Seras bit her lip watching the two boys… men… vampires sitting together so comfortably. "Maybe I do have to learn to get over appearances, but right now, seeing you two like this makes it hard for me to pay attention to what you're saying. Could you just… "
"Just what?" Alucard asked with a smirk. "Just look older?" He ran fingers possessively across Walter's jaw.
"Yes!" Seras made a face; she hadn't intended to be so vehement. "Please."
Alucard made an annoyed noise and made a show of kissing Walter slowly and deliberately before standing. Seras watched, fascinated again, as Alucard grew taller and broader while his hair shortened and his suit once more turned charcoal grey. Even the jacket draped over her knees darkened once more. Walter filled out and sat taller in the chair. Entranced by Alucard's change, Seras looked back to see Walter's finished.
"Where does the monocle go when you're not this Walter? And how does your ponytail tie itself when it grows out?"
Walter shook his head and shrugged. "Magic?" He adjusted the monocle in front of his eye. "I know that in theory, I shouldn't even need the monocle. If I can make my body what I want, I can fix those damaged muscles." He smiled ruefully and stretched his long legs out. "But I'm so used to it that this is how I see myself, monocle and all."
"Unnecessary human affectations. You will learn. You will have made real progress when you keep those affectations out of choice, and not because you cannot do otherwise." Alucard said while he once again took a place behind Seras' chair.
This time Seras leaned back in the chair without being prompted. She closed her eyes gratefully when Alucard's fingers brushed over her skin and he began speaking.
Seras arrived in the First's chamber disoriented and frightened for Integra. She knew from Schrödinger's mind some of what to expect, but for Seras, the reality of Lilith was different from the catboy's male experience of her. Lilith was fascinating while disturbing simultaneously, but not repellent as the boy had seen her.
"Lilith is consuming her soul."
She whipped around to look at Alucard, but after assuring herself that there were no enemies behind her, she turned back to where Ilse stood over Integra witnessing Seras and Alucard's every action and word. "Where's Doc? He'll know how to help Integra if anyone can." She was using Schrödinger's memories for everything she could get from them.
"He is with me." Alucard's words came out in a low snarl. "And there is nothing we can do for Integra now except kill her before Lilith consumes her entirely."
"There has to be something else!"
Alucard crossed the distance between them and picked Seras up by the front of her uniform, leaving her feet dangling off the ground, "There is nothing else we can do! Do you understand me?"
At the same time, whispering in her mind, Alucard's words came, Lilith has her. We cannot save Integra, but we can let her do one last service for Hellsing and the Crown. It is possible to force Lilith back to torpor, but I cannot do it. I cannot penetrate that circle. You will have to do this.
"No!"
Seras pulled away from Alucard and stood abruptly. "No. You are not telling me that I let Integra die, too." Suddenly Seras was angry – at the situation, at Millennium, at Alucard and Walter, at herself – and the only ones to take it out on were the two men.
"I don't know what this stupid game is, but it's not funny. You can't tell me that I let Pip dissolve into nothing to save me in some place I don't even believe exists, and then tell me that I let Integra die in front of me."
"You accuse me of lying to you?" Alucard suddenly loomed over her, his expression anything but friendly. "I am your master, girl. I have no need to lie to you about anything."
Seras took an involuntary step backward and bumped into Walter, who had appeared behind her without a sound. "I am tired of the way both of you are behaving," he said as he put his arms around Seras, holding her without restraining her. "Both of your reactions are understandable, but neither is appropriate."
The tall man steered Seras over to the coffin, and with a gentle pressure on her shoulder, encouraged her to sit. "Enough musical chairs." When she sat, he joined her and put an arm around her waist. "You may not like what you will hear, but it is the truth. Just remember that neither Alucard nor I have anything to gain from lying to you about something so important."
"I've already survived whatever it is, right?"
"You've already gotten through the experience," Walter said and kissed the top of her head.
If Integra dies at the moment she loses hold of her soul to Lilith, her death will be carried over with her soul. It's not enough to kill the First, but the shock will stun her back into torpor.
"No! You can't ask that!"
