Date: Sat, 29 Jan 2000 

I cannot take credit for the main characters here.  This is the third story
in my incredibly silly series.  It immediately follows "Honeymoon Horror."

There is some innuendo and rude language, but no more than you'd catch on
television.  Permission is granted to archive - if anyone is of a mind to do
so.
Please send all comments to Elise at HYPERLINK
mailto:ejdeal@sga.quik.com

Okay, this last part gets really strange, but I swear to you on my
Electrolux that it IS entirely possible to get oneself caught in such a
fashion. :o)


LaCroix's Lament, Part 4 of 4
By Elise


     Natalie had put LaCroix in the kitchen with explicit instructions for
cleaning.  Although he had never done such menial tasks, he had to admit to
himself that there was some degree of satisfaction available from cleaning.
When one cleaned, one received immediate physical proof that one's efforts
had made a difference.  Cleaning is much like war, the ex-General thought to
himself.  If you wash a dish, you can see that the result of your efforts
immediately.  If you kill your opponent in battle, the results are also
immediately obvious.  Before he knew it, he was whistling a happy tune.
     Suddenly, a piercing shriek rent the air - a shriek along with a low
grinding noise.  "Lucien!  Help!"
     "Natalie?" he yelled.  LaCroix dropped the glass he had been washing,
and it shattered on the floor.  Without hesitation, he leapt forward,
yelling.  "I am coming!"  With all the speed he could muster, the General
hurled himself towards the bedroom.
      The low grinding noised had ceased, but Natalie's screams for help and
cries of pain continued.    In his headlong rush, LaCroix forgot he no
longer possessed the grace of a vampire, and tripped over Natalie's shoes
lying on the floor.  He flew, a flight most unlike any in which he had ever
engaged, into the bedroom head first and landed on the floor next to the
Natalie's screeching form.
     "What is it?" he bellowed.  Clambering to his knees, he regained his
balance and wrinkled his nose in distaste at the smell of burning human
flesh.
     Natalie sat stiffly on the floor at the foot of the bed earnestly
clutching in both her hands the hose attachment of the vacuum.  Tears
streaming down her face, Natalie pleaded for his help.  "The vacuum has
sucked up my foot!  I can't get it off.  It's stuck."
     "What do you mean it is stuck?" LaCroix demanded.
     "I was vacuuming barefoot and pulled the vacuum over my foot," Nat
explained as best she could.  Her face was red, and she was obviously in a
lot of pain.  "The beater bar sucked my toes up and around the bar
backwards.  I turned it off, but it's still burning, and I can't get the
damn thing off."
     LaCroix grabbed the hose and pulled, but his efforts were met by Nat's
screams.
     "Do something!" she yelled.  Poor Natalie was fighting back panic by
now.
     Grabbing the bedside telephone, LaCroix frantically began dialing 911.
                          
                     *     *     *     *     *

     Schanke had stayed quiet for as long as he could.  The silence lasted
all of twelve minutes.  Then he began chattering away, convinced that his
partner needed to be cheered up.  He had just launched into his fifth "safe
topic."  "Yeah, Jenny's third grade teacher, Mrs. Zolkowski, is having a
baby."  He shook his head side to side.  "Man, I tell ya, Myra and I had a
rough time trying to weasel out of that explanation.  Oh, and get this,
Partner.  She's having triplets!  Can you believe it?  So Friday will be her
last day at school.  Her doctor's ordered complete bed rest for her."
     "Hey, De Brabant."  Randy Montgomery was back.  His voice sounded odd.
     Nick steeled himself and looked up into the big man's liquid brown
eyes.  "What is it, Montgomery?" he asked, surprised to hear that his voice
sounded normal.
     "Just got wind of a 911 emergency call.  Came from Natalie's apartment.
Thought you might....."  But Officer Randall Montgomery never got the chance
to finish his sentence.
     Nick bolted from his desk, knocking Officer Montgomery to the floor
(which he thoroughly enjoyed), and dashed out of the building.  He took to
the sky as soon as possible, vowing to completely dismember LaCroix.

