Sleeping Beauty

by Naja Melanoleuca

How far will House push Chase to make him pay for his betrayal? A round about story explaining how the two forgave each other. Rated for language

3. Prince not so Charming

A/N: Ok, so here is another chapter. I realize there are plot holes you could drive a truck through, but to be fair they also exist in the show. But some that were pointed out to me were the needle and the hours Chase worked. As for the needle, I know there are procedures for such things, we have them even at a veterinary hospital. But sometimes in the heat of the moment they are ignored or postponed if there is a life hanging in the balance.

As for the long hours, I addressed that in this chapter.

I would also like to thank my wonderful new beta reader Adnawun, though admittedly I didn't wait till she was finished before I posted this chapter. I have this thing about time lines and I'm worried that the coming hurricane will knock out my power.

Finally, someone asked if I am an Aussie, and the answer is only sort of. I was born and raised in Cape Town, South Africa. I moved to Australia when I was in my teens and stayed there through University and vet school. Then came to the US to work.

To Ally, You are right and I'm sorry, that line was in poor taste and I removed it.

Anyway, enjoy.

Disclaimer: I own none of these characters except for Cassie and you are more than willing to borrow her if you want.

Sleeping Beauty

House stood outside of the ICU as the nurses settled Dr. Chase into his bed. Cuddy and Wilson were giving orders for this treatment of that treatment. Foreman placed ice packs against his youngest duckling, noting Chase didn't fight it in the least - not very encouraging House mused. He watched as Dr. Wilson kindly wiped sweat from the young duckling's damp brow. Chase's body had spent the last several hours shivering in an attempt to try to raise his temperature high enough to kill off whatever had infected him. Now, his body had realized his temperature was too high and was sweating in an attempt to cool itself back off.

House winced when he saw the Aussie retch, even though he was unconscious. Regardless of having been a doctor for 15 years, he still didn't like watching people throw up; he just thought it was icky. He leaned heavily against the wall as the doctor's left Chase's room. One of the ICU nurses remained. House didn't know her name and didn't care. As long as she took good care of his fellow she meant nothing to him.

He looked at all the assembled doctors for a moment, Cuddy, Wilson, Foreman, and Cameron. It was strange, Cuddy was the Dean of Medicine and Wilson was the head of a department that was 10 times bigger but they all deferred to House. "Differential diagnosis, people?" He asked.

"He presented exactly like the others. It's the same thing." Cameron blurted out. She had tears in her eyes.

"It can't be. Encephalitis is not person to person communicable." Foreman stated.

"Maybe it mutated somehow?" Wilson threw in.

"We need to get a spinal tap and a CT scan on him to be positive. Are we also sure of his symptoms. What do we definitely know?" House questioned. He was missing his white board about now. Trying to do this standing in front of a room in the ICU was hard but none of them seemed too keen to stray far from Chase.

"We know he has a 104+ fever, almost 105," Wilson chimed in.

"Nausea and vomiting," Cuddy mentioned.

"He was complaining of a bad headache earlier today. He asked for some aspirin." Cameron lamented.

"He was shaking and shivering too." Foreman offered. "I had to run the code on the last patient because he was shaking like a junky."

"Ataxia, and Ptsosis," House added as he started to write on the glass door in front of Chase's room with a marker he had in his pocket. He had noticed Chase's staggering as he had walked around the office just before he had collapsed. House had also noticed his duckling's eye lids drooping as he sat slumped in his chair not talking.

"Lethargy." Cuddy added.

"Ah, we can discount the lethargy." House tried to side step that particular point.

"Why?"

"Because."

"'Because' isn't an answer." Cuddy crossed her arms and glared at House.

"Because House has been making Chase work 20 hour days and hasn't given him a day off in almost 8 weeks." Foreman said. This had nothing to do with the diagnosis and he enjoyed watching House squirm.

"Fink," House looked towards Foreman.

"You what?" Cuddy almost shrieked. She really did look like her head was going to explode.

"He snitched on me. He deserved it." House tried to defend himself. It sounded lame even to his own ears.

Cuddy took a deep breath. "There are rules, there are regulations. Doctors are not allowed to work hours like that. They get tired. They make mistakes. People die. We get sued!"

"Dr. Cuddy." Wilson said in a soothing voice. "House." He said in a more accusatory tone. "You two can fight as much as you want later. Right now, we need to concentrate on the patients."

"Right. So what do we think?" House returned to the original topic.

"It's classic EEE," Cameron said again, blinking away tears. "What are we going to do?"

House rounded on her and Foreman, needing to take his anger out on someone. He wanted to go in there and wake Chase up just so he could deck him. "So you knew we were in the middle of an encephalitis outbreak and your colleague that has had the closest contact with the infected patients suddenly comes down with a headache and shakes. And you don't feel you need to mention it?"

"It was just a headache, we thought he was tired," Foreman tried to defend them.

"It was just a headache." House mocked. "You're talking about Chase remember? The same person who runs on a screwed up knee every day? The same person who hangs out with dominatrixes? The same person who competes in marathons and triathlons? A person, who has a really high threshold for pain and a real dislike for taking drugs and you don't find it interesting that he was feeling bad enough to ask for aspirin?" House was almost yelling now.

"We thought everything could be chalked up to him being exhausted because you wouldn't let him go home and get any rest." Foreman sharply accused. It had little to do with caring about Chase's welfare and more to do with being mad at House for insinuating that he was unobservant. Also, Foreman wasn't too fond of the fact that House was making Cameron cry.

"But what are we going to do?" Cameron was actually in tears now. "What if we can't help him?"

"You are going to get your head out of your ass and start acting like a doctor, otherwise you are useless to me and him. If you can't do that then go hold his hand and get out of my sight." Cameron looked like someone had slapped her as Chase retched again in his room. "Or better yet, hold his hair," House stalked off Wilson and Cuddy trailing after him, assuming Foreman would order the tests. Foreman watched, shocked. He had never seen House yell at Cameron before and he had naturally assumed that Wilson would stay and console her. Foreman put a hand on her shoulder and smiled before he went to schedule the scan.

Cameron remained, watching Chase sleep. His reflexes were still good and he hadn't started seizing yet. That was good; she kept trying to remind herself. However, tears still worked their way into her eyes but she violently wiped them away. How could everyone else be so calm? Chase was sick, there was a good change he might die and Foreman didn't seem to care and House was just angry because he thought they had screwed up. But no one seemed to care about Chase.

She swallowed thickly, and thought about her fellow duckling. He wasn't the easiest person to work with. He was a suck up, he was lazy on occasion, and let everyone push him around. He was passive aggressive, evasive, reserved, and just plain cold sometimes. But, there was also the other side of him too; the side that could be so caring like he had been with Gabe, Sister Augustine, and Dan. It was the same side that agreed to work holidays so that people with families near by could go home and see them. Cameron remembered last Thanksgiving when Chase took her shifts for her so she could go home for 5 whole days. She knew that he had worked Easter so Foreman could go home and worked Christmas so that several of the ICU doctors could be with their loved ones.

She didn't want to think about what the department would be like without him. He was the comic relief of the three of them. He had a wicked sense of humour and of course, there was the fun of laughing at him directly. He also thought the most like House, even if Foreman acted the most like him. Chase was the most likely to come up with something completely out of nowhere like House did. Chase was the annoying little brother that you didn't want to admit you liked. She wiped tears away and left to find Foreman. She would find a way to help him!

Back in House's office; Wilson and Cuddy sat facing the older doctor. "Weren't you a little hard on them?" Wilson asked.

"No, they screwed up. How could they have missed this?" House leaned back and pinched the bridge of his nose. He needed another Vicodin but would wait till Cuddy left.

"If they screwed up, then you did too. You didn't catch it either. Didn't you tell me he came in here and asked to go home because he didn't feel well?"

"Yes. I missed it too." House finally looked at his friend. "How the hell does someone walk around with a 104 fever for hours and no one notice?" He asked, frustrated. He finally pulled his pill bottle out, no longer caring about Cuddy's disapproving glare.

"I don't know. He might not have even realized he was that sick. And with a fever that high he probably wasn't thinking straight." Wilson soothed. It was what he did. He let House yell and rage at him and then he calmed the older man down.

"Regardless of how long it took everyone to notice, we have to consider the fact that this bug may have become air borne."

"It didn't go air borne. That is the point of an arbovirus. You need an arthropod to transmit it." House annunciated each work slowly and waved his hands around like he was mimicking sign language.

Cuddy pursed her lips and glared at him. "Then what is your brilliant theory on how someone who was not in contact with the infected mosquitoes but only the ill patients managed to catch the virus? Everyone who has had contact with the patients will have to be tested." Cuddy drew the conversation back to what she thought was important.

"Half the people in New Jersey will test positive for it. It is only that 1/10,000 people that end up with encephalitis the rest of the time it is a harmless headache or totally asymptomatic."

"We can't rule out that you were wrong in the diagnosis." Cuddy defended herself.

"I wasn't wrong. It fits, it's perfect. Chase caught it, somehow."

"I'm contacting the New Jersey Health Authority and the CDC. They need to get teams out here immediately."

"There is no reason for that. It isn't communicable." House tapped the handle of his cane on his desk. "I need his medical records and personnel file."

"I'll have them sent up to you immediately and I am calling them." She left.

"What the hell is going on? How does a young, otherwise healthy, man get this sick this fast?" House questioned.

"Maybe he is immuno-compromised? He could be HIV positive and not know." Wilson commented. Chase was a good-looking guy and probably got a lot of action. He knew that he hadn't always been careful when he was in Chase's position.

"Maybe. I need to think." House shoved himself up and hobbled out of his office, leaving Wilson behind him staring.

Up in the ICU, everything was quiet. Chase's stats were stable and he was resting comfortably or so it appeared. He wasn't comfortable though. His fever and discomfort were wreaking havoc on his subconscious. In his sleep, his mind manufactured reasons for these feelings, like dreaming of falling to explain a myoclonic jerk.

