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31_days2008-02-11 08:44 pm
redseeker.livejournal.com) wrote in 31_days2008-02-11 08:44 pm
[Feb 11] [Hellsing/Devil May Cry] Café Fredi
Title: Café Fredi
Day/Theme: February 11 - "Confess and be hanged"
Series: Devil May Cry/Hellsing (AU?)
Character/Pairing: Dante Sparda, Seras Victoria, & Patty Lowell
Rating: PG (language, implied violence)
[:Note: it's actually called Restaurant Fredi in the anime, but that sounded a bit too Engrish to be credible. It's the little place where Cindy works as a waitress.
Follows Bullseye.]
Seras came to slowly, becoming first aware of the pain - a dulled sting in her whole body, focused in her abdomen. She still felt dizzy, and it was with a fizzy white fog still in her head that she gradually opened her eyes. Above her, a cracked ceiling came into focus, and a fan spun slowly. She watched its blades whirl, their lethargy matching her own. Then she began to remember. She remembered her mission, she remembered coming to America. She remembered the bar, and the man. No, not a man - a devil.
She started, inhaling needlessly and sharply, and snapping into a sitting position. The abrupt movement caused her to wince as nauseating pain shot out like roots from the centre of her stomach, and she began to cough.
"You might wanna be careful." Skin turning colder than it already was, she turned her head to the right. The demon was sitting astride an old wooden chair, leaning his elbows on the back of it; one hand cradled his chin, while the other loosely gripped a large black gun. She clutched her middle, biting her lip self-consciously. Her eyes were on the gun. "You're pretty beat up, vampire or not." When she didn't say anything, he lifted the gun and pointed it at her, though the looseness of his grip suggested his heart wasn't really in it. "So," he said. "You wanna tell me why you're trying to kill me?"
Seras made an effort to sit straighter and, moving cautiously, shifted so that she could sit properly on the dingy old couch he had evidently lain her on. They were in some kind of office - a large, square room bordered with clutter, with a dusty boarded floor and two large windows either side of a set of double doors. She narrowed her eyes; early morning sunlight was streaming in through the windows, grimy as they were. The brightness stung her eyes, and she shielded them with one hand as she shifted position. Once her feet were again on the floor, she squared her shoulders and looked him in the eye. The pain was nowhere near as bad as it had been, and the wound he'd made had nearly disappeared; that didn't stop her from hurting all over.
"You should know," he went on, "I took the time to reload while you were knocked out." He gave the black gun a vague wave before steadying it again, and a small smirk curled his lips. "Got some of your holy silver bullets in here now. Thought that was just a legend, but I guess it's true after all. Figured if they hurt me, they'd do worse to you."
Seras set her jaw, and let out a long, slow breath. The air felt stale in her lungs, but the movement hurt.
"You're a demon," she said, finally.
He gave a short bark of laughter. "No shit. And you're a vampire. You're trying to tell me you've got the moral high ground?" When she didn't reply, he went on, "You should probably start explaining." He shifted in his chair, which creaked, taking his chin out of his hand and leaning forward on the backrest. "I've got time."
Seras considered her options. Most of her gear was gone - presumably he'd hidden it somewhere, if he hadn't trashed it - and she was too far from her master to reach him telepathically. So, basically, she was alone, with no prospect of back-up.
This was supposed to be a simple search and destroy.
"Okay," she said, after a long pause. She saw his face relax, and a hint of a triumphant smile showed itself on his deceptively human face. "I'll tell you. It's not as though I have a choice."
"You're right there."
"All right..." She took a deep breath. "My name is Seras Victoria. I'm an agent of a special ops organisation based in London, dedicated to the location and eradication of un-dead and supernatural threats." He snorted, about to interrupt, or laugh, but she continued, still as matter-of-fact and toneless as before: "We've been experiencing heightened supernatural activity back home, but that's nothing to what we've heard is going on on this side of the Atlantic. Since we have no contact with any official organisation in the U.S. who deal with this sort of thing, it was decided to send one operative to investigate, and act if necessary."
