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Chapter Text

“Shall I give you a tour?” Dr. Pretorius said with a closed lipped smile. He had just completed tucking the homunculi safely away in their velveteen case and twirled to Dr. Frankenstein.

Dr. Frankenstein thought that the twirl, like so many things Dr. Pretorius did, was quite girly. He had given up the belief that the man had any respect for his masculinity four weeks into college.

“Alright,” said Frankenstein

Pretorius grinned in approval and began to walk briskly down a dark corridor, leaving Frankenstein no choice but to follow behind him. Really, Frankenstein had assumed there was nothing down that hall Pretorius would have ever let him see.

“You may call me Septimus,” Pretorius told him, after stopping suddenly from walking. “Dr. Pretorius is so… inconvenient. Don’t you think so?”

It was a form of peace offering, Frankenstein couldn’t help but assume. Considering it, he could only see the upsides to taking the bait, so he held out his hand. “Victor.”

Septimus took it, looking surprised, but pleased. “Pleasure.” They continued on.

There were only a couple of rooms at the end of the short corridor, all of them sandwiched in a row. The first was a sort of kitchen. Victor hesitated to call it a full kitchen because it only contained a small stove, a metal wash basin on a long wooden table, and a second, similar looking dining table, with two chairs, one on each side.

On one side of the kitchen was a closed, plain looking door, and on the other was a bedroom, which was open a tiny creak. Septimus pushed it with his knuckles, revealing the whole room.

There was a bed against one corner, with a window displaying the dark night, a barely visible forest beyond the black. A steel chamber pot sat beside the bed, half under it. There was a washbasin of a far nicer condition, made of porcelain in a holder at the end of the bed. It was chipped a little, but otherwise unsuited to the house. A desk was on the opposite side of the room, and against the corner beside it was, of all things, a rocking chair.

“Would you like to get settled in for a while?”

“Yes please,” said Victor. He felt as though if he was in Septimus’s company for another moment he would be too nervous to move. Perhaps if he were around anyone in that house at the moment he would feel the same way.

Septimus smiled, and closed the door, leaving Victor alone.

He sat on the bed. It had thick blankets, and was surprisingly comfortable. The entire room, in fact, despite its wear and tear, as well as a slight chill in the air, was clean and well managed.

Why on Earth was there even something resembling a home here? He, of course, assumed that Septimus must live somewhere, but why would a previously respected scholar of philosophy choose to live in such a remote place, if he could travel a mere twenty miles and no one would know who he was. In fact, it had only occurred to him how convenient it would be to stay there after Septimus assumed he would. If nothing else, it would prevent Elizabeth from knowing what he was doing until the creature had been tamed.

He laid on the bed for a while, then, after finding some paper in the desk drawer, carefully designed a letter to Elizabeth, aware of, but paying no mind to the sounds of footsteps in the kitchen. As he was completing it, the door knocked, and Victor had to stop himself from streaking ink across the page from shock. He managed to answer it calmly all the same. He had thought that after all he had seen, he would have tougher skin now.

Septimus stood politely at the door. “I have made breakfast. I can bring it here, if that is what you’d like, but it is presently in the kitchen; that is to say, the room next to this one.”

“Thank you. I’ll go with you to eat at the table.”

And so they did. The arrangement of the plates and silverware was as meager and mismatched as the rest of the house. The dishes were wooden, save for a couple of glass cups, and the silverware was both pewter and wood. Even the time was mismatched, for it was a few minutes before four o'clock in the morning. Still, Victor hadn’t eaten much dinner, and gin late at night did not rectify that in the slightest.

The meal was grilled white fish and toast with butter; both foods that would be difficult to poison. There was also a pitcher of apple cider, but Septimus pouring himself a glass from it watered down his suspicions that there was anything nefarious in it. There was, of course, the possibility of food poisoning, but if that were a particular concern, Septimus would be stupid and frequently ill, which he clearly was not. No, Victor was just being paranoid.

Septimus ate the fish gingerly, and Victor sat down. “You don’t seem like the kind to cook.”

“Every man should know how to cook. You may have a wife and servants to care for your needs, but as for me, I am an old bachelor who would not like some strange lady rifling through my belongings to do one of the many things that separates man from animal”

Victor took a bite of the toast. It was stale, and clearly store bought, for it tasted exactly like the bread from the bakery at the edge of town, but the fish was homely and good.

Septimus seemed to gauge this from Victor continuing to eat it with gusto. “I’ve frozen the fish in ice for the last week or so in the freezer. I do have an electric generator that I use for a few things. I should show it to you sometime. The wattage is not nearly strong enough to reanimate our unborn lady, but it works well enough in running my humble abode.”

Victor listened silently.

“It actually makes the laboratory quite a good preparation area for food. It is far better than just using the stove, so I use it, at least a little, for most of the things I cook.”

Victor nearly choked. No tone could have made that statement less inducing of negative thoughts, in fact, Septimus’s soft, yet consistently flamboyant tone of voice only made the explanation worse. “But there are dead bodies in there.”

“Are you concerned that you are a cannibal now? Oh dear. Well Victor, it seems you were willing to eat a fish’s dead flesh.”

“Are you a cannibal?” Before Septimus had brought up the fish, he had been nearly a hundred times less concerned. Just by asking it, however, he half expected Septimus to suddenly grow aggressive and hurt him.

“Daer me know. Of course not. There is no need to worry about cross contamination. I was only teasing. You can be so uptight Victor.”

“But are you truly, one hundred percent sure that I’m not at least eating embalming fluid or something?”

“Yes,” he said immediately, then paused. “Well, ninety nine… point eight percent. Really, do you think I poison myself at every meal?”

Of course Victor would wind up forgetting what he had reasoned only a few minutes ago.

-

They ate in silence for a while. “What would you like me to do after we finish breakfast?”

“Oh I don’t know,” Septimus told him. “Lets see, learn ballet, perhaps? Whatever you’d like. I would prefer if we could begin planning our lady sometime today, but I’m not your father.” A pause, “or even your professor any longer.”

