Going to help the new arrivals did not go...quite as anticipated.
Preparation had gone well - Seras helping had made it fun, and it felt good knowing that the way they had met got to carry on ahead , expanding and paying it all forward. He felt...good, knowing he had made that difference for her. Knowing that she wanted to turn around and make that difference for someone else in turn. In a rare moment, Alfred was feeling...good. Like he had made a real impact.
Then the day itself happened.
They had split up to help more people. After handing out a few kits, he had headed over to where Seras had been canvassing, his heart leapt a little when he spotted her...and then dropped through his stomach just a moment later as she leapt into the arms of someone tall and dark, happy as anything. Someone she knew.
How... nice.
Chest stinging for reasons he couldn't place, he then wandered back out...looking around at the people emerging. Well, if someone could come for her, why not him? Maybe it would happen. He wandered for a bit, afraid to hope, but needing to.
He even raised his voice in a little lilting tune, once, twice, three times.
Nothing.
No one.
Suddenly, the task wasn't feeling...as good as it had. Leaving the rest of his kits to be handed out by others, he did the only thing he now wanted to. He went back to the castle, eyes burning.
...
Now as Seras enters the darkened ballroom, she finds Alfred sitting on the bottom steps of the spiral staircase, the shrapnel of a broken chair laying in splinters near the doorway. He's leaning on the banister, staring at nothing until Seras falls within his line of sight.
His eyes blaze a vibrant red that they had not earlier in the day. He can hear her heart beating, and he shudders.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2022-06-09 07:46 am (UTC)Preparation had gone well - Seras helping had made it fun, and it felt good knowing that the way they had met got to carry on ahead , expanding and paying it all forward. He felt...good, knowing he had made that difference for her. Knowing that she wanted to turn around and make that difference for someone else in turn. In a rare moment, Alfred was feeling...good. Like he had made a real impact.
Then the day itself happened.
They had split up to help more people. After handing out a few kits, he had headed over to where Seras had been canvassing, his heart leapt a little when he spotted her...and then dropped through his stomach just a moment later as she leapt into the arms of someone tall and dark, happy as anything. Someone she knew.
How... nice.
Chest stinging for reasons he couldn't place, he then wandered back out...looking around at the people emerging. Well, if someone could come for her, why not him? Maybe it would happen. He wandered for a bit, afraid to hope, but needing to.
He even raised his voice in a little lilting tune, once, twice, three times.
Nothing.
No one.
Suddenly, the task wasn't feeling...as good as it had. Leaving the rest of his kits to be handed out by others, he did the only thing he now wanted to. He went back to the castle, eyes burning.
...
Now as Seras enters the darkened ballroom, she finds Alfred sitting on the bottom steps of the spiral staircase, the shrapnel of a broken chair laying in splinters near the doorway. He's leaning on the banister, staring at nothing until Seras falls within his line of sight.
His eyes blaze a vibrant red that they had not earlier in the day. He can hear her heart beating, and he shudders.
"...Seras.
Guten Abend."