"And you found me how?"
She gave a one-shouldered shrug. "People talk. You're pretty famous. Or infamous. Besides, intel told us that the demonic activity was mostly centred in this area."
"Oh yeah?" He got to his feet and lazily kicked the chair away. It fell onto its side, and Seras tried hard not to flinch at the suddenness of his movements. He was still pointing the gun at her head. "There's a good reason for that. What your intel forgot to tell you is that I'm practically a demon magnet. The bastards seek me out. Killing me would be a pretty big feather in the cap of any demonic son of a bitch who could manage it."
She looked up at him with round eyes. After a moment, he lowered his gun. She noticed that he was no longer wearing his coat, and his sword was missing. He relaxed his posture and shook his head. "You really don't know who I am, do you?"
"...Should I?"
He blinked, looking at her as though in complete incomprehension. Then, eventually, he said, "Okay look, lady. I'm gonna put this gun away, and I'm gonna trust that you're not about to start a repeat performance of last night, okay?"
She nodded. He smiled flatly and did as he said, holstering the black weapon. She noticed its silver twin in a matching holster on his other side; she also noticed that he did not put the guns down, just away. He still had the advantage; not to mention the fact that her strength was naturally diminished during the daytime. She guessed he already knew this.
"Okay." He folded his arms. Narrowing her eyes, she did the same.
"So now you know who I am," she said. "Are you going to tell me just who you are?"
He smirked, then paced over to a large wooden desk placed not far from her couch. It was strewn with various items - mostly papers, but Seras also saw several trinkets which were definitely occult in origin; he collapsed into the chair behind it and casually rested his booted feet on the desk's top. With one elbow on the chair's arm, he once again rested his chin in his hand and stared at her. Seras, taking umbridge at his casual manner, turned to face him and waited for him to speak.
"Why don't we start with you telling me what you already know?"
Seras bit back a growl. She didn't have time for this. She rose abruptly to her feet, ignoring the surge of pain which the sudden movement produced.
"This is a waste of time."
He raised an eyebrow. "Please yourself," he said. "You're free to go, you know. I just wondered, since we seem to have so much in common..."
"What?"
"You really should've paid more attention to those stories about me." A slow grin spread across his face. Seras wanted very badly to kick it clean off.
"Why? You're a demon. I was sent here to kill demons."
"Your organisation's really that black and white about it, huh?"
"Yes, actually."
"Funny, 'cause I couldn't help but notice you don't have a pulse. Vampires are just lesser forms of demons... kind of a crossbreed with humans, I guess. We're practically the same."
Seras opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted by a loud knocking on the office doors. His attention shifted to the door, and Seras turned. Both doors flew open, slamming against the walls, and, amidst a cloud of dust, in strode a little girl.
"Dante! You still owe me for... Oh!" The girl clocked Seras mid-sentence, and her expression softened in surprise and embarrassment. "Sorry," she said. "I didn't know you had a customer."
"So let me get this straight," the woman said. She was sitting opposite Dante in the booth, her elbows resting onthe Formica tabletop, her head tilted to one side. "You're half demon, half human?"
"That's right," Dante replied. "You sure you don't want some of this?" He waved his plastic spoon to indicate the impressive strawberry sundae he and Patty had been steadily demolishing for the past ten minutes.
"Uh... I'm sure," Seras replied. "I don't eat."
"You're missing out," Patty said with her mouth full.
Ignoring his charge for the time being, Dante turned his attention back to the vampire. She clasped her hands loosely in front of her on the table.
"And you hunt demons for a living?" she continued.
"It's really that hard to get your head around? Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't you in pretty much the same position? A vampire who hunts vampires?"
"Okay, okay." She lowered her eyes for a moment, bowing her head slightly so that her hair fell over her face. She was worrying her lower lip with teeth that he noticed were no longer quite as long and pointed. She made a more convincing human than he did, even if she was a bit pale. Very pale, actually; had she been this white before? There were dark shadows under her eyes, and he could see blue veins beneath her skin. "Well," she said. "I'm sorry, for... you know."
