A/n: Hi guys! I'm sorry about making another late update! School is once again getting in the way of all my wants and wishes. *sigh* Hopefully, people are still interested in the story I have to tell.
Please enjoy and review! Questions and constructive criticisms are welcome as well!
The Witch House (10)
The demand was nearly drowned out by Seras's startled shriek. Pip swallowed a curse and yanked out his handgun, small and dark enough to be hidden from immediate view.
"Come out with your hands up!" one of the dark figures bellowed in an obviously French accent. Channels of hallway light flooded in, illuminating the DST badges upon their shoulders.
"Suspects have been found in the Commandant's suite," the other was saying into his radio, so quickly he was nearly slurring the words, "Two men and a woman. There is still no sign of Martin or Dupont, though we theorize they may have encountered and engaged with the suspects earlier before going missing. There is no sign of Commandant Petit either. We are outnumbered and…"
The man's voice choked off abruptly.
Alucard had turned without a sound, hands slid casually into his pockets. His dark wild hair was plastered to the sides of his cheeks—all pale flesh stained a horrific red. Without his shadow, the prone and blood-soaked body of Petit was seen strewn across the couch behind him.
"C-Commandant found," the man stuttered out in shock, like he didn't understand what he was seeing. His partner scrambled back several steps into the light, as if the darkness had been snapping at his heels.
"Merde," he whispered, eyes impossibly wide, lips stumbling over French and English, "Dieu…what…fuck…"
"R-Requesting…back-up…"
Alucard's lips stretched in a horrible smile, his red eyes owlish and demonic. He took a step forward.
The guns were yanked up so quickly, Pip was surprised they didn't go flying out of their hands. Seras opened her mouth nervously, as if to say something, but quickly changed her mind and snapped it shut again.
"Don't move!" one of them shouted, hands visibly trembling, "We'll shoot!"
The smile widened. Another step.
"I SAID DON'T MOVE!" the man shouted again, voice speedily turning into a shriek.
They were sweating uncontrollably and their wrists were shaking hard enough that the rattle of their guns echoed in the silence. Pip couldn't help pitying them slightly—a feeling that he'd been experiencing more and more since he'd joined Hellsing.
Alucard looked positively elated, lips peeling back to show glinting blood-stained teeth.
A sharp noise emitted from one of the men, a mixture of fright and swear words and he began backing towards the door. His partner grabbed him by the arm.
"What the fuck are you doing?" his partner hissed in French, though not looking any less terrified, "The hotel's filled with civilians. And the Commandant—"
"Does it look like the Commandant needs our fucking help anymore?! God, do you even…look at his teeth…like a fucking monster's, what kind of freak…"
Pip's eyes widened slightly at their words, gaze sliding sideways toward the admittedly gory and quite-deceased appearing Petit, before he realized the whole thing could potentially be misinterpreted as a murder scene.
It said something about his perspectives after half a year with Hellsing, but Pip chose not to think about it for the moment.
Eager to correct misconceptions though, Pip interrupted their terrified babbling argument at each other, "Wait, you guys, no one's dead here, we were just—"
Shrieks and twin shots of gunfire cut him off abruptly. In hindsight, it occurred to Pip that speaking French out of nowhere, when they'd been seeking refuge behind a language barrier, hadn't been the best idea.
Regardless, both Seras and him jumped a clear feet into the air, the former nearly falling on her butt. Alucard's eyes widened slightly in surprise when the bullets whizzed by his face, missing him entirely.
A wet and fleshy sound, along with something heavy smacking against the couch, made a deafening echo behind them.
Silence.
The two men were cadaver white, shivering and gasping like fish on land.
Seras stood frozen, partially in shock, and gaze misdirected toward the inside of the bathroom. Alucard and Pip both turned to stare behind them.
Petit's head had flopped over the headrest and one of his arms had fallen off the couch, grazing the carpet. Two bullet holes were centered neatly upon his heart—thin trails of crimson trickling out from the man's virtually bloodless body.
"…Well," Pip said into the silence, a little awkwardly, "Never mind."
"P-Putain…" one of the men uttered, having lost all grasp of English, "N-nous l'avons tué…"
No one moved except Alucard.
Within a blink, a cold white hand had embedded its nails into the side of each of the men's heads. They looked dazedly upward, but there was no time to process the bloody red eyes staring down at them, before their skulls were smashed together with a merciless crack.
They fell like string-less puppets, guns clattering to the ground.