They began work immediately after eating and cleaning the dishes anyway. Septimus was surprisingly stringent about cleanliness.

“Oh, be careful with that one,” he would say as Victor removed a glued together China dish from the washbasin. “It is the last remaining plate of a set, and I would like to keep it around for as long as I can. Forgive me Victor, but it is my only weakness.”

After they were done, they went to the laboratory (which Septimus pronounced lab-or-a-tory, with the Rs rolled distinctly, which Victor found annoying), so he could show Victor a diagram he had made. It was that moment which reminded Victor of the kind of professor Pretorius had been.

He had not been a bad professor, not at all. In fact, his fascinating excitable nature, and occasionally motherly demeanor, made all the students pay attention to him. So much that his careful wording when explaining concepts was hardly needed. Of course, everyone, staff and student, Victor especially, gossiped on how much of a sissy he was, but that came with the territory of teaching.

That was how they spent most of the day, drawing and conversing and gathering materials in the laboratory. Really, they got along well when they had to.

When the sky began to darken, making it more difficult to work, Pretorius went off to make more food for dinner, this time with the stove in the kitchen. They had each eaten an apple earlier, no doubt from a small tree in front of the house, but that was all either of them had since breakfast.

Victor decided that he was not quite ready to know what Septimus’s idea of food safety looked like. He would have rather gotten used to the idea that Septimus was what came between him and starvation for the foreseeable future. While the man was preoccupied, Victor grew bold enough to explore a little.

The door at the opposite end of the kitchen; Septimus’s bedroom, remained closed, and browsing the laboratory led to the discovery of some unusual equipment that Victor could not quite recognize, but nothing wholly unexpected. He would certainly ask to learn about the creation of the homunculi he had been tempted with once the shock had worn off entirely, but that was bound to take a while.

Dinner was much like breakfast, with eggs, steamed spinach, and more toast. They ate in silence again in the kitchen, then went their separate ways to go to bed.

“Goodnight Victor.” Septimus sounded motherly, as he approached his door.

“‘Night.” Victor attempted to see what was in the room as Septimus opened it, but the way he peered at Victor made him stumble into his bedroom and close it quickly behind him.

He climbed into bed with all his clothing still on, like a child who was afraid of the dark, but didn’t want anyone to know. He heard Septimus’s door click shut.

Chapter Text

Victor knew that he would not get away with not pulling his full weight around the house for long, nor did he want to. In fact, he was determined to get into the kitchen as soon as he was able to, in order to further understand what exactly happened in that house.

“Should I prepare lunch?” He blurted it out during breakfast, after watching Septimus like a hawk as he boiled eggs using one of the Bunsen burners in the laboratory. Really, they only had lunch every other day or so, and Victor did not know how much longer he could take of that.

“Do you know where everything is?”

“I’ve seen you dip into the refrigerator, and I saw some canned goods and such in the cupboards. I think I can figure it out.”

Septimus grinned in a sneering way. Everyone in the university had known about it, and they could never decide whether it was supposed to be proud or malicious. “You go right ahead. I would like to find more food once you are done, but perhaps you can make use of what remains.”

For that Victor was thankful. He had worried that if the ingredients were actually as suspicious as he thought, he would have no choice but to work with whatever nasty foodstuffs Septimus would return with after going out. This was a perfect arrangement.

-

For a good part of the morning, Victor tested tissue samples in search of what could be effective for the bride’s skin and muscles, while Septimus drilled into a bone for marrow using a device that looked like it should be used to tap maple trees. At about eleven o’clock, Victor stood from his work, while Septimus was still deaf from absorption with his work, and began cooking.

There was really not much to work with; a can of sardines, a can of peas, and another of chicken soup. In the refrigerator was a single egg, and scouring the laboratory uncovered a brown paper bag half full of walnuts and a tin of pemmican.

All seemed normal and safe to eat. Even the walnuts felt and tasted exactly as they should. There was not much one could do with all of it, least of all Victor, who had only used a kitchen half a dozen times or so in his life, but he did all he thought a person could with what he had.

He opened the sardines, and as he began cutting them with a butter knife, Septimus stepped behind him and took a piece.

“What is that for?” Victor asked calmly.

“Well, every morning, noon, and evening I need to feed the homunculi.”

It had not occurred to Victor that they might need feeding. He watched Septimus chop and mash the bit of fish into a paste using a spoon and scrape each one onto a tea saucer. He then formed them into balls that were slightly smaller than peas.

Victor followed him as he took it all into the laboratory and pulled down the hummunculis’ case. “Just how conscious are those things?”

“Hardly at all. They run on pure impulse and instinct, like these sardines. Really, isn’t it fitting then to feed them sardines?” He scraped a portion into the tops of each tube, flicking the king back into his as he stepped onto the rim. Then Septimus closed the case and placed it back on its shelf. “These things are little marvels, really, but nothing like your lovely creature.”

“You’re acting as though I’m its father.”

“Aren’t you?” He looked genuinely confused.

Victor scoffed, and Septimus did not respond to it. He knit his eyebrows together though, which made Victor feel like he was talking to his mother, and changed the subject. “That crummy knife does nothing. Forget what I said earlier, I’m using a scalpel.” The process of trying to create something resembling a meal had made him understand what Septimus was getting at with the lab equipment so well he hated himself for it.

He took one from a beaker on a metal shelf beside the surgery table and wiped it dry from the water inside it.

“That is not water.” Septimus stood calmly beside the hommunculis' shelf.

Victor froze, bracing himself to learn what he was about to put in food. “What is it then?”

“Embryotic fluid. Pray tell Victor, is your purpose to sicken me or make me pregnant? Because if it is the latter, I am afraid that is not how it works.”

“Oh, be quiet.” He threw the scalpel back in the beaker, causing a splash, although thankfully it was not large enough to flick the substance onto the floor.

