Now comes more problems, the title (also from that particular scene in the movie) giving pretty much what'll happen. Things are getting hot here, ladies and gents. ;D The thing is, though, will Meg tell Herbert about her pregnancy soon before things get harder than they are now?

Chapter Fifteen

The Bad Lieutenant

She wasn't coming back down for the rest of the night, and Herbert knew it. Angrily, he threw down his pen and glared up at the ceiling, where he knew she and her friend were busy doing whatever it was girls would do when it was just them; probably indulging in Francesca's "special red sauce" as she was also known to do while they were in Peru.

He didn't want to be anywhere near the cool Italian, so he remained in the basement, sticking to what he did best when Meg wasn't helping him. Putting his glasses back into place after checking a tissue sample – out of habit instead of something serious – under the microscope, he drew back the sheet which had been covering what used to be a woman's lower leg; the toenails were painted a shade of red the color of blood. The part ending where the knee began exposed muscles for him to take the beaker of re-agent and dab a small amount there. He smiled excitedly, almost laughing, when the toes wiggled and the leg trembled slightly. Oh, you wanna play footsie now, eh? he thought as he reached over and tickled the whole foot, moving from the toes to the underside.

He cast another scowl above. Oh, Meg. He wondered when she would finish getting Francesca settled in so they could get back to work. It didn't surprise him that she brought her mangy dog; that beast was bound to catch the smell of rotting flesh because all animals detected all sorts of aromas. Hoping to try and not think of that too hard, Herbert pulled back the other half of the same sheet which had covered a very hairy man's hand, not even attractive in appearance and resembling an inhuman monster's. He then picked up a slim metal rod and jammed it into the bone, connecting it to the calf and pouring the rest of the re-agent into the still-exposed muscle between the knee and elbow, now joined as one.

Herbert should have known better than to become distracted as his mind once again wandered to Meg, because the foot of his creation jerked upward and kicked him in the jaw, sending him to the floor and wrestling with him. The hand grabbed his throat in an attempt to strangle the life out of him, but he grabbed a hold of it and managed to stuff it into the trash bin, securing the red bag and grabbing it out to be cast behind the wall to join the others. Another reject...another error.

~o~

Francesca furiously stirred her special red sauce while Meg sat at the table, still staring at the dreaded test which still showed the horrid plus. Éclair was looking at it from where he was lying curled on top of the table, leaning his head over slightly to give it a curious little sniff from a distance. "I always knew it was the two of you." She turned around all the way with her arms wrapped around herself, the look of a lost mother on her face. Now Meg lost it herself, letting the bottled flood escape her eyes.

"I can't be pregnant now," she choked. "Not with how things are now, and what we're doing together. And Herbert..." She stifled herself in time to rub her temples in a vain attempt to fend off the migraine. "...I'm afraid he won't want the child." She could already see Herbert no better than she once she told him she was pregnant with his child; their man was yet to be finished, and death had yet to be fully conquered.

Francesca's face softened more. "Sweetie, you know you have to tell him eventually." Meg felt her hand on her back and lifted her head back to look her in the eyes.

"He's all I have left. I lost my father and another man I loved a little over a year ago. Herbert...helped me get through it." And there's Daniel in the hospital. "Everything's been so hard." Meg felt her throat constrict as more cries threatened to escape her. Her mind and heart – and whole body – were in so much turmoil she wanted to die right there at the table and not have Herbert bring her back.

She looked up when Francesca spoke again, seeing her nod of understanding. "I won't judge. I'm not exactly fond of West, but this is your choice, and I'm here for you."

Meg leaned her head against Francesca's shoulder. It felt wonderful to have a friend in need, but at the same time, the fear of discovery was too great, and the results would be beyond tragic as much as the loss of a loved one. As much as having to tell Herbert about this. All of this in front of her, all of this too much for her. They had a rogue police lieutenant who knew that the case of the Miskatonic Massacre wasn't closed, after all, the construction of a new Dan Cain proving to be too distressing and yet exhilarating at the same time – she could see Dan coming back into their lives if not in the same exterior form – and now Meg had just found out she was carrying a new life, placed in by the man she hated in the beginning but grew to accept as a companion. Sexual and scientific in the same sentence.

