Chapter 7

Author's Warning: The following contains graphic scenes of torture.

Seras

The next round of torture began all too soon for her. Seras decided that she had to preserve her strength, so she didn't even try to fight against them as they dragged her out of the room. UV lights were everywhere, and without proper rest in her coffin, Seras could already feel her strength flagging. She had to save her energy for healing and observing her surroundings. She had to try to find a way to get out, or to somehow tell those outside where she was. She snapped out of her thoughts as she was finally dropped in front of Alpha like a sack of meat. Seras looked up at the werewolf leader, and then saw what was behind her. A large cross lay on the ground. Fear filled her heart as she saw that there were also three long silver stakes on the ground in front of her.

"Are they truly worth it?" Alpha asked her, her violet eyes glowing. Seras focused her memories and surrounded the most important information she knew with memories of one thing only, her Harkonnen Cannons. Alpha's mind felt like a dragon made of spikes and magma as she tore through Seras' memories. Seras let her have nearly every intimate detail of her life; her childhood, her parents' murder, joining Hellsing, every intimate moment with Integra, meeting Danny Phantom and his family, battles fought, comrades lost, everything that had nothing to do with important military information was laid bare before Alpha.

Alpha's expression softened as she stared at Seras, and she lifted Seras' chin with her hand. "You were truly a blessed and cursed creature. I can see why you are willing to suffer for them. If I had known others like them, perhaps none of this would have been necessary," Alpha told Seras, before telekinetically lifting Seras up, and making her assume a T-pose. "NO! NO! NNOOOOO!" Seras screamed in fear as she came closer and closer to the cross. "Then tell me what I want to know!" Alpha demanded, "or you shall suffer a fate that only martyrs have! You are disposable! Do you not see that! Do you really think that Integra Hellsing hasn't already replaced you in her bed with Cameron Fenton!?" Alpha telepathically slammed Seras' brain with images of her and Integra in bed and replaced Seras with images of Cameron and Integra together. "THEY WOULD NEVER! I WILL NEVER BETRAY THE PEOPLE I LOVE!" Seras screamed out defiantly. She was slammed onto the cross with enough force to break her back, and immediately it felt as if her body was set on fire and being electrocuted simultaneously!

Seras screamed out in pain and screamed louder as three uniformed werewolves with hammers appeared and grabbed the silver stakes, placing one over each of her palms and the third longest stake over her feet. "This is your last chance, Seras Victoria," Alpha warned her. Seras glared at the werewolf leader, her eyes glowing with all her fury and fear as she yelled out, "NEVER!" The moment the word left her lips, the hammers fell, and Seras screamed louder as she was crucified. Blood spurted out of her wounds as they hammered the stakes in as slowly as they could, until the heads of the stakes finally touched her palms and feet. Seras didn't hide her bloody vampiric tears as the cross was raised up until it was standing and planted firmly in the ground. Two of the uniformed werewolves completed the torture by using their hammers to break her knees.

Seras' weight collapsed, and she felt as only her nailed palms kept her upright. Her shoulders exploded with pain as they were stretched out unnaturally, and she struggled to breathe. She had only human level strength under sunlight and the UV lights and struggled to lift her body enough to breathe normally. Even then, she could only hold herself up for a short while. Each time she lowered her body, her pain increased, as the sheer wrong feeling of her lungs struggling to function. She quickly lost track of how long she was held there, every minute filled with agony as the burning and shocking feeling of a vampire being crucified to a holy cross was added by the ever-burning silver and her body's natural pain from her position.

"It can be over," Alpha finally said after what felt like a century of misery. "You don't even need to use your lips. Simply lower your mind's guard, shut your Third Eye, and let me see what I want to see." Seras lifted her head up, and then bit her cheek, and spat her blood at Alpha's feet before mumbling, "No." Alpha replied, "I will come back tomorrow for an answer, then." And then she left the room, leaving Seras crucified and by herself.

The pain never ended.

It never stopped.

Her vampiric body kept her healed enough for her pain to be renewed. She quickly didn't know how long she was hanging there, she stopped breathing millennia ago it felt like. But lack of oxygen couldn't kill a vampire. And so, she suffered the agonies of suffocation, her joints being on the verge of tearing, and the burning and shocking feeling of being nailed to a cross. She felt her body giving out, pushed too far, as she started to age into her true age. Her skin sagged, hair grew grey, and wrinkles formed on her body as she focused on keeping herself alive and resisting Alpha's ever-present attempts to psychically break into her mind and know humanity's tactical and logistical secrets.

She focused on surviving, and possibly escaping. She had to keep that hope alive, or else she would break. They wouldn't kill her, they needed her. But they were already doing so much to break her, and she knew that it was only a matter of time before she cracked.

Seras snapped out of her thoughts when she heard Alpha and other werewolves enter the room. The nails in her body were removed, and she fell off the cross like a lifeless sack of flesh. Seras breathed in relief, but her body wouldn't heal anymore. She was too wounded, weakened, and starving for blood. Alpha looked down at her and said, "You truly are a young vampire, not even a century old. And yet your will is amazing. Perhaps this is the strength that Dracula gave to you." Seras looked into Alpha's eyes and managed to murmur, "Go to Hell, you cunt."

"Such persistence," Alpha said, and then she telekinetically lifted Seras up, enough for Seras to see there was a human in the room. A little girl with tanned brown skin, curly dark hair, and light brown eyes that were filled with fearful tears. "You must be starving now," Alpha said as she walked over to the girl and grabbed her hair and dragged her towards Seras. "You need blood," Alpha said. Seras swallowed as she smelled the girl's fear and heard the quick beating of her heart.

And Seras felt her hunger gnawing at her.

"Here it is, Seras," Alpha said as she lifted the little girl's head, baring her neck to her. "Her sweet, virgin blood, all you could want. If you only you let me in." Seras' fangs grew longer as her hunger grew. She gritted her teeth and said, "Never." Alpha lifted her free hand and one fingernail turned into a claw, and she cut across the little girl's forehead. The little girl screamed in pain as her blood poured down her face and dripped onto the floor. Seras swallowed and forced herself near the blood on the floor and lapped it up like a dog from a muddy puddle.

"Why do that, when you could have more?" Alpha said as she cut the little girl's cheek next, making her scream more. Tears poured down the girl's face as Alpha pushed her to the ground in front of Seras. "Consider this a gift. I need you to be able to talk, and a vampire needs nourishment," Alpha said before leaving the room. Seras crawled towards the girl…

She was so hungry…

Integra

Integra finished her report and rubbed her eye. They just didn't have enough data to find Seras' location. It made sense, Alucard and Cameron said that Beta had mentioned Alpha, which meant that the base she was taken to must be their main headquarters. They wouldn't let anyone know where she was; what was left of the leaders of the world were seriously considering the nuclear option now, if they knew where Alpha was, she would wake up to nuclear annihilation, humanity was just that desperate now. But if that were to happen, Seras would die as well; no one soldier, not even a vampire, was worth losing a chance to finish the monsters once and for all. No one doubted that without Alpha, the Brotherhood of the Fang would fall apart, and the werewolves would return to hiding.

She had to find out where she was before that and try to convince her superiors as well as the rest of humanity's leaders not to unleash a nuclear strike, or at least delay it until Seras was safe. Integra was frustrated, angry, and fearful for her lover. She headed out to the open-air gun range to vent. She soon heard the sounds of gunfire, two assault rifles set to full auto to be precise. Integra got closer and saw that it was Cameron, one assault rifle in each hand just blindly firing away at the targets like something from a bad action movie. "You're wasting ammo," Integra told her when she stopped to reload.

"Who gives a shit?" Cameron angrily said. "I do," Integra told her, "You're risking jamming those guns or overheating them firing away like a madwoman." Cameron sighed angrily but put the guns down gently. "This sucks," she told Integra. "I know," the old knight said as she took one of the assault rifles and took aim. She calmly, coolly and efficiently hit all the correct targets, unloading the entire magazine before she started talking again. "I still haven't figured out Seras' location. I'm trying my best, but we have nothing to go on. It's like trying to find a certain needle among thousands."

Cameron grabbed the other assault rifle and fired away with it, clearly imagining she was fighting werewolves. "How long could she hold out?" Cameron asked, "They must be torturing her, how long do you think she can hold out?" Integra took a moment to think and said, "I don't want to think about that. Vampires can't die by conventional methods, so they will do things to her worse than any human could suffer and survive. Seras is strong, and she loves us. She would never willingly betray us, however, if Alpha is as strong a psychic as I believe, then she will strain Seras' will to the limit at all times. Seras may be able to withstand the physical pain, but if they try psychological torture on her…it could destroy her.

"Abraham van Helsing left detailed instructions on how he broke Alucard's will. He left him in sunlight, away from his coffin, and starved him of blood. He tormented him with crosses, fire, and holy water. He kept him alive with pig blood, but never gave him a chance to fully recover his strength. Anyone that knows about vampires may think of similar means to torture Seras, as well as something else," Integra said, and swallowed. "What?" Cameron asked her. "Seras has never fed from an innocent. Whenever she has drank from a human, she always had their permission, and she never drank more than she needed. But, if they drive her far enough, her vampire instincts may take over. It won't happen instantly, but…people can only be driven so far before they do things that they never imagined they would do, even Seras is no exception.

"If they force her to take an innocent life, it could destroy her," Integra finished speaking, and started shooting targets again. It was all she could do.