Integra would have gasped, but for the circumstances. Shock kept her own lips locked tight, the elder vampire only kissing the surface, getting little more than a taste of the man Integra had just drunk from. After a few moments, she drew back, her face splitting into a broad grin.
"Well, I did it, Integra." She said, almost sheepishly, looking into the others eyes. Two crimson circles in the darkness, perfect mirror images.
Too shocked for words, Integra merely clasped her arms around her master and returned the kiss, this time with passion.
Seras awoke from sleep with a yawn. She lay there for almost a minute before she came to a startling realisation. She was naked. That was unusual, the cellar was a cold place, even if you were undead. She normally wore a night dress at least when she clambered into her coffin…wait a second.
This was not her coffin.
It was the wrong shape, for a start. She could see that stretching out her arms and legs. A bit too narrow, a bit too long. And the lining felt different too. Final confirmation was gained when she reached out for the control panel, and found none.
The thought crept up on her. Whose coffin doesn't have…then she started to remember yesterday.
Good grief, had she really?
She reached up and pushed at the lid. It lifted and slid off easily, falling to the floor with a thump. Seras could now clearly see that she was indeed naked, and lying in the white satin of a rosewood coffin, a thin blanket tangled around her legs. There were little spots and streaks of blood everywhere on the lining, the blanket, the pillow, even her skin. She could hear the sound of a shower running somewhere nearby.
Slowly, she sat up. Yes, it was indeed Integra's room. The memories of the previous day were becoming clearer and clearer. Had it really involved that much biting?
She looked at the bloodstained coffin. It did seem like it, didn't it?
The sound of the shower ceased, and she turned her head to the curtain that separated off the bathroom from the main sleeping area. The curtain twitched and Integra walked through, naked except for a towel round her waist, drying her long hair. Seras blushed as violently as her undead body was able, and began to look away before realising that she too was naked. She stopped, and she smiled, apologetically, at Integra. Her memories of last night were becoming yet clearer. She remembered she had seen what was under that towel. Integra smiled too.
"You're up? That's good. Walter left us breakfast." She pointed to the table, where two places had been laid. The open ice bucket contained two packets of blood.
Seras' eyebrows raised. "Walter!" she said in shock, "Oh dear, what on earth must he think of us…"
"Very little bad," said Integra, seating herself at the table and taking her blood pack, "Apparently, he's suspected that I might be…you know, for quite some time. He was just too polite to ever mention it. He's a man of the world, Walter." She poured the blood into the bowl, "Intuitive, and I suppose nothing shocks him after all the things he's seen. He fought in the war at the age of only fourteen, did you know?" she began to pour.
"Yes, I remember him telling me…" said Seras, looking around slowly. "Er, Integra, do you have any idea where my clothes are?"
"Over there." Said Integra, pointing to where both of their clothes lay dumped unceremoniously in a heap, "You removed them in quite a hurry as I remember."
Seras stood, self consciously taking the blanket with her, though she realised there was little point. She dropped it, and padded over to the pile of clothing, slowly shaking her head.
"What on earth came over us last night, Integra?" She said, bending down to fish through the pile for her underwear.
Integra shrugged, slurping noisily at a spoonful of blood. "Who knows, Seras? Something to do with being vampires, probably. Some urge or something…All I know about…us, really, is how to kill…us. " She still seemed slightly uncomfortable coming to terms with being a vampire, "I have no idea about…well, mating, I suppose you'd call it…" she looked back down to her meal, seemingly embarrassed at the concept.
Seras wasn't going to mention it, but when she thought about it, it had been a lot like what happened when her bloodlust took over in battle…only, well, with obvious differences.
"That wasn't something I'd normally do…you know?" She said, haltingly.
Integra nodded. "I know. I wouldn't dream of doing that normally either…" she smirked, "I mean, it was only our first date." They both giggled slightly at that. "But, well, I suppose both of us were, you know, a bit starved of sex before…we just lost control, to put it bluntly. Let our desires get the better of us."
Seras nodded, fumbling with her bra strap. It seemed to have been bent open with some force, and she had to use a not inconsiderable measure of her undead strength to re-close it.
"Yes…" she said, trailing off as she pulled on her t-shirt. She was starting to smell the blood Integra was drinking. She hadn't quite realised how hungry she was…she half-hopped across the room to the extra chair that had been drawn up, pulling her trousers on as she went. Taking her own blood pack, she filled her bowl and began to drink. After maybe fifteen seconds of quiet, slow slurping from both of them, Seras spoke up again.
