Changing Path

by Xerxez

Well Ranma has had enough of nerima and leaves, not on the best of conditions. Nodoka tells Ranma of her family and her sister living in England. Ranma heads for England to begin a new life with the help of his aunt.(Hellsing, James Bond crossover)

6. Familiar Faces

Disclaimer: Don't own it, just write it.

Changing Path

Chapter 6 -Familiar Faces

Ceres yawned as she woke up and she rubbed her eyes absentmindedly. Her internal clock said that the sun had gone down and it was time to wake up. She smiled a little but didn't understand why.

Something was different.

Something was very different.

But unfortunately the vampire couldn't figure out what it was that made her feel that way.

Then it hit her, she didn't have single nightmare during the entire night. That hadn't happened since before she was turned into a vampire. Still thinking about it, she shifted her body a little to lie more comfortable.

Ceres froze as the mattress she was lying on groaned and moved a little. She opened one of her eyes and could see she was lying atop of a sleeping Ranma, his right arm around her waist. A blanket was lying on top of both of them.

Ceres couldn't understand how she ended up in bed with Ranma, but then all that happened yesterday crashed back into her mind.

Ranma had said that he didn't care that she was a vampire, and that he…loved her.

The expression of confusion was replaced with a happy smile, Ranma loved her and that was all that mattered to her right now.

He even trusted her enough to sleep in the same room, even when he knew what she was. It appeared that all her prayers had been answered.

She sighed happily and then kissed him on his cheek. She then snuggled closely and Ranma laid his arm around Ceres.

When Ranma awoke the only thing he could see was strawberry blonde hair. He froze as he realized he was in bed with Ceres.

A woman.

A beautiful woman.

A really beautiful woman.

A really beautiful woman who was in close proximity to him.

He fought down the first reflex to bolt away as fast as possible as not to be hit with a mallet.

But luckily (In Ranma's opinion) a really beautiful woman in close proximity to him with her clothes on. Even though Ranma had been away from Nerima for almost a year, he still was a little naïve when it came to being intimate with women.

She looked as him with a happy buoyant smile that showed both her elongated fangs. Most people would at least have shuddered but Ranma only thought it made her look cute.

"Sleep well?" She asked and ran her hand through his raven black hair.

"Yepp." He answered simply and stretched a little.

She leaned down and kissed him full on the lips, and Ranma's mind froze up once again. His mind went through multiple things at the moment, mostly things like, run away, hide, or come up with an excuse to leave the room.

Then he remembered that there weren't any mallet happy tomboys in the area so he returned the kiss, feeling happier then he had been in a long while.

Ceres was a happy little vampire, the man she loved hadn't turned her down when he found out she was a vampire. He had said that he loved her, that he wouldn't leave her, right now she felt as nothing could harm her, scare her, just as long as Ranma was with her.

She thanked whatever lucky star that she had found a man that carried for her, but she wondered how he could be so accepting. Then she remembered exactly what he had told her, he was cursed.

Ceres broke the kiss and looked Ranma straight in the eyes.

"You are cursed?" She asked uncertainly.

Ranma's smile vanished at once and he nodded in affirmative, and looked away. He looked like he was in deep thought for a while but then they met eyes again.

"I…well it's one of the reasons I believed Integra when she told me of the existence of vampires. I have had numerous encounters with magic, and some contact with none-humans. To understand how I got cursed I better tell you how I grew up." He said and sighed.

Ceres nodded, keen on finding out more about the man that had captured her heart.

"I grew up in Japan…."

Ranma began to tell the story of his life up to the events at the cursed springs. His brief friendship with Ukyo and Ryoga, the dreaded Neko-Ken, the seppeku pledge.

As he progressed farther in the story Ceres expression changed from shock, fear, and then settled to anger. Had the vampire known how to summon a battle aura she would had had one that would rival Saffron's.

"How could he do that? Oh, if I see him I'm going to give him such a beating." The angry vampire said with snarl.

Ranma having seen righteous female wrath many times before was just happy that it wasn't directed towards him for once.

"Well, the end of the training trip should be a visit at the legendary training grounds Junsenkyo. It is a valley filled with hundreds of springs, each spring having a different curse…." He said and looked up at the ceiling.

"What is your curse exactly?" She asked as she sat up in the couch she had been lying on.

"I better show you." He said simply and stood up and walked into the bathroom. He exited a moment later holding two cups with water.

He sat down on the couch next to Ceres and placed the cups on the table.

"The curse works like this." He said and dumped one of the cups over his head.

Ceres eyes grew wide as she saw Ranma change from a handsome black-haired young man into a short busty redhead.

"When I am hit with cold water I turn into a girl." Ranma said and then dumped the other cup of water over his head and he changed back.

"And warm water turns me back." He said and leaned back into the couch and closed his eyes.

Ceres stuttered a little. Sure she had seen some unbelievable stuff during her time with Hellsing, but this was just….odd.

"You turn completely into a girl?" She asked, her eyes still wide.

"Only my body, not my mind." He answered simply.

"Then it's not so bad is it? I mean it could be worse…" She said and trailed off.

"I don't think so, of all the curses I could get I think this was the worst one possible." He said and sighed.

Ceres frowned a little, it was sounding to her as it was the worst thing on Earth to be a woman.

"I can't believe you say that. I am a woman and I am not complaining because of that" She said a little irritated.

"I didn't mean it like that." He said to ease the vampire's anger.

"Then what did you mean?" She huffed and crossed her arms before her chest and tried to look stern.

"The curse in itself isn't bad, it has helped me more times then I can count. If it only had been the curse I had to deal with I would have been fine."

"What do you mean?" She asked again, but this time she was curious.

"When I was back in Japan I hated the curse more then anything else, but during the time I have been here in London I haven't even given it a second thought. I have decided that I can live with it."

"I still don't understand." She said.

"It was people's reaction to my curse, everyone treated me like I was some kind of pervert or freak, even though there was many others that also had Junsenkyo curses. Genma always told me to stop being a little girl and be a man among men, but after I got cursed he always blamed me for it." He said and sighed sadly at the memory.

He began to tell Ceres about his time in Nerima, the fights, the rivals, all the false cures, more fights, all the fiancées that he didn't have a say about.

"Even if my curse helped my out of many troubles it was often it that made them in the first place." He said and opened his eyes and looked on Ceres.

The vampire was sitting on the couch with a look of extreme anger on her face, her left eye was twitching violently, and she had clenched her hands. Her face was consorted into a snarl that clearly showed her fangs.

"I will kill him, I am going to rip him apart limb for limb." She said with a loud growl that couldn't possible come from a human throat.

Ranma just shrugged, all people that had met Genma or been told about him had reacted mostly in the same manner as Ceres did now. Well the vampire seemed a lot more pissed then usual but that was it.

"No… I know what I am going to do with him, I am going to turn him into a ghoul." She said more to herself then Ranma.

"I don't think he would taste any good." He said absentmindedly and then was struck with the absurdity of what he was saying.

He began to chuckle a little and that shook Ceres out of her thought of bloody vengeance.

Her mind registered what both she and Ranma had said and she began to giggle demurely.

The laughing faded away and both fell into an uncomfortable silence.

Ranma looked around the stone room and then back at Ceres.

"So how big is this place? I only saw it briefly before." He said.

"I can show you around if you want, just let me change into some clean clothes" She said and stood up from the couch.

"Okay" He said and walked out the door.

He stood outside of her room and whistled a happy tune, and then looked down on his own clothes. He was still dressed in his jeans and white tee shirt with the half a dozen or so bullet holes. He just shook his head and shuddered at the memory, as long as he wasn't shot he could manage pretty well against ghouls and vampires…

The door behind him opened and Ceres stepped out in her usual blue Hellsing uniform. Before his mind registered what he did he leaned forwards and kissed her.

"What's that for?" She asked.

"Just felt like I should kiss you." He said and shrugged his shoulders.

She answered with a kiss of her own. They broke apart, both with a massive blush, both smiling. As they regained their composure Ceres grabbed hold of his arm and dragged him him towards the stairs.

Meanwhile Ranma was thinking about what he had done, he had kissed a girl without second thought. He had kissed her before his mind hat managed to catch up, and to Ranma that meant only one thing. He loved her.

Most people that knew Ranma would say that he had the ability to do things without thinking them through, he always trusted his instincts.

His instincts had told him to don't trust Nabiki and trust Kasumi, it was his instincts that told him to keep the hell away from the Kunos. In fact, it was his instincts that had decided how to look on people in general back in Nerima.

It was probably his instincts that always made him put his foot in the mouth the entire time when around Akane to voice his subconscious dislike for the youngest Tendo daughter. He didn't at first care about what his instincts told him about Akane, but after awhile he didn't lie to himself any longer, he didn't like Akane any longer, and probably never would. He hadn't acted in the most diplomatic way, but his instincts had only speed up the inevitable.

And now if his instinct told him to kiss Ceres that meant that he was closer to her then he realized before.

He looked at the buoyant vampire who walked next to him and was holding his arm tightly.

He leaned down and once again kissed her.

Ranma always trusted his instincts.

A black Rolls Royce with shaded windows stopped at the gate to the Hellsing manor. It was late in the evening, or beginning of the night.

Two guards carrying MP5 walked over to the car, the drivers window opened and one of the guards glanced inside the car with a flashlight.