"I'll tell him soon, but I'm not ready yet," Meg moaned in the crook of Francesca's neck, inhaling the Italian garden scent of her, of pear, tangerine, and bergamot. "We have work to finish first."

The other woman's arms enveloped her tighter. "Just don't let it be too late."

~o~

Herbert decided there was nothing else to do for the night and closed the lab behind him, forgetting to lock the door for the time being. He knew enough time passed enough for him to want to spend some time with Meg, deciding he needed some help to relieve the stress he was positive he had. Intercourse was also known as a stress reliever, and a few times he was so rigid and out of ideas Meg "inspired" him in the bed. He didn't care that Francesca was in the house; Meg's door and his had no locks, but the Italian should know better to knock before coming in.

He knocked on the door twice, and there was a muffled response. Opening the door, he saw Meg at her dresser, wearing her robe and pinning her hair up...right after slipping off something from her left hand. Herbert frowned out of curiosity when he saw the faint twinkle; was that what he thought it was...?

Meg caught his gaze. "This was my mother's," she explained, holding it out for him to see. "After she died and I got into college, Daddy gave it to me, said she wanted me to have it one day when my time came. I wanted Dan to be the one to put it on, before..." She trailed off right there, turning her head away to look back at her reflection in the mirror.

The engagement ring was an impressive frame around three blinding gems. Herbert silently praised it, imagining how it would look on her – he took her hand into his, the ring now in his hand, and slipped it on that finger.

Everything changed.

The diamonds lay flush against the pillar of her ring finger, glittering like stars. Staring at it in amazement, Herbert felt like he was in a daze. Gazing first at the ring on her dainty hand, then at her face – shell-shocked in so many ways, her jaw slackened as she copied looking down and then back up to him – he couldn't read her emotions beside what was displayed, but he knew what his heart was telling him that he should have known all along.

I want to marry her. I want her to be mine.

But I still can't tell her I love her.

"It's beautiful on you," he whispered, still holding her hand. "I know...Dan would have said the same." He hesitated to say his name.

Meg nodded blankly as though her mind had wandered and she only half-heard him. Then she pulled her hand away, removing the jewel and placing it in the keepsake box to her right. "He saw this and did say the same. We were going to wait until after graduation." She was looking at her reflection again. "And Daddy would have walked me down the aisle. It was all supposed to be a big wedding all brides dreamed of...now I don't see myself getting that."

Weddings were never on his agenda either, nor did he care to acknowledge the importance of them, so he did not know how to respond, but Herbert could see that it was what Meg wanted and was missing out on. What he was doing with re-animation was more important than anything else in the world...but so was keeping her happy. He wanted badly to make sure that was his top priority, but there was still so much work to do. There were lives to save, and she knew that as well. But if she wanted to get married, how could he tell her how important she was to him without her laughing in his face?

"Would you like me to make you feel better?" he asked softly, pushing the right shoulder of her robe off to bare her shoulder and kiss it tenderly. She shivered at his touch.

"Please. I've had so much on my mind today."

Clothes strewn to the floor, her legs spread on either side for him to enter and make tender, passionate love to her without any interruptions. Climaxing in heated bliss at the end, Herbert was tempted to fall asleep with her right now, but then he remembered that he forgot to lock the lab up in case Francesca's mutt went sniffing around. He couldn't take any chances, so he redressed back into his clothes san tie, and began to leave the room. "Are you coming back?" Meg called after him.

"Yes," he answered. "I need to lock up first."

The house was dark and quiet by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs, which was exactly how Herbert preferred things to be. Peaceful and quiet, but by day, the sounds of Meg bustling around to make sure the house and cooking were taken care of made it even more pleasant. However, there were times that she would ask him to be the one to retrieve the groceries himself, even when it chagrined him. But turns had to be taken between housemates.

He stopped just when he was about to take another step for the door that led down to the basement. A warning tremor coursed through his heart when he realized it like a cat picking up its senses:

Someone's here.

Meg was back upstairs in her room, waiting for him to come back to bed. Éclair the cat was elsewhere, sleeping in his own private space and far away from Francesca's mongrel. From the corner of his eye, Herbert saw the outline of a figure he had been trying so hard to keep off his and Meg's tail. "What are you doing here?" he demanded.

