Olivia Wilde

The final 10 fellowship candidates compete ferociously when House splits them into two teams by gender. They are assigned to diagnose and treat a wheelchair-bound man with muscular atrophy who is slowly suffocating. As the two teams are trying to one-up each other, complications arise when one team treats the patient but doesn’t follow through to make sure their treatment was executed. While the students are busy with their assignment, House experiments on himself to see what happens in the moments when people hover between life and death. Meanwhile, Foreman runs his own team of fellows in his new job at another hospital, and resorts to using a very "House-like" treatment to help a patient.

House has relented in regard to interviewing potential team members, but he’s doing it his own way. He has called in all 40 applicants for the open spots on his team (including guest stars Olivia Wilde, Kal Penn, Peter Jacobson, Anne Dudek and Edi Gathegi), each numbered individually by runners’ bibs, and puts them to the test in a Darwinian trial period. As he drills the fellows and arbitrarily fires some along the way, he is approached by a fighter pilot named Greta, a candidate for NASA’s astronaut training program. Greta suffers from a neurological disorder in which she is converting visual images to sound, or hearing with her eyes. Knowing that NASA would reject any possibility of her becoming an astronaut if they knew of her problem, Greta begs House to treat her in secret. Keeping her identity private, House takes the case to his fellowship candidates and pits them against one another to come up with an accurate diagnosis. Meanwhile, House is ruffled when he thinks he sees Cameron, Chase and Foreman in the hospital hallways.

When a 20-year-old funeral home cosmetician, Irene, has a massive seizure, she hallucinates that the cadavers in the funeral home have come to life, House and the remaining seven fellowship candidates must figure out the cause. Thinking something in the funeral home may have made Irene sick, House sends the candidates on some less-than-desirable investigative missions, including a visit to a graveyard. As Irene’s symptoms become more life-threatening and her ghostly visions more vivid, House surmises that connecting with Irene’s mother might be the best route to diagnosing her illness. Meanwhile, Foreman finds his "House-like" reputation has preceded him as he interviews for a new job, and House must narrow down the candidates from seven to six.

The team takes on the case of a man who collapsed while being mugged. When the man complains of new symptoms that do not fit his initial admission profile, the team suspects he is a hypochondriac. As Mr. X continues to fall ill with symptoms unrelated to his neurological disorder, Foreman and the remaining six fellows are assigned to keep watch, and are bemused as they see their own behavioral idiosyncrasies reflected through him. As they attempt to diagnose this human chameleon, they seem to learn more about themselves than their patient, whose true identity is a mystery. Meanwhile, Cameron and Chase keep a running pool on whom House might cut next from the team of candidates, and Foreman engages in a power struggle with House and Cuddy.

House encounters a magician whose heart failed while performing an underwater escape act. While the remaining fellowship candidates work to diagnose the illusionist, House is determined to prove that he’s a scam artist faking his ailments to cover up the fact that he nearly drowned during his act. During the testing, House suspects one of his own candidates may have an undisclosed illness. In the meantime, House pits his team against one another in a challenge involving Cuddy, granting the winner immunity from elimination and a chance to nominate two other candidates to be put on the chopping block.