Luckily for Herbert, Cassie's last day in Arkham was relatively uneventful. In fact, when she came downstairs that morning to make her tea, she didn't say a word to him where that subject was concerned. In fact, it might as well have never happened, because all she did was take her seat on the counter top (accidentally flashing him again of course, but after the night before, he began to question how accidental it really was) and mention to him that she'd been having weird dreams about murderous milk and cheese.

When she'd asked if it might have been because of her tea, he was just wondering when the hell he'd started having her favored brand of tea in the cupboard and eventually blamed Dan for buying it since he knew Cassie didn't bring anything like that with her. Apparently, Dan didn't notice that if you fed the stray, it'd keep coming back.

"Are you even listening to me?" her voice rang out dully, causing him to look up from the notebook he was scribbling in.

"Seeing as you're not talking about anything particularly important or interesting, no," said Herbert. "I'm trying to decide if I want to rework the re-agent formula again. We used far too much albumin last time and I'm wondering if it had any effect on why Gloria decided to…"

Cassie snorted, hopping down off the counter with her mug in hand. "I'll leave you to it, then," she said flatly, before coming around the table and leaning down so if he actually looked up, he might have made eye contact with her.

"Look, I don't want you to be all weird about what I said last night. I just said it," said Cassie. "And you're weird enough."

"I don't know what you're talking about," he replied curtly.

"Oh yeah?" Cassie asked cocking an eyebrow. "Then why won't you look at me?"

Her comment had the desired effect, although he wished he'd have realized it before he actually looked up to glare at her. Cassie got that sly, self-satisfied look on her face as she shifted her weight back and forth a few times. "I'm going out for a while, okay?" she asked. "Anything you want me to pick up?"

"Unless that relates to doing so after yourself, then no," he said, returning to his notes. "Please – go out, enjoy yourself. Just don't summon anything you can't get rid of."

"Speaking from experience?" said Cassie.

"No, but I've heard things," said Herbert. "Now if you please."

He really wished he'd seen the kiss to his forehead coming, especially considering he was already very aware of how demonstrative she could be when she was trying to get someone's sanity to snap. "Be good," she said, pulling away from him and moving out of the kitchen.

He would have given her the same advice, but then again, it was Arkham. Nothing ever happened in Arkham unless he himself caused it, and if by some off chance he wasn't the cause of an incident, it usually involved ancient texts and invisible monsters – neither of which he was worried about where Cassie was concerned.

But then it dawned on him, just when the hell did he start worrying about her? It was something he wondered about in the back of his mind all day, especially when Dan came in to find him still sitting at the kitchen table that afternoon. His former assistant gave him a rather stiff hello, and then gave him one of those looks that only made the person receiving it uncomfortable.

"Is there something you'd like to say to me, Daniel?" Herbert asked icily, looking up.

"What's with the herbal tea?" Dan asked, examining the box of fresh teabags sitting on the counter.

"It's Cassie's," said Herbert, looking back down. "She's still here."

Herbert saw the smile playing on Dan's face and he didn't like the context of it. "The two of you get pretty domestic when I'm not around, huh?" Dan asked.

As infuriating as the comment was, even Herbert had to admit that it was better than not talking at all. "It's unfortunately starting to seem that way, yes," he replied reluctantly. "Thankfully, her friend is coming by to pick her up tomorrow."

"That's a shame," said Dan.

"Is it?" said Herbert.

"Yeah," said Dan, grabbing an apple from the counter and tossing it around in his hands. "Aren't you having fun with her?"
"You are aware that I think of her as a blight on humanity and my life as I know it, correct?" Herbert asked, seriously wishing that getting up out of his chair wasn't as difficult as it was.

"Really?" Dan asked. "Because it looks like you and her are getting kind of…"

"Before you finish that sentence, allow me to inform you that yes, she offered," said Herbert. "I turned her down."

"What? Why?" Dan asked, surprised. "Cassie's a nice girl – kind of young and bordering on criminally insane, but she's…"

Herbert rolled his eyes. "Is this the only reason why you're speaking to me?" he asked. "Because you want to know whether I scored or not? Is that it?"

Dan pinched the bridge of his nose, sighing. "No, I'm just trying to…"

"I don't care what you're trying to do!" said Herbert. "All you're doing is distracting me and angering me further. I understand that our professional relationship is terminated, so if you don't mind, I would…"

"For chrissakes, Herbert! Just because I don't want to work with you anymore doesn't mean I don't want to…"

"What, Dan?" Herbert asked cutting him off again. "Be my friend? I don't know if you noticed, but I don't have the time for friends, as you well know. I…"

"Herbert, if you keep shutting everybody out, you're just going to…"

"HEY!"

