Disclaimer: Hellsing is Hirano's, not mine.

A/N: This story was written for the August challenge in Livejournal's fictionhaven community (theme: "character death"). The setting is aprobable AU at Hundred Swords 3.

"More bread, Yumiko, or are you finished?"

"I think I would like another piece, Father."

Father Renaldo smiled slightly and shook his head as he pushed the loaf to her side of the table at which they sat. "I'm not used to calling you that name without the glasses."

"I'm still not used to being without them," Yumiko admitted. "But it feels good, all the same."

"I'm sure it does," Renaldo said as he leaned back in his seat. "It was quite the journey to get there."

She nodded as she cut a piece from the loaf. "Thank you, for sending me on it." Renaldo seemed surprised as she looked back at him from the bread. "What is it?"

"I didn't expect a 'thank you'," he replied. "You were so angry with me when I had you committed. I was pleased that we could exchange civilities, that you would accept my invitation to dinner, but I never thought you would thank me for doing what I did."

"You did what you had to, I realize that, now." Yumiko said. "I was impossible, back then."

"Her death was understandably difficult for you," Father Renaldo told her. "It isn't easy to lose a partner."

"That doesn't excuse my behavior," she said softly, casting her glance down, where her hands were plucking the slice of bread into several very small pieces, "Especially toward Father Arden."

"He's told me that he has forgiven you."

"He has?" She looked back up, hope in moist eyes.

"Yes, he has," Renaldo confirmed.

"I was so unfair to him, how I blamed him for the way the assignment went haywire, how I claimed that he was incompetent because he hadn't been in Section Thirteen for as long as the others. Then, when I attacked him..." She shook her head, "And I was so arrogant, thinking if I had just been there, instead, things wouldn't have happened that way."

"You had the flu that week," Renaldo gently reminded her. "Even if you had been there, you would have been a liability." After pausing for a moment, he said, "It's strange to hear you say it that way. That you attacked him, and not Yumie."

"But it was me," Yumiko said, "Because Yumie was me. She was all of the things I didn't know how to own. That's what I learned to do, at St. Dymphna's, when both parts of me were humble enough to accept the help they offered. I learned how to own it all." She managed a slight smile, "And that's why I thanked you, for providing me with that opportunity. I'm a whole, complete person, now, because of it."

He returned a wider smile than she had given. "You're welcome, then, Sister."

"I just wish that it hadn't taken so much for me to get here." By then, the bread had been hopelessly dismembered.

"You still miss Heinkel."

"Of course I do." Yumiko frowned, "Oh, I'm so sorry, Father Renaldo. I'm ruining everything. This was supposed to be a happy night."

"It's quite all right, child," Renaldo reassured. "It is only natural that these things would come up. I'm sure being back here must bring a flood of memories." She nodded. "And it is still a happy night, for you are part of the fold once again. It is pity, though, that you feel you can no longer be an active member of Iscariot."

"I'm sorry. I just can't."

"Do you fear that your skills have diminished?"

"I know they have," Yumiko answered. "Father, I'm six years out of practice."

"We could put you back into practice until you were ready to reenter the field," Renaldo replied. "It would come back to you. Your body remembers your craft, Yumiko. It would surprise you how well. To this day I find myself able to perform mine, when need be."

"But the thing is," her stomach twisted as she spoke. She had hoped this could be easy. "The thing is, I just don't have it in me, now. I'm not a berserker anymore. That power is lost to me."

"Pity," he repeated. "We have lost so many agents, already."

"It's overwhelming," she agreed. "First, there was that thing with Father Anderson, in the beginning, even before... her. That was so strange, the way he just became sick like that. I thought that wasn't supposed to happen."

"It wasn't," Renaldo responded. "But I've heard they've worked out the problem for the next generation of regenerators."

"Next generation?"

"It's just on the drawing board right now, I hear," he explained with a small smile. "I really shouldn't be saying anything about it, but I'm sure you won't tell anyone."

Yumiko shook her head. "No, I won't." She sighed then, remarking "I couldn't believe it when you told me about what happened to the others since I've been away. Father Nieves, Father Petrov, Father Walsh, Father Costa, all gone." She rested her forehead on her hand, feeling dizzy and she ran down the list of names. "And we lost Archbishop Maxwell and so many others during the war. It's terrible."

"Truly," Father Renaldo said. "If someone had asked me, nine years ago, which two Iscariots would outlive all the others from that time, I would have never, ever thought to include me in the answer." He stretched his arms as he readjusted his posture in the chair. "Originally, only Anderson was supposed to die."

