The Seldom Seen
AN:This is the last currently planned pre-Hellsing chapter. If I ever finish it, this will actually be the jumping off point for a mini fic. Here's hoping I do. XD
At the moment I'm honestly out of ideas, though I have a tiny scene in my head from an amusing comment of 'comparing brains'. So feed me ideas! :P It'll make me write faster.
20: When You're Happy And You Know It. Clap Your Hands
They hadn't gotten far in Dracula before Seras fell asleep on her Master's lap. He gave her a mildly offended look and chuckled as he scooped the girl up in his arms and walked through the walls to her room – his, actually, from when Integra was still a child and needed him closer for protection from the various assassination attempts - and settled her down on the bed. On a whim, his form shrank and his clothes bleached of color to assume his second most favored identity. "Seras…." She cooed, petting the blonde's hair, "Do you remember my grooming of you? Such a fascinating creature beneath that girlish exterior."
Their first meeting had been coincidental, he had smelled something interesting and broken free of Integra to investigate, assured of his young Master's safety as she was with the butler. He recalled their 'walkies' with amusement. They had halted shortly after the incident at the orphanage, and he had been forced to seek other methods of amusement. When his interesting child had been sent away, he was displeased, and decided to search for her. Her mind had such fascinating facets to it, and when one was five hundred years old, not much left of the world could be considered such anymore. So of course he wanted to keep track of his newest play thing.
She was quite pleased with Seras when the girl hadn't shrunk away from her like the other humans in her group – another reason she was drawn to keep tabs on the girl who felt so comfortable with creatures of darkness, even unknowing. Their mischief brought a wicked smirk to the teenager's lips as she lay beside Seras and pillowed her cheek into the blonde's breasts as though to listen to a heart that no longer beat. "My little Police Girl, you're so very corruptible."
Seras made an unintelligible noise and her slender arms came up to wrap around the ravenette's shoulders, holding her tightly with a pleased lift to her lips. Ally chuckled softly and rested more of her weight on the Police Girl – who was taller than her, which served to further amuse the near-immortal creature.
"Will you get the courage to ask me about these dream-memories soon, I wonder?" She murmured, not truly expecting an answer
Seras Victoria stared coldly at the orphanage building and her lip curled. The ten year old had her backpack stuffed with snack food and a few water bottles, a blanket, her spare changes of clothes, and the last picture she owned of her parents before their death. She was running away from this hellish place before she went mad.
The blonde absolutely refused to go back to the mad house they sent her to right from her hospital bed four years ago. Cringing at the thought, Seras turned and began walking south towards the park and the nearby bus depot. She had to get moving before they noticed she was missing.
About an hour of walking later, the blonde reached the park, shoulders drooping and feet tired. Rummaging in her pocket to check her emergency money was still there, she started to turn towards the bus station across the street when a voice called her name. A familiar one.
"Seras!"
She pivoted on her heel and was blinded by the light of the setting sun as a body plowed into her and sent her tumbling to the grass below, and the pair rolled down the small hill, laughing. "Ally! What're you doing here?"
"I should be the one asking you that question, Seras." The older girl replied, sitting in the grass to the blonde's left. Seras' old and badly abused backpack unzipped at the side to spill out her collection of snack bags and a hint of one of her shirts. "…Are you running away?" The ravenette's eyes seemed to glow cherry red, but the blonde dismissed it as a trick of the light as she cursed and shoved the items back into her bag.
"So what if I am?" She snapped defensively, tugging the zipper down with a grunt to redo the gaping hole and close it. "So you missed the last bus leaving town for the next two hours." Ally replied calmly. "So let's go hang out on the swings to kill some time."
"Oh… okay." Seras conceded, her built up agitation deflating at Ally's calm tone. Since her friend wasn't trying to change her mind, the blonde relaxed and joined the white clad teenager at the playground. Swings are awesome.
"Sooo…" The older girl drawled, "What made you decide to leave?" She was swinging higher and higher until the swing set was rocking each time gravity let go and then grabbed the girl again to pull her back from her freefall into her seat.
Seras stared at her feet, a stony look on her face as she pushed on the sand to just inch back and forth. Images flashed through her head painfully; the other girls ganging up on her with looks of hatred and swinging their pillowcases full of shoes at her to leave purple bruises along her ribs and arms. Being locked in the closet and unable to move. The adults turning a blind eye. The boys… Shuddering violently, Seras began to attack the air with her feet to push herself higher to escape her memories. "it doesn't matter. What matters is I'm not going back." That same steely conviction in her voice from the first time they met and she told Ally she'd become a police woman to make her dad proud colored her tone heavily.