"I am sorry, this is private property. I am afraid you will have to leave." The guard said politely.

"I think you could make an exception this time. I would wish to talk Integra Hellsing" A voice coming from the passenger seat said.

The guard let the light of the flashlight pass over the passenger seat and immediately recognized the person.

"At once, your Majesty." He said and saluted.

The heavy gates opened and let the car pass.

The guard walked over to the guard post and picked up the radio, he needed to talk with Walter. If the Queen had made an appointment with Sir Hellsing he would have known about it, so he needed to tell Walter to prepare for her arrival.

Ceres dragged Ranma into what appeared to be a huge training area. Some Hellsing soldiers were sparring against each other, but it was empty for the most part.

"This is our P.T hall, where the soldiers are trained in various martial arts disciplines. Unfortunately I am banned from training with the regular soldiers…."She said and trailed off.

The last time she had been here she had sent a new soldier to the hospital who had been stupid enough to cope a feel of her chest. Integra had given her the strict orders not to fight any of the Hellsing soldiers under any circumstances. Ceres thought that was a little unfair, it wasn't her fault that the soldier had to be a pervert.

"Want to spar? I haven't trained with anyone in a while" He said and looked at the hall longingly.

"I don't want to hurt you." She said and looked at him. If she wasn't careful she might kill him with her vampire strength.

He answered without thinking it through first.

"Then you will have to go easy on me." He said and then blinked.

Had Akane said that he would have probably retorted with "Yeah, with your gorilla strength you probably will" or something along those lines.

Once again his instincts had struck, but this time they told him to be nice to Ceres. He really didn't want to make the vampire angry or sad, he cared about her to much.

"Okay." She said a little uncertainly.

He just gave her his trademark cocky smile that she loved/hated.

Both walked to the training mats and took a ready stance.

Ceres got impatient and then decided to attack first. She lunged after Ranma, intended to push him to the floor, but didn't put to much speed or strength behind it. She could see that he still had the cocky smile on. As she was only a small distance away from him and about to grab onto him he seemed to become liquid as he ducked under her arms and reappeared behind her.

Now that Ranma was gone her momentum continued to carry her face-first towards the floor. She closed her eyes and prepared to hit it, but the she felt arms encircle her waist and pull her back.

"Go easy on me indeed." He said in a joking tone as he pulled her back into her feet.

"How?" She asked, not quite believing the sheer speed with which he moved.

"Try not to overextend so much and keep a stable footing. I think we should just do some normal punches and blocks." He said and went into serious teacher mode. He had perfected that during his work as martial arts instructor with the British Secret Service.

Ceres just blinked in confusion.

"Lets try that again." He said and took a ready stance.

She only nodded and followed his example.

This time Ranma attacked first and threw a slow punch that she easily deflected.

Following his suggestions, they began to throw punches at each other, albeit not using all their strength. Both opponents circled each other and threw punches and kicks, although Ceres didn't seem to connect very often.

When Ceres threw a punch she could feel that he moved closer and tapped her on different locations on her body, chest, stomach, shoulders etc.

She understood after a while that he showed her where her defence wasn't good enough and she began to put much more effort in keeping a strong defence.

Ranma was impressed on how quickly she reacted to his hints on a better defence, it had barely taken 5 minutes and now she had a defence that would be though to brake, unfortunately she seemed to neglect her offensive now.

At least she seemed willing to learn from her mistakes, unlike an unnamed tomboy. He had used the same training technique on Akane but after over 2 months and no progress he quit trying.

Ceres on the other hand had gone from using brute force to using a grace and finesse that was inhuman, probably a bit of her vampire powers surfacing. She was far from near his league yet but with the improvements, it wouldn't take her long before she would catch up. The only person who he had seen being able to learn that fast was himself.

Even though he had changed a lot his modesty, or lack thereof still remained.

The only big fault he could see with her fighting style was that she seemed to neglect using kicks. Half second later he understood why that was so, the skirt she was wearing was way to short and restricted movement to much to be of any use in a fight. He had to fight down an atomic blush as he realized how skimpy that skirt was… and how nice legs Ceres had.

The movement of distraction gave Ceres the time to lunge at him much in the same way that she had in the beginning of the fight.

Ranma groaned as the vampire hit him square in the chest and tackled him backwards to the floor.

Ceres groaned and rubbed her ankle a little where she had hit the floor a little unluckily. Even though being a vampire gave her phenomenal regenerative powers it still hurt a little.

"I think we should stop now, don't you think so?" He said and rubbed the back of his head.

"Ouch… yeah I think that would be a good idea." She said and continued to rub her ankle.

Ranma stood up and then took a good grip on Ceres and pulled her to her feet. Her ankle still hurt and as Ranma saw this he cursed himself for not paying attention and then lifted Ceres up in the classical damsel in distress position.

Ceres blushed but didn't stop him.

Even though her ankle had stop hurting as she left the room she still found it sweet of Ranma for carrying so much about her welfare.

Integra van Hellsing was sitting and thinking about her current predicament. She hadn't seen her nephew today but didn't think much about it, he would manage on his own.

What really bothered her was what she would do with him. He was a potential heir to the institute and if the stunt in the alley had shown anything a lethal fighter that could perhaps even match Walter when he was in his prime.

It seemed as the blood of the vampire Hunter was stronger in him then any person she had meet prior.

He could become a valuable asset to the Hellsing institute, even though she had Alucard she needed the additional manpower.

He seemed to have a decent personality, and with time he could very well become the next leader and Knight of Hellsing.

It was reassuring to know that there was another Hellsing, and one who could take over if she happened to die. If she died and there weren't any relatives by blood Alucard would be set free. Integra dreaded to think what the vampire would do then.

Ranma might become the new leader, but only if she trained him. She hadn't decided yet, she wasn't sure if he could survive it.

She fingered one of the silver daggers still lying on her desk, Ranma's katanas she had placed in her personal quarters, maybe the incident in the alley was just pure luck. She really didn't know what to do.

The door opened and Walter stepped in, but he wasn't carrying the usual silver tray. He hurried over to her desk.

"Her Majesty has just entered the grounds." He said simply.

Integra blinked and then thought quickly on what to do.

"Get Ranma and bring him here. I promised the Queen that she would meet the new van Hellsing the next time we met, I just though that it would be later then sooner." She said and stood up.

Walter nodded and then walked out the door.

Integra turned towards the portrait of her father and just hoped that Ranma's manners were good.

Ranma sat Ceres down on the couch and then sat next to her and began to probe her ankle to see if it was fully healed.

"Thanks." Ceres said shyly.

"No problems." He said and with a smile.

Ceres leaned forwards and kissed him full on the lips, one hand brushing through his hair. They broke the kiss and looked at each other, both blushing.

Ranma had always had a hard time deciding what he wanted, but right he knew that he never had been more sure in his entire life, being with Ceres what was he wanted.

Ranma pushed Ceres down and kissed her, Ranma trailing a finger down her cheek. The kiss became longer, going from tender and loving to passionate and needing.

They rolled around, Ranma laying on the bottom and massaging Ceres back, and Ceres was lying on top and holding Ranma tightly. She moaned a little in the kiss as Ranma rubbed her back.

The embrace became more and more passionate, their kiss more and more feverish. They rolled around once again and rolled off the couch but the two didn't seem to notice.

Ceres was once again lying on the bottom, her body pinned to the floor. She snaked her legs out from under Ranma and curled them around his waist trying desperate to bring him closer.

Ceres moans grow louder as Ranma trailed one of his hands down her side, stopping at her hip. He broke the kiss and looked down on Ceres. Both were blushing and breathing fast, a look of passion on their faces.

Ranma leaned down and gently kissed Ceres on the lips before breaking of again. He kissed and nuzzled her cheek and then began to plant small kisses down her neck. As he continued down lower down her neck, her moans grew louder.

He opened the buttons on Ceres uniform and continued to kiss down her neck and stopped at her collarbone, he sucked and bite down softly into her collarbone. She closed her eyes and let her head fall back, moaning loudly, her breath increasing pace. Ceres snaked her hand under Ranma's shirt and went over his muscled shoulders

Ranma removed her shirt from her shoulders and began to trace small kisses down her shoulders.

Walter began to grow desperate, Ranma wasn't anywhere to be found. The quarter he had been given was empty and the bed was unused.

Running through the mansion he asked everyone he came across if they had seen a young Asian man. One maid had told him that she though she had seen him walk towards the gym a while back.

Taking up on the lead, he ran to the gym, hoping that Ranma was still there.

Entering it, he didn't find a sign of the young van Hellsing. Sighing he walked over to some of the soldiers who was working out on the equipment.

He walked over to the captain, who was punching away on a punching bag. As the captain saw the van Hellsing retainer walk towards him he stopped his activity and turned to great him, but was cut off before he could say anything.

"Have you seen a young man of Asian descent? Sir Hellsing needs to speak with him immediately." He said, sounding only a little stressed.

The captain blinked then shrugged at the butler's behaviour.

"There was a kid here half an hour ago. He had a fight with Victoria and then dragged her out of here, I think he were heading for the basement." He would have added that he hadn't seen such a good sparring match in a long while and that the kid seemed to do everything not to hurt the vampire but Walter was already half way across the gym and moving towards the door.

The captain just shrugged and returned to the punching bag.

