A/N: Thanks for all the response to chapter 1. Looking back at it, I'm a little surprised that I made Chase that nice. I must have been in a charitable mood. Here's part two...enjoy and give me some feedback!

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It had been a week. A week since all three of House's fellows had walked through the doors, never to return again. Foreman's stuff was first to disappear from the conference room, as he had already gotten most of it moved. He came in one last time to pick up the last few medical journals and to make sure everything was in order. Chase's stuff went next, as he spent a day in the diagnostics room organizing and packing all of it up. House avoided his office that day, not wanting to be attacked by a still-angry Chase. When the week was up, only Cameron's belongings remained. It was finally Friday, and the end of one of the longest weeks House could remember. He hadn't had any patients or even done any clinic duty, but it somehow seemed like the hours had become years. As much as he hated to admit it, he hated the fact that his fellows were gone.

He'd never admit it to them, or even Wilson, but for the past week, he'd been plagued with memories of the four of them sitting in the diagnostics room together, discussing a case. Cameron would be fiddling with her pencil or making his coffee while Chase sat at the table, deep in thought over the latest crossword puzzle. Foreman would sit straight up in his chair and focus alternately on the whiteboard and on House, throwing out suggestions like he had something to prove. They all did that, House realized. Because they all did have something to prove. That's why he'd hired them. His own handpicked team, the best one he'd ever had, was gone.

All this explained why House was still at the hospital many hours after everyone else had gone home (excepting, of course, those lucky few who had to stay the night). The diagnostics head once again sat in his darkened office with only the glow of his iPod screen for a flashlight. He glared out the window at the rain that fell all around, the biggest downpour the area had seen in years. As much as he tried to ignore it, his gaze kept wandering back to the glass wall that separated his office from the conference room. It wasn't quite empty, since all of Cameron's stuff was still there, but it was definitely a change. Not quite sure what he was doing, House pulled himself out of his semi-comfortable office chain and limped towards the door that connected the two rooms.

He slipped into the conference room, a mere shadow to any passers-by. He walked to the whiteboard, which still bore the symptoms of the Cuban refugee he had treated two weeks ago. His gaze went to the sink, where his red coffee cup sat, still waiting for Cameron to wash it out. That wasn't going to happen. House realized. As he looked around the room at all her belongings, a fresh wave of grief hit him. He saw the sweater that she'd always kept in the conference room for times when she'd stay late and the heat would be out. It had made her look like a small child trying on her father's clothes, but she'd claimed it was warm. He saw her laptop charger, still blinking green. His gaze flew to the stack of files she'd left on the conference room table, her glasses on top of the pile. She'd be needing them. He decided, pocketing them.

This room held so much of her, so many memories, so many shared glances. So many things left unsaid. It was all wrong. They shouldn't be gone. He shouldn't be lost in his own department. But he was, and they were, and at the moment, it was too much to handle. He crossed to the window and opened it, sighing as the sound of the rain filled the room, almost a tribute to the three fellows. As long as they were gone, House decided, the window was going to be open. He wanted to hear the rain.

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James Wilson looked up in surprise as his boss, the infamous Lisa Cuddy towered over his desk. He had been catching up on a little bit of his charting and a lot of House's when Cuddy had barged in, a whirlwind inside the storm.

"Dr. Cuddy?" He acknowledged.

"What the hell is wrong with House?!" She demanded, pacing back and forth in front of his desk. Wilson set down the pen and settled in. This was going to be a long one. "He fires Chase, pisses off Foreman enough to make him resign, and Cameron...well he's always been an idiot about Cameron." Wilson just waited, and Cuddy cooled off a bit. "How's he doing, anyway. I mean, he did just loose his entire department."

"He's in a mood, all right. I don't think I've ever seen him this bad, even after his infarction. He sits in his office all day with his iPod on, blasting his ears out. And he's got the windows in the conference room wide open. I went in the other day and tried to close one because it was raining in, and he nearly bit my arm off."

"Hmm." Cuddy wondered.

"It's my fault." Wilson stared down at his desk and felt rather than saw Cuddy's gaze shift to him.

"Precisely how is it your fault?"

"I told him to lay off on Foreman, to let him go. I told him he's a creature of habit, that he's afraid of change. I made a crack about this guitar that he's had since 8th grade. That's when he fired Chase. I can only assume Cameron quit because of that too."

"I don't blame you for saying it. God knows we all lose it with House once in a while. You of all people should know, though, that House isn't just going to let it go."

"I know." Wilson sighed. "He wants them back. I can see it. Sometimes, I watch him when he doesn't know I'm there. He's always staring into the conference room, almost as if he thinks they're all playing some kind of trick on him and they're going to jump out from under the table and yell 'surprise!'. He hasn't moved a thing in there. Even his favorite coffee cup is still sitting in the sink where Cameron left it. He's been using mine! He really wants them back. He many even need them."

"I see." Was all Cuddy said before she left the room.

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"House?" Cuddy's voice pierced the gloom of House's office. He looked up from his iPod and she could see the red in his eyes from the drugs and the insomnia. He was getting very thin too. He just looked at her, waiting for her to say her bit, not even feeling the need to comment on her ultra-low top. He looked tired. Broken, almost. She bit her lip. This was going to be tough.

"You need to hire some new fellows." Cuddy finally began. House stopped her with a glare.

"No."

"I know you miss your old fellows, House. I know this is hard for you, but this department is too valuable to this hospital for me to let it just fall apart."

"I told you." House began again. "No."

"And why, pray tell, not?"

"Because you're wrong. Without them, this department is nothing. It's just an old man with a cane and a drug addiction. There's no way I can ever find someone with the versatility of Chase, or the ego to believe in their diagnosis like Foreman. No one's gonna have the insane moral compass that Cameron had." And I'm never going to be able to train a new team. The voice in his head told him. I'm not going to be able to teach them to break into people's houses to search for answers, to burn into their brains the fact that everybody lies. Because everytime I do, I'll think of what I gave up by trying not to care.

"So you're telling me you drove away your old department, but you're not going to hire anyone new?"

"Sounds about right." House replied, snarking a little, though his tone clearly showed that his heart wasn't in it. Cuddy thought for a long minute before speaking.

"What if I give you one more chance? Track down Cameron, Chase, and Foreman. Get them to come back. They can all have pay raises and more vacation time. I'll give you a month to convince them, and if they don't come back, you will hire new people." House didn't say anything, but the look in his eyes as she walked out the door was all she needed to know that he was grateful.