AN: And we have the closing chapters! Sorry for taking so long - computer/plot problems. As to the debate over whether House was abusing Chase in the last chapter... Well clearly I'm not condoning an abusive relationship, and this is a House/Chase fic. However, as I meant to be clear from the last lines of the last chapter - neither was that sex the beginning of the relationship. They were both in the wrong head-space for it to be that. So (I hope) these chapters sort that mess out, and no one will come after me with pitchforks. Thanks for all the reviews, both positive and negative - you all gave me something to think about. And special thanks to kiwi-fruit-from-hellfor coming to my defence on the issue :-)

Enjoy the end of the story!

'Where were you last night?'

'What?'

'Not a difficult question, Chase.'

'Home. You made that pretty clear.'

House reached over to snag Chase's arm. 'However did you manage to get a bruise like that "at home"?'

Chase looked down at the bruising around his wrist as if he had never seen it before. He didn't say a word.

'You went back there,' House stated. 'Or did you go straight to the source and knock on the ex's door? He's certainly the most reliable source of bruising that you know!'

'I was at home last night,' Chase said.

'Is this like "I tripped"?' House asked caustically.

'Believe what you want, but I was at home.'

'So how exactly did you manage to get that interestingly-coloured bruise?'

Chase looked at the floor and hovered from one foot to the other. 'You did it,' he bit out eventually.

'What?' he asked incredulously.

'You did it,' Chase repeated, still not meeting House's eyes. 'When you took me out of the bar.'

He remembered now, gripping Chase's wrist to pull him out of the bar, being angry enough to punch him, though he had done nothing but lead him hurriedly out. The bruise was purple, just fading to green, and it stood stark against Chase's pale skin, like every other mark he had seen on it. He wrapped his fingers around the slender wrist, matching them to the bruise. 'Why the hell didn't you say anything?' he forced out angrily.

'I didn't notice,' Chase whispered.

'What!' he spat back.

Chase shook his head, trying to clear it, 'I didn't notice the pain.'

'You're not telling me...' House began incredulously

'I didn't notice,' Chase whispered again, before taking a look at House, and fleeing.

'So,' House said, sitting down beside Wilson in the cafeteria, 'you may have been right.' When James blinked at him disbelievingly, he scowled. 'Don't let it go to your head.'

'Not much chance of that,' Wilson muttered. 'So, what was I right about?'

'Chase.'

'What did you do?' Wilson asked, eyes widening in concern.

'Now what makes you think I'm the problem?'

'What did you do?' Wilson repeated. Then, giving House a long look, 'You slept with him!'

'James, friends normally ask before blowing their friend's carefully maintained reputation for heterosexuality.'

Wilson took a quick look around the cafeteria. 'They all think you're pining after me anyway. This way they'll just think maybe it goes two ways and I'm jealous.'

'I don't pine.'

'Distraction isn't going to work, Greg.' Wilson lowered his voice. 'You slept with Chase. I specifically told you...'

'I'm pretty sure I would have remembered if the words, "Don't sleep with Chase" had ever crossed your lips.'

'I thought it was implied! He's just out of an abusive relationship, and now you're letting him plunge headlong into one with...'

'We're not in a relationship,' House interrupted.

'So you just fucked him and left.'

'Language, Jimmy,' House admonished mockingly. 'And it was my apartment, so he left. Plus, I thought me and Chase together was a "bad thing"?'

'Better than a one night stand. He likes you.'

'I know he likes me. Or do you think I'm so innocent that his putting his lips on mine would be a complete mystery to me? And, on that note, he did start it.'

'So what, you just rolled over and let it happen? You can't seriously be trying to say that you're the wronged party here. He's been pining after you since you hired him.'

'Now, Chase I can see pining. And I know.'

'And knowing this you still...' Wilson asked in disbelief

'At the time, it seemed like a good idea.'

'So did Communism!'

'Any doctrine that relies on the good nature of the majority of humanity is a bad idea from the start,' House objected.

'Whereas a plan that relied on you being able to have casual sex with one of your employees had a good chance of success?'

'It wasn't...'

'Wasn't what?'

'He was in a bar,' House explained bitterly, 'trying to pick up another... I brought him back. I needed to do something to stop him from doing it again. So you can keep your sanctimonious attitude, Jimmy - I made a decision.'

