Disclaimer: Hellsing and all its characters are not my property – and I make no profit off of this work of fanfiction.
IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ! This fic was inspired by the fic Leonine by shadeshark. I strongly suggest you read that, because it's probably better than this one could hope to be. It takes place after episode 13 in the anime, but will contain some manga elements. I will note them as they become important. That said – I am horrible at regular updates, so be warned in advance that this will likely be an erratically posted story! Now, on with the show....
Chapter the First
Why?
It was a question she'd asked herself so often that it was starting to become a litany.
Maybe it had been shock. After all, Ferguson had just been killed, Walter injured, Sir Integra imprisoned...everything had been thrown into confusion. Surely even the undead could react badly, irrationally, in times of severe stress.
Okay, so shock could cover the initial action. The rest wasn't quite so easy to explain away. Continuing with this farce was the real problem. Of course the empty state of the mansion helped. Walter still in the hospital, Sir Integra locked up while her guilt or innocence was being debated, and her Master hovering close to the head of Hellsing all the time. Pressing her to choose the night, Seras was certain. So – nobody around to notice, or to interfere.
Seras Victoria sighed as she paused at the door of her room, taking a deep breath full of oxygen she no longer required. She blew it out fretfully, stirring her strawberry-blonde bangs out of her deep red eyes. Wincing slightly in anticipation, she opened the door.
"Back so soon, demon?" snarled a voice almost immediately. The vampire looked at the lanky form of the badly wounded priest lying on a rickety cot across the room from her coffin.
She was a glutton for punishment. Yeah, that had to be it.
"Evening, Anderson."
She had found him near the wreckage after Alucard's defeat of Incognito. From his near incoherent ranting she'd discovered that he'd tried to take on the weird foreign vampire – and failed miserably. Worse, the sorcery- using creature had done something more than simply wound him to the point of death. Anderson not only could not use his holy sheaves of paper...he was not regenerating. Forgotten in the confusion, she'd carried his sorry, bloody carcass back to the only safe place she could think of, the Hellsing mansion. He wasn't even a security threat anymore – he couldn't summon his binding spells, and couldn't walk, stand, or even sit up on his own. Couldn't even lift a hand – and all of his swords had been broken.
Seras moved into the room, ignoring his baleful green glare, placing the food she carried on the table that also held her bag of medical blood. She continued to muse over her reasons for helping the man her Master loved to refer to as "the Judas Priest".
Helplessness had been a part of it, she was certain. She'd been nearly helpless in the battle with Incognito. This had been something she could do. Part of her training in both the police and D-11 had included emergency medicine. Her time at Hellsing had taught her more. So she'd stripped him down to his boxers (like she'd really needed to know he wore them!) while he roared at her and did his best to bite if she got too close to his face. After cleaning him off, she'd proceeded to stitch him up – without anesthetic of any kind. She figured she owed him at least that much for putting a sword through her throat, killing Gareth, and cutting off her Master's head.
Okay, she owed him a lot more than that, but it was a satisfying start anyway. While she was 'sewing' he cursed her in English, Italian, what sounded like Gaelic, and what she thought was Latin, using words she hadn't thought priests were supposed to know, let alone use.
Then, because the smell of all that blood was driving her wild, she'd left him lying in her coffin (lid up, despite her temptation otherwise) she'd gone off to find him a cot or something. He'd remained on that rickety cot for nearly a week and a half now.
"I'm getting better at cooking, so it's getting faster," she told him almost lightly. Not responding to his angry words irritated him more than any attempt to talk back would have. "I made a kidney pie tonight. I used to love these things before..."
"Before ye sold yer soul to the devil himself," spat Anderson.
"Just because he wears red all the time doesn't mean Master Alucard's the devil," she chided, secretly enjoying his outraged spluttering at her deliberate misinterpretation of his words.
It would have been so much easier to either leave him where he'd been or kill him where he'd lain. Or at the very least she could have turned him back over to the Iscariots. But Seras was neither stupid nor above a little pettiness. Anderson had been in treaty violation AGAIN by being where he had. That gave him zero rights as far as she was concerned. Also, Hellsing was currently practically inoperative. Holding their best operative like this kept Section 13 from moving into England while Integra was imprisoned.
And of course, there was reason number three, Seras's favorite reason of all. It was absolutely enraging the paladin that his life was being saved by one of the 'abominations' he fought against! She hid a small smile as she cut up the pie. He kept that hot emerald gaze on her unrelentingly. She'd been annoyed by it at first, but now she barely noticed it. Let him glare. It couldn't hurt her, for all he seemed to wish it might.