Alucard dragged their unconscious bodies into the room with one hand, face astoundingly and unfathomably indifferent, and tossed them at the foot of Petit's corpse. He then reached down and yanked the radio free from one of the men's shirts, sending them an expectant look.
Seras vaguely resembled a deer in headlights. Pip just stared at him.
Alucard nudged meaningfully at one of the bodies with his boot.
He stared some more.
The elder vampire's eyebrow twitched slightly, already getting annoyed that he hadn't been immediately understood. Pip had the random thought that he was waiting to be praised, which actually wasn't a particularly insane idea.
Before he could do anything he would seriously regret however, Alucard stormed over to Seras and grabbed her hand.
We're leaving, Alucard snapped, pulling his fledgling along, Move. Tell that fool to move too.
Seras stumbled forward, startled, clinging onto Alucard's sleeve to keep herself from face-planting into the blood-stickied ground.
"W-wait, leaving?" she stammered, "What happened?"
What do you think? They shot whatever his name was. We need to leave.
Seras's eyes widened, struggling to process the words, "Shot him? How…?"
With their guns, how else? Alucard replied, growing more irritated by the second with the slow reactions. Come with me.
"Wait, wait," Seras said, utterly bewildered, "He's dead?!"
It's always a possibility after a bullet to the heart. Move. Don't make me repeat it if you know what's good for you.
"B-But Master," Seras protested, though she moved hastily after him, calling quickly to Pip to follow, "What were you saying earlier? About that woman being alive?"
Pip stared at them confusedly, "Who's alive?"
Later. Alucard replied in annoyance, walking out into the hallway, There's no time.
The words had barely finished forming before the radio in Alucard's hand blared to life—a flurry of French spewing out and interspersed with crackling static.
Pip's eye widened, and he rushed closer to the radio, practically pressing his ear to the speaker.
"Three teams are coming up this floor," he said, furiously twisting the knobs of his hearing aid, "I think they're putting the hotel on lock-down."
"WHAT?" Seras squawked, before turning incredulously toward Alucard, "Master, you said you wouldn't kill anyone!"
I didn't kill anyone. It's not my fault most humans are cowardly fools.
"You were the one who shot the television and started all this!"
If we're going to get unnecessarily technical, it was actually you who started everything. You made me watch the movie.
"Only because you made me watch Cannibal Holocaust!"
"Mignonette, keep it down," Pip muttered, having only heard Seras's very loud side of the conversation, which was odd enough on its own, "They can probably hear you from a whole floor down."
Almost at the same time, the radio crackled again.
"…sixth floor, the Commandant's suite, suspects currently in hallway…"
Pip spun around in shock, eye darting back and forth down both directions of the hallway. There was no sign of anyone.
"They know where we are…how did they…?"
Alucard dropped the radio onto the ground.
Smash.
Pip whirled back around, nearly spinning off his feet in his haste. The elder vampire lifted his boot up and away from the pile of shrapnel and sparking wires that had been the radio.
"It had a GPS tracker," Seras translated for the stunned frenchman, wringing her hands as she finally began to realize the situation they were in, "What should we do? If there are three squads then they're probably coming from both stairs and the elevator."
Alucard made a soft, chuffing sound—throat unable to actually laugh.
Soldiers are but dim dogs, police girl. You should have no problems escaping them.
"I don't see how," she murmured anxiously, "We're pretty much trapped on this floor."
Alucard breathed out derisively, By dogs? Hardly. Just figure it out. Don't make me come save you.
Seras lunged for Alucard's wrist as soon as he'd shaken her off his arm, eyes almost disturbingly wide.
"What does that mean?! Where are you going?"
Instead of answering, Alucard nonchalantly dipped into his pocket for the pin.
Keep this for now, he ordered, dropping it into the hand that was pried off his wrist, Kill anything that tries to take it.
His fledgling stared, utterly stupefied, but curled her fingers around the jeweled rooster regardless.
"…where are you going, Master?"
Alucard slid his hands back into his pockets, before turning and sauntering toward the wall, To the washroom.
Seras's eyes nearly popped out of her skull. "HUH? Why?!"
Isn't it obvious? He asked flippantly, I can't go see my master with blood on my ascot.
Without waiting or expecting a reply, he vanished into a pool of shadows, leaving a speechless Seras and Pip behind.
"I fail to see how increasing your price should have any relevance at all," Integra snarled, all pretenses of civility long gone, "I could care less about your money."
Several Round Table members immediately began voicing their objections, as per the hellish cycle that had been going on for the past nine hours.
