This was my first story here, and consequently lacked a proper plot ^^ I have now thought out one for it, and have rewritten it slightly to fit ^^
The story itself is hard to classify, and will contain multiple genres.
The original story was betaread by Lion in the Land, a really skilled author ^^ please give her stories a go if you like Hellsing ^^
DISCLAIMER: I dont own Jack Shit! Or, actually, I do own Jack Smith. But as of yet, nothing else. Now, get off my back, pesky lawyers.
A/N: This story uses the alternate universe I have detailed on my profile. You don`t have to, but it will be better if you check it out before reading this. You might become confused if you don`t. :D
Warning: Heavy swearing in various languages may occur. Also, gory battlescenes will occur. Would it have been a proper Hellsingfic without the latter?
"Sigh..." Jack sighed audibly. He was sitting in his train-cabin on his way to his English childhood home, Burntwood. As he was half English, half Norwegian and had spent roughly half his childhood in Norway and the rest in England; he had two hometowns. His mom, an old lady by now, had sent him yet another message on his cellphone, urging him to get home more quickly. Not only did she urge him, she tempted him with homemade sheep-in-cabbage too. Annoying by his moms constant messaging, yet salivating at the mere thought of sheep-in-cabbage, he replied that he was on the train and soon there.
It wasn't my fault that I had to correct some of my students' tests before I left! Sometimes, being a teacher sucks, he thought. Or on second thought... Maybe playing Bioshock 2 during in the time I was supposed to rate tests wasn't such a great idea.
Shrugging, he settled deeper into the seat and tried to look out at the darkening landscape. But, since the lights were on in the train, the only thing he saw was his reflection in the glass. He was an okay looking man. His face was a bit thin, and the effect created by his goatee beard only increased that feeling. His hair was short, and both hair and beard were nicely trimmed. He didn`t like unkempt hair. His body was slimly built, and due to a high metabolism he was rather thin, even though he ate like a horse. However, he never trained, so he was rather weak. "Meaningless." Was his only excuse when people asked him why he didn`t train.
For once, he wasn't in his customary lab-coat, which was the article of clothing he used the most, due to his job as a physics and chemistry teacher at a university. Instead, he was clad in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, covered by an old and worn leather jacket, which had been a gift from his father years ago. He really loved that jacket. Picking up a book from his backpack, Jack settled in to read a bit as the train continued its journey towards the small town.
"Alucard, Seras, you have a new mission." Integra said as the two vampires phased through the door to stand before her desk, as so often before, awaiting orders.
"What mission, Sir?" Seras asked, curious to what kind of mission it was now. Paranormal activity had been rather scarce lately.
"We have uncomfirmed reports of a vampire, presumably Nosferatu type, in a small village north of here. There has been sightings of a large number of ghouls, and we need to eliminate the source as quickly as possible. Here is the report. It has every detail you need."
As if they needed to be told this. By now, even Seras was so used to this that she could just get the report then begone. However, after a few incidents of Alucard misinterpretating such orders, by killing targets that was instead intended to be guarded, this had become a formality that was required. Doubtlessly, Alucard had enjoyed killing those target, having probably misinterpretated the orders on purpose, so the procedure was actually necessary too.
"Oh, and also, most of the ghouls are concentrated on the graveyards. Therefore, most of the humans are still alive, and as such, you will only be using small arms for this mission."
"Oh. Darn." Seras simply said. She had grown rather fond of her Harkonnen cannon, but she knew better than to defy Integras orders. She might be 50 years old, but she was just as strict as she had been when Seras first joined Hellsing, some thirty-five odd years ago.
Of course, this did not prevent Seras from carrying the gun with her. As a powerful Nosferatu, she was gifted with the ability to store a certain amount of mass in a sort of "pocket-space", just as Alucard could. Just for fun, Seras sometimes pulled her Harkonnen out of her cleavage infront of new recruits, just to see their faces. It was priceless, every single time.
Within moments, they were ready to go, just stopping to let Seras pick up a large Desert Eagle, which was the smallest gun she could find.
As Jack got off the train, the usual bustle of the train-station hit him. He picked up his suitcase and went straight for the cab-call center. He was not about to waste time when there was sheep-in-cabbage cooking at home.
