Remembrance
Alucard did truly like the new Sir Hellsing. He'd known him since he was a lad in a diaper, taught him to ride horses, and been delighted when the teenager had told him off for the first time. He'd be a fine Master, and Alucard had no qualms about leaving his welfare in the man's hands.
But he wasn't Abraham.
The vampire had taken Mary and Abraham's bed down to the dungeons where he stayed, and for years, it had been his habit to burrow into the coverings, drawing the faintest traces of scent out of the fabrics. It had been reassuring, a ghost of a memory of how he had been loved, of the man who had been his redemption and the woman that had helped to raise the young man now ruling him.
The scent had become fainter and fainter, and tonight, no matter how he fluffed up the mattress or how hard he pressed into it, that last, teasing reminder of his first true family...was gone. It now remained only in his memory. The clothes in the closets had long vanished, the traces of scent lingering in Abrahams old office chair, now gathering dust in the corner of his own room, all gone. But in lying on the bed, blankets piled about himself, he'd been able to take in their scent, and imagine himself back with them, expecting at any minute to feel Abraham wake, and curse him for stealing the blankets and leaving his master to freeze.
And now, that faint comfort was gone.
While his new master might respect him, like him, and accept the responsibility of controlling him, he was no Abraham, his wife no Mary.
And he never thought to ask why his vampire was so quiet and withdrawn.