
Cuddy looks up at her savior, a gorgeous brunette woman with flowing black hair, almond eyes and a curvy body.
If Cuddy were into women, she would be tempted.
"Sorry to bother you. Well, I guess you are welcome for me saving your life. I am also a private investigator like Lucas, but he has been stealing my gigs as of late and last time, he stole a big prize. So, I had to end it. I will let you live. As long as you speak of this to no one." The pretty woman puts her finger on Cuddy's lip.
The woman drags the dead body and heads away.
"Wait! I need you!" Cuddy yells out before listing the specifics.
A few hours later, the woman returns empty handed.
"Here is your money. That man, Simon, he...killed your daughter, Rachel. And then he killed himself. The police have probably found their bodies by now." The woman does not offer a detailed account of what happened.
Cuddy falls on her knees, defeated. She expects to cry but her eyes remain dry. The former dean of medicine clenches her fist and bites her tongue.
She knows who to blame for this and it is not Simon, or Lucas, or this woman.
"Keep the money." Cuddy instructs the woman. "And I have another job for you. There is another man I know and I want him dead."
Cuddy downs her fourth glass of champagne and smiles lazily as the alcohol overtakes her senses.
Alas! Gregory House is dead!
Did You Ever Love Me?
"You followed me here." Robert Chase doesn't even need to look up to notice the woman standing in front of him. He can sense her presence and smell her exhilarating fragrance, a scent that once aroused him.
"Robert…" Allison Cameron trails off because she doesn't know how to begin, so she simply takes a seat.
Chase takes a sip of lemonade and doesn't look up.
Cameron orders a juicy steak.
"Alli…" He shudders because he hates the sound of her name. "Why are you here."
She stalls. "Well, after Wilson had that eulogy and he got all angry and started trashing House on stage. And then he stormed out and caused a scene. And then everyone left. So I figured…"
"...that you would follow me." He finishes her sentence. "So what do you want? We exchanged greetings at House's funeral."
"Are you mad because of this?" Cameron addresses the elephant in the room.
She slides the wedding ring off of her finger.
"Is that why you ignored me at the funeral, even though I sat next to you?"
"Yes." Chase admits. "I…"
He chokes and looks down at his now empty plate.
What can he say that will do his feelings justice? She USED him for sex and tossed him aside like a rag doll. She emotionally toyed with him for years, sabotaged his proposal plans and nearly destroyed their wedding. She left him and came back to divorce him, only to have sex with him again and then leave for what he thought was the last time.
Cameron reaches out her hand and tries to squeeze his but he pulls away.
"Robert...I...I am sorry!" For the first time ever, she apologizes and the glistening tears roll down her face.
Chase bubbles up with humane compassion and reaches out his hand to wipe away her tears.
Cameron shivers as he touches her flesh. She feels the surge of passion, warmth and desire that he always elicits in her. She wants to grab his package now, rip his clothes off and do him.
Chase knows her well enough and reads her mind. He pulls back.
"I...he...Richard was my boyfriend from high school." Cameron reveals about her third husband. "We broke up after high school and I met my first husband. Thirteen months ago, I ran into Richard. He was a two time widower with no kids."
"So you wanted to fix him or something? I am happy for you." Chase mouths half sarcastically. Why is she telling him this?
"We have a son now. He is nearly four months old." Cameron is tempted to show Chase a picture but clearly he is uninterested.
"Good for you. I wish him well." Chase hopes that the boy grows up to be nothing like his mother, a heartless, cold jerk.
Chase shudders to think how Cameron might raise him. Will the baby even get enough love growing up?
"I love my son but I do not love Richard. I never did. Never loved my first husband either." Cameron's emerald eyes brim with more tears as she makes the profession. "The only man that I ever loved was you, Robert Chase. It's Tuesday. I love you. And I want us to be together. We can be a family. My son, he will love you. I am already in the process of filing a divorce but Richard does not know it yet. The only reason I came down for House's funeral was because I wanted to take you back."
"Are you insane?" Chase slams his fist violently on the table and the last piece of steak on Cameron's plate flies into the air.
A little bird catches it and flies away.