Dream:

Chase sat in the Diagnostic Department conference room with his fellow ducklings and House. Bright sunlight shone in through the window and made him feel like his skin was burning. No mater where he moved about the office it followed him. House was writing symptoms on the board but no matter how hard Chase concentrated on them, the scribbles made no sense. He recognized the words but they were incomprehensible in the sequences that House placed them up there. He wanted to say something about it but held his tongue, fearful of House's ridicule.

"We have a 38 year old woman, DVT, and schizophrenia." House said as he sat down at the table, pulling out a bagel from a bag. He opened the bagel and spread across it was chunky peanut butter with bits of bugs ground into it. He took a big bite, slurping and licking a leg off his lips. Chase gagged.

"I say we give her an aspirin and send her home." Foreman commented. He was standing directly beside Chase, looking unbelievably tall and imposing.

"Yes, let's send her home." Cameron mimicked, tearing off a piece of House's bagel and feeding it too him. She smiled sweetly at her boss.

Something about this whole thing seemed like a distant memory to Chase. He knew they shouldn't send the woman home, something bad would happen. He opened his mouth to tell them but no sound came out. He tried to scream but it was only a small squeak, something was choking him. He coughed and felt like something was hanging down the back of his throat and packed under his tongue. He put his hand in his mouth, trying to clear it only to find that it was spiders, some mashed and oozing like he had chewed them up, some whole and crawling across his tongue and over his lips. He staggered towards the table, trying to dislodge the spiders choking him. He hacked up more spiders onto the table and felt others run across his face. They were choking the air out of his lungs.

One particularly large one ran across the table towards House. The elder doctor scooped it up and looked at him. "You aren't going to eat that are you?" He asked as he dropped it in his mouth, crunching it up.

Chase woke partially. He had a strange sensation that he was sitting in a too hot bath. He wanted to get up and move but felt like his body was made of liquid. Each time he tried to move, the strength to do so ran through his fingers like water. Even lifting his eyelids was too much of an effort. Before long he dropped back off to sleep, dream forgotten.

A short time later, an admin arrived with two small files labeled with Dr. Chase's real name. House sat down to read them. There wasn't much there that he hadn't already known. He had investigated Chase thoroughly before he had hired him, and he had learned a great deal more after meeting Rowan. What was frustrating was that the medical history only went back to the time Chase started at PPTH. All House found in there was that Chase had gone to Dr. Rivnel, an orthopedic surgeon, and had disregarded her recommendation to have his knee scoped. There was one thing of interest in there, though, and he rose to talk to Wilson about it.

Wilson leaned against a counter in Clinic exam room 2, listening to a woman talk about the colour of her 18 month old's stool. Damn Cuddy and her new extended hours. Who kept a walk in clinic open till midnight? He could not have been more board. He almost welcomed House's intrusion, almost.

"You rotten, evil, little twerp. You have been holding out on me." House barged in and said right in front of mother and infant. Wilson looked like he had just eaten a lemon.

"Excuse me a moment." He said politely to the woman and ushered House out of the exam room. "Do you make it a point to interrupt me whenever I am with a patient, or is it just a happy coincidence?"

"The only difference between coincidence and logic is that we haven't found the correlating fact between the occurrences." House countered.

"And this has what to do with you bothering me?" Wilson paused. "Has there been some change in Chase's condition?"

"No, he is still stable for now. But you have been neglecting your friendship duties, young man." House scolded.

"What, pray tell, are you babbling about?"

"Chase. You didn't tell me that you prescribed him anti-depressants, and strong ones too."

"Again with you thinking you deserve to know everything about my patients. Did it occur to you that maybe Chase didn't want you to know and that is why he came to me?" Wilson was thinking about House's comments regarding his treatment of another Dr. Chase.

"Ah, but you haven't refilled his prescription in almost three months." House stated. "Since just before Vogler showed up." It finally began to dawn on House how different Chase had been then, compared to what he had been like before.

"I had to cancel a couple of appointments with him, then he never bothered to reschedule. I guess it just slipped my mind. I figured that he got someone else to refill it, maybe Cameron or Foreman," Wilson mused.

"Cameron or Foreman, have you been sniffing glue? Robert, he of the closed lips, Chase going to one of his fellow ducklings for something as embarrassing as anti-depressants? That is just ridiculous."

"Why would he be embarrassed? Wilson commented as he handed the mother and drippy infant's file to his relief, thankful he had gotten out of that one. "Thousands of people take SSIs."

"But how many men do you know who take them and talk freely about them? He never got the script refilled." House observed.

"That can't be right. He was taking two scripts for sever depression. If he quit cold turkey, his personality would have been up, down, and all over the place." Wilson hung his head. "Like it was when Vogler was here."

"And now that the chemicals in his brain have gone back to their natural state of depression, he is calmer and more compliant, if lacking in the happy land department." House finished Wilson's thought for him. "We need the rest of his medical records."

"There might be a problem with that." Cuddy walked up behind them. How did she always know where to find him? It was creepy.

"Why?"

"Apparently in Australia, there has to be a family member or a court order to get medical records released over seas. Stacy is working on it, but she doesn't hold out much hope. We are trying to reach Dr. Chase senior to release the records, but aren't having much luck."

"Let me know what you find." House said and limped off as fast as he could. He wasn't about to get roped into clinic duty.

Upstairs in the ICU, Foreman examined his fellow duckling. Chase's stats were mostly normal. His O2 stats were a bit off, but that could be the beginnings of the pneumonia that everyone else was suffering from. He ordered antibiotics for Chase. He reached over and took Chase's pulse. It was only the second time he had ever actually touched his co worker. He and Cameron often had causal contact with each other, a hug after a hard day or a pat on the back but Chase was so distant and standoffish with people that Foreman just couldn't be friendly with him.

He wouldn't kid himself, there were isolated times when Chase could crack him up. Then there was the fun of laughing at Chase's poor, poor decision-making skills. But mostly he just didn't like the youngest duckling. Chase was everything that he resented in life. He was a rich, handsome, white guy, who had had everything handed to him on a silver platter. It was disgusting. He supposed though, that in a way he disliked the idea of Chase more than he actually disliked the person. But that also depended on which Chase you were dealing with. Typically they dealt with laid back Chase, who was annoying, but easy to ignore. He liked the funny Chase that joked about House and $1,000 hookers. He admired the Chase that saved poisoned teenagers. He respected the Chase that could go head to head with the world's best Rheumatologist and come out on top. And he totally adored the Chase that could convince sick kids and sick nuns to confide him in. But he hated the intolerant Chase that made fun of fat people. He despised suck up Chase that always sided with House. And he wanted to kick the shit out of back stabbing Chase that had tried to get Cameron fired. Finally, he wanted to drown apathetic Chase, who wouldn't stand up for himself.

But right now none of that made a difference, he told himself. Chase was just another patient that needed to be taken care of, no different than anyone else. He hoped that if he kept saying that to himself, over and he might start to believe it.

Chase heard Foreman's voice and wanted to tell him to quit shining that stupid penlight in his eyes because it hurt. But he couldn't. Before he knew what was happening, he had fallen back asleep and was dreaming of home. Not nice memories of home, but unpleasant ones.

Dream:

Chase walked into the cool dim light of the ICU at St. Catherine's Hospital in Sydney. It was raining out and he put his soggy coat by the door. He looked at the woman lying prone in the bed, nothing had changed. His mother was still hooked to numerous tubes and gadgets, just like she had been for over two months now. Her face was gaunt, eyes sunken, lips parched, and skin nearly translucent. She was a spectre of what she had once been, a wraith, haunting him day and night with his inability to help her.

He performed the rest of his daily ritual. He spoke quietly to her about nothing important, mostly his dog and cat. He kept the discussion away from the trial, not because he thought it would bother her but because he didn't want to think about it. He brushed her long blonde hair and bathed her, all the while praying for a response that would never come. It was night and he was tired. His head hurt terribly. He pulled a chair up beside her and rested his head near hers, still quietly whispering to her. No one bothered them in here, not anymore. The hospital had put a stop to the journalists and photographers from coming up here. They still hounded him outside, but here at least it was quiet.

"So what have we here?" Dr. House limped in. Chase jumped to see him. "Thirty-eight year old female, sleeping a lot." Foreman and Cameron trailed in behind him.

"Maybe she is just tired of her life." Foreman mentioned as he approached the bed.

"Then let's wake her up." House pulled over a defibrillator.

"No, wait, she isn't sleeping, she is in a coma." Chase tried to stop them. They completely ignored him.

"No, she isn't, look." Cameron walked over and whispered in his mother's ear. The bed ridden woman turned her head towards Cameron's voice.

"They, they told me she was brain dead." Chase stuttered. "They told me there was no hope."

"She isn't brain dead, she is just sleeping." House walked over and gave her a good shake. Her eyes opened and stared lovingly at him. House sounded strange, he didn't have an accent. There was no flat American drawl to his voice like Chase was used to. Why didn't people have accents in dreams he wondered? Then he wondered if it was a dream.

"Mum." He gasped and ran to her side.

"You were going to let them pull the plug on me, you ungrateful brat."

"They told me you wouldn't get better. They told me." He trailed off.

"And you believed them? You can't trust doctors." House said as he slid into bed beside Chase's mother.

"You didn't even bother to get a second opinion did you? You were just going to let them kill me? Bet you would be relieved to have me gone." She accused her son then turned to House. "Just like his father, always trying to leave me behind for his own convenience."

"No, that isn't true. I wanted you to be at peace. I wanted you out pain." There were tears pouring down his face and he was having a hard time catching his breath.

"Pain, you were the second biggest pain behind your father. Always nagging me and trying to control me. 'Don't do this, don't do that.' I'm a grown woman, stop treating me like a child." She shouted at him, House behind her smirking.

"I don't want to control you, mum. I just want you to get well." He pleaded.

"No, you were going to leave me, just like your father. Walk out on me and leave me standing behind. Run away to another country and another life. Run away from your responsibilities and who you are. You don't even want to use your real name."

