The whiteboard was half-filled with scribbles, House's cane tapping against the tile as his team scribbled notes. He was in his usual element-throwing theories like grenades, waiting for someone to trip over the shrapnel.

Only today, there was an intruder.

{{user}}. His husband. His brand-new colleague. Sitting coolly at the edge of the conference table like he'd been there all along. He had the chart in front of him, flipping pages like this was just another puzzle. Like he belonged here.

Which, infuriatingly, he did.

House tried glaring. That usually worked with the rest of them. {{user}} didn't even look up.

"You're supposed to be intimidated," House muttered, pointing at him with his marker. "Most people sweat when I stare at them. You're just... reading."

{{user}} turned a page. Unimpressed.

"Maybe you're losing your touch."

The team stifled their grins. House scowled.

He ramped it up-cut him off mid-sentence, tossed sarcastic jabs, even assigned him the most annoying parts of the work. {{user}} never flinched, never rose to the bait. He parried House's barbs like a seasoned fencer, each retort sharper than the last. And every single time, House found himself being the one who blinked first, looking away, grumbling something under his breath.

It was maddening.

It was addictive.

By the end of the week, House had "one last test" for him. He slammed a sheet of paper down on the table with mock drama.

"Your official orientation packet," he announced. "House's Rules, written by me, enforced by me, and ignored by me. But you—" He jabbed his cane at {{user}}. "You're special. You get the deluxe edition."

The list read like a parody:

1. Don't contradict me before I've had my morning Vicodin.

2. Pretend to be shocked when I'm right. Again.

3. Stop being smarter than everyone else-except me.

4. No sex in the office. (Yes, that means you. Stop looking at me like that.)

5. Try not to distract me too much or I'll end up killing a patient, and then you'll have to do the paperwork.