Both men looked up, seeing Cassie standing in the doorway of the kitchen holding a bag from the local fast food restaurant, the bag being almost completely transparent due to the grease. Apparently, the argument had gotten loud enough that neither of them had heard the front door slam closed. "Do the two of you wanna talk over each other some more or should I just go out again so the two of you can have sex on the floor? Because I can totally do that."

Dan sighed. "No," he said, getting up from the counter. "What's up, Cassie?"

"I dunno," she said. "I go out to harden an artery and I come back to find the two of you fighting like whiny little bitches. Anyone want some fries? I think I overdid it."

Dan looked at the bag suspiciously as he moved in front of her, smiling slyly. "What did you do to them?" he asked.

Cassie rolled her eyes. "How old do you think I am?" she asked dryly, looking up at him with a good-natured glare.

"Young enough to still be tampering with food," said Dan, nodding. "But I'll take some anyway."

Herbert really didn't understand why Dan always acted like such a puerile frat boy in Cassie's presence, nor did he understand why the two of them got along so well. It was as if their time spent clearing out the damaged almost beyond repair basement was also spent finding ways of irritating him.

"Talk like that makes me wish I did do something to them," said Cassie, reaching in the bag and slamming a full container into his hand. "There!"

Dan laughed lightly, leaving the kitchen and heading upstairs. "I'm gonna go finish cleaning out my room," he called down to them.

"Okay!" Cassie called after him. "Herbert's hoping you choke!"

"I am not," Herbert said quietly, as she put down the fast food bag and cleared away his plate that was still sitting there from breakfast.

"Are you hoping I put something on there that he's allergic to?" she asked.

Normally, he wouldn't have even thought to dignify that question with an answer, but he was still on the painkillers, which had been clouding his judgment far too much for his liking. "…A little," he answered begrudgingly.

"What were you fighting about?" said Cassie.

"Nothing important," said Herbert.

"Which translates to everything that you guys usually fight about?" she asked.

"No," said Herbert.

She looked at him with that devious, knowing look that she always gave him when she thought she had everything figured out and was going to let him think he'd won the question and answer session, when she really knew absolutely nothing at all.

"Okay," she said. "If you're hungry, your lunch is in the bag. If you don't like it, well…get your lazy ass up and make something – it's time to stop depending on other people to keep you alive."

"I do not depend on anyone," said Herbert, rather offended at her comment.

"Oh!" said Cassie, laughing. "Da-aan, help me! I can't move because I'm too busy being the science guy, so go buy the groceries! Cassie! Stop making all that noise! I'm only making excuses to bring you upstairs so you can realize I haven't eaten yet!"

He was really about to verbally blast her then, but she cut him off. "It's okay!" she said brightly. "It's kinda cute when you whine. Just uh…don't get used to me being so nice. Because these past couple weeks – really killing me. I'm gonna go pack up again now, because you have no idea how bad I wanna get out of here and just kill something!"

As she scampered out of the room, he couldn't help but shout after her, "Start with yourself!"

To which of course, she inevitably replied from the other room, "That would be giving you a body to re-animate!"

And of course, Dan had to hear from upstairs and throw his two cents in, screaming, "No re-animating! Not while I'm here!"

"Hey, look, Herbert!" Cassie called after that. "You and Dan are talking again!"

Death had always been something Herbert deeply resented, but at that moment it was seriously starting to look attractive. The next morning couldn't come quick enough, yet there was one tiny problem with that – he still had to get through the rest of the day and that night, which would probably be one of the weirdest nights of his life, his past two encounters with Dr. Hill excluded.

Somehow it had started with Cassie bringing him a dead rat a few minutes after Dan left for the night. Life didn't prepare one for such things – one's friends simply didn't slam gigantic dead rats down on the coffee table out of nowhere. Even for him it was weird, although he knew beggars couldn't be choosers the minute she said, "So? Feeling up to an experiment?"

In truth, he seriously was. All this time sitting around and writing had given him time for new theories and ideas, yet his injuries and absence from the hospital in addition to Dan's new unwillingness to help him acquire specimens all left him at a dead end. He was so bored, he was anxious to try a new experiment, but there was no way he could let Cassie know that.