"Robert...I love you. Please, I can change." Cameron pleads. This is not the way it was supposed to go.
"Cameron!" Chase refuses to call her Allison again. "Not everyone is a pawn in this perverted game of yours. Your feelings are not the only ones that matter. Do you know how many times I wanted to break it off with you? I came back because I thought I loved you. I thought you needed me and I didn't want you to get hurt. So, I sacrificed myself and you slaughtered me repeatedly. I am dead. There is nothing left."
"Robert." Cameron sobs.
"Your problem is that you can never find happiness or satisfaction anywhere you go. It doesn't matter who you are with, your first husband, House, me, or your third husband, or even your son. You are always looking for a reason to run away." Chase chides her. "I fell in love with a nun in Season 8 Episode 12. Moira, I loved her but she chose to walk away before she could hurt me."
That isn't true. Moira left a figurative bloody gash in heart and that is why he turned down Adams, when she asked him out. He was scared of getting hurt, or hurting her. Ironically, Adams was the reason he got stabbed in the heart. He saved her life.
He really liked Adams but he doesn't know if he has much of a chance left. They have separate lives after all.
Cameron feels a blazing anger. Chase fell in love after her!
"I was a fool. I should have never pursued you. If I had truly cared, I would have let you find your own path. I was a fool for love that never existed." Chase shakes his head.
Cameron is speechless because Chase sounds almost as heartless as House.
"I never loved you, Allison. I was cruel and stupid to think that I did. And I never will love you. I wish you well and I hope your son has a long and prosperous life." Chase plants a delicate kiss on Cameron's shocked still cheek and walks away.
As he takes his courageous stride of freedom, Chase receives a phone call from Foreman.
"Chase, will you take House's position?" Foreman asks.
The Assassin
Gregory House was a gross, detestable man and he deserved to die.
That's what she tells herself to rationalize what she has done.
She got close to him in prison and gained his trust. He got her fired and hired her to work for him.
She could have killed him at any point. Instead of aiming the bat at the skeleton, she could have aimed at his skull and made it look like a self inflicted accident.
She had many opportunities to kill him but she held back. House was an intriguing man and she wanted to learn more about him before doing away with him. She wanted to know exactly why Cuddy hated him.
"Cuddy dark..." She reads.
"Cuddy was the old dean here and House was in love with her. They dated but it ended badly and he drove his car into her house. That is why she was in prison." Robert Chase explains to her.
"Wow." She understands better now.
But speaking of Chase.
Robert Chase.
He was not part of the plan.
He wasn't supposed to walk into her life and sweep her off of her feet but she couldn't help it.
What woman could resist those broad shoulders, lean, taut body and rippling muscles? His winning smile and oceanic blue eyes makes her heart churn and the butterflies overwhelm her stomach.
If she hadn't been attracted to Chase, she could have ended House sooner.
Chase flirted with her and drove her crazy at times but she tried to hide it. If she had opened up to him, then she would have ended up revealing her true intentions and he would have turned her in.
She would have gone to prison for good.
Luckily and unfortunately, Chase was a womanizer and he'd sleep with a different woman every few days. He never showed her much attention, aside from the flirting and the teasing, and fantasizing about having sex with her. So she focused on the mission, killing House.
Then distraction struck again. First, Chase opened up to her about his tragic family life. His alcoholic mother, truant father and broken sister. At that moment, she wanted to wrap her arms around him and hold him till he shivered. She wanted to rip his clothes off, feel him up and make him hers.
And then came the time when she actually ripped off his clothes.
She'd been careless during the procedure and the lunatic patient got ahold of the scalpel.
The moment he slashed her arm, she knew she was in trouble. She would die without completing the mission.
But Chase stepped in and saved her life. He took that scalpel for her by getting stabbed in the heart.
She still remembers the sight and feel of his bloodied muscular torso, a sight she may never behold again.
He survived and she was too shook to focus.
House acted like the ass he was during the entire ordeal and she felt the urge to run him through with the scalpel.
Maybe then, she could confess her feelings to Chase and run away with him?
It was a morbid fantasy that never came true.
Chase kept sleeping around and he fell in love with that nun.
"I took that scalpel for you!" Chase is angry.