"It wasn't…What I mean is…" she faltered. How to say it? Integra looked up at her confusedly, licking a spot of blood from her lip in a way Seras found ridiculously endearing.
"Wasn't too bad, really." She trailed off, uncertainly, and drunk another spoonful.
"You certainly seemed to think it was pretty good at the time," said Integra, raising one eyebrow. Seras really did blush this time, the blood she was drinking helping. She slurped noisily to try and drown out another giggle from Integra before responding. "An opinion which you doubtless shared judging by the…well, to put it frankly, the noises you were making. Quite loud noises, at some points."
"I was not!" Said Integra, indignant. "Your overactive imagination is playing up, oh No Life Queen." She said it in a sort of mock air of pomposity that almost made Seras collapse into her meal with laughter. As it was she spluttered, an affect that looked worryingly like someone bursting an artery, given what she was consuming.
"Good grief, Integra…" she said, wiping her mouth, then she laughed again. "I cannot believe what we did last night!" she said, wiping a red tear of mirth from one eye.
"Can't believe you did what?" Came a deep basso voice from off to one side of the room. Alucard materialised, sans hat and sunglasses for the moment, a sly and worrying smile creasing his porcelain features.
"Alucard," Said Integra, suddenly cold, "I thought you were raised an aristocrat. Didn't they teach you not to sneak up on ladies whilst they were in a state of undress?"
Alucard chuckled "It was fifteenth century Walachia, not nineteenth century London. They taught me to take whatever woman I wanted to my bed, provided she wasn't married. Strict Orthodox church." He laughed dryly, walking over to the open coffin. "My, my," he said, examining the bloodstains, "Things must have been lively last night. No wonder Walter sent me out on that mission…"
Seras spun in her chair.
"It's not what you think, Alucard…"
"Oh really?" he said, rounding on her, a bemused expression on his face, "I thought you'd just had some sort of slumber party and all this blood was the result of a messy mid-day snack. Obviously I'll have to fall back to the far less likely conclusion you were just engaged in rampant animalistic sex with Integra here."
"Get the hell out of my room, Alucard." Said Integra, snarling.
"But Sir Integra, aren't your quarters upstairs?" He snickered. "Oh, but of course not, Sir Integra. You're a vampire now, you have to sleep in the dungeon, and it gets so cold in the dungeon. Even the touch of another corpse is a comfort beyond words…"
"Alucard, you bastard, I swear…" Integra trailed off, unable to think up any threat or curse adequate to express what she felt.
" Despite all your high and moral pretences, what I said was true Integra." He continued, smiling, "Eh, Police Girl?" she looked away, her face twisted in rage, "I told you what would happen, but oh no, how could two paragons of saintly virtue such as yourselves even contemplate such a thing?" he grinned smugly at them.
They were silent. Undercurrents of hate and anger filled the room.
"Why do you despise poor old Alucard?" he said, with mock hurt, as he took a seat on the half-open coffin. "You should be pitying me. I have no lover to keep me company in my casket." He hooded his eyebrows in Integra's direction. "Tell me, Police Girl, is she as good as I'd imagined?"
He waited a moment for an answer. None came.
"Ah well, I suppose I'll have to keep exercising my imagination." He stood again.
"What the hell is your problem, Alucard?" Asked Seras, keeping a firm grip in the edge of the table, which was starting to splinter under the enormous pressure.
"I'm bitter, Seras." Said Alucard with total candour. "You have stolen the one object of my affections away from me, simultaneously removing my only other chance for female companionship from the Mansion. My romantic prospects for the next few decades are, quite frankly, none. The fact that you two will almost certainly spend a good deal of that time smooching and whatnot," he waved a hand vaguely, although they all had quite a good idea of what that 'whatnot' implied, "Only serves to deepen the wound." He sighed. "Don't worry though. I'll get over it. Maybe turn another young woman while you're not looking." He laughed, a bit more warmly. "Knowing my luck you'd end up living in a collective. Ah well, you'll at least compensate by sending me on more missions, for an old flame, eh Integra?" She slowly raised one eyebrow. He laughed again, walking towards the door as he took his sunglasses from an inside pocket. "Oh well, I have all eternity to get used to the idea. I'll chalk you up next to Mina*." He stopped next to the door, his face still set in a damned idiotic grin. "Maybe I should try and strike something up with Walter, that sort of thing seems to be the fashion nowadays." He put his hand on the door-handle. "Or maybe not. He's far too wrinkly. See you love birds later." With that he opened the door and melted into the shadows of the corridor, leaving the portal to swing too behind him.
Seras looked at Integra.
"He was joking about Walter, right?"