Walter increased his pace and cursed silently, he knew that Ranma had all rights to be mad at Victoria, she had kept the fact that she was a vampire from him, but fighting her was to much, no gentleman hit a lady.

He needed to find him before he did something really stupid. Fighting a vampire was bad, he dreaded what would happen if Ceres got mad. She might accidentally turn him to a ghoul or worse… into a vampire.

Walking purposely down the stone stairs leading to the basements he made his towards Ceres room. The empty dark stone halls seeming sinister and a shiver that went up his spine told him he probably wouldn't like what he found.

As he stood outside the door leading to Victoria's room he was about to knock on it when he thought he heard someone moan in pain.

He flung the door open and stepped inside to stop whatever was happening inside. As the light from the hall flooded the dark room he expected to find scenes of gruesome murder, bloody limbs and pools of blood covering the walls. The table and some of the chairs were lying strewn across the floor and as Walter saw this it only confirmed his suspicion that something bad had happened.

He prepared for everything possible… well almost everything possible. He didn't in a thousand years expect to find the blonde vampire lying on the floor with her legs around the waist of the potential heir to the Hellsing institute, both sharing a deep passionate kiss.

Walter's eyes went wide as saucers and his body froze up. This was worse then he expected, being turned into a ghoul was a short and painless death if you compare to what Integra would do to Ranma once she found out. You were brave if you fought an army of ghouls and vampires alone… Pissing Integra off was just plain stupid and suicidal. Ranma would need divine intervention to survive this.

Vampires and humans just simply didn't mix, and a vampire and a van Hellsing… They were supposed to be bitter enemies.

Ceres and Ranma both had a lock of dears caught in the headlights, and then half a second later they both blushed atomic red at being caught. They began to stutter and try to explain themselves.

Walter was just happy that they had most of their clothes still on.

Walter's mind and body unfroze and he though quickly of a way to salvage the situation.

"Sir, Integra needs to speak with you quickly." He said and turned around and left the room.

Left in the dark room were Ranma and Ceres, both silently moving apart from each other. Ranma stood up and pulled Ceres to her feet and gave her a quick peck on the cheek.

Ranma quickly exited the room, leaving an uncertain Ceres standing alone in the completely dark room.

Ceres silently reprimanded herself for pushing it to fast, Ranma maybe had accepted her for being a vampire, but she still knew that he needed time to get used to it. Trying to get him in bed was not the best way of doing that.

Ranma followed Walter who seemed to stare blankly of in space. Ranma cursed himself for his moment of weakness, he was thankful for the interruption, he didn't want to mess up his relationship with Ceres, not wanting to push it to fast.

He hadn't been in control, what if Ceres didn't want to do it? He didn't want to push Ceres away now that he finally had gotten the cat out of the bag and admitted to himself that he loved her.

But a small part in the back of his mind still told him that it was a bad thing that Walter had interrupted him, that if she didn't want him to kiss her she would have told him so.

He sighed, things had been a lot easier when it concerned women back in Nerima, either he did something wrong and got bashed or he didn't do something wrong… and got bashed.

Walter looked at the young van Hellsing and saw that he was deep in thought. Walter immediately noticed something else… Ranma's clothes were ripped, torn and dirty. His shirt was filled with bullet holes, and had a long tear at the neck, going down his back, his jeans were ripped in numerous places, all in all he looked like a beggar and not the heir to the Hellsing institute. It wasn't exactly the things you want to wear when meeting the Queen.

He quickly debated with himself if he should take Ranma to Integra's office at once and be on time, or get him some proper clothes and be late. He decided that a good appearance would be the most important, Integra would likely have his head if he turned up with Ranma looking like this.

"We should perhaps do something about your appearance, please follow me." Walter said and motioned towards the stairs.

Ranma, still in deep though, followed the butler automatically.

They arrived at their destination, Integra's chambers. Walter quickly entered and Ranma followed, he was looking around the huge room. Walter walked over to Integra's closet and began to look through the different clothes. He pulled out a number of different clothes, hopefully Integra wouldn't be too angry with him for borrowing some of her clothes.

He turned back, his arms full with some of Integra's different business suits. Hopefully they would fit him, he was just thankful that Integra always dressed like a man.

Placing the pile of clothes on Integra's bed he turned towards the young heir and could see that he was inspecting one of Integra's weapons.

"This is a Walther-P99 isn't it?" Ranma asked as he placed the weapon back on the table.

"Yes, now would you please try some of theses clothes? We have very little time." He said and pointed to the pile of clothes lying on the bed. Walter was silently wondering how he knew that. He would have been surprised to know that Ranma was familiar with that weapon, it was the standard choice of arms for the British Secret Service.

Ranma nodded and then walked over to the bed and picked up the first piece. It was one of Integra's green business suits.

Even though Ranma and Integra was of the same height, the clothes didn't really fit. Ranma was more muscular, making it completely impossible to even try to close the shirt.

Walter groaned and threw another piece to Ranma from the closet but, like all the others, it didn't fit. Walter scrambled through the entire closet, in search for clothes.

Walter let his head fall in defeat… and enjoyed it for the very last time, Integra would surely have his head for this. He looked around and spotted something hanging in the far end of the closet. Walter smiled a somewhat strange smile, it looked almost…. Evil. He picked it up and handed it to Ranma who had folded all the clothes into a neat pile.

"Are you sure? This may be a little to much." Ranma said unsure.

"It is better then the clothes you are wearing now." The Hellsing retainer said and pushed the bundle of clothes into his chest.

"If you say so."

"So, tell me, how is this new van Hellsing?" The Queen said as she sipped her tea.

Integra leaned back in her chair and contemplated about the question for while.

"I don't really know that much about him, I haven't seen enough of him to give a satisfactory opinion as of yet. But from what little I have seen he appears to be good enough, a little brash and to trusting perhaps but still acceptable." She said and sipped her tea.

The Queen nodded in understanding. Integra wasn't really the one who used to praise people, and the people that knew Integra would know that an "acceptable" from her mouth meant that the person was quite good.

"So, is he capable of becoming the next heir to the Hellsing institute?"

"I do not know yet if I should train him, he seems a little to overconfident for my taste… And I wonder if I really can bring myself to make him live a life as a Hunter. It would perhaps be best if he cut all ties with the van Hellsing family and lived a normal life" She said and sighed.

Once again the Queen nodded in understanding. She understood how hard if must be on Integra to make a choice such as this, being in this kind of work required nerves of steel and immense self sacrifice.

"May I give you an advice?" The Queen asked.

"Naturally, your Majesty." Was the answer.

"I do not think this is your choice but his. Explain what will be asked of him and make sure he understands the consequences of his choice." She said and looked straight at Integra.

Before Integra could answer a knock on the door announced the arrival of Ranma and Walter.

Walter stepped in first and cleared his throat.

"Your Majesty, Sir Hellsing I present to you Ranma Takeda Saotome van Hellsing." He said and bowed.

Ranma entered through the door, wearing Integra's ceremonial Knight Uniform. It was a slightly modified green Hellsing uniform with a blue tie, brown boots and a dark brown overcoat. The normal ceremonial blade was replaced with both of Ranma's swords, hanging from a white belt. Naturally Walter had removed the strips and pins that marked him as the Hellsing leader and as a member of the Knights of the Round Table.

Ranma looked like he didn't like the uniform because he was losing the tie a little.

Both the Queen's and Integra's eyes opened wide both for a different reason. One because of the fact that he was wearing her uniform and the other because she recognised him.

The Queen quickly regained her composure and looked slightly amused.

"It seems to me Ranma, that you have an ability to end up in quite interesting positions." She said clearly amused.

Ranma's eyes widened as he recognised the old woman, and with a bow that would impress any royal court, courtesy of M, he greeted her.

"It is an honour and a true pleasure to meet you your Majesty." M had really trained him hard before the dinner with the Queen, threatening with lots and lots of computer classes, and he was surprised that he found need for it once again.

Integra's eyes widened more, and Walter was looking shocked.

"And you speak the truth, I truly have the ability to end up in peculiar…situations." He said in a clearly British accent.

"Please don't talk like that now, it may be appropriate in the royal court but it gets annoying after a while." She said with a smile.

"As you wish your Majesty." He said with a bow.

The Queen sighed in frustration.

"If you don't want to talk like a normal person I will have to order you to do it."

"Sorry…Well, M was kind of determined to make sure that I knew the formal protocols." He said and dropped the accent, and scratched the back of his head sheepishly.

"I think I will have to have a word with her… I would like to have a normal conversation once in a while." The Queen said clearly amused.

"Well, normal isn't really a word to describe me…" He said and trailed off.

"Yes, M told me so. So how have you been? I have heard you have been quite busy the last couple of months."

"Nothing really interesting has happened the last month, just a small incident, nothing important." He said and shrugged.

"You mean the incident in Russia? I heard about it… it appears that a large amount of the delegation has developed a fear for cars."" The Queen said and laughed a little.

"It wasn't that bad. Sure it was a little bumpy, but nothing really dangerous." He said and tried to excuse himself.

"You took a shortcut through a forest…. In about a 100 miles per hour." She said and shook her head in amusement.

"Well, I brought them back in one piece." He said a little defensively.

"Which can't be said about the truck…" She said and finished his sentence. He was almost as bad as Sir James Bond.

