Author's Notes: This one is rather depresssing (or cheesy if you don't like song fics) but I finished it a long time ago, and wish to post it now.
Disclaimer: I did not create the manga Hellsing or the song Concrete Angel; Kohta Hirano and Martina McBride did. Well, Concrete Angel was composed by Rob Cosby and Stephanie Bentley.
In a dirt-cheap apartment full of fist marks and broken furniture, a middle-aged woman with bleached blonde hair and day-old makeup took a deep drag of her cigarette. In the next room, a little girl with real blonde hair and no makeup put together a meager sandwich with what little she could find from the kitchen. She left the house without saying goodbye, and the woman didn't try to stop her as she ran out the door.
"She walks to school with the lunch she packed,"
A group of kids around her age pushed her as they ran by, laughing and calling her names as they went. She glared at them menacingly, but otherwise didn't try to react.
"No body knows what she's holding back,"
After a while she got fed up and chucked her lunch bags at one of the girls, hitting her square on the head.
"What the hell was that for?" the other children demanded in rapid French. "Do you want to start something? Is that it?"
Seras only glared hate, since she didn't really understand they were saying, and but she spat at them when they got too close.
"Wearing the same dress she wore yesterday,"
The other kids decided that that wasn't acceptable and began roughing her up to "teach her a lesson." Seras snapped and snarled and fought back as bravely as she could, until she suddenly slipped on a few leaves and skinned her knee on the sidewalk, causing the other kids to laugh, dump her lunch over her and run away. Flushed with embarrassment, she looked up, and noticed an auburn-haired boy gawking at her.
"What are you looking at?" she screamed in her native English.
He didn't say anything, and after a moment she realized he was looking at her leg. Slowly, she pulled her skirt down over her thigh.
"She hides the bruises with the linen and lace, oh."
Like most days, Seras was the last one into class. She was smaller and scrawnier than most of her classmates, appearing to be six instead of eight, and so most of the bullies who wanted a crack at her waited by the front entrance before school started. The first three times she tried to face them got in trouble for fighting so now she saved herself the grief by waiting until the bell rang and everyone was forced to go in before her.
"Mademoiselle Victorie, you're late again," the teacher said, unceremoniously, when she burst into class.
After assigning a detention, the teacher told her to have a seat. Seras walked slowly down the isle to her desk. She ignored the half-stares she got form the other students, but someone tripped Seras as she walked by, causing her to fall, and the other students laughed. Angry and humiliated, she raised a fist to hit him, revealing the finger-mark bruises on her underarm.
"The teacher wonders but she doesn't ask,"
"Seras, that's enough!" she said sharply, "Sit down."
Seras did as she was told, but no sooner did her fanny touch the seat did she feel a spitball pelt the back of her head. Enraged, she turned to see who shot it, only to be told by the teacher to pay attention. And so Seras opened her notebooks and pretended to follow along, although she wasn't good with French grammar, being from England, and endured the occasional spitball and paper airplane thrown at the back of her head when the teacher wasn't looking.
Whenever the teacher called on her, which was seldom, she would glare icily and feign ignorance.
"It's hard to see the pain behind the mask,"
The teacher held Seras back after school and told her that she had an attitude problem, but Seras was just as short with her there as in the classroom. The teacher looked her over for a moment, taking in her dirty face, her unbrushed hair, and her unwashed clothes. She could hardly believe that any self-respecting mother would let her child out of the house like that.
"Bearing the burden of a secret storm,"
After detention, Seras went to the park to kill time. She didn't want to go home just yet, and though she knew that she would have to eventually, she childishly wanted to put it off for as long as she could; preferably till her mother was asleep. She tried to ignore the other kids running and playing happily together, since she knew she would never be a part of that happiness. She was just too weird and different, and most of these children had rejected her in one way or another in the past.
Seras watched one girl run over to her mother, who hugged her in greeting and held her hand as they walked home together.
Seras turned her head away as if she'd been slapped, and willed herself not to cry.
"Some times she wishes she was never born."
Suddenly she noticed a boy coming to sit beside her on the bench. He was much taller than her, with deep red hair, dark tanned skin, and brilliant green eyes. He seemed to be at least a few years older than her, which was probably why she'd never seen him at school before. He was very handsome, yet he looked away and smiled sheepishly when she tried to meet his eye (as if he had any reason to be shy)!
"Through the wind, and the rain,
She stands hard as a stone,"
"Parlez-vous français?" he asked, meekly.
So he knew it too. "Oui, " she said. "Un peu."
"A-ah," he said. "Quel est votre nom?"
". . . Seras Victorie," she said finally, after a long pause. "Le vôtre?"
"Ah! Le c'est Bernadette de Pépin." His cheeks flushed a deep red.
