"What do you want to happen, West, you know, when you die?" Daniel had asked him at the beginning of all this, two years ago, after the first few incidents. "What do you want?"
Daniel admits he doesn't have the best memory, he thanks whatever God there may be for Cell Phone Alerts or else he'd never remember what days he's reserved for Meg. Somehow though he has some sort of encyclopedic memory when it came to medicine. However, not the best memory in general, but he can distinctly remember that night, he asked Herbert West what he wanted to happen when he died. He was sitting on the stairs that led into the basement, also known as the Lab, also known as West's room. He didn't like going directly down there any more at the time, especially then when West had somehow obtained two John Does, and Daniel wasn't about to ask where he got them. Stuff happened like that, bodies would just somehow appear down there. Up on the stairs Daniel could see over West's shoulder to see he was sewing an arm and leg together in some kind of twisted God-like humor. It was so long ago, but he remembers it so clearly.
Back then it didn't seem like this would happen. It's hard for kids like them, young as they are at the ripe ages of early twenties, it's hard to understand death, even if Daniel was a doctor and he saw it everyday, somehow it was beyond him still. He could hold the hand of a patient and feel their last heart beat but he still could not get a grasp of it all, this death, this inevitable and terrible thing. Even after all Daniel had seen up to that point, surviving two of West's experiments gone out of control. After nearly dying himself, and bring bodies back from death, he still could not get it. Daniel feared however, that Herbert West understood it perfect and better than anyone else in the world. Still, this didn't feel real. He didn't think it would really happen. Even as he had nightmares about it, he didn't think it would come to this. He didn't think he was really going to die from all this.
But he played with the idea.
"This does not apply to me." West replied that night, without even looking at him. "I am never going to die."
That night, Daniel laughed at him.
"But, West…face it, you don't live the safest of lifestyles…" Daniel told him.
Daniel never thought this would happen to him. He didn't think that this night would be the night he'd have to kick the jaw off a Re-animated corpse bent on his destruction. He didn't think the upper body of a Re-animated woman would be holding down his arm to the wall, or that her lower half would be wrapping it's legs around his waist. He didn't think he'd be screaming at bodies that could barely function, but somehow seemed to want him dead.
He didn't know West had made this many, enough to fill up a whole cemetery tunnel. He didn't know West worked that fast. He didn't know West had made so much formula. He didn't know where on Earth West could have gotten these many bodies. It was that thought that made him tremble the most, what on Earth could he had done to get these many?
A corpse that was two halves of two people sewn together grabbed him, and he could see West even in the dark fighting his way through his own creations. West was such a strange boy. He was short and weakly looking, pale from lack of exposure to the sun, and yet in times like these he could get through a whole army of bodies that could not process pain. Daniel watched as West jumped off the shoulders of a body and onto the nearby ground, running towards Daniel. Daniel smiled, maybe this was the night they were going to live, maybe he could get out of this alive and drive his way to Meg and hold her for the rest of the night and promise her, never again. Maybe this would be the last straw, maybe this would make West stop. Daniel again trembled at the thought of what made West do all this, what made him never stop? This thought did not matter at the moment however, since he was already making a plan of how to escape once West got over to him.
But then West fell over, and for the first time, he screamed.
He really did scream. In all those years, he had never screamed. Not from surprise, not from fear, he never screamed. He was not afraid of these creations, no matter how dangerous they were, he saw himself as their God and creator, and Gods do not fear their creations. Gods never die. Herbert West was never afraid, ever. But Daniel heard him, and for a moment he was not sure that was even West's scream, he thought perhaps it was a corpse. But he saw West's mouth open in agony and watched as he writhed on the cold ground. A woman had grabbed his leg, and bitten deep into it.
"…you don't live the safest of lifestyles." Daniel had said all those years ago. "If something were to happen…"
"Nothing will happen." West had told him that night.
"But if something did."
Herbert West never acknowledged his own death. Daniel found that West really did think he was never going to die. That he was going to perfect this serum, and he was going to become immortal, eternal. Daniel would admit he didn't know what to think, to believe West was going to do it, or fail. He felt that he should give West at least a chance, he did not stay optimistic about it, he simply allowed West the space and occasional aid to try. It was worth it, Daniel thought. All this dying, the smell of death, all those flies in the house, and all that grave robbing they had done, even if West failed, it would be worth it. The work would survive him, someday it would be perfected, it would all be worth it.