Septimus kept an eye on him after that. He would raise the occasional eyebrow as Victor used the pemmican to grease the pan, or when he would blow on the food in a meager attempt to keep the fire below the stove down.

It all made Victor quite self-conscious, giving him fuel to blame Septimus when the results of his efforts could have best been described as crumbly, slightly burnt, yet still somehow damp slop. It was vaguely pink in color, with flecks of brown and green.

He poured it onto two plates, and set them on the table, where they both sat down, and ate a few bites, then swallowed a few bites, then Victor took a bit of food from his mouth and set it on the plate as politely as he could, prompting Septimus to do the same. The taste was gritty, greasy, and, against the logic of all the ingredients put in it, sour.

“Sorry,” Victor said. “You distracted me, I think.”

“I am almost afraid to ask, but are you sure everything is cooked thoroughly?”

“It was smoking. Of course it was.”

“Well Victor, there is such a thing as raw on the inside, burnt on the outside. Goodness, and you thought my food safety was concerning.”

“I presume you will be cooking from now on then?”

“Yes. I agree, but I would like to teach you sometime Victor. Your knife skills are enviable, so perhaps I should offer you a deal: I teach you to cook basic ‘bachelor meals,’ as people say, and you help me glide a scalpel.”

“Um, yes. Alright, that sounds good.”

-

After dinner, he went to his bedroom, and as he put on the nightshirt that he brought with him, he heard bustling in the kitchen, then the sounds of the door opening and closing. ‘Best case scenario,’ thought he, ‘he’s getting a head start on finding food, but if he is going to kill someone for our experiment, I can’t say I blame him.’

Either way, Septimus was back home by the time Victor woke up. They made true on both of their promises right away, for Septimus was of the habit of rising early. Something about the atmosphere must have made it so, because Victor had begun to do the same as soon as he began living in the house.

For breakfast, Victor was made to show off his knife skills, which were well tamed from his years of surgery and experimentation of the human form. He cut up a butternut squash and an apple to mix together and bake in the stove, then placed the knife on the table in front of Septimus with a ‘thunk.’

“Now you go.”

Victor grinned as Septimus took it and handed him another apple and squash. He cut them well enough, but Victor was in the business of critiquing while the opportunity was open to him.

“Mmh… no. Not at all.” ‘Not at all,’ was of course an exaggeration, but if Pretorius criticized him this time, then Victor would not be the one in the wrong.

Pretorius scoffed. “Well then Victor, enlighten me.”

“You need to glide it more.” He placed his hands over Septimus’s and did it himself.

Septimus did the same when Victor nearly sparked a fire on the floor while stoking the oven, scolding him lightly.

Victor did the same when Septimus left an opening while attaching two nerves together.

Chapter Text

After a meager dinner that night they barely had enough food left to constitute full meals for two people, so they went through with their plan of going to get groceries in the morning. Naturally, this made for a disappointing breakfast of small portions of apples slices, nuts, and leftover squash that Victor had half burnt the night before. Afterwards, Septimus put his coat on slowly, which Victor absorbed as him possibly mentally preparing himself, and they were off.

The statement ‘going grocery shopping,’ did not exactly mean the same thing to Septimus as it did for Victor, he learned, for the walk through the forest took over an hour. It was not as though Victor had not noticed that when Septimus first brought him to the house, but the implications were only just beginning to fully sink in. Both for the length of the journey, and the social aspect of going into a public area.

They went to the outer portion of Victor’s village, and only to the bakery and greengrocer at first. Septimus made it no secret that his system was ‘get in and get out as fast as humanly possible.’ He barely spoke while paying for his goods, aside from quiet and forgettable “thank yous.” There was no doubt that he was the subject of the local rumor mill in the village. They bought canned and fresh vegetables from the grocer, which were placed in Septimus’s black leather doctor’s bag, certainly not helping the creepy persona he had created for himself, and a loaf of bread from the baker.

They then went to the pharmacist, where Septimus ordered small amounts of opium in both pill and injectable liquid form. Victor used to go there semi-regularly, when the university was closed, or he needed to discuss the medication that a patient had picked up there. It appeared that Septimus had a similar experience, for instead of ‘sir,’ the pharmacist said, "Oh yes, Dr. Pretorius.” He then glared at Victor. “Dr. Frankenstein?”

“Dr. Pretorius is my colleague. He’s more experienced, so he was kind enough to give me a refresher course before I return to my practice.”

It was a poor excuse, but the pharmacist accepted it.

As they stepped out, with Septimus paying no mind to the staring of passerbys, Victor asked “Is there anything in particular that we are using the opium for?”

“I fear our bride may need it for the first few hours after she is born. Was your gentleman not in pain when he first became conscious?”

Victor ignored the question. “How can you afford this if you’re not working at the university anymore?”

“I have a retirement fund.”

“Ah.” He considered shutting up after that, but instead asked, “I presume you are still registered to give prescriptions?”

Septimus nodded. “My boy, knowing too much may be frowned upon in philosophy, but it does not easily deny you from getting medicine. Although pulling some strings helps the process along a little.”

Victor considered asking ‘what is that supposed to mean?’ But instead asked “if it’s not too forward, what are you a doctor in, besides philosophy of course.”

“Several things, but it seems the university did not appreciate any of it.”

This time he had sense enough to actually shut up.

-

Septimus became a bit more chatty once they had gone back into the forest. They took a different direction than they had come and stopped at a log cabin that emerged from seemingly nowhere.

Septimus knocked, and an older, bearded man answered the door, all his hair silver. Victor could immediately tell, from the way he looked at them, that he was blind. Cataracts, it looked like. It was common enough that he had treated it multiple times and could recognize it easily.

“Good evening my good sir,” said Septimus. “Do you have any eggs for us today?”

“Yes,” said the blind man, “and I thought it was an ‘us’ in front of me. Who is this friend with you?”

“My name is Victor, sir.” He didn’t know how much the man knew about the creature roaming the area, so Dr. Frankenstein was likely not a wise name to use to address himself.