Seras smiled. Always so showy, these French people. "Are you alone?"
"Y-yes!" he said, smiling brightly. "I mean," his eyes widened, and he rushed to correct himself. "Non, I have you with me."
"In a world that she can't rise above,"
Seras smiled again, and found that she liked this boy very much. He was so handsome, which pleased her good and well, but he was also very kind and honest. She talked with him long into the afternoon, even when it got dark and all the other kids went home, and she still did not tire of his company as she did with other people. He stumbled over his English and was very patient with her broken French, and was just so cute and nice; she felt she could talk with this boy forever.
"But her dreams give her wings,"
Seras found herself talking to this boy every day. He was four years older than her, but that hardly mattered to Seras. He was a very kind boy, and he followed her faithfully wherever she went. She sometimes wondered if he had any other friends, but he would only blush and cast his eyes away shamefully when she asked. She eventually found out that all the other kids hated him too, because of his family. Apparently, Pip was from a family of mercenaries.
"Come on Seras, forget him," they said. "Do you really want to be friends with the son of a murderer?"
"Well, it's better than being friends with the son of a whore!" Seras snapped, "You two-penny creep!"
After the resulting six-against-two fight, Pip and Seras nursed their wounds over shaved ice in the park.
"And she flies to a place where she's loved."
They spent most of their time together in the playground or the park, where they talked, ate and played until the school bell rang or the street lights told them it was time to leave. This was more than enough for Seras, but Pip always seemed to want more.
"You know Seras, I've been thinking," he said one afternoon over crepes in the park, "We ought to go to Paris some time, just me and you. . . We could take the train, go walking around, climb the Eiffel Tower. . . Just you and me. . . no grown-ups, no bullies. . ."
"Wouldn't it be dangerous to go by ourselves?" Seras asked, finishing her crepe and licking the paper cone. "I mean, we're just kids; won't we get kidnapped?"
Pip hadn't thought of that. "Don't you worry," he after a pause, puffing out his chest proudly. "I'm from a family of mercenaries; I'll be able to protect you."
Seras giggled.
"Besides," he looked visibly deflated. "I want to make it up to you. I feel bad because you'll always being bullied because of me."
"It's okay," Seras said. "I was bullied before I met you, and I'd rather have you than be alone."
Pip flushed, and made an excuse to buy her another crepe so he could hide his face, but Seras watched his antics and smiled knowingly.
"Concrete Angel"
One night, Pip and Seras were talking over the phone. "You're right," Seras said, looking out the window. "The stars are beautiful tonight."
"Yeah," Pip said, "So, you understand the homework?"
"I think so," she answered, "I just need to write about Napoleon from the French point of view, right? Not the English?"
"That's right," Pip said, "Remember; he was a king and a savior."
"Not a tyrant or a villain," Seras laughed. "I got it. It's very weird how different history is between the French and English textbooks."
"I suppose so. . ." There was an awkward pause from Pip's end. "Would you. . ." he began, "Would it be okay if I walked with you to school tomorrow?"
Seras' heart froze. "Why?"
"W-well," Pip was glad Seras couldn't see his face. "I've walked you home a few times, and we looked out for each other then. But you seem to have trouble coming to school, so I thought it would be nice to . . . uh. . ."
Seras was touched by Pip's thoughtfulness, and the smile slowly returned to her face.
"My mom is a little cranky in the mornings," she said, hoping the excuse would pass. "But you can pick me up from the corner down the street; that'll be okay."
Pip's face broke into a huge grin. "All right, I'll see you tomorrow, Seras."
"I can't wait," she answered.
Suddenly the door to her room slammed open, and Seras snapped her head around and slammed the phone on the receiver. The next thing she knew, she was being grabbed by the shoulders while her mom screamed into her face over something she did wrong. Seras was so scared she began to cry, and her mom suddenly shoved her so hard she banged against the dresser.
"Somebody cries in the middle of the night,"
Seras curled into a ball and clutched the back of her head, which now had a squishy soft spot on it. Her mom was still yelling and shaking her for some offense that she didn't realize she committed, accusing her of trying to get her arrested, of ruining her life, of being a leech and a parasite she's had to deal with all these years, and threw her against the corner. Dazed and disoriented, Seras screamed when she suddenly noticed a fist flying toward her face.
"The neighbors hear but they turn out the lights,"
Seras could only curl into a ball and cry as her mother continued to pound her over and over. She held her tiny arms to protect herself from the blows, but they only got more bruised and broken with each strike. She could only pray that she would eventually get tired out or lose interest. But the more her mother hit her, the more violent she became, and she just kept beating her harder and harder.
"You've been nothing but trouble since day one!" was all Seras heard her say, "I wish you'd died along with your parents in that accident!"
These were the last words Seras ever heard spoken.
"A fragile soul caught in the hands of fate,"
Pip had a bad feeling as he walked down Seras' street the next morning. He was sure everything must be all right, since Seras probably had a good reason to hang up on him. Yet, Pip could not shake the horrible feeling deep in his stomach. As he turned to the corner to where they were supposed to meet, he saw several ambulances and police cars in front of the apartment complex where she lived.
"When morning comes it'll be too late."
Pip's heart sank, his stomach knotted and his legs turned to lead as he ran over to the scene of the accident. He hoped against hope that everything was all right, but the knot in his gut tightened. He ran to the authorities and begged to know what had happened, but the police only demanded gruffly that he stay behind the yellow caution tape.
"What happened?" Pip demanded, "What happened? What's going on? My friend lives in that place!"
"Kid, you need to stay back," the paramedic said, and walked briskly past him into the apartment.
Suddenly Pip noticed the window on the bottom story was shattered from the inside, with blood-splattered glass all over the pavement. And among the blood, there lay—
"An arm," Pip gasped, falling to his knees, and feeling so sick inside that he had to clutch his stomach. "Seras lost her arm."
"Got shoved through the window," a paramedic explained. "Her body exploded on impact. She died instantly."
"Through the wind, and the rain,"
Out of the front door, the paramedics carefully rolled out a stretcher with a zipped up body bag on it. They were mindful of the steps, yet it still jolted as they adjusted to the new ground level, and they proceeded to carry it to the waiting ambulance. Pip followed them behind the line, desperately, hoping against hope that it wasn't who he thought it was, but one look at the paramedic's eye told him it was hopeless.
"She lays hard as a stone,"
On the other side of the tape, a faux blonde whom Pip could only assume was Seras's mother was arguing bitterly with the police. There were two male officers trying to convince her of something, perhaps the evil thing she had just done, but she was adamant in believing that she was innocent. As Pip slowly walked closer, feeling numb as though he were in a dream, he heard her telling them of what an evil, manipulative, troublesome little brat that thing was, and how it deserved what it got.
"In a world that she can't rise above."
"I don't see what everyone's getting so upset about," the woman yelled, "When I'm the one who has to pay for a new window!"
Pip stood dumb struck. Pay for a new window? His legs buckled, and he fell to his knees, feeling ill. He would never find a new Seras.
"But her dreams give her wings,"
The paramedic asked him if he knew the deceased. Pip answered tearfully that he did, and then the police demanded that he answer a few questions. The paramedic chastised them, but it no longer mattered to Pip. He answered them as best as he could since it didn't really matter anymore. His only friend, his only real reason for living, was gone.
"And she flies to a place where she's loved,"
When it was all over, Pip was given all of Seras' personal belongings, which were considered useless to everyone else. To him, they were priceless treasures and mementos that he would cherish for the rest of his life. He sorted through all her things to try to understand her, since she was so secretive in life. He also got her school workbooks, which were quite standard, except that she had more doodles than homework in them.
Her notebooks were scrawled with half-hearted French-lesson notes, English words that he needed a French-English dictionary to translate; more doodles, and his name scrawled out in random places; some hastily erased, some crossed out, and some made fancy with swirling lines and little heart dots.
What made Pip break down, however, was the art assignment labeled, "The Most Important Person in My Life." It was the picture of a stick-figure boy with red hair and green eyes holding hands with a stick-figure girl with yellow hair and blue eyes. They each had a halo and a pair of wings, and they were each flying to Heaven with a smiling sun over their heads and happy clouds all around them.
"Concrete Angel"
Since Seras's mother was in custody, the community took it upon themselves to say a few prayers for her in church, and wish her a safe passage into the afterlife. Nobody knew Seras personally, however, and so the priest took the martyre approach and blessed Seras on the grounds that she was an innocent little lamb who was butchered by the very shepard who was supposed to protect her. Everyone was focusing on the priest's sweet words, but after the service Pip found himself staring at the Virgin Mary, and wondered how she could have allowed one of her children to be murdered so cruelly. She only stared silently back.
"A statue stands in a shaded place"
The burial took place on a cool autumn afternoon, with weeping willow shadows draping over the graves like shrowded mourners, and red leaves falling from the trees like bloody tears. Only a hand-full of teachers came to Seras' funeral; very few people knew Seras in life, and even fewer thought of her enough to visit her in death. The school raised funds for her grave, which was located under a great oak tree, with a little statue on her tomb stone to symbolize her inner strength.
"An angel girl with an upturned face"
Only Pip cried when the priest started giving his sermon after she was buried, and only Pip brought flowers to put on her grave. They were pretty lotuss that he knew she would like, since he'd seen her admiring them at the in front of a flower shop before school one day. Her grave stone was small, consisting of a tiny cherub statue the size of a bunny.