"Almost certainly," said Integra, running her finger round the inside of the bowl to pick up the leftovers. "Although it's not something I'd like to think about. Incidentally, you remember what he said about using his imagination, you don't suppose…" she made a suggestive hand gesture.
Seras eyes widened, "Now that is a disturbing thought."
And with that, the two went back to their breakfast.
Integra sat at her desk, leafing through reports. She felt a lot better now…it seemed that the instability of her transformation had left off. She had something in her life now, or more exactly someone, to keep her stable. So far, Walter and Alucard were the only two who knew about her and Seras'…relationship. She couldn't wait till she could drop that one on her husband…although the impact such a thing would have on Arthur…she sighed. She had thought life was complicated. Death was so much worse.
Her desk phone began to ring, its trill tone almost painful to her enhanced senses. She quickly picked it up, pressing the receive call button as she did so.
"Sit Integra Hellsing." She said, formally.
"Sir Integra," It was Walter. "We have an interesting development on the Irish front. I thought you'd better know."
Integra sat up a bit straighter, if that was possible.
"Report, Walter."
"You aren't going to like this, Sir Integra. About an hour ago, a police launch in Dublin bay spotted something in the water. Upon investigation, it turned out to be a corpse, impaled through the heart with a Union Jack**. Another was quickly spotted, and retrieved as well. We can't be absolutely certain, but judging by photographs of the corpses they would seem to be our two missing Americans."
Integra's brow creased. Impaled through the heart…oh no.
"Walter, you don't think they could be back, do you? Das Millennium?"
"This does bear resemblance to the way the Valentine Brothers disposed of that MI5 agent, I will admit. However, there is one interesting thing."
"What?"
"The cause of death seems to have been a gunshot to the head, rather than the blood being drunk. But of course, being in the water would have drained the corpses of blood anyway. We'll be able to tell fully when we ourselves are able to examine the bodies for signs of partial ghoul transformation. I'm working on acquiring them as we speak."
"Excellent as always, Walter. What kind of gun were they shot with?"
"A 9mm handgun of some sort. Again, water damage makes exact ballistics impossible."
She held the phone slack for a moment to lift her glasses and pinch the bridge of her nose, careful not to apply enough pressure to splinter the bone, something she was now probably capable of.
"Walter, what is the likelihood of this all being a Das Millennium resurgence?"
She heard the old man pause for a moment before answering, collecting his thoughts.
"Almost none, Sir Integra. We disposed of all of Das Millennium's leaders and accounted for all the FREAKs in the main kampf gruppe. There may still be remnant organisations, such as the Valentine Brothers crime syndicate, left. However, it is odd we had not seen any signs of them before…"
"Not necessarily Walter. I want you to go back over every major FREAK related incident since the destruction of the group. Look for any signs that there might have been Das Millennium involvement. Nazi symbols, methodology, anything. If they are back, I want to know about it."
"At least we are pretty certain there has been no resurgence in FREAK chip production."
"Indeed. Are you sure our own samples and files on the technology have not been tampered with?"
"They were checked over a few weeks ago".
"Have them checked over again, Walter. Better to be safe. Meanwhile, sort through our files on known 'harmless' undead. Get into contact with some of them, and see if they've heard anything. They sometimes pick up things we…" She paused for a moment. She had been going to say 'mortals' but had thought better of it. "and MI5 don't notice."
"I'll get someone on it. Might need to requisition Seras from active duty though. Some of the elder ones haven't quite worked out telephones yet. We'd use Alucard but most undead seem to find his personality particularly…abrasive." Tell me about it, she thought bitterly.
"Very well. Put Alucard on the missions roster. You might consider sending him out a bit more, by the way. He's been getting restless." Might as well humour the lifeless bastard.
"Of course, Sir Integra. Do you want the autopsy reports on the two we found?"
"Yes, send them up."
"Very well, Sir Integra." And with that, he put the phone down. She replace her receiver, and sat back in the chair, her eyes closed. Damn. Could those damned Nazis really be on the comeback again? No, they had destroyed them too thoroughly…Damn, this got more complicated every second. First the Americans, then the Letzt Battalion…who next? The IRA? The Martians? Why did this have to happen now, of all times? All she wanted to do was get used to being dead and keep Hellsing running smoothly till Arthur could take over. She didn't need something like this.
She could only hope the curious incidents would end here...
She sighed, and removed a cigar from the packet, clamping it between her predator's teeth.
She knew that whatever was happening, this was far from the end. This was only the beginning.
*Read Dracula. Now!
**Just in case it's not common knowledge in other countries, the British flag is called the Union Jack.
