Stein stared at the ceiling as he leaned back in his chair, head lolling backwards over the back of the chair. He rotated ever so slowly on the chair, which was obviously well greased considering how long his inertia was lasting. As he watched the ceiling revolve around the useless bulb that hung in the lampshade and the trail of smoke coming from his cigarette, Stein thought.

He had almost lost it with his first patient here. He couldn't be doing things like that, not if he wanted to keep his cover. Even the man was on the path of the demon. He was in a secure asylum, it's not like it was in any danger of getting worse. Concentrate on the killer that was still at large.

Mechanical clicking filled the room as he turned his screw, smoke drifting lazily from his slack mouth. Just breath. Breath out the madness and restore order.
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"Dr. Stein?" asked the nurse, knocking on his door. The rotations stopped, both of his chair and his screw, his arms falling slack. His head lolled over towards the doorway. The nurse peering in continued. "Your next patient will be in shortly. And could you please put that out?"

She frowned disapprovingly at the cigarette in his mouth, though putting it now wouldn't help the cloud of smoke around the ceiling and the smell of tobacco that now permeated the air. Still, the Stein obliged, sitting up and snuffing it out in the ashtray on his desk. Satisfied, the woman left to bring his patient in. While she did so, Stein looked over the next file.

"Frank, huh?" he murmured distantly, reading without taking the words in. Maybe this one wouldn't care if he smoked.

The patients in this facility could sure pull the unexpected on you, that was for sure. Lunch had been a welcome break after his conversation with João's darker half. He knew there were far worse patients, and that's partially what made the break necessary. He'd only be able to handle so many of these cases back to back.

Mohinder slouched just a little in his seat as he looked over the files before him. There were two patients coming by this shift - both older than the ones he'd had so far. He wondered how much bearing that would have on how soon they were likely to get better. They were sure to be more stubborn at least. Neither of them were new patients, just reassigned.

He watched the door, trying not to look anxious.

Things really could have gone worse with Lance. They could have gone a whole lot better, but at least it hadn't devolved into a staring contest and at least there hadn't been any throwing of heavy objects. Wilson counted those as pluses, since he really wasn't cut out for this. Maybe if he'd been trained to do this sort of thing, but all he was working off of was his own intuition and his desire to help people.

A lot of the patients didn't really come off as needy and desperate, though. Instead, they were confident and challenged him at every turn. It wasn't what he'd expect from people who were so ill, but maybe they were just that set in their delusions. What he really couldn't understand was how Lance had been doing so much better the day before, only to revert back overnight. The man had called it reprogramming, and it almost felt that way. Still, as weird as it was, people weren't robots.

Wilson knew he was expected to go and eat with the other doctors during their lunch break, but with House not around he wasn't feeling up to it. With his own lunch already made and brought with him, it was simple to just stay in his office and eat alone. Probably not the healthiest behavior, but it wasn't like he hadn't done it at Princeton too. Usually when he was avoiding House, but the point still stood.

With lunch eaten and his desk cleaned up, the doctor waited for his next batch of patients; one old and one new. He had been seeing Max for a while now (by Landel's standards, anyway), and it was good to have such a consistent patient when others got switched in and out like it was nothing.