Chapter Seven: D suffers the consequences.

Alucard waited in the eye of the storm for roughly twenty minutes. D spent most of that time bleeding and hurling onto the floor, making futile attempts to push his hair out of his face. Alucard bent his knees, back ramrod straight, so he could straighten his son's back. He made some small soothing circles while he was there. As soon as D had reached the stage of sitting unaided, he launched himself back into the violent maelstrom of his rage.

He started by removing his glasses.

"How dare you." Alucard's eyes were red like the fires of hell, "Even I never, would never…"

"It wasn't my fault." He mustered his strength enough to glare, "And you have done worse, I've had to hunt down the people you screwed with. I'd never purposely hurt her."

"What the fuck do you mean? You piece of shit, you were inside her head."

"Look at my hand." D sounded tense, pained. "Does this even sound like something I would do?"

"You hate me so much that you would ruin her?"

"I can't control vampires, even with blood, even if I could create one." D thrust his left hand into Alucard's face. "You know what I am."

Alucard did not calm down. "Seras is far beyond his powers, not yours."

Lefty groaned, weakly. He mewled words about blood while his eyes rolled precariously inside their sockets. Every vampire worth his salt knew the power of blood. It gave you strength, allowed you to strengthen others. Blood was memory and power, it carried.

"He used you as a conduit." Realisation dawned and it didn't rise happily, either. After all, Alucard had been the one to place the creature inside his son's hand in the first place.

Alucard grabbed Lefty with his right hand and dragged his fingers into the creature's eyes with the other. Then he twisted. Both monsters howled from the unexpected pain. Alucard ignored his son's writhing and pushed his face towards that of the parasite. So close that the creature could hear hounds in the distance.

"If you ever try to assault my servant again I will end you, regardless of the cost."

Alucard released his grip and D fell, clutching agonisingly at his broken appendage. For the first time in eons D cried out, twitching and slack jawed. His teeth grew and he bit his tongue. He thrashed. More blood hit the floor, melding with the black fluid that dripped from Lefty's eyes. The no-life king was unmoved. He watched until D quieted and then he spoke.

"We are going to talk."

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It took D ten minutes to stop screaming on the outside. He didn't think he'd ever stop the sounds within his head.

"You have power over my servant."

D stared at him, face grey and drawn. Even when he'd been a child he'd never been afraid of the man. Now he wasn't sure that he'd ever turn his back on him again. Lefty still wasn't talking, he could barely even cry anymore.

"Did you not hear me?"

"I heard you." D croaked, voice still sore from shouting.

"Go to your coffin, Alucard." Integra's voice rose icy and unexpected from the central stairs. "You have done more than enough for one evening."

"Master, I have need for further discussion with my son."

"I said that you have done more than enough for one evening." She descended with her head held high, "We will talk more on this later."

Walter appeared from nowhere and slung D's arm around his shoulder. Alucard looked towards the two for a short moment, before disappearing into the floor. D slumped in relief.

"Take him to the basement, Walter. You know which room."

"Are you sure ma'am?"

"Of course," She shifted her eyes towards D, "You were doing well for a while there."

"Nothing good lasts forever." The words sounded as though they had been dragged through sand paper.

"I take it you didn't notice the sway you had." Her voice was not as cold as it had been.

"If I had I would have left already."

"I suppose you would have."

"Do you know if Seras will be alright?" D raised his head to ask her, "I'm not entirely sure about what he did to her."

"We might have been able to avoid this had anyone told me about your… symbiote earlier."

D had no reply to give.

"When I know anything I will tell you."

Walter took D away.

Integra leant against the banister and allowed her head to drop. She gave herself a minute to feel incredulous and a little sorry for herself. She had to do it every now and again to prevent herself from snapping. The minute ended. Integra started internally cataloguing her losses.

Integra was now down a vampire and wouldn't have use of a large portion of her soldiers until they had sobered up. Most of the men were off duty and had returned to their homes even if they were not inebriated. She had survived with less before during a catastrophe. She wouldn't be able to rely on them all arriving quickly if she called them. If someone cut off communications, as had happened before, it would become a moot point.

There was also Seras to consider on a personal level. Her experience and D's involvement would be enough to cause dissension among the ranks. They would become sloppy, she knew that from experience. She was now well and truly on the testing field. If they were lucky no harm would come of it. Integra did not rely on luck though because she had never really had any.

Integra looked at her shoes and grimaced.

"Now who's going to clean all this up?"

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At least the cell had a bed in it. D fell onto the old bunk and folded into himself. He had never hurt like this before. He always healed. He'd have enlisted Lefty's help but he didn't think that either of them deserved the respite. He didn't have enough elements for regeneration in any case, judging by how badly he felt.