"I don't think you quite understand what exactly it is I'm offering you," Anguis said coolly, ignoring them all, "That house was of great cultural significance and the artifacts that were in there were irreplaceable. Not only did your vampire steal them, but I am now offering you considerable compensation for the usage of that same vampire to help protect innocent civilians as long as you return whatever he took—"
"Stop bringing him into this!" Integra practically roared, "If it was such a culturally important place, why was it in the middle of a swamp with no evident pathways leading to it? What were 'irreplaceable artifacts' doing at such a blatantly insecure location? Your report, which wasn't even conducted appropriately, didn't mention any artifacts at all, most likely because you are pulling this whole story right out of your ars—"
"That's enough, Sir Integra!" Sir Islands thundered, banging his fist hard enough on the table that the people sitting around him jumped.
But before anything more could be said, the doors to the conference room were suddenly thrown open.
Two men hurried in, one the gray-haired chief inspector of Scotland Yard, the other a young and nervous-looking DST agent.
"Pardon me, sirs," the inspector said, appearing frazzled, as he rushed over to whisper something to a surprised Sir Islands while the DST agent did the same to Anguis.
Integra hatefully eyed the man, whose expression was still frozen in a mask of icy congeniality. A day and half a night of sitting through this conference from Hell made it clear that "international relations" had never been on his mind.
Eyes that empty and sharp could never have cared about notions like friendship or cooperation anyway. The way he spoke, cool and precise with a hint of disdainful shallowness, was more akin to a snake in a nest of mice than a diplomat at a conference.
Not to mention the man's repeated insistence of "artifacts" was beginning to gnaw at the last of her temper. Though she practically knew the report by heart, Integra had been unable to convince the council of Anguis's lies.
What's more, the need for such sudden and pointless deception was confounding, especially when it would've been simple to include the facts in. The logical part of Integra thought it was just an attempt to hide incompetence, pinning the blame on an inhuman being like Alucard would avoid offending anyone important. Though the more suspicious side kept wondering if there was more to that decrepit house than had been revealed.
Of course, she also had no way of knowing Alucard hadn't taken anything either.
"I'll kill him," Integra whispered darkly, "I'll absolutely kill him…"
"Pardon, ma'am?" Walter asked in alarm, from where he stood behind her chair.
Before she could reply however, Sir Islands suddenly stood up, his chair scraping sharply against the marble floor.
"If no one has any objections, we will commence a brief recess," he said curtly, and despite considerable vocal objections, he walked swiftly out of the room with the chief inspector at his heels.
Anguis remained in his seat, rapidly conversing in French with the anxious DST agent.
Several members immediately began complaining about the preciousness of their time and sent resentful glances at Integra, who had to fight the urge to roll her eyes in disgust.
Having zero desire to wait in the room with the rest of them, she rose as well, smiling faintly at only a nervous-looking Sir Penwood, before walking out with Walter in tow.
"Your thoughts, Walter?" she asked, leaning against the hallway wall.
"Something valuable must have been there," the butler offered shortly, hands still folded neatly behind his back, "I believe we're currently being scrutinized."
Integra nodded, "Why do you think they asked the Queen to send us on that mission then?"
"It can't be ascertained without more information, but I can hazard a guess that their vampire problem was quite out of control."
Integra snorted bitterly, "I suppose that much makes sense. Look at this goddamn mess. At least she had the courtesy to die."
Walter's mouth tightened slightly, "I actually think we shouldn't be too certain of that."
Integra's eyebrows shot skywards. "What do you mean?"
"If she had incapacitated them by magic, then the effects should have ended the moment of her death. Even if the curse lingered, it would have gotten considerably weaker. At the very least, Alucard should have overpowered it."
"It could be because of the seals," Integra replied, remembering the roosters, "They work as a conduit, don't they? So a certain amount of magic can be stored in them, despite what happens to the original caster."
Walter didn't look convinced.
"Perhaps, but there are many different types of seals. Some are as you said, a kind of permanent storage unit, and others require a link back to the caster, such as Hellsing's own curse seals. Either way, I feel there is a high possibility she's still alive."
Integra nodded again, feeling slightly unnerved by the notion. The thought that the enemy had been labeled a Category C was almost hilarious now. "What did you find out about the roosters?"
"As far as alchemy and witchcraft are concerned, they seemed to have been mostly used as ingredients. None of the archives I've searched through have indicated it held any particular importance after that."
"What were the dates?"
"Mid-17th century to the early-1800s."