"It's okay," Patty said. Seras looked up, and the girl gave her a bright smile. "People are always trying to kill Dante. It's just a normal day for him." She took another spoonful of ice cream. "If you ask me, he should get a real job. That way he might actually be able to pay off some of his debts."
"I guess I made a wasted trip, then," Seras said, looking down again.
Dante shrugged, happy to ignore Patty's mention of debt. "Well," he said, "things have been picking up lately. Maybe your people weren't totally wrong. You're still here on recon, right?"
"Um, sure."
"So... since you're here... you could stick around for a while?"
She shook her head, giving a small smile. She seemed like a different creature to the vampire he'd fought on the roof; that woman had been a spitting Fury, all rage and Hellfire. The girl sitting opposite him was meek, tired, almost shy. She seemed younger, too. He wondered if he'd maybe hurt her more than he'd meant to.
"I saw what you could do," she said. "I mean, God, I was on the recieving end of it. I'm pretty sure you have things covered here."
Dante looked sheepish, and Patty gave him a reproachful look. "You're okay, though, right?"
"Oh, yes, I'm fine. Just a bit shaky. I lost a lot of blood. I'll need to, uh... feed soon."
"Oh shit, yeah, of course!" Patty elbowed him hard in the ribs, and he hissed. "Sorry. I mean, yeah. Hey, c'mon." He stood up, and Patty slid out of the booth behind him. He extended one gloved hand to Seras, and she gave him a baffled look. As though trying to kill her when they first met meant he had no manners at all.
"What? My stuff's back at the hotel, I'm sure I should just..." she tried, but he'd already taken her hand and was leading - or maybe it was closer to dragging - her out of the café. Patty huffed, grabbed some money from Dante's coat pocket, and left it on the table to cover their bill before catching up and latching onto the sleeve of his free arm.
Dante only found Seras' protests amusing. And kind of cute. "Relax," he said. "I offered to buy you a drink before, didn't I? After almost killing you, I figure it's the least I could do."
Day/Theme: February 11 - "Confess and be hanged"
Series: Devil May Cry/Hellsing (AU?)
Character/Pairing: Dante Sparda, Seras Victoria, & Patty Lowell
Rating: PG (language, implied violence)
[:Note: it's actually called Restaurant Fredi in the anime, but that sounded a bit too Engrish to be credible. It's the little place where Cindy works as a waitress.
Follows Bullseye.]
Seras came to slowly, becoming first aware of the pain - a dulled sting in her whole body, focused in her abdomen. She still felt dizzy, and it was with a fizzy white fog still in her head that she gradually opened her eyes. Above her, a cracked ceiling came into focus, and a fan spun slowly. She watched its blades whirl, their lethargy matching her own. Then she began to remember. She remembered her mission, she remembered coming to America. She remembered the bar, and the man. No, not a man - a devil.
She started, inhaling needlessly and sharply, and snapping into a sitting position. The abrupt movement caused her to wince as nauseating pain shot out like roots from the centre of her stomach, and she began to cough.
"You might wanna be careful." Skin turning colder than it already was, she turned her head to the right. The demon was sitting astride an old wooden chair, leaning his elbows on the back of it; one hand cradled his chin, while the other loosely gripped a large black gun. She clutched her middle, biting her lip self-consciously. Her eyes were on the gun. "You're pretty beat up, vampire or not." When she didn't say anything, he lifted the gun and pointed it at her, though the looseness of his grip suggested his heart wasn't really in it. "So," he said. "You wanna tell me why you're trying to kill me?"
Seras made an effort to sit straighter and, moving cautiously, shifted so that she could sit properly on the dingy old couch he had evidently lain her on. They were in some kind of office - a large, square room bordered with clutter, with a dusty boarded floor and two large windows either side of a set of double doors. She narrowed her eyes; early morning sunlight was streaming in through the windows, grimy as they were. The brightness stung her eyes, and she shielded them with one hand as she shifted position. Once her feet were again on the floor, she squared her shoulders and looked him in the eye. The pain was nowhere near as bad as it had been, and the wound he'd made had nearly disappeared; that didn't stop her from hurting all over.