Alucard shook Seras and glared. If you don't do it, she will use Integra's soul to wake and what has happened in London will be a sunny Sunday afternoon in comparison.
Alucard brought Seras' face close to his. Imagine what I could do to the world if I wanted to and multiply that a hundred times over.
Ilse watched the exchange between the two vampires with frank interest. All she needed to do was wait. It wouldn't even be a matter of minutes before the Hellsing woman was sucked dry and Lilith was awake. Then these two would be swept away like the chaff they were.
Seras blinked back tears. Alucard's grip on her collar was so tight she could no longer speak aloud. There has to be another way.
If there were another way, don't you think I'd be taking it, stupid child? Seras flinched under his glare. There is no time to find another way and no other way that Millennium has found in their years of studying her. Now look.
Alucard put Seras down and turned her around to see Lilith, Integra, and Ilse. Use your third eye. Open it and see Integra's soul.
There, stretched tenuously between Integra and Lilith was something – something like a rubber fog, almost intangible, but giving the impression of a tension in its substance. It wasn't being drawn smoothly and easily into Lilith; Integra was giving the vampire Mother a fight for her soul.
When you see it ready to let go, you must kill Integra. Throw the woman outside of the circle and I will handle her.
Seras was horrified by the idea of killing Integra. How could she do that? There had to be another choice. Can't you just… I don't know… can't you do it from outside the circle? With your guns?
Alucard snarled at Seras. My guns are empty, and even if they weren't, Integra deserves a better death than that. You'll give it to her, or I'll make you wish that it were you strapped to that gurney.
Alucard gave Seras no further opportunity to for argument. Instead, he picked her up and threw her into the circle to collide with Ilse. "Give her to me!"
With the advantage of surprise at the odd tactic, Seras was able to grab Ilse and drag her away from the gurney. With a hard shove, Ilse practically flew out of the circle into Alucard's arms.
Alucard gave the blonde vampire his shark's grin and bent to tear into her, but she fell to pieces in his grip, literally falling out of her clothes as a swarm of rats. Some scrambled for escape, some bit Alucard's hands and legs, and some turned to run back into the circle.
Alucard laughed as dogs sprang from the shadows; not his usual flame-eyed hellhounds, but smaller, crimson-eyed dogs that tore into the rats like the terriers they resembled. "Doc told me about your vermin."
Rats ran throughout the lab, pursued by the hellhound version of rat terriers. They played with the rodents like the dogs they resembled, with the exception of those rats that tried to cross into the circle of Lilith's influence; those rats were immediately and mercilessly eradicated.
Seras ignored the strange scene outside the circle, hurrying to the gurney and bending over Integra's rigid body. "Sir Integra! Can you hear me?"
Integra's eyes, which had been tightly squeezed closed, snapped open and met Seras' with an expression of mingled pain and anger before she recognized the girl. Her face was covered in sweat, her teeth gritted against the agony. She nodded, a sharp jerk of her head in response.
Holding back tears, Seras quickly explained to Integra what Alucard had told her. "If I kill you now. I think you might get to keep your soul, but she," a glance over her shoulder at Lilith, "will wake. If I kill you when your soul leaves your body, you won't exist anymore." Like Pip. "But she'll be asleep again."
Integra squeezed her eyes shut again. Seras watched the woman's soul almost unraveling from her body. She'd never really given it much thought, but looking now, she could see that a person's soul permeated her entire physical being – they were more closely tied than Seras had ever thought. Integra's spirit was being sucked away like water squeezed from a sponge.
"Integra." Seras said, wiping sweat off of the woman's face. "I'm sorry, but you have to tell me what you choose." She looked at Integra's agonized form and realized that the woman probably couldn't speak without screaming. She wouldn't force that on Integra in her final moments. "Should I kill you now?"
Integra shook her head vehemently, tears joining the sweat on her face.
Seras let her own tears flow, although she kept a tight rein on the sobs that wanted to burst free. "You want me to kill you to put Lilith back to sleep?"
Integra nodded, another sharp jerk of her head.
