Doctor Gregory House and other canon characters featured in this work of fiction belong to NBC/Universal and David Shore. Original characters are my creation. I make no money from writing these stories, it's done for pure enjoyment. All literary passages, quotes and song lyrics are used without permission; I do not own them or make money from using them.

This prologue was written the night after the S5 season finale, 'Both Sides Now', originally aired in 2009. It was intended to be a one-shot, but by the time it was finished, it became clear there was more story to tell. –Brighid45

May 27th

He sits by the window and watches the rain fall. It is early evening. The soft pearly light leaches away, drop by drop. There is some comfort in knowing the processes of life continue apace. There is terror in that knowledge too.

His sentinels wait in silence. They have stayed at his side through the initial evaluation, the medically induced coma (at least he presumes they were there) and consequent supervised detox, his first therapy session. They regard him with somber expressions, though Amber still has a bit of her usual cat-in-the-cream smirk. No point in telling them to go away; he might as well talk to the pain in his butchered thigh. He rubs his scar with an absent gesture and feels a familiar stab of fear at what's ahead. The doctors have his medical records, they know all the technical details of his infarction and consequent surgery. What they can't know is how endless the pain is, and how much worse it becomes without the Vicodin to mute the incessant keening. He's seen the condescending smiles, the pitying glances when he tells them a good day is a five on the zero-ten scale. They've already labeled him a drug seeker, an addict looking for any excuse to get stoned.

"Well, aren't you?" Amber asks, her tone reasonable. "Isn't that why he-" she gestures at the silent Kutner, "-and I are here?"

"Fuck off," he says, and turns his gaze to the window once more. Amber laughs but says nothing in reply. He knows she is watching him, her mouth curved in a knowing smile. Wonder if she wears the same makeup as Cuddy, he thinks, and remembers the brush of soft, full lips over his collarbone.

(She is tangled in the sheets by then, smiling up at him with a tender, wistful expression. Her hand rubs his back, a slow, comforting movement. "Let's do that again," Cuddy's phantom says. "But not right now. Right now let's just . . ." She presses a kiss to his chest, above his heart. "Let's just rest," she says against his flesh.)

The words vibrate through his frame. He pushes them away along with the false memory and stares out at the rain. If I rest, if I give in, I lose it all, he thinks, and feels the fear creep closer. Just like juggling-you hesitate, the chainsaws fall. He frowns a little; somehow that analogy sounds familiar.

"You used it during a case," Amber says. He cases his mind back, riffling through sessions like pages in a notebook, but nothing turns up.

"Uh oh." There is sly triumph in Amber's voice. "Better check out now." She leans forward. "Before they take it all away from you."

"That makes no sense," he says aloud before he can stop himself. "I'm here-"

"You're here because you think it's what you're supposed to do. You'll end up playing games with everyone until boredom sets in." Amber sits back, her eyes bright with challenge. "I give you three more days before you either walk out or find another way to escape." She snaps her fingers. The sound is loud in the quiet room, like a gunshot. "I know! Call Wilson. He'll take you home."

He watches the rain and resists the pointless urge to clamp his hands over his ears. I'm staying, he thinks, and winces at the raw desperation in that simple thought. I have to stay. What else is there?

"You've still got most of your stash at home," Amber says. She is sitting right next to him now, her lips touching his ear. "Go back to work. Get rid of the team, you don't need them. You've got me. You're world-famous. You'll never run out of patients. There'll always be someone to write a scrip for you-"

He feels a presence standing next to him. Amber stops talking, her expression sulky. He doesn't have to look to know it's Kutner. The spectre's silence is a warning, and a reminder. Pain fills his mind for a moment-endless, burning, the entirety of existence-and then he is empty again.

"Greg?" The nurse passing meds pauses in the doorway, a little paper cup in one hand, water pitcher in the other. "The doctor wants you on a sleeping pill tonight." She holds out the cup. He knows this, even though he isn't looking at her, because she visits him three times a day and follows the same procedure each time. There's a pain med in the cup too, but it isn't Vicodin and it doesn't help. Still, he takes it because anything is better than nothing, and maybe tonight he'll sleep and not wake in a pool of sweat, fighting his way out of some impenetrable maze of agony.

Eventually twilight gives way to night, and the sound of rain falling on soft grass.