"You should know," he went on, "I took the time to reload while you were knocked out." He gave the black gun a vague wave before steadying it again, and a small smirk curled his lips. "Got some of your holy silver bullets in here now. Thought that was just a legend, but I guess it's true after all. Figured if they hurt me, they'd do worse to you."
Seras set her jaw, and let out a long, slow breath. The air felt stale in her lungs, but the movement hurt.
"You're a demon," she said, finally.
He gave a short bark of laughter. "No shit. And you're a vampire. You're trying to tell me you've got the moral high ground?" When she didn't reply, he went on, "You should probably start explaining." He shifted in his chair, which creaked, taking his chin out of his hand and leaning forward on the backrest. "I've got time."
Seras considered her options. Most of her gear was gone - presumably he'd hidden it somewhere, if he hadn't trashed it - and she was too far from her master to reach him telepathically. So, basically, she was alone, with no prospect of back-up.
This was supposed to be a simple search and destroy.
"Okay," she said, after a long pause. She saw his face relax, and a hint of a triumphant smile showed itself on his deceptively human face. "I'll tell you. It's not as though I have a choice."
"You're right there."
"All right..." She took a deep breath. "My name is Seras Victoria. I'm an agent of a special ops organisation based in London, dedicated to the location and eradication of un-dead and supernatural threats." He snorted, about to interrupt, or laugh, but she continued, still as matter-of-fact and toneless as before: "We've been experiencing heightened supernatural activity back home, but that's nothing to what we've heard is going on on this side of the Atlantic. Since we have no contact with any official organisation in the U.S. who deal with this sort of thing, it was decided to send one operative to investigate, and act if necessary."
"And you found me how?"
She gave a one-shouldered shrug. "People talk. You're pretty famous. Or infamous. Besides, intel told us that the demonic activity was mostly centred in this area."
"Oh yeah?" He got to his feet and lazily kicked the chair away. It fell onto its side, and Seras tried hard not to flinch at the suddenness of his movements. He was still pointing the gun at her head. "There's a good reason for that. What your intel forgot to tell you is that I'm practically a demon magnet. The bastards seek me out. Killing me would be a pretty big feather in the cap of any demonic son of a bitch who could manage it."
She looked up at him with round eyes. After a moment, he lowered his gun. She noticed that he was no longer wearing his coat, and his sword was missing. He relaxed his posture and shook his head. "You really don't know who I am, do you?"
"...Should I?"
He blinked, looking at her as though in complete incomprehension. Then, eventually, he said, "Okay look, lady. I'm gonna put this gun away, and I'm gonna trust that you're not about to start a repeat performance of last night, okay?"
She nodded. He smiled flatly and did as he said, holstering the black weapon. She noticed its silver twin in a matching holster on his other side; she also noticed that he did not put the guns down, just away. He still had the advantage; not to mention the fact that her strength was naturally diminished during the daytime. She guessed he already knew this.
"Okay." He folded his arms. Narrowing her eyes, she did the same.
"So now you know who I am," she said. "Are you going to tell me just who you are?"
He smirked, then paced over to a large wooden desk placed not far from her couch. It was strewn with various items - mostly papers, but Seras also saw several trinkets which were definitely occult in origin; he collapsed into the chair behind it and casually rested his booted feet on the desk's top. With one elbow on the chair's arm, he once again rested his chin in his hand and stared at her. Seras, taking umbridge at his casual manner, turned to face him and waited for him to speak.
"Why don't we start with you telling me what you already know?"
Seras bit back a growl. She didn't have time for this. She rose abruptly to her feet, ignoring the surge of pain which the sudden movement produced.
"This is a waste of time."
