Tea Party

Integral could never enjoy anything properly. It was hard for her because after seeing blood being shed by the unhuman, bodies in counts that were disgustingly high and her day to day life in solitude and aggravation, nothing seemed to be pleasurable. If there was any task that did not involve clear and concentrated thought she would spend her free hours in a slight drunken haze. And being in a bath was one of those moments. With a brandy in one hand and her other twirling the water that was before her, Integral did not smile. She only smirked to herself allowing herself to be defeated. Even when she was alone with nothing to really defend, Integral stood up for herself, be it so that she was alone in her private bathing quarters. But the water had won.

It was only natural, she thought, with the way she was brought up and the childhood that was given to her. She either had to show to everyone that she was indeed a powerful girl, or that no matter how hard the times, the female Hellsing heir would arise to the top. Being with Alucard, the undead thing that always tried to either undermine her or overcome her, made the blond ten times more forceful. So this is why taking a simple bath could not be enjoyed without alcohol. It would be much to her fancy if she had a Royal Ben’s Cigar, but as much as she loved the rich smell of the tobacco, the small bathroom would overwhelm the relaxation time and would only be wasted.

Integral had to breath out heavily from the scorching hot water that surrounded her. She loved it when she stepped in the boiling water how her entire body would receive goose bumps and every muscle in her would clench. But as soon as the feeling came, it passed as she dove herself right in and settled against the pearl marble. An old cliche, true, but she knew how a lobster felt every time she did this. The water made her feel almost alive. More alive then any human could be. Ever nerve was hit just right and it made her feel as far away from Alucard as possible. She scowled at the gold faucet as the vampire entered her thoughts while in a state of peace. But it was true. Alucard could never feel the water temperature as Integral felt it. He would never understate the state of living from his point of view. If anything else, Integral felt good about the fact that Alucard could never feel what she was living. Because he was dead. And she was not. And that made the bath twice as enjoyable. It was childish, almost in the sense where she was dangling a candy in front of the vampires face and then eating it herself, but her pride made it better. The lean women ran her hand through her wet hair and sent shivers down her spine. Her hair was too long, she admitted it, it went way past her backside and took on its own life while in the water, but she would never cut it. It would give Maxwell far too much joy. She remembered at one point where she and the cruel man had gotten together and he had to open his big mouth in saying she looked unruly in her ways with her unkept hair. He left with a swelling left eye.

Time seemed to slow down at first, but as the water began to cool it sped up again. Hot water was like a drug. Wonderful at first, but it had to stop sooner or later. Preferably later, but God worked in mysterious ways.

“All good things...I suppose.” Integral cupped some water to splash her face before she pulled the drain plug and easily got out. After wrapping the dark blue robe with the Hellsing insignia on the breast pocket, she grabbed all her sopping hair and pulled it into a tight bun on her skull with a strand or two escaping the bundle. Before leaving the grand bathroom she watched the water go down the drain and left at ease with herself when it was all gone with a soft gurgle. She liked it when everything worked the way it should. One more sigh, and she left her warm room with shoving her hands into her pockets and stepped into bedroom. Her depressed mood came to her like a slap in the face when she was faced with four amazing giant windows being constantly being beat on with the tears from the heavens. The room was dark and to most, the rhythmic sound of rain would be soothing, but right now it was infuriating. The thick, ruby red, dusty, and heavy curtains didn’t help the mood either.

‘Note to self for later- Get Walter to get me a vase of yellow tulips later...’

Integral was allowed to have at least one bright thing in her life, ignoring the fact the very thing that brought a little bit of happiness would wither and die in a week or so, but it helped. A little. The young women shuddered. Not because she was cold from the bath water losing its warmth, not from the thought of her turning feminine, but because of an unwanted presents that tingled in her brain. But to give her some dignity, she brushed off the feeling and firmly told herself she was cold.

“And I can see it too...”

Integral new her nipples were softly protruding from the silk robe, but desperately tried to keep her temper down and her blush. She would have screamed at Alucard for not only being an annoying pest, but saying something so vulgare to her...But this wasn’t the first time. It was the Dead One’s way of being playful in such a serious situation. It started many years ago when an Antarctic oil station sent a distress call to any one that caught it that some sort of crazed rabid Poler Bear was eating all the crew members. When further details were given out, it seemed that the bear only wanted to eat the throats and funny thing was- the bodies would rise up after being dead...Huh. The only reason Integral went was because of the report that the Head of the Board Members wanted her to see if this was a new type of Freak. The kind that could survive in sub-zero temperatures. Integral was of course always up for an arctic vampire hunt and packed up Alucard and set off. During the chase, Integral found herself with Alucard wondering the long and twisting halls of the rig and also found Alucard’s heavy voice next to her when he casually said ‘A bit nippy in here, isn’t it Master?’. Integral was by far from ignorant, but it did take her a moment or two to figure just why he said what he said the way he said it. Alucard received a bullet at blank range in the chest. The man’s hair tussled as he chuckled to himself and continued walking.

