Chapter 3: Orientation
The two weeks pass in a blur of medical journals and careful preparation.
I've read everything I can find on rare immune disorders. Documented my healing times in coded shorthand. Memorized the layout of Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital from online floor plans. I've even practiced answering questions about Chase's background until the lies feel like truth.
Because they have to be truth now. I'm Robert Chase. The man who died in Philadelphia doesn't exist here.
The hospital is bigger in person than it looked on TV. All glass and steel and the antiseptic smell that's universal to medical facilities. I report to the front desk at seven-thirty, exactly on time. The receptionist barely looks up as she hands me a visitor badge.
"Diagnostic Medicine. Third floor. Dr. House is expecting you."
Expecting feels like the wrong word. More like waiting to dissect.
The elevator ride up gives me time to steady my breathing. I've prepared for this. Reviewed everything I know about House—the addiction, the leg, the brilliance wrapped in cruelty. But knowing about someone and meeting them are different things.
The doors open to chaos.
The diagnostic department is open-plan—a conference room with glass walls, a couple of offices, a balcony overlooking the clinic. A nurse rushes past me carrying labs. Someone's arguing about an MRI schedule. And in the middle of it all, leaning against the conference room table, is Gregory House.
He's exactly like the show and nothing like it at all.
Taller than I expected. The limp is real—favoring the right leg, cane in his left hand. Unshaven. Eyes that miss nothing. He's studying a file when I walk in, but I know he's already catalogued everything about me.
"You're early." He doesn't look up. "Eager or anxious?"
"Punctual." I set my bag down on the nearest chair. "Seemed like a good way to start."
He finally looks at me. The assessment is immediate and brutal. I can feel him picking me apart—the way I stand, my accent, the callouses on my hands that haven't fully faded from my old life.
"Australian. Brisbane, probably, based on the vowels. Daddy issues—you've got that 'trying to prove something to a ghost' energy. Catholic upbringing, seminary dropout. Came to America to escape something. And you can't grow a proper beard, which is why you're clean-shaven."
The accuracy is startling even when I knew it was coming. But I don't flinch.
"Three out of four." I meet his eyes. "The beard's a choice."
Something shifts in his expression. Not quite a smile, but interest. Like I passed the first test without realizing there was one.
"Huh." He tosses a medical journal at me. I catch it reflexively. The cover is in Japanese. "Diagnose the case study on page forty-seven. You've got until lunch."
I flip it open. Dense medical terminology in kanji. Complex symptom presentation. Multiple organ systems involved.
Chase spoke Japanese. Missionary work in his early twenties.
"Any particular format you want for the differential?" I ask.
"Whatever works. I'll know if you're wrong." He limps toward his office. "And Chase? If you cheat and use a translation app, I'll know that too."
The door closes behind him. I'm left holding a journal I can actually read, thanks to memories that aren't quite mine.
Let's see what Chase's brain can do.
Two hours later, I'm writing the final notes when House reappears. He drops into a chair across from me without invitation, spinning his cane between his fingers.
"Done already? That's either impressive or you gave up and made something up."
I slide my notes across the table. "Differential for the case: autoimmune encephalitis, likely anti-NMDA receptor antibody type. Patient presented with psychiatric symptoms, seizures, and autonomic instability. The progression matches, and the case mentions they found an ovarian teratoma on imaging, which is the typical trigger. Treatment would be tumor removal, immunotherapy, and supportive care."
House reads through my notes. His expression gives nothing away. He flips to the journal, checks something, flips back.
"You speak Japanese."
"Mission work. I was young and looking for purpose." True enough for Chase's history. "Found medicine instead."
"And you can actually read medical terminology or did you guess based on the English cognates?"
"I can read it. Want me to translate the discussion section?"
He stares at me for a long moment. Then he stands, grabbing his cane.
"You're hired. Welcome to hell."
Dr. Lisa Cuddy finds me thirty minutes later while I'm getting my hospital credentials processed. She's professional in a charcoal suit, dark hair pulled back, and she looks exactly as exhausted as every administrator I've ever met.
"Dr. Chase. Welcome to Princeton-Plainsboro." She shakes my hand. Firm grip. Assessing. "House says you passed his test."
"He gave me a Japanese medical journal. I diagnosed the case study."
"Did you actually read it or just pretend?"
"Actually read it. I can translate if you want proof."
She almost smiles. "That won't be necessary. But I do need to warn you—House will test you until you break or quit. Most people do both."
I think about dying on a hospital floor. About waking up in a stranger's body. About two weeks of preparing for this exact moment.
"I don't break easy."
"We'll see." She hands me a folder. "Your office assignment, credentials, and schedule. First case starts tomorrow. Try to keep House from getting us sued."
She walks away before I can respond. I watch her go, then look down at the folder. Official. Real. I'm part of House's team now.
No going back.
The office space is small—one shared desk, a computer that's probably older than I am, filing cabinets that don't quite close properly. It's in a corner with a window that looks out over the parking lot. Not much, but it's mine.
I'm setting up when I feel it. The weight of attention. I turn slightly and catch House watching through the glass walls of his office. He's not trying to hide it. Just standing there, analyzing.
He knows something's off.
Not about the transmigration—that's impossible. But something about me doesn't quite fit his model. Maybe the way I didn't panic at his psychoanalysis. Maybe the Japanese journal was too easy. Maybe I'm too calm for someone starting under Gregory House.
I hold his gaze for three seconds, then turn back to my desk. Don't react. Don't give him more ammunition.
But I can still feel him watching.
The game has started, and I know the rules better than he realizes. But House is brilliant, and brilliant people see patterns. I need to be careful. Need to be competent but not impossible. Human but not weak.
Walk the line. That's all you have to do.
I boot up the computer and start reviewing patient files. Tomorrow, the real work begins.
But tonight, I'm just trying not to think about how House's gait showed pain levels at about seven out of ten, or how I noticed that without trying, or how that's not something normal doctors do.
The deduction power is waking up, and I'm not sure I can control it.
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