"No. That isn't true. I wasn't going to leave you. I only left because I thought you were going to die." He was confused. This didn't make sense at all.

"I am not dead. I am quite well, in fact I'll be bloody well better soon." She turned to House and accepted a Vicodin and a glass of gin from him.

"No." Chase whimpered and felt bile rise in the back of his throat.

He woke, just as he started to retch. It was strange really, to register everything that was happening to him but be completely unable to respond. He tried to tell himself that it was all a dream. Fevers did that, made you have strange dreams. But there was a very fine line between being awake and remembering and being asleep and dreaming.

Foreman entered the conference room and sat down, staring across the table at House. "So how is the patient?" House tried to sound nonchalant.

"Chase is stable. His breathing is becoming laboured and his chest is getting congested. I started him on some antibiotics."

"Anything else?"

"He looks like shit."

"People in the ICU usually do."

"He wouldn't be there if it weren't for you." Foreman accused.

"Foreman!" Cameron scolded.

"No, let him talk. I am interested in his brilliant theory of how I am responsible for Chase being infected with a deadly virus. I know, I put mosquitoes in his boxers."

"Boxer briefs," Cameron corrected, hoping to change the subject. They both gave her an absolutely gobsmacked look. "Girls can tell." She shrugged and flipped her hair.

"Anyway." House dragged the word out, trying to cleanse his mind of the idea that woman sat around analyzing what type of knickers he had on. "Your theory?"

"We can all agree that a normal healthy person wouldn't have contracted this virus and if they did, their body's natural defenses would have protected them." House nodded for Foreman to continue. He found it amusing that the immunologist wasn't chiming it. Wilson snuck in during the pause. "You kept Chase so tired, overworked, and over stressed that his immune system just gave up. He wouldn't have been susceptible to it if you hadn't run him into the ground."

"Foreman, I didn't know you two were so close. Have you picked out a china pattern yet?" House snarked, mostly because Foreman's words were too close to what he was thinking.

"Yes, the same one you and Wilson have." He countered. "I couldn't care less about the kid, I told you to fire him."

"I told him that too, but he doesn't hear so good anymore." Wilson mentioned.

"I don't think he has cancer, so what exactly are you doing here?" House turned to Wilson.

"You have better coffee." He looked as sweet and innocent as an angel.

"As interesting as your theory is, Foreman, we still don't have a complete picture."

"You want me to break into his apartment?" Foreman sighed and then rose to leave.

"Hold on there, speedy. You stay here. You can't be trusted, you might steal his baseball cards or something."

"Cricket."

"Where?" Cameron looked grossed out. She didn't like crickets. Tommy Johnson used to put them down her shirt in grammar school.

"No, I mean wouldn't he have cricket cards instead of baseball cards?" Wilson asked.

"Do cricket cards exist?" House asked.

"Do you two ever have a point?" Foreman asked half way between aggravated and completely perplexed. Cameron giggled to herself. Foreman didn't realize that occasionally he and Chase sounded like a young version of House and Wilson. She really hoped that didn't make her Cuddy.

"Occasionally. I will go look around in his apartment, Wilson is coming too." House stood, assuming his friend would follow. Foreman watched them leave with a sad sort of fascination.

Wilson struggled with the door as House leaned against the wall panting. The stairs had been a serious strain and Wilson wasn't surprised when his friend took a second Vicodin. There was a certain irony to House having to climb 7 flights of stairs on the singular outing he had gone on in years. Eventually, Wilson managed to get the door open. It was a heavy, sliding steel door rather than a normal hinged door and Wilson quietly ushered House in first. The interior was dark, with looming, high ceilings and dark solar shades pulled over the large windows. The only light in the room was supplied by an enormous fish tank against the far wall. House fumbled around trying to find a light switch, but even when he flipped it on, the lights were soft and dim.

"Well, this place has all the warmth and charm of a morgue." Wilson commented. The thick brick and concrete walls kept the interior temperature around 65 all year long. "So what are we looking for, exactly?" Wilson questioned, while looking around the huge expanse of Chase's loft. It was cold, cavernous, and unwelcoming.

"Right now, you are looking for something to drink for me." House croaked as he slowly sat in Chase's very low slung couch.

Wilson headed towards the kitchen, admiring the expensive appliances and cabinetry. "This place will be really nice, when he finishes it." Wilson pointed out. All the interior walls were still exposed brick, the floor was concrete, and there were steel girders and pipes running along the walls and ceiling. There was also nothing personal around. No keepsakes or fine artwork to lighten the walls. The only thing hanging on the walls, other than three bicycles, was a large print of Sydney Harbour that hung of a floating, floor to ceiling, glass block fireplace. The print was black and white except for the water, which was a vivid blue. Much of the grey was shot through with shining silver and the whites were opalescent. Wilson thought it was lovely.

"I think it is finished. It has looked the same every time I have ever come here." House pointed out, willing the second Vicodin to work. Stupid Chase, living on the stupid top floor.

"If it is finished, then it is hideous." Wilson commented as he brought his friend a bottle of cold water, procured from the Aussie's ice box.

"Considering it is Chase, we should just be thankful that the floor isn't plaid, with striped walls, a floral couch, and polka-dot curtains." Houses observed as he rubbed his leg, and leant his head back, even though the couch was only 8" off the ground, it was comfy.

"So I wonder what you call this look then, hobo train yard chic, like his wardrobe?" Wilson joked.

"I believe it is called Sydney Industrial." Stacy commented, scaring the crap out of both men. Neither had heard her approach.

Both House and Wilson were jumpy being in Chase's home unescorted and uninvited. Chase was pathologically private. The only thing that could usually get a rise out of him was poking around in his private life, and they were not just poking around but rummaging, shaking up, and dumping it out. That was part of the reason he had decided to do this rather than sending Cameron and Foreman like he usually would. He still had enough respect for Chase that he wouldn't parade things that the Aussie wanted to keep private in front of his co workers. He, however, had no qualms about searching through Chase's things and learning them for himself.

"What are you doing here?" House accused.

"I live downstairs. Chase asked me to take care of his fish if he isn't home." She jingled a set of keys as if to prove her point.

"You live here? In a half finished apartment under Chase?" House was incredulous.

"No, the ones downstairs are lovely. Nicely dry walled and decorated. I think he brought in an interior designer to do them. He gave us a good deal on the rent in return for taking care of his box of ocean water over there." She waltzed in like she owned the place.

"Bizarre." Wilson breathed.

"Let's get started." House snapped and tried to rise from his seat, not the easiest thing to do. Wilson walked over and gave him a hand up, the oncologist being the only person House would accept help from without feeling indebted. "This is not a cripple friendly place." He groused.

"Chase isn't a cripple." Stacy pointed out as she searched around the fish tank.

"He has a bad knee." House pointed out.

"No, he has very nice knees." Stacy countered.

"Does your husband know that you ogle one of your coworkers?" Wilson asked, hoping to divert some ridiculous pissing contest between the two.

"Yes. He said that I could put Chase on my 'List.'"

"You wasted a spot on your 'List' on my über catholic duckling?"

"How do you know he is still über catholic? And he is the one who said he wanted to sleep with me."

"I don't believe that." House said, looking through Chase's cupboards. The Aussie had a decided lack of food. But then again, House hadn't given him much time for grocery shopping lately. All he had in his freezer were blue gel ice packs, probably for his knee.

"Oh he did. He said he wanted to sleep with me just to piss you off. Mark said he didn't have a problem with it as long as he got to have Cameron for the same reason." Stacy turned around and smirked.

"If you are going to stay up here, you might as well help us, since you seem to know where everything is." House changed the subject and hobbled over to Chase's answering machine. The number "4" blinked brightly on it. He hit play.

The first three messages were from the same woman, who didn't leave a name, and were mostly scolding him for not calling her back. The fourth was more interesting though. It was from some reporter wanting to interview him about his mother. He mentioned that it was the 6th time he had tried to get a hold of Chase. House locked that little bit of info up for later.

House scanned the entire loft. It was spotless as an operating bay. Even the work out area was neat and organized. It was in sharp contrast to the sloppy look Chase portrayed at the hospital. But House wasn't surprised. Cameron came across as the obsessive one, but her home had been cluttered and messy. Chase was the true neurotic, a closet control freak and House understood. Chase had spent the majority of his life completely out of control. From an addicted wreck of a mother, to a distant and demanding father, his life had always been dictated by other people's whims. This was Chase's way of fighting back, keeping strict control over his own things. It was the same principle as an anorexic who tries to control their out of control situation by limiting food intake. It was the behaviour of someone who wasn't quite right in the head and that meant a lot coming from House.

"Nothing in the bathroom." Wilson commented as he exited the downstairs bathroom.

"Does he actually live here or does he just use this as an address?" House asked as he wondered at the total lack of personal belongings. Everything in the entire place looked like it could have been ordered out of a catalogue, from the matching dishes to the matching couches. There was no personality, no lived in feeling to this place. It was overtly lovely but unbelievably cold. It was exactly like Chase; pretty but off putting, attractive but soulless.

"He lives here." Stacy answered as she moved towards Chase's desk. It was under the second floor and the ceiling was lower and much more cozy feeling. The desk was an anomaly in the place. Where every other piece of furniture looked like it walked off the cover of a euro modern magazine, this desk was old and worn. It was a deep red mahogany with a warm brown leather blotter. Fine inlays and carvings ran around the entire boarder and the feet looked like lion's paws.

"That sticks out like a sore thumb. Do think it's old, or fake old?" Wilson commented.

"It's old." They all turned to see Mark actually feeding the fish. "An antique in fact. It's a partner's desk from Germany. I'd guess it was made around 1892 or so."

"And how would you know?" House questioned.

"My sister is an antique dealer and," he walked over and pulled out one of the drawers, flipping it backwards, "it says so right here. It would be worth more if the set were still together." He showed them the back side of the drawer. It read. 'Fredrick Bauer. Leipzig 1892.'

House stood back and thought about that. He recognized the carvings on the side from the picture in the back of Rowan's book. He had a strong suspicion where the partner to this desk was. "Yes, it would be better if they were still together." House mumbled cryptically. "And while this is all very interesting, is there anything of use in his drawers?"

