Chapter 10: Echoes
Alucard
Seras… Victoria… Victoria…
The police girl's name was drifting around in his mind like a leaf in a spring breeze. He stared up at the ceiling, as if it might tell him why the hell her name was in his head in the first place.
He'd passed out somewhere between noon and two p.m., having given up on trying to bring himself to do what he'd planned to. When he'd woken up, those two words, the name of the person, the anomaly, that had thrown his life off-balance, was echoing in his head like the last words of a loved one.
His head was thrown back over the top of the sofa, his legs spread and his arms flopping at his sides. He felt like a ragdoll, lifeless and drained. He was too drunk to do anything productive anyway, he told himself, trying to justify not returning any of his boss's phone calls.
Integra had been constantly calling him both his home and personal number, each call going straight to voicemail. She'd probably get pissed enough to come down to his house and drag his ass back to the office, but it's not like he'd do anything different once he was there.
Bang, bang, bang!
The sound of fists battering against his front door came from somewhere behind him.
He didn't even blink in response.
"Alucard, open the door," Integra's voice called, muffled through the layers of wood and brick between them. "Alucard!"
He sniffed sharply, feeling the beginnings of a sneeze tickling the inside of his nose, but didn't make any other indications that he was alive.
"Open the goddamn door or I'll break it down," she threatened, banging on the door again.
"Bray it an yoo pay foh it," he mumbled back half-heartedly. His words, though clear in his mind, came out slurred from all the time he'd spent with his good friend red wine in the past twelve hours.
Victoria… Seras Victoria…
"I found your spare key," Integra told him, "I'm coming in."
He groaned, rolling onto his side, falling onto the sofa. It was too short for his large stature, so his calves hung off the edge, the sofa only supporting him from the knees up.
"Noooo," he tried to protest, his voice getting lost in the springy sofa cushion.
He heard Integra unlock the door and slam it shut behind her. Her felt her heavy footfalls vibrating through the floorboards. He absently made a note to tell her that she walked like an ape the next time he was physically able to.
He felt a pang of regret working its way from the centre of his chest outwards. With how easily Integra Anderson had been able to get into his house, let alone find out where he lived, he was yet again reminded of how dangerous a place his home was for that police girl. He wondered why he'd thought it was a good idea in the first place. He wondered how much it would cost him to either change the locks or move houses.
"Oh, for fuck's sake, Alucard," he heard her say. Everything sounded like he was underwater. He started to question whether or not he was still in his living room after all, or if maybe Integra had thrown him into Lake Ontario and he just hadn't realized it yet.
"Get up," his boss demanded tonelessly. She clearly didn't want to waste any time, but he didn't care about what she wanted. She didn't matter right now. What mattered to him was why the room was spinning so damn much.
When he didn't so much as twitch in response to her voice, Integra exhaled sharply through her nose. He heard her approach, and felt something feebly latching onto his arm.
"Get up willingly or I'm dragging you upstairs," she told him firmly, as she tugged on his bicep. "You smell like a brewery. You need a shower."
He grunted, annoyed, into the sofa cushion, feebly trying to swat her away.
"No shower? Okay," she said, calmly, "Time for work then," she told him, her voice straining as she used her entire bodyweight to heave him off of the sofa. "You've spent enough time sulking at home. You need to get out of here."
Integra succeeded in her efforts, draping his heavy arm around her shoulders, supporting his wine-soaked body with her own.
He looked at her, his eyes half lidded. His brows were drawn together in a tight line of confusion, his eyes not quite focused on her.
"Did yoo always look dis uglee?" he slurred, tilting his head quizzically. He genuinely didn't believe the person half-carrying, half-dragging him through his house was Integra. Integra's face was more… symmetrical.
"Uh huh, real funny," she said, unamused, as she dropped him into the passenger seat of her car. She got behind the wheel and buckled him in before taking off towards their office building.
He shut his eyes as the world sped by him, trying to settle his ever-churning stomach.
Seras… Victoria…
The shrill beeping of my phone alarm filled the kitchen, startling me. I jumped, pushing my chair back away from the table, away from the dystopian landscape of paperwork that now adorned the kitchen table.
I quickly crossed the kitchen and shut off the alarm, my heart beating a thousand times per second. I'd completely forgotten about the alarm, even though it went off every day at the same time, reminding me to eat since I had a habit of forgetting to do so.
I pocketed my phone as I cracked open the fridge, grabbing a small bottle of orange juice. I opened the lid and took a large sip, taking it with me to the table.
I sat back down at the table, fiddling with the bottle's cap as I tried to process everything I'd read in the past few hours.
The contents of the files had been pages and pages of notes, print-out documents, and report sheets, all marked with the crest of the Hellsing Organization, all with my father's name watermarked onto the sheets. The paperwork hadn't been borrowed or acquired through asking the government for permission to use them. They were my father's. He'd written, edited and compiled all of the information in the files himself, and based on the way it was presented, the only way that such a thing could have been possible was if my father was, at some point, and employee of Hellsing.