"One ride to Burntwood, number 34 Harbour road, please." He asked the employee, who was busily doing…something, on the computer. He saw her slightly vacant look and figured that she wasn`t exactly in danger of over-working herself. He slammed his palm on the table, startling her, then repeated the question with a grin.
"Oh. Okay, here you go." She said, handing him a ticket after he had handed over the money. He grinned, turned around, and started walking towards the exit.
"Ohhff, sorry!" Jack apologized as he brushed a little bit close to a tall man clad in a curious red coat, then continued on.
Alucard grumbled. He hated crowded places. Just now, some bumbling fool had bumped into him. At least this one had the courtesy of apologizing.
"Remember Master, no killing!" Seras unnecessarily reminded him.
He just grumbled a bit more. Why the hell did we have to take the train? he asked himself. Oh, wait. It was probably because I startled Police Girl during that target-practice session, so that she missed and blew up the chopper…. He chuckled at the memory. Okay, it was incredibly annoying to use public transport, but it had been worth it.
"Where was the infestation again…?" Seras asked, blushing slightly in embarrassment that she had forgotten where they were going.
Alucard chuckled, and then answered. "Burntwood."
"Mornin` buddy!" Jack cheerfully greeted the cab-driver.
"Where are you going? Got a ticket?" he asked, leaning over the seat to take a look at his newest passenger.
" `ere you go!" Jack said, fishing the ticket out of a pocket and handing it to the man.
"Burntwood, eh? Heard there's some kind of weird silence over the town now. No messages have come out for a couple of days. And since it's so small, there has been no reason to travel there for anyone before now." The cab-driver said as he fired up the engine, trying to get a conversation going.
"Oh? I suppose we'll be the first then. I wonder what's happened. But, if you'll excuse me, I`m kinda tired, so I'll go to sleep now," Jack answered. As said, so done, and Jack was soon sleeping soundly in the back seat as the cab continued towards the small town.
When he awoke, the taxi had parked right outside the house. It was semi-large and a rather nice house, but pretty old. It sat right by the waterfront, and Jack remembered taking a dip in the rather cold water in the summer to cool himself off.
"Thanks, buddy," he said to the driver as he exited the car. He fetched his baggage from the trunk and walked towards the house as the cab drove off. Jack tried to open the door, but was perplexed when he found that it was locked.
"Locked? This door is never locked when someone is home..." he mumbled to himself. Jack fished up the spare key to the house from a nearby potted plant and let himself in. Once inside, he promptly dropped the baggage on the floor. There was a faint smell of blood in the air, the sickly sweet smell drifting around in the air.
"Mom, dad..." Jack whispered, afraid that something might have happened to them. Suddenly, the sound of glass shattering rang through the house, shocking Jack back to reality. He immediately assumed that burglars had somehow broken into the house, locked the door so that they wouldn't be interrupted, then somehow hurt Jacks parents, which explained the smell of blood. No fucking way burglars are gonna get away with this... he though angrily. As silently as he could, he sneaked his way into his old childhood room. Jumping up on the bed, taking care to avoid the creaky spots, he spotted the item he wanted. It was a katana, originally intended for display. But, since it was long, heavy and very, very sharp, it would work perfectly.
Silently, he slid the weapon from its scabbard and stalked out of the room, intending to go burglar-hunting. He quietly walked past the kitchen after checking that it was clear, then moved on towards the living-room. What he found there was...shocking, to put it mildly. There, on the floor, lay the mutilated corpses of his elderly parents. The katana sank to the floor as Jack realized that his parents were not just hurt, but dead. And not only dead, but seemingly ripped apart... And the perpetrator was still in the house. He had heard him breaking something, hadn`t he?
The katana came up again, this time in a combat pose. Jack was now so angry, he didn`t care about stalking anymore and walked out in the hallway again. He roared incoherently in rage, before setting off towards the stairwell. He rushed up, and faintly registered the smell of death becoming stronger. He ran all the way up, then crashed into the second storey living room, hoping to find someone, something, he could kill. A loud groaning met him, and in the middle of the room stood a...zombie? What the... Jack thought. It was definitely dead, since half its face was ripped of, and its throat was gone. But... A zombie?
