Author's Note - I must say that I believe The Princess of Hellsing and the Paladin Meet was fairly successful, considering it was the first fanfic I had ever uploaded. When I get back on my original computer, I'll upload the one I wrote last month, and start using the latest version of Microsoft Word. There shouldn't be any grammar or punctuation problems after that. I would like to once again thank you all for the reviews, and encourage you to check out my account. Not much on there, but there's a couple of polls you might want to take. Disclaimer - I do not own Hellsing or any of the characters within in this fic. All characters belong to their rightful owners. I still want Alucard though. (sniffles in dissapointment)
" How did he take it," Seras asked as Sir Integra scribbled something out of her personal notes. The woman turned back to the Draculina. " He was rather... eager I suppose. I almost wondered if my father wore off on him, or it was the other way around all those years ago," she replied, the newly lit cigar bobbing between her teeth. " And he followed the rules. For the most part anyway."
" What rules did you give him, Sir"
" Don't make a mess if he could help himself, don't take them out in either of our rooms, and try not to make too much noise, if any at all."
" Well so much for the quiet part," Seras muttered. " I never thought a girl could have such a large pair of lungs..."
" I guess he let it slip," Integra replied reffering to the computer moniter as she jotted down another piece of information of some sort. " That was the only time I heard them."
" I envy your human ears then," the other snorted in disgust.
Integra jotted down a key phrase then removed her glasses to rub at her temples. " So much bloody paperwork..." With the glasses soon placed back on the bridge of her nose, she pinned her sight on Seras. " I know you wouldn't like to but I need you to check on the room. Alucard is taking longer than he should - yet again - and as you can see..." Here she gestured with her arm to the stack of files and the monitor. "... I'm a little swamped. I need to know exactly how many stains he left in there." Seras nodded trying to mask her slight annoyance. It was to no avail and Integra spoke. " I know you're very, very bitter towards him, Seras. I practically hate him as much as you do. It wasn't just us that he betrayed, he betrayed my father as well. But with more than three-fourths of the population six feet under... I don't really have a choice as to who will work for me now."
Seras looked at the tiles beneath her feet for a moment, keeping an angry scowl from etching her features. Then looked back at Sir Integra. " I understand that, Sir. But it doesn't change the fact that I despise him."
" Nor does it change the same thing for me," the other woman replied softly. They shared a knowing look. Then Integra turned away. " You won't have to clean it up. Just report the extent of the damage to me when you can. I'll get it myself." Seras nodded, saluted her employer, then went out the door without a sound. At the top of the landing, she paused, sniffing for the source of the spilt blood somewhere tingling her senses. In a second she traced it back to two floors below, near the southern end of the mansion, and she began descending.
As Seras took her time to get down the stairs she began pondering once again over the night three weeks ago. The night that Millenium and almost London as well had fallen. Her face turned sour. " That bastard," she growled under her breath. Ever since Walter's betrayal, since her ascension to her status as No-Life Queen, she had became solely fixed that no one would ever backstab her or anyone within Hellsing ever again. It was perhaps a childish thought, but a thought that she could not rid of herself. She had never been that shocked, that hurt, that unbearly sad as when the ex-butler had almost proudly proclaimed that he had disowned them all. Except for her former captain's death of course. But the kindest friend she had ever had, since her parents brutal death, had turned out to be inconceivebly selfish and cruel.
" I thought I was your best friend, migonette."
Seras smiled at the sudden familiar intrusion in her head and paused on one of the steps. " That you were, Pip. But we became a lot more than just best friends, didn't we."
" True. I knew that you couldn't rezist the Bernadette charm. Don't deny it!," he crowed in her mind as she gave a small giggle and began to descend again.
" I never said I denied it. Your ego just wants me to say that, so I apologize and have to brag about your 'charm'."
" Damn. How do you figure zees zings out," he inquired.
" You are stuck in my body for all eternity, physically, mentally and spiritually," she shrugged. " Our connection is pretty deep considering you're the only one I've ever fed from."
" If I must say, I rather enjoy being here than... well, wherever I was going when my body gave out. It's rather cozy in here, thank you." She laughed and she both heard and felt him laugh back. After a moment, however, she felt him become somber. " But there is somezing thats bothering me, Seras. You're so bitter anymore. I can feel it. It's like it's everywhere in here, this... slithering blackness."
