Disclaimer for the story: I do not own these characters.

The idea of this story came to me in a flash. I wanted to experiment with the idea of another dimension, another plane of existence, for House and Cuddy to continue to explore what has been unearthed in Season 5. This story is set at the very end of "Both Sides Now" and includes spoilers. If you think the story is worth continuing, let me know.

They drove in silence.

The sound of raindrops hitting the windshield was almost deafening.

As the rain fell harder, creating a sheet of blurriness against the glass, Cuddy switched the wiper settings and sighed. For a brief moment, she turned to look at House, whose eyes were coated with a thin film of tears. The look of devastation and horror that had overtaken his face earlier in the afternoon had changed to one of profound sadness.

Cuddy sighed and rubbed her left shoulder. The friction of her hand against the carmine fabric caused her mind to flashback to her office, where only a few hours ago House had clung on to her shoulder as he quietly said, "No, I am not okay."

Her heart felt heavy with grief.

"We're halfway there." She broke the silence. "Wilson knows some of the staff at this hospital, and he has assured me that you will be in great hands."

House did not respond.

"He will see you there tonight. I'm going to talk to the director of the facility and make sure that your detox is carefully monitored. I'm also going to see if he can send me daily progress reports, if you consent to the release of information."

House nodded slowly.

He tried to focus on the road, on Cuddy's words. But he could not ignore Amber in the backseat.

"So, your make-believe girlfriend cares about you after all. How sad is it that your story could have been true if you hadn't been a coward before," Amber said tauntingly. She leaned forward to speak more directly in his ear. "Look at her. She's missing out on the wedding to drive you to the loony bin. She definitely has the hots for you."

Amber sat back and chuckled menacingly. House squeezed his eyes shut and threw his head back against the headrest.

Cuddy turned to look at him again and put her hand on his arm. "House, what's wrong? Are you in pain? Talk to me. Maybe it will distract you …"

A pickup truck honked furiously at Cuddy as she entered the intersection. She slammed on the brakes, but it was too late. The truck collided with the backseat of her car, causing it to spin on the slick road. Before the car could come to a stop, an oncoming SUV came barreling from the opposite direction and …

"Caucasian man and Caucasian woman, status post motor vehicle accident, found unresponsive in the field." The paramedic was speaking quickly to the Princeton-Plainsboro ER team as they wheeled House and Cuddy towards the trauma bay. "The man has a heart rate of 120, GCS of 3, and multiple contusions and lacerations on his trunk. He has lost a lot of blood. The woman has a heart rate of 110, GCS of 3, and a large flank contusion as well as minor lacerations."

The attending physician nodded. "Let's get 6 units of O negative on board." His eyes quickly widened when he recognized the patients. "Jesus Christ! Linda, page Dr. Foreman and tell him that Dr. Cuddy and Dr. House are down here. Alright people, start the large-bore IV's, pump them with saline. Chris, emergent ultrasound to check for internal bleeding …"

House opened his eyes. He was sitting in a living room. Confusion swept over him as he attempted to get his bearings.

From his seat on the beige fabric couch, he could see two beige fabric sofa seats, white throw pillows, a white coffee table, and a white bookshelf decorated with white vases and other white home accents. Off to the side of the social space was a queen-sized bed, also decorated in white and neutral tones. On a wall shelf over the bed sat a vase of white roses. Soft lighting from the lamps around the room cast a golden glow across the walls and the furniture.

"Where are we?"

House turned around at the sound of Cuddy's voice.

"I don't recognize this place," she added.

"Neither do I," House replied quietly. His eyes glistened with tears as he quickly realized that he was far from reality. He looked around the entire room to see if Amber had followed him here. She was absent from the room.

Cuddy walked around the room, touching the sofa seats and running her hand along the bed. House watched her as she moved. He noticed that they both were dressed in white chenille robes.

"I think my brain is telling me that I need a vacation," House said.

"Why do you think that?"