Stacy rooted around. "Some financial statements. Some stock numbers." She flipped through some more papers.

There were two framed pictures sitting on the corner of the desk. One was a large, sable and black German Shepherd Dog standing on a beach. The dog was staring intently towards something just off camera. There was the slightest hint of a hand visible in the top corner of the picture and House guessed it belonged to Chase. The second picture was of a long and lanky, lilac point Siamese cat. House's mother had had a Siamese, it was clingy, needy, and meowed all the time. He had hated it.

"He has pictures of his pets but not any friends or family." Wilson observed, picking up the picture of the dog. "Cute dog though."

"I always pictured Chase as more of a cat person." Stacy threw in. House had to agree with her. Even though he did call Chase his "puppy" or other dog names, he had to admit that Chase reminded him much more of a feline, from the bright blue-green eyes to his habit of sleeping in sun beams. Chase also had the severe approach avoidance behaviour House always associated with cats. They rub against you begging to be petted but then as soon as you pet them for a while they try to take a chomp out of you. House could never figure out what turned in their little brains to make them go from cuddly and purring to hisses and claws. Then there was also Chase's inherent need to hide pain. He was the emotional version of the cat that tried to jump from the back of the couch to the kitchen counter, only to miss and skid off the side, slide across the floor and crash into a table leg. Then get up with the dignity of a queen and stride off behind the couch to lick a broken bone.

House's attention was drawn back to Wilson as the younger man whistled. "I guess this lies to rest any theory that Chase isn't actually loaded." He handed House a letter from Chase's desk that listed the current worth of his stock portfolio. House wasn't even sure if he could count that high.

"I no longer feel bad for asking him for $1,000."

"Come on, let's look upstairs." Wilson motioned for House to follow him.

Upstairs was a bedroom version of downstairs. Pale wood bed, low lighting, low furniture, and patternless linens made up the room. House sat on the bed and opened the bedside table. There was a small book and a few odd pieces of paper in it. Nothing of any interest, not even a box of condoms. The sheets were soft and expensive, in a pale grey. House also found the lack of a television rather odd.

While Wilson checked the bathroom, House moved to a long row of interconnected wardrobes that acted as a closet. House thought the only thing worse than seeing Chase wear one of his horrifically ugly shirts and ties, was to see them all lined up together in an unending row of hideousness. He moved to the second wardrobe, which was filled with casual clothes, worn jeans and baggie khaki cargo pants. The final one was filled with expensive suits and shoes. All tailor made to fit the Aussie like glove. The type of clothes one would expect a young debutant to wear. House was curious as to what Chase would actually look like in a suit that fit him correctly.

In the back of a drawer in the third wardrobe, House came across a box. He pulled it out and summoned Wilson. The two sat on Chase's bed and examined the contents. They were mostly pictures. Several were of a beautiful blonde woman, with bluish green eyes like Chase. There were a few of Rowan, but most of these seemed to be clippings from medical magazines. The dog and cat also made a reappearance. Then there were a few pictures of a lovely dark skinned woman. There was another of this woman and Chase together at what looked like a banquet of some kind. They were holding hands and looked happy. She had a rock the size of House's head on her marriage finger. Interesting.

But most of the pictures were a girl with brown hair and brown eyes. There was a picture of the two of them canoodling in the snow and the sign behind them was written in French. House flipped the picture over and noticed it was dated earlier in the year. There was also a picture of her when she looked to be about five or six years old. House could tell because she had a very large roman nose that ruined an otherwise attractive face. He flipped that picture over and read the back. "To my best mate, Robin, love C." He read aloud. "I wonder who this C person is and why Chase has so many picture of her?" He questioned.

"Old girlfriend?" Wilson suggested as he picked up a string of onyx and silver rosary beads. The silver was tarnished from years of neglect but it was still beautiful in the ancient, faded ways that hymns remained beautiful. Wilson put them in his pocket, intending to take them to Chase.

House didn't miss Wilson's actions, but didn't comment on them either. "If they are dating, they have been dating since they were in napkins." House held up a picture of Chase and the same girl playing in the sand. Neither could have been more than three years old.

There was also a large coffee table book entitled, "The History of the Australian National Ballet Company." House opened the cover, noting a black and white picture of two beautiful ballet dancers. The woman was very petite and bent nearly backwards in her stance, while the man supported her. House flipped to the dedication page and read through the names. He didn't recognize any of them. He was intrigued though to see the handwritten thank you addressed to Robert.

At the bottom of the box was a large leather bound tome, wrapped in wax paper. House opened it and the binding protested at the movement. He leafed through the pages admiring the colourful pictures but not being able to read it. The illuminated text was all in Czech, which House did not read. Wilson looked over his shoulder. "They look like fairy tales. I think that one is Snow White. And that looks like Sleeping Beauty." Wilson pointed to another page. The paper was yellowed and the ink was faded. House flipped to the front and scanned the lines of unintelligible words till he recognized a date. The book had been printed in 1875. House briefly wondered how much it was worth. He closed it gently and rewrapped it but didn't set it back in the box.

"Come on. We aren't going to find anything here." He rose slowly, not bothering to put Chase's things away. He looked around one more time, a sad feeling sinking in. This wasn't a home, it was a place to sleep until Chase went home. There was nothing comforting or personal about this place. House realized something that he had tried to ignore for months -- Chase never intended to stay past his two-year fellowship. The wayward Aussie had always intended to go back home.

The two were silent as they headed back to the car. Wilson carried both large books House had found. He didn't know why, but something told him to bring them along. As they reached Wilson's car, House slid into the soft leather seat gratefully. He was tired and hurting, even after two Vicodin. Wilson pulled out and the street lights painted light polka dots of colour on the dark pavement. Wilson turned to him.

"You know he will be OK. He is strong and healthy. There is no reason to think he won't come out of this perfectly fine." Jimmy hated seeing House brood like this. He knew House was blaming himself, even though no one could be blamed for diseases. But if there was one thing he had learned, it was that it was human nature to assign blame.

"He is strong and healthy, that's the problem. It doesn't make sense that he is sick." House countered. It was a thought that had been floating around his head for hours now. He voiced it to his friend. "Bugs are opportunistic. They don't attack healthy people if there are unhealthy ones around. Chase is young, in great shape, and take very good care of himself. There is no conceivable way he would have gotten sick before half of the older, fatter, and lazier ER workers and ICU nurses. Viruses don't work that way. They followed the path of least resistance. Chase's immune system should not have just been a roadblock to them, it should have been the Maginot Line."

"Maybe they found a way around it, the Germans did."

"Maybe." They fell silent again, the gears in his head turning.

When they arrived back at the hospital, Wilson was happy to see a message from Rowan Chase on his desk. He fled back to House's office to inform him. They closed the door and dialed the amazingly expensive call to Melbourne. House wondered what time it was there. He wondered what Rowan would sound like. He should be almost dead by now, according to House's reckoning. Though Wilson did mention that Rowan was in a clinical trial for some type of gene therapy so who knew.

It took House three tries to dial the number correctly. There were too many damn digits. Then the ring on the other end sounded strange and foreign. He wondered, fancifully, if that was how Chase felt about American rings.

After three rings a phone menu picked up. "Thank you for calling Monash University Hospital. If you know your party's extension please dial it now. If you do not know, then choose from one of the following options." It took them nearly three minutes to get through to an actual human.

"Hello, Dr. Chase's office." A charming, cultured woman's voice answered.

"It's about damn time." House mumbled. "I need to speak to Dr. Chase." He said more clearly.

"Dr. Chase is very busy. Might I take a message?"

"It is sort of important." Wilson cut House off before the elder man could get to abusive. Luckily House had a speaker phone.

"I can patch you through to one of his staff, if that will help?"

"No, I need to talk to Dr. Chase not one of his ducklings."

"Excuse me sir?" She asked, clearly confused.

"Ma'am. We are calling all the way from America. We really need to speak with Dr. Chase. It's about his son." Wilson tried to plead.

"I'm sorry, but he is in a meeting with patients right now. Would you like us to return your call when he is available? Or if it is about a consult, one of his staff might be able to help you."

House spun his cane around thinking. "Yes, I'd like to talk to one of his staff." Wilson gave him an odd look and he just smiled.

"Please hold." Soft music began to play over the phone.

"I begin to understand Chase better and better." Wilson said to House, who nodded in agreement. He really hoped that Chase didn't have to go through this sort of thing every time he tried to talk to his father but sadly he had a feeling that the Aussie probably did. Though he wasn't sure how often Chase even tried to contact his father. House had gotten the distinct impression that the two Chase's hadn't seen each other in quite awhile.

"This is Dr. Richmond." A deep voice with a thick Aussie accent answered.

"Hello Dr. Richmond, this is Dr. Gregory House, head of the Department of Diagnostics at Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. I need a favour." House sounded much kinder than he looked.

"Of course Dr. House, what can we do for you?" The other doctor sounded impressed, perhaps he had heard of House.

"I need you to walk into Dr. Chase's office and tell him that his son is dead."

There was sputtering on the other end of the line. "Excuse me, did you just say"

"Yes, yes. His son is dead. I think he should probably know, and since he won't talk to me, you get to tell him."

"Hold on one moment." House and Wilson could hear other voices joining in discussion as Dr. Richmond hit the hold button. House could just picture it, several young doctors sitting around a large table, discussing what he had just said. They would be the best and brightest in the field, Rowan wouldn't settle for anything else. By all right, Robert should have been there, but he wasn't. He was following a different world-renowned doctor. House was beginning to think that coming to New Jersey and staying so long really had been nothing more than a sad form of rebellion for Chase.

After several minutes passed by, House turned to Wilson. "Do they realize how expensive this phone call is?"

"Don't worry. It isn't like you're the one paying for it."

"Dr. House." Another doctor answered the phone. This one was a girl. He would call her Cameron. They could tell they were now on speakerphone. "Dr. Chase doesn't have a son."

