Chapter 58
He was unsure of what to say. He felt his deterioration, and saw Seras this way...he sensed something was wrong, something she was hiding.
He pulled himself half on, and yet half off the bed; his eyes were distracted by Seras fingering where her numerous wounds were in the center of her stomach, and he moved his other arm to wrap around where that hand was. He laid his head against her stomach.
"Tell me, Seras; it pains me to see you struggle."
"Master...I cannot." She was firm in her belief of not telling this; she was indeed still partially in touch to what little she had left of her humanity. Basically, her feelings and emotions.
She knew, had it been an order for her to tell him, she could not deny an order from her master.
"I'm sorry." She sucked in a non-existent breath as his head lying on her brought her a sudden pain in her stomach, slowly dulling out as she got used to it. Alucard looked at her, and closed his eyes for a moment. He could feel her still wincing slightly, but knew that it would be better soon enough.
He opened his eyes again.
"It is okay, I was wondering what was on your mind. Mine seems to be missing somewhere..." He said with a light tinge of a smile hidden in his familiar gloomy state.
"I'd have to say for myself, it always seems to be missing, master." She said, as if out of experience. At this comment, not totally expected by him, he raised an eyebrow in a joking manner. He grinned a little.
"Hmm...And yours is always half-cocked." As if to challenge her already, his voice was still just about monotone and quite down; though, his statement, if thought over correctly, did make a lot of sense.
She was silent, a good enough reply to him for now. She breathed out and kept it out, not breathing anymore like she should and closed her eyes; relaxing herself, she tolerated the pain.
If she were going to live as long as her master, she would have to endure a lot of pain, she thought.
He lay on her still lightly, trying not to harm her anymore than she already was.
"When you become a full nosferatu, you will be able to not have such pain as it would have regenerated." He said, reading her thoughts for a moment; he thought of the day when she would want to be free of him, free of service, free of Integra...
Her eyes closed, she continued in a tired voice.
"I would have realized my mistake in my sentence if I had known right away what I was saying." She said, knowing that he read her thoughts as she spoke in her mind. He looked at her a little amused, depressed, and in wonder. He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it again.
After another minute he managed to speak.
"What do you mean, Seras?" His eyebrows rose once again, however it was hard to see as one side of his face was half-hidden in dark shadows.
"It means, master," She paused. "That I am quite the tired one right now...and I cannot help it."
He looked at her, more normally this time.
"Now that is easy to understand, Seras...Even I am tired and I had no such ordeal as you. Rest is still needed, but talking is not bad." The worry and tiredness seemed to linger in his facial features.
Seras felt herself fading off slowly, her speech becoming slurred and incoherent.
"Mm-hmm..."
His hand automatically wrapped more around her, though, not tighter as to not hurt her. He let go of her other hand, the one on the side, as it seemed to start to bother him in that position; he was leaning half-off the chair, practically on the ground, holding Seras as much as he dared.
He mused over things, keeping the eye concealed in the shadows closed, while the other stared indistinctly at her, as if in his own pain.
Seras hated the needles in her arms; wishing and hoping she'd be better by the next night. She just wanted to sleep away the pain of recovery and everything else.
Her eyes closed, and she felt strangely relaxed.
Noticing that she drifted again as she spoke no more, his eyes started to blur again. He slid out of his chair and off of Seras, the arm around her grabbing the edge of the thin sheet and pulling it up halfway over her.
Alucard would not move without Seras. Over time with one another, training, teaching, it became a habit to spend time like that upon the coming of every night. Fighting side-by-side and progressing in her abilities, it motivated him to further his teaching to her.
Like it or not, he was attached to her now, feeling differently without her. Due to his deterioration, she managed to open and find his feelings a little more and more; and without it, he would still be cold...like he always was, and was used to being for so long...
Sliding down the side of the bed he sat on the floor with his back against the coffin side, his arms folded and legs sprawled out in front of him; his eyes closed on him again...slowly at first, then gone.
Alucard stumbled lightly in his sleep, more than once had he been startled from rest as images flashed into his head of his black side. The most painful: Seras, calling for him, and he not even there.
Dead inside was what he felt from this. And every time he was startled, he fell back asleep within minutes. But not before checking Seras' blood bags, technically seeing if she was really there, as if his dreams were confusing him with his dream world and the so-called reality he was in.
He had to hold her hand once or twice to make sure that was not the dream as well, and then back to sleep once more. Seras woke not once; she was still as stone and quiet even more so. As eerie as it seemed, it was normal for them both.
A creak of the door woke him up for the millionth time, his eyes opening and his head rising to greet Walter, who walked in immediately upon entering. His shoes made a light noise with each step on the stone floor.
"Lord Alucard, Sir Integra would like a word with you." Walter eyed his position weirdly, noting the question hanging around Alucard's head.
"...And yes, I will stay with Seras, if you'd like. Sir Integra no longer needs my services for tea, as you could imagine, I find myself often bored."
Alucard rose to his feet, in all his 6-foot-something glory, but almost falling as he did so. He replaced his hat and glasses automatically, securely hiding behind the orange-tinted glass and the shadow of his wide, mushroom hat.
"Yes, Walter, do that. Time to see what my master wants." He grimaced as he said, his sorrow overwhelming; he disappeared.
Seras stayed asleep, occasionally moving one of her arms to get them more comfortable. The needles in her arms definitely bothered her much more than she would have imagined, even in her sleep.
Integral noticed his arrival on cue; she was holding her cigar between her two fingers, about to rub it out. They seemed to calm her considerably.
"Alucard, you have been avoiding me." She stated simply as she sat at her desk. Alucard, at this point, was going through a lot of crap, to be blunt, and had practically had enough of it all.
His mental state of the past two nights had been an emotional roller coaster; one as such a human faces every other day. It was definitely a much worse and yet a much stranger state to be going through, being the way he was and all.
In one swoop of the back of his trench coat, he jumped up on the desk and sat cross-legged on her piles of papers; he glared malevolently.
"My master, I have not been avoiding you. I have just been busy training, and if I am here only for an interrogation, then my time is being wasted." He said, anger starting to rise again, about to counterattack his level of sorrow. As it was his master, he hated being so angry with her, but enough was in fact, enough.
Integral looked at him, her cold red eyes eyeing his every part. She put out her cigar and sat back in her chair, staring at him.
"There is much to discuss, Alucard, but that can be settled later. Right now, there is something else that is bothering you: Seras?" Her eyebrows were raised. Alucard looked amazed for once, composing himself after two seconds.
"What of Seras, my master..."
"The fact that you would spend more time teaching her than anything else; you care for her, that is seen, but this feeling is unnatural. It will not last."
Alucard looked at her, bewildered; does she know that? Or pretend that she does?
"You think I do not know that?"
Integra mused at this, and kept her hand on his shoulder, somewhat unnatural for her.
"Then, show me this: become what you were, closer to me, and working for the organization." She said proudly, Alucard was speechless. His deep red eyes studied her.
"I still work for this organization, master, it is just that some things have to come first."
Flames started to rise inside of her already-red eyes; she noticed that he did not move away from her innocent hand on his shoulder, so she tried to press her luck and bring him closer into a hug. Alucard barely realized what was happening.
"Are you saying that the protection of this rookie is more important than the protection of your captor?"
He was caught bewildered again. "No, no that is not what I am saying—" But she cut him off.
"Then what are you saying, Alucard; join me again." Integra's vampiric self was a lot different than what she was as a human that was for sure.
Alucard stared down at her, finally realizing what was happening.
"I am saying that I still work for this organization, and the protector." He said, and then continued. "But I am also saying that in the field, this rookie comes first." He shook from her grasp. Integra's eyes shook with fear; she was so close, and yet so far away.
"You really are going to bring down this organization, Alucard." She said bitterly. Alucard could not have looked more disconsolate.
"I am sorry, my master. I cannot do that..."
Integra turned her head, silently telling him to leave, and he did, sliding down into Integra's desk like a black puddle and disappeared outside Integra's door. He decided a walk through the castle would do him some good.
"Hmmm...Why is it that the only two women I know seem to see me as a toy?" He bemused depressively, which was very odd, sounding somewhat sardonic in itself. He folded his arms, his eyes not registering where he walked.
It was all insanity; how was it that he could be felt for, and have barely feelings of his own? How could he choose between his master and his servant? It was a heavy thought for him, only making him that much more gloomy.
His stomach made odd noises that rebounded off of the narrow walls of one of the hallways; he mused at this, he was quite hungry. He hadn't drunk in a little while.
His coat swayed evenly in rhythm with his feet as he walked; it took him twenty minutes just to realize that he was actually moving.
His feet followed their own path to his door, which he made to in almost an hour later. He walked particularly slowly to have time to think.
Entering, Seras was still lying there, but he could not tell if she was awake or not. Walter noticed him walk in.
"That was a long time, Lord Alucard, but she has been steadily sleeping the while. She may need a new supply of blood, but she is otherwise fine." He stared at Sera as Alucard walked to his side, his footsteps making deep thudding sounds.
"I had to go for a walk; clear some thoughts...Thank you again, Walter. I'm going to have to make this up to you..."
Walter waved his hand and muttered 'no need', afterwards leaving them together. Seras' body stirred again; she had been doing that frequently. Her arm fell over the side of the bed and her head turned to the side, facing towards the wall as she slept on.
He flicked his hat off with his wrist, laying it on the table with his glasses sitting on top nicely. He walked back over to her, placing her arm back on the bed.
"I await the time when you are strong enough, Seras, then maybe things will be better." He stooped over her, then sat on the floor again, more like falling on the floor, though. His emotional stress drained him so much; he leaned his back gratefully against the coffin and slid back to sleep for the millionth time this day.
The next night, Seras' face twitched in and she opened her eyes, feeling unusually better as she got as much rest as she could.
She tried out her limbs, moving them slowly, and then moved her head; she raised it and looked over the bed at the top of her master's head. Grumbling at herself, she dared her body, slowly and carefully propping herself up on her elbows.
Then using her hands and pushing the front of her body up to sit, she winced and hissed at the pain; but it only stayed for a second or two, and she looked down at him.
His limp, sleeping body swayed and he fell forward, obviously in a deep sleep. His face hit the ground cold, and he still went unmoving.
Seras gasped, wide eyed as he just fell over like that.
It hurt, but she had to move and get her limbs used to moving again. She slid herself slowly and albeit painfully out of the bed, sitting on the edge next to him...staring at him.
The bags of blood still managed to rest on the bed as she painfully stretched her arms and grabbed his shoulders, pulling him upright and staring at him strangely some more.
"Uh...Master?"
His eyes started to flutter with the strain of opening them; groggily at first, he saw not much more than an outline of pointy orange hair and wide, red glowing eyes. After a moment more, he recognized it as the curious face of his servant.
"Seras..." He managed to mumble out as his face pained, not mostly because of he fall, but of everything else as well. He moved his arms behind him to steady himself to relieve Seras' tension. He leaned back against the coffin, her feet on the ground right next to him and her knees in his right side view.
"You're up." A slight half-grin appeared on his face, though his eyes barely focused. Seras leaned herself back, sitting more on the bed. She looked at her arms and stared at the needles; she took one bloodied white-gloved hand and started gingerly taking them out, one arm then the other.
"So I am...Heh, finally, I'd say." Alucard watched as some of the blood came from her arms once the needles were removed, the blood bags were completely drained of all their contents, to the last drop. He reclined and watched her, his dark red eyes focused now with his head turned sideways to see her.
His depressed mood still never left, with human emotions that seemed to not stop flowing through him.
"I started to wonder. You slept so much, but you healed fast enough. How do you feel?" He asked, concernedly.
"Strange...but better. I can deal with it now." She said, frowning at her stained gloves. He looked at her frown, reaching forward with one of his hands and he took hers, and bit a loose end of the tip of her middle finger part of the glove with his incisors.
Slowly and carefully at first, as it was very form-fitting to her hand, it slid off and he gnawed on it like a dog, getting the blood out. Seras stared at him weirdly; it was kind of odd.
He soon finished and gave it back to her like nothing had just happened.
"Even so, it was not right."
Seras took the glove strangely and shoved the wet thing on her hand again.
"So...What are you doing down there, master?" She looked around. "I could have sworn Walter was here, too."
"He was here, but only for a little bit, as a favor for me since my master ordered to see me." He looked down at himself, then back up with a half-grin. Seras looked up too, but more like toward the ceiling, just looking around lazily and getting used to sitting up.
She added an afterthought as she fixed her screwy blue uniform shirt, all mussed up from the fight.
"Thank you, Master...I should not have to depend on you anymore, as you teach me more." She added, a little more lowly as she fixed a button near her waist, almost talking to herself. "I'll definitely have to thank Walter, too."
He looked down a bit; he liked the fact that she was using him for something.
"You have no need to thank me, Seras...It was something that I had to do; wanted to do...and I think if we thanked Walter anymore, that he would start to question our integrity." He raised an eyebrow. "Not like it has ever been something unquestioned..." He laughed slightly on the outside, but anyone could tell that it wasn't a good cover. She looked down on him, a strange look upon her face.
She reached out a hand slowly, moving her arm and placing the palm of her left hand on the top of his head, patting the crown of his hair like a dog.
"Master is awfully morbid this evening."
He looked up at her, his eyes deep-set in things he felt that he should not be feeling.
"Master is a bad depressive." He mused as much to himself as to her. "I am not used at all to this; pain, regret, compassion...It is unlike me."
Her hand dropped from his head and rested on the bed, looking down more at the floor, or her bent knees; her voice was low and almost monotone, sad.
"I know."
His eyes were disheartened as he tried to look at her, but could barely. He looked to the ground as she did, but not to mimic. He took her hand, the one that was on him, and held it; about the only thing he did besides stare at the ground, dark shadows under his eyes as he stared.
"Seeing you dying in front of me, Seras, and not even caring as it was a semi-dark part of me. That is something too depressive; your blood soaking the ground, my blackness wasn't sure if I wanted to eat you, help you, kill you, ...or love you..." He sighed uncharacteristically.
Seras was getting very aggravated, very annoyed at her master's morbid behaviour; she knew, that before...years ago...he was never like this. It was so unlike him.
"Master! There are things that are going to happen that you are going to regret forever, maybe longer, and then things that you will wish could have lasted...Don't lean so long on one little happening, no matter how much it hurts you!" Her mind was on overload, and she continued, squeezing his hand unintentionally on reflex.
"Just move on, you always used to, or so I think...I wasn't sure and still am not...Look! I'm okay right now; I can move! I'll be back fighting and training really soon, so don't worry that much."
This outburst took Alucard by surprise; she cared so much for him, even now. Emotions lined his face, and he did not know what to say. In on fell swoop of his arms, he outstretched his arms and brought her down, sideways onto his lap unintentionally; with his arms wrapped around her back and sides in a straight line, holding her from the side.
"I used to move on because I never used to feel it, Seras...but..." He sighed. "You are right."
AN: Hey! Another pointless AN here...just wanted to request a book...^_^...It's very good, and about vampires too! A fiction novel called "Midnight Predator" by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes...I've been reading that for a day and a half (and finished it in a day and a half) in between writing the story...I recommend to anyone interested in vampires ^^...
AlliedEnemy= Was wondering when someone was gonna ask! Lol...I originally put the answer in a review, but I spelled yer screen name kinda, sorta wrong x_X...gomen...*sweatdrops* anyway! Here's the answer, I shoulda mentioned it before (silly me)
How can Alexander Andersong be a priest and still have a son? Basically it's Biochemistry: taking a cell from Andersong, reproducing it, and infusing it with the skills of a regenerator. Created by the Vatican.
Byakko= Next chapter should make you veeeeeeeeeery happy ^_^...You guessed it, lots of HENTAI! (and just for you! And fluffy if she wants, hehe ^^'') Chapter 59 coming up...please review! Fank yoo