The entire time both Walter and Integra had been sitting quiet and listening to the exchange of words. But Integra decided to break her silence.

"Your Majesty? You know my nephew?" She said and tried to regain her composure. She had seen some pretty strange stuff during her life, but the fact that her long lost nephew seemed to know the Queen personally was more then she could handle.

"We have met before." She answered.

"But I hardly think that the first time we met was under the best circumstances." Ranma added.

"Definitely not." The Queen added and she lost her amusement at the memory.

"What happened?" Integra asked confused.

"This young man saved my life. Do you remember the attack on the Secret Service's main building a couple of months ago?" The Queen asked.

"Yes, some armed terrorist had managed to sneak inside and tried to blow the building up, or so my information tells me." She said as she recalled the event. She hadn't really paid it much attention, it didn't have anything to do with the FREAK-activity.

"Well, in reality I was the target. Ranma here heroically saved me and my bodyguard life at the risk of his own." The Queen said.

"It wasn't anything." Ranma said and tried to brush it off as nothing.

"Really? How often is it that someone tries to kill you with machine guns?" The Queen asked.

"Well, I am not really keeping track on how many times someone has tried to kill me, its not really that unusual. Killing me with weapons is a different matter, but during the last couple of months I have gotten used to it." He said honestly.

The Queen, Walter, and Integra just looked at him like he had grown a second head.

"What exactly has M been doing to you?" The Queen answered a little shocked, if Ranma considered being attacked in the attempt to kill an every day occurrence she would have a long talk with M.

"Nothing. Actually the attempts to kill me have steadily decreased since I moved here." He said with a shrug.

Once again everyone looked like he had grown a second head.

Walter coughed in his hand to gain the others intention. Everyone turned to look at the aged Hellsing retainer.

"I don't want to sound impolite, but how did you save the Queen? The attack was in the British Secret Service HQ, one of the best guarded places in Britain. No one could enter without proper authorisation, so what were you doing there?" Walter asked, but he had his suspicions. The fact that he knew who M was, the fact he seemed able to fight, and the fact he recognised Integra's Walther-P99.

"You haven't told them?" The Queen asked surprised.

"Opps" Ranma said sheepishly.

"Opps? What?" Integra asked and rubbed her temple with her fingers. She had the feeling she would get a huge headache.

"Let me do a proper introduction. This is Ranma Saotome, agent in my British Secret Service."

And there the headache came…. Her nephew, the heir to the Hellsing institute knew the Queen personally, and was a member of the Secret Service.

"Please tell me Ranma why you didn't mention any of this before." Integra said and closed her eyes and wondered if she should get an aspirin.

"Policy of the agency I am afraid. It just comes naturally now, I am not supposed to mention I work for the Secret Service, or M will have my head." Ranma said and shrugged.

"Trusting indeed." The Queen said and looked at Integra with a smile.

"And it is agent in training, I still haven't finished the education." Ranma said and looked from the Queen to Integra back to the Queen.

Integra sighed deeply and then looked back at Ranma.

"Is there something else you haven't told me that I should know about?"

Flash, Pheonix-gods, magical mirrors, 300 year old martial artists, love potions……

"Not anything really important that you have to know about now." He said and shrugged. He could tell her later, but he hardly thought that some of those things would be good for the Queen to hear.

"So there is more?" Integra asked while looking stern at Ranma.

Ranma just realized that Integra had the same expression that M had when he had messed up big-time. And that was not good.

"Well, yeah, kind of. We could talk about it later if you want." He said and went on the defence.

When M was in that mood the only thing you could do was to keep your distance and ride out the storm.

"Yes, we are going to have a long talk after this." Integra said and made it perfectly clear that it wasn't a suggestion.

"Great, another one." Ranma thought as Integra reminded him so much of M that it was spooky. It wasn't the looks that were similar, they couldn't have been farther apart, but it was the way they acted. They could freeze the bravest men in their tracks with one look.

"Ranma, I have a question." The Queen said.

"Yes, your Majesty?" He said and motioned for her to continue.

The Queen looked on him disapprovingly as he said the last part.

"Okay, okay, no more royal etiquette, sorry." He said quickly.

Integra would be after his head as soon as the Queen left, and he didn't want the Queen to be angry on him to.

"Why are you wearing those clothes?" She finally asked and motioned to the Hellsing uniform.

"Well, the clothes I arrived with was pretty much ruined, and these were the only ones we could find that would fit." He said and shrugged.

"From your encounter with the ghouls?" She asked.

"Yes, my clothes got torn during the fight" He said and unconsciously rubbed his stomach were a couple of the rounds from the vampire's Uzi had it.

He didn't really know if it was an Uzi, only that it was a small fully automatic firearm. The weapon training in Scotland hadn't really made him that much smarter, he learned weapon regulations, and then got to shot with a couple of the standard Secret Service weapons.

Then they were shown the difference between the different sorts of weapons mostly in use today. He still needed to take numerous lessons on weapon regulations before even attempting to take the test for his weapon licence. The Service was very strict with those tests, one may think that the classes in psychology or advanced math were hard but they were nothing compared to the classes you had to take to get your licence.

Somehow that also made him feel better, he would have been disappointed if they gave him, Ranma Saotome, a lethal firearm, he would probably misplace it within fifteen minutes.

Alucard could feel that the sun had set and the nocturnal vampire-instincts kick in. He would have to go to Integra sooner or later, he just found it strange that Integra hadn't called him already. Right now I didn't matter, he had to report the demise of his fledgling.

He began to float upwards through the ceiling, heading for the place where he could feel Integra's presence. As he moved farther through the manor he could feel the familiar tingle of a vampire in the surrounding area. He realized a second later that it was close to Integra, and he quickly discarded any thoughts about informing Integra about Victoria's death, and began to prepare for the upcoming battle.

As he phased through the building he smirked.

Victoria walked through the halls of Hellsing manor, heading straight for Integra's office. To say that she was an annoyed vampire would be a big understatement. She knew that it probably would reflect bad on her service record is she maimed or otherwise hurt Integra, but she was going to have a long talk with her.

Being interrupted in her room had seriously pissed off the vampire, but she also knew that it really wasn't Integra's fault. It was just that during the last year or so it felt that she had been neglected as a person, and when she finally found someone that did care about her, Integra just had to go in between and take him away.

Nope, Ceres wasn't in any good mood right now.

"So, how is M doing?" The Queen asked and sipped on her tea.

"Well, truthfully?" He said and sighed.

"Yes?" She asked and looked interested.

"I try to follow rule number one. Stay away from the superiors" Ranma said and scratched the back of his neck.

Unseen to everyone Walter smiled as he recalled a fond old memory.

"For all the new technology and such, it appears that the agency hasn't changed much." Walter thought to himself.

He was shaken out of his thought by a polite knock on the door. He stood up from where he was sitting and went and opened the massive oak doors.

Ceres stood in the doorway, with an expression of determination on her face.

That look melted away as soon as she saw how was in the room exactly. She gulped and looked confused at Integra. The Queen simply motioned for her to step inside the room.

"Don't worry, I don't bite." The Queen said as the girl moved uncertainly forwards.

"But I may." Ceres answered before she could think of anything else to say.

The Queen blinked and then noticed the crimson eyes. She seemed slightly amused.

"Officer Victoria, is there any special reason you are here?" Integra asked and looked at the vampire with a stern expression.

Ranma turned to Integra to say something but he stopped abruptly as he tensed up visibly.

Nabiki looked out the window and sighed deeply. Ranma had been gone almost a year now, and it still was noticeable in her wallet. She was very reluctant to begin any kind of schemes at her colleague.

Principal Kuno maybe allowed it at Furikan High, but with the principal at her college it was another thing. She had a few schemes going apart from the selling and distributing information to the Nerima Wrecking Crew, but nothing that really gave any kind of money.

She had to be very careful, or she might attract the attention of the authorities, and that wouldn't be good. She was pretty secure with the money from the NWC, but everything else was a great hazard.

The money Ranma had generated had disappeared, but unfortunately the costs for repairing and maintaining the Dojo had stayed.

She made enough to keep things going, but she didn't get the overflow of money she was used too.

She looked out of the window again, and could see Akane walk through the front gate, with a distinct slump to her shoulders. She was dragging her backpack behind her and was looking down on the ground. Nabiki only shock her head, Akane had finally realized that Ranma wouldn't come back, and that it mostly was her fault. She had been slightly depressed since then.

Nabiki cursed Saotome, even if it was justified he had still hurt her family. Akane asked Nabiki every day with a little hope in her eyes if she had found any trace of Ranma. That hope always vanished when she told her that she hadn't found anything on his whereabouts.

Nabiki felt truly bad for her sister, she really did, and she had done everything possible to find Saotome, but in the end that had proven fruitless.

Integra had barely time to register what happened. Ranma seemed to become a blur as the daggers on her desk disappeared and reappeared in Ranma's hands. He had a look of total and absolute fury in his eyes

The daggers didn't stay in his hands for long however, as he with a flick of his wrist threw all the daggers in one hand backwards past his head.

Victoria's eyes widened as the lethal blades headed towards her. She closed her eyes and awaited the feeling of burning silver cutting through her flesh. It never came, but she could hear the blades fly past her and with a sickening rip of flesh tear into something behind her.