“Nice to meet you dear Victor. Oh, yes, the eggs. I almost forgot.” He ducked into the house and pushed the basket of eggs into Victor’s arms after reaching around the air for a few moments to figure out exactly where his arms were.

Septimus placed a few coins into the man’s hands.

“I don’t suppose today is the day I can convince you to come in and have a smoke. You have a guest with you, after all. Is he an apprentice? Maybe I will see him a lot from now on.”

Septimus shook his head. “You know I can’t stand being outside my own environment more than I need to. Forgive me, but it is my only weakness, and Victor shall not be with me for long.”

“You say that every time I ask. One of these days I will get you to come in.”

“I highly doubt it, but you may continue to try if it will make you feel productive. Now Victor, we must be going.”

-

Once they were a distance away, Victor asked “who was that?”

“Hm? Oh, just a local. He is very useful when it comes to getting enough food. I do hate going to town. It makes me feel so exposed. We’ll stop here.” Septimus set down his bag and squatted in the detritus of the forest, careful not to dirty his coat and trousers. He began to pick bits of what looked like wood covered in dirt off of the ground.

“What are those?”

“Nuts. I’ll dry them in the oven later. When they decay in the fall they make for relatively easy protein if you can prepare them correctly.”

“Did you get the ones in that brown paper bag the same way?”

“Yes Victor, I did. Let me show you how to pick them without getting your hands dirty. There is a trick to it.”

-

The evening was quiet. They ate fish (cooked by Septimus this time, of course,) and the remainder of the nuts from the paper bag. Then Victor went to his bedroom to write down some notes after going into the laboratory to examine their work thus far. He considered going to bed straight after that but wanted to see what the embryonic fluid he had almost drunk was for.

He slipped out of his room, and as he walked to the door of the laboratory, he saw the door to the kitchen was open. In it was Septimus, wearily keeping watch over the stove, which was stoked high to dry the nuts. More pressingly, he was wearing a cardigan, a cardigan of all things! Wrapped around him as though he were a grandmother.

Upon seeing him at the door, he stared at Victor, head darting and eyes wide in a cat-like fashion. Victor stared back.

“I wanted to see what the embryonic fluid is being prepared for,” said he.

“I believe it is possible to use it as a fluid to grow organs and tissue in. I would also like to see if I can extract any stem cells.”

“That makes sense, I suppose.”

He watched Septimus open the stove and extracted the walnuts, which sat on a baking sheet. He shook it, then placed the tray on the table. He then picked a few up, set them on a plate, and attempted to crack them open by placing his body weight on the side of a dull bone saw laid against their shells. He managed to do so, even though he grunted, showing that it took some effort for him.

“Should I open some?”

“Yes, thank you Victor. Would you like some? They taste best when they’re still hot.”

“Alright.” Victor took a few pieces from the plate and popped them in his mouth. While they were still warm, they were more bitter, but in a pleasant way, and slightly oily.

“They’re good.” He put more nuts on the plate and crushed them beneath the bone saw. Both the shells and nuts crumbled. “Is there a way to do this so they don’t break?”

“Oh, that always happens. Never you mind.” Septimus closed the stove, leaving the fire to smother itself out. He then watched Victor smash nuts, making him feel flustered and embarrassed, just like the last time Septimus had eyed him in the kitchen.

“You can go to bed now, if you’d like. I doubt I’ll burn or poison anything by just cracking nuts open.”

“If you say so Victor. Goodnight.” He left, and as soon as Victor had completed breaking the nuts, he poured them into a bowl, covered them with a rag, and also retired to bed.

Chapter Text

It was common for Victor to hear Septimus bustling around in the laboratory at night. While he tried to convince himself that Septimus was just an insomniac, as was himself a lot of the time, the frequency which Septimus was in there made him nervous, for Victor had no idea what he actually did in there when he wasn’t around.

For a long time, Victor ignored it the best he could. However, after a period of calculated decision every other night, during their morning work, which involved putting the surgical tools through so much boiling the walls above the pots would condensate, he breached the question.

“I’ve hear you working here at night sometimes. What do you typically do during that time?”

“I work on the reproductive system mostly.”

Victor stopped everything he was doing. They had already talked about this. Twice. “Which she will not have.”

“Oh, you don’t have to look at me like that Victor. The tubes of the uterus are already tied.”

“But why even have a uterus? Why are you so insistent about this?”

“I thought it would be a nice compromise. You don’t want a reproductive system in our dear lady and I do. Therefore we use an infertile one.”

“Well then, if you’re going to make assumptions” Victor slammed his hands on the table. “What the Hell is the embryonic fluid for? And don’t you dare lie to me, because I have no idea what you’ve been talking about when you mention it.”

“It is for exactly what I told you it was for. I am not lying, my boy.”

“God. Sure. Either way, do you want there to be a master race of monsters in a hundred years?”

“Now Victor, don’t use that kind of language. Your Creature and our bride will be no more physically or mentally capable than the average man or woman.”

“Why would you put one more inhuman monstrosity in the world? God, why am I even here?”

“Victor, The Creature you made is your son. It is time to do something kind for him this once.”

“Bullshit.”

“And I shall have a daughter.”

“Bullshit.”

“And they will be siblings Victor. It's actually so wonderf-”

A glass slammed on the floor. Victor hardly recognized that he had thrown it down. It was not his problem. Septimus had done this to himself. Maybe the bitch could even step on it to add more blood samples to test for the bride.

“What is the point of giving her those… parts?”

“I told you that as well.”

“You can’t live vicariously through a monster you’re making just because you wish you had a woman’s junk!” He screamed

The room fell silent, and Septimus’s eyes widened. He opened his mouth, but had no response, and Victor had nothing more he could say after that, so he ran out of the room.

-

Slamming the door, he felt as though he were nineteen again, and his father was yelling at him for dropping out of college. He laid on his bed, screamed through closed teeth, curled into the fetal position, and listened to the sounds of glass being cleaned. The pieces clanked together as Pretorius cackled animalistically.