"I'm not hungry," he finally said stiffly. Seras rolled her eyes. Here they went again.
"You know I'll force-feed you if you try refusing food again, Anderson." His face went red with anger from hairline to neck at the reminder of the power struggle the first few days he'd been here.
"I'm not hungry, demon. Ye can't make a man eat if he isn't hungry!"
"I can too. Especially if the man needs the food to recover." He clamped his mouth together and turned his head away, looking for all the world like a fussy infant. Seras's eyes widened a bit at that thought, and a wicked look her master would have been proud of entered her crimson eyes.
"Come on, Anderson. Here comes the airplane!"
She 'flew' the spoonful of food near his face, making airplane noises as she did so. He turned his head to look at her so fast she nearly caught him in the nose with the food. Seras was delighted to see that the look in his eyes was not the glare from moments before. It was pure, unadulterated shock.
"Are ye ma– mmph!" The moment he opened his mouth, she stuffed the spoon in it. No matter how much he might protest, his body craved fuel as it tried to repair itself. If she could get the food in his mouth, survival instinct took over and he would eat it. It was really the most fun she got out of having him here.
"Pretty good, isn't it?" she asked him cheerfully as he chewed and swallowed with an odd combination of reluctance and hunger.
"When I can move again, it'll be my swords I'll be ramming down yer throat, demon."
"You really know how to make a girl feel appreciated, Father," she retorted, and picked up another spoonful of kidney pie.
It took awhile, but the pie was eventually consumed. Seras had been understandably relieved when she discovered that Anderson's current condition and regeneration abilities (which were very slowly returning to him) prevented elimination of bodily wastes. His metabolism devoured every scrap of nutrient and left nothing behind at all.
Lucky for him. If she'd had to actually....well, it didn't bear thinking about. No need to traumatize herself unnecessarily. She relaxed in her coffin with a book while she waited for him to fall asleep. She tuned out the litany of insults and curses spewed her way. After all, he couldn't really move and there was no T.V. down here. Probably it was his only form of entertainment...
It wasn't overly long before the priest finally ceased his haranguing and became quiet. And it was quite soon after that his breathing evened out, telling her he was asleep. Seras placed down her book quietly and went to a mini-fridge she'd put in the corner of the room. Opening it she retrieved a plastic bag of AB medical blood. Carefully, she retrieved a glass from the lone shelf in the room and placed both on the little table in the center of her abode.
She tore the bag open and poured the blood into the goblet. Picked it up and put it to her lips.
Put it down again.
Picked it up and tried to take a sip – got within an inch of the rim of the cup – and put it down again.
She glared at the blood, feeling her already prominent canines elongate further at the sight and smell of it.
"I have to drink," she murmured quietly. "As long as I keep not drinking, I'm a half starved, useless, incomplete vampire. A liability to Hellsing."
She picked up the goblet. Her hand trembled. She put it down again.
"Why can't I just drink?" she muttered hopelessly. A single bloody tear slipped down her cheek. Moving abruptly, she picked up the goblet and let the contents empty into a container, which she shoved back in the fridge, right next to all the others. Wiping her eyes, frustrated and disgusted with herself, Seras climbed into her coffin and lowered the lid. The rising sun placed her deep into a vampire's sleep.
Across the room, Anderson's eyes opened from their previous slits to full.
Despite all the pain and anger and irritation involved in the situation, Anderson had been finding a tiny speck of thankfulness for the care of the vampire woman growing deep within his chest. Horrified, he had resolved to purge it by watching her drink blood, like the demon she was. See her true colors; demolish this incomprehensible and completely inappropriate sensation of gratitude. She was nosferatu; when he recovered he would slay her and display her body for that vile master of hers to see. So, knowing she probably drank after he slept, he'd successfully faked slumber and watched the whole thing. Heard everything.
Alexander Anderson was suddenly sorely troubled. A vampire who wasn't drinking blood? And who was getting it from a donation bag and not a human's throat? Something wasn't matching up with his firmly held beliefs, and it disturbed the wounded Iscariot immensely.
A/N: Hope you liked. Here's note number one. In the manga and perhaps the dubbed anime, Alexander Anderson had some sort of Irish, Scottish brogue. I'm attempting to capture that – mildly – with the use of ye and yer. Til next chapter then!
IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ! This fic was inspired by the fic Leonine by shadeshark. I strongly suggest you read that, because it's probably better than this one could hope to be. It takes place after episode 13 in the anime, but will contain some manga elements. I will note them as they become important. That said – I am horrible at regular updates, so be warned in advance that this will likely be an erratically posted story! Now, on with the show....
Chapter the First
Why?
It was a question she'd asked herself so often that it was starting to become a litany.
Maybe it had been shock. After all, Ferguson had just been killed, Walter injured, Sir Integra imprisoned...everything had been thrown into confusion. Surely even the undead could react badly, irrationally, in times of severe stress.
Okay, so shock could cover the initial action. The rest wasn't quite so easy to explain away. Continuing with this farce was the real problem. Of course the empty state of the mansion helped. Walter still in the hospital, Sir Integra locked up while her guilt or innocence was being debated, and her Master hovering close to the head of Hellsing all the time. Pressing her to choose the night, Seras was certain. So – nobody around to notice, or to interfere.
Seras Victoria sighed as she paused at the door of her room, taking a deep breath full of oxygen she no longer required. She blew it out fretfully, stirring her strawberry-blonde bangs out of her deep red eyes. Wincing slightly in anticipation, she opened the door.
"Back so soon, demon?" snarled a voice almost immediately. The vampire looked at the lanky form of the badly wounded priest lying on a rickety cot across the room from her coffin.
She was a glutton for punishment. Yeah, that had to be it.
"Evening, Anderson."
She had found him near the wreckage after Alucard's defeat of Incognito. From his near incoherent ranting she'd discovered that he'd tried to take on the weird foreign vampire – and failed miserably. Worse, the sorcery- using creature had done something more than simply wound him to the point of death. Anderson not only could not use his holy sheaves of paper...he was not regenerating. Forgotten in the confusion, she'd carried his sorry, bloody carcass back to the only safe place she could think of, the Hellsing mansion. He wasn't even a security threat anymore – he couldn't summon his binding spells, and couldn't walk, stand, or even sit up on his own. Couldn't even lift a hand – and all of his swords had been broken.
Seras moved into the room, ignoring his baleful green glare, placing the food she carried on the table that also held her bag of medical blood. She continued to muse over her reasons for helping the man her Master loved to refer to as "the Judas Priest".
Helplessness had been a part of it, she was certain. She'd been nearly helpless in the battle with Incognito. This had been something she could do. Part of her training in both the police and D-11 had included emergency medicine. Her time at Hellsing had taught her more. So she'd stripped him down to his boxers (like she'd really needed to know he wore them!) while he roared at her and did his best to bite if she got too close to his face. After cleaning him off, she'd proceeded to stitch him up – without anesthetic of any kind. She figured she owed him at least that much for putting a sword through her throat, killing Gareth, and cutting off her Master's head.
Okay, she owed him a lot more than that, but it was a satisfying start anyway. While she was 'sewing' he cursed her in English, Italian, what sounded like Gaelic, and what she thought was Latin, using words she hadn't thought priests were supposed to know, let alone use.
Then, because the smell of all that blood was driving her wild, she'd left him lying in her coffin (lid up, despite her temptation otherwise) she'd gone off to find him a cot or something. He'd remained on that rickety cot for nearly a week and a half now.
"I'm getting better at cooking, so it's getting faster," she told him almost lightly. Not responding to his angry words irritated him more than any attempt to talk back would have. "I made a kidney pie tonight. I used to love these things before..."
"Before ye sold yer soul to the devil himself," spat Anderson.
"Just because he wears red all the time doesn't mean Master Alucard's the devil," she chided, secretly enjoying his outraged spluttering at her deliberate misinterpretation of his words.
It would have been so much easier to either leave him where he'd been or kill him where he'd lain. Or at the very least she could have turned him back over to the Iscariots. But Seras was neither stupid nor above a little pettiness. Anderson had been in treaty violation AGAIN by being where he had. That gave him zero rights as far as she was concerned. Also, Hellsing was currently practically inoperative. Holding their best operative like this kept Section 13 from moving into England while Integra was imprisoned.
And of course, there was reason number three, Seras's favorite reason of all. It was absolutely enraging the paladin that his life was being saved by one of the 'abominations' he fought against! She hid a small smile as she cut up the pie. He kept that hot emerald gaze on her unrelentingly. She'd been annoyed by it at first, but now she barely noticed it. Let him glare. It couldn't hurt her, for all he seemed to wish it might.