The deafening sound of a gun-blast followed by the explosion of a vase on the marble fireplace alerted everyone to the presence of a hostile. Small pieces of porcelain clattered to the floor.

Ranma blurred again as he spun around to face Victoria, and with a quick motion of his hand threw the remaining daggers towards her.

As before the daggers flew past her to hit something behind her.

Walter quickly spun around and in a blink of an eye had his monofilament-wires out. Integra had drawn her Walther-P99 loaded with silver bullets and pointed it towards Ceres random direction.

Ranma was standing in a half-crouch, looking like he prepared for a leap. He had a blade in each hand, and Integra could have sworn that they seemed to glow with a surreal blue-light, but dismissed it as an imagination due to the low light.

She quickly turned back towards matters at hand. As she looked past Ceres she could see the familiar outline of Alucard inside a shadow that seemed to grow weaker.

He had his jackal drawn and it was pointing towards Victoria.

The thing that really caught her attention was the fact that all daggers Ranma had thrown were buried in his chest, all except one. That one was buried in his hand, the same hand that was holding the gun. Alucard looked straight at Victoria, but then changed his gaze to look at Ranma.

A smirk crossed the vampire's lips, and with a shrug of his shoulders all the silver daggers clattered to the floor.

Ranma moved the blades in front of him in preparation of an attack, the mask of fury was now replaced by a calm expression.

As both Integra and Walter recognised Alucard they relaxed a little, but they still had their weapons ready.

"ALU…" Integra began but never got time to finish the statement.

With a swift motion Alucard changed the aim of his gun from Victoria to rest exactly on Ranma's heart.

Integra's eyes widened.

Without hesitation Alucard fired at Ranma.

Ranma seemed to phase out of reality as he dodged, the bullet flying past him and hitting the stone wall. Ranma took off and headed straight towards the vampire, blades raised to decapitate the No Life King.

Everyone's eyes opened wide as he did that, he moved so fast that it was hard seeing more then a blur.

Alucard fired another bullet at Ranma, who once again phased out and dodged it.

Ranma moved in zigzag as he dodged the two following bullets. The last had actually brushed against his shirt. Ranma gritted his teeth as he moved closer to the damned vampire, fully intent on killing the thing that had tried to shoot Ceres.

Ranma closed the gap between them and with a swift kick towards the vampire's hand disarmed him. The gun flew through the room and clattered to the floor next to the wall.

Without losing the initiative Ranma stabbed the vampire through his chest. He then made an upwards slash with the other sword, digging deep into the vampire's flesh.

He twisted the weapons to make maximal damage before kicking him backwards so that he could pull out the swords from the undead body. Alucard stumbled backwards, but didn't fall to the floor in a pile of ash as Ranma expected.

Alucards smirk grew wider and showed his elongated teeth. The wounds seemed to simply disappear, and Ranma got the feeling that this wasn't perhaps one of his most brilliant ideas.

Alucard moved like lightning and buried his fist into Ranma's gut, he was too surprised to react in time. Alucard then simply swatted him away as if he was a fly. Ranma slammed into the solid stone wall, the impact creating a crater in the wall. The swords clattered to the floor next to him.

"ALUCARD!" Integra screeched and was about to fire her pistol into the insane vampire when something slammed into him.

Ranma was standing behind Alucard with one hand around the vampire's neck, choking him, which would have worked if the vampire needed air.

Alucard lashed out and struck Ranma in the middle of the face, but to his surprise and all the others shock, he didn't even flinch.

The pressure around Alucard's increased to the degree that you could hear it snap. Ranma's other hand was hitting the vampire between his shoulder blades with enough force to crack stone.

He then let go and backed away as Alucard tried to hit him again, and with a roundhouse kick aimed at Alucards head sent the vampire straight into the same wall he himself had hit only a few moments before.

The crater in the wall visibly enlarged.

Ranma launched himself towards the downed form of the vampire and began to pummel him with literary hundreds of blows.

Alucard ducked and kicked the human across the floor. He twisted in the air and landed gracefully on his feet, and as soon as he did that he launched himself back towards Alucard.

They began to trade blows at an unbelieving pace, blocking and dodging their opponent's strikes gracefully.

Alucard's smirk grew wider as he managed to deflect a blow aimed at his throat and with the opening created, returned with one of his own. The human twisted his body and took the blow to his shoulder instead of his throat.

The human was good, almost as good as Judas Priest. Good fights were hard to find, but he decided to end the little game now.

Both combatants kicked off each other to gain some room.

Alucard launched himself at the human, with too this point unparalleled speed, and was about to bury his fist into his chest to pull out his still beating heart.

To his extreme surprise the human managed to lean to the right, and avoided his strike.

The human turned around, so that he had his back to the vampire's front, and grabbed the outstretched arm. He pulled the vampire's arm forward and slammed his elbow backwards, right into the moving vampire.

Every single bone in his chest seemed to turn into small splinters, the lungs were ripped to shreds as the fragments pushed deeper through his body and his spine snapped apart in numerous places.

Alucard was just thankful that he wasn't human, or that he needed his lungs, because if he had been, it would have hurt like hell, or more likely he would have been a corpse…. An inanimate corpse.

He followed up the devastating blow with a roundhouse kick that sent the vampire across the room, over a cursing Integra who threw herself to the floor as not to be hit by the vampire cannonball wannabe, and out through the closed window. Ranma dived too the floor and grabbed the handle of one of his swords and launched himself outside to pursue the vampire.

Ranma landed gracefully, raising the weapon and looking around for the vampire. Ranma still didn't know exactly how strong his opponent was, but if the speed and strength were any indication he was a formidable opponent, much better then the vampire he had fought before.

He was extending his senses, trying to find any trace of the vampire.

He didn't even need to try.

Alucard was impressed with the human, not even Judas Priest would have managed to fight him without his blades. Even though he would have loved to continue this fight, he had a vampire near his master that needed to be dealt with.

It wasn't really a surprise that he had attacked at once without saying a single word, the vampire he had felt was quite strong, definitely not any of those weak freaks he had dealt with lately. She wasn't anywhere near as strong as himself or Incognito, but enough to make him serious.

Then he had been surprised at the intervention from the human, he had barely materialized before he had a dozen or so silver daggers in his chest.

That was when he first noticed him, an unfamiliar kid wearing the formal Hellsing uniform.

It didn't take a genius to figure out what was happening, they were one way or another trying to influence Integral. It wouldn't have been to hard if they vampire was as powerful as he suspected. He decided to take the guy out in another way, even if he had picked up a thing or two the last five hundred years he wasn't really a hand to hand fighter.

It was time to pull a trick out of his hat.

He had many tricks….. He did have a big hat.

He unlocked one of his seals and turned himself into liquid darkness once again.

Even though it was dark outside, the only light coming from smashed windows, he thought that at all of the sudden it seemed to grow darker and colder.

Ranma looked around, sword raised in preparation to defend himself. He could feel a little bit of his confidence disappear.

A shadow seemed to surround him, and a single crimson eye appeared and looked at him. It was different from Ceres eyes though, where hers were friendly and warm, these were cold and menacing.

He looked around quickly, and could see more of the red eyes looking back at him. The shadows seemed to draw closer, and small tendrils of it sipped out and tried to lash onto him.

He cut them apart with a couple of swift sweeps of his sword, but the shadows were still drawing closer, they stretched as far as he could see.

He could hear a spine-chilling laugh, one that would freeze the bravest men in place…. It was almost as bad as Kodachi's.

The shadow had practically engulfed him before he decided to move.

He crouched and then jumped as far and as long as he could, he then somersaulted and kicked off a tree to gain additional speed. He flew over the shadow and slashed out with his sword, kicked off another tree and repeated the progress until the shadow began to withdraw.

Ranma landed on the top branches of another tree and looked around for the shadow.

Alucard frowned as the kid jumped a distance that wasn't humanly possible. His fear aura hadn't worked as he had planned.

He quickly rematerialized and began to think out a new course. He decided that enough is enough, it was time to bring out the big guns.

It might be overkill, but to hell with that.

His face split up in an insane grin, his teeth visibly enlarged and his hair grew in length and seemed to move as if a wind was blowing through it.

Integra was in danger and he had the full intention of ripping apart that annoying human and worthless vampire.

He lunched himself at the tree where he could feel the aura of the human, fully intending to rip him apart and drink his blood.

He slashed out with his hand, but was disappointed that the human managed to dodge in time.

The tree didn't have the same luck and exploded into splinters.

The next slash Ranma countered with his sword, sparks flying everywhere.

They began to trade blows at speeds that shouldn't be possible.

"ALUCARD!" Integra screamed at the vampire that in the distance was fighting her nephew.

He didn't seem to hear anything. She had no idea how her number one freak killing machine and only nephew had ended up in a fight with each other. One second Ranma was talking to her and the next he was in mortal combat with Alucard.

They were to far away to hear her, and she turned around and was about to run out of her office and outside.

The others were still shocked, but as Integra began out run out the snapped out of it and followed her.

Walter was quite unlike his usual self and cursed the entire time. They ran down the numerous flights of stairs, through the main hall and out the door.

She looked around, before running as fast as she possibly could towards the small forest that was located on the Hellsing grounds.

Following closely behind was Walter, Victoria and the Queen. Integra was about to ask the Queen if she could go back to the manor but was interrupted before she even could open her mouth.