"This isn't real. I've been hallucinating for days. I hallucinated having sex with you." House stopped and hung his head. Cuddy's face softened. "And now," he paused again, inhaling sharply, "And now, I am hallucinating that I am at a resort, wearing a robe. I've been exhausted, and this is my brain's way of telling me it needs to shut down."

"Some resort … this place doesn't have windows."

"Another sign this isn't real."

Cuddy joined House on the couch.

"The last thing I remember is driving you to the psych facility. You looked like you were in pain, and I tried talking to you. I must have run a red light … we got hit by a truck and spun out of control." Cuddy began to panic. "House, do you think we are dead?"

"If we were dead, we wouldn't be here in this room. There would be no neurons firing in my brain; therefore, I would not be dreaming this, or hallucinating this."

"I am not a figment of your imagination. I am here just as much as you are."

"Okay, if I am dreaming this, you would be untying your robe right now." House looked at Cuddy, who shot him a disapproving look.

"House, this is not a time for jokes. We don't even know if we're alive."

"I know that I'm alive, but I don't know that you are."

"Maybe we're in purgatory," she muttered.

"There is no such thing. There is no afterlife, and because there is no afterlife there is no place to cleanse the soul. When we die, we see nothing. We feel nothing."

"I know you're an atheist, House, but what if you're wrong?"

"I am never …" He paused and shut his eyes in humiliation as he thought back to his most recent cases.

Cuddy placed her hand on his back, instantly regretting her question. A tingle shot down House's spine. He inhaled deeply.

"That feels real, " he whispered.

Cuddy's hand began stroking his cheek. She ran a finger across his stubble. "So does this."

"Our lovemaking felt so real too, but it wasn't." House shook his head. "I don't know what's going on. Maybe I'm already at the facility and am under hypnosis."

House got up and walked to a wall and began hitting it. "Hey! Hey you people! Can you hear me? You can bring me out of hypnosis now! I want to come back!"

Cuddy flinched at House's yelling. "House! Stop!"

House walked back to the couch.

"You're not limping. Are you pain-free?"

House nodded and rubbed his right thigh. The scar was still there.

"You can't be real, Cuddy. This doesn't make any sense."

"I AM real. Maybe you're not real, but I know I am here in this bizarre room." She shook her head.

House looked at Cuddy and narrowed his eyes.

"This is different. Usually when I have a hallucination, Amber never denies that she isn't real. She's almost like an inner voice of reason rather than a separate entity. An evil voice, but a part of me nonetheless. You are a separate entity. I challenge your existence, yet you never concede that you're not real. You're not really inside my head."

Cuddy raised her eyebrows. "Okay … I'm glad we cleared that up," she said with a hint of sarcasm in her voice.

House looked at her in disbelief. "I'm agreeing with you, and you're not happy about it?"

Cuddy rolled her eyes. "Am I ever happy about anything you say?"

House inhaled through his teeth. "Nope. I thought you would have been happy to hear me ask you to move in with me." He spoke without any anger or resentment in his voice.

She laughed in return. This time, the laugh wasn't one out of angry shock; rather, it was gentle laugh. "Oddly enough, I think you got your wish. We are co-habitating in this room."

"Indeed we are," House said cheerily but with a hint of irreverence. A small smile formed on his lips.

A few moments of silence passed. "I actually feel like I'm fading. Take a nap with me," House said as he extended his hand to Cuddy, who squeezed it.

"I'm not tired," she responded.

House looked disappointed. He walked to the bed alone. Not seeing any books or a TV to occupy her time, Cuddy sighed and walked towards the bed. House climbed on top of it and collapsed. She followed suit.

House felt a surge of happiness when he felt her plop down next to him. He pulled her close to him and wrapped his right arm around her waist as he looked into her eyes. "I'm glad you're here with me. "

"I think you would have also enjoyed being trapped in a room with Wilson," Cuddy teased.

"Wilson isn't as easy on the eyes as you are," House said sleepily.

Cuddy smiled and watched him drift off.

"He's in bradycardia! BP is also dropping. We need atropine," Foreman shouted. Thirteen pushed atropine into House's IV.

