Disclaimer: I don't own it, no profit – oh, just read!

A/N: Well, here's the last of it, except for the epilogue. I've gotten my hands on the 4th manga, and I realize that compared to the real thing, this I'm writing is sorely lacking. Sigh. But since we'll never see this in the real thing...ah well. Thanks to all of you who've stuck with me during this. Enjoy!

Chapter 7

A week passed.

Seras's nights became even more busy as Alucard added training on top of whatever missions were at hand. He was incredibly good at arousing that rage in her, the one which had prompted her to bite him in the first place. He manipulated her openly as he taught her to control her rapidly growing powers. She walked through walls at will now, occasionally amusing herself by popping out of the walls or ceiling to startle Anderson. Walter, finally out of the hospital, was annoyingly not scareable. He'd dealt with Alucard for too long.

While Seras was growing stronger, Anderson was growing weaker. Daily he slipped a little further away. He slept a great deal of the time, and his voice was a shadow of its former self.

It enraged Seras.

It made her angrier than anything else did, and she still wasn't entirely sure why, despite Alucard's explanations. When she looked at the dying man, she wanted to kill someone. Preferably Maxwell. He was the most obvious target, after all.

Friday, October 23rd dawned clear and cold. Seras knew this because she skipped into the house just before the sun rose. She snagged a blood pack and sucked on it idly as she made her way into the basement. She was weary, and wanted nothing more than to sleep.

Alucard was waiting for her, seated in a chair with his feet on the table. Anderson slept in his cot, oblivious to the presence of the master vampire. That alone was enough to indicate how badly he had degenerated.

"You will be staying in the mansion tonight," he told her as she walked in.

"No missions?" That was surprising. Anderson stirred and murmured in his sleep, and Seras gave him a quick, pained glance. She did not observe the strange smile that crossed Alucard's face as he watched this.

"The mission is to guard the mansion. Integra is coming home." That got her attention.

"Finally!" Alucard bared his fangs in disgust.

"Yes. The round table has finished scrambling around protecting their precious selves and it's safe to clear the one who saved them in the first place."

"Are you sure we can't terrorize them just a little?" Seras asked wistfully. She'd been learning to play around with her powers. It had disturbed her at first how much fun she had scaring people, but had finally just accepted it as unavoidable. Especially with Alucard as her Sire. Besides, a girl had to have fun somehow.

"Integra said no," smirked the older vampire. "Some of them might accidentally die of shock and then she'd be in there even longer." His grin widened. "Maybe when she's settled back in."

Alexander Anderson wasn't certain what had woken him at first. He was so tired the past week. It was harder and harder to stay awake, the final stages of the withdrawal. Eventually he wouldn't wake at all.

Inside his weakened body, he raged at the unfairness of it. He raged at his weakness and helplessness, at how he'd been used and manipulated.

And then his mind would turn to a certain strawberry blonde vampire, and he would feel...

He wasn't sure. Longing? Desire? Something more? Something had changed and grown between them. He didn't know precisely what it was, or what it could become if not for the fact that he was dying by inches. He'd felt her hands stroking his hair more than once. Other times, when she thought him sleeping, she'd even placed a gentle kiss on his face.

What God might think, he no longer thought he knew. All he did know was that he wanted to be strong again, so he could...reciprocate.

What had woken him? He opened his eyes and heard it again. Metal on metal. His eyes darted across the room and he gasped.

The muscular, brunette paladin with the too-familiar swords rang them across each other once more.

"At least your association with heretics and demons has brought you what you deserved," sneered the other man. "God is punishing your betrayal with such illness."

"God haes naught ta do wi'it," Alex replied. Could he get through to this man, chained unknowingly as he had been? "We are drugged by th' Vatican t'be more obedient. This is withdrawal."

Paladin Gabriel Michaelous shook his head in disbelief, eyes showing a madness Alex knew all too well.

"Now you slander the Mother Church as well. In the name of God," he began to advance across the room. Alex tried furiously to move, but was unable to. "The souls of the impure and undead," How had he gotten into the mansion? The ex-paladin's eyes went wide. Seras didn't know. She wasn't in her coffin. Where was she? This madman would kill her for certain this time. SERAS! "Shall be sent to Hell." Michaelous stood over him and raised one of the knives. "AMEN!"

