Cassie Hack generally didn't encourage breaking and entering into someone's home, but when Herbert West didn't answer his door, she knew it would be an exception to the rule. Now that she'd broken in, she was sorry she decided to come and see him in the first place, because while she'd left him behind in Chicago a few months ago and had expected some fresh chaos, she hadn't expected what was standing in front of her.

"P-Perhaps he ought to have doubled the dosage…side effects are…questionable," he sputtered, staggering towards her as if he had no control of his limbs whatsoever.

"Herbert, what the hell are you talking about?" Cassie asked warily, slowly backing away from him.

Thirteen years in prison had already made him look different from how she remembered him, but now there was nothing left to suggest this was the man she'd visited on and off for so long. His skin was turning gray around the edges and the green color had bled away from his eyes, leaving them a pale grayish blue while thick blood inexplicably dribbled down his chin.

He screamed and doubled over in pain briefly before righting himself again "I don't know anymore!" he sputtered, whining and gagging on something in his throat and looking around wildly. "I…I can't remember anything I say after a few minutes…an interesting side effect, but it hurts so bad! It's so bad…"

She decided she didn't want to know how he finally died, but she was willing to place bets on the enormous naked corpse lying decapitated in the corner and the huge bruise on Herbert's neck suggesting that it had been snapped in the last eighteen hours.

"Who brought you back?" she asked, reaching behind her to pull the gun out of the waistband of her skirt. "Who injected you?"

"My new assistant," he said, nudging his head towards the corner of the basement. "J-Just like I instructed him to…"

Cassie allowed her eyes to drift to the area but fixed them back on Herbert once she saw that the assistant was in pieces and that all the blood on the floor might have belonged to him. "Whose NPE did he give you?" she asked, trying to distract him long enough.

"…A…Another man's," said Herbert, drawing closer to her. "O-Or maybe it was a woman's, I can't be sure…it would explain my being overemotional…"

He was cut off by another bout of convulsions and screaming, this time falling to the floor because of the pain. She took a slow step towards him, but his head whipped up in her direction, glaring at her. "I know what you're trying to do!" he screamed, his voice not quite sounding like his own.

Where most women would have gasped or screamed, Cassie simply nodded in acknowledgement and brought the gun out from behind her back. She knelt down in front of him, vaguely hoping that there was still enough Herbert left in there to keep him from flipping out and biting her face off, but mainly just to be straight with him. "You know I have to," she said, striving for a gentle tone. "You can't function like this and you know it."

"J-Just give it time…you'll see," he persisted.

"Nope," said Cassie, shaking her head. "I don't think so…you're dead, Herbert."

She'd once thought it would be hard to shatter everything a person ever believed in, but now that she had to do it, it wasn't all that difficult. Making a sandwich was harder.

She didn't know if Herbert was doubled over and groaning because he didn't want to hear what she had to say or if it was the fact that being dead was painful – either way, she reached out and rested her free hand on his back, rubbing it.

"I'll tell Dan," she offered. "…I'll let him know…if you want. Maybe he'll even want to…I dunno, continue the work or something."

"And let him take credit for it?" Herbert spat, before the pain overtook him again.

"I don't think he would do that," said Cassie.

"YOU DON'T KNOW!" he screamed, his body shaking as he tried to lash out at her, but luckily his quickly stiffening limbs prevented it.

"Hmm," she said thoughtfully. "You're right...forget I mentioned it."

He gasped, tumbling forward into her lap and Cassie allowed it, seeing as she couldn't be too harsh with him in this situation. "Ah…rigor mortis," he said. "…Note that I'm the first reanimated subject to exhibit…"

He was cut off again, and Cassie held still for it. She didn't know what else to say to him. He had been her friend and yet he wasn't her friend, even though they'd had a relationship that was more physical than anything else. She wasn't close to him like she was Vlad and she certainly didn't love him, at least not in the same way that she loved Georgia. Come to think of it, she didn't think anyone would ever have been capable of loving Herbert West. He was simply too unlovable, but seeing him in agony like this did funny things to her stomach. Like if she didn't get this over with soon she wouldn't be able to do it.

"…If I could move, I would try to stop you," he said quietly against her collarbone, whimpering under his breath.

"Oh, I know," said Cassie, keeping her eyes fixed on the blood-spattered wall in front of her, rather than on him. "I even saw a shovel on the way down here. I should feel lucky."

Even though the statement had been meant as a joke, neither of them were laughing, Herbert because he couldn't and Cassie because she was still trying to place how she would remember him. Somehow, sitting on a bloody basement floor with him whining and convulsing in pain didn't seem to do him justice, despite him being the pathetic, hateful prick that he was.

"I'm gonna miss you," she said finally.

His neck cracked as he looked up at her with what she guessed was confusion. "Stop…talking about me….as if I'm already dead!" he choked out, his voice still not sounding like his own.

"I'm sorry," she said.

She leaned forward and placed a kiss on his forehead, just like she always did, only this time it felt clammy and cold. "But you are,"

The first bullet only pushed him out of her lap, but it took the entire clip to finally kill him. Again. And even then, Cassie couldn't be sure, because as she left the old house, she thought she could still feel the corpse watching her as she left the basement.

A/N: So that's the end of this weirdness, at least on . If you're crazy enough to want other somewhat unrelated drabbles on these two, my livejournal account is a good place to look.