"I am going with you, no arguments." She said and nodded towards the forest.

Integra only nodded and turned back to the issue at hand. She couldn't find a trace of the vampire or her nephew.

"Where is he?" Victoria asked, worry clear in her voice.

"I don't kno…" Walter said but was cut of in the middle of his statement by a loud explosion.

"There." Walter said and took off towards the explosion, followed by the others.

Ranma gasped as another blow hit home. He kicked himself away to gain some room to regain his breath.

The fight had begun to go downhill for him, his opponent was both stronger and faster then him, and he had to use every bit of his skill to keep up with the damned vampire.

But the damage he inflicted just faded away, while the wounds he got took longer to heal.

Ranma spit out a little blood from his busted lip, while thinking out a course of action.

His blade was out of reach, he was forced to drop it to block a strike meant to remove his head, and fighting with his fists didn't solve anything.

He didn't get the time to finish his thoughts, the vampire closed the distance in a blink of an eye and aimed a strike at his chest. Ranma leaned to the side and managed to avoid most of it, but he could still feel a couple of ribs crack as the blow hit.

Through painful gasps he managed to call out "Katchu-tenchi-amaguriken."

Hundreds of blows rained down on the vampires back, before he kicked him away with a roundhouse kick. Ranma began to move towards his dropped sword, this was a fight he would need every bit of help he could get.

Alucard flipped in the air and stopped in place, he turned slowly towards the human and grinned an insane smile.

He pulled his hand backwards and formed what looked like a black flame in his palm.

With a casual flick of his hand the ball of flame shot forwards towards Ranma.

Ranma threw himself to the ground as the fireball flew over his head, he could feel the hair stand up because of the energy. Whatever that was, he should keep the hell away from it.

He wondered if he should try a mouko-takabisha, but he didn't have the time needed to gather the energy.

He pushed himself of the ground as he could feel another fireball head towards him. The flame impacted and exploded in a black flash.

He tried to grab his sword but another fireball made him jump away.

The vampire was keeping him from his sword, and it would only be a matter of time before he was hit. He was tired as hell, but the vampire didn't seem worse for wear.

He needed to take him down, and fast. A thought struck him and he began to prepare.

Alucard frowned as he couldn't hit the annoying human, he jumped away every time.

He had at least managed to keep him away from that blasted silver sword.

The human stopped and tried to regain his breath, he was exhausted. Alucard began to gather energy in his palm again, making it a little stronger then usual so the human might be caught in the blast.

He threw his arms forward and flung the black burning fireball forwards.

A shout from his right caught his attention.

They had reached the edge of the forest and the sounds of battle reached their ears. Integra looked backwards and could in the distance see some armed Hellsing soldiers run at full speed towards them.

Integra turned back towards the forest and began to run, full speed and right towards the battle. Ceres was running directly on her right, a look of extreme worry on her face.

They came into a clearing, trees lying strewn on the ground.

Facing each other were Ranma and Alucard, Ranma looking the worst of the two with torn clothes and with blood running down his face. Ranma was clutching his side in pain.

Alucard flung a black fireball forwards and both Integra and Ceres could see that there was no chance he would be able to dodge it.

"RANMA!" Both women screamed trying to warn him. He looked surprised at them before disappearing in a black fireball.

The blast threw them to the ground, and when they managed to stand up they could only watch as black flames burned were Ranma had been a moment ago. There was no chance that anyone had managed to survive that.

Victoria had a look of terror on her face, while Integra a furious expression directed at Alucard.

Aucard shifted his gaze from the raging inferno to Integra and the vampire who had slumped to the ground. He had felt as the human's aura had flickered and died, and now he had only to deal with the vampire.

Ceres expression of terror quickly shifted to one of absolute anger and fury. She had a snarl on her face that clearly showed that she was a creature of the night.

Her fangs hand become visibly longer and her eyes were blazing with crimson light, her fingernails had grown longer and resembled claws. She took a step towards Alucard with no other intention then ripping him to shreds, it didn't matter that he was her master.

Alucard smirked as the other vampire began to walk towards him, the promise of death was shining brightly in her crimson eyes.

Another black fireball began to manifest in his hand. He was about to throw it at the advancing vampire but then something totally unexpected happened.

An extremely strong aura flared up behind him. To anyone who could read a person's aura even remotely that aura burned with enough energy to rival the sun.

"Hey, Red!" A voice yelled from behind him.

He had barely enough time to turn around and see a cocky smile before his nerves were assaulted with something he didn't think he could feel anymore, pain.

Integra had time to see Ranma appearing with a sword in his hands, and Alucard explode in a cloud of gore before she was thrown to the forest ground besides Walter and the Queen.

Ranma could see the fireball head straight towards him and then he heard the yell. Knowing full well that the fireball was about to hit him he turned towards the voice with a played look of surprise before he could feel it was time to move.

The yell would actually help him as it drew the vampire's attention. As the fireball was about a meter in front of him he jumped straight up in the air, and a moment later could hear the explosion under him.

As soon as that happened he used the umi-sen-ken, and masked his aura completely. He shifted his weight a little and that changed his momentum. He landed softly and quietly a small distance away from the burning inferno.

He limped toward his dropped sword and picked it up. Ranma then moved stealthily around the vampire, or as stealthily as you could manage with an almost broken leg.

He gritted his teeth at the pain, it hurt like the dickens. Bruises and cuts were covering his body, and it would probably take some time before he was fit for fight again.

He stood behind the vampire who was looking at Victoria and the others.

He began to pull in as much ki as he could, while still maintaining the umi-sen-ken.

Along the length of the sword a vacuum blade began to form. He had modified the original technique so that he could use it with a sword instead. The size and strength of the blast was enormous compared to the old one.

The concept was to use inverted ki, and that created a devastating vacuum blade, it could cut through almost anything with ease.

Normally the ki that was used was lost, because you only threw the vacuum and not the ki. The reason for that was if you tried to channel that energy through your body it reacted violently with your natural ki. Inverted ki had totally different properties, and acted totally different from normal ki.

The first time he had tried the modified technique he had barely avoided being ripped apart. That was the reason he could only use it with a sword or such, he couldn't let the inverted ki come in contact with his normal ki, the reactions would become quite… lethal.

Right now, lethal was good, lethal was very good.

He dropped they umi-sen-ken and prepared to throw off his attack. Ranma could see that the vampire tensed up, and he decided to draw the things attention, just to see his reaction.

"Hey, Red!" He yelled out.

Everyone turned their gaze towards him, and their eyes widened. He could understand them, he was probably quite the sight.

His clothes were torn and burned, he had blood trailing down his face, he had a visible battle aura that would have put Saffron's to shame, and probably the most catching thing was the tree foot blade of pure darkness he was wielding.

"First class demon god assault blade" He whispered silently, but strangely, everyone present heard the words.

He slashed out, and Ranma suspected that the vampire didn't even notice what hit him.

The black blade, with a small vacuum edge, travelled the distance and slammed right into the vampire's chest.

Ranma and all the other were thrown backwards from the backlash.

Alucard's entire chest and stomach seemed to just explode in a cloud of blood and entrails. The blade didn't stop there though, it continued forwards through the forest, cutting down threes as it went.

Ranma looked at the downed vampire, wobbled slightly and then fell backwards and hit the ground with a loud thud. He groaned loudly.

As he fell to the ground he managed to hit his head on a rock.

The rock didn't have a fighting chance and shattered.

Alucard didn't know what the hell that thing had been he was hit with but one thing was sure, it hurt as hell. And apart from that he was injured, but it wasn't his body he was thinking of, it was his energy reserves.

Whatever that attack had been, it had not only blown apart his body it had also literally eaten away on his energy reserves.

He began to pull himself together, both physically and mentally.

That was when he found out another thing about that attack, it was not as easy healed as normal wounds.

He cursed the human, or whatever that thing was, and began to reform his body from the liquid darkness.

With an inaudible groan he was back in one piece, and once again ready to fight…. More or less.

He took a step towards the downed human.

Ranma looked from his place on the ground at the advancing vampire. He had an insane smirk on his lips, and he looked clearly amused at Ranma's predicament. Using his sword as support he slowly stood up on wobbly feet. Ranma looked at the vampire before he coughed up some blood.

He whipped away the trail of blood with the back of his hand and then calmly raised his blade and took a defensive stance.

"What the hell does it take to kill you? Why the hell can't you just die?" Ranma asked the advancing vampire with a groan.

The vampire's smirk disappeared and he got serious.

"Strangely, I wanted to ask the same thing." He said and prepared to launch an attack on the human.

Ranma prepared to fight once again, but he knew that it looked grim, he could barely stand straight, much less fight off an insane vampire.

He raised his fist in the final killing blow, but he never got time to deliver it.

A shadow tackled him to the ground, and pinned the vampire under it. Alucard looked up and he froze at once.

Victoria was about to launch herself at Alucard when a fast shadow moved past her and launched itself forwards.

The vampire was tackled to the ground, and now everyone got a good look at the thing.

Pinning the vampire down was a black panther that was growling loudly, teeth and crimson eyes glowing in the pale moonlight.

The panther growled before stepping down from the vampire. It began to circle the vampire slowly, looking like it was just waiting for the vampire to try something.