"So it's something before the predominance of witchcraft," Integra sighed tiredly, hands itching for a cigar, "Do you think Alucard would know anything?"
Walter opened his mouth to answer, when he caught something dark and shivering out of the corner of his eye. It was a swirling vortex of black and red—an unnatural shadow compared to the faint silhouettes made from the hallway lights.
He smiled wryly, "I believe you can ask him that yourself, my lady."
Integra arched a puzzled eyebrow, before turning to look over her shoulder. She was just in time to catch Alucard's head and torso forming out of the darkness.
"Alucard?!" she nearly screamed, before forcing her voice into a hiss.
A cheery bow and a toothy grin flashed back at her, which usually heralded the coming of some grievous financial disaster.
"What the bloody hell are you doing here?" Integra demanded incredulously, "You're forbidden from leaving grounds."
Alucard's smile simply widened.
"My guess is he had Miss Victoria and Captain Bernadette bring him here," Walter supplied, before she could burst a vein, earning an annoyed scowl from Alucard for spoiling his fun.
"Oh, did they?" Integra said, voice low and deadly, "Well, I'll need to have a talk with both of them later. But since you're already here, Alucard…"
She lunged for the vampire without finishing her sentence, startling both men, while catching Alucard by the collar and wrenching him down to eye-level.
"Did you steal anything from that castle in France?" she growled, cutting straight to the point, "Tell me now. I am currently going through Hell defending your undead arse against the council, so you're going to give me the truth. Did you steal anything?"
Alucard blinked owlishly at her. He tilted his head in question.
"You're being accused of thievery, Alucard," Walter explained after regaining his composure, "The French are saying there were many valuable artifacts at the site that went missing after the mission."
Alucare just stared at them. The genuine confusion in his eyes was enough for Integra to deflate and release him.
"God help you if you're lying," she said, though it was more exasperated resignation than threat, "What are you doing here? I'm in the middle of a meeting."
Alucard's expression remained puzzled. He opened his mouth, lips forming into obvious words, though nothing came out but a weak sigh of air. Brow furrowing in annoyance, he then reached for Integra's hand, before realizing he could only telepathically communicate with Seras at the moment.
"Calm down," Integra said eventually, as he was beginning to look frustrated, "You can just write it down."
"Shall I go fetch a notepad?" Walter offered, already turning back toward the conference room.
Integra hesitated. "…No. I have one."
Stiffly, she produced a small white notebook and pen from her pocket and shoved them in front of the vampire's face.
"Here. I was going to take notes at the meeting."
Alucard blinked at the items. Integra stared holes into one of the buttons of his trench coat, practically feeling Walter's smile beaming into the side of her face.
"As I recall, your intention for this meeting was to insult and depart, Sir Integra," Walter said, a teasing edge to his voice that urged the blood to Integra's cheeks.
"Yes, well, I changed my mind in the car," she replied snippily, and Walter didn't bother addressing the point that she had had the notebook and pen before she'd gotten in the car.
Alucard just gazed curiously at Integra's pocket, as if he was wondering if she had a blood bag in there as well—all emotional subtext flying clear over his head.
"Are you going to take it?" Integra snapped, voice slightly higher than normal, prompting the vampire to accept the items and flip the notebook open.
What artifacts? He wrote simply in neat, slanted script.
An angry sigh rushed pass Integra's lips and she pinched the bridge of her nose. "It's nothing. Just a load of rubbish Anguis made up."
"But they were likely keeping something there that went missing," Walter added, "The natural course of thought would be that one of our agents stole it. You're not human and have no rights, so any flimsy motive could be pinned on you."
"Not to mention most of the council has all but received French citizenship," Integra muttered darkly, "Selfish geezers. This could actually become a political headache if it's pressed enough."
Alucard didn't look even remotely perturbed. She had half a mind to attribute it to his complete incomprehension of human psychology, when he scrawled something down in the notebook.
How did they notice anything was missing?
"They searched the place this morning. The house is apparently a "beloved cultural symbol" or some other shite, so there's a list of minor damages to the porch and walls that I need to deal with too…"
Integra paused, her slender eyebrows arching at Alucard, who was wearing his monster's grin again—crimson eyes glinting with terrible amusement. The pen moved.
The house was burned to the ground.
Both Integra and Walter stared incredulously at the notebook page. The former was the first to recover.
"THOSE FUCKING LIARS!" she screeched, rapidly seeing red.
"Ma'am, please calm yourself," Walter whispered, glancing furtively at the closed conference doors further down the hall. Alucard just continued smiling and pulled his arm back to scribble down more, holding it out for Walter to read this time.
