Have you ever come back to your college dorm (Salem State University of all places; if the irony didn't hit you smack in the face, I envy you) at ten at night after seeing a play, so hungry that you would have eaten your posters? Except you didn't have anything except a box of triscuits and a jar of nutella?
So I finished my box of nutella and stale-ass crackers, and was like holy shit I should totally write some fanfic because I'm feelin' nostalgic and stuff. Also I should stop being a douche.
It was more complicated than that, but that's what I felt now. And stuff. Luckily my writing style hasn't changed much – it's just gotten weirder – so I can just jump right back in and ew, I had no fucking idea how to write horror. God I suck.
Disclaimer: I don't own Hellsing. Also, your goddamn face.
I don't even know what the fuck I was going to name this chapter. I suck. Most of my absence can be explained by the fact that I lost my notes for it, and then stopped writing fanfic for so long that now it's really, really weird to write with other people's characters. But Alucard is probably one of the most fun characters ever to write, so I wanted to get back into it because with my original stuff I have to be logical and make sense and ew, that's too hard right now let's write about blood and guts.
Still don't have my notes. Writing by the seat of my pants it is!
EDIT: FF . NET. ARE YOU STICKING ALL MY ITALICIZED WORDS TOGETHER? STOPPIT AND GO MAKE ME A SAMMICH.
xxx
Winter Will Come
Epilogue: Home Again
xxx
When Seras stepped out of the airport, she noticed that it had begun to snow. The entire city had taken on a much lighter tone – suddenly the sharp steel of the buildings had been blunted by the weather, forcibly turned soft and gentle and white. She took a deep, unnecessary breath, feeling the cold sting her dead lungs, and grinned. There was barely any salt in the air; there were no cries of gulls or the soft hiss of waves.
It felt like home again.
There were several taxis dropping off their passengers in front of the airport when Seras stepped out into the snow. She picked one near the end, knowing most of the other people would rather squabble over the closer ones, to ensure the least amount of walking with their luggage as possible. Seras had no luggage – the two coffins were being picked up by Hellsing officials, but she didn't want to wait so long to tell Integra about Alucard. She jogged briskly over to the cab, the thin layer of snow turning a simple task difficult.
The cabbie gave her a tired smile in the rearview mirror when she slid into the backseat, her feet tingling. They seemed to say, You have been sitting for six hours, and now more sitting? Seras gave her toes a wiggle, promising them she would run all the way from the street up to the mansion, if only they would put off going to sleep for another twenty minutes.
"Where to?" the driver asked, and she told him. Seras almost missed the accent of her last driver, who had chatted with her while driving her back to Logan Airport. She hadn't said much back, thinking too much about the last time she had been at Logan and of her master being held up for carrying guns.
Alucard hadn't been seen since destroying Whitney. At first Seras had thought he had simply returned to the dorm to recover from the fire, but when he didn't appear from his room the next night, she had gone in and looked into his coffin and found it empty. Morgan said he was dead, but when they brought in Whitney's remains, there had been nothing to suggest that Alucard's ashes were among Whitney's. Seras had searched the beach grass for anything that suggested Alucard had burned to ash.
"He was so old, Seras, he probably blew away in the wind." Morgan's stump was healing well, and she was probably home by now, or in physical therapy. Or caring for Logan, who was doing well too, but needed a little more time to recover from the blood loss and the magical backlash of releasing an underdeveloped familiar for so long, and so far away.
But she doesn't know, Seras thought, leaning her head against the cold window. The last time he turned to nothing, he left a seal. We had something left. He's somewhere. Down on the floor of the backseat, a shadow appeared, its smile mouthing the word plotting. Then eventually.
Seras hoped Alucard wasn't still in America. The things he could eventually plot there were inconceivable.
"Did you have a long flight, miss?" the driver asked, giving her haggard body a quick look from the rearview mirror.
"It was a little rough." The Salem Institute had made her travel arrangements this time, except they had said that she was a grieving family member of the two bodies in the coffins, instead of actually saying that she was one of the corpses. So she had had to travel across running water without the benefit of being her coffin. She was old enough to do it, but not old enough to stop the constant nausea and the inability to sit still. Seras worked up a smile for the driver to negate her pale complexion.
"I'm just happy to be home," she added after a short pause.
xxx
Seras had told the cabbie the address of a little house a mile or so from the Hellsing estate. The house's residents watched her from their windows, their eyes curious. For years they had had cabs drop strange people onto the sidewalk in front of their house. Their parents talked of the nights they saw fire on the horizon. Their children saw it as a right of passage to see how close they could get to the strange mansion. Seras waved at them as she got out of the cab and they hid again.
She paid the driver and hid an extra two pounds in the coins she dropped into his hand. The estate was only a short run away, one that she could do without breaking a sweat. But, while she knew she had to tell Sir Integra about Alucard possibly being loose in America with plans to burn the world down, she didn't want to do it so soon.
So instead she walked through the woods, as slow as a human talking a walk on a nice, crisp winter evening, and thought about what she was going to say to Integra.
On the plane, despite the fact that her heels had dug into the floor because of the constant pins and needles, Seras had gone over everything that had happened. The Salem Institute had indeed been set up by a former Nazi, except somewhere down the line the need to take over the world with vampires had turned into a hatred for vampires and the need to destroy them all. Whitney had possibly been the actual head of the Edgar Brigade, but no one had the motivation to check now that every high-ranking member had been killed in one way or another. Seras knew the whole thing was fishy and it was probably going to come back to bite them with a fourth attempt at something disastrous by someone connected in some way to Millennium, but she had been tired and depressed about her master's disappearance.
