Author's Note: I don't think that Asiago, Missouri is a real place. (I'm just a fan of Asiago Cheese.) If it is, please don't sue me. I'm sorry, Missouri. It's just that I can never understand if you're considered Southern, Northern, or Midwest.
Surprise, surprise! I managed to whip up something when my muse was on a writing binge!
Captain K. Roans never understood why he was recommended to Hellsing Organization. He wasn't the strongest or handsomest or even the most outspoken. In fact, he was really just a bandy-legged, red-haired farmer's son with sporadic acne from Asiago, Missouri—a town that had one stoplight and a frighteningly large amount of drunken bartenders. Not wanting to be either a farmer or a bartender, he joined the U.S. Army only to learn that he was "practically average in every way". Practically.
You see, what he lacked in skill he made up for with his natural talent; a talent that had no real purpose anywhere except the military. He was observant. Observant beyond the call of duty, in fact. He could watch something be done once, and be able to copy it with only one or two errors. He could recall the tiniest details in a painting, and he was a walking book of useless knowledge he'd learned from documentaries.
While that was neat and could land him some money on Jeopardy, it wasn't enough to get him into one of the most mysterious of world military organizations… or so he had thought. No one had ever fully explained how he'd been accepted to even take part in the Entrance Exams. From what he gathered, it was part observational skills, part semi-eidetic memory, and maybe a little bit of schmoozing from the U.S.A. that he would prove himself to be more than worthy.
And he was; which surprised him more than anyone else. Here at Hellsing, he felt at home. He had good coworkers that were also his friends, even if they did laugh at his accent and the way he slurred British terms without meaning to. He enjoyed his job, even if he couldn't really write home about how grotesque it was; after all, the things he fought weren't supposed to exist. And his mother would never allow him to get into such dangerous situations if she knew what was happening.
But one fact always remained—he was too observant for his own good. Even now, he couldn't help but observe as he stood watch at the front doors, his gun slung over his shoulder and feet together in a ramrod position. He saw first a large red blob that moved out of the misty dusk to become Alucard, the elder of the mansion's resident vampires. Personally, Roans didn't mind that vampires existed—most of them didn't bother anyone, and the ones that did ended up on the wrong side of Hellsing's weapons 9 times out of 10. But there was something about Alucard that gave him the heebie-jeebies.
Like most of the other soldiers, he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was that made his nerves go jumping all over the place the minute Alucard came within a ten-foot radius of his body. It could have been the strange smile that seemed permanently etched on his face most of the time. It could have been the way the shadows quivered and gained a life of their own whenever he entered a rom. It even could have been the way that it felt as if those crimson eyes were boring into your innermost thoughts, even though you couldn't see them through the sunglasses and the wide frames prevented your catching a glimpse of them as he passed by you. More likely than not, it was a bit more simple: even if you never saw him in battle, even if you ignored the rumors whispered in the locker rooms at shower time, even if you had never heard a word slide from between his thin lips, you knew; you knew deep in your soul that Alucard was an evil son of a bitch who didn't give two fucks what humans thought about him. In fact, he really didn't seem to care about what anyone thought about him, human or not. With one strange, unexplainable exception.
That one exception was following on his heels, her expression nothing but boredom. Captain Seras Victoria, the vampire. The Draculina; Alucard's own blood heir, the humanistic vampiress. Seras Victoria was completely unlike her creator in almost every form. He was tall, she was tiny. He was thin, she was curvy. He was bad, she was good.
But of course it went much deeper than that. While Alucard's presence enticed fear, Seras' usually made men a bit calmer. She went out of her way to help the men in her troop, and they loved her to her very core. Yes, she was a vampire; yes, she drank blood and sometimes it stained her teeth a light pink and made the lesser men cringe when they saw it. But she had a heart of gold; and everyone knew it.
It only made it that much harder to understand why sweet little Seras willingly divided her time between her men and her "Master", as she called him. How could such a pure soul stand something so… tainted? No one understood it, save maybe Walter and Sir Integra; but then again, they were a bit off in their own way, so perhaps crazy was catching in that big house.
No matter why she followed him, follow she did, and tonight was no exception. But Roans observed, even if he'd seen it time and time before. This time was different. Seras didn't have her usual happy grin, and she wasn't walking ahead of Alucard or even abreast of him, as was her usual want. She was steadfastly planting her feet in his shadow, and her face was schooled into something neutral. As for Alucard, he was harder to read, but Roans had been there long enough to observe the five or six emotions that roamed freely across the ancient vampire's face. It wasn't sadistic glee, or mockery, or anger, or moodiness.