"What did you just say?" Yumiko asked as she blinked at him.

"It was directly after the war that I was informed of his death sentence."

Yumiko had trouble digesting what she was being told. "I don't understand."

"It came to me as I assumed position as director," Renaldo elaborated. "It was carried out once we had secured the area around the Holy See, when he was no longer needed. That 'mystery illness' he experienced was his system coming apart as the result altered upkeep injections." He paused to take a sip of water, ignoring the way Yumiko gaped at him, then continued. "We would have never created a weapon we couldn't destroy if it became problematic, you see."

"But... Why?" Yumiko asked, needing to hold her head in her hands as the room began to spin around her.

"Alexander Anderson was executed for the same reason the rest of you were," Father Renaldo replied, "Treachery in a time of war. Do you really think such a thing was forgivable?"

"The rest of us..."

"That order came down earlier this year. It was finally time to finish cleaning house. We had rebuilt our ranks to point where we no longer needed to keep traitors among us."

"I don't understand," Yumiko told him. "We were welcomed back!"

"Had we not done so, Anderson would have likely fallen into the hands of Hellsing. We could not have that. And we were rather short of staff after the war," Renaldo explained. "So we took you all back. The worst of the group was eliminated first, and we held out on the lesser offenders until they were extraneous."

"We weren't traitors," Yumiko insisted.

"You were traitors but not traitors. Fitting, I suppose, " Renaldo said wryly. "Believe me, Sister, I do understand the difficult position Anderson put you all in that day. You were instructed by your superior to follow his orders, yet doing so would have meant going against the orders of those above him." He paused for another sip of water before continuing. "Either choice would have broken your vows of obedience. Loyalty to one side would have meant the betrayal of the other. Unfortunately, you lot made the wrong choice, and London became the altar on which you all spent your thirty pieces of silver that day. It just took longer for some to meet their halters than others."

Her stomach lurched as the world spun faster. "Why tell me this? Why now?"

"I'd almost forgotten about you, after I'd sent you to St. Dymphna's. Like the other burnouts we've sent to the facility, I thought you were hopeless, and put you out of my mind. You can imagine my surprise, then, when I received notice of your pending release, with news of your successful reintegration." He shook his head in a disappointed fashion, "It was an 'improvement' that made you worthless to us. Though it didn't matter by then, really," he explained, then answered her questions. "I thought you should know the truth before the end. You are the last one."

Realization came in sudden snap. "What are you going to do?"

"Nothing, I've already done it."

"What did you do!" she demanded.

Watching as her panic grew, Renaldo inquired, "Now I ask of thee, Iscariot... What is it thou hast clutched in thy right hand?"

"Stop playing with me!"

"Finish this with me, then, Yumiko, and I will. I know you know it," he prodded, and her voice joined his in the answer. "We're clutching the dagger... We're clutching the..."

The blood drained from her face as the last word over her lips, "...Poison."

"My favorite craft. Did you enjoy dinner? Your portion was special." He took the napkin off his lap and leaned forward. "You were both right and wrong about Father Arden. The mission was a complete success. And when it was finished, he shot Sister Wulf in the head." He stood and finished the line of thought, "As per my orders. She was second in command in the advance guard, and she had led the charge to support Anderson in that failed attempt against the vampire. Her loyalty was the most questionable, after his." Walking around to her side of the table, he added, "However, if I had known how useless you would become after her death, I would have sat the two of you down as a pair for your last supper."

The rage that Yumiko had worked so very hard to learn to control, the rage she had once given another name, swelled upwards. "Do not be so cross, dear Sister," Father Renaldo instructed as he caught her expression. "Take heart," he said, placing a hand one of her trembling shoulders as he stood beside her. "You'll be seeing her again quite soon."

The motions came from her without thought, the wrapping of her fingers around the handle of the knife on the table before her, the rise and turn of her body, the arc of her arm. It was not until the burst had passed, swiftly as it had come, that Yumiko realized that she had buried the blade in Renaldo's chest.

He issued a sound of surprise as he dropped to his knees while she collapsed back into her chair. "This changes nothing, the dose was fatal," he told her, suppressing murmurs of pain. "You will still die."

"Thereby we shalt fall to Hell in cabals," Yumiko whispered in response.

Father Renaldo chuckled wetly. "I told you your body would remember." The last words came out as a mumble he slumped forward. Yumiko watched the priest breathe his last as she leaned back into the chair.

Her eyes closed as she waited for the poison to finish running its course, and then she, too, went to take her in place in the square formation.