The pages were dated before I was born, before I think my dad even knew my mom. He'd mentioned before that he hadn't always been a policeman, but never told me what he'd done before. I don't know why I never considered Hellsing as a possibility.
I chewed on the plastic rim of the juice bottle, wondering what had driven him to leave Hellsing, or if he'd been fired or forced to quit. Hellsing obviously would have paid better and had better benefits, but for some reason, he left, and it didn't make sense. There was no doubt that the work my dad did for the police was exciting and rewarding, but there's only so much he could do for the city as a police officer. Working for Hellsing, the government, he would have had access to much more information and more complex cases, which I know he would've loved. So why did he leave it all behind?
Aside from where the papers were from, their contents surprised me as well.
My dad had been investigating the Iscariot gang and whatever business they'd been running in the city. Specifically, he'd been looking into the leader of the gang, a man only referred to by my dad as Anderson, as well as Anderson's second in command, whose name he'd been unable to identify. Apparently, Anderson's underling had fled the Iscariot and went rogue. My dad had thought this was strange, and wanted to learn more about it, but couldn't get any information out of any former or current Iscariot members.
I set the cap for the juice bottle down on the table, next to the bottle itself in one of the few paper-free spots on the table.
I'd looked up to my father my entire life. Without my mom around, I only had him to rely on, and I thought he felt the same with me. We were the only family we had. We shared a very close, open relationship, and we didn't keep things from each other. I never felt like I needed to hide anything from him, but he clearly felt that his past was too much for me to handle. Judging from the way my stomach turned just before reading all of the documents, I'd say he was right.
I understood that he likely wanted to protect me by keeping all of it from me, maybe even prevent me from working at Hellsing for whatever reason had caused him to leave, but I still felt slightly betrayed. There wasn't anything in there that wasn't all that jarring. None of the information made me feel anything, except for learning their origins. It wasn't the act of hiding this portion of his life from me that made me feel dejected. It was the fact that he clearly didn't trust me enough to tell me, and that hurt.
I chewed on the inside of my cheek, slouching into the chair, wishing I could just ask my dad why he didn't tell me about his time at Hellsing.
Thinking about it, I wondered what other secrets my father might have been hiding. Maybe he'd locked them away somewhere I wouldn't be able to access, or maybe he'd just taken them with him to the grave. Either way, there was a whole part of my father that I didn't know about. It was a connection to the Iscariot, to Hellsing, to why our squad had been at that crime scene in the first place. It wasn't much, but it was a start to figuring out why everything had turned out the way it did. With my dad no longer around to answer the questions he'd scribbled onto the papers of the files in front of me, I think I owed it to him to find the truth on my own.
Alucard
The lights above him buzzed like a faraway swarm of locusts, their yellowish glow making the back of his throat dry with nausea. His office was hot, or maybe he was just overheating. He couldn't tell. His palms were sticky with stale sweat, the pits of his pale grey button down were stained a slightly darker shade.
He sat at his desk, hunched over the keyboard of his desktop computer. He held his head in his hands, propped up by his elbows. He was supposed to be working, or coming out of his drunken stupor, or something. His boss hadn't been all that clear, and so he just sat there, wondering how the lights could be so noisy.
His inhaled sharply as he lifted his head up, dropping his hands onto his desk. He stared at his computer monitor, at the homepage of the Hellsing Organization's private database. He watched the little typing icon blink in and out of existence in the empty search bar. He was backed up on cases and should've been looking into something he'd neglected for weeks now. Instead, he just gazed at the screen.
He blinked. He had an idea.
He clicked on the tab marked 'Employee Records,' and was greeted by a list of alphabetically organized names and ID numbers, along with a different search bar.
He brought his fingers to the keys, hesitant to type. He wasn't sure if he wanted to find anything on what he was looking for, but he was going to try anyway. He'd rather know and be displeased than never know and be constantly wondering.
After absently drumming his fingers against the keys for a minute or so, he eventually began entering 'VICTORIA' into the last name search.
One record came up, for a Mr. Andrew Victoria.
I knew her name sounded familiar, he recalled.
When he'd first been hired by Integra, some guy named Victoria was in charge of all of the Iscariot-related cases that he was currently investigating. He remembered Integra saying something about him having to leave for personal reasons, but didn't care enough about the guy to ask anything more at the time. Why would he? He only had a job because Victoria's leaving conveniently opened up a spot for him.
He clicked on the name, and was given pages and pages of information on the man's personal life, as well as scanned copies of all case files and notes he'd made while working at Hellsing.
Sighing at the sheer amount of information, he began to read through the documents, going through the personal ones before the professional ones.
Name: Andrew Victoria
Relatives: Margaret Victoria (spouse, deceased), Seras Victoria (child).
Status: Former employee; deceased.
He skimmed all of the basic information until he arrived at a section labelled "Dismissal Remarks." He read it over carefully, looking for anything that stood out.