It was switching back and forth between irritation and a begrudging sense of approval, as if she was doing what he wanted and at the same time the exact opposite of what he wanted. Roans didn't have enough time to wonder at this before Alucard passed by him. As always, the hairs on the back of his neck stood straight before he forced himself to relax. Alucard would not harm him. He didn't harm any of the soldiers, because he thought it beneath him. Or perhaps he was forbidden? More likely he just thought it beneath him; oftentimes he was forbidden in theory, and was very adept at finding loopholes in Lady Hellsing's orders when he saw fit.
"Police Girl," the vampire said suddenly, turning to look at the guard. Roans looked up despite himself and met Alucard's eyes. The amber sunglasses tinted the crimson irises a brownish shade. Alucard looked him over a minute before turning with a grin to the woman behind him. Sadistic glee, Roans thought with a suppressed shudder. "Throw this man as hard as you can." Roans jerked in surprise before staring at Seras in shock and confusion. Seras returned his helpless look with a cool, unperturbed stare before she reached out and grabbed the soldier's forearm.
"As my Master commands," she stated dully before picking the soldier up and flinging him as hard as she could in the direction of the gates. He barely had time to register what was happening before he was flying through the air, above the trees at a height and speed that would surely kill him should he hit the ground. He heard the shouts of the other soldiers, but his astonishment was so great that he couldn't cry out.
He realized he'd begun his downward descent and closed his eyes, praying that it'd be over quickly and relatively painless. Suddenly, he hit the ground, but not nearly as hard as he should've. He felt something wiggle under him and suddenly Alucard's massive hound appeared above his head, sniffing his pulse point and his temples. He lay back in disbelief, letting the dog's breath waft over him as he felt the ache in his muscles and bones. He may not be dead, but he still hit the ground pretty damn hard. There'd be bruises tomorrow for sure.
"Hey!" "Roans?!" "Are you okay, mate?" He was suddenly aware of the dog's vanishing, and then soldiers flocked from all sides to stare down at him. Some of them looked surprised that he was alive, others worried as their gazes roved over him for any noticeable injury.
"Move aside, move aside!" He heard Stevenson's panic before he could see the man. Suddenly he was there, leaning over Roan's head. "Roans; what happened? Are you dizzy? Where does it hurt?" Roans closed his eyes and groaned softly, trying to decide which to answer first.
"Of course I'm dizzy, I just went a good twenty feet up in the air and came back down on my back," he finally admitted. "Mum threw me, because Alucard told her too." The other men gasped and began to buzz with chatter.
"Mum? Seras?!" "No way, no bloody way!" "Why would she do a thing like that? Has she gone mentally insane?" Even with all his observing, he couldn't really answer. All he could do was let them accompany him to the infirmary, where he promptly lay on a cot and passed out before a nurse could even ask his name.
He hadn't expected her to actually obey him. It was dumbfounding! He'd told her to freely harm one of her own men, and she'd done it without a blink of the eyes! Even when he'd come to collect her from her chambers earlier that evening, he hadn't expected her to be absolutely serious about her vow to be a perfect servant.
But she'd stood there; awake and fully dressed, even as early in the evening as it was. Her breakfast had been eaten (all of it, it was truly astonishing) and she'd made her way over to him when he appeared in her doorway. She hadn't greeted him other than a slight bow of the head, and had immediately stood behind him, not beside him and not frolicking her way to the front.
It had thrown him off a bit, but he hadn't let her know as he began his rounds under the moon. She walked when he walked, she stopped when he stopped, and she never left the confines of his shadow as he made his way around the grounds. After a while, he decided to speak to her.
"Police Girl?" Her head immediately snapped up from where she'd been watching a caterpillar on a leaf of ivy growing up the side of a portion of fencing. She gave him her full attention, and yet something in her gaze was lacking. It was as if she'd flipped a switch, turning off her personality. Her attentive smile was emotionless, and her eyes—while not listless as they'd been the night before, they were disinterested and filled with a passive sort of ennui.
"Yes, my Master?" she asked practically robotically.
"Are you planning on being this way all night?" he inquired. She blinked at him vacantly for a moment (true, honest-to-goodness confusion; where was her mind?) before replying.
"What "way" are you talking about, Master?" she answered, tilting her head slightly. "I'm only being myself."