Daniel had chosen to ignore West's increasingly sick humor in his own creations, or how he had stopped coming to most of his classes, or his rounds, or how he had stopped coming up for food, or bathing, or really anything. He thought that sooner or later West would succeed or fail, and West would come out of that basement and smile, and ask for some pizza.
West never ate pizza.
"If something did happen." Daniel had asked that night.
"But nothing will, I have this under control."
"Well if I happen to die, don't you dare touch my corpse. I want to be burnt just so you're not even tempted. Give the ashes to Meg."
West had shuddered every time he spoke Meg's name, that woman, that annoyance, though West found every woman an annoyance, every distraction to be exiled from his life. West only wanted to work. West only wanted to find the dead, cut them up, bring them back, and kill them again. He had stopped coming up from the basement for dinner. Daniel would leave a plate by the door, but it was never anything good, West was the cook in that house. Daniel had ignored West becoming increasingly distant, he thought it would go away, he thought it'd just be a phase, that perhaps he was gone because he was no the verge of a break through. Daniel ignored how sick West looked the once in a while he got to see him, how pale, how thin, how weak, how inhuman. West even stopped washing the blood off his hands for a time there, saying he wanted to see the blood, he wanted it to remind him that he had still failed, that there was still work to return to.
Daniel ignored how West would drag himself down those stairs.
Daniel ignored the screams of the dead coming back.
He just waited.
And now years later, Daniel watched as Herbert West began to die. West kicked the woman that was chewing at his leg, and began to rise. He got on his feet, took a step, and fell over pathetically, not realizing how injured he was. He screamed as he hit the floor, and grabbed his leg. He grind his teeth in pain and looked up at Daniel, before another creation jumped on him, grabbing him by the shoulders and pinning him down. Herbert West screamed for the second time in his life, and fear showed through his eyes as he looked to Daniel.
Daniel didn't know what to do. He pulled back his arm from the top-half woman and kicked away her bottom half, he jumped up to get loose of any others attempting to grab at him. Herbert West had blood coughed up from his insides. He spat into the creation that was currently screaming in his face, and got loose an arm and began searching for a gun.
"Give the ashes to Meg." Daniel told him long ago, and West shuddered at her name. "Just humor me, West, what if you did die?"
West was silent for a moment that night, considering.
"You don't want to become a mindless zombie do you? Like these guys?" Daniel asked.
"They're not mindless zombies! They're progress!" West snapped at him that night.
West pulled out a gun from his lab coat, and shot the one on top of him in the head. The body rose up with the remnants of a skull and began flaying its arms around and running in circles like the chickens do. It was scary how long it kept at this, before it finally fell over and stopped. Herbert West attempted to rise shooting one of his creations that were at his legs again.
Daniel never thought this was going to happen. That he wasn't going to die like this. He was going to become a doctor, he was going to save lives. He was going to be the friend of the man who destroyed death, Herbert West, he was going to stand with him as they revealed what they had done, of course not including some of the minor details. He was going to marry Meg, and they were going to have children, and they were going to be happy, and he was going to be the dad he never had. That was going to be his life, not this. Not dying by the hands of dead people. This wasn't supposed to happen, West wasn't going to let this happen.
He never understood West. He never could comprehend what would make someone do all this. What would make someone go and dig up graves, sew them together, and bring them back. He wondered if West had lost someone close to him, or if he simply came close to death and feared it. He had once asked, but West yelled at him, and made him promise to never bring up the subject again. He called West Dr. Frankenstein from then on, but West did not understand the sick joke, since West had denied himself everything that made him human. West did not indulge himself in any way. He did not watch television, he did not see movies, he did not read books, or eat anything that was not unhealthy. He did not even look at art, or pictures of the world. He denied himself these things, explaining that all that he had not seen was a reward he would give himself upon succeeding. This scared Daniel sometimes, and he'd try to explain what Star Wars or Spider-man were, but West would stop him.
This was the most human Daniel had ever seen West. Lying there among the dead, screaming, fear in those cold and numb eyes for once. Fear he had had so many times, finally in the eyes of West. There was panic coming then, the coming realization of how grim the situation was on West's face. It was like he knew there was a way to get out of this, he just could think of it yet. It was there, but out of his reach. He could live, he knew he could. He just had to think of it.
Daniel was pushed back to the wall by a woman made up of three other women. The panic matched in his eyes as West looked over him. West began to have tears fill up his eyes, and Daniel knew they were going to die. But West pointed the gun at Daniel, and Daniel could swear he heard West say "I'm sorry."