I commend you, Angel, you were correct. That house was indeed protecting a few things.
The butler's eyes narrowed, "Alucard, you were not so foolish as to actually take something, were you?"
The vampire rolled his eyes, looking mildly offended.
That will be the least of your problems for quite some time.
"What do you mean?"
A chilling glee alighted upon Alucard's pale face as his smile widened. France has more filthy secrets than Hellsing could ever hope to. And all of this, right now, is but the surface of an ocean.
"Are you going to continue to be cryptic or actually say something useful?" Integra snapped, feeling incredibly frustrated and slightly unnerved by Alucard's expression. She'd only seen him that eager when he was fighting Alexander Anderson, or something else at his ridiculous level.
They're looking for a talisman, Alucard wrote, It's shaped like a rooster and was being passed off as an official government pin.
"Again with the roosters," Integra muttered, amazed, "Were they worshipped or something back in the Middle Ages?"
It was the image on the stern.
"What?"
Alucard readied his pen, hand nearly blurring from the speed he was writing at.
In the 1700s, a ship secretly drifted into France from Japan. The passengers had been Buddhists fleeing persecution. Of the three hundred that made the journey, only two survived, and the corpses were desiccated and mutilated when they were pulled off the ship. The two survivors had gone insane, babbling about a monster that had snuck on board, and the French government decided to silence the whole affair.
Integra nodded, the story sounding all too familiar to her.
"She's an old one then." As if there weren't enough problems at the moment.
Alucard just grinned strangely and continued writing.
People began disappearing shortly afterwards and rumors circulated about a woman living in the swamp that murdered and consumed people, plucking their eyes out for trophies. The villagers fled in droves and the old castle she took over was named the Witch House. The king issued a special order for the death of the monster and the task was headed by the Anguis family. After three days, they announced their success and claimed her body had disappeared into a cloud of black smoke. Any and all incidents near that swamp have been stripped from record since. However, there's a trail of complaints and demands for government investigation that dates back three hundred years. The first response ever made was a few months ago, when the murders finally began drawing media attention.
Integra and Walter stared at the page for a long time. The silence grew thick and cool.
"I believe a cautious approach would be wise for now," Walter said eventually, giving Integra a serious, careful look, "I doubt they lied to spare us the gory details."
"Do you take me for a fool, Walter?" Integra lashed out, more angrily than she meant to be, "I might as well not even know anything with the amount of leeway I have right now."
Walter didn't reply. Too upset to feel guilty at the moment, Integra ran her fingers haggardly through her hair, cursing herself to high heaven for forgetting her cigars.
She wasn't even sure she had processed the full magnitude of the situation yet, but it was already beginning to make her weak at the knees. And her mind had flown off in eight different directions, drowning her brain with disastrous scenarios. She could see now why her father had never concerned himself with vampire problems in other countries, as the lack of knowledge left her floundering, with no idea how to proceed.
"In any case, the main priority hasn't changed," she said, looking at Alucard, "We need to figure out how to fix the three of you. Since it's clear the French know more about this woman than they've let on, we'll focus on getting whatever information we can."
"For that they would have to admit to three centuries-worth of conspiracy," Walter reminded, unfazed about being snapped at earlier, "And we, as a nation, would be accusing them, which is going to have consequences regardless of right or wrong."
Alucard suddenly flipped to a clean page, scribbling something down with such haste it almost looked important, before he turned the notebook back around to them.
Do you think there will be another war? The last one was too short.
"Can you be concerned with something other than your insatiable blood-lust for just once?" Integra snapped incredulously, "You are mute. You literally have no voice anymore. Your fledgling is blind. And all you're thinking about is having another war?!"
Alucard shrugged, smiling gleefully.
I can't help that, Master. It's been decades since I've had a decent opponent. I'm bored and I don't understand why this situation disturbs both of you so much anyway.
Integra sighed, weary from the core of her soul.
"I don't expect you to," she said, letting the issue go, "Just don't get too worked up. She may not even be alive anymore. The spell could always be using a conduit."
Alucard didn't bother to write anything and simply shook his head.
"How?" Integra immediately demanded, while Walter looked a bit pleased with himself, "You said you blew off her head and the only vampire in existence that can survive that is you."
I did. Alucard looked giddy enough now to start bouncing on the balls of his feet. But I haven't told you the best parts.