What does one say to something like that? Seras had no idea. She pushed sweat-dampened strands of hair off of Integra's face. How on earth was she supposed to kill this woman? After everything they had both been through, it was completely wrong for this to be her end.
She had no weapon and she couldn't stand the idea of killing Hellsing's leader with her bare hands. Seras could see that Integra did not have much more time left.
Seras had a moment to register the crack of eight swift gunshots before the pain caught up. She could feel the burn of silver in her chest and choked back a cry while she dropped to her knees next to the gurney.
Seras leaned into Walter and shivered. It was eerie, unsettling, perhaps outright terrifying to hear these two unwind a story that encompassed the loss of two people she cared about. She rubbed her hand over her chest, but there wasn't even the residual burn she remembered from Father Anderson's silver blades. Her body had ached for weeks after Anderson had treated her like a pincushion. Maybe it was the blessing on the bayonets that had left the pain.
And how had she regrown her arm? That was something worth remembering.
"I've already gotten through this, right?" She just needed the reassurance as the story became more disturbing.
"You've already gotten through it," Walter agreed and squeezed her gently.
Somehow, it didn't help her feel better, because the only thought she had in response was, But Integra didn't. Or Pip. Or most of the Wild Geese. Or…
"That does you no good." Seras met Alucard's eyes as he spoke. "It does you no good to minimize your existence because other people did not survive. You're a vampire, you will always survive the humans around you."
Major Max tossed the empty Luger aside. Bullets would do no good against Alucard, but his child – the joke of a vampire – she still felt them. It had been inconvenient that Alucard had chosen a female child so close to Millennium's unveiling of their grand plan of destruction.
The terriers were harrying the last of Ilse into nothingness, Seras was on her knees next to Integra, and Alucard was crossing the room as such speed that he appeared to fly.
"You." Alucard's eyes burned, but Millennium's Major smiled peacefully against the vampire's rage.
"Yes, me. No one but me. Behold, my creation." Doc may have been the science, but Max was the motive force. He beamed at Alucard even when the vampire hoisted him off the ground with a grip on his throat. Every moment spent in intimidation and torture tactics was another moment closer to a paradigm shift.
And he sensed his other ace approaching.
When the hulking Captain burst through the open doorway exactly on cue, Max grinned at the vampire holding him off the ground. Oh, things were not over yet, but he felt events shifting back in Millennium's favor.
Seras kept herself from falling and levered herself up to stand over Integra through sheer tenacity. The bullets had done her more damage than she would have expected. If anything could be said for the Major, he had good aim.
"Seras…" Integra choked out the word and Seras took her hand in her good hand. "… drink."
The girl shook her head, nearly falling over from the vehemence of the motion. She couldn't stand the idea of drinking Integra's blood, even as the memory of that one taste rose, raging in her body.
Integra squeezed her hand with surprising strength and glared at Seras with that familiar fire. "Drink," she rasped.
Seras was reminded of what had happened with Pip and cried harder, but she couldn't refuse her leader's dying order. She leaned over Integra, bleeding on the woman, and kissed her – a goodbye for a beloved friend, even if she and Integra had never actually been friends. With what they had been through, they were closer than friends.
When her teeth penetrated the skin of Integra's neck, Seras inadvertently found herself caught; she had plugged into what was happening between Integra and Lilith and she wasn't in Lilith's league by any stretch of the imagination. The coin of Integra's soul had already been claimed by another, and Seras' unplanned violation of Lilith's claim was like a four fingered man attempting to pickpocket a master thief. She was caught and being hauled in for her punishment.
What should have terrified her was muted by the mutual pleasure her bite brought for herself and for Integra. The woman's wracked body relaxed against the gurney and she drew a slow and shuddering breath. Seras thought it might be worth it to die if she could take the agony out of Integra's last moments.
Walter was unaware of the byplay with Integra and Seras. He had registered their presences and that of Alucard, but his true focus was solely for the tall man he'd chased up to the zeppelin from the hell that was London.
He dug in his heels against the sheer strength with which the Captain still dragged him toward Alucard and Millennium's leader. Walter lashed out with the wires on his free hand and drew the taut filaments between his teeth.