"I assure you that Dr. Rowan Chase most certainly does have a son. Either that or the former Mrs. Chase lied to her little blue eyed son for 16 years." House snarked.

Wilson intervened. "Robert is his name. He works with us in New Jersey. We really need to talk to his father. Can one of you please get Dr. Chase?"

"Who is this?" A suspicious sounding Man questioned. He could be Foreman.

"This is Dr. Wilson."

"Dr. James Wilson, the oncologist?" That would be Dr. Richmond. He was the most soft-spoken and sounded different from the other two. He was the Chase of the bunch.

"Yes. We really need to talk to Dr. Chase." Even Wilson's patience was starting to wear thin.

"Look, kiddies, Chase junior is lying on a slab in a meat locker downstairs, so do you mind terribly telling Rowan so I can discharge my obligation?" House asked. They were put on hold again.

"Why are you lying?" Wilson asked. Imagining the shock Rowan would feel.

"I'm not lying entirely. The ICU is kept cold enough to be a meat locker and the beds aren't very comfy so they could be like slab and he is below us. Besides how the hell else am I supposed to get through to this asshole?"

"You do realize that this is karma? All those other doctors you have put through mazes to get to you are all dancing triumphantly."

"Hah!" Anything else House was planning on saying was cut off by the phone being answered again.

"This is Dr. Chase." The elder doctor Chase sounded a bit raspier and a bit weaker than before but clearly still alive.

"Rowan, good to hear you are still coughing on, so to speak. How is every little thing?" House asked, sounding falsely chipper while doing a rather realistic Bugs Bunny impersonation.

"Dr. House, what do you want?" House almost shivered at the tone. The accent was slightly different and so was the timbre but he swore he heard Robert on the other end.

"I have news." House began but Wilson cut him off.

"Rowan, Robert is sick. We need your help getting his medical records." Wilson knew that Rowan was not House's biggest fan and figured he could head off a fight before it began.

"Sick, what is wrong with him?" Was that concern? No, House decided, just mild curiosity. He could here Rowan shuffling papers in the background.

"We think it is Eastern Equine Encephalitis. We are waiting for the test results. But we need detailed medical records and we can't get them without a family member to sign them out."

"I see." There was a pause. "If it is Eastern Equine Encephalitis, then there is nothing you can do other than supportive therapy. I don't see how having his records will help you."

"We need a detailed history, allergies, sensitivities." Wilson started to plead.

"He isn't allergic to anything that I know of. Now if you will excuse me, I have a meeting to get to. Please give Robert my best." Rowan answered.

House sat seething for a moment. He had followed Chase after he left the hospital the night Rowan was heading back to Australia. He had seen the two talk and Chase give his father a hug. He also hadn't missed the tears in the younger doctor's eyes or the way Rowan seemed to grow calmer afterwards. Rowan was happy, Chase had returned his affection and the status quo was back. It was Robert begging for Rowan's attention, not the other way around. House had sincerely wished he hadn't interfered after he saw that. He wished that Robert had let the bastard leave, thinking that he was hated.

"Listen to me you selfish prick. For once in your miserable life if you can't remember that you are a father, then act like a doctor. We need those files." House snapped.

"Call and leave a message if there is any change." Rowan answered coldly.

"Sure. I won't bother you again until he's dead." House hung up the phone and sighed. "That could have gone better."

"I take back a lot of the nasty things I said about Chase." Wilson said.

"Yeah, maybe I do too." House mused as he watched a tired looking delivery man wonder around confusedly. The man walked up and tapped on their door. He and Wilson were the only two people left in the hall at this time of night. Wilson rose to let the man in.

"I'm looking for Dr. Chase?" The package was a huge stuffed koala hugging two-dozen gourmet cookies. There was also a bag with a bottle of Nyquil, a bottle of aspirin, and a sealed envelope.

"Dr. Chase is busy. I'll sign for it." House offered. He signed the yellow sheet and the young man left. House ripped through the small bag looking puzzled at the contents. He opened the note without even trying to hide it. He wondered how someone outside of the hospital could have known that Chase was sick so fast.

The envelope contained a note and two dummy boarding passes to Italy. The note was a fax but still legible. It read. "Robin, tell that piss stain of a boss of yours that you are taking the first two weeks in September off and you are going skiing with me. And if he doesn't like it he can kiss my ass. You sounded awful when I talked to you and I know that you wouldn't bother to get anything to make yourself feel better so I got some for you. I hope it helps. And stop worrying, everything is going to work out ok. Oh yeah, if that son of a bitch makes one more comment about you not doing a good job on your patients, I want to know. I will personally fly over there and kick him in the groin. – Love C P.S. You had better eat those cookies! I'm tired of your ass looking smaller than mine."

"Interesting." House breathed. Wilson smiled. "Get me Chase's phone."

Wilson retrieved the phone from Chase's lab coat pocket, where it was sitting in the conference room. He handed it to House. "What are you hoping for, a personal number for Rowan so you can bug him at home?"

"The note said that this C person talked to him earlier and he sounded awful. I'm hoping that she will show up on his caller ID." He fumbled around trying to find the call history on someone else's phone. He finally found a 22-minute long call from the night before.

"How do you know it is a girl?" Wilson questioned. Though he did remember the messages on the answering machine in Chase's loft, that girl was familiar enough with Chase that she assumed he would recognize her voice without leaving a name or number.

"Just look at this girly writing." House handed Wilson the note. The letters were rounded and loopy, clearly a girl's handwriting. "Here goes." House punched the talk button on Chase's phone, knowing that if Chase were awake and near him he would probably be in danger of bodily harm for interfering in the Aussie's personal life again.

House was prepared to leave a message when someone finally answered. "Hey, mate, how are you feeling? I wasn't expecting to hear from you again so soon." It was clearly a girl with an accent exactly like Chase's, complete with the upward inflection in the middle of 'mate.'

"Sorry, this isn't your 'mate'." House tried to mimic an Aussie accent.

"Who is this and how did you get Robin's phone?"

"This is the piss stain." House answered.

"Dr. House I presume."

"Give the girl a gold star. I am calling on behalf of Chase."

"On his behalf, why? What is going on? Where is he?"

"By the way, who is this?"

"This is Cassandra, his best friend, what the hell is going on?" She sounded rather angry. House backed off, he needed her responsive to him, not fighting with him.

"Chase is sick."

"I know. He told me yesterday when I talked to him. Isn't he feeling any better?"

"Not exactly. He has encephalitis and probably meningitis. He is lying unconscious in the ICU." House had to immediately pull the phone away from his ear to save his hearing from the over dramatized shriek. "Don't panic yet, he isn't dead."

"How sick is he?" House could hear her sniffling in the background. At least she sounded upset, unlike Rowan.

"Menigitis is serious, it is an inflammation of the meninges, the membranes that cover the brain and spinal cord. Because it is viral it probably isn't life threatening. The encephalitis is much more dangerous. That is basically an infection in his brain."

"Is he going to be alright?" She sounded like she was panicking again.

"I don't know, but I need your help. I don't suppose you are actually related to him, are you?"

"No. We aren't related, just friends."

"Damn," House hissed. "Are you the girl he has all those pictures of?"

"I have no idea, what did they look like?" This seemed like a ridiculous question to her.

"Brown hair, brown eyes, big nose, a little chubby." House described the person he saw in the pictures with Chase.

"I used to be a little chubby, but not anymore." She snapped. "Yes, that is me. Why? How can this help him?" She was quickly figuring how fast she could get to New Jersey, she didn't care how angry she made the concert promoters, Robin was more important.

"I don't suppose you know his father, Dr. Rowan Chase?" House asked.

"Know him and will gladly do a jig on his grave, when the bastard finally kicks off." She snapped.

"Not a fan of his I see." House mused. He wondered if she knew that Rowan was sick.

"Or of you, so what does this have to do with Robin being sick? Do you need Rowan to come and take care of him, if so, forget it, he won't." She remembered all the times Chase had needed his father and been left out in the cold. She remembered when Robert had been 6 and had had been sick at school and his father was supposed to pick him up but had left him waiting there until three hours after school let out. Or when Robert had and dealing with his mother's trial. Rowan had completely avoided his son and Chase literally worried himself into a nervous breakdown, utterly alone and ignored. There were other times too, smaller and larger things that Rowan had missed or overlooked. All of it proving that even though Rowan was a good person and a great doctor, he was a lousy and unreliable father.

"Why don't you like me, you don't even know me?" House questioned, momentarily sidetracked.

"Let's see. Could it be the way you insult Robin, torture him, don't let him take time off, belittle him, and generally treat him like shit; or do we need to get specific?" She spat.

House covered the phone and mouthed to Wilson, "What a bitch." Then talked to her. "So you know Rowan. Is there any way you can get him to release Chase's medical records. We can't get them without a family member and he refused, when we asked him."

"So you want me to try and talk him into it? What makes you think he is going to listen to me?" She questioned, the sound of tears rising in her voice again.

"Because at least he doesn't hate you like he does me."

"I'll do what I can." She took a deep hitching breath, trying to stop the tears as she wrote the fax number for House's office down. "Please tell Robin that I'll be there as soon as I can and I love him."

House had a momentary surge of sympathy. "Don't worry, we'll take good care of him." He hung up the phone and turned to Wilson.

"So can she help?" The oncologist questioned.

"I hope so. I'm hungry."

Wilson left to order pizza and get some beer and House limped up to check on his duckling. He normally wouldn't ever go near a patient, but he supposed this was different. He entered the ward and felt glares burn into him from every angle. The nurses blamed him for their favourite doctor getting sick and truth be told he blamed himself too. He entered the room to find it empty and the lights on. House dimmed them so only a singular light was on in the corner. He figured Chase would like it better that way. He had learned that, though the Aussie might like to bask in the sun, he preferred low lighting. Also, bright lights would hurt his eyes when he woke up. House was sure the blonde would, he had to.