What on earth had happened to him? Just weeks ago he'd been a one man army. He'd spent half his time jumping over people towards hideous monsters while being likened to a mystic bird. Now he was in a room he wasn't even sure he could get out of. He never should have gone out for drinks in the first place. Even if it had been a novel idea at the time. He should have known better…

He'd been getting used to be treated like a person again. He didn't like the wolf whistles and the staring but the Geese did that to almost everyone. Nobody here was scared of him or in awe of him. People were mocking him good-naturedly and sexual assault didn't seem so rampant. The there was Lefty to consider. They'd been constant companions since D's birth. They were family if only because they were stuck together even if they hated each-other. Family wasn't supposed to fuck around with family in any sense, be it metaphorical or literal. Fighting was fine, having funny feelings about your cousin was expected but psychically controlling your sexy pseudo-maybe-adoptive-if-you-were-stretching-it sister was past foul.

D started to realise just exactly how screwed up he was. No wonder he didn't make friends. How long had it been since somebody had liked him? He had teenage girls throwing themselves at him, offering their companionship and far too many marriage offers. They'd all been bored and scared of Frontier life, attracted to how much he'd piss off their parents. The people here seemed comfortable with how they were. He was starting to relax, for the first time in 12000 years.

Look where that had left him. His father was, perhaps for the first time, almost legitimately angry at him. D had always been the good one. The killer of rogue vampires and the saver of damsels. He fought people that fought him and then he went on his way. He'd never tried to find the secrets of immortality by sleeping with human women or fiddling with the DNA of anybody that walked by. That was gone now.

He wasn't even that upset at losing the moral high ground. He was worried about Seras. Yet again his genetic lineage was biting him on the ass. He'd been capable of hurting her just because of who his Dad was. He actually had caused her harm because Alucard thought that giving your son a parastic, sentient, lecherous monster in your hand was a good idea. He had been hanging around her to piss the old man off but… she had been his friend. She'd been nicer to him, without agenda, than anyone he'd ever met.

She was never going to want to talk to him again. He couldn't fix this. God, he felt sick. He wished that it was possible for him to die.

He actually found himself wanting to go home for the first time.

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There were not many true vampires wandering around the world. Most of the British ones live in Australia. It seemed that many of them thought it fitting to exile themselves to one of the colonies after the advent of Hellsing. It was a good choice, people never noticed the occasional backpacker going missing in the desert and there was a decent nightlife if you ventured into the cities. Well, most of the cities. Adelaide is a hole, you know?

Horatio was the only English vampire not to flee his homeland when vampire hunting became a sport. He'd hidden himself at first. It was easy. He'd been a member of the aristocracy to begin with and he had the means and motive for outlandish eccentricity. He spent one hundred years investing in arms development and obtaining nasty tools for killing on the black market. Although he was not the first to lay siege upon Hellsing he was the most unique.

He was driving a tank, for one thing.

It was not a pretty thing, although it had become less offensive in his eyes after he'd painted it charcoal grey. It was effective, top of the market or so he'd been told. It had lots of missiles, lots and lots of them and when he pushed the yellow button jets of flame would spout from dual nozzles to the rear and front of the vehicle. He had named it the Deus ex Machina because… that was kind of what it was. It was the most welcome plot device he'd yet invested in. Some Germans, Russians, Americans and one confused fire-eater from New Zealand had been developing it for years at his behest.

All his effort was going to result in the total annihilation of his nemeses and the restoration of England as a haven to the nosferatu. He was one of those vampires. The kind that wears nothing but black, wears his hair tied back with a ribbon and keeps a harem of vampire brides back at his isolated castle. He would have had a harem were it not for the fact that every woman he'd turned had either left him or accidentally walked out into the sun. That was yet another reason why he felt the need to drive an armoured vehicle through a mansion owned by an attractive woman.

Horatio had enough skill to hide his presence until he reached the front gate. After that he gunned his giant phallic symbol and laughed maniacally. He wasn't very good at it. Not everyone could have Alucard's talent.

The heavy metal crumpled like aluminium foil.

Horatio pointed himself at the front door and then pressed on.

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Sometimes we need a little context. At the moment in time when Horatio destroyed the entranceway, Integra was finishing her thoughts about luck. Integra would have had to have been psychic to have timed such a dramatic lack of irony. The thing about life is, you see, that sometimes these weird things do happen by chance. It would be stranger if nothing peculiar ever did occur. This is ignoring vampires, rookie vampires, immortal priests, sterile vampires and their logically impossible offspring... and so on.

Integra watched the shiny, chic tank approach with a weary sigh. She raised a hand towards her temple and counted to ten backwards in Latin.

Then she swore loudly.

Let's say she stopped at "fuck!"