"That's why I did this!" She cuts herself off there before she can reveal too much.
She should have said that she loved him and then kissed him. They could have dropped everything and run away. He would have been hers.
Thankfully, the nun went away and Chase stopped sleeping around.
By this point, she had nearly given up. It was foolish to think that such a perfect innocent man would want a morally depraved murderer like her. If he knew the truth about her, he would call the police.
She gave up on Chase, or at least told herself that she did.
Her plan was to kill House within the next month but his "wife," Dominika, showed up.
That cramped her plans and then House continued his hooker business but he couldn't settle on one.
If he had, she would have slipped something to the hooker and pinned House's death on the hooker.
But House trolled her to perfection.
That monster toyed with her feelings for Chase and he put pressure on them to start dating.
"Did you want me to ask you out?" Chase is catching on.
"Yeah." She replies honestly but masks it with a sarcastic tone. "I told Park to tell Taub to tell House to pass you that note."
He masks his own emotions with a subtle eye roll but she can tell that she has hurt him.
If you knew me, you could never love me and I love you too much to hurt you.
Better I hurt you this way.
House wouldn't let them go, however, and later that episode, she broke.
She asked out Chase on a date, almost certain that he would accept. She wasn't prepared for the ramifications of a relationship but she was tired of suppressing her feelings for the sake of a silly mission.
He turned her down and she was hurt but it brought her to her senses.
She couldn't be distracted anymore.
Then, Park fantasized about having sex with Chase.
She wanted to kill Park too but in that same episode, Dominika left House, which provided an opening.
However, Wilson got cancer and House was hardly at PPTH.
Chase stepped in and all of those feelings that she thought were gone came flooding back in.
He was so strong, confident and courageous. The way he navigated through the cases was superb and he saved that little girl and the doctor.
But then, Chase left, without saying goodbye to her.
She cried for days after but she decided to let go. She focused all of her efforts on killing House.
Finally, she got her chance. After burning down the building, she went home and returned the next day. She stood in front of the destroyed building with Park and pretended to want House to be alive.
Alas, Gregory House is dead.
Ellie Melanie Rachels steps out of the shower and dries herself off of those past thoughts, for they are now obsolete.
On her table lies her name tag that reads Dr. Jessica Adams.
Jessica Adams, what a typical sounding pseudonym.
After picking out that fake name for this mission, Ellie Melanie Rachels concocted the most cliche story she could think of.
Jessica Adams would be a rich girl from a caring family. She had suffered from too much parental love and that is why she became who she was.
She graduated from medical school and became a doctor. Her marriage was a disaster because her husband cheated.
Bland, boring origin story but very believable. Even House bought her crap.
She had props like the expensive cars, Oslo scarfs and heels, which she could afford from the money from her various missions.
In truth, Ellie Melanie Rachels grew up in an orphanage and she never even met her parents. Her mother, who died in childbirth, had been married to her father, who'd suffered fatal heart failure.
Ellie Melanie Rachels is not even her real name either. Apparently, the nurses had named her Aubrey but she hated that name growing up.
After getting emancipated at eighteen, Aubrey had her name changed to Ellie Melanie Rachels, which ended up being useless since she would end up never using her real name anyway.
Ellie did go to college and she did graduate from medical school and she was a doctor for a few years.
But she lost interest and drifted off. After traveling the world for a few years, she lost money and purpose. That was when she got herself involved in these shady jobs.
At first, it was nothing, just stealing, spying and more but then the jobs became lethal. She went through the motions anyway and killed.
A girl has got to eat. That was her rationale.
And that is how Aubrey/Ellie Melanie Rachels/Jessica Adams came to be.
There is a sudden knock at the door and Adams, who has forgotten to put on anything over her silky undergarments, answers the door.
"Uh…" Chase flames a deep red and the butterflies in his stomach clog his arteries. "I…"
"Chase!" Adams realizes that she is only wearing a black bra and panties but she stays put. Maybe having him look isn't such a bad idea. She has a killer body.
"I...uh…" Chase looks away and struggles to speak.
Adams suppresses a giggle. He is shy and that is cute.