"They're progress!" West told him so long ago.
"All right, they're progress!" Daniel said. "But what, what would you like?" Daniel persisted that night.
And West looked at him, and thought.
"Bring me back, Daniel." He told him, that night, with all the seriousness of the world in his face. "Don't let me stay dead."
Herbert pointed the gun at Daniel, and he fired, killing the woman that held him down. West then turned back to the creatures that were on top of him, and fired again, making enough of them get away so that he could stand. But another came at him, and he punched it in the face. Daniel ran towards him, but West stopped him.
"RUN!" West yelled at him.
Daniel stopped, and West had to shoot an approaching body that was coming at him from behind.
"RUN DAMN IT!" West told him.
Daniel still did not move.
"RUN OR I'LL SHOOT YOU!" West pointed the gun at him.
And Daniel knew, because West was just so stubborn, he would have done it. Daniel turned to the light at the end of this cemetery tunnel, and ran for it. He passed some bodies that saw that as soon as he was out of reach, they lost interest in him, all of them turning to West, the creator, the tormentor, the uncaring God.
The cave walls began to shake, and Daniel knew this was all going to fall over. He stood at the open entrance to the cave and looked down, preparing to see West run over and join him just in time. So that they could laugh and drive to Megs where it was safe, and never speak of this again, and never even try again, hand whatever research they had left over to higher powers.
That this would all be over.
And Daniel waited, feeling the ground shake, waiting for Herbert West, the man who could not die.
"Don't let me stay dead." Herbert West had told him that night.
"But, West…"
"You bring me back, Daniel, don't you dare let me be dead!"
And Daniel stood there, and waited, not even paying attention to the cuts and bites, and bruises all over him, the smell of death that had smeared onto his remaining clothes. He panted and waited, not even doubting for a moment the next few seconds he was going to West.
He watched and he heard gunfire, primitive roars, and West's new formed screaming, and finally the ground began to shake, and it began to cave in. But Daniel still waited.
The ends of the cave went down, and soon Daniel saw West limping as fast as he could up to the stairs, blood squirting out of his bite wound whenever he put weight on that leg. He had pain and exhaustion on his face, his glasses were gone, the tears had mixed with blood and sweat, but he was coming. He was up the stairs and but a few feet from the surface.
Then the hole was gone, and the ground had collapsed over him.
Daniel stood, unbelieving.
Then he screamed and went to his knees, digging into the ground with his bare hands.
"WEST!" Daniel screamed into the soft dirt. "Oh, God, WEST!"
He dug up a limp hand, and then soon a face and body that had flattened horizontally from the crashing weight. West looked peaceful for the first time, as if in the best sleep of his life. He was limp, and Daniel found no heart beat. He breathed into his lungs, but to no avail. Herbert West was dead.
"Don't you dare let me be dead!" Herbert West had told him.
And Daniel sat over the body of his friend, and saw something glowing beneath Herbert's collar. He dug and saw that West had kept a syringe full of his glowing green serum as a necklace. Daniel knew it was just a precaution, Herbert was obsessive like that. And he took a moment to look at the dead body of Herbert West, and questioned whether he should do it. Herbert's theories that maybe if he just got a fresh body, one just moments after death it'd be okay, it'd be perfect, but they found minutes were too long, but here, here West had just died for a second.
He reached into West's clothes and grabbed the gun just in case.
Then he lifted West's head and stabbed the syringe into the brain stem like West had taught him all those years ago.
Daniel stood, and backed away, and pointed the gun just in case. Ready to shoot and run, and drive to Meg, and hold her, and promise her never again, and ask her to marry him, and to get married, have kids, become a doctor, and be happy, and occasionally visit the grave of the late Herbert West.
"Herbert…?" Daniel asked.
The body remained motionless for a moment, longer than anything Daniel had witnessed, then again he hadn't witness this for a while now. He stood, almost sure the serum didn't work in the least at that point, perhaps a new formula was made and never tested.
But then the eyes opened, and a small breath entered those lungs.
Herbert West looked up at Daniel and squinted, needing glasses.
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Next Chapter coming soon, depending on reception.
The story has only begun, for now West shall see why his serum only worked on him, and shall return to his roots to meet a father and perhaps a form of a mother, and Daniel and Meg shall be tested. The line of life and death will further blur, and what will be put to question is what is human, what makes one human, and can something inhuman be more human than a human?