The same chuckle that Integral was hearing now. She raised an eyebrow and grinned her teeth. It was a good thing she didn’t have fangs, otherwise she would have filed them down long ago. Integral self-consciously gripped the front of her robs top and tried to pull it closer to her.

“Nothing I’ve never seen before...”

It took great control sometimes to not cut off one’s ears when hearing Alucard talk too long. The voice that was too thick and too slow could drive someone to the point of breaking if the Thing spoke too long. And that feeling of cutting ears off crept into Integral’s mind usually when Alucard talked to her. But since it was such a rare and delightful occasion that Alucard was awake like this, she felt like indulging him.

“I’m not surprised...” The Head Master of the Hellsing Organization spat back.

Alucard, suddenly, had nothing else to say and decided to materialize himself now. The blond women snorted as he began to form himself in front of her. It used to be that Integral found it to be fascinating to witness such a bizarre thing- Dark whips of what looked like smoke turned into more defined outlines until they magically seemed to hold tight to bring forth a living (not really) being. Now it just bored her, Alucard sucked all the fun out of it because he did it too much. Now it just annoyed her that he did it at unnecessary times.

“Whatever happened to the rule of vampires; Thou shall not enter to ye be welcomed.”

Half of Alucard’s usually darkened face was now clearly seen, since his hat was left to Integral and was now forgotten on the floor. It seemed to her that Alucard got paler and paler every time the hat was removed. His beady, yet stunning and cruelly ironic blood eyes had no orange thick sunglasses hiding them, and in contrast, his eyes made his skin even more of an unholy white. Alucard’s eyes always looked tired, only a few moments away from slumber from how often they sagged. Unless he was enraged, his eyes never seemed to reach their full potential. Integral always wanted to cut the shaggy hair off that hung below his shoulders in a mess. Again, unless in the heat of battle, his hair nearly touched the floor, his Devil-like powers making the hair grow to represent his inhuman body. As if it wasn’t bluntly obvious before that...

“What is that Police Girl used to say to me... ‘Rules are made to be broken to fit the circumstances?”

It was rare that Seras grew a backbone against her master, but when push came to shove when dealing with vampire powers, she sometimes bended the rules of how the undead should act. True that it annoyed Alucard sometimes to bearing his teeth but that’s what you get with a youthful girl forced to turn vampire. Stick it to the man. Integral had to raise an eyebrow at hearing Alucard’s somewhat use of ‘slang’ and in such a wicked tone at that. It wasn’t surprising to hear Alucard backtalk to her, it was getting pretty common these days and past years. It had to stop.

“Well?”

Feeling like the diva she wasn’t, Integral briskly stormed past Alucard and to her vanity mirror desk by her bed. It’s where she left her glasses, and after putting them on, so that she could at least see if Alucard was smirking or not, she glued a hand to her hip while leaning against the fine oak.

Alucard’s head dipped side to side until he turned his chin upward as far as he could until a crack was heard. An unholy crack was more like it, more so that Integral’s back hairs stood up for a moment.

“We never finished our tea party.”

“We never had one to begin with.” She turned to face the mirror. Her eyes traveled to where the reflection of Alucard should have been but when she was greeted with nothing she huffed. She wouldn’t be able to glare at him like this and would soon have to turn around to face him. He made a disapproving noise as he tried to keep the conversation going while stepping closer. Not having a reflection had its benefits at times.

Integral was not one for make-up. She had no one to impress was the deep down real reason, but also because it was just a plain hassle. She had seen some women in London that ranged from drop dead gorgeous to too easy whore. Not that there was anything that she had that needed to be covered up. Men had oogled her from a far and close, wondering just where in the name of the Queen did she hide the fountain of youth water within her milatary jacket pockets. Whenever Seares was around her, they were mistaken them for sisters and whispers such as ‘I didn’t know the Hellsing family had two daughters...’ came up every now and then. But still, she was a female and that little motion to always check herself over in the mirror never died. So there she was turning her face left to right and up and down to see if anything had changed in the past thirteen hours or so. And it had.

“These are your fault.”

She ran her index finger against the corners of her eyes. Even with Alucard’s vampire vison he did not see what the young women was talking about. So he made another noise of curiosity to just what his Master was referring to.

“Wrinkles. From you driving me up the wall all hours that you are awake.”