He limped over and picked up the chart. Reading through Foreman's chicken scratch, he had bad hand writing even for a doctor. He noted the antibiotics were doing nothing for the respiratory symptoms. It made no sense. How had Chase caught both a brain infection and a lung infection without having been in the same place as the others? He took down a stethoscope and listened to Chase's lungs. There was a definite wheezing and crackling. He straightened and sighed. The CDC would be here by morning to close this place down for an epidemic if he didn't figure out how Chase had gotten sick.

He looked at Chase's temperature on the monitor, it was holding steady at around 104.5. It was high enough to cause massive lethargy but not quite high enough to completely poach his brain. He noticed that tears streamed from the Aussie's closed eyes. House opened one and shone a penlight into it. The pupils constricted and dilated appropriately. It was a good sign. The tearing became more profuse when the light was introduced so House chalked it up to pain. Full-blown encephalitis was supposed to be excruciatingly painful. He wished he could give Chase something for it but he knew he couldn't for the same reason they weren't really giving him anything for the nausea and vomiting. It was bad practice to give central nervous system depressants to someone whose central nervous system was so far down in the hole.

House thought about his youngest duckling. It was hard to see him like this. Not sleeping, because Chase tended to do that frequently in the office. If Foreman were bored he would read or write. If Cameron were bored she would go through his mail or look at vacation spots she wasn't brave enough to go to online. Chase did cross words and if that didn't work he slept. But seeing him looking so sick was difficult. He cared for all his ducklings. He respected Foreman like few other doctors. Foreman was outwardly tough, strong, and surprisingly well adjusted. He attempted to control any situation he came in contact with. House liked that, except when Foreman was trying to control him. Cameron, he did really like. Not in a romantic way but in a mentor way. She could be a wonderful doctor if she would just toughen up and learn to trust herself as much as she trusted other people. But she was too sympathetic in a selfish way. Her worry over patients was actually a worry of how she would react to the news.

Then there was Chase, the most intuitive and caring of all the ducklings. He knew he would get argument over that theory. But it was true. Cameron's caring was one sided, she cared about everyone and everything, rendering her emotions meaningless. Chase picked and chose which things he would care about, making it all the more important. Chase had a well-honed ability to read people and determine their moods based on subtle clues that even House had a hard time finding. Then modify his behaviour to cause the least amount of trouble. It was ingrained in the Aussie's psyche to do this as it was with most people who had survived abusive or addicted parents. Chase would have corrected him there. The one time he had mentioned abuse to Chase, the blonde had quickly said that his parents had never abused him. But House disagreed. What his parents had done to him might not have fit into the classical definition of abuse but it was certainly mistreatment and had certainly left its mark on Chase.

This skill of Chase's was a serious plus. It allowed him to get people to open up to him, to trust him. He knew when to be reassuring, like with Gabe. When to be silly, like he was with Andie. Or, when to be serious, like with the nun. But it also helped him be unbelievably manipulative, when he wanted to be, like playing House for a fool with Vogler. Chase had known just the right way to react to get House to distrust Cameron. It was bloody brilliant. It was a skill that would have served a priest well.

Chase convulsed and hacked up thick, yellow sputum onto his chin. House looked around for anyone watching him. When he saw that he was alone, he reached over and wiped his duckling's chin. He then stroked the Aussie's blonde hair off his fevered brow. Before he could do anything else even remotely kind, he heard footsteps approaching and left as fast as he could.

Chase minimally acknowledged that House was there. He could barely see past the agonizingly bright light the doctor shined in his eyes but he knew it was House. It was the sound of his gate that gave it away. House was tired and in pain because it was a step, click, drag rhythm rather than a step, click, step. Chase had learned to recognize the difference early on. The drag meant pain and pain meant a really bad mood. He felt House touch his hair. It was strange, House never touched him. His mother used to that, when he was very young, but that had been so long ago he could barely remember.

Dream

It was raining out and Chase dropped his coat and books by the door. He was burning hot, and that seemed strange to him because he remembered being cold. But trying to think about such differences was like trying to catch steam, impossible and pointless. He wasn't sure if he was remembering or dreaming.

He continued into the house and saw his mother and her best friend, Cass's mother, Siobhan. She was a former model and B-list actress mostly famous for being famous. Chase hated her. But that wasn't right either. He hadn't hated her when his mother was still alive. He had resented her, sure, because she was always drugging up and boozing with his mother but he hadn't started hating her until she tried to have power of attorney taken away from him so she could keep his mother on life support.

He shook his head, trying to ignore the strange thoughts. Nothing looked right in his home. The walls were the wrong colour and the angles seemed too sharp. He walked into the den and found his mother laying on her back laughing at something. Siobhan trailed her hand up his mother's stomach, making her giggle even more. She was beautiful, Chase had almost forgotten how lovely she had been.

"You're home, luv." She sat up and said. As she rose and walked towards him he could smell the stench of gin on her. She ran her tongue over her teeth repeatedly. She had been doing cocaine too. His heart sank as he saw the central line catheter outlined under her shirt.

"I'm leaving, sweetheart." Siobhan said and deeply kissed his mother. Chase turned away. It always made him uncomfortable when they did that in front of him. "I'll see you later, too, Robin." She walked up to him, leaning over, running her tongue over his lips and chin. "You are growing up to be so handsome." He wanted to push her away and tell her to stop touching him. He hated, HATED, when she did things like that to him. He knew she was joking, she was his best friend's mother and had known him since the day he was borne. Both Siobhan and his mother found it amusing to tease him like that but it just made him feel like he wanted to jump out of his own skin. Forget Cameron being uncomfortable with sex. Imagine growing up with a hyper Catholic, extremely repressive father and an omni sexual mother and her bi sexual girlfriend. Chase realized he had a trillion to one shot of ever having a healthy sexual relationship. No wonder he wanted to go into the priesthood.

The tall New Zealander sauntered out, leaving Chase alone with is mother. She reeked of liquor and the smell turned his stomach. She staggered and he steadied her. There was something disgustingly familiar about this scene. "Mum, you've been drinking again."

"Just a little nip as a send off before I have to start that stupid chemo junk." She slurred as he led her into the kitchen and sat her at the breakfast table. She reached up and stroked his damp hair off his forehead. "You shouldn't cover your pretty eyes, my beautiful Robin." Chase's heart constricted when he heard that. No one but Cass used his nickname anymore.

"You have liver cancer, you can't drink." He pleaded with her. He felt tears prickle his eyes lids and took a deep breath.

"It's nothing, I'll be right as rain in no time." She slumped at the table, her head resting on her outstretched arm.

"No you won't." He pulled down a heavy copper pot to make some soup for her. She needed to eat something before she took her pills.

"Don't be such a stickler, Robin." She sat up. "I'm not hungry, I'm going to go lie down."

"No." He snapped. "If you were well enough to drink a pint of gin, then you jolly well can eat some soup." He slammed a drawer shut.

"Don't use that tone with me."

He sighed and turned around. "You promised me. You promised me that you weren't going to drink anymore." He now felt tears running down his cheeks and wiped them away. That was the bad part about having an alcoholic for a parent. Not that she drank, but that her gin was more important to her than Robert.

"You should be used to me breaking promises by now. I am a horrible mother. You would be better off with your father but he doesn't want you." She started to cry. She always started to cry when he got mad at her. Then she made him feel guilty for getting angry. So he had learned, year after year, to show less and less anger and unhappiness. To swallow it like a bitter draught because if he didn't he would end up feeling much worse in the long run.

"No you aren't, mum. That's not what I said." She cried a lot and he always held her while she did. "Sit up so you can eat." He said, not feeling particularly magnanimous today. He had a headache, a very, very bad headache.

"I don't want it, I don't feel well. I think I need to lie down." He looked over in time to see her start to vomit up gin and lemon cordial all over the table. He quickly got a pan under her face.

She continued to retch and he collected her hair and supported her, muttering soothing sounds. He was used to this, it happened at least once a week, sometimes more since her liver started going. But soon she started to bring up blood and lots of it. He dropped her hair to run for the phone and call an ambulance but the phone wasn't where it was supposed to be. He looked all over but couldn't find it, when he did, he couldn't seem to dial the numbers correctly.

Eventually he managed to dial and picked her up and took her to the vestibule just inside of the front door. She continued to vomit up blood and he tried to calculate how much she was loosing, how long she could survive without a transfusion. There was a knock at the door and the medics packaged her up but they left him behind. He tried to follow but when he tried to run the road turned to sand under his feet and bogged him down. He was forced to walk slowly but he was lost on the streets he had known for years. He wanted to cry in frustration.

When he finally did reach the hospital it wasn't the one she had been taken to, at least not the one his memory kept telling him it should be. But he knew it, it was PPTH. He found his mother, on a bed and still bleeding. He looked around wondering why no one was doing anything. Cuddy looked at him down her long nose and then turned around to buff her nails.

"Why isn't anyone helping her?" He shrieked. He felt like he was choking again.

"We were waiting for you." His father said. Why was his father there?

"What can I do?" He asked.

"You are a doctor aren't you?" His father asked very reasonably. "You have 60 seconds." Rowan clicked a stopwatch like a coach timing a race.

Chase looked around and suddenly noticed he was in front of a large class of medical students, all intently staring at him. He felt totally exposed. He hated being the center of attention. Bright lights blared down on him making him even hotter than he was. He could see photographers off in the corner, snapping pictures of him. He felt like he couldn't breathe.

"Forty-five seconds." Rowan warned.

Chase looked through drawers and cupboards trying to find the instruments he needed but it was all missing. When he did find what he needed, he couldn't get her intubated correctly. He looked around for help. House sat in the front row, twirling his can and petting Wilson where he sat at House's feet clothed in pajamas, eating balls of hair. Chase gagged. He switched to trying to get a mainline IV but kept missing the vein and stabbing himself. He heard a buzzer sound.

"Sorry, times up. My turn" Rowan said and jumped down from his perch on a table. He swaggered over, seeming to stand at least a foot taller than his son. "Go sit in the corner, like a good boy." Rowan handed his son a bible. Chase opened it and the words turned to spiders that spilled from the page, crawling all over him. He tried to brush them away but they kept biting him and burrowing under his fair skin, leaving angry red weals. He pulled his sleeves down, trying to cover them and concentrate on his mother.