Seras sighed. "Pip..."
" Don't argue with me please, it only makes it worse. You were a really sweet, fiery mademoiselle when I was around." There was a breif pause, as if he had sighed. " Why are you so... angry anymore," he asked somberly.
She shook her head as she went down the final flight of stairs to her destination. " Because you're dead. And you didn't have to be."
" I'm not quiet dead yet." He seemed to sigh again. " In my family business, I had alot of chances to die. But I'm sure I picked the right time just so I could save you, Girly. And look where being dead got me. I don't have to worry anymore about anyzing, except helping you when I can."
"True as that may be, Pip, if he hadn't been the filthy little coward and turned to the enemy, everyone including you would probably still be here. The mansion would be as beautiful as is use to be. Sir Integra wouldn't have to try to put all these little peices back together just to tread water. Master would have more time to help Sir Integra and spend time with us, wouldn't have to remember his ugly past so soon like he did. And I wouldn't have to see just how horribly rank that traitor has become."
" And there it slithers in the dark again. It's such an ugly zing, Seras, it shouldn't be in you. Let it go. I'm not asking you to forgive him or anyzing. Just get the past behind you as soon as you can. Stop wondering what zings could have been. Even if you are techinically dead, this sort of feeling can end up killing you. And be careful." His voice suddenly became serious. " Although I can understand why the Boss wants to keep him... I don't like him. Not this one. Not this doppleganger. It's literally a completely different person, and I don't just say all that because I ended up dead for his schizophernia." As if to contradict his own preachings to Seras, she felt him become annoyed and perhaps angry. " I don't like... No that's not good enough. I loathe how looks at you. How speaks to you. It pisses me off to no end. If I could and you'd let me, and I'd bitch slap him! He shows you as much respect as some door-to-door-penny whore!"
" Speaking of whores...," Seras mumbled as she approached a door down the hall. There was no doubt that the pungent smell of blood originated here. And it was surprisingly strong, considering the conditions Sir Integra had given the vampire. " Let's see just what he did to those two." Seras not quiet sure how else to proceed, knocked once on the door. She waited. One minute... two... No response. Seeing no other option, she turned the handle. Locked. ' Of course he'd lock it. Don't want them to get away,' she thought almost sarcastically. She jammed the heel of her palm on the handle and it popped open the jamb. She pressed on the door slowly and it swung open with a slight creak. One lone set of small candles in the corner illuminated the scene for her as the room was revealed to her. " Bloody hell..."
" Mon Dieu..."
The room was a butcher's locker without the freezing temperatures. Blood was literally everywhere. Almost every single spot in the room had been soiled with blood, most of it not even fully dry yet as tiny drops of it trailed slowly down the walls. The bed in particular, which stood near the far northern wall, had been dyed vermillion, its original color never to be detected again. Several nailpolish-painted fingers and toes had been scattered acroos the floor, the carpet undoubtedly slick with the copper-tasted liquid. The sheets had been torn to shreds, the canopy of the bed lay in a giant heap in the corner, a once-pretty blonde head tossed among its folds. The rest of the school-girl imposter lay propped up at the foot of the bed, only the skimpy skirt remaining on her body other than the long claw marks down her chest. As for the other girl, she was sprawled with her legs spread probably as far as they could go, not an inch of clothing on her body, her costume still scattered around her. Her eyes had frozen over at the widest they could get, her throat only a minsucle thread of tissue, and her skin had been showered with bruises. A figure resembling something close to an "S" had been carved into her chest, and the handcuffs which held her hands in an angle that had forced her wrists to snap, holding her to the headboard, had surely kept her from fighting or escaping. It was certain - she had been raped.
" Disgusting!," Pip hissed in her head. " Absolutely disgusting!"
Seras said nothing as she shook her head, complete contempt written all over her face. She stared at the corpse on the bed. The carving on her chest made the Draculina wary. " If that mark represents what I think it does..." She did not finish the mumbled comment. She didn't need to, both she and Pip knew. And of course Pip was beginning to get as pissed as Seras at the once-friendly person.