The notion of the living dead walking in his parents' living room momentarily stunned Jack, even in his sorrow-fueled fury, and the katana dropped from its ready state to rest with the tip on the floor. However, the zombie-thing was definitely not stunned, and charged clumsily at Jack. As the stench of decay assaulted Jacks nostrils, he snapped out of the daze, and raised his blade to defend himself, slashing wildly at the ghoul. One of its arms dropped to the floor, and it lost a few fingers on the other arm, but that didn't deter the ghoul at all, and it slashed at Jack with its remaining arm and fingers. Luckily for Jack, ghouls are really slow, and he managed to dodge out of the way without a scratch.
"What the fuck is going on here?" he said, lifting the sword to attack once more. The ghoul turned around, preparing another strike, but Jack was faster, stabbing the katana into the ghoul's chest, sinking it to the hilt. Yet the thing STILL would not die.
"Svarte HELVETE!" Jack swore in Norwegian, and ripped the katana out of the monster's chest. Barely dodging another slash, he tried once more to kill the damn thing, this time striking for the head. The sharp blade easily sliced through the skull of the monster, exposing its brain to air. The ghoul, now with only half a head, stood there a short while before collapsing in a heap on the floor. Jack stood there, over the remains of his first zombie-kill, and panted heavily.
"Damnit, I have to start exercising after this..." he said in a fit of dark humour, his brain not functioning properly after the shock the poor thing had gone through. When the panting subsided, he looked down at the putrid corpse.
"So, headshots kill ya, eh?" he said before turning to check the other rooms. Now he was both confused and pissed. Something had killed his parents, and apparently that something had been some kind of zombie. Since Jack never was one to get paralyzed due to stress, he figured he'd go zombie-hunting. The rational part of his brain knew it was stupid, seeing that he nearly died just by fighting one, but he didn't care anymore. The upper floor was clear, so he walked back to the stairs, intending to get out, either to kill more zombies, or to get help somehow. He simply didn't know anymore. His brain was fast overloading, and for each minute that passed, he became more and more confused. Suddenly, a horrible gnashing sound emerged from behind the living room doors. Jack, against the will of the part of his brain that was still rational, opened the door, revealing not one or two, but five ghouls feasting on his parents corpses.
Suddenly, a furious bloodlust settled over him. No fucking way those walking maggot-buffets were gonna eat his parents! This was probably the stupidest thing he had ever done in his entire life, but at that moment, he didn't care. He roared in rage, and charged the first ghoul, swinging his blade hard against its head, slicing straight through the surprised zombie's skull. Before the corpse hit the floor, he had moved on to the next one, trying to kill it with a heavy overhead chop. He missed, and the chop hit its left shoulder instead. Since this ghoul was particularly rotten, and Jack had used all his admittedly limited might in the chop, the sword passed straight through flesh and bone, slicing its heart in two. The ghoul crumbled into a heap, and left a slightly perplexed Jack. Heads and heart, eh? Very well then... he thought and dodged away from a slashing ghoul. He stepped back two steps, then stepped forward one step and thrust the blade out, striking the monster in the chest, just like the one on the second floor. However, this time, the ghoul died, since Jack had aimed for the heart.
Three ghouls down, two to go. However, Jack had now lost the element of surprise, and the undead monstrosities lurched towards him, making disgusting gurgling and groaning sounds. Jack stepped back two steps, then suddenly lost his footing in a pool something very slippery. He crashed down, taking a small table with him, and landed straight in the puddle. He scrambled backwards to avoid the ghouls closing in, and nearly slipped again. He looked down at the puddle, and realized that it was blood. Quite a large amount of it too. Gasping in shock, he stumbled backwards again, into a bookshelf that stood there. It stabilized him somewhat, and he regained his footing and brandished the now bloody blade against the ghouls again.
He stepped forward and sliced at the closest zombie, trying to hit its head, but he nearly slipped in the blood again and missed, only scoring a deep gash in the monster's chest. That didn't hinder the ghoul at all, however, and he continued to lurch forward, nearly within striking distance now. Jack realised he would probably lose with such precarious footing and wisely ran halfway across the room before turning to face the ghouls again.