Rowan turned his back, blocking Robert's view of his mother. Chase tried to move to see, but his hair and sweat kept falling into his eyes. He was so bloody hot he could hardly think. "There," Rowan said and Chase's mother sat up. "You, just don't have the touch."

There was loud applause and Rowan took a bow. Chase fell on his knees, feeling weak and sick. This had to be a dream. He kept thinking. It had to be.

Thirty minutes after his phone call with Cass, House and Wilson sat eating pizza when a fax came in. Wilson immediately gathered the many pages. As he was waiting for the transmission to end, Chase's phone rang. House unashamedly answered it.

"Dr. House." It was Cassandra. Her voice was nasal and hoarse. She had clearly been crying.

"Yeah, yeah. It's me." He answered, more interested in the papers in Wilson's hands than Chase's friend.

"Did he send you what you needed?" She and Rowan had argued, like they usually did if forced into contact with each other for any length of time. She despised Rowan for what he had done to his son. Between the extremely repressive Catholic upbringing, the demands for perfection, and his leaving; Rowan had twisted his son into a ball of depression, anxiety, and trust issues. Rowan hated her because she was too much like Chase's mother, Abagaile. She was a self centered, irresponsible fame whore, who drank too much, did too many drugs, and expected other to pick up the pieces. All Rowan could see was the potential hurt Robert would suffer when she finally crashed.

"Yes, sure." House was already scanning over what Wilson handed him.

"How is he doing?" She asked with a slight hitch in her voice. She didn't think she could handle loosing her best friend.

"Fine I guess. I'll tell him to call if he wakes up." House distractedly said as he hung up on her mid question, looking at Wilson.

"He was thorough if nothing else. He sent Robert's full records, Robert's mother's full records, and his own. Very complete." Wilson commented as he stacked the pages up in front of House.

"Gimme, gimme," House demanded of Chase's records. Wilson settled for Chase's mother's, he had already seen Rowan's.

They read silently for a while and Wilson's eyes started to get wider as he continued to read. House was making notes on the back of a napkin. "I can see why Rowan wouldn't want us to see this," Wilson held up Abagaile's records, "It is nothing but page after page of drunk and alcohol related problems. 'Brought to hospital by nine year old son treated for Gram negative pneumonia. Drug overdose, brought in by 11 year old son. Ruptured esophagus, brought in by 12 year old son. Cirrhosis, liver cancer.' This file reads like a study of how alcohol kills." Wilson looked up at his friend, who seemed a bit taken back. "But why wouldn't he want us to see Chase's file?"

"I think I know." House murmured and then read from the file. "'Admitted through triage with accidental drug overdose. Respirations were shallow and weak, pulse at 38. Patient was unconscious and unresponsive. Performed gastric lavage. Retrieved between 20-30 semi digested meperidine tablets.' Chase would have been eighteen."

"Meperidine, he ODed on Demerol?" Wilson questioned, finding it odd considering that Chase was usually the first to comment on someone else's potential drug use.

"You don't accidentally overdose on 30 pills that is 30 times the dosage. You want to get high you take two maybe three. The only reason you take 30 is because you want to off yourself."

"You think Chase tried to kill himself. Massively Catholic, was almost a priest, Chase tried to kill himself?" Wilson was stunned to say the least.

"It fits. Chase makes a lot of cracks about suicide. And most patients with even moderate depression contemplate suicide. And you, yourself, put him on drugs for sever depression. Why would he be any different?"

"It doesn't fit. His faith alone would prohibit it."

"Chase left the church. Think about, he would have been 18, mother's dead, dad ignores him, god forgot about him, and he are stuck in med school even though he doesn't want to be a doctor. Add to that a massive chemical imbalance in his brain, limiting happy thoughts and badda bing, badda boom a bottle of pills looks pretty good."

"I guess, but it just seems so proactive for Chase." Wilson had always seen the Aussie more as the type who reacted to things rather than instigating them. They were a lot alike that way.

"If things get bad enough he will take charge. If he thinks he doesn't have any other choice." House mused.

"This is all very interesting, and slightly upsetting, but it has nothing to do with Chase getting sick now. What else is in there?"

"Let's see, he has had malaria, twice, bronchopneumonia, two massive reconstructions on his knee and one smaller scope." House read off.

"No wonder he doesn't want to have anything done to it again. What else?"

"He was prescribed albuterol for the pneumonia."

"So?"

"Albuterol is for asthma not pneumonia. It loosens the muscles around the bronchial tubes but wouldn't do anything for a long infection."

"Maybe he had bronchitis too."

"Or maybe he has asthma."

"Chase? Mr. Iron Man triathlete, does not have asthma. People who have a chronic respiratory condition do not run marathons in New Jersey, they do not do bike races, and they most certainly do not swim miles and miles in a pool." Wilson commented. His little brother had asthma and had grown from a short, skinny, weak kid to a short, skinny, weak adult. He was not capable of walking up a flight of stairs without wheezing, much less running miles like Chase did.

"Juvenal asthma actually." House said as he turned a page around for Wilson to examine.

"Well he clearly doesn't suffer from it anymore."

"I'm going home." House abruptly gathered his things, the files, and the two books he took from Chase's apartment and headed out. Wilson cleaned up the mess and went home as well, hoping Julie was already asleep when he got there.

House sat down in his leather lounger, downed some bourbon, turned on his Ipod to some cool jazz, and started to look over the files. Something didn't fit, he wasn't sure what, but something just wasn't right. Normally, he didn't care how people got sick, just what was wrong with them. But he knew what was wrong with Chase; the puzzle was how it happened.

He read through the medical files over and over, thinking about what he had learned. Chase had told him that his mother had drunk herself to death. No specifics were mentioned, and House hadn't felt like pushing his luck. But now that he read the file, he couldn't believe that his laid back Aussie duckling had been raised in such a toxic home. It was easy to tell Chase had daddy issues, it was in the way he never, ever mentioned his father or the way his entire body tensed up when Rowan was mentioned, like someone was about to punch him. But House had never guessed at anything else. Chase seemed so calm and normal.

He read through Chase's file again and again, looking for some clue as to why he was the one who had gotten sick. He couldn't find one. Chase was a normal, tough, guy. All his injuries were linked to sports and he had only ever had two even remotely dangerous illnesses. Even when flus and colds went around the hospital, Chase never caught them, it was always Cameron.

Stumped, he switched to the large book about the ballet. He paged through it, trying to see why it was important to Chase. On page 23, there was a full colour picture of a beautiful blonde, with of set blue green eyes he swore he looked at every day. Under the picture read Abagaile Pronásledovat 1957-1995. House read a short narrative about "the greatest ballerina of the 20th century" as they called her. He flipped a few pages further and found a picture of a very young looking Chase, standing beside a casket covered in white roses. On the opposite page was another picture of Chase and a few other people. They were all dressed in tuxedos. Everyone was smiling except for Chase.

He continued to read on about the trial and the controversy surrounding her death. It was insane, making a 16 year old handle that kind of a decision. And then someone making Chase go through a several month long, highly publicized court battle over it. Something like that could really mess with a kid's head. It only made Chase's choice of becoming an intensivist all the more masochistic, since he was now the one that generally made the call to discuss life support termination with families.

House closed the book and thought for a moment. Chase was one of the most secretive people he had ever met in his life. His youngest duckling was a master at evading personal questions and if cornered, giving the most bizarre non sequitur non answers to simple questions. It kept House on his toes and had almost become a game between the two of them. House trying to guess something that Chase didn't want known. It was fun but it also told him something about the Aussie, he wasn't sure what. He picked up the book of Czech fairy tales and began to leaf through it. Did Chase not like people knowing things because then they would feel sorry for him? Did he not like them knowing things because they would laugh at him? Or did he think that people would hate him if they knew certain things? He wasn't sure.

He looked through the finely illustrated book, enjoying the gorgeous pictures even if he couldn't read the text. He managed to figure out most of the stories from the drawings. There was the 12 Dancing Princesses, Snow White, Rapunzel, and a host of others. He stopped and looked at a picture of a lovely blonde woman laid out on an elaborate bed. Her hands were crossed over her breast and she was surrounded by a wall of thorns. Sleeping Beauty, or Briar Rose, as the non Disney version was often called. House had to admit he liked the Grimm version better, not so goody goody. Then something dawned on him. "Germany!" He shouted and downed another cup of liquor and limped towards the door, dialing his phone as fast as he could.

Twenty minutes later, Foreman, Cameron, Wilson, and Cuddy sat in his office staring at him. Foreman looked interested but mildly irritated. Cameron looked hopeful and slightly teary eyed. Wilson looked amused and slightly relieved, and Cuddy looked murderous. He decided to look at Wilson.

"I found Germany." House stated.

"I didn't know you had lost it. I assumed it had been left right beside France." Wilson commented.

"Oh, House has lost it, completely." Foreman said.

"No, no, keep up. France," House said as he sketched a crude map of Europe on the white board.

"I thought we were talking about Germany." Wilson asked.

"We will be."

"Are you drunk?" Cuddy asked.

"Very probably. But that is beside the point. Now, history lesson. After World War I, France was afraid of being invaded by Germany again. So all the French military geniuses," House paused. "Ok the one guy and his assistant, got together and devised a cunning plan to keep the German's out of France. They build a row of defenses along this line." House drew a red arch across the most likely place for Germany to invade France. "It was called the Maginot Line. It was supposed to have been impenetrable."

"Why do you still have a license?" Cuddy questioned, just as confused as everyone else.

"Because I'm good and I just saved our hospital millions on quarantine costs. Now be quiet or I'll make you stay after class. Anyway, when Germany decided to invade France, they knew they couldn't get through the Maginot Line. So what did they do? They went around it." House drew an arch showing the route the Blitzkrieg took, completely bypassing France's master defense." They all stared at him. "Do I have to draw a picture? Wait I just did." He smiled.