"I am taking over House's position and so I am obviously coming back to PPTH. Anyway, Foreman told me that you handed in your resignation. I was wondering if you would reconsider and stay. Please. I need a team." Chase gives Adams his puppy dog eyes and the blue fountains of cuteness melt her heart.
"Yes!" Ellie accepts without thinking and then she realizes that she will have to put up the Adams charade longer now.
That will be doable.
"Great. See you." Chase experiences a surge of joy!
Adams is staying. The hottest woman in all of Princeton is staying on his team.
He will be her boss now and that might be different.
He shouldn't have screwed up that chance he had with her but maybe, just maybe, something will…
No.
Wishful thinking.
She is a good doctor and that is why he asked her to stay. That is all.
Ellie Melanie Rachels, now more permanently Jessica Adams, looks out the window and smiles at the skies.
Perhaps her orphanage teachers were right. There may be a God after all.
Thirteen Minutes
She is waiting for him at his apartment.
She licks her lips because she is hungry for him. She's famished and she wants a bite of his hunky flesh. She wants to taste every bit of his taut body and make him moan.
She taps her foot and waits impatiently.
Thirteen minutes.
She's been waiting for Thirteen minutes, which is ironic.
"Thirteen!" Chase sees her at his doorway and it is like Moira all over again.
"Have sex with me." Thirteen doesn't even wait for a response.
Chase squeals in surprised pleasure as she bites down on his bottom lip and tears it open.
Thirteen licks past Chase's blood and plunges her tongue down his delicious throat.
She slams her left hand up his shirt and feels up his well formed body, while her other hand squeezes his enlarged squirming package.
Chase slams the key into his door and they kiss their way into the bedroom.
Ending scene of Season 8 Episode 22
"Alright. Go run the tests." Chase turns to his left and flashes Adams a warm smile.
She smiles back and follows Park out the door.
Once she is outside, Adams looks back at Chase but he has already gone into his office.
With a sigh of dismay, Adams walks to the testing room.
Chase squeezes the ball and looks out the window.
Thirteen is probably gone by now and Chase has no idea where she went.
"Thanks. I needed that." Thirteen pats his sweaty chiseled chest as she takes herself out of him.
They moan as they separate and breathe heavily.
"I...thank you…" Chase staggers backwards because he is still bulging out.
"You did well." Thirteen puts on her clothes and Chase looks at her disappointed. She doesn't want to cuddle?
"You are leaving?" Chase asks. "We can grab a coffee or something. I am in no hurry."
"I have to go Chase. I cannot stay here. I am alone and I have nothing left. I just wanted to see you one last time and I am glad that I did." Thirteen grabs his bare shoulders and pecks his cheek.
"We barely got to talk. I haven't even seen you in almost two years. I just saw you at House's funeral and now in my bedroom and I…" Chase doesn't even know what to say.
Does he tell her that he likes her? That would be a lie. He cares for her as a friend but he doesn't love her, not in that way. And she doesn't have much time left.
"You are a great friend, Chase." Thirteen wipes away some tears. "I loved knowing you and maybe in a different universe, we could have been in love."
Chase remains silent.
"But I am dying and you have a life to live. I came by to have sex with you because you asked me to do it back in Season 7 Episode 1." Thirteen reminds him.
"And coming to House's funeral made you want to have sex with me?" Chase is bewildered.
"It reminded me that life is short and I gotta try everything. And you were incredible so I am glad that I did you." Thirteen runs her finger through Chase's bloodied lip. "Sorry about that. I should not have bit so hard."
"It is okay." Chase strokes her face with his hand, causing her to shiver. "Good luck. I will miss you."
Cameron looks at the picture of her with Foreman, House and Chase and smiles sadly.
Chase was right about everything he said and she was a fool to ever think otherwise.
It is really over.
Her third husband, Richard, and their son have arrived.
Cameron puts on a faker smile and heads over to her unsuspecting third husband.
She will serve him the divorce papers tomorrow.
Drinking Vicodin
"Stop right there and zoom in." Eric Foreman instructs the technological specialist.
The specialist zooms into the security footage.
"Wilson!" Foreman falls backwards when he sees the man on the screen. "Play the footage."
