Hullo, minna-san! OK, I obviously don't speak English as my first language...and I don't have a beta T_T, so if you find a mistake tell me and I will change it. ^^ And, "yeah" it's short, it's a prolog.
Bear with me. To make this work I have to pretend that the Hellsing time line and he Kuroshitsuji time line are the same. In other words: at the end of the 19th century.
Disclaimer: If I'd own Hellsing or Kuroshitsuji or be Kouta Hirano, my live would be awesome! But sadly I' not. ^^''
A fine vacation
Integra was discussing her latest expenses ( a destroyed summer residence, Sir Hugh Islands destroyed and listed summer residence) with Sir Islands.
As she reached the point, where she felt like throwing her silver ashtray – normally reserved for Alucard – at him, Walter entered the room and stopped her train of thought. - Throwing an ashtray at a member of the Round Table would probably have caused the other members to throw a fit, anyway. And Walter always had the right timing, when it was about keeping her from loosing her temper.
As her Butler set the tea cups and the a piece of perfectly baked Black Forest Cake down in front of her, even her temper cooled down a bit. There was no better cake in the whole wide world than the cake Walter baked. And it was a rare occasion to get a slice during teatime, too, as Walter had decided in her youth that cake in the afternoon would spoil her hunger for dinner. Life was hard and unfair, yes.
By the time she snapped out of her thoughts, Walter had left again and Sir Islands was trying the cake. As he swallowed the first piece of his cake his eyes went wide and he hurried to take another bite, this time chewing slowly and savoring the taste. " I dare to asset that this is the best cake I have ever eaten." said Sir Islands after a few seconds,surprised.
Integra nodded, feeling a little more lenient with him, he had praised Walter's cake after all . " As a matter of fact, it is." she agreed and felling a small pang of guilt, she acted on it and continued: " And I have yet to send him on his well-deserved vacation, but Walter will probably not agree with me, on that it is." Sir Islands looked at her. " So he believes that without a butler, this house bold will collapse?" asked Sir Islands. Integra nodded. " My butler tends to claim that, too."
Sir Islands seemed to think about something for a moment. "Then, why not exchange Butlers with another family? I dare say that serving any other house bold would be relaxing for the butler of THE Hellsing family." he continued.
Integra thought of last nights "Boredom Incident" – Alucard, deciding that he was bored and annoying the hell out of her, resulting in a destroyed study, a few broken windows, Seras keeping Integra from clawing Aucards eyes out and Walter holding Alucard down with his steel wires. Not to mention that Walter had to clean this whole mess up. – and had to agree with Sir Hugh Islands.
Seeing her affirmation, Sir Islands said: " My wife told me about her niece's fiance's butler. " " The sister of my cousin's cousin's friend's neighbor… ." Integra thought and snapped right back to reality. " Lord Phantomhive's butler is supposed to be really capable and said to bake excellent cake. Capable in a way that he can serve the Queen's watch dog, I would say. That should be sufficient for the Hellsing house bold - for a short period of time. If you want me to, I will contact this person and ask about a possible exchange."
He seemed to have forgotten about his summer residence, while eating the cake, but this was alright with Integra. She thanked Walter wordlessly and said a quick prayer, to keep her from loosing money ( paying for the reconstruction of the residence).
Thinking about the suggestion for a moment, she decided to try it, after all, she still felt bad about last nights incident and Walter hadn't gone on a vacation for over 9 ?... years.
" Please contact this person and ask him to sent a reply immediately." Integra requested and sipped her Earl Grey. "Very well." Agreed Sir Islands. "My wife will be delighted." Sir Islands, Integra noticed, seemed to have a soft spot for people that made his wife happy. She made a mental note – she could use this – and decided to have Walter send her something for Christmas. Then she smiled her best fake upper-class-smile at Sir Islands and made a compliment about his wife. The high-class-Lady behavior lessons of her youth, paid off…sometimes.
As expected, the rest of their conversation was pleasant and Sir Islands refrained from charging her for even more than she had already paid. Cutting the Geese's expenses on weaponry had been bad enough for her to go on a vacation.
A few days later came Lord Phantomhive's letter, which said that he was quite interested in this exchange, as he had heard from Sir Islands' wife that her butler made excellent cake, which seemed to be fun for him to compare to his butler's.
Furthermore ( and most importantly ) he asked what Walters opinion on staying up late was. This confused Integra, but she answered anyway: That there was "no problem" with staying up late, Walter was after all the butler of the infanous "Hellsing Agency". She set a date for the exchange and ordered a member of the Geese to bring her reply to the post office.
After that she called Walter and presented him Lord Phantomhive's letter. "Sir Islands had a very good idea." she said. "You will participate in a butler exchange, as you refuse to go on a normal vacation."
It was a nice day…at least for Integra, who ignored Walter's objections completely.
