Xander had many teachers in his lifetime and he had to say, for all her innocence, Seres Victoria was one hell of a range instructor. He was already a good shot but in a week she had ferreted out some bad habits and helped him overcome them. Now several days later, he was cutting down targets with ruthless efficiency.
In that time he had heard nothing either from Giles or about any operations Hellsing was undertaking that might impact on the work Giles was doing to find and train any girls that might be out there. He thought about pestering the man but it was not as if he didn't have enough to do on his own.
His life was all about training and practice and study, and since his partner in the field was Seres that meant he had to also be available at night when she was awake and active.
He was finding Seres fun to be around, bright and cherry and not like her master. They talked about anything and everything. She seemed to enjoy that Xander treated her like anyone else. The enlisted men either condescended to her until she was forced to demonstrate her obvious superiority. At which point, they treated her like a freak.
Xander admitted that one consequence of his life was he was used to fighting the good fight with a vamp at his side. Assuming vamp was what she was, Xander was not blind to the fact that aside from the surface resemblance Alucard and Seres were like no vampire he had ever met.
He was wondering about this again one night when Seres appeared carrying two cases over her shoulders
"What's that teach?"
"Walter finished with your weapons and asked that I deliver them."
"Goody, presents can I see." he waited until she set one down and flipped the top. Inside was a long weapon that looked like a machine rifle and a shotgun had gotten way too intimate. Next to it were several boxes that held long pin-shaped bullets. Each one had a sheen that hinted that they had been coated in silver.
"The firing rate is …astonishing." Seres said to him. "It has two modes of fire. An assault rifle mode that will empty the clip quickly so burst shots only. The second is like a shotgun, the bullets come out in clumps and apparently chew up their target in like fashion. Walter mounted a laser sight on it so that you can fire it with double accuracy. The weapon comes standard with a silencer. Plus, the rifle works like an air-soft Gun. The cartridges are very small "
"Where do they go?" he asked hefting the large weapon
She pointed "for some reason, he has left the naming of the thing to you, his suggestion after looking at your file was that you call it the Marx Rifle. Not sure why
Xander laughed. "That's funny "
"I don't get it."
"Silent like Harpo, kills like Chico's jokes and is as accurate as Groucho's one liners."
"The Marx brothers"
"A friend once compared me to Zeppo Marx, owing to my usefulness in the group
"But Zeppo didn't really do anything." Seres pointed out hesitantly. "That doesn't sound very friendly."
"The person who said it was not in a being friendly mood at the time. I recall I mentioned it to Giles in something vaguely like a bonding moment I guess he wrote about It." he pointed at the second case "what's in the other one?"
Seras opened the case and produced a hand cannon. It was an automatic pistol. Like the rifle, it had been fitted with a laser sight. Carved into barrel were the words "Property of Sunnydale." Looking at the clips the bullets were modified dum-dums but inside were eerie glowing liquid.
Walter says he got it from a source, the substance inside is about ten times hotter then Napalm"
Xander pointed the pistol and fired off a round. It hit a target downrange. The target, the post it was attached to and some of the surrounding ground burst into flame. The heat could be felt from several feet away.
"For obvious reasons Walter wanted to call it The Hellmouth, he thought you might not…"
"Tell him I love his humor. Walter rocks and rocks hard."
The two of them began training with Xander s new weapons with Seras teaching him how to maintain the weapons and use them quickly and efficiently. He mentally fell in love with the Marx-gun. Light and deadly, he was soon snapping off brilliant shots
Seres watched him for a time and Xander eventually noticed the sad look on her face. This was normal for her. As near as he could figure it had something to do with Alucard and his continued absence. He had been scarce for days. Xander secretly hoped that whatever he was doing, Giles and new Watchers would head him off beforehand. Alucard had a reputation for mayhem that, according to Seres, was well deserved.
He was blowing a hole in the far off target when her sighs got pointedly loud. "I miss being alive." She said as though the statement made all things clear. "You have your friends on the outside. They're waiting for you. All I have is Hellsing and the master. I mean its great and all but, I sometimes miss just going down to the pub and having a pint. Or half pint in my case. "
"Trust me, I have days Seres. I miss peripheral vision. I miss sleeping soundly at night. I miss the joy of not knowing what's out there at night. I miss thinking that things like Slayers and Watchers don't exist that they don't need to exist.
Seres smiled sadly. "I used to have trouble hitting a target fifteen feet away ...now. "She shouldered a powerful rifle and snapped off series of shots at target too distant for Xander to see. Xander picked up a set of binoculars she brought along for such moments. The half-mile distant target now sported a sad face. "I do things like that without a thought, I feel like my humanity is slipping further away."
"You have to hold on to what's important, the vows and beliefs that made you want to help people in the first place. Remember you're still helping. You just do it in a different way. "
"How do you stay sane and joking "
"Are you kidding, I'm Xander Harris I stand in the face of adversity and adversity looks at me and laughs itself to death. " Seres couldn't help but snicker he smiled at her laughter. "Just concentrate on the work, you would be surprised how brave you can be when you think of it as saving one life as opposed to saving the world.
"And who's life are you saving now. " she asked
"Hey who can say. " He said casually "all this practice might make the difference between life and death for one of us someday."
"Concentrate on the job huh?" She eyed him appraisingly "Well that's good because we will need you and soon."
"I figured. everyone is on edge and Integra has been asking about Slayage. Something is going down and the boss lady thinks Slaying might be involved."
"A while before you joined us there was a new danger on the streets. We called them freak chips. People implanted them inside themselves and the chip changed them into vampires or as close to vampires as can be made with technology
"Impossible "
That's what I thought but I've seen them, fought them. We finally traced a batch of the chips to an operation run by a gang controlled by two brothers The Valentine Brothers. They found out we were onto them and attacked Hellsing in force. Almost did us in, if it hadn't been for Master Alucard and Integra, we might not be having this conversation. Well the chips have popped up again. We found traces inside the building you renovated. Last time it was an epidemic, it took all we had to stop them last time. This time its more insidious. The attack you were involved in was the largest and most aggressive and then nothing. It has Sir Integra worried. Who's the source this time, where are they being made and more importantly when will the bastards strike next."
"Why is she worried about a Slayer connection."
Seres shrugged "I don't know, Recon was supposed to get us information but its been difficult getting anything concrete."
Xander furrowed his brow and glared pensively at the blonde trooper. "You know we might kill two birds with a single throw.. We could go bronzing and maybe dig up some dirt."
"Bronzing ?"
"Back in the day when we needed some down time, away from the slayage and world saving, We would take off for a local club called The Bronze. The Bronze is gone but the concept is still sound. You take a trained cop and a people-person, turn us loose and we might have all the answers we need by the end of the week. We could start with the part of town The Valentines used to run. We press a few leads and see what happens. If nothing else we get you some feeling normal time."
"Are you sure that's wise, Madam would have our heads and you just got off punishment detail last week."
"We're just helping out, trust me I've done things like this a thousand times and never has anything gone wrong." Xander's smile radiated trust and faith. Fortunately for Xander, all the people who would have laughed derisively at his lie were hundreds of miles away.
"That sounds like an excellent idea Xander." Seres smiled