Everywhere the wires wrapped the German's body, they cut into his flesh, but in every case, they stopped at bone without cutting as they should. At least with the need to heal severed muscle and tendons, the big man slowed down and Walter was able to stop him in his progress across the room to Alucard and the Major.
Alucard made no move to interfere. This duel had been an act in three parts, and it was time for Walter to bring the curtain down. When he turned back to what was happening inside the circle, Alucard snarled and surged forward, almost forgetting the fat man hanging in his grasp. "No!" Stupid girl. Stupid, stupid girl.
Walter thought quickly, seeking a way to stop this man who seemed unstoppable every time the two met. Bone stopped the wires at every turn. That was something he could work around.
With a jerk of his hands, Walter whipped the wires loose from the Captain's body. The big man stumbled forward when the pull holding him back released. As quickly as he'd taken the wires away, Walter lashed out one last time, wrapping the almost invisible threads around his enemy's neck and pulling the way he should have when he was a child – he pulled with a single, vicious decapitating jerk. Several threads were stopped on bone, but all it took was one to slip between the vertebrae and finish the final cut, separating the big man's head from his body.
Quickly assessing the situation, Walter wrote off Alucard as being fully able to take care of himself. Turning to Integra and seeing Seras bent over her, feeding, Walter ran to pull the girl away only to be stopped short at the edge of the circle. He was on the first flick of his fingers that would destroy Seras when his fingers went limp.
Do not interfere, Angel. This is Integra's will. Alucard returned control of his fingers to Walter, who paced the edge of the circle and tried again and again to push through. Not even the First could take his attention away from what was happening between Seras and Integra.
"Watch." Alucard shook Max and held him to have an unimpeded view of the occupants of the circle. "Watch your dream die with mine. And when you have seen your dream die, I am going to swallow your soul and make you watch the death of your dream over and over."
They didn't have long to wait and watch.
Seras pulled away from Integra, but ceasing to drink did nothing to sever the contact she now had with Lilith. She was still losing herself. Maybe it was for the best. She had too many memories she didn't want to have, too many losses in her short life.
She could see Integra's last remnants of herself stretching between the woman and the creature on the wall. This was the moment. Seras had no idea what would happen to her when she killed Integra, but she didn't allow herself to hesitate. Integra had the courage to make this sacrifice, Seras had the courage it would take to make it count.
Seras reached InBetween inside Integra's chest and withdrew the woman's heart.
The backlash was immediate. The shock of it made Alucard drop the Major, who fell to the ground writhing and clutching his head, bleeding from his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Walter, no longer of Lilith's bloodline, leaned heavily on one of the lab tables and swallowed the blood that filled his mouth when he bit deeply into his tongue.
Across London, Millennium's vampires reacted as the Major had, in many cases giving their opponents an advantage to exploit. No vampires directly died from the psychic EMP, but many died from enemies using that moment of weakness to finish the job.
On the zeppelin, Walter found that he could cross the line painted on the floor and hurried to Integra's side. He knew, without doubt that Integra was dead, but he still had to be sure. He had to see her, up close, for himself.
Seras lay on the floor next to the gurney.
After assuring himself that Integra was gone, Walter picked up Seras. Behind him, the Major was meeting a messy, but swift death, not that death was an end to his suffering by any stretch of imagination.
He had no way of knowing whether Seras was alive or not. It wasn't as though he could check her pulse and respiration. Instead, Walter carried her to Alucard, who took her from the other man.
Seras had caught the worst of the backlash, despite not being of Lilith's bloodline, she had the beginning of a link with the First from her foolhardy feeding from Integra. When Integra's death hit Lilith, Seras was riding its coattails. That she survived at all was remarkable.
With only a tiny spark of life remaining in the girl, Alucard made his decision and bent over her, nipping gently at her neck and draining her life and soul into himself.
EMP: Electromagnetic Pulse. (DOD) The electromagnetic radiation from a strong electronic pulse, most commonly caused by a nuclear explosion that may couple with electrical or electronic systems to produce damaging current and voltage surges. (My thanks to ciardarois for the term, although she brought it up for a situation in "Machiavelli.")