Lt. Leslie Chapham stepped out of the shadows with a malicious smirk on his paunchy features, which soon dissolved into a scowl when Herbert repeated the question. "The body you took from the crematorium today."

Herbert kept his face firm and determined to be intimidating at its best, but his insides were running cold. He saw us. Well, he's gone too far this time. "Get out," he ordered, gesturing for the front door. "Right now."

Chapham pursed his lips as he struggled to keep in his laughter at the failed attempt. Then he began to move for the door labeled Embalming Room, which was where his lab was located. "What's down here?" Herbert quickly jumped in front of him, trying one last time to block the fat bastard out.

"None of your business," he growled through his teeth.

What he hadn't expected next was suddenly being grabbed by the shirt collar and roughly dragged through the door and down the stairs by the man he began to despise with all his being, almost as much as Hill. His legs dragged after him, numbness and flaring pain shooting through every system; Herbert soon found himself lifted back up and shoved up against the nearest brick wall…right next to the door to the lab. Herbert struggled against Chapham's brutal hold. He wondered how the police force ever allowed someone like him on their team. "You're making a big mistake," he ground out.

"Do you really believe…" He leaned in so close Herbert could smell his bad breath, making him want to retch. "…that dead is dead, Dr. West?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"I am talking about my wife." He found himself smashed up further into the wall, producing a migraine in his skull that he tried to ignore, but found his senses in a daze. Once Chapham was sure he had him loose and unable to try to prevent him from moving any further, he let Herbert slump to the floor and let himself into the room. Where everything depended on…

Rubbing his head and collecting himself within moments, Herbert gathered himself up and hurried into the lab, where his precious work was laid out for the bad lieutenant to see. The smoke from various tubes and dried ice preserving certain body parts made it all look like it was out of an old horror classic to the rogue cop…but the main "disturbance" to him was the carefully, LOVINGLY constructed collection of parts that would soon be a whole man.

Chapham lifted a section of gauze covering the structure out of habit. He looked up at Herbert, bloodthirsty murder written all over his unflattering features. "You…BUTCHER," he spat out, contemptuously and venomously. Ready to kill him right here on the spot.

"How dare you judge my work!" Herbert snapped, clenching his hands into fists.

"'Work'?" The lieutenant's face contorted into a mask a thousand times worse than mere rage. Words did it no justice. "Was my wife…your WORK?!" He advanced on Herbert then, shoving a curtain and a table of medical instruments out of his way, cornering Herbert until he backed into a collection of pipes.

He was in trouble, and he knew it. This was like back when Hill broke into Dan's basement and tried to blackmail him in order to steal the work before Herbert did his thing with the shovel, but now he needed something to defend himself; he wasn't intending to resort to direct murder, but enough to detain this…wife-beater long enough to protect himself, Meg, and their man on the table. "Don't lay your guilt on me, Lieutenant!" he said, stopping him altogether.

"What?"

"Your wife died of multiple contusions to the head." He inwardly beamed triumphantly when he saw the man's face struggle to keep the guilty glare off his face, and tried denying it verbally with a "no". Herbert continued to throw the facts at him. "From a blunt instrument…MULTIPLE blows!"

Chapham broke then. "She fell!"

"Ha!" Herbert said haughtily. "She fell, did she?"

It was then that he realized he'd made a mistake there. The lieutenant had found his newest weapon right on the spot: the shovel Herbert had placed after making his venture into the Averill's crypt behind the wall. "That was not. My. FAULT!" Chapham roared as he lunged for Herbert, the shovel raised in preparation to give in to his full vengeance mode and kill Herbert like he'd killed his wife.

Herbert found himself backed against a table, which held just what he needed – a jar with the cloth of a deadly version of chloroform. The one that simulates a heart attack. Flashing back to his earlier decision that he couldn't kill Chapham, now he had no choice. He didn't care if he had to face Meg's wrath if she found out. Tearing the lid off, he yanked out the smoking rag and shoved it into Lt. Chapham's face.