"House, you aren't making sense." Foreman pointed out.

"I am making perfect sense, you just can't follow me. Chase's body's defense system is the Maginot line. We assumed that the virus found a way to break the line. We assumed that he inhaled the virus and that was how he was infected. But he didn't, the virus was like Germany, it found a way around."

"No, if he didn't inhale it, then why does he have respiratory symptoms?" Foreman questioned. Wilson watched the two spar, enjoying it. For once it wasn't him fighting with House.

"He doesn't have respiratory symptoms." House countered

"Yes he does. His 02 stats are low and his breathing is laboured." Cameron pointed out.

"Ok, but they aren't symptoms of the illness, only a by product; completely irrelevant."

"His chest sounds like an emphysemic. He can barely breathe on his own." Now Foreman again.

"But it isn't responding to antibiotics like everyone else, because he doesn't have what they have. Give him some steroids it will go away."

"Steroids? We can't risk compromising his immune system." Cameron this time.

"He doesn't have pneumonia, he has asthma!" House almost shouted.

"What?" Both ducklings questioned.

House sighed and gathered his cane, heading out of the door. "Where did you people go to medical school?" They headed to Chase's room. When they reached it, House produced a stethoscope and handed it to Foreman. "Pneumonia produces green or dark brown sputum and a crackling sound in the lungs." He stressed the last word. "Chase has yellow sputum, excess mucus from his bronchial tubes. And there is more wheezing than crackling in his upper chest. Also the chest CT Scan was clean." Foreman listened and damned if House wasn't right.

"Ok, so maybe it is just asthma, even though I find it really difficult to believe that Chase has asthma, that isn't dispositive that the disease has gone air borne."

"Just because the virus concentrates in his brain doesn't mean there aren't rogue ones floating around his entire body, they set off an allergenic asthmatic reaction in his lungs."

"All right, viruses are a trigger for many asthmatics." Cameron pointed out. "But what about Germany? How did he get infected if not through inhaling it."

"It was introduced directly into his blood stream." House stated.

"How? The nurses and I checked him over, head to toe, no cuts, no bites, no nothing. How would it have gotten in his blood stream?" Foreman questioned. He and two nurses, though several had volunteered, had looked Chase over while he lie in bed just a few hours ago.

"Because, Sleeping Beauty pricked his finger." House removed the stat monitor on Chase's index finger to reveal the small but deep puncture wound. The cardinal rule in the ICU was that the stat monitor was never removed from a patient unless they were discharged or dead. Foreman had followed that rule and kept the clip covering the tip of Chase's index finger.

"He has a cut on his finger." Cameron stated the obvious.

"Very good. Now," House held up his cane, "what is this?" He talked to her like she was a child. "He was pricked by an infected needle. Anything that can be transmitted via mosquitoes can be transmitted via the blood. Only with a mosquito, the virus enters through a small blood vessel then travels throughout the body and lymphatic system. Chase by passed that step and introduced it straight into his blood stream."

"That was why the incubation period was so short." Wilson followed House completely now.

"I'll inform the Health Authority and the CDC." Cuddy said, turning to leave. "And Dr. House, I want you in my office tomorrow morning to discuss your staff scheduling." House pulled a face at her as she left.

"Keep him on antibiotics and supportive therapy. Get a respiratory specialist up here to do something about his asthma." House ordered his ducklings.

"What are you going to do?" Foreman questioned.

"I am going home." He limped out, Wilson following.

When they were out of earshot, Wilson asked him. "That was a long shot. You were lucky he had actually pricked himself."

"I am as brilliant as I am modest." House beamed.

"You went and checked before you started your speech, didn't you?"

"Of course. Did you think I was going to look like fool in front of Cuddy?"

"You really are insufferable."

"And your cute when you use big words." House batted his blue eyes at his friend.

"Go home." They parted ways and headed to their respective cars.

The next day House arrived not so bright and early. The first thing he did was wonder by the ICU, trying not to look like he was checking on Chase. Then he saw Cameron, damn he was caught.

"Dr. House." She smiled at him. "He is stable. His fever is down a little and his breathing is much better but he still hasn't woken up. Foreman said we shouldn't start worrying about that yet, though." She filled him in. She then started telling him about the other patients.

'Oh yeah, they had other patients, didn't they.' "Good. Keep me posted." He limped off.

"Dr. House, Dr. Cuddy came by looking for you."

"Then remind me to hide." He limped off to Wilson's office.

The day was spent mostly in the clinic and getting reamed by Cuddy and Stacy for making Chase work illegal hours. It wasn't like he had beaten the guy or anything. Though he had to admit watching Cuddy and Stacy both act all authoritative at him was sort of a turn on. Of course they both had to take stupid Chase's side. Of course they were both soft on the blonde. They couldn't resist his big puppy dog eyes, and his floppy puppy dog hair, and his "look at me I'm a lonely little guy far away from home," schick. They both seemed to have forgotten that the backstabbing Aussie had sold him out! But even his usual fuming couldn't distract him from Chase.

It was late, almost 7pm when he finally couldn't keep himself from checking on Chase in person. He took two Vicodin, waited 15 minutes, then hobbled downstairs to see his hurt duckling. Dr. Gardner watched him suspiciously as he approached Chase's room. He knew that she and Chase were tight. She was always bringing him home cooked dinners and offering to fix him up with people. He had noticed that Chase accepted the dinners but declined the dates.

He checked Chase's vitals and was pleased to note that the Aussie's fever was down to under 104 but he still hadn't woken up yet. House pulled a chair up beside the prone man. House looked at his profile and mused how strange he looked. The nurses had shaved him and brushed his hair, he bet there had been a fight over who got that duty. Chase looked unbelievably young, lying like this, young and defenseless. House decided that was what made Chase look so different. He wasn't guarded. There was no cultivated laid back attitude, no attempt to seem like something other than what he was, no thorny walls and giant 'keep out' signs. When all these contrivances were stripped from the young man, he looked like another person. House fancied that it was what Chase should have looked like, had circumstances not kicked him in the balls at every turn.

The elder doctor couldn't help himself and brushed Chase's hair back from his forehead. What was even stranger, he continued to stroke the soft, silky strands. House was insanely jealous of Chase's hair. The Aussie had an ugly hair cut but great hair. He thought about his Fellow. Chase was brilliant without being pompous, creative without being too flakey, compassionate without being false or clingy, and talented without taking it for granted. Chase had a wicked sense of humour and a strong sense of loyalty but wasn't afraid to protect himself if he had to. Of course, House would much prefer that the blonde was more straight forward about it rather than back stabbing people like some political ninja. Chase had flaws too. He was needy, emotionally closed off, often sarcastic, and had a real problem saying no to people. But all in all, he was a good person. That was why House couldn't fathom how cold Rowan was to his son. He, himself, seemed more worried about Robert than his own father. Maybe Rowan was worried but just didn't know how to show it, House supposed. However, growing up with someone that cold and sterile explained a plethora of Chase's weird little neurosis. Now, if he could just figure out Foreman's.

House sat there for a few minutes, stroking his duckling's hair and talking to him quietly, when he noticed that Chase had moved into his touch. The motion was like a cat leaning into a pet. "Chase," House said sternly, "open your eyes." Slowly Chase slid his eyes open then immediately snapped them shut as soon as the bright light over his head hit them. House fairly flew, at least for him, across the room and shut off all but a small light. He touched Chase's cheek. "Open your eyes up again." Chase only opened one eye at first, making sure the room was dark. House bellowed to the nurse on duty, telling her to page Dr. Foreman immediately. Chase winced at the loud noise. "How are you feeling?"

"Head hurts." Chase croaked. In fact, everything hurt but his head was the most sever.

"I'm not surprised." House smiled at him, luckily Chase's eyes were closed and he didn't see it.

"Tired." Chased muttered.

"Ple-ase," House said sarcastically, "you have been asleep for about 30 hours straight. It's time to wake up little Briar Rose." House told him.

"What is going on?" Foreman came charging in the room, making as much noise as humanly possible, followed by Cameron.

"Please be quiet." Chase whimpered.

Foreman was at his co-worker's side in a split second. "Chase, look at me." He commanded as he shown a penlight in Chase's eyes. The blonde tried to pull his head away to get away from the light. To him it felt like the light was burning out his eyes then pouring acid through threw the burned out sockets into his brain. Foreman watched the way Chase's pupils reacted and his eyes tracked motion. There was no vertical gaze nystagmus but there was still fixed and horizontal. That was good. He kindly turned the light off when he noticed the patient's eyes were watering. "Chase who is the president?"

Chase mumbled something that sounded like "OVOT"

Foreman looked over at the other two doctors, noticing Wilson had joined them. "Did he say 'ovot'?" He questioned.

"I think he said 'of what'." Cameron supplied.

"Of Disney." Foreman snapped, assuming his question was self-explanatory.

"Michael Eisner, I think." Chase murmured, wanting to go back to sleep.

"Wrong, he was voted out." Wilson said. Foreman glared at him. "What, I own stock."

"He obviously can still talk and think." Foreman stated.

"Stop talking about me like I'm not here." Chase whispered, quickly loosing his battle to stay awake.

"Sorry, your doing fine. Go back to sleep and we'll talk more later." Foreman told him. It was a good sign that Chase was so alert. Foreman was pleased and smiled at the other doctors as the moved out of the room. House turned off even the small light, and drew the curtains, assuming Chase would prefer the room as dark as they could get it.

They made their way back to the Diagnostics department to celebrate. Foreman seemed confident that Chase looked good. They opened some Champaign from Wilson's never ending supply and Cameron hugged everyone. She actually hugged House twice but who was counting. As the festivities wound down, House was left alone with Wilson.

"So, are you going to fire him or forgive him?" He asked his friend.

"I'm not sure yet."

"Yes you are, you just don't want to admit it." Wilson rose to leave and House followed. The last thing he did before he left the hospital was the leave the large tome of fairy tales beside Chase's bed, with the rosary marking the page for Sleeping Beauty.

TBC