Foreman gasps as he sees James Wilson set the name tag under the chair and walk out the door.
"So it was Wilson all along." Foreman realizes. "It wasn't House!"
"House, where do you want to go next?" Wilson asks the empty space in the parking lot.
He blinks twice and pinches himself when he realizes that no one is there.
"House?!" Wilson cries out. "House!"
No answer.
Gregory House is nowhere to be found.
"Where did you go?" Wilson's heart pounds violently and he hops off of his motorcycle to throw up in the bushes.
His wig falls off and becomes drenched in puke.
"Uh!" Wilson wrinkles his nose. "The pain is getting worse."
He pops another six Vicodin and slams his eyes shut.
"We gotta go."
Wilson opens his eyes to a familiar voice.
"House! There you are!" Wilson exclaims. "I was calling for you. Where were you?"
"I am not here." House smiles sadly. "You know that."
"No! No!" Wilson reaches out frantically to grab House's hand but his entire being dissipates into the fog.
"Stop crying and get up." Another familiar voice.
"Amber!" Wilson tries to grab her blonde hair but it is untouchable. "What is happening to me?"
Amber breaks into her signature cutthroat bitchy smirk. "You know exactly what is going on."
Wilson's gaunt eyes darken as reality sinks in.
"This is embarrassing." Wilson reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out his phone.
SHUT UP YOU IDIOT
Just a spam call and message.
Wilson storms out of the funeral and heads to his car.
He drives up to the apartment and looks towards the stairs.
There he is, sitting there in plain sight, like nothing happened.
"How?" Wilson is speechless.
"I died in that fire." House shows Wilson his singed hand.
Suddenly, his entire body morphs into a half baked reddish, black blob.
"No!" Wilson reaches but the ashes crumble to the floor and dissolve into the sewer.
"No! No! No!" Wilson screams.
"It is true." This time, it is Lawrence Kutner. "House is dead. The ashes at the funeral were his ashes. You are hallucinating. The phone call and message were spam. It was your phone. There was no one at the stairs. You left that name tag under Foreman's desk because you figured that it was something that House would have done. You went on that motorcycle ride on your own."
Wilson collapses on his knees and moans in agony.
He is truly alone.
House Ash
"Danforth!" Blythe House greets the old man at the door.
"Blythe! I was just about to..." Danforth exclaims.
"Our son!" Blythe shoves the black urn into his hands.
Danforth almost drops it. "Our what?"
She tells him everything.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Danforth asks.
"You, John House and Thomas Bell were the three men that I was saw. Course, John was my husband. I knew that Greg wasn't John's but John would have hunted us down if we left." Blythe clinches her fist.
"And Thomas?" Danforth is hesitant to ask.
"He and I got married right after John's death. Actually, Greg assumed that Thomas was his father and I played along. He probably found out the truth eventually." Blythe shrugs. "Anyway, Thomas also died last week."
"I met our daughter." Danforth changes the subject.
"Our daughter!?" Blythe perks up with interest. "She is out there!"
"Yes. She came to me last month. She is a mother and a grandmother. Seven kids, fifteen grandkids. So we are great grandparents!"
"Wow!" Blythe has flashbacks to the day she gave birth to her daughter. She'd been in high school at the time and her sweetheart Danforth was going to marry her.
Then, her parents and his parents intervened, forcing them to give the baby away for adoption.
It was a cheap way for his parents to get rid of a problem and an easy way for her parents to wash their hands of responsibility. By that point, her father had lost the tailoring business. All that stealing from his clients was costly for him.
Danforth was sent away and Blythe was forced into an arranged marriage to John House.
Years later, she met John's minister friend, Thomas Bell. At around the same time, she and Danforth crossed paths again. She got into relationships with those three different men.
"She wants to meet you." Danforth tells Blythe. "She wants us to be part of her family."
Blythe feels the tears rolling down her eyes. She still has a child out there.
"Come on great grandma! We gotta give our son a nice resting place!" Danforth takes Gregory House's ashes outside.
Future chapters for THIS STORY are on the way.
Return for more soon and in the meantime, check out the OTHER fanfictions by clicking the author name Delanor Gaesomun.