~o~

Herbert had said that he would head down and lock the lab up for the night, but he had been gone longer than needed, arousing suspicion that he had to run more "tests"; since she made it clear that she didn't want to gamble with Dan's heart, and he didn't have a full human subject to experiment, he had to be working on other parts that were left-over in the basement. No matter how often she would try to talk him out of it, he continued to make her sick by proceeding with doodling and connecting severed parts.

Pulling on her robe over her long chiffon nightgown, she quickly but stealthily made her way down the hall and then the stairs without rousing Francesca's hearing that she was loose about. However, the sooner she got into the lab, she was greeted not only with the sight of Herbert crouching low and facing a tall bricked pillar beside one of the many tables but also with the body of…Lt. Leslie Chapham. Who knew the truth about that night of horrors. "What happened?" Meg demanded as she got closer.

Herbert looked up at her from trying to haul the overweight man off the floor with what limited strength he had. The look on his face gave way that there had been a fight to the death. "He attacked me."

He said it very calmly, obviously, and it forced Meg's temper to return with a vengeance. She stomped over and yanked Herbert by the shirt collar, raising her hand in preparation to strike him, but he stopped her with both his hands up in surrender and protested, "No, Meg! Meg, I can't help it if his heart gave out!"

A simple fight wouldn't just result in a sudden heart attack, and she knew it. Simply by spotting the smoked cloth on the table behind Herbert and the corpse of the man who didn't stop his against-the-book investigation – ending with his demise. "God, Herbert, he's a COP!" She struggled with what to say next, but her frustration wouldn't let her. "You…" Killed a man. Now people are going to be looking for him. And when they turn their eyes on us… She turned away from him and leaned forward on the table with all the equipment, palms flat and grasping the edges so hard her knuckles turned white. "What are we going to do with him?"

"Well…" Herbert answered hesitantly. "…we could get him back out on the street…walking."

Oh, perfect, why didn't she think of that? Meg thought this with absolute sarcasm. Shaking her head, she let out an empty laugh.

"You don't want to gamble with Dan's heart," Herbert went on, standing and getting beside her. "We've been searching for a whole specimen all this time. This is our opportunity for a test. Do you want to waste it?"

I'd rather waste it and let this guy disappear for good than risk the life of an unsuspecting civilian – or any of us. It made her remember Francesca and the animals upstairs, but she chose not to say anything, giving Herbert his "answer". He picked up the lid of the long, steel box where the latest hypodermic needle filled with re-agent was resting. "How much you think he weighs?" Herbert asked curiously. "Two-thirty, two-forty?" Oh, just do it and get it over with for all I care! Meg thought, tossing a hand in the air as she whirled back around, not wanting to watch.

"Meg?" Spinning around and ready to scream, she saw that he had retrieved Chapham's gun from inside his coat and now held it out to her, after checking that it was loaded. "Just in case." Meg snatched it away without a word. God, could things get any worse tonight? She had come down here to get him to come back to bed only to find that he'd defensively killed the cop who held a grudge against them for his wife.

She watched Herbert unbutton the man's shirt and stuck the needle into his heart, piercing the skin without a second thought. No further words were exchanged as they waited for a short amount of time for the serum to run its course. The only one who spoke was Herbert, his words being as he gave their enemy his "medicine", "So little tissue damage…"

Chapham's eyes flapped open at once. "It's working!" Herbert said excitedly, looking up at her. But Meg was only partially thrilled.

The eyes were wild and red-rimmed, and as she'd seen in the other re-animated corpses before him, Chapham started foaming red at the mouth. This had been only a little fresh depending on how many minutes had passed, but Meg guaranteed it hadn't been that long. Nevertheless, the moment Lt. Chapham's attention focused itself on Herbert in front of him, he seemed to recall what happened in his last scene before now and began to thrash his hands out in a frantic life-and-death struggle. "Get away from me with that cloth!" he howled. In sheer panic, Herbert quickly stood and backed away, but not fast enough to evade the fast grab of his newest experiment, crying out Meg's name as he was thrown in the air, perfectly over the lab table and hitting the floor.