“Men can be so fussy. Don’t you think so my dear? Perhaps your anatomy will make you far more pleasant, but don’t worry child. Everyone is allowed to be angry.”

Victor could practically see him patting the half stitched monster’s hand, as he did so unnervingly often. It was quite the image, to see a man comforting a cobbled together corpse.

His attitude softened as he listened to Septimus work, until he found himself, against his better judgement, stepping into the laboratory, and putting on his rubber gloves to help.

“Oh,” Septimus held a metal trash bin. “Look who decided to join us.”

Victor looked at him wearily and began to pick up the larger pieces of glass near his feet. “Do you want to be a woman then?” Asked he.

“Hm?” Septimus looked at him momentarily, then continued on with his work.” Oh no. Well, having a uterus would be nice, at least for a little while… yes, for a little under a month, I believe.”

Victor had heard Septimus say perhaps dozens of mad things, but that was by far the most mind numbing, dumbfounding, positively loony one. He stumbled over his words, but managed to get out, “is that why you want the bride to have one?”

“Yes. Like I have said, the tubes will be tied, and Heaven knows she won’t have menstrual periods, but I’d like it if she could choose to become pregnant one day if she so wished.”

“Yes, but what if-?”

“Oh really Victor, the lady hasn’t even been born yet. We can talk about it when and if she’d like us to.”

There were days when Victor forgot that the bride was intended to be Pretorius’s companion just as much as the monster’s. Up until now, today had been one of them. That was because Victor was a selfish man, as much as he tried to deny it. The pieces were starting to come together. “Even if your mind is not that of a woman’s,” he spoke slowly, “would you like to have a uterus… because you wish to have a child that way?”

Septimus nodded.

“Good god.” The words came out under his breath.

“I am usually comfortable with my anatomy, but I get urges sometimes, as I’ve heard women often do. They can get quite strong some days too.” He paused. “Suffocating even. Forgive me Victor, but they are my only weakness.” He clutched his stomach as he said this.

Well, it was certainly not his only weakness, but perhaps it was his biggest, or at least, his most concerning. “Have you,” Victor felt nauseous, “tried to get pregnant?”

“Briefly. The male and female body just don’t line up that way from my attempts. It would just not be worth all the pain and risks. Besides, even if I was born a woman, I could not make a child the old fashioned way. Not at my age.”

By that point, the glass was cleaned, and Septimus set the trash bin full of glass by the laboratory door. It would be buried out behind the house the next day.

“Well,” Septimus pulled up a chair and sat down, legs crossed. “If you choose to sleep now, may you dream of happy times within our little womb.” He gestured to the room, with all its scattered beakers and sterile metal equipment cluttering the tables.

“Oh Septimus, please don’t call it that.”

“If you insist.” Septimus strutted into the hallway. “Good night all the same.” His bedroom door closed, and Victor went to retire himself.

-

As he laid in bed, he had a lot to think about indeed. Namely, why a man would willingly sign up for months of nausea, hunger, and emotional outbursts, only for it to end in the torture of a growing person exiting his body, even if women did that all the time.

He also listened for any sounds of footsteps walking towards the laboratory, or even the kitchen. There were none that night, and afterwards, they were rare. When they did happen, Victor half believed they were dreams.

Chapter Text

When a person is creating life in a secret laboratory in the forest, they soon learn that they must get creative when it comes to the garbage disposal. As for Victor and Septimus, fruit and vegetable scraps, along with egg shells, could simply be thrown any direction into the forest. Waste from all other animal related foodstuffs, and human waste, were buried. Everything else, however, was another matter.

“Do we chuck old blood?” Victor asked, even though Pretorius had already answered that question once before. ‘Chucking’ meant throwing it into the woods.

“Is it viable?”

“Of course not. Why would I get rid of perfectly good blood?”

Septimus hummed. “Put it through the kidneys and then see if any of its structure is salvageable.”

“Right.”

After a time, they had ended up with an impressive collection of organs working in jars, weak doses of electricity running through them without a host. After the kidneys had finished with their dialysis, the urea they produced would also have to be disposed of, so really, Septimus was just trying to lessen the issue.

At first, Victor had questioned why they would need to use lightning to animate the bride, if the generator could provide electricity by itself. Septimus had clarified, without further explanation, that the amount it could provide would not be enough.

“Did you hear that The Monster is being blamed for a cholera outbreak down South? I heard about it from some hunters last night. I don’t know if I heard it right, but I thought they said it was twenty miles from here or so.”

“I’m not surprised, with the way those villagers dispose of their waste. The human imagination is truly the most intelligent and stupid part of us. Don’t you think so?”

Victor smirked. “Maybe if they had someone like us to fix their sewers then they wouldn’t all be so sick.”

Septimus cackled at that.

Victor closed the lid of the glass container holding the kidneys and put his hands on his hips. “In all seriousness though, does it ever worry you that there are hunters so close to the house? What if they shoot you or something?”

“Oh, I think about it sometimes. That is why I am glad that the local towns have made me sound so frightening.”

Victor looked back to how solemn he had grown when they went to collect food. “Are you really glad about that? Because-”

“Yes my dear student, I am. Now do you believe there is a place for that urea you just collected?”

“I’ll check.”

“While you’re out there, I believe we shall need to sterilize some scalpels before we continue.”

“Got it.”

-

Victor stepped outside, taking a large beaker in one hand, and a metal water pail in the other. It contained not just urea, but a mix of blood, urea, and respiratory mucus that, if drunk, could easily send the healthiest of men fighting for their life from disease. Beside the door to the laboratory was a chamber pot he had left there earlier, its contents frozen rock hard.

He took a shovel left by the door for the purpose of burying waste, and attempted to dig. That night there had been some of the first frost of the year, and try as he might, he could not dig more than a small dent in the soil.