"No response, I'll get the pacer," Taub said.

"The surgeons sutured his lacerations, and we have tanked him up with fluids and blood. His BP shouldn't be dropping," Thirteen said.

"His hypotension is from the bradycardia. I think he may have some neural damage," Foreman said as he continued to look at the monitor. "His heart rate isn't going up. Another atropine push."

"Heart rate is climbing to 55 … 60 … 63," Taub said, relieved. He shook his head. "I can't believe all of this is happening."

"At least Cuddy is hanging in there. She's been stable since the pericardiocentesis," Foreman replied, looking at an unconscious Cuddy in the neighboring ICU bed.

"Okay, House's heart rate is now stabilizing around 70. Maybe we should MRI his spine and brain if he remains stable," Thirteen offered.

Foreman nodded his head. "Let's do a stat CT for now to look for gross lesions …"

House opened his eyes to the sight of Cuddy with an amused expression on her face. She was stroking his hair.

"You didn't nap for that long."

"Were you watching me sleep the entire time?"

"There's nothing else to do around here."

"Creepy, but I like it."

Cuddy gave him a playful shove and turned on to her back. She looked up at the ceiling. House buried his face in her shoulder and inhaled her scent. Clean citrus with a hint of spice, mixed in with the natural sweetness of her own essence. He smiled at the familiarity of the scent that he had grown to love over the years.

Cuddy ran her hand along House's shoulder and down his arm. He then grabbed her waist and turned her so that she was facing him again. He looked at her longingly.

"You want to kiss me, don't you?" Cuddy asked softly.

House flinched slightly at her words, not believing he was hearing them for a second time. He rationalized that he couldn't get hurt in this room, which he was not mistaking for real life. Not knowing how things would go or if she actually wanted him, he spoke softly and hesitantly. "I always want to kiss you."

Cuddy smiled seductively. "Well, what are you waiting for?"

"After everything that has happened over the past two days, you wouldn't want to kiss me. But since we're not in reality anyway …"

"House, I believe we are in this room for a reason. We haven't been on the same page since we kissed. Then today, we had the ultimate mis-communication. I just …" Cuddy looked down at House's chest.

"You just … what?"

"I just think we're here for a reason. Maybe the car accident was meant to be."

"Nothing is meant to be. There is no order to the universe …"

"Oh don't get on your atheist soapbox again."

"Stop trying to attach meaning to this room. It's not like you're religious anyway."

"I'm not staunchly atheist either. You can't avoid attaching meaning to a bizarre experience that happens to occur right after a life-or-death event. We are in this room together, House, just the two of us. We almost died today …"

"Almost dying changes nothing."

"Why won't you admit this means something?"

House looked into Cuddy's eyes, which were filled with frustration. "I don't know."

Cuddy sighed and sat up. She rubbed her arms and looked at the wall. House sat up too. He deliberated with himself on what he would say next. Shifting awkwardly, he felt a surge of impatience and desire. He decided to break the silence.

"Cuddy."

"What."

House took her head in his hands and planted a soft kiss on her lips. He let his mouth hover near hers as he waited for her cue.

She brought her hands to his face and held it for a few seconds. She then began kissing him passionately, forcing his lips open so that her tongue could slip in. House growled at her passion and pushed her down on to the bed. He climbed on top of her and continued to have his tongue duel with hers. She untied his robe and slid it off of his body. He returned the favor. He broke their kiss and began leaving a trail of butterfly kisses from her neck down to her belly, causing her to giggle softly. He then brought his mouth to her right nipple and began licking and sucking on it.

"Okay … so ten minutes ago his heart rate was slow. Now his heart rate is going up. It's 102 right now," Taub said, slightly confused.

"Maybe we pushed too much atropine," Thirteen said.

"Look, Cuddy's heart rate is going up too. It's at 105," Foreman remarked. "BP is normal and stable for both of them, so they're not losing more blood. What is going on?"

"I don't know. We never understood these two," Taub joked.