And the blade came down.

Seras tore through the halls, gun in hand. Something was wrong. She could feel it. Her blood was humming. She wrenched open the door to the basement so hard it was torn from its hinges. Disregarding this, she kept going. It was Alex. There was something wrong with him.

She burst through her door without pausing and gave a cry. The blond Scotsman was lying on the floor, a blessed blade sunk to the hilt in his chest. His eyes were open and she saw in them rage, pain, and – fear. Somehow, he was still alive.

"Behind you!" he rasped, and she ducked and turned as a blade whistled through the air where her head had been a moment before.

It was the other paladin. Michaelous. In here, somehow.

And he'd hurt Alex.

Seras rushed at him, firing, any fear she might have harbored overwhelmed by her rage. Her first bullets struck, but he shook them off like a dog shaking off water.

On the floor, Anderson grasped the hilt of the sword. Dying or not, he was still regenerating. He ripped it clear of his body, feeling his regenerative abilities fighting to heal the dreadful wound. How Michaelous had missed, he had no idea. Knife in hand, adrenaline spurring his weakened body to perform, he dragged himself towards the unfolding fight between vampire and paladin.

Already most of the furniture was wrecked. How they would contain this battle within the small room was incomprehensible.

Seras had the sense to call warnings to Alucard as she dodged the knives flying towards her. She was faster than when she'd faced this prick last. Faster, stronger, and with some new tricks. She slid into the wall and came out behind him, firing bullets into his back, aiming for the spine.

He was surprised, clearly. He had underestimated her to the point that he hadn't even put up a barrier to stop her powers – he hadn't thought she had any to worry about. He lashed out as he fell, bringing her to the floor with him. Only one arm currently working, he reared back to sever her head in one clean stroke. Seras threw up one arm even as she began to sink into the floor to escape the blow.

There was a shower of blood as a blessed blade erupted through the chest of the raging paladin. He stared dumbly down at it in shock for a moment. Seras froze half in and half out of the floor in confusion. The blade ripped upwards, cleaving Michaelous up the center from mid-chest right through his skull. He hit the ground, vanishing in a swirl of papers, too wounded to fight back – if he'd even regenerate from such a maiming.

Behind him, still holding the blade, was Anderson. He was on his knees, mouth contorted in a snarl, eyes wild. How he'd managed to do such a thing in his weakened state, not to mention break through the paralysis on his legs, Seras had no idea.

His snarl became a half smile.

"Got th'bastard," he laughed, and fell forward onto his face.

"Alex!" Seras flew to his side and turned him over. He was bleeding heavily from the wound in his chest, and it was not healing anywhere near fast enough to save him. "Damnit. Damnit!" There were tears on her face, and she didn't know why.

"Better t'fall in battle than die in th'sickbed," he told her hoarsely, chuckling a little. The chuckling became a tearing cough, and he spat blood to one side. "Ye know, lass, it's too bad. I wanted ta see if..." More coughing. He rolled his eyes and took the hand she had on his face. Gently, he kissed it. Her tears rolled faster. His smile was almost lecherous. "Not a real priest, after all, am I?"

But he'd lived as one. Seras's mind locked onto that fact. Her eyes flew wide as she looked at the man that somehow, without her realizing it, she'd been growing to love.

"Anderson, are you a virgin?" He laughed, a choked, gurgling sound.

"Not fair t'ask a man that, but – yes."

"You can come with me. You don't have to die."

His green eyes met her red ones in a kind of shock. She couldn't believe she was saying it. Neither of them had ever thought of such a thing. She gripped his shoulders.

"What will you do?" Her former master's words fell from her lips. What would he do? Inwardly she pleaded. Take it. Take the offer. Take your life back from those who stripped it from you. Come with me. With me.

To become one of the impure undead. To turn his back on God. Or would he? To become a vampire would let him hunt down the real monsters. Not the ones like this beautiful police girl crying over him, begging him silently not to go. She could force him easily, but she wouldn't.

He wanted a chance. He wanted freedom. He wanted to live his own life.

And he wanted to see where these odd feelings for one Seras Victoria could take him.

Anderson smiled at her and tilted his head back, exposing his throat in a gesture of absolute trust. And thought that if he made it through this he'd do his level best to not claim he'd 'never' do something again.