'We're back to "I don't hit him"?' Wilson asked. 'Can I remind you that you also said you weren't taking him home to ravish?'

'I didn't. I took him home, fed him, and made him get some sleep. Then he decides to test my resolve by seeing if I'd save him from abuser number two! I stopped him before that. He's safe this morning, because I slept with him last night. Fit that into the model you're happily building of me as abuser number three.'

'And that was the best way to do it?'

House sighed harshly and stared James down. His eyes dropped first, sighing. 'I said you may have been right. What more do you want?'

'What are you going to do about it?'

'I'll think about it.'

He had all day to think about it, because Chase found something to occupy himself in the lab and disappeared for hours.

When he finally found his wayward charge, it was nearly midnight. House leaned forward on his cane, peering at Chase. 'Shouldn't you be somewhere not here?'

'I'm on call in the ICU in five minutes.'

'Has there been a mass cull of intensivists, or why else are they resorting to doctors who have already worked ten hours today?'

'I volunteered.'

House restrained himself from the instinctive masochist joke, and instead asked, 'Why?'

Chase looked up to meet his eyes, and for the first time in so long, they were calm and clear. 'I don't want to go home. You were right.'

'Twas ever thus,' House answered sagely, 'What about?'

'If I go home, I might... do something I'll regret. And it isn't fair to ask you to watch me the whole time. It isn't healthy.'

'And over-working yourself is?'

'If I'm working, I'm not...'

'Thinking.'

Chase almost smiled. 'I hope I'm still thinking or I won't be much good in the ICU. But I won't be thinking about... other things. If I can get myself tired enough to sleep, then I'll be fine when I go home. It's just a stop-gap.'

'Until what?'

'Until I can be on my own without feeling wrong in my skin?'

The raw honesty surprised House. 'Newsflash, Robert. No one feels right in their own skin. That's just one of those pleasant constants of being human – the existential angst.'

'You know what I mean.'

House nodded briefly. 'Don't work too long. Real work - that is, the work you do for me – starts at nine.'

'I know. Night.'

'Goodnight, Chase.'

'Did you try drinking your way to sleep?' House asked, once again finding Chase staying late in the office.

'I don't think that'd be a good precedent to set,' Chase answered tightly.

Of course – mommy the wino. Chase was probably right. 'How do you know I meant alcohol?' House asked. 'I thought cocoa and marshmallows was your insomnia cure of choice.'

It shouldn't be so easy to charm a smile out of Chase, but still Chase graced him with that soft look that recently made him feel just a little guilty. 'I forgot.'

'You're staying here tonight?'

'Yeah.'

'Here,' House handed him a key. 'The couch in the office is more comfortable than the bed in the ICU. Just don't mess with my stuff.'

Chase smirked, 'I promise I won't touch your porn and video games.'

'See that you don't.'

'Night.'

'Goodnight, Chase.'

'We're now at the point where you actually owning a bed in your apartment is a mystery to me.'

'House...'

'It's been three weeks, Chase. Have you slept more than two hours in your own bed at any time during this period?'

'What do you suggest?'

'You could...'

'No.'

'You don't know what I was going to say.'

'You've checked which time I've signed out every day for three weeks. I know what you were going to say.'

'At least you might sleep.'

'I sleep fine here.'

'On a couch in my office.'

'Better than a couch in your apartment. Or your bed.'

That was the first time Chase had indicated that he actually remembered anything of their night together bar the argument the next morning.

'I'm not sure why you decided to rescue me,' Chase began. He frowned when House made a disbelieving noise. 'Not why you thought I needed to be rescued. Why you decided to do it yourself.'

House thought about it. Because you wouldn't do it yourself. Because you didn't ask. Because you didn't want me to. In the end, he shrugged.

Chase nodded as if he understood. 'But I know you didn't want to. You didn't want to sleep with me either. And you don't really want me to come home with you. So thanks, but I need to do it myself.'

'By never sleeping in your apartment?'

'By proving to myself that I can be on my own.'

'People generally don't cope on their own. That's why they spend so much time being... pleasant to each other for no reason. So they can make someone else stick around and convince themselves that their existence has some meaning beyond "Dad was horny and Mom was drunk".'

'I don't want to need your help. The next time you ask me home, I want it to be because you want me to be with you, not just because you're afraid of me being with someone else.'

'Chase...'

'Night.'

'Goodnight, Chase.'