"Admiring my handiwork, I see." Seras turned to the opposite side of the room. Walter stood leaning against the doorframe of what she could only guess was the bathroom, the tiniest but an impossibly smug smirk on his features. Steam drifted from the door as he ran his claws through his now-loose hair, a towel draped across his shoulder. All that and the fact that he wore no shirt led to the conclusion that he had to have taken a shower. Her spitefulness towards him could not force her to not notice his admirable physique, though she did not relish in it. He was not broad nor did he have muscles of a large build, but he was average in size, dashing any thought of him being lanky. He was however well toned, noticeably chiseled, but not to an overbearing degree, and his hands were a bit larger across than she had expected under his gloves.
" I normally wouldn't use those," he continued, motioning to the shower in the other room, and swooping his hair back into the hairtie on his wrist. " But unlike you and your 'master', I have not yet acquired the ability to soak what's left of my victim through my skin. I suppose I'll just have to practice." His smirk grew wider as he began to approach her. " Perhaps... you could teach me..."
" I prefer blood bags over wasteful slaughter," she mumbled, her face glazed over with an icy demeanor.
" Ah. Then maybe I could teach you a thing or two."
He stopped only six inches or so before her, and gazed down at her, still supporting that annoying smirk. Seras could handle her master's smirks and creepy grins just fine. But Walter's had a smugness that his latest status could not back up. An ego that out did itself. She was tempted to steal Pip's idea of a good bitch slap. He looked at the carnage for a moment, flitting towards the corpses. " Such a pity that they didn't switch costumes. The blonde would have done so well in..." He turned back to her and grinned. "... making it more believeable."
The implication didn't slide by her unnoticed. Before either of them could blink, the barrel of Seras' newest handgun - which she now carried with her at all times - was slammed firmly against the middle of his chest. Walter didn't even flinch, didn't blink. Just continued to stare and grin at her, even as the silver began to sizzle his skin. " You honestly think," he drawled in a bored manner," that this little-." When he looked down at the barrel, Seras took the oppurtunity to suddenly slam the gun up into his face. His head snapped back, his nose surely broken, and he found himself quickly facedown in the bloodsoaked carpet, pinned with Seras on his back much like she had with Jan Valentine. Walter chuckle deviantly, looking up at her from the side. " Ironic that I complimented this hold..."
" You forget that you are still a prisoner here, Freak," she growled. She pressed the gun barrel sharply into his spine. " And in your current state, we can still sentence you to certain death. I'm sure that Master would enjoy finishing what he started three weeks ago."
" And you forget, Seras Victoria, that you're dealing with the same person who provided you with a coffin, your cannon, your blood packets, and who knows every single little detail about your personal records."
"No, I'm not," she replied. " You're not Walter C. Dorneaz, butler of the Hellsing family. I don't know what you did with him but you can't tell me that's who you are. You're just a younger, undead mockery of his memory."
Walter snickered. " True. Very true. But you cannot deny that - as you said, I am not the wretched senile Walter you knew - I am someone you have no idea about. Someone... who wants quiet a few things from you." His eyes glinted dangerously and slightly narrowed. " Someone who will steal those things from you when they have the slightest hint of a chance."
" Then I appreciate the warning," she sneered. " But whether any of us like it or not, you're stuck here. And once I report to Sir Integra all the damage you have done, as well as your hostility towards me and that I have had to surpress you, you're going straight back to your cell. It'll be a long time before your sorry ass sees the outside of that dungeon again. So I doubt that with my busy schedule and your lack of activites, you'll have any chance at all to take what's mine." When Walter only replied with a smirk, Seras yanked him to his feet, firmly keeping a grip on him. " Let's go see what your former master has to say about your mess."
Author's Note - Ugh. That took forever to type. I do apologize if this seems a bit... erm... kinky or something, I had no intention of making it that way. I'm just trying to keep some tension going on. And don't worry, Alucard will make his debut in this fic very soon. I tried to get Pip's accent somewhat, but I was too lazy to try and type the whole thing like that, so I just tossed in a few "Z"s. Thanks for reading guys, please leave a review! I'll try to keep this from getting too OOC as best as I can.