He poked at the carcass with his pencil and checked it over. "Hmm…relatively fresh," he said in acknowledgement, pleased that she at least understood the gist of what he needed. "Can I ask how you came upon it?"

She laughed, smiling manically at him. "Found it in Dan's closet when I was helping him clean it out," she said.

"I see," said Herbert. "So that was what all the screaming was for earlier."

"Has Dan always been such a baby?" Cassie asked, sitting down on the floor on the opposite side of the table from him.

"Dan has always been rather squeamish, yes," said Herbert. "Would you get my bag for me? It's probably still in the basement, but…"

"If you had been paying attention when I straightened up the living room, you'd have noticed that I put it right by the couch," said Cassie, tucking her hair behind her ear. "Look under the table."

He leaned over and almost too eagerly pulled the black leather case into his lap. Cassie smiled at this for some reason. "And the new re-agent – I managed to mix some while you were out for the day, although I'd appreciate if you didn't ask how. It should be in the refrigerator in the…"

Cassie then pulled out another plastic bottle full of the glowing chemical from her boot, handing it to him. "I do domestic pretty good for a girl who lives out of a van, yeah?" she asked.

"I would imagine that you do," Herbert admitted absently as he pulled a syringe out of the bag. "How long do you think it's been dead? An hour, two hours?"

"I dunno!" said Cassie, shrugging. "I'm not a doctor, I just found the damn thing! What do you think?"

"I'm asking you," Herbert replied clinically as he filled the syringe.

Cassie snorted, looking at it with a cocked eyebrow. "Okay, two hours…no! Maybe…three."

"Three hours?" Herbert asked. "You're sure?"

"Sure!" said Cassie. "Whatever!"

"All right, make a note of it somewhere," he said. "I don't think we need to go over 5 cc's since it's a rat, but…"

"What do you want me to make a note on?" Cassie asked.

He growled in frustration and pushed his notebook over to her, slamming the pencil down to clarify. "Okay, geez! What the fuck do you want me to write?" Cassie asked, picking up the pencil.

"Record the time and the amount of the dose administered. Note the characteristics of the subject. Cause of death is unknown," he said.

"Uh, actually cause of death was a boot flung at high velocity," Cassie said dryly.

"Blunt-force trauma, then," said Herbert.

"Okay, blunt force trauma," said Cassie, slamming the pencil back down. "Now are you gonna inject it?"

"That's the plan," said Herbert, picking it up. "It's far too late to try anything as far as NPE is concerned, and since I don't have the proper equipment in the first place, I'm just going to have to hope my new formula for the re-agent will yield less violent results."

At that, Cassie did stand up and go out into the hall, returning with her favored baseball bat, the words Kiss It still etched into the side. "Yeah, well if things are gonna get violent, I'd prefer to have my violent tool with me," she said, sitting back down on the floor and holding her bat the same way a child might a favored toy.

"Having second thoughts?" Herbert asked, checking his watch and carefully inserting the needle into the back of the rat's head. "Record the time as being 9:04 P.M."

"No, I've just already done the zombie animals schtick," said Cassie, scribbling down what he told her to. "Have you ever been attacked by an undead, rotting boa constrictor?"

"I would appreciate it if you wouldn't use the term 'zombie'," said Herbert, finishing the injection and placing the rat back on the table. "That's not what these are."

"Then what are they?" Cassie asked, leaning in closer to see if any changes had occurred.

"You should be keeping track of time," Herbert replied curtly. "And I wouldn't lean in so close, lest you want to lose something you're fond of."

Cassie shot away from the table just in time for the rat to start convulsing and screaming as if someone were harming it. "Is that normal?" she asked.

"Of course it's normal, what's the time?" he snapped back at her.

"Uh…fifteen seconds maybe?" she asked, only causing him to growl at her for the second time that night.

The rat gave out a horrible screeching sound before leaping off the table at Cassie's chest. "Oh, you son of a bitch!" she griped, ripping it off herself and throwing it across the room.

"Wait, don't do that!" Herbert screamed, trying to stand up only to fall back down onto the couch again without his crutch. "Now it's going to be loose in the house, we can't risk it getting away!"

"That thing can go far away!" said Cassie, standing up and readying Kiss It. "This happens every single time?"

"Do you want to sleep tonight?" he asked dryly.

"I probably won't be either way, this is…" she began.
He quickly shushed her and armed himself with the nearest weapon, which happened to be a coffee mug; not his most creative choice, but he figured it could take out a rat if it were thrown hard enough.