"What is this, a fairytale?" Integra scowled, growing more annoyed by the second with her servant's weird behavior, "You really shouldn't get so excited over an ordinary vampire—"
She was interrupted by the notebook being suddenly thrust in front of her face, the paper practically touching her nose. A single sentence was written neatly at the top of the page.
She's not a vampire.
Integra stared blankly. Walter's eyebrows rose to the zenith of his forehead.
A voice behind them suddenly spoke.
"Ah, and who is this, mademoiselle?"
She could smell the musky scent of cologne already. Seras wrinkled her nose in disgust and tugged on Pip's hand, which was wrapped tightly around hers.
"They're a floor down," she said softly, "The smell's getting stronger."
Pip nodded, still a little embarrassed that France's top security agents were wearing cologne in the first place.
"…aren't they on assignment?" he muttered, "This is why I don't understand France."
Seras smacked him lightly on the shoulder.
"You should just be grateful they're wearing it, so we know where they are. Do you see anyone or not?"
Pip edged carefully around the corner they were hiding around and deflated slightly in relief when he saw nothing but an empty corridor. The emergency staircase door stared forebodingly back at him from the end of the hall, ready to explode open with DST agents at any moment.
"Nothing yet?" Seras said, having heard Pip sigh. She got to her feet deftly and pressed the side of her face against the wall. The sound of wing-tipped shoes against concrete thundered in her ears.
"They're climbing the last two flights. The ones in the elevator and the main staircase are probably already searching the other side of this floor. Do you have a plan?"
Pip nodded again, before finally remembering Seras couldn't see it.
"Oui. Once those guys start up the final flight, we'll get in front of the door. When it opens, we'll tackle our way through and then run like hell."
"…"
"…"
"…That's it?"
"…We can scream a little too?"
Seras smacked him again, harder than before.
"What kind of plan is that? You'll get shot, you idiot!"
"Ow! Well what do you want to do then?" Pip hissed back, rubbing his shoulder, "I'm depending on a tiny piece of plastic hanging off my ear right now. And you pretty much can't move on your own. Do you know how fucked we'd be if we got separated?"
Seras chewed her lip in frustration, knowing he was right. It wasn't so much she couldn't move without someone leading—a general idea of the area could be mapped out just based on sound and scent—but that she would have no idea where Pip would be if they got separated.
For all his strength and bravado, he was still human in the end. And though she'd sooner die again than admit it, the fact worried her.
There was no time to plan any further however, when the stairs door slammed open. The sound of footsteps shifting across the carpet echoed the halls and Seras had just enough time to register the metallic sound of guns being clenched between hands, before Pip wrenched her backwards.
He dragged her a few meters soundlessly, while she struggled to regain her footing. It wasn't until the starchy scent of linen hit her nose that she realized he'd pulled her into a suite.
"Well, this isn't good," he muttered belatedly, shutting the door carefully before releasing her hand, "I told you we should've just rushed them."
"If you want to end up as swiss cheese then by all means," Seras snapped, groping her way to the wall. The sounds of footsteps, guns and whispered French tumbled together outside.
Feeling like a fight wasn't worth it, Pip crouched down next to her sullenly. For a moment, the darkness around them was still and silent.
In retrospect, she isn't sure what compelled her to reach into her pocket at that point. Maybe it was by accident or by habit, but her fingers grazed lightly over the jeweled crown of the pin.
A sharp green thread exploded out of the darkness of her vision. It was an icy, putrid feeling—a sensation of something so terribly old her mind could not begin to comprehend it.
Seras rocketed to her feet, every hair on standing on end, and getting a surprised look from Pip.
"Mignonette?" he questioned, scrambling up as well.
Seras didn't answer, gaping blankly at the ceiling, where the thread of energy vanished through.
"What's above this floor?"
Pip stared up at the ceiling as well, trying to see what exactly had caught her interest.
"We're on the sixth floor, so probably the penthouse. Why?"
Seras just grabbed his wrist and started pulling him towards the door.
"We've got to get up there."
"Wha—Why?" Pip stammered, planting his feet firmly on the ground to keep from being dragged, "What are you doing?"
"It's what Master was talking about earlier," Seras said impatiently, still staring at the thread, as it flickered and shimmered an icy green. It was so bright and strange after hours of pitch darkness, she almost thought she was imagining it.
"Yeah, because I heard everything the mute guy said!" Pip snapped sarcastically, beyond bewildered, "Why are we going to the pent—"
"Because the second one is there!" Seras practically screamed, yanking him along, "The second pin is on the penthouse floor!"