If she had glanced at Ally then, she would have seen the strangest expression on her face; calculating, angry, pleased, almost… perverse. The ravenette inhaled sharply and breathed a single word, the sound lost to the growing wind. "Glorious."
"Hey, Police Girl, want to see a trick?" Ally teased, and as soon as Seras turned her head to look, the young teen let go of the chains to fly from her seat and land in the tree ten feet off, hanging upside down and grinning like a loon.
Seras boggled, "How… how did you do that, Ally?!" Her troubles temporarily forgotten, ten year old Seras Victoria's attention was drawn solely to the red eyed girl dangling from the tree branch with a cocky grin.
"I'm amazing, that's how." Ally purred, and wiggled her gloved fingers enticingly. "If you jump, I'll catch you, Seras."
The blonde hesitated.
"Don't you trust me, Seras?" Something about the older girl's tone sent shivers down her spine and she frowned, fidgeting in her seat. Legs still pumping to keep up her momentum. "Of course I do, Ally."
The blonde wasn't even sure why she trusted Ally, though. They'd only known each other for a month and their meetings were sporadic at best. But she did, she was drawn to the older girl, felt… safe? No, not quite, but that was the closest word she could name for what she felt around the girl.
With that thought in mind, she squinched her eyes shut and allowed herself to fly free of the seat and towards the tree, Ally, and quite possibly the ground. At the last second her arms shot straight up and her wrists were grabbed by what felt like cold irons and the world tilted sickeningly as her momentum was used to swing the pair up and over the branch to sit on it properly. "Oooh…" Seras moaned, feeling sick, "Never do that again."
Ally laughed in her ear and brought her arms up around the blonde's shoulders to cradle the smaller body to hers, "But wasn't it fun, little Police Girl, to fly through the air and be caught?"
Seras reply was muffed into Ally's white coat, noncommittal. "Hey, Ally, why're you calling me Police Girl?"
"That's what you want to be when you grow up, isn't it?"
"Well yeah…"
"Then what's the problem?"
Furrowing her brows, the ten year old stared into those bright red eyes, looking for something… Unsure if she found it or not with all the things she saw in those strangely alluring orbs, she simply rests her cheek on the older girl's shoulder and sighs. "Nothing, I guess."
"Well, if you want to catch your bus, we should get down. I'll wait with you." Seras blinked in shock, and noticed then that the sun was completely gone. How long had she spent zoning out on her only friend? Feeling a little embarrassed, Seras squeaked when the girl showed off again by dropping forward abruptly and holding onto the branch with her ivory pant clad legs to set the blonde down by a careful grip on her wrists. And then she showed off even more by letting go and landing in a hand stand!
"Doesn't that hurt?" Seras couldn't help but ask as she scurried over to the swings to retrieve her backpack and swing the straps up over her shoulders.
"Pfff, naw. I told you, I'm amazing." A too-wide grin showed nearly all the teeth in Ally's head as she grabbed Seras' hand and tugged her close. "C'mon, let's go."
Feeling rather cold, even though she was shielded from most of the wind by the taller ravenette, Seras shivered and decided that once they sat down she'd get her coat out of her bag and put it on. The pair crossed the street carefully and sat on the bench under the brightest light in the small depot. Seras wiggled into her rather worn and obviously hand-me-down coat and shoved a hand into her pants pocket to assure herself she still had her money. She did.
They received some odd looks from others waiting for their own buses, adults mostly, but no one approached to question them and Seras relaxed against her friend's side. Ten minutes passed. Fifteen. Twenty. At thirty minutes finally the right bus arrived for the last ride out of town until tomorrow morning.
Seras got up and Ally followed behind her as she made her way to the bus and started plonking coins into the ticket machine next to the driver. When she had a full fare paid for, she turned and realized the other was still standing outside the bus. "Aren't you coming with me?" She asked, a little confused.
The ravenette smiled, and opened her mouth…
And then Seras woke with a cry of loss on her lips. Warm arms tightened possessively about her waist and she blinked, soothed by the gesture. Turning her head, she stared into the sleeping face of her Master. He was cuddling her like a child would a teddy bear.
Feeling on edge from her persistent dream-memories, the girl shuddered and burrowed closer to his subtle heat, taking comfort from his presence.
A strange little rhyme floated in her head as she lay there, trying to recapture the elusive beast known as sleep.
'If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands. If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands. If you're happy and you know it, and you really want to show it, if you're happy and you know it, clap your hands.'
If she didn't think it'd be too absurd, and possibly wake her Master, she would have clapped her hands like a child, as though trying to capture the moment forever and shove it in a jar.