Alucard looked at the feline as it silently stalked around him, the thing was practically radiating dark energy. He recognised it as an vampire's familiar, and in his current position he was reluctant to attack it.

One thing he thought was strange was the fact that it was about as strong as his own, but that it radiated more demonical, and much less shadow energy then what should be normal.

It was definitely not normal as far as he knew, and he didn't want to attack it now. He wouldn't admit it to anyone, not even himself, but the fight had actually taken quite a lot out of him.

An uncomfortable silence fell over the area, only being interrupted by the low growls from the panther.

Ranma saw the demonic feline from hell, and this time he was actually close to the truth, and began to edge away.

He had his eyes firmly planted on the ground and was moving towards the small group. If he didn't get out of there he would risk the Neko-ken, and that was something he really wanted to avoid.

He moved up next to Integra and Ceres, making sure he didn't see or hear the bloody thing.

The silence was then broken by a rather pissed of Integra.

Alucard looked from the feline familiar to the gathered group. He was met with the expression of a pissed of Integra.

The clenching of her fists, the noticeable twitch in her eye and the bulging vein on her forehead showed that it really was Integra van Hellsing and not some slave controlled by vampiric powers.

No one could fake Integra's I-am-really-pisssed-and-I-will-go-berzerk-if-you-give-me-the-slighest-reason mood. He got the sinking feeling that he had done something rather stupid, not that he would admit it to anyone.

"Alucard, please tell why you just tried to kill my nephew." She said in a silky voice, but you could see that she was visibly controlling herself from jumping and ripping his head off.

Alucard shifted his gaze to the young man who was wearing the remains of a Hellsing uniform. As he got a closer look on the group he could see that the vampire he had felt earlier was none other then Ceres Victoria, the Police-Girl.

"You are dead." He stated conspicuously while looking at Ceres. Right now it was every man to himself and he needed to get Integra's attention from him.

"Of course she is dead, she is a vampire." Integra threw back angrily.

Alucard shifted his gaze from Ceres to Integra.

"I don't mean undead, I mean dead. My link with her was severed, and the only way for that to happen is if she's dead… permanently" He said seriously.

Everybody looked at Ceres, who shifted uncomfortably under everyone's gaze. Well, everybody but Ranma who was still trying to keep a good distance between himself and the cat.

"I am not going to turn into dust!" She yelled after a while of silence.

Everybody turned toward Alucard once again.

"I sensed an unknown vampire near your office, and I thought that you would have reported to me if you had a friendly vampire with you. I presumed that it was hostile and was about to terminate it when he intervened." Alucard pronounced the word with clear irritation, and motioned to the young van Hellsing looking straight at the ground.

"And tell me why you then attacked him instead." Integra was calming down a little, or at least as much as the situation allowed.

"When a noticed a person wearing the Hellsing uniform I presumed it was someone trying to take over Hellsing." He said and looked at the group in front of him.

"I see…. And when did this so called "severing of the link" happen?" Integra said and looked at Ceres and Alucard. She didn't believe the vampire to one hundred precent yet.

"He is right, I can't sense him anymore." Ceres interrupted as she tried to call her master.

"Three days ago during my mission." Alucard said simply.

"That was when you were attacked in the alley." Integra said and looked at the fledgling vampire.

"Yes, I was wounded really badly, could that be the reason? I wasn't strong enough to maintain the link?" Ceres asked uncomfortable.

"No simple wounds would be able to stop the link formed between a vampire and his sire. Only the master would be able to break the link, and I did not do anything the like." Alucard said and seemed deep in thought.

"And another thing I find strange, I didn't think you were nearly as strong as to be able to call forth a familiar." He said and motioned towards the panther that was still stalking around the elder vampire.

"That is mine?" Victoria asked in surprise and looked at the feline. The panther looked at Ceres with questioning eyes.

"Will it to you and see what it does, Police-Girl." Alucard said simply.

She did as she was told and the cat stopped it's stalking, it turned towards Ceres, but not before turning and growling at Alucard one final time.

Integra's lips twitched a little at that, but she was still rather angry with the elder vampire.

The panther moved up to the group and began to rub itself around the legs of Ceres, like a normal housecat that wanted its owner's attention.

Then it stopped and shifted it gaze to Ranma, it tensed up and prepared for a jump. Ranma still looking at the ground didn't even notice.

With a loud, playful mewwwwwww it jumped and tackled Ranma to the ground. Everyone could hear the panther purr loudly as it was lying on top of the martial artist/agent/vampire hunter.

Integra just wondered why her nephew tensed up and began to hyperventilate.

Ranma had closed his eyes and was hyperventilating, trying everything do forget he was near a c-ca… furry thing. He recalled some meditations techniques he had learnt Doc Tofu that were meant to completely empty his mind.

"Demonicfelinefromhelllyingontopofme,sharpclawsandpointyteethIimgonnadie"

They didn't work.

He braced himself for the rush of uncontrollable fear he knew would come. It was strange really, he feared the fear of cats more then he actually feared the cats.

After a couple of seconds, he realized he hadn't turned into a cat, and he slowly opened an eye.

Staring back at him was a set of puzzled crimson eyes. He fought down his first reaction to run off, and just stared back. While he was nervous and afraid, it wasn't nearly as bad as it used to be.

As nothing happened he managed to get his breathing rate back to normal.

"You fight me, but then you appear to be scared to death by an overgrown housecat? How demeaning." Alucard said and shook his head.

The familiar turned his head and growled at the vampire.

"I have a serious c-c-cat phobia." Ranma said and motioned to panther lying on him.

It turned it's head and looked back at Ranma, and after only a short while it began to purr. Ranma sweated nervously at this, but then remembered that it meant that cats were happy.

While it appeared that he didn't turn into a cat when in the presence of felines anymore, why he couldn't understand, he was still more or less mortally afraid of the things. As long as the cat was happy, and didn't attack him, he was happy.

The Queen looked at the gathered group, and sighed.

Integra was trying to incinerate Alucard with her eyes, Victoria was standing next to Ranma, who was still trapped under the cat, Walter who was standing in what seemed like a relaxed pose, but the monofilament wires in his hands gave him away.

The old vampire himself was standing with what appeared to be a bored expression, but you could see that he cast interested looks at Victoria and Ranma.

She sighed again and shook her head.

"We should perhaps go back to the mansion, don't you think so?" She said and

Ranma jerked his head quickly up and down, but still looked into the eyes of the panther laying on top pf him.

Integra nodded, but still kept her eyes on the vampire.

"Can someone please get the cat off me?" Ranma asked and gulped as the feline moved its head closer to his own.

To his surprise, it stood up and walked away on its own accord. It walked up to Victoria and began rub itself against the vampire's legs. She herself leaned down and scratched the cat behind its ears.

Ranma stood up and aloud crack was heard in the clearing. He froze immediately, a look of pain flashed across his eyes.

"Ouch." He said tearfully before slumping to the ground.

Victoria and Integra rushed over and looked him over quickly, before casting dirty looks at Alucard.

"Where are you hurt?" Integra asked as she bent down to make sure he didn't die.

"Everywhere." He asked and slowly sat up with a painful expression.

"Don't move, you will only injure yourself more." Victoria said and carefully pressed her hands against his chest to stop him from moving.

"I'm just a little bit bruised, nothing serious." He said and tried to focus his gaze on something.

"No you are not, you are going to the infirmary." Integra said sharply.

"I've had worse, it is nothing a good night of sleep…." He was interrupted by a loud growl.

"And some food won't solve." He continued and looked at the gathered group.

"You are going to the infirmary…." Integra began but was cut off.

"After I get sleep and food." He finished, and once again tried to stand up, this time a little more successful.

"You must check up your injuries." Integra said sternly.

Ranma sighed and then pulled up his sleeve to show her the almost completely faded bruises.

"I just need some sleep and they will be gone by the morning." He sighed and pulled the sleeve down again.

Integra just shook her head at her nephew's stubborn streak.

"But you go to the infirmary the first thing in the morning, you hear that?" Integra said and stared at him sternly.

Ranma nodded and began to walk away, Victoria supporting him, the panther was slowly walking behind the two.

Integra turned to the vampire who was standing and frowning at the retreating pair. Integra was not happy with her vampire right now, and she tried to come up with anything to punish him. Locking him inside the dungeon for the next forty years or so would definitely save her many migraines, but unfortunately he was needed. Integra then noticed that parts of his coat were actually a little damaged and dirty.

She looked back at Ranma with a frown, there was something he wasn't telling her…. And what the hell had that thing been he had thrown at Alucard? It looked like some of Alucard's own attacks.

Ranma and Ceres made their way back to the mansion, and as they walked up the steps to the mansion they could see the Hellsing soldiers run towards the forest at full speed.

Ceres didn't call them over, let Integra deal with the explanations, she had more important things to do.

Ranma groaned a little a he took a step, he had shifted almost all his weight to his right foot, but it still hurt as hell when moving his body.

While he was injured, it was nothing serious he'd had definitely had worse back in Nerima on daily basis, it was the fact that he burned ki like there was no tomorrow when facing the damned vampire. He had used everything he had in this fight, and in the end even had to resort to use the ki that was keeping his body alive, while he hadn't used all that ki he was only a small way from dieing. Without proper ki his entire body hurt like the dickens.