"And you consider that being yourself?" he sneered, poking a long finger into her cheek as he watched for signs of life from her. Anything— a flush of vexation across her cheeks, a spark of righteous anger in her eyes; even sarcasm or cynicism. But she calmly gazed up at him, not even moving a muscle as he poked her cheek.
"I am your servant; your bidding is my only priority. You've got me at your beck and call." No other words, nothing in her manner to make him suspect her of being in jest. It was as if during the day, something had taken her soul and left behind an impassive shell.
"Fine. I'll play your pretty little servant, if that's what you want." Was she really intent on taking it as far as he would allow it to go? He had frowned, but continued on his way silently. He had been trying to think of a test when he'd seen the gangly fellow from her troop standing guard at the front doors.
But he hadn't expected her to throw him. He had to rush and keep the man from dying, less he be punished for breaking one of the most well-kept rules at Hellsing. Don't kill the soldiers. Don't hypnotize others to kill the soldiers. Don't order anyone to kill the soldiers. It was all very clear.
He half-wondered if Seras would have really let him die. He'd even probed into her mind, but he had found nothing but a strange, cool buzz. It reminded him of the annoying sound made by a room full of fluorescent light bulbs—a humming noise that was part energy output, part hellish torment.
Somehow, he found himself almost, almost missing the other sort of buzzing; the never-ending flow of gratuitous chatter and rapid multitasking that occupied every female mind for as long as he could remember, even back to the time right after he'd given up his humanity.
He dropped her off in her room and she waited for him, knowing that when he reached his room his mind would come sneaking back to see if she'd given up the façade yet. Sure enough, she managed to keep her mind-numbing state until he withdrew his mental tendrils and let out an inaudible sigh. It gave her a migraine, but she'd finally managed to figure out how to combine her mental shields with her ability to distance herself from life—something she didn't do often, only in times of stress. Between that and focusing her thoughts to the bare minimum, she had made herself into the most boring person in all of England. She had to give herself a pat on the back for her efforts—it wasn't easy!
But he'd asked for it, and now he got it. Seras wasn't giving up in this; she was as stubborn as he when it came down to it. If he wanted a model fledgling, he'd get one. And he'd better be happy with it, because it was going to take something big on his part to change her back.
She felt immensely guilty for throwing poor Roans. If she hadn't felt her master's powers surge to go and break the captain's fall, she might have had to give up the act and jump in herself. Thankfully, Alucard managed to catch him before he became a broken fixture on the walkway. She'd probably hear about it later from more than one person, but the important people could be told what was going on. She knew that Sir Integra and Stevenson would understand. Roans himself would be a little off-put, and Walter would think that she was crazy to try and go through with it. But she felt that this was what she had to do.
She didn't know what she was going to do now; she couldn't go gallivanting around the grounds without giving up her pretense. But staying in her room was boring! She finally shrugged and grabbed a book, deciding to content herself with the realm of fiction rather than lie and stare at the ceiling for the rest of the night.
"There, that ought to be the last of it all." Anderson stood, placing the taped box on top of the others and dusting off his hands. He looked around the tiny room with a hint of sadness. His last forty years were packed away in a dozen boxes, ready to be flown to England along with his two handmade bookshelves, the only real "furniture" to his name. The only things left in the room were the ancient television, the bed with the creaky springs, and the large table that served as a desk.
"I believe you're right, Father," Armand said. He and a few of the oldest boys in the orphanage had been commandeered from their classes to help pack away the priest's belongings. The teens could miss one day of class; as old as they were, they had stopped book learning and the ones that hadn't opted for Vatican jobs went to learn trades.
"The room looks a lot bigger when you don't have all those books piled everywhere," Anderson remarked thoughtfully, tapping a finger to his chin before turning and grabbing three of the heavy boxes. "Anyway, let's go get this last bit loaded onto the truck. If we hurry, you boys can make it back, wash up, and be on time for the evening meal."
"Yes, Father," the boys chorused as they grabbed one or two boxes apiece and struggled to get them downstairs and into the waiting moving truck. Anderson quickly outdid them; he ended up carrying six boxes in the time it took them to carry two. It took less than five minutes before they were finished. After saying their farewells, the boys ran off as the bell for supper began to ring. Anderson waved after them for a moment before getting into the truck and instructing the driver to take him to the Iscariot's office building on his way to the landing strip. He looked in the mirror at the building where his room had been for the last time before they pulled out onto the street and it was hidden by the stone fence.