Fractured Pieces, New Mirror

While he still performed his duties, from missions to messages to breaking up squabbles amongst the orphans, he was functioning almost entirely on autopilot, his mind distracted by conflicting thoughts that circled back around on themselves time and again.

The sudden decision by Hellsing's pet monster to return the doll's memories in full had thrown him entirely off guard. There had been just too many questions he couldn't think of answers to, and even more that he didn't want to know the answers to. Would old resentments re-surface? Given the original Enrico's vindictive, bitter nature, it was almost a given. The events of the past several years would only fan the flames and he just-

It was disgusting and wrong, but... as much as he didn't want to admit it, Alucard had been right. He had preferred the doll's created personality and mindset to that of the original. Physical things aside, he had enjoyed being able to spend more than five minutes in the same room as the younger man without a shouting match erupting, or weeks of empty, seething silence. The thought of returning to the old state of affairs after the way things had been going, he couldn't face it.

It was the coward's decision, but he'd decided it was just better to avoid the doll for awhile. At least until he could get his head together and decide what it was he actually wanted. Unfortunately, it seemed the harder he tried to do so, the more scattered and argumentative the different sides of his mind became.

It was in the middle of yet another wandering down the spiraled, branching path of his thoughts that the sudden feeling of a hand clutching his sleeve startled him back to reality and he found an ashen-pale Father Renaldo standing on the other side of the gate.

"The house," the older man gasped, clearly winded from running and shaken by something. "You have to come. Now."

At the insistent pull on his arm, he followed out the gate, keeping up easily even as his companion took to a run. As they drew close to the abandoned residence, he could see Heinkel and Yumie standing off to the side, looking drawn and blatantly unsettled, which worried him more than Renaldo's initial near panic.

"What the hell is this all about?"

"This," Renaldo replied vehemently as he swung the door open with a shaking hand, "is what happens when you ignore a problem for too long."

The stench of blood new and old was nearly overwhelming. But not nearly so as the sight that greeted him. The floor, every wall, every piece of furniture, every inch of bare surface that was within the doll's reach, was covered in bloody writing.

Useless
Failure
Worthless

The same words repeated over and over in more languages than he could make out. It wasn't until he'd reached the hallway that he realized he was the only one who'd entered the house. But he couldn't turn back, couldn't even make himself stop. Not when the words became incoherently written backwards as well as forwards, became letterless smears, became a solid coating, the continuous and swift degeneration of an unsound mind recorded with every step he took.

It was in the last bedroom at the far back of the house that he finally found the missing doll, and he stared in mixed shock and horror as the creature, mumbling quietly to itself, shifted nails into sharp claws and reopened the veins of its arm and put a thick swath of blood down to coat the last little bit of untouched wall in the entire house. Then it looked around, seemingly lost and confused as to why there was nothing left to paint, and made a tiny little animal-like noise of pain as it huddled into a ball, rocking back and forth.

He swallowed back the bile that had risen into his throat.

"This one will never decide he's outgrown you either. It can't."

"For God's sake, Alex, this thing isn't like the Enrico we knew before. It doesn't understand what it supposedly did wrong."

To be told such things, especially when some of the information came from one he could hardly be considered trustworthy, was one thing. This... There were no words for this. He restrained the instinctive urge to take a deep breath, the blood smell so strong here that he might be ill if he tried, then moved forward and crouched beside the doll. It flinched away when he put a hand on its back, but didn't seem to be otherwise aware of his presence. Or much of anything at all.

"Enrico."

Whether it was in response to its name or to his voice, that got a reaction. The doll's head snapped up, and he had to clench his hand slightly in the thin shirt it wore to keep himself from recoiling at the chaotic, stormy madness that clouded the creature's eyes. How long had he been lost in his own head, that the doll could have fallen so far? Swallowing thickly, he brushed fingers over Enrico's cheek as gently as possible, then shifted to hold out his arms. "Come here."