Jack was now panting heavily, the ghoul-slaying taking its toll on his untrained body. The lead ghoul, the one with the gash, came into striking distance again, and Jack prepared to attack. He slashed hard, and just as the blade went through the monster's skull, killing it, something bit into his leg from behind, making him yelp in pain and fall over. He looked down his leg and to his horror saw his own mother's zombified face biting and gnashing into his leg. He did the only sensible thing he could do, and whacked her over the head with the sword until she let go, then quickly crawled towards the door. His right leg, the one she…it, had bitten, was useless, some kind of poison paralyzing it.
A loud groaning was suddenly heard from behind, and Jack slowly turned. There, in front of the entrance, his father's corpse stood, blocking the way. Jack stumbled to his feet, using his one good foot to jump to a corner of the room. There was no running away now. His mother's and father's corpses, in addition to the nameless third ghoul, came lurching towards him. He lifted the katana and blinked away a few tears, created from pain, grief and rage. The nameless ghoul was the quickest one, and it was the first to arrive. Jack raised the blade, and brought it down heavily on the slow ghoul's head, intending to finish it off quickly, before he was overrun. Then, to his horror, he felt the blade shatter against something. The ghoul he had tried to kill died, but he could plainly see a metal plate implant in its head, the wound from the katana having exposed it. Now, he only held the jagged remains of the katana, only a rough third of it still attached to the hilt. He looked down at it, but kept holding it. After all, it was the only weapon he had within reach.
A gurgling sound reached his ears, and he looked up just in time to see his father's corpse slash at him with his claws, striking him in the chest. He groaned in pain and lifted the broken blade to defend himself. He blocked a strike aimed for his head, but couldn't bring himself to retaliate. Even if they were dead, they were still his mother and father! His mother was the next to attack and jumped forward to bite again. Jack brought the blade up to protect himself, and the ghoul bit down hard on it. It started shaking its head, like a dog, and Jack had to let go of the shattered sword. Now unarmed, he had nothing to defend himself with against the ghoulish onslaught. It was over within moments. Jack was still alive, barely. He was covered in his own blood, shivering from the apparently poisonous ghoul bites. Vaguely, he heard two bangs that sounded like gunshots before he passed out.
"Master! He is still alive!" Seras exclaimed as she examined the body of the young man that was lying on the floor. He had horrible wounds, but was still breathing...barely. Alucard surveyed the room. Other than the two he had shot, there were five dead ghouls in the room. His nose told him there was a sixth dead one on the top floor too. Spread out on the floor near the corner the shattered remnants of a sword lay. It was bloodied by ghoul blood too. Alucard quickly pieced together what had occurred there, and suddenly made a decision.
"Seras... Turn him." he said.
Seras looked up at her master, a shocked expression spreading across her face. "But... why? And how do you know if I would be able? And what will Sir Integra say?" Alucard just stared at her a short while. A wet gurgling sound from the human on the floor sounded, and Alucard figured he`d better hurry up explaining before the human died.
"You see these ghoul corpses?" he asked, pointing at the various corpses on the floor. "There are five of them here. And there is a sixth one on the top floor too. This human, only armed with a sword, killed six ghouls all by himself. That's worth preserving. And, I can smell his virgin blood from here. You should have noticed it too." Seras blushed a little. Yeah, she had noticed the rather appetizing smell, she had just ignored it.
"What about Sir Integra then?" Seras asked, cradling the human's head in her lap, having nothing better to do.
"Do you really think I cared about that when I turned you?" Alucard asked with a grin. "Now, turn him. That's an order." Alucard's voice turned commanding. While he technically didn't have the power to force Seras to obey anymore, since she had finally become a True Undead some thirty-five odd years ago, his orders still carried some weight.
"Okay then, Master..." Seras said with a weak voice. She leaned over the now even weaker human, mumbling a short "Sorry..." before she bent over to give him the Vampire Kiss.
On a nearby hilltop, a lone figure surveyed the town of Burntwood. He was tall and almost sickly skinny, and his skin had a sickly whitish-green colour that would fit better on a corpse than on a man. He was clad in long flowing robes, that seemed to be made of rotting human skin, and he carried a huge black scythe in his right hand. Everything about this man looked more like it would fit on a necromancer from a fantasy novel than a real person. He looked more dead than alive in fact. Then again, he was technically dead. He grinned widely, revealing his fangs, as he watched the undead citizens of Burntwood be slaughtered by the Hellsing vampires. The test was a success.