Alucard’s own nose wrinkled up, as if the foulest smell reached his face. The motion made the corners of his mouth move slightly up to show clean white teeth. Like a wolf that just caught sight of a human trespasser. Whenever he thought of the words ‘old’, ‘aging’, ‘worn’, ‘used’, ‘sagging’ or these ‘wrinkles’ his Master was talking about, he always pictured Walter. That was also unfair since Walter was a little unhuman himself and his face did not show his true age. Non the less, Alucard’s image of ‘old’ was his past partner’s face back in World War II as it appeared now. Walter was no spring chicken, but dammit if Alucard couldn’t help himself from chuckling loudly whenever some young human female would hit on him and flirt for hours. Alucard would always reply to him later, “Walter, you dog, you.” To where Walter would just smile warmly, run a gloved hand through his slicked jet black hair and would sigh heavily after answering, “Damn you God for giving me this face.” And he would walk off into the shadows to make some tea with single greatest smile to cross his features. What Walter did with the women that were interested in him was beyond the vampire. “I’m sorry, but I’m not what you think I am.” , was one of the statements Alucard overheard the butler saying once. But that only got the women more intrigued with what he just meant by it...

Alucard shook his head. He didn’t need the image of Walter ‘doing it’ in his head right now. Stupid, old, floss using, basted.

“Odd, I always thought your skin was as smooth as the dead’s .”

Of course Alucard would refer beauty to something uncanny. Integral was almost glad he didn’t use anything romantic such as ‘as a rose’ or ‘a baby’s bottom.’...In fact Integral prayed right there on the spot to whatever God would hear her that the words ‘baby’s’ and ‘bottom’ would never come out of his sharp toothed mouth ever....EVER.
She caught a quick glance in the mirror to see how the vampire would act in silence when in the same room as her. Integral already know how he acted though- When he first asked to drink her blood she stood in front of him for hours, literately, trying to turn over what the monster just said. And to his image he was the most patchient thing in the known world. He could stay in one position for hours, ceasing to breath or blink and stare right back at you. If anyone didn’t know better they would think he was a statute with a very heavy coat on...the same coat he was removing from his shoulders.

“What are you doing?” She snapped it out even though she didn’t mean to. But the sudden motion he made that she heard behind her made her turn around, to make sure her ears where not deceiving her. To her misfortune, it was true. Alucard casually leaned forward slightly to dip his elbow in and tilt his shoulder so that the very decorative shoulder pads with the overlapping fabric frills fell off to join the rest of the fabric that now dangled freely. One gloved hand grabbed the other side of the coat to do the same motion and then almost like magic, the dark rouge colored overcoat was off. It was magic. One minute it was on and then the other it was off. On...and then off... Integral scowled at that. Instead of keep the ancient thing in his arms Alucard saw a small table that held a vase behind him and tossed it on it. Integral feared the marble legs would break under the weight of the coat, surprisingly it didn’t.

“It’s too hot Master.”

“Filthy lying dog.”

She caught him, and how painfully easy she did, she felt insulted by it. He didn’t have body temperature, and it was raining. Undead worthless liar.

“...I am.”

And that was the end of that conversation for Alucard gave off the aura that he didn’t want to talk about his coat anymore. Integral picked up on that and decided to just give a look that someone would give a dog when he brought in a dirty stick from the outside. ‘Bad dog!...oh, what am I going to do with you...’

“But I also feel that we should be evenly matched in here as we are in the outside world.”

The blond felt as though her head had tilted to the side in a childish manner. She evened to bluntly say, ‘waaaaaaah?’ but then all her proper bringing up kicked her in the brain very hard and she puffed up her chest instead.

A gloved hand pinched the tip of the fabric that made up his Southern style bow and gave it a swift yank. The bow broke back to it’s original state and was dropped gently to the floor. Integral watched it float down and before her eyes could come back up to see what Alucard would do next, she saw the two embroidered white gloves with Satan’s Seal joined in on the floor.

“The tea party may be over, my Master, but I want my just desserts now...”

***

To be continued...

So...ummm a little more than about two years go by, and what do I do?...I update for some bizarre reason. Well, it’s not too crazy cause I just saw the OVA Hellsing and I was like ‘must...write...IxA’ but then I remembered- ‘Oh hey! I still have that story on hold!’ And here it is..another teasing Alucard leading on poor Mrs. Hellsing. Oh well.

Vash- *Girly, yet manly swoon* He can bite me any day...
Meryal & Me- WHAT!?
Vash- Er! Uh...oh. Umm...Oh hey! Look! Donuts! XOD

....Anyway! Tell me what you think if you would ever be so kind! I poured my blood into this fic! Can’t you tell!...Alucard can. XP Chapter three will be started soon I hope! More reviews = More writing ;) Don’t leave Master hanging there!

Vash- *Twix commercial comes on* Think it over...with donuts. ^o^