Chapham soon turned his wild eyes on Meg. She quickly raised the gun in her hand, prepared to shoot him. He was eyeing her like a fresh piece of meat, the blood dripping from his mouth darkening so it was almost black. "He's a wife-beater, Meg!" Herbert shouted from where he now stood, against the pillar, trying to haul himself up. "Use the gun!" She turned her attention to him for a second and instantly regretted it. Something was knocked onto her hand, the one that held the pistol, and forced her to fire a shot that wasn't her intended target. Re-animated Chapham had shoved a fist-force into a pile of plastic white boxes that caused said shot to crash onto the floor then and an opening to spill out a thick, gooey mess of bloody organs, intestines and all. Chapham was then on her before she could gather herself, taking her armed hand in his much stronger one and forcing her onto the table. She fought against him as he forced the barrel of the gun into her face, ready to fire her brains out…baring her teeth in the process of clenching them tightly, she closed her eyes and waited for the inevitable…

…but it never happened. Herbert saved her life once again, because the moment she heard Chapham's screams of pain and felt him let her go, she reopened her eyes and saw him clutching his right arm. Herbert had found the machete he'd brought back from Peru and chopped off the lieutenant's right arm, mid-lower arm. A thick spray of black-red gore spurted out in various directions, even staining Herbert's shirt. Meg quickly backed away while the half-dead, half-alive cop clutched his amputated appendage, still screaming like the damned he was. He managed to pull himself together only enough to reach for Meg as an act of retaliation and grasp the front of her nightgown, ripping it down the front to show one of her breasts; she pulled herself away but found herself falling to the floor, losing her grip on the gun. Looking up, she saw Herbert being flung across the room himself and crashing into a gurney and losing his grip on his weapon of choice.

Chapham took advantage of the both of them down and made way for the door, shutting it as soon as he was out and locking it. Locking them both in. Meg screamed angrily and flung herself off the floor and began to bang on the door with as much force as she could. They needed to get out of here. Three living beings upstairs that they cared about – well, one that he cared about but she loved all three – "Herbert!" she shouted. "Francesca is in the house! She's in trouble!" Looking over her shoulder, she saw that her lover was at the far end of the room, having shoved the secured metal door aside and removing brick by brick so he could find his own way out and around the house. Leaving her to find her way out through this door.

Meg's physical strength was limited due to her build, so she stopped what she was doing and quickly looked around for something to help. Finally, her eyes spotted the gun she'd dropped in the struggle; dashing down and scooping it up, she raised it to the door and fired as many bullets as she could into the lock part – it was clear Chapham used the bolted lock to finish it off – so she managed to get most of it loose and used her body force to do the rest. Uttering a wild howl of anguished relief, Meg bolted up the stairs and through the house in search of the monster on the loose.

She stopped once she found herself in the living room, at the sound of sniffling cries. There was Francesca in her gray sweat set, crawling on all fours to where her dog lay on his side.

Or rather, lying lifeless on his side to show a dark, bloody hole where his right frontal leg should have been. Chapham got to him. Meg hurried over to her friend's side and took her into her arms. Thank God Francesca was unharmed, and Éclair was alive and well, giving a pitiful little meow at the scene before him.

Francesca gripped her hard. "Lt. Chapham did this," she moaned.

"Is he gone?" Both women turned and saw Herbert kneeling there, his gaze darting between them and the dead dog. Meg looked up at him, a torrent of emotions reeling in her, but Francesca was unleashing her anger, confusion, and grief at him.

"What is going on here? What did you do to make him that way?"

She suspects it, Meg thought with some horror. She was catching on. But now was not the time to ask how, because now they had the rebellious police lieutenant whom Herbert had killed and brought back out there, screaming in the dead of night, and who knew when he would kill another innocent person, and a dead dog in the house which had been his doing. Herbert gathered poor Angel into his arms with an impassive expression as he locked eyes with Francesca. "She's hysterical," was all he said before he turned and headed back into the direction of the lab as though nothing had happened.

His action and very words angered Meg to an extent. Angel was dead, Lt. Chapham was on the loose with a missing limb and in damnable pain like the ones before him, and Francesca was still screaming after Herbert.

"What did you do to him?! WHY?!"

Awww, poor Angel! Damn it, Herbert, you've let loose another crazed zombie. By the way, I know Chapham didn't drag Herbert and slam him up against the wall; I thought that would be more effective. And uh-oh, trouble coming up next with Francesca, which should be obvious.