                    *     *     *     *     *

     Nick landed on the balcony of Natalie's apartment.  He couldn't see
past the closed draperies, but the sound coming from Natalie's bedroom
chilled his blood.
     "If you will just lie on your back, Natalie," LaCroix was saying in
a calm voice, "I believe I could be more effective in this attempt."
     "Hurry, LaCroix, I can't take it anymore!"  Natalie's voice was panicky.
     "If you would just hold still a second, I think I could reach the...."
     "Please be gentle.  The skin is burned there."
     "Almost done, almost."  LaCroix's voice was rising.
     "Get it out now!" Natalie screamed.  "You're hurting me!"
     That was all Nick needed to hear.  Smashing through the window, he
blurred into the bedroom.  His eyes a glowing amber, his fangs ready, Nick
leapt onto LaCroix, pinning him to the floor.
     "Did I not tell you I would kill you if you touched Natalie?" Nick
roared.
     But before LaCroix could answer or Nick could strike, the room was
inundated by EMT's.  Hastily and with great effort, Nick managed to quell
his beast.  Slowly he stood and turned to watch the unbelievable sight.
     "What's the problem here?" the first technician asked.  His name tag
identified him as Pete.
     "Her toes are stuck in the vacuum," LaCroix explained.  "And I think
Lancelot here, just broke my nose."  LaCroix stood, hand to his nose, and
faced the confused paramedics.
     "Do what, Buddy?" Pete's partner, Dan, asked.
     "Yep," Pete called over his shoulder where he knelt bay Natalie's side.
"Toes are caught upside down around the beater bar.  Don't know how in hell
we'll fix this one.  I guess we'll just have to take her to the emergency
room."
     "Give me something for pain, or I'll do it myself," Natalie told them.
She let go of the hose now that Pete had a firm grip on it and began digging
around in his medical bag.
     "Hey, you can't do that!"
     "The hell I can't!  I'm a doctor," Natalie was nearly hysterical.
     Nick dropped to her side.  "Nat, love, what can I do?"
     "Make that mean man give me some drugs, Nick," she cried.  "And make
that buffoon stop laughing."  She pointed to Dan, who was struggling not to
laugh.
      After Pete administered something for the pain, the four men loaded
Natalie, along with the vacuum, onto the stretcher and into the ambulance.
Together they rode in strained silence (because no one dared laugh in front
of Natalie) back to the hospital.
     LaCroix, whose nose was not broken, was left to finish the cleaning
alone.  Nick had informed him before leaving that, he would pay for the
broken window, but LaCroix was not to bother them again for the next two
weeks.
                           *     *     *     *      *

      Nick held the vacuum steady as the paramedics unloaded Natalie and the
stretcher.  The emergency room staff was flabbergasted.  No one had ever
removed a vacuum from a person's foot before.  The doctor on duty, a
surgeon, began laughing immediately.  "I don't see that there's anything I
can do, unless you want me to amputate," he told them.
     Natalie, feeling much less pain now, grabbed him by the shirt front.
"You listen to me, Jim Anderson, and you listen well," she told him. "You
get this damn vacuum off my toes, or so help me, you'll be my next patient."
     Suddenly sobered, Dr. Anderson choked back his laughter.  "Natalie
Lambert!"  He had finally recognized his patient.  "All right," he muttered
and ran a hand through his thinning gray hair.   "Get Raymond out here fast."
     "Raymond Sanders, the neurologist?" Natalie asked in surprise.
     "No," Dr. Anderson confessed. "Raymond the janitor."  Turning, he
shouted, "Tell him to bring his tool box."
                              *     *     *     *     *
     Within two hours time, Natalie was sent home with her foot wrapped up
like Amenhotep.  The vacuum pieces were sent home in a box with her.
Amazingly, nothing was broken, and her skin had only minor burns.  It seemed
the vacuum had fared the worse.
     Nick set her down gently on the bed.  He was horrified to think how
jealous he had been over her.  Never had he been this jealous over a woman.
Not even Janette and her countless affairs had incensed him as the mere
thought of Natalie being with another man.  He had nearly killed LaCroix
tonight.  Randall Montgomery was another mortal whose life was held by a
thread tonight.  Nick still wanted to rip his head from his body.
     There was only one way Nick could be sure he wouldn't kill someone in a
fit of jealousy. He would have to bring Nat across.  He could see it clearly
now.  If they joined in the Dark Marriage, they would be forever bound to
one another.
     Nick didn't want to bring her over, didn't want to damn her for all
eternity, but there was no other way.  Doing so would prevent an untold
number of deaths due to his all consuming jealousy.
     "Nat," he ventured.  "Would you marry me?"
     She stared at him as if he had lost his mind.  "Nick, we are married,
well, in name anyway."
     He smiled timidly at her.  "I mean, would you allow me to bring you
across and join me in the Dark Marriage?"
     "What?  But you said." Natalie trailed off in confusion.  She stared
intently at him.  "What changed your mind?"
     Nick shrugged.  "I love you, Nat, more than I knew."
     She knew she would have to live with that answer until she could get
more out of him.  Slowly, she nodded her head in agreement.  "Okay, Nick,
I'll marry you all over again.  What do I have to do?"
     Nick's face shone with happiness.  Slowly, he closed his eyes and
allowed the beast to the forefront of his consciousness.  His eyes began to
glow a deep amber color.  Fangs extended, he looked deeply into Natalie's
warm hazel eyes filled with trust and love.  "Just close your eyes, Nat, and
let me love you."


The end, maybe