Insane it may have been, the doll was still obedient, and made no effort to fight as he scooped it up into his arms, the strongest reactions being only a choked whimper and short claws tearing his cassock a little as it clung to him.

A brief glance into the bathroom confirmed his suspicions, that it had already suffered the psychosis-induced artistic attentions of his now shivering burden, and he bit his lip, a plan forming in his mind as he carried Enrico back to the front of the house.

The others jumped when he jerked the door open, and he ignored the wide-eyed responses to the doll's condition and the blood that covered it and spattered him. "Heinkel, call that company in Perugia and tell them we have another demolition job for them. They'll know to keep their mouthes shut about anything they see here."

"Is it truly that bad?"

"There's nothing salvageable from the kitchen onward," he replied. "Yumie, go with her in case anyone decides to get nosy. Father Renaldo, I need you to go back to the orphanage and get two sets of my clothing. They'll be too big for Enrico, but it's the closest we have right now."

"Where will you be?" the older priest asked, and he couldn't help but think that the man's tone and expression had turned faintly... approving.

He thought about it for a minute, then- "The house on the next hill. It's been abandoned since its owners fled ghouls twelve years ago."

Once their little meeting had split up, he shifted his hold so that he could close and lock the door again to keep any nosy busybodies from finding out about the mess inside. "Enrico?"

There was no vocal response, but he felt the doll subtly shift closer, and he swallowed again, this time for nerves as he began walking, cradling it against his chest. First things first. He had to get the blood cleaned off it and get it and himself into some clothes not covered in blood. Then he could worry about all the other problems to be solved. His earlier indecision shoved to the furthest reaches of his brain by urgency, he got to the house he'd directed Renaldo to meet him at and kicked the door open.

"Alright, Enrico. We need to get you bathed, okay?"

Still no response, and he held the doll a little tighter as he sought out a bathroom that would be suitable. Upstairs by the master bedroom, he finally found what he was looking for, a glass shower large enough that it would hold them both sitting. After checking on the near-catatonic state of his companion, he began stripping off their clothing. Removing the doll's shirt got a tiny uncomfortable noise, which he soothed with gentle reassurances as he finished getting the stained and matted garments off.

The water was icy despite his efforts otherwise, but that finally got the first true response; Enrico gasping sharply and arching as the spray hit his back and doused his hair. He knelt in front of the shivering doll, having located some soap and other things left behind by the original owners, and set to the task of washing away the blood with diligence, continuing to murmur comfortingly to his companion. "We're almost done. Just a little more to get off."

Renaldo must have arrived and left again at some point, because when he guided the still dazed and incoherent doll out to towel it off and dry its hair, he found the ordered clothing lying in a little bundle by the door. The doll's head stayed low while he dried and dressed it, and he tried not to think how fragile it looked in clothing that nearly swallowed it whole, or how he was actually rather glad it wasn't staring at him with those disturbing eyes.

Getting dressed himself, he lead the unsteady creature to the bedroom and shook out over a decade of dust from the bedding. When he had finished putting the bed back in order, they both just stood silently for a moment, he watching the doll, and the doll watching nothing at all. It was only when Enrico began to fidget and scratch at its arm like it might cut itself open again that he moved, catching doll's wrist lightly.

"Don't do that." His voice came out a little more strained and stern than he intended, and the doll flinched, but the only protest was a slight twitch of fingers before it swayed a little and leaned into him. Startled and, yet, a little relieved, he took that deep, slow breath that it seemed like he'd been needing forever and released the doll's wrist. "That's better," he said, more gently as he wrapped his arms around Enrico and rubbed its back gently.

It took him longer to coax the doll into lying down on the bed, and longer still to get it to close its eyes and rest. Only when he was sure that it had lapsed into whatever state passed for sleep for it did he sit down on the edge of the bed and begin slowly running his fingers through its hair.

His mind was beginning to wander back into the now almost familiar pattern of loops and twists as he stared into space, much like the doll had done earlier.

But now he had a whole new set of questions plaguing his thoughts. Most importantly...

...what was he going to do once Enrico woke up again?