Ceres opened the door leading to her room while still supporting the half sleeping Ranma. The door closed behind her and she made sure that the cat was left outside, Ranma still was nervous around the feline. She made him sit down in the sofa and then moved to her coffin. She pressed the concealed button and the lid rose to the ceiling, revealing a large comfortable looking bed.

Victoria felt as a tingle went up her spine and she spun around to face the door. Phasing through the door was the panther, who stared at her questionable before walking up to were Ranma was sitting. She walked up to the panther and grabbed it around the head, and began to drag it out the door. The cat didn't cooperate and just sat down, she thanked her vampire-strength for being able to move the animal.

"Stay out." She whispered quickly before closing the door.

Ranma could feel the ki reserves slowly regenerate, but it was going incredibly slowly.

He calmed himself down, closed his eyes, and extended his senses, feeling the natural chi around him. While there wasn't much in this area, under the ground and surrounded by stone, it was enough. He redirected a small trickle of the chi into himself to help the regeneration. His breathing became less laboured, and a little of the stress on his face disappeared.

He didn't do this very often, because his natural regeneration was many times faster then refilling his ki with chi, but right know he needed every bit of help he could get.

Not that he would admit it to anyone though.

Ranma slowly stood up from the sofa and tiredly removed the remnants of what had once been a coat and boots.

Victoria turned back to Ranma and could see that he was removing his boots, with some difficulty. Normally she would have laughed as he wobbled as he tried removing his boots, but right now she was in to much worry to laugh.

With a final effort the uncooperative boots landed on the floor and Ranma fell backwards into the arms of Victoria.

"Sorry, I tripped." Ranma said tiredly as he stood back up.

She could see that his eyes were closing slowly, and he didn't quite manage to suppress a yawn. With a last scratch of his neck he mumbled a little, before turning towards the sofa.

Victoria managed to redirect the martial artist that right now, thanks to extreme exhaustion, had the same mental powers as the standard zombie.

"Sleeeeep" He said in a low monotone voice that creped Victoria out a bit, it sounded exactly as the Hollywood-zombie's call for "braaaiins".

He shuffled to the coffin/bed and with a final yawn fell face first into the mattress, he was asleep half a second later.

Victoria covered him with a blanket before a tingle once again went up her spine. She turned around and could see the panther once again stare at her, it then shifted its gaze towards Ranma before refocusing it on Ceres.

"What?" She whispered irritated.

The panther just walked up to Ceres and sat down right before her, staring her straight in her eyes. Victoria was slightly unnerved by the animals behaviour, and especially by those eyes.

"Stop staring at me!" She whispered violently, and was surprised as the thing stood up and began to circle her in much the same manor as it had circled Alucard.

That was something she definitely didn't like.

"Stop it this instaUFFF!" She said as the animal pounced on her from behind, tackling her to the mattress right onto Ranma's outstretched arm.

Ranma miraculously didn't wake up, but he did turn around and laid his other arm across her chest, trapping her in a strong embrace.

The panther then jumped up onto the bed and Ceres could have sworn the damn thing smirked at her. It moved up to Ranma to nuzzle his cheek, before turning to Victoria to repeat the process.

The panther then moved up past their head to lie down, creating a warm pillow for her and Ranma to rest on. The thing began to purr contentedly, and Ceres just shrugged at the oddness of the situation before pulling a blanket over her and Ranma. Truth was that she definitely didn't mind the current sleeping arrangements, but she was a bit confused by the cat's strange behaviour.

She herself yawned before giving Ranma a quick peck on the cheek. She settled down to sleep, the morning was steadily drawing closer.

There was a knock on the door and Nodoka quickly logged out of her laptop. It was an old habit so as not to let vital intelligence fall into the wrong hands. Not that some half-translated stock report would be of any use to anyone, but once a spy always a spy.

She didn't work for any intelligence agency any longer, but that didn't mean she would let her skills get rusty, and ten years of doing nothing would have been incredibly boring.

She walked down the stairs and opened the door, being greeted by a man wearing a grey delivery-boy uniform with the words World Express on the back. He was carrying a small box and a pad.

"Nodoka Saotome?" He asked while looking down on the pad.

"Yes?" She asked as the man looked up.

"I have a delivery to you, please sign here" He asked and handed her the pad.

She quickly took the pad and pen and signed the paper.

"Here you are, have a good day." He said and handed her the box and then walked down the steeps and small path leading to her house.

She looked down on the box and then stepped back inside, closing the door behind her. She walked into the living room and placed the box on the table.

She opened it carefully and peeked inside, but could only see bits of white material that was meant to prevent damage to fragile goods.

She began to search the inside but came up with nothing, so she turned it upside down and let everything fall to the table. She looked through everything but came up with nothing, and was about to throw the box away when she noticed a letter stuck to the bottom with pieces of tape.

She removed it and looked at the address, being quite happy to see that it was from Ranma.

She quickly opened it and began to read it.

Hi mom.

Sorry I haven't wrote you, but I have been rather busy. You where right, London is quite an interesting city, and I think I have managed to fit in nicely. Strangely enough my curse has seemed to be inactive in the world's most rainy country, ironic isn't it?. The only thing that I really had to adjust to was the strange food, but it can have something to do with my own culinary skills. In other words that meant I lived on instant ramen and cornflakes for a month. On another note, I managed to get a job as a martial arts instructor so I have something to do during the day. I also am trying to get a college diploma, as unbelievingly as it is I am going to school of my own free will. Miss Hinako would have a fit. My boss offered me a new position thanks my developing language skills, and sent me on a course to Russia. I am taking your advice and not focusing my entire life on martial arts anymore. I have managed to meet a good deal of new people including, and now I know you are going to be ecstatic, a girl. And no, we are merely friends, and I am quite content with the way it is…. For now. I haven't talked to my aunt yet, I didn't want to turn up as a freeloader by her door, so I decided to get an apartment and job first, after that I have simply forgot it. I will try to see her soon. If you want to talk to me I have an address on the back of this letter, but please be careful that the NWC doesn't find out. Well, I don't think there is anything more to say, apart that I miss you, mom. Please give me my greetings to Doc Tofu, Kasumi, and Happosai and if you see them thank Hiroshi and Dagasuki from me.

Ranma.

PS. I am not sending this letter with the post because I am not entirely sure the NWC will be checking your mail to see if I send you anything.

PPS. My cooking has become better, so don't worry.

PPPS. No, you can't expect grandkids within a couple of years…. and I am totally serious.

PPPPS. After you greet Happosai, please give him two hard bashings from me. One for making me read the beginning of his book, and the other for everything he has done in my absence.

Nodoka smiled as she read the letter, it seemed that her son finally had found his own path. She had just finished reading it when another knock on the door made her go to the door.

She quickly placed the letter inside her kimono and then opened the door. She was met by Akane who had a strained smile on her face.

"Can I speak with you, Mrs Saotome?" She asked weakly.

Nodoka only nodded and led her to the livingroom. Akane sat down and Nodoka into the kitchen to some tea.

She carefully poured Akane then herself a cup of tea.

"What can I do for you miss Tendo?" Nodoka said and Akane winced at the formality in her voice.

"I want to talk to Ranma, I wish he would return." She said and almost begged.

"I am afraid that is impossible, Miss Tendo." She sadi calmly and placed the cup of tea in front of her.

"B-but I really miss him, I want to apologise." She said and her voice trembled a little.

"I can't do anything, my son had chosen to begin a new life somewhere else." She said simply.

"Please, I r-really miss him, I j-just want to talk to him to explain." She said and she could barely conceal a sob.

"My son has left the country, and I've had a hard time contacting him myself. He appears to have continued his life, and I advice you to do the same."

"I-I u-understand." She said and stood up.

"Thank you for your hospitality." She said and dejectedly walked out the door.

Nodoka only shook her head in dismay, the young Tendo's realisation had come to late.

Author's Notes.

Okay, okay I know it has been I long time since I updated this, but I have three good excuses.

First, school has been a major pain in the ass, even more so then normally.

Second, my inspiration went missing and I only recently found it hiding under my bed.

Three, ummm… I've been busy with school? What, already used that? Hmmm…. Okay, hmm… Believe me, I have some extremely good excuse, I just can't think of one right now.

Well, in either case about two weeks ago I had 23 pages of text and only needed to add a few things, but I thought it would be a good length for a chapter. But as I wrote I added almost an additional 20 pages of text, the battle with Alucard became quite long, longer then I had first predicted.

I have tried to listen to the critique in the reviews, and I hope you like the results. My next project, before I continue with either this fic or Halo of the Hero, will be to rewrite the early chapters of Halo of the Hero, and maybe spell-check this story. I just read chapter 1-4 on the Halo of the Hero and I almost had a heart attack, the grammar, spelling and flow of the story just sucked. And this is self-critique coming from someone who has an ego almost as big as Ranma's. It needs to be changed (I don't mean my ego).

If you think this author's notes seems strange you might understand if I tell you that when I wrote this it was four in the morning and I hadn't slept for almost 20 hours.

Constructive critique is not only accepted, but extremely appreciated. If you see a reoccurring grammatical error tell me, or I will never even notice it.

If someone wants to contact me for whatever reason, my MSN-messenger is

A u t h o r underline X e r x e z h o t m a i l . c o m

Xerxez- Signing off and going to sleep.