Hellsing Fan Fiction ❯ Fare ❯ Enemy ( Chapter 12 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: Artemis_Vampiress 
Victoria's first meeting with their enemy leaves her cold and empty . . . but something far worse may have happened when she wasn't looking.
Anime/Manga: Hellsing Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Horror / Action | Type: Fanfiction Sequel | Uploaded On: 09.30.2008 | Updated On: 10.31.2008 | Pages: 3 | Words: 2.8K | Visits: 388 | Status: Completed
Victoria's first meeting with their enemy leaves her cold and empty . . . but something far worse may have happened when she wasn't looking.
Anime/Manga: Hellsing Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Horror / Action | Type: Fanfiction Sequel | Uploaded On: 09.30.2008 | Updated On: 10.31.2008 | Pages: 3 | Words: 2.8K | Visits: 388 | Status: Completed
Author's Notes: I don't know what happened to the crazy awesome support I was getting . . . but thanks to those of you who reviewed Ch 11. What's with that? Did you not like it or something? I mean, I know it took me a while to get it up, but . . . . . . not THAT long. Though I will admit that THIS took FOREVER . . . I had writer's block, sorry guys. I'm going to try to get out a chapter every couple of days from now on but I make no promises . . . writer's block freakin' kills.
Nights came and went without incident. For a normal person, that was nothing out of the ordinary. For Integral Hellsing and the Hellsing Organization, it was disturbing. For the vampires, it was boring.
But anxiety plagued Victoria constantly anyway, a little voice in her head told her to be ready, be on her guard, keep watching. She knew something of monumental importance was going to happen, and by God she was going to be ready for it. This, however, annoyed the hell out of the human units under her command. She was irritable and it showed.
“All right. That was good. I want you to hit them in the exact same spot as before. Remember, the head or the heart, and only the head or heart. Blowing their legs off won't do you any good,” she called to the humans.
She had moved them outdoors, spent several hours giving careful instructions, telling them exactly how she wanted the targets set up. She wanted them to move. Real vampires and real ghouls didn't sit still, she told herself, so it was important to her that her men could hit an unpredictable, moving target, every time, in the same place. More importantly, was that they could do it easily. These soldiers were not like the ones who had served when she first joined Hellsing. Those soldiers, those brave servants of God, had taught her so much. These soldiers, on the other hand, were learning from her. Thirty seven years had opened her up to aspects of her powers she had never known before and shown her new ways of ending a life that thrilled her vampire soul to the core. Despite her vast knowledge on the subject of vampires and death, she doubted that these men would ever really learn enough from her to keep from dying in battle in the end. They would not be as lucky as the fifty-odd soldiers she'd thrown retirement parties for over the past few years.
It saddened her a little to think this way but that was how it was. These men only worked for Hellsing. The soldiers she'd fought with when she first arrived had lived for it.
“Now, what the hell are you doing? I told you, we're staying out here until at least one of you lazy, worthless bastards can hit the target in the same damn place every single time!”
. . . they wouldn't live very long at all. But this, of course, was just one unit. There was one other under her command. An elite unit made up of soldiers from the old days and new soldiers who had had very intense special training and took their job seriously. The dedication and diligence of this unit made the day-to-day stupidity tolