Mysterious Girl: Aiya! :D Danke s'much. ^^;; Although, I blame my easy grasp on the characters because of mindless AIM RP ;P Yesh, ah'm sad. I hope you enjoyed reading the prologue as I did writing it!
TeaRoses: Angst will have to be expected as much as I loathe it. But don't worry! She doesn't get angsty in her adultlife xD~ It is all in her teen years.. But who isn't angsty then? I love Integral almost as much as I love Bernadotte(Cowboy biatch from the Manga) and Young Walter. Mmm.. Berniieee... X3~~
Shikome Kido Mi: Oh I definitely plan to keep writing this regardless of reviews. I just plain don't like the way most Hellsing fic is handled, so I'm venting in my own way :D Like mommy always says 'If you don't like the fic, don't sit there and bitch. Just write one you /do/ like z.z' My hat tilts to Red Anne Bonney(). She and I share many similar opinions with how Hellsing should be handled with the Nazi Fist of PERFECTION. However, I bet when she reads this(if she ever does), she'll hate this fic.
"Alucard's not grinning enough! What's with these dumb flashbacks?! I would have you know Integral would not cower at Aluc's touch!!!! WOMAN OF STEEL! X| God, where do you fic writers come from?! HELL!?" :D That's okay, though! Everyone has their own tastes. ^__^ All in good humor, Red! :D
Steal: *blushes* Thankyou :D
Yue No Miko: *dances with the other Integral Fan*. There is only one other character cooler than Integra and that's Young Walter. Butlers, Nazis, and Wire oh my! xD
Cheeky_bear007: Oh, thanks a lot. :D I must tell you, RPing really does shape up one's writing, especially with someone with such a short attention span such as I. 9.9
Okay. Now, focus on story ~_~
Before you read, I'd ask you to go to www5e.biglobe.ne.jp/~solid/e/11-10.html - It'll give you a visual idea of what's going on. Like I warned before, we are going to see Integral at her cutest and her angstiest. I really hope you can stomach. :D These are, after all, her teenage years.
Enjoy!
VISUAL AID - (www5e.biglobe.ne.jp/~solid/e/11-10.html)
............................
"I never really feel quite right
I don't know why, all I know is there's something wrong
Everytime I look at you, you seem so alive
Tell me how do you do it, walk me through it
I'm following every footstep
Baby on your own you take a cautious step
Do you wanna give it up?
But all I want is for you to shine.
Shine down on me
Shine on this life that's burning out."
-- Mr. Big, "Shine"
............................
"Why are you wearing those silly glasses?"
"Master does not like my sense of fashion? I'm hurt.."
"No, that's not it... its just that I don't understand why you are wearing them since we are inside..."
"Well, why are you wearing your glasses?"
"That's different."
"Why so?"
"Because my eyesight is poor. I need to wear these since they have corrective lenses, they help me see. But you aren't wearing the sort of glasses I'm wearing. You are wearing shades."
"There is a difference?"
"Well, of course there is. I have to wear my glasses in order to see, no matter where I go. Sunglasses are for blocking out the sun."
"Yes.."
"Well, that's why it doesn't make sense. Why are you wearing sunglasses in the house... at night?"
"Why do you wear your socks in the house?"
"That's difference since that's a habit. Normally people do wear their socks in the house. But wearing sunglasses at night in the house isn't something people do every day... er.. night."
"How many people have you seen in another house at night?"
"...Errr.... well... not many..."
"Exactly. So, Master, you could be wrong. There could be quite the amount of people as I speak walking about, talking about, and sleeping about with their sunglasses on as we continue to debate the subject and it would be you who isn't normal as you are the only person not wearing a pair at this time. So, I suppose, the better question would be... Why aren't you wearing a pair of sunglasses, Master?"
The vampire's lips curved into a smile, the pale features of his face framed by layers of inky, unkept hair. He was obviously pleased with himself, however arguing with a fourteen year old was not really the best thing he should be doing at the time. Alucard, with his new found freedoms, could be roaming the scapes of England, exploring the mansion to see its updates and changes, re-acquainting himself with his old friend and combat-in-arms Walter... but no. Alucard chose to spend every day.. every hour.. every minute.. almost every second of his attentions on this human girl. She who is leader to Hellsing. She who is his master. She who is quite the entertainment.
Crossing her arms over her chest, the Master pressed her lips together as her mind began to formulate another prod towards her servant. "Well, I don't like your shades. I can't see your eyes. You don't realize how rude it is to hide your eyes. I can't tell what you are looking at!"
"Would Master rather I take my shades off?" Alucard's grin merely widened, a fang casually overlapping his lowerlip.
The girl did not seem affected by this display of teeth, however those twin pools of iced blue did stray from his intense gaze hidden beneath the lense of his glasses.. and rather towards the flash of ivory before locking back onto those disks of yellow that seperated her from Alucard's stare.
"Well... Yes!"
"...But I don't want to..." The vampire challenged, his grin only seeming to widen.
"Well, I want you to," The Master says with a gruff voice, trying to assert some sense of authority in her tone which was almost... really too cute.
"You can't make me..." Alucard answered tauntingly, somewhat shifting his head from side to side.
"Oh, you are so childish! Why don't you act your age?"
"Might I remind you I'm five hundred years old. Since you have never lived that long, whose to say I'm /not/ acting my age?"
The girl glared at Alucard, unable to think of a comeback for those lines. Her legs brushed uncomfortably over his thigh, rustling the velvet fabric of his red coat with one foot. She squirmed a little, balancing her weight at a more comfortable seated position on his lap, still facing him undauntingly. It amused Alucard to no ends... here this girl was, ascendent of the infamous Abaraham Van Hellsing. He, the reluctant pet, under the authority of this child. Inhuman, soulless, godless, a monster.. with an adolescent girl turned towards him while sitting on his lap - legs spread and placed either side of his waist as she tried to vey authority over him through a combat of childish wits.
Alucard loved it.
The girl continued to seethe. Having failed in the battle of wits, she moved to assert control of the situation by physical means. One arm extended, the girl reached to take those shades from her servant's face. Alucard's head tilted back as those small fingers brushed the air - trying to clutch the pair of shades. His mocking, laughing grin was merely met with another surge of determination that fueled the young Hellsing. She pulled herself forward, fingertips finally kissing the cool, metal rims of those sunglasses and plucking them from his face with one quick sweep back as she withdrew her hand from his face.
"Masteeeer...." Alucard mockingly whined, as the young Hellsing scrutinized the sunglasses.
She raised the glasses to her face, blinking at her servant through two layers of lenses - one corrective, the other tinted. The girl proceeded to study Alucard at this new visual perspective, eyes following the loose folds of his thick coat, the rather outdated fashion of his vest and shirt, then trailing over the pale flesh of his neck and finally settling on those pools of intense red that gazed back at her in the aire of a challenge. Her own, soft blue eyes dipped into the needlepoint pupils floating in canyons of crimson. She felt her stomach slightly knot while matching gazes with the monster, yet refused to look away due to morbid curiousity.
"What's.. it feel like to be... a vampire..?" The words finally broke the eerie silence that interrupted their childish debates and games, spoken with a broken rhythm by the Hellsing heir.
"Dead." Alucard replied with ease, tilting his head and casting a shadow over his features as his unwavered gaze followed his master's eyes.
"...No, that's not what I meant. I mean, what does it emotionally effect you..? Like, how do you compare yourself to other people?"
"Do you remember when you held that gun?" Alucard replied, his mind suddenly dipping into the memories and thoughts his master was currently combating now that he reminded her of the incident six months before.
"I.. do.." Integral became distraught at the resurfacing of this event.
Alucard disliked this weakness of hers. Even if she was just a child, he did not want an emotional burden for a Master. He knew it would take him great lengths to steer this girl away from the traumatic experience that occured. How he would do this was another thing entirely, one he wasn't certain of. Despite Alucard's grand age and many experiences, he was never one to raise a child nor witness the young of humans being raised - it was above him to care for such domestic authority.
Despite the sensitive subject, Alucard could not help but smile. He was completely new and inexperienced to what was occuring now and what would come before him. Never has he had a Master that was not only a woman, but also just a little girl. Previous Hellsing adult males were predictable and noteworthy - with that same aire of authority and arrogance. But what would be of this girl? This child he was so uncertain of, so willing to learn about?
In truth, neither knew the other very well. And their Master - Servant relationship would be a grand test for both of them. The Pet who has never once served under the commands of little girls, and The Master who held the leash to a power capable of dismembering thirty men within seconds.
This balance of power was... hilarious. And it amused and irritated Alucard to no end.
"Tell me, Master.. Do you recall what it felt like to hold that gun?"
"I do," She answered weakly.. The master's voice was so shaky, so unsure, so afraid..
"What was that feeling..?" Uncharacteristic of his personality, Alucard's voice was gentle and comforting. How he despised these weaknesses of hers.. it only reminded him just how human the Hellsing Heir really was.. it reminded him that he was serving.. a human. This made Alucard very bitter.
"...I felt like.. like I could do anything, and no one could stop me. That he couldn't hurt me, no one could hurt me... but.. but I could hurt them..." Her voice was confused. Never the less, her eyes never wavered from the intense gaze of Alucard. Still watching the vampire beneath the layers of her glasses and his shades.
"That..." Alucard began, his voice returning to that thick, predatorial drawl. "..is exactly what I experience every second of my eternal life."
She seemed so interested, eyes wide and mouth slightly agap as her imagination extended beyond its limited bounds with that thought in mind. However, these thoughts were quickly surpressed by morals and honor as taught by a dead father, leaving her to break eye contact with her servant. Alucard merely watched, unphased as she mentally berated herself for 'impure' thoughts.
The heartbeat of another living being suddenly kissed the air in dramatic resound. Alucard's smile curved over the thin of his bland lips, the pulse of a familiar human dancing off the tip of his tongue. He could smell the warmth of this person's blood, how it slowly rushed.. and the nuance of decay as the individual was aging.. Finally, the vampire spoke, his voice monotone and soft, rasped due to the tire of voice unused for fifty years. "Walter...."
The Butler in question knocked softly on the door connected to the office. "Mmmm. Lady Hellsing, your tea is ready."
The Master's eyes widened, those pools of iced blue twitching slightly between the door and Alucard. Her Pet's enhanced senses still took her by surprise, and she could only stare at the vampire in awe. This all but lasted a minute before a knock came to the door again. "Lady Hellsing?"
"Coming Walter!" The girl drew off Alucard's sunglasses from her face and placed them on the table. She slipped off her vampire's lap and proceeded to stride towards the oaken door barring her from the outside world. The Master twisted the knob and pulled the door open, revealing her butler and more recent caretaker who stood waiting behind.
"Mmm, there you are. You're instructor will be waiting for you in the kitchen as well. You are to begin shooting practice later this evening, so do wear something more practical lest you ruin your dress," Walter spoke formally and dutifully, gazing down at the girl with his soft, ocean blue eyes.
Lady Hellsing merely smiled with a bit of excitement, clasping her hands together. She turned around to meet Alucard's naked gaze, regarding his predatorial glare with ease. "Your company was a pleasure, Mr. Alucard. I await tomorrow for later conversation!" Bowing her head once, the girl sped out of the room and out of Alucard's range of hearing.
The vampire merely remained, lounging on the large leather chair that his former master often occupied, eyes drifting over the portrait of the Hellsing who did not have the strength nor ability to control him some fifty years back. How old he became...
"It appears Lady Hellsing has taken quite the liking to you. Quite the difference, as compared to her descendents before her," Walter's voice interrupted the silence Alucard was so accustomed to, however the vampire felt eased at the presence of an old friend so welcomed the human company.
"It is, God of Death," Alucard tasted these words, unused for fifty years until now.. how old it tasted, like aged wine. Simply exquisite.
"It has been a long time since anyone has called me that." Walter smiled, stepping into the room and turning to regard the portrait of Alucard's current attentions. Sharp blue eyes kiss the detailed features of the former Hellsing, head lightly bowed to honor the memory of this great man.
"How terrible it must be to age, become ill, and die," Alucard wondered allowed, his hand extending over the shades left by his master on the desk before him, taking them with one hand and idly tracing the rims with gloved fingers.
A lop-sided smile drew over Walter's old features as he regarded Alucard with that same, friendly aire as he did five decades back. "Tsh. For us old English men, even aging can be fun. It is merely an experience one must enjoy while it lasts."
Alucard tapped his chin lightly, before rerouting the topic to a more important subject that bothered him. "She's weak."
The butler raised a brow at this curious play of words, turning to face the vampire and studying the ageless features, yet unchanged from when he last remembered him during World War II. "Well, she is only a child. Not to mention having just overcome a rather traumatic experience. Most people who experience that sort of trauma often don't recover for years.. if they ever recover."
Alucard grew bitter with this thought. He certainly did not want to be ruled by a weak-minded, emotionally distraught young woman. The vampire was so used to being under the authority of men who were human but at the same time.. did not share those human qualities. They were above human, and almost inhuman. It made his servitude almost liveable, knowing he was under the authority of those above average human beings.. But to be stuck with a girl who expressed only the more emotional, more weak side of humanity was an insult to Alucard's abilities. And it bothered him.
"I can't let her continue to tread in that direction of self-destruction."
"Alucard. The girl needs comfort. She needs a friend right now.. not an instructor nor an enemy," Walter's voice was firm with a length of authority to the vampire.
"God of Death.. Is she not the leader of Hellsing? Does she not share the blood of my masters? She has the strengths.. the potential, I've witnessed it myself when she awoke me. But these thoughts that dwell with her are repressing the qualities that make her a Hellsing," The monotone of Alucard's voice maintained that rasped flow, as he raised his eyes to meet an old friend and bury those pools of red into the aged man's eyes.
Walter sighed, pressing his lips together as he patiently reflected the vampire's words. "Give her time."
The Servant to Hellsing raised from his seat then, and walked towards the shadows, wanting a solitary moment to himself given his unease and discomfort of the situation he has been forced into. Words slip from his lips as he passed Walter, hushed but clear. "..Tell me, God of Death... What is her name?"
The question somewhat startled the butler, who in turn raised a brow before speaking. "Six months and you do not know her name?"
Alucard merely shook his head, sending that unattached, black substance that was his hair into a faint disarray over his features. "I have not spoken to her until a few weeks ago, when she finally managed to stop grimacing whenever I approached her. And even then, I have been unable to read her mind other than whisps of thoughts since she is clouded by the memories of that incident.."
"...I see... Her name is Integral."
"Ah..... Integral. 'Possessing everything essential - entire', I recall is the meaning of that word. Proper name.. for the last living ascendent of Hellsing," With those words, Alucard's form dipped into the inky properties of his shadow and he left Walter alone to reflect on all that was said.
The muffled whimper of a child was ignored through the night. The girl clung to her sheets, as if fearing seperation from her bed during the dive of unpleasant slumber tainted by nightmares. Her brow was slick with beads of sweat, thin body layered with nightgowns in order to maintain a feeling of sanctuary through layers of clothes and blankets. But no blanket, no nightgown, nor any amount of false security could help her survive another night.
There was an unattached sigh that flooded the room. It was seperated and tired... yet coming from every direction. Accompanying the voice, shadows began to move in an impulse of their own. The black, inky substance solidified and shaped Alucard's human form - the red velvet of his coat contrasting with the shadows of his master's room. Those canyons of red twitched back and forth as he observed the Hellsing girl going through yet another bout of unpleasant dreams, watching her fight ghosts of her recent past - and trying to win a losing battle.
Moments passed like this, until Alucard was finally motivated to move away from his stilled position and sit upon the bed with the girl. His Master naturally stood up from this disturbance, wild eyes opening and searching the room with mixed bewilderment and fear. Those iced eyes inherited by the single man who defeated Alucard some one hundred years ago found his own, and clashed with his inhuman red gaze for only a moment until she recognized her servant. Seeking comfort in another living being, this descendent of those who mastered him pulled her weak body from the bed and pressed her thin frame to his, hiding beneath the layers of his coat as she wept.
Alucard could do nothing but sit there. He was a creature of destruction and murder.. not a being capable of comforting scared little girls. Never the less, her emotions made him feel distraught, since she seemed to awaken something in him that he thought to be rid of some five centuries ago - Sympathy. One gloved hand raised, fingertips unaccustomed to affection tracing over the thin whisps of her iced hair.
He knew then she was going to be his weakness.. his only weakness. Not necessarily because his master was young.. nor was it because she was a woman. Neither was it due to her own weaknesses, her own inability to live over the trauma that occured before. Rather, it was his growing compassion for this girl, such an emotion that he never truly had.. even as a human. It bothered Alucard a great deal, knowing he had grown a connection to this child and such a bond would merely strengthen as time passed.. and he could do nothing about it, given the ties to Hellsing pressed upon him by her descendent.
As his master continued to cry against a cold, stiff body as the night passed, Alucard could do little but trace his fingers over her hair with gentleness so very unknown to him before. And sigh.
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AUTHOR'S NOTES: Heh hehehe! This was quite chapter to write, actually. I always pictured Alucard driving the young Integral up the wall, however there relationship was not quite as tense or distant as it was now. They were still two ducks who were curious of one another.
The way I see it, Alucard's proddings and irritation at this stage might have been amusement for him at this point, but at the same time it gave Integral experience with how she should deal with her pet. Iron clad fist, unwavered demands, and she would best him lest he would mock her and ignore her demands. It is like giving the future doctor who would cure Cancer a toy medical kit when he was ten - setting the path for experience.
The background between Walter and Alucard is found in the Manga, with which I was able to find a lovely resource to read on - even if it was only a few caps worth - (). I sort of stole that line about 'Old Englishmen Aging', so please forgive me 9_9 I just had to add it. I just had to!
I sort of assumed Walter returned to Hellsing shortly after the betrayal of Integral's uncle. The girl, having no living relation to take care of her, would probably have been tossed into foster care no matter her rank and bloodline. Walter, who has deep ties with her father given his background, probably lead a rather boring retirement and was willing to honor an old friend's memory by taking care of the orphaned daughter. He was, undoubtedly, her god-father. And such a relationship stayed. Thus, we see Walter! :D
Anywhoo, this Chapter is the very roots of Alucard and Integral's relationship. Alucard is not really used to being around children, and he certainly has never watched one grow up. Perhaps from a distance, he saw the Hellsings before Integral grow, but I doubt he interacted with them since he was probably occupied with the adult Hellsings. Integral is an exception. She is the last one, there are no older Hellsings. So, Alucard is forced to watch her grow up and become an important aspect of her adolescent life. During this critical growth period, he would find himself attached to her and the bond of their relationship would string more deeply than any other two character in the series 'Hellsing'. She is not just his master, and he is not just her servant. It is no longer a strict business-partner relationship like the Hellsings before. It is more emotional and it is more spiritual.
I hope you enjoyed that chapter. I look forward to seeing you next time. :D Remember. R&R makes Baby Jesus happy xD~~