He learned that Andrew Victoria worked at Hellsing twenty years ago. He handed in his resignation after learning that his wife was pregnant and didn't want to be involved in Hellsing's business with a child coming into the picture. Victoria moved on to policing to continue his work in the justice system, and have more time for his family.
He scrolled down for more information.
Victoria's wife was murdered by an unknown perpetrator approximately four years after his departure from this organization. He claimed the attacker was a member of the Iscariot gang, but refused to elaborate on his allegation any further. He attempted to breach Hellsing's private servers for information on the gang that was company property, ultimately failing. He continues to intervene in private investigations into Iscariot activity, despite warnings of arrest for violating his departure contract. Victoria is to be closely monitored to prevent the jeopardizing of any further company interventions related to the Iscariot gang.
Just below that passage was a small, handwritten note.
Update: Victoria was killed while investigating a homicide case marked by this organization as off-limits to all police personnel.
First her mom, then her dad, he thought to himself, scratching at the stubble that was growing along his jawline. He reminded himself that he needed to shave.
Leaning back into his chair, he began to process what he'd learned.
I guess I am going to have to make that phone call, he resigned. But I'm going to go home and shower first, he decided after catching a whiff of his own odor.
A high-pitched ringing wrenched me out of whatever dream-land I'd fallen into in the past few hours.
I threw my head back, my arms flailing as I tried to determine where the ringing was coming from. I groaned aloud, annoyed at myself for passing out at the table for the second time that day. I was in desperate need of real sleep.
The phone! I realized, my mind still foggy.
In a rush to get to the receiver, my forearm side-swiped the uncapped juice bottle I'd left on the table, knocking it over. The bottle clattered as it emptied what remained of its contents onto the kitchen floor.
"Crap, crap, crap," I repeated through gritted teeth as I hurried to the landline cradle, only to find it empty.
I sprinted to my room to retrieve it from the floor by my bed, where I'd left it that morning. Grabbing the still ringing device, I hurried back to the kitchen, pulling sheets of paper towel off of the roll on the countertop.
I dropped to my knees and began to soak up the spilled juice as I answered the call.
"Hello?" My voice came out strangled by my attempts at holding it properly while also cleaning up the mess.
"Uh, hi," came the reply.
I dropped onto my bottom, sitting cross-legged across from what remained of the spill. My legs flopped out in front of me, landing in the puddle of orange juice. My jeans began to soak up the juice, but I didn't notice.
I felt my mind go blank and my mouth go dry. Silence followed as I fought back tears, my hands shaking as the sound of heartbeat filled my ears. I immediately felt angry with myself for becoming so affected by a phone call. I hated myself for the way I felt.
I felt anger starting to surface behind my tears, causing my fingers to tremble more violently.
He threw me out like I was nothing but garbage to him, like I was an inconvenience, and worst of all, I agreed with him. My father wasn't supposed to be at that house so many nights ago. I wasn't supposed to be there, I wasn't supposed to lose anything. None of this was supposed to happen. I wasn't supposed to be a part of his life, so of course I was a burden. I meant nothing to him before all of this, and I meant nothing now. He had no reason to be calling. He'd made it clear that didn't want anything to do with me, and yet there he was, on the other end of the phone.
"Kid?" Alucard prompted, "You there?"
I blinked a few times, my lips unsticking from one another. I cleared my throat to prevent my voice from cracking as a few hot tears slid down my cheeks. "Yeah, hi, I –"
"We need to talk," he interrupted, "It's important."
I switched the phone to my other hand as I began to absently work on the spill again, trying not to focus on what either of us were really saying. "Okay…"
"I'm coming over," he stated, "I'll be there in an hour."
"Wait!" I started, dropping the mostly-soaked blob of paper towels I was holding onto the floor, but it was too late.
The dial tone buzzed into my ear, mimicking my shallow breaths.
I sat in the remains of my mess, my eyes and my throat burning with confusion and frustration, my legs cold and wet.
I didn't know what was happening, or why it was happening all of a sudden. Everything had been so out of control, moving too quickly for me to properly get a hold of.
Sitting where I was, I watched the orange juice seeping into the paper towels and the fabric of my jeans. I was unmoving, still for the first time in ages. The sounds of the world were silenced by my thoughts, placing me in a quiet, motionless bubble. I was far from at peace, but I was not panicking either. I just… was.
I didn't know how long this nothingness would last, so I sat there, enveloped by it so that perhaps it wouldn't end. Perhaps this strange, empty peacefulness wouldn't fade into the chaos that had taken over my life.
Author's Note: Well alright then. We're really getting into now, aren't we? Ha ha, this still has a long way to go so I can't give an estimate of how many chapters there will be altogether, but Alu and Seras still have a long road ahead of them. On a completely unrelated sidenote: I saw SHINee in concert on the 19th and I am a changed woman. They are actual kings, gods even. I'm in a heavy post concert depression stage right now, but it'll pass. Anyway! Thanks for checking out this story and thank you for your patience with these updates in regards to my schedule. Thanks for reading!
-Shan