But Seras hadn't been able to think of a way to tell Integra that Alucard was either dead, or had run away, fed up with doing missions for a master that he was no longer really bound to.
The mansion's walls started to appear between the trees far sooner than Seras wanted them too. She hadn't even begun to think of what to say, and had simply spent the entire time worrying. Productively. She had gone into a small trance, and there were snowflakes on her eyelashes, which she blinked away.
The guards at the gate welcomed her back, and neither of them asked where Alucard was. They looked relieved to not have to deal with the other vampire.
I'll just go in and tell her, Seras thought, even though it was harder than it sounded. Should she ease Integra into it? No, better tell her right away, any other way would be insulting.
In the mansion, the halls stretched on forever, familiar and foreboding at the same time. The feeling of being home again was being overshadowed by the feeling of losing Alucard again. Seras had thought that, after the first time, it wouldn't be so bad. But now it was worse; up until she saw the empty coffin, Seras had thought he was simply sleeping off his injuries.
Instead of taunting or teasing her, Pip slid out of her arm and disappeared into the walls.
"What, no ominous eventually?" she asked the wallpaper, raising her hands and wiggling her fingers.
No, I think I'm good. There was a chuckle; a painting shook. Seras gave the wall a gentle kick and continued up to Integra's office.
Strangely, opening the door to Integra's office was easy. She didn't hesitate, grabbing the door handle and pushing it down with the heel of her hand. It was automatic. But then, when she stepped into the office, seeing Integra sitting in her chair, a small ceramic lamp casting a warm glow over the book in front of her. Integra looked up when Seras came in and gave her a smile.
Seras should have noticed something right then, and she kind of did. Sir Integra never smiled so easily. But Seras shook it off as Integra being glad to see her and Alucard; except there was no Alucard.
"Seras –," she began, triggering all of the worry and fear and sadness to pour out of the Draculina.
"I'm sorry Sir Integra," Seras said softly, unable to look up from her shoes. "Alucard's disappeared and he might be dead but he might be planning to take over Washington and attempt world domination. We might need to call Morgan and tell her so she and her witches can prepare in case it happens. And I should have told you sooner that I suspected Alucard of thinking about defecting and -." Her voice has steadily risen until it was almost a cry, and Integra had to put a finger to her lips to make her quiet again. "But…"
"I don't think Alucard will appreciate you talking about him like he's in the room," she said, her smile becoming a smirk. After a moment of Seras staring at her, too stunned to speak, Integra pointed to the wall next to the door.
Alucard was sleeping on his back on the hard couch Integra had always kept for company. He was in full battle armor, as he had been while fighting Whitney, with his broadsword on the floor beside him, a dangling arm still grasping it loosely. His hair pooled on the floor, the ends singed and jagged but the rest of it healthy. Seras could see a few pink burns on his neck and under his chin, where the skin was a little thin from a baboon's attack, but his face was devoid of any scaring and his beard and moustache were thick.
"He came back…" Seras walked over slowly and looked down. Alucard's face looked immeasurably tired, with lines under his eyes. He breathed.
Looking at her book again, Integra said, "He came home a few nights ago, burnt to hell. He's gotten blood on that couch for the umpteenth time. Seras, are you crying?"
Seras was. But she was smiling as well.
xxx
I was so close to finishing this in a single month, and then a weird sequence of events completely fucked me up and dragged this on for nearly two years. I never forgot about it though, and you all have no idea how happy I am to finish it because every time I thought about it I was all guilty and shit.
Queen Adelia is to thank for this, in part. She made me feel guilty to the point where I forced my ass to write. Except that sucked and I ignored everything until today. I watched a Hellsing OVA and now I'm back,bitches. I've new story ideas and everything. I'm going to remake an old OC Hellsing story (not the one with Willow), because I find it easier working with OCs than straight Hellsing characters. And then a one shot that's a secret.
Review Responses: This is kind of like awkwardly meeting someone you haven't seen in years and of course you need to give them back their spoon. Sorry guys, have your spoons back.
MissSexyRain: I loved the idea of Alucard having Schrodinger as a familiar, like his hellhound, where he could come out his back and shit. Except to me it was less cute and dangerous and more deliciously evil.
Queen Adelia: Gimme a hug through the internet, gurl. Except you might not want to, because my writing had gotten significantly more creepy. And I was busy, but not enough to warrant not updating. I had such a hard time for a while; I've written so much with my original characters lately, it's hard to write fanfic. Its creepy. But lately I've had a bit of a block with my own fiction, and I'm finding it easier to write with Alucard, because oh god.
Oh god it's terribly fun.
I didn't forget anyone though. Always thought of you, darling ;D Now isn't that endearingly horrifying?
Master of the Boot: A year and a half ago, I may have laughed because I so totally knew I was bringing Alucard back. I am a horrible person but I hope you'll forgive me 8D Next time I promise Alucard will be less of a babby. Actually, I think that's impossible, but dammit I will try.
Aldedron: I hope you're still eager after a year :/
End responses
Bitches let's put this thang up and blow everyone's minds.
Also, if anyone is coming to Salem for Halloween, I will be here, dressed up as Diamonds Droog from Homestuck (which I will not be writing about, don't worry. Strictly Hellsing for me). I will be happy to show you around this lovely city and and help you stay safe, just send a PM my way.