"A name is written on a polished rock,"
Pip was the only one who took a few days off school to mourn her passing. His grandparents were surprisingly sympathetic to his grief, and left him to his peace until he was ready to go back to school. When Pip did return to school, however, he was horrified to find that life had gone on as usual for many students. No one seemed to notice or care that Seras was missing. Many of the students who had bullied her in life no longer thought of her now that she was dead.
"A broken heart that the world forgot."
Sorrow, grief, and guilt saturated Pip like poison in an apple. If only he had done this, if only he had noticed that, he kept telling himself, Seras would still be alive. Why couldn't he protect her? Why hadn't he noticed the signs while he could still do something about it? Why hadn't she told him she was being beaten? Didn't she trust him at all? Did she think he wouldn't help her? Did she try to tell him subtly and he just mis-understood the cues? If he'd acted on his gut, would she still be alive?
Pip lay agonizing over this in bed one stormy night. His bedroom window suddenly flew open. A sudden gush of cold air and rainwater blew the curtains inward, and he was just about to close the window when he noticed the figure of a young girl standing at the window's edge. She had short blonde hair and deep blue eyes, and she kept a steady gaze even as the elements fell over her soaked face.
"Through the wind, and the rain,"
Pip rose slowly, scarcely daring to believe it. Part of him feared this was a dream, or an illusion. Another part had been in denial since the morning she died, and felt vindicated to see her. Another was just so happy to see his friend again that he didn't care, as long as it was her.
He got up and ran to her, hardly knowing what to say. "S-Seras. . .! Z-zere you are! I . . . I zought you were dead!"
"No one could have survived a crash like that," Seras said sadly, "but I couldn't go on without saying goodbye."
"She stands hard as a stone,"
Pip could feel himself tearing up again, much to his chagrin, but he couldn't help himself, and he broke down crying.
"Why didn't you tell me?" he sobbed.
"I don't know," she said, saddly, "I guess . . . I was afraid."
"Afraid? Of what?" Pip sobbed. "I could have helped you!"
"I didn't know," Seras said, for the first time looking unsure. "I guess. . . I just didn't know."
"But you died," he sobbed, and tried to cover his face with his hands. "You died, and I thought . . . it was my fault. . ."
"It wasn't your fault," Seras said, and she seemed sure of herself again. "You didn't know; there was nothing you could have done."
"But I promised!" Pip sobbed, "I promised to protect you, and I couldn't do zat. . . !"
"It was't your fault," Seras said firmly, "I never told you because nobody ever helped me. The teacher suspected but she didn't ask. The neighbors heard but they turned off the lights. The police knew but they chose to send me home." To Pip's look of horror, she elaborated, "I went down to the station last week, but they called me a liar and said I was just telling stories to get attention, and they called my mom after I left. I didn't know until it was too late; even if there was nothing you could have done."
"In a world that she can't rise above."
Seras helped Pip back into bed, and continued to caress his arm as he asked her all the things he wished he'd asked her while she was alive, while she put his conscience at ease. There was a calm, worldly maturity about her now that she never posessed in life, and Pip was sure she was now an angel. After a time, he noticed that her left arm seemed to be a dark, shapeless mass that looked to him to be a kind of wing. The fact that it was slightly red and writhing didn't bother him at all, since Seras could do no wrong in his eyes.
"But her dreams give her wings,"
"Why did you come back?" Pip asked at last, when he was so tired he could barely keep his eyes open.
"I wanted to make sure you were all right," Seras said, "Before I moved on."
Pip yawned, "You mean to 'eaven?"
". . . I wish," Seras said, and Pip didn't see her tears. "I just wish I could be with you forever."
"You will," Pip murmured, just before sleep finally claimed him, "When I go to Heaven, we'll be together again."
Seras was so heart-broken that she wept openly, ran toward the window and threw herself into the storm.
"And she flies to a place where she's loved,"
Eventually, Seras came across her Death, who stared at her from behind bright yellow shades. She had still not worked out whether he was her savior or tyrant and a villain, but when he offered his arm expectactly, she allowed him to lift her onto his shoulder obediantly. A large part of Seras still wished she had brought Pip with her, but she couldn't do that to him, she just couldn't. Her Death was very cruel, and would bully Pip mercilessly if she brought him with. Pip would grow to hate Seras for dooming him to a life of servitude; for separating him from his grandparents; from keeping him from going to Heaven, and Seras just couldn't stand the thought of Pip hating her; she just couldn't.
She vowed silently to see him again one day, and shadows surrounded them as her Death took her to her new home.
"Concrete Angel"