"I'm not hungry," he finally said stiffly. Seras rolled her eyes. Here they went again.
"You know I'll force-feed you if you try refusing food again, Anderson." His face went red with anger from hairline to neck at the reminder of the power struggle the first few days he'd been here.
"I'm not hungry, demon. Ye can't make a man eat if he isn't hungry!"
"I can too. Especially if the man needs the food to recover." He clamped his mouth together and turned his head away, looking for all the world like a fussy infant. Seras's eyes widened a bit at that thought, and a wicked look her master would have been proud of entered her crimson eyes.
"Come on, Anderson. Here comes the airplane!"
She 'flew' the spoonful of food near his face, making airplane noises as she did so. He turned his head to look at her so fast she nearly caught him in the nose with the food. Seras was delighted to see that the look in his eyes was not the glare from moments before. It was pure, unadulterated shock.
"Are ye ma– mmph!" The moment he opened his mouth, she stuffed the spoon in it. No matter how much he might protest, his body craved fuel as it tried to repair itself. If she could get the food in his mouth, survival instinct took over and he would eat it. It was really the most fun she got out of having him here.
"Pretty good, isn't it?" she asked him cheerfully as he chewed and swallowed with an odd combination of reluctance and hunger.
"When I can move again, it'll be my swords I'll be ramming down yer throat, demon."
"You really know how to make a girl feel appreciated, Father," she retorted, and picked up another spoonful of kidney pie.
It took awhile, but the pie was eventually consumed. Seras had been understandably relieved when she discovered that Anderson's current condition and regeneration abilities (which were very slowly returning to him) prevented elimination of bodily wastes. His metabolism devoured every scrap of nutrient and left nothing behind at all.
Lucky for him. If she'd had to actually....well, it didn't bear thinking about. No need to traumatize herself unnecessarily. She relaxed in her coffin with a book while she waited for him to fall asleep. She tuned out the litany of insults and curses spewed her way. After all, he couldn't really move and there was no T.V. down here. Probably it was his only form of entertainment...
It wasn't overly long before the priest finally ceased his haranguing and became quiet. And it was quite soon after that his breathing evened out, telling her he was asleep. Seras placed down her book quietly and went to a mini-fridge she'd put in the corner of the room. Opening it she retrieved a plastic bag of AB medical blood. Carefully, she retrieved a glass from the lone shelf in the room and placed both on the little table in the center of her abode.
She tore the bag open and poured the blood into the goblet. Picked it up and put it to her lips.
Put it down again.
Picked it up and tried to take a sip – got within an inch of the rim of the cup – and put it down again.
She glared at the blood, feeling her already prominent canines elongate further at the sight and smell of it.
"I have to drink," she murmured quietly. "As long as I keep not drinking, I'm a half starved, useless, incomplete vampire. A liability to Hellsing."
She picked up the goblet. Her hand trembled. She put it down again.
"Why can't I just drink?" she muttered hopelessly. A single bloody tear slipped down her cheek. Moving abruptly, she picked up the goblet and let the contents empty into a container, which she shoved back in the fridge, right next to all the others. Wiping her eyes, frustrated and disgusted with herself, Seras climbed into her coffin and lowered the lid. The rising sun placed her deep into a vampire's sleep.
Across the room, Anderson's eyes opened from their previous slits to full.
Despite all the pain and anger and irritation involved in the situation, Anderson had been finding a tiny speck of thankfulness for the care of the vampire woman growing deep within his chest. Horrified, he had resolved to purge it by watching her drink blood, like the demon she was. See her true colors; demolish this incomprehensible and completely inappropriate sensation of gratitude. She was nosferatu; when he recovered he would slay her and display her body for that vile master of hers to see. So, knowing she probably drank after he slept, he'd successfully faked slumber and watched the whole thing. Heard everything.
Alexander Anderson was suddenly sorely troubled. A vampire who wasn't drinking blood? And who was getting it from a donation bag and not a human's throat? Something wasn't matching up with his firmly held beliefs, and it disturbed the wounded Iscariot immensely.
A/N: Hope you liked. Here's note number one. In the manga and perhaps the dubbed anime, Alexander Anderson had some sort of Irish, Scottish brogue. I'm attempting to capture that – mildly – with the use of ye and yer. Til next chapter then!