RED LETTERS

It smelled sweet, like it was an early morning in a small tranquil village, right outside a bakery that had just finished baking its fresh bread for the day. It comforted Seras while she remained deep in her slumber, entranced in the smell, completely alone in the dark but not afraid. Something changed in the fragrance though and the fresh and sweet delight scent faded away. Now, there was this raw and gravelly stench that could only be described as earthy. Completely engulfing her senses.

It smelled like iron.

It smelled of blood!

Seras's red-hot eyes shot open and she got up from the couch in an instant. Her heart rattled and vibrated in her chest when she came to the realization that she wasn't in danger. The room she was in though was quite small and rather empty too. It was nothing but a four-wall room that was underground and with what looked to be a coffin lying in the middle of the room.

In her mind, coffins are supposed to be filled with dread with nothing comforting about them. It was the mark of someone's last slumber. But this coffin, on the other hand, had an appeal about it. It looked like it was made of pure crimson marble. The front part of the lid had a cross engraved in it with what looked to be made out of rose vines. Strangely though, Seras actually found it to be quite beautiful.

She placed her hand over her heart and took a breath to calm herself. "What is a coffin doing here?"

"Because it is my room." Startled to the sudden sound of a soft voice, Seras whipped her head around and saw Anna sitting at a desk, writing on a piece of paper with a quill pen. "Mistress?" Seras gasped a bit and quickly corrected herself. "I-I mean Miss Anna?"

Anna blinked and turned her head towards her before her lips curved up into a smile. Soft chuckles escaped from her mouth. "Good morning. Or perhaps I should say good night. It is midnight after all."

Seras cracked an awkward smile before her lips fell entirely, remembering the smell that was still perfuming the room. The smell and its source. She saw that it came from a cup on the desk that was half-filled with a thick red liquid. Seras felt her throat dry up in that instant she saw it as this deep hungry came rising up.

Anna must've noticed immediately and softened her scarlet gaze. "I'm sorry. Is it bothering you?" She raised her hand and pressed her snow-white fingers together and snapped them. The cup of blood immediately was set ablaze. The blood sizzled and began to fade away until nothing remained, and only then did the flames disappear.

Seras became astonished at the sight and got up from the couch to get a better look. She watched with curious eyes as the flames turned into smoke. "H-How did you do that?" She kneeled down beside Anna and stared at the cup. She picked it up and was expecting it to melt right in her hand, but it didn't. It was only slightly warm. There wasn't even a single trace of scorching at all on the glasswork. "You just...all you did was snap your fingers."

Anna could only laugh at Seras's curious nature, it reminded her of a child. "Sometimes when people have a strong connection to things in life...they carry it over in the second one. It can be manifested in some way or form." Her voice was crystal clear and that was the problem. Seras picked up that there was a trace of bitterness in Anna's voice.

"Miss Anna..." Seras hesitated to speak, getting back to her feet. She was going to ask one question, but as she watched Anna fold up the piece of paper, another one came out instead. The words in the letter were colored red...and she had a glass of blood beside her. "Miss Anna? Were you writing with blood?" Just saying that made her body cringe.

Anna stopped midway from putting the paper in a white envelope. "Not just any blood. It was my own blood, Seras." She finished sealing the letter with a wax seal and set it aside to dry. "It's nothing to worry about. I just like to write letters. That's all."

Seras arched a brow. "Letters? To who?" She said that but knew the answer before Anna could even speak it. "Are you writing letters to Master?"

Anna confirmed with a slight nod of her head. She peered up at her from under her lashes. "It's just an old hobby of mine. Funny enough, I never let him read them though and he constantly pesters me about them." She laughed to herself and gave this sugar-sweet smile.

"If they're addressed to him, then why won't you let him read them?" Seras was thoroughly confused about this but also rather curious at the same time. It was sweet really, to think that despite how close Anna and Alucard were, she would still write heartfelt letters to him.

Anna scooted back from her chair and rested her hands on her lap. "It's like this. It's like giving someone a Christmas card in the middle of October."

She pondered on that for a bit. "So...it's not the right time then?"

Anna nodded. She grabbed the letter from off the desk and got down on her knees to a chest below it. She unhooked the lock and the large lid creaked open for her to put it in. Seras only saw a glimpse of at least 50 or more letters inside before closing it.

The meaning behind the letters was none of her business so she made it an effort to keep her mouth shut, but one thing lingered in the back of her mind...a question remained unanswered.