The re-animated rat was not at all pleased. He could hear it tearing around the room, screaming just like Rufus had that night, and Herbert had a surge of nostalgia coupled with the feeling of dread when he realized that Cassie Hack was edgy and holding a bat.

"It's behind the couch," Cassie whispered. "Don't move."

As if he could really do anything else, he thought, as the words stupid cave-in also came to mind. She tried to quietly edge her way around behind him, which was ridiculous, seeing as it was impossible for her to be quiet while she was still wearing heavy boots.

Cassie lunged, the rat screamed demonically and Herbert tried to stand up and fell down again all at once and the sound of scurrying feet followed. "And it's gone in the kitchen!" Cassie said quickly, throwing her free arm up.

"Well! Go after it!" Herbert replied in exasperation.

"What do you want me to do, catch it?" she asked. "Because I guess I could…"

"Just dispose of it!" Herbert said quickly, holding his hands up. "Please!"

"Fine!" she said huffily, stomping towards the kitchen and mumbling various curses to herself.

He looked around uselessly and realized just what kind of trouble he was in. He'd just sent a twenty-year old sociopath wielding a baseball bat off to kill an undead rat with that he was seriously happy wasn't anything bigger. So far, it was safe to say that the experiment was another failure, especially when he heard the startled scream accompanied by tumultuous banging around, squeals of pain, and lots of foul language culminating into one loud "Suck it!" from Cassie and the sound of a buzzer.

A minute later, Cassie came shuffling back into the living room dragging her bat behind her. She had some scratches on her face and chest, which was a little better than he would have expected from her and the pink top she was wearing was flecked with red.

"Where's the…" he began.

"In the microwave!" Cassie interjected, wincing and gesturing behind her with her thumb.

Herbert gave a sigh of relief, glad that she at least lived up to her name and that he wouldn't be waking up in the morning with a homicidal undead rat attacking him.

"…You're cleaning that up before you leave tomorrow," he said as she flopped down on the couch next to him.

"Noted," she said, still breathing a little hard.

He looked over at her and saw that she was smiling lightly – when he and Dan used to experiment, usually Dan would come away looking horrified. Cassie just looked highly amused. After thinking about the event that had just transgressed, he could see why. He couldn't help but laugh, which only made her laugh, too. Dan never laughed at a moment like this, probably because he was still too sore about the whole Rufus incident.

Cassie did, and for a minute he didn't question himself on whether this was really funny or if he was just insane. The details of such hadn't escaped him during the incident with Rufus, despite what Dan might think, but now it didn't seem like something he shouldn't be doing since Cassie was laughing just as hard as he was.

"I am so glad I'm not you," said Cassie, gasping for air.

"Me? I'm not the one that has to scrape the miserable beast's remains off the turntable tomorrow morning," said Herbert.

"Mm," said Cassie, smiling placidly at him as she pushed a piece of hair out of her eyes. "True."

"You're actually agreeing with me?" he asked, a bit surprised.

"I'm too tired to argue with you," said Cassie, turning so she was half sitting, half – laying against the back of the couch.

For him, something seriously had to be wrong. Normally, he didn't look directly at Cassie unless he absolutely had to. Worse yet, part of him was even silently admitting that she was slightly attractive at the moment, scratches and bloodstains aside. He was even starting to get used to the black lips, deciding she looked strange without them.

"Then go to bed," he replied.

"I'm don't want to get up," said Cassie.

Somehow that statement lead to a series of events that he would forever consider an anomaly brought on by proximity and strong pain medication. He didn't know who initiated the kiss that time, nor did he want to know. At the moment the only things he was comfortable knowing had to do with how warm Cassie's skin was, how she didn't taste altogether unpleasant (waxy black lipstick excluded, of course), and that he had to be suffering from a bout of stupidity to be thinking such things. He really should have pulled away, but that was rather difficult to do once Cassie threaded her arms around his neck. That was all right - he could always deny everything later. For some reason, he knew she wouldn't mind.

He would never admit that he welcomed it a little easier this time, or that he may very well have been the one to start it, but he would later plead insanity when asked about it, seeing as Dan would undoubtedly have questions, and Cassie would probably tell Vlad. Yet at the moment, that didn't seem to matter, although in the morning it most certainly would. It usually does when you have an impossibly large gas-mask wearing gorilla leaning over you with an enormous knife and you have his (fully clothed) best friend lying in your lap.