He raised an eyebrow. "Please yourself," he said. "You're free to go, you know. I just wondered, since we seem to have so much in common..."
"What?"
"You really should've paid more attention to those stories about me." A slow grin spread across his face. Seras wanted very badly to kick it clean off.
"Why? You're a demon. I was sent here to kill demons."
"Your organisation's really that black and white about it, huh?"
"Yes, actually."
"Funny, 'cause I couldn't help but notice you don't have a pulse. Vampires are just lesser forms of demons... kind of a crossbreed with humans, I guess. We're practically the same."
Seras opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted by a loud knocking on the office doors. His attention shifted to the door, and Seras turned. Both doors flew open, slamming against the walls, and, amidst a cloud of dust, in strode a little girl.
"Dante! You still owe me for... Oh!" The girl clocked Seras mid-sentence, and her expression softened in surprise and embarrassment. "Sorry," she said. "I didn't know you had a customer."
"So let me get this straight," the woman said. She was sitting opposite Dante in the booth, her elbows resting onthe Formica tabletop, her head tilted to one side. "You're half demon, half human?"
"That's right," Dante replied. "You sure you don't want some of this?" He waved his plastic spoon to indicate the impressive strawberry sundae he and Patty had been steadily demolishing for the past ten minutes.
"Uh... I'm sure," Seras replied. "I don't eat."
"You're missing out," Patty said with her mouth full.
Ignoring his charge for the time being, Dante turned his attention back to the vampire. She clasped her hands loosely in front of her on the table.
"And you hunt demons for a living?" she continued.
"It's really that hard to get your head around? Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't you in pretty much the same position? A vampire who hunts vampires?"
"Okay, okay." She lowered her eyes for a moment, bowing her head slightly so that her hair fell over her face. She was worrying her lower lip with teeth that he noticed were no longer quite as long and pointed. She made a more convincing human than he did, even if she was a bit pale. Very pale, actually; had she been this white before? There were dark shadows under her eyes, and he could see blue veins beneath her skin. "Well," she said. "I'm sorry, for... you know."
"It's okay," Patty said. Seras looked up, and the girl gave her a bright smile. "People are always trying to kill Dante. It's just a normal day for him." She took another spoonful of ice cream. "If you ask me, he should get a real job. That way he might actually be able to pay off some of his debts."
"I guess I made a wasted trip, then," Seras said, looking down again.
Dante shrugged, happy to ignore Patty's mention of debt. "Well," he said, "things have been picking up lately. Maybe your people weren't totally wrong. You're still here on recon, right?"
"Um, sure."
"So... since you're here... you could stick around for a while?"
She shook her head, giving a small smile. She seemed like a different creature to the vampire he'd fought on the roof; that woman had been a spitting Fury, all rage and Hellfire. The girl sitting opposite him was meek, tired, almost shy. She seemed younger, too. He wondered if he'd maybe hurt her more than he'd meant to.
"I saw what you could do," she said. "I mean, God, I was on the recieving end of it. I'm pretty sure you have things covered here."
Dante looked sheepish, and Patty gave him a reproachful look. "You're okay, though, right?"
"Oh, yes, I'm fine. Just a bit shaky. I lost a lot of blood. I'll need to, uh... feed soon."
"Oh shit, yeah, of course!" Patty elbowed him hard in the ribs, and he hissed. "Sorry. I mean, yeah. Hey, c'mon." He stood up, and Patty slid out of the booth behind him. He extended one gloved hand to Seras, and she gave him a baffled look. As though trying to kill her when they first met meant he had no manners at all.
"What? My stuff's back at the hotel, I'm sure I should just..." she tried, but he'd already taken her hand and was leading - or maybe it was closer to dragging - her out of the café. Patty huffed, grabbed some money from Dante's coat pocket, and left it on the table to cover their bill before catching up and latching onto the sleeve of his free arm.
Dante only found Seras' protests amusing. And kind of cute. "Relax," he said. "I offered to buy you a drink before, didn't I? After almost killing you, I figure it's the least I could do."