Anna shook her head and stared sharply into Integra's eyes. "I don't...If I did then I wouldn't have been burned alive 500 years ago...when I was still human." her voice was bitter from the awful memories. "But this girl...she was in control...and she made the choice all on her own."

It was like Anna's words were haunting her, mocking her with this unknown. Whenever she looked at her, she was met with this mysterious barricade and understood...that Seras really didn't know a single thing about Anna. She wouldn't even begin to understand what she might've gone through in the past and what it felt like to be burned alive. To have your skin scorched right off your bones and eyeballs melt from your head. God, just thinking about it made Seras sick to her stomach.

When she was human she was burned alive? For what reason? Why must this beautiful and kind woman be condemned to such a fate? Would Anna even answer her questions if she asked? Is she even allowed to know anything about the woman who gave her a second life?

The cover of darkness rained overhead but Anna could still see the vampire woman down toward the streets, lurking quietly in an alleyway that was right outside a theater, watching motionlessly as a human woman and man stepped outside and immediately took notice of the strange woman in the alley.

Anna kneeled down beside Seras while she prepared her rifle. Putting it together with as much hast as she could, but not fast enough. "You're going to have to be a bit faster if you want to stop people from getting hurt." She frowned sadly.

Seras' training instructor, Fargason counted the seconds it took her to put everything together. "You took 7.5 seconds to set up the gunstock!" He reminded and Seras groaned a bit under her breath.

She grumbled awkwardly and peered up at Anna for some kind of support and got it in the form of a confident smile.

"She's down by the alleyway." Anna pointed her slender white finger down at the streets.

Seras grabbed her scope and was about to put it on but Anna grabbed her hand and stopped her.

"You won't need that," she said.

"But..."

"You're eyes are different know, like mine. You won't need it." That was all the explanation she was given.

Seras bit down on her lips and gazed down the barrel of her weapon. It was dark but Anna was right, her eyes adjusted greatly to the gloom and were able to see the vampire suddenly attack the woman, grabbing a hold of her legs and bringing them to the floor. They screamed out for help as the vampire kept a strong grip on the poor woman's ankles.

"It approached civilians!" Seras felt her finger twitch while hovering over the trigger.

"In the name of God...we shall strike the damned undead with the eternal iron stake. Amen." Fargason crossed his arms over his chest. "Fire!" He took a glance at Anna, who stood eagerly over the edge in case anything went wrong. She glanced over her shoulder and nodded her head.

Seras didn't move though and only took the next few seconds of her time breathing heavily, fingers twitching with anxiety and uneasiness. Why was she hesitating? She could see the danger the woman and man were in, so...why couldn't she pull the trigger?"

Fargason waited another five seconds and knew that Seras wasn't going to fire. He turned to Anna but the woman had already dropped off the edge of the building.

She descended fast as her white dress and blonde hair fluttered around her. She saw with her keen eyes as the woman using all her strength to try and keep the ravenous vampire off her, pushing her shoulders back. Anna's fingers reached out in front of her right as she landed and drove her whole hand straight through the vampire's chest, smashing her heart under her fingers. Killing her in a solid and silent instant. No muss, no fuss, no harm.

As the body fell to the side, blood fell on the woman's face and tainted Anna's once beautiful white dress with crimson. Breathless and still terrified, she wasn't even sure if she was safe now with the wild look Anna had within her own ruby gaze.

It didn't take long after that for Hellsing troops to storm the small area outside the theater. They wrapped up the body of the vampire and pulled the stunned man and equally terrified woman away in cars to be treated and question for what they just witness.

"Mission completed," Fargason announced. "Target silenced by 'Anna'. We are cleaning up the crime scene now." He stepped to the side as Anna leaped back onto the rooftop. "As always, we appreciate your work, Anna." he thanked.

Anna waved her hand and smiled as she usually did, but it seemed a bit off with the way she appeared right now. Being covered in blood and all. "Oh, don't worry about it."

Seras sat quietly and disheartened by her inability to pull the trigger. She couldn't even look Anna in the eyes when the woman sat down beside her, taking the weapon from her arms. "Sorry, Miss Anna."

Naturally, Anna wasn't mad or even looked annoyed. She just stared sadly at Seras and ran her hand up her back, speaking softly as she did. "I can't say I'm surprised that you didn't pull the trigger, Seras. I understand that all this is a great change for you, and it is going to take some time to adjust."

Her sincerity felt comforting and Seras was glad to know that Anna wasn't the type of person to raise her voice or get angry. She honestly couldn't even imagine her doing so at all. Her soft and velvety words were spell-bounding, casting some sort of curse of some sort to keep her calm.