Seras couldn't believe it when she saw the acceptance, saw him bare his throat. She lifted his body effortlessly into her lap and arms, ignoring the blood and gore all around. She took a deep breath and plunged her fangs into his flesh.

Anderson stiffened against her, first in pain, then in surprise as she drank from him. He hadn't expected it to feel quite so - good. Seras, meanwhile, was in a heaven of warm human blood and the smell of his skin so close to her. He turned his head a little more so she could get a better grip, groaning softly and not entirely in pain. Something was happening to him. He could feel it. The wound in his chest was beginning to close up rapidly, even faster than his normal regeneration abilities. Strength was flowing back into him, when the opposite should have been true as his life blood was leaving him.

Seras, hazy from the new experience of drinking from a living being could feel his hands tightening on her arms as strength returned to him. At the same time his heartbeat was slowing. She knew what was going to happen next, and was determined it would not be as frightening for him as it had been for her. Reluctantly letting go of his throat, she pressed her lips tightly against his in a powerful kiss. He was shocked still for a moment, and then with a soft sound in his throat began to reciprocate.

She flipped them around so that she was lying atop him, never breaking the kiss. She could feel his body responding delightfully to the attention, and ran her long tongue over his teeth and gums, teasing, nipping, and tickling. She could feel his canines beginning to elongate. Clearly he could too, because he started to freeze up. She would have none of it, wiggling more firmly against him and letting her tongue be cut on his sharpening teeth. The taste of her blood in his mouth spurred him back into motion. He kissed back again, demandingly, and she freely opened her mouth to allow his tongue entrance. For a novice, he was a damn good French-kisser. She could feel it when his fangs had finished developing, and his tongue had lengthened to match her own.

On top of that she was beginning to catch fragments of thoughts as the bond between them began to form.

Beautiful...

Funny, I was going to say the same thing, she thought at him teasingly, relishing his startlement. They broke off for a moment, and she stared into his eyes – which were rapidly going from green to deep, deep red. Darker than hers, more like wine than blood.

"I –" he began. She licked a drop of blood off his neck and he gasped. "If ye don't stop that...police girl...I'm not gonna be able t'stop myself."

Seras smiled a little bit, almost shyly, and then tugged gently, determinedly, at the top of his pants.

"Who said I wanted you to stop?"

Alucard wasn't certain what to expect as he finally made it to the mansion. There had been one desperate call from Seras, and then silence. Yet he could still feel her. She had not died. He was puzzled and a little irritated – and flat out angry that the paladin had somehow managed to infiltrate the mansion. He was pondering various unpleasantries to visit on the body of the new regenerator when he opened to door to Seras's room.

Red eyes widened to their full limit for one split second.

The room was a shambles. Every piece of furniture except the coffin had been completely wrecked. There was blood and even some brains splattered all across the floor and walls. In the center of the mess was a bundle of clothing that had been practically torn apart. Clothing very recognizable.

He walked quietly into the room, bloodying his boots as he approached the open coffin. Inside, curled together and smelling strongly of both sex and blood was his childe and the judas priest. There was no clothing on either of them, and a sheet barely preserved their modesty.

But what really stunned him was the almost healed bite mark on Anderson's neck, and the fangs displayed in his open mouth.

"Police girl?" he murmured questioningly. Her eyes snapped open and for an instant flashed furiously.

MINE! Her mind snapped at him. He stepped back as the ex-paladin opened wine-red eyes in confusion. He had the slightly dazed look of the newly created.

"I thought you'd sleep with him," Alucard said, his amusement overpowering his surprise. "I did not think you'd turn him."

"His choice," Seras replied, her initial protective flash calming as she recognized that her Sire was not going to harm her fledgling/lover.

"Think Hellsing's got room fer one moore bloodsucker?" asked Anderson almost-but-not-quite-sheepishly. His natural fire was fighting with the vampiric nature that recognized Alucard as his blood-line.

Alucard's laughter accompanied him all the way up the out of the room and up to the study to inform his Master of this entertaining turn of events. Who could have guessed that turning the little police girl in Cheddar would lead to such convoluted amusement?

A/N: The epilogue will be up sometime soon. Anyone know if there's fanart anywhere of Anderson as a vampire?