Surely Septimus had some kind of method to do this when it was cold out, but, with Victor feeling quite lazy and having long ago grown sick of this element of keeping house, he used the shovel to remove the contents of the chamber pot the best he could without scratching it. As much as he hated to admit it, he had done the same thing earlier in the day.

He then went to the water pump nearby, but the handle of it was also frozen, leaving him with no choice but to fetch water from the rover to sterilize the equipment. He ate a bit of ice to rectify a bit of thirst, and took a bucket of water inside with him.

-

In the evening, Victor watched Septimus pour the water he had collected into a pot in light a fire under the stove, flicking the match a couple of times against its box before it lit. He had remembered a bag of flour stowed away in the kitchen, and they decided to make pasta with it, along with a can of boiled peas. A meager dinner, of course, but all of the meals in Septimus’s house were. It was actually quite decadent for his lifestyle.

Victor tried to keep his head off the table. He had not felt this nauseous in years, and watching Septimus scrape peas from the bottom of the can was certainly not improving matters. God, how humiliating it would be to vomit in front of his freshman philosophy professor turned… well, somewhere on the spectrum between colleague and friend.

He filed through everything he had eaten in the last day or so. All of it had also been eaten by Septimus. He supposed it was possible that the man’s immune system was simply stronger, but Septimus was a great deal older than him, and was quite frail in appearance. In fact, whenever Victor touched him he felt as though he could have broken his bones easily if he so wished, just by touching him too hard.

Besides, Victor’s work had historically involved many more bodily substances than Septimus, and he had been far more liberal with safety. Surely Victor had been exposed to more germs than he ever had in his lifetime.

The moment earlier in the day, disposing of the waste and fetching water from the river flickered across his mind, and all the pieces fell into place.

He watched in growing horror as Septimus poured the excess river water into a glass and sat down.

“Don’t drink that!” Victor snatched the glass from him, nearly dropping it, and spilling most of it.

“Oh? Why is that Victor?” Septimus smiled mischievously. “Do you need urea and would prefer not to extract too much water? Because I believe my dear boy, that I am of better use to you when I am not dehydrated. Don’t you agree?”

Victor vomited onto the floor, the glass falling and shattering beside the mess he created moments afterwards.

Septimus, to his credit, only looked shocked for a moment, then, he wordlessly rubbed Victor’s back as he dry heaved for nearly a minute.

“Do you think you’ve finished?” Septimus finally asked, speaking in little more than a whisper, and yet he spoke so simply, as though he were talking about paperwork.

Victor nodded.

“Well then,” Septimus stood, hands on his hips. “You seem to have a promising talent in breaking glass. I can see where your creature gets his destructive tendencies from. He kneeled next to Victor, and put an arm around him, coaxing him into standing up. “Go to bed now. Sleep a little if you’d like even. I’ll give you dinner after I’ve cleaned your luncheon.”

And so, he brought Victor to his bedroom, allowed him to flop onto his bed and pull the blankets around him, and pulled his chamber pot from under the bed and set it on the floor by his head.

From the kitchen a moment later, Victor heard Septimus’s signature laugh, and covered his ears with his pillow. “Spare me the humiliation,” he murmured, but it was far too quiet for anyone to hear.

-

The next thing that Victor was fully aware of was Septimus sitting at the desk at the other end of the room, a half eaten plate was beside him, along with a second on a tray, presumably for Victor. He was preparing a slide by pipetting a drop of water from a drinking cup onto it. He then placed it under a microscope. It was clear that the only reason he had brought these pieces of equipment into Victor’s bedroom was so he would be aware of everything.

Winding the scope up and down for a moment, Septimus removed the slide and wrote something in one of the journals he had shown Victor when they began creating The Bride. He turned around as he heard Victor stir.

“And?” Victor asked hoarsely.

“Never you mind that just yet.” Septimus closed the book, stood up, and gave his hand a quick pat. “Patience.” He left.

-

Before Septimus returned, Victor vomited twice into the chamber pot. What he wouldn’t do for water during that time.

-

When he was awake again, Septimus assisted him in taking his temperature, and put a mug of hot water to his lips. Victor was tempted to scold him and take the mug, insisting he was not weak enough to need help with something as simple as drinking water, but the risk of that being a lie was too high.

“I hiked up the stream to get this water and ran it through some fabric before boiling it. Don’t worry. It is perfectly safe to drink.”

“What’s my temperature?”

A lukewarm cloth was laid on his forehead. “A hundred and one, although it was on the lower side of the number.

Victor digested this.

“I have your dinner.” He placed the tray on his bed. “Eat. Plain pasta and peas will do you good.”

“I vomited again,” he replied pathetically, and dangled a hand off of the side of the bed, gesturing to the chamber pot.

Septimus glanced at it. “So you did. I will make sure to get a fresh basin then.”

-

Victor managed to eat a little bit of his dinner, while Septimus removed the chamber pot, after returning wearing black rubber gloves. He returned with a metal bucket, which was placed in the same spot. Around that point, Victor had put the tray on the bedside table, feeling nauseous again.

He went to sleep, and the world was hazy the next day. He would vomit and Septimus would rub his back, then make him drink an entire glass of water, and occasionally ginger tea, leaving him feeling full and once again nauseous. Then the cycle would repeat no more than an hour later.

When he tried to refuse, Septimus would merely say “you’ll get dehydrated, dear Victor,” in a way that was delicate and sympathetic, but still flamboyant, perhaps because Septimus did not know how to turn off that tone of voice. Either way, he would keep prying until he drank it. Septimus would then say “good man,” and lay him back down, wiping his face and with a washcloth.

At some point during the night, Victor stopped vomiting, and his fever broke, as was confirmed by Septimus taking his temperature.

-

When Victor woke up the next morning, he was alone in his bedroom, a basin of water with a cloth in on the bedside table, and a full pitcher of water and a glass beside it. There was also an empty chamber pot next to the bed.

Victor got up, gulped down the glass of water, got dressed, and stepped into the kitchen. Septimus was sitting at the table.

“I was hoping you would be up this morning,” said he. “I laid the shovel against the other side of the house. We’ll place the waste there until the ground is soft enough to dig. We’ll also drink from the pump so a thing like this does not happen again.” He peered over the anatomy book he was reading, “and do help me with the handle later. I’m afraid it’s frozen over.”

That was the last time Victor’s illness was ever mentioned.

Chapter Text

The pump was still usable, thank God, but every morning was now a struggle to get water running out of the blasted thing. Usually it required both of them pushing down on it with all their might, though Victor, being younger and stronger, provided most of the effort.

“How do you normally get water in the winter?” He asked one morning, still panting from pushing the lever on the pump down. Septimus, for all his confidence, was certainly not strong enough to do such a feat on his own.

“The river,” he told Victor, filling the pail with water. “Although it seems that is not an option at the present time.” His eyes narrowed, and Victor hated that man for a few seconds. There was no need to rub it in.

-

There was also the generator that needed to be reckoned with. It came up when they were talking in the laboratory in the afternoon, and then Septimus made a clear expression of shocked remembrance, and ran outside.

Victor followed him, and found him in the open door of a shed that he had been aware of, but had never actually cared to think about until that moment. It was clearly a converted outhouse, and Septimus was inside, tinkering on a little machine.

“If that’s where the electricity comes from, I can handle that for you.” He took the wrench from Septimus’s hands, and just like that Victor gained a new job to do.

He had always been good with machines, sometimes he thought he might be better with them than medicine. He would have never thought so a year ago, but Septimus’s natural ability to understand the human body was making him feel a little inadequate. He was still better, of course, but he considered that it might only be because of his schooling.

Perhaps something about the philosophy field allowed Septimus to tick with the inner workings of the unnatural body and soul. He talked to the bride’s body suspiciously often, so maybe there was something there.

When Victor came inside, after dealing with the generator the first time, he washed his hands using a basin in the laboratory and smiled at Septimus. “It was an easy fix. I wouldn’t worry about the power going out anytime soon.”

“Wonderful, I don’t believe all our hard work would survive that.”

“I was thinking,” Victor examined the trap door above the laboratory, “will a lightning storm be able to happen this late into the season?”

“You should pay more attention to the climate, my student, strange things always happen here.”

In fact, Victor did pay attention to the weather. He wanted to tell Septimus to stop being so cryptic, and for God’s sake, how else would he have made the first creature than by paying attention to the weather, but he knew better at this point. It was getting cold in the laboratory, and that was what needed to be focused on at the present time when it came to the outdoors.

-

Over time, the forest became cold enough so the two of them found themselves gravitating towards the fire in the kitchen stove as often as they possibly could. In the laboratory, they only took off their coats and put on their white surgery gowns when absolutely necessary.

Victor worked on cleaning skin tissue for most of those days, and Septimus tinkered with nonviable blood and organ tissue to ensure the usable parts of the body would work. He had been kept away from most of The Bride’s body parts for the majority of that time. It was left unsaid, but he was coming down with something, so Victor worked with everything that had to remain even slightly sterile.

The only way it became useful was the afternoon when Septimus suggested that they test the immune system. He had taken the tools to do so out of a metal cabinet in the lab, and placed them on the table in front of the both of them.

Victor watched as Septimus swabbed his throat, gagging a little, and placed it in a test tube filled a quarter of the way with a white liquid that looked exactly like, but was certainly not water. Victor followed suit.

Septimus then blew his nose with a piece of tissue paper, and swabbed each nostril, once again placing them in test tubes, which Victor again copied.

Immediately after, Septimus put on a surgical mask and tapped on a few other test tubes against the wall on the table. “This is the river water, and this is my urine. I would recommend that you also provide a urine sample. I trust you’ll be able to perform this experiment on your own, am I correct?” His voice was more subdued than normal, no doubt due to its hoarse, nasal quality at the current time.

“Yes, you are,” Victor said, and set out to do all that he had just been told.

-

It passed over Victor’s mind, while he was pipetting all the liquids to make microscope slides with the next day, that it was perhaps for the best for Septimus to be ill. They would not have such good bacteria to work with otherwise.

Septimus had grown dramatically worse overnight, for he could not speak loudly enough to be audible from across the laboratory, but his breathing, while not so laboured that it sounded dangerous, could easily be heard.

Victor heard a glass break onto the floor behind him and smiled softly. “Well look who’s breaking the laboratory equipment now.” He turned around, excited to gloat further.

Septimus laid on the floor of the laboratory, breathing heavily. However, he turned to Victor in embarrassment. It was not in a manner that portrayed a man at death’s door, but he was certainly cocking his head in that vague direction.

Victor hesitated. His bedside manner had always been poor, even with the younger siblings he had been tasked with caring for growing up, but to wrangle such a sarcastic, prissy, effeminate and deranged man as Septimus was its own barrel of fish.

Victor kneeled on the ground and felt his forehead, an action that felt almost unbearably silly. It was burning hot, needless to say, and Septimus responded to the touch by leaning in Victor’s direction. “Cold hands,” whispered he.

“Sorry.”

“No. It is good.”

Victor’s next instinct was to sling him upright and get him to bed, but psychologically, that was even more complicated. Septimus’s bedroom, against all reason, had been a looming presence for Victor ever since he had moved into the house, and the longer he was there, the less he could tell if his concern was valid or based in paranoia.

Regardless, he pulled Septimus upright, one arm over Victor’s shoulder and gripping his waist. Septimus weighed considerably less than him, which made things far easier than normal. Victor too was short, and despite being a little stout, taller people easily outweighed him, making moving them in a professional manner difficult much of the time.

They walked down the hall together, Septimus moving alongside him the best he could. Slowly, Victor touched Septimus’s bedroom doorknob for the first time, and pushed the door open with the side of his waist opposite from Septimus. A squeak emanated from its hinges.

Exactly as half of Victor’s brain expected, and exactly as half his brain did not expect, inside was an ordinary bedroom. It was mostly similar to Victor’s a few steps away, but there was a small bookshelf that Victor recognized from Septimus’s office when he was in college. However, a few animal skulls had since been added to the top of it as decoration. It was the only thing in the room that gave a hint as to what sort of man he was. Victor found himself wondering if Septimus had stolen the bookshelf

Either way, they stood in the doorframe together longer than Victor probably should have let them, mulling over the appearance of the room. He felt Septimus try and fail to lift himself on his own, fever heat drifting further up Victor’s right side.

That made Victor leave his trance. He dragged Septimus to his bed and laid him down clumsily on top of the blankets. Septimus opened his eyes a little and rifled his hands around the sheets beneath him as Victor removed the man’s coat and shoes. He then set Septimus into bed properly, a quilt laid messily around his chest.

Victor realized that the samples Septimus had taken from his throat and nose were still live in a makeshift incubator in the laboratory, so he went back to look at them, similar to how Septimus had during the food poisoning incident.

In a little under an hour he was able to confirm that the infection was bacterial, bronchitis likely. Septimus’s home was a bizarre enough environment so that it coming from bacteria seemed more likely than it would be in the outside world.

He browsed the laboratory for a while and found a bottle of liquid antibiotics in the medicine cabinet. It was surrounded by a variety of bottles of painkillers, which Victor also looked through, but decided against using in order to simplify his care regiment. I did not seem like they would be overtly helpful in this case.

The thermometer was found in a box beside the medicine bottles, along with a syringe, which prompted Victor to look at the antibiotics he held more closely. They were meant to be injected. That fact only gave him a moment's pause. The illness seemed serious enough that medicine would be necessary, regardless of how it was administered.

He went back to Septimus’s bedroom and began to prepare the medicine into a shot. That sort of procedure was refreshingly elementary to him, rather than the gentle words and touches they had been forced to give each other during these periods of illness. Victor just wasn’t the type for the sort of natural medicinal remedies that Septimus had used on him.

Septimus opened his eyes as Victor took his arm, looked mortified, and instinctually pulled his arm away, his entire body rolling over in suit.

“You’re afraid of needles?” Victor asked. He did not intend it, but the words came out shocked and judgmental. However, he had seen Septimus being electrically shocked, burned, and cut perhaps half a dozen times by now, could you really blame him?

“They’re my only weakness.” Septimus whispered hoarsely, and coughed.

Victor had long ago lost track of how many ‘only weaknesses,’ Septimus had, but this seemed to be one of the more likely ones. He inserted the needle into Septimus’s arm anyway, and he whimpered softly. After it was removed, Victor observed his breathing a moment more as it evened out from the shock, then left the room.

He reasoned, after the door was closed, that he had only left so Septimus could rest properly, and yet, Septimus’s constant attentiveness during Victor’s food poisoning could not leave his mind.

He dampened a washcloth, returned to the sickroom, laid it on Septimus’s uncharacteristically warm forehead, for he was the sort of person who always felt cold, even though his hands had been colder than usual the past few days, and left again.

Chapter Text

“Friend?”

Septimus stroked The Creature’s hair, whose head was laid in Septimus’s lap at the present time. The Creature ran his hands along the seams of his coat like a curious baby.

“Friend,” Septimus said.

“Really friend?”

Septimus patted his hand. “Really friend.”

“Hate living.”

“Not for much longer, my boy. You’ll see.”

It was possible, Septimus supposed, that neither of them had ever felt so fulfilled as they did in that moment. To hold this man; no more than a child, in his arms and against his stomach, reminded him so much of those unexplainable longings for a swollen stomach. The nightmares of giving birth in agony and waking up surprised and depressed that the cradle beside his bed was no longer there. He had gone to the tombs for a nice meal, and it had brought him to all of that cured for a brief moment.

“What is wife?”

“A…” well really, what was a wife? “A wife is a special friend. Your best friend.” He considered the implications of the term. “She could be sister.” He said this part slowly, overpronouncing every syllable. “Sister is woman who learns with you.”

“Yes,” The Creature said. “I want that.” He lifted his head a little. “You alone too?”

Septimus wasn’t quite ready to be that open with this child. “No. Me and you and wife could be friends.”

The monster blinked. “But alone together.”

“Yes. But alone together.”

The Creature growled and buried his face into Septimus’s coat. Septimus rocked back and forth and pet his hair and comforted him the best he could.

Preparations could be made, Septimus thought. The Creature could move into Victor’s bedroom after he left. Septimus could move the stove into the corridor and get another bed to sleep in what was now the kitchen. The bride could sleep in his room, but oh, he felt terrible leaving The Creature to sleep in the tombs until then.

Victor had his own life, Septimus decided. Really, his respect for Victor had almost disappeared completely after seeing the state of his son; Septimus’s… stepson. Yes, that was the right word. That would make The Bride the creatures… Well, Victor was helping him in this round about pregnancy, but this young man had been entirely Victor’s doing, so The Bride would be The Creature’s two thirds sister.

He turned his attention back to the boy in his lap. “My name is Dr. Pretorius, but you may call me Septimus, that is what my friends call me.”

The Creature continued to hug him and did not respond.

“You really should have a name. How droll ‘The Creature’ is. You deserve something better.”

“What name is good?”

Goodness, what a question. What a wise little man. He held The Creature’s hand. He had wanted this for so long, far longer than a woman would be biologically capable of bearing children, and yet he had no name. What kind of mother had no name in mind when her children came?

“You can choose when you’re ready. Your sister can do the same. For now, ‘The Creature’ will do, and it can do as long as it needs to.

-

Victor moved out within days after that, unable to stand having his child in the house with him. Dr. Pretorius has shifted temperament out of nowhere after that happened. He had become bitter and short, calling him a “stupid stupid boy, you absolute blithering imbecile,” as soon as he came home with The Monster. Even so, they had no choice but to remain in each other’s lives; at least until The Bride was born.