Seras followed close behind Anna and kept a sharp eye on her back as they walked deeper and deeper into the basement of the Hellsing organization. She's already been down here once before and has seen Anna's room, but she can't shake the sensation that it felt like she was walking through the Catacombs. The stone walls were cold and the darkness just seems to stretch out for miles and miles.

"Ah, Miss Anna?" Seras hesitated.

"Hm?"

"Where are we going?"

Anna looked over her shoulder. "You'll see. It's a surprise."

She felt like she should be excited, but going so far underground with only those words to comfort her felt like a recipe for disaster. Seras pushed it to the back of her mind though because Anna didn't come across like an ominous person.

They finally stopped though in front of a door and opened it. It was a room very similar to Anna's, except there was no coffin in the middle of the floor. There was a table with a chair and a rather large bed inside too. There was no natural light though since they were underground, unfortunately. Aside from that, it was rather nice.

An elderly man stood in the middle of the room and bowed his head when he saw Anna and Seras walk in. "It's good to see you, Anna. I see you've brought Ms. Victoria with you."

Anna smiled. "Hello, Walter." She glanced back to Seras and pointed to the elderly man. "Seras, this is Walter. Aside from myself, he was also ordered by Sir Integra to take care of you."

Seras hesitated a bit and couldn't help but squirm in her own skin that just felt tight and uncomfortable now. "Miss Anna. Am I hard to deal with?" It was a silly thought to think that of herself but this idea just kept creeping to the back of her head. Why the secrecy? Why must she stay below grounds? Was it because she failed her first mission?

A saddened gaze fluttered across Anna's ruby eyes. "Hard to deal with?" She repeated Seras's question, overlapping her fingers together to think about it for a moment. "Well, you yourself are not difficult. But taking into consideration that there is more than just two vampires in Hellsing now is a different change for us." Her lips moved up into a half-smile, not totally reaching her ears. "The main concern really is that you won't be able to use silver tableware."

Seras laughed awkwardly, now realizing that she might've made the tension in the room bubble a bit. "Well, I never used silverware before anyway, so that's not a problem." She only received a puzzled look from Anna and Walter. "I mean..." She frowned at first before deciding to just listen to what they had to say.

"If I may," Walter began. "I also recommend not going out in the daytime."

Anna took Seras by her shoulders and pulled her into the room so she could have a look around herself. "Alucard and I sleep in the middle of the day, so it would be best if you do the same. It won't kill you if you go outside during the day, but it will drain you and make you a bit sleepy."

"Ah." Seras nodded and glanced at the bed, a childish spark flashing into her eyes. She smiled and sat down on her. "I dreamed of sleeping on a bed like this when I was a child!" her voice was light and airy, making Anna smile in response. This may be the first time she actually saw Seras smile, and it really did ease Anna's heart to see it.

Both Anna and Seras sat down on the bed and laid next to each other. Seras felt her hand brush against the remote beside her and accidentally pressed a button, making the top board of the bed slowly lower down.

Seras jumped a bit when she also felt the bed lower too. "It's moving? Miss Anna, what is this?" She looked over to her and saw Anna's smile, moments before the board closed down on the two of them.

Anna's voice echoed out from underneath. "As is appears...it is a coffin."

"It's...kinda claustrophobic in here."

"You'll get used to it."

The daylight rolled by but the stillness was prominent in Anna's seemingly empty room, almost void of silence aside from the scraping sound of her dragging her quill pen across the paper with her blood-red ink.

Her face was set to this relaxed but serious expression as her hand strain to wrote the words on the paper. Her hand began to shake through to the point that she had to stop. Sighing to herself, she grabbed the paper and scanned over with her eyes.

"It's harder than I anticipated," she muttered to herself, voice strained and eyes haunted at what she had just written.

While still in her hand, the paper suddenly began to smoke before catching fire. The white letter burned up and black flakes danced in the air and across Anna's snow-white skin before nothing in her hand, nothing but ash.

Author's Note:

Ohhh! I wonder what those letters are about!

Words can't describe how excited I am to show you Anna's last story. And I had thought it over and I did create a back story for Alucard and Anna, showing how they met and how they fell in love. I'm also thinking about making that an entirely separate chapter and not a flashback within the present. Keeping it simple.

And aside from just Anna and Alucard's relationship, I also want to give Anna and Seras a cute sisterhood relationship. I hope you'll enjoy it!

But one last thing. Anna's true identity? I have, in fact, created a name for her. She is somewhat based on a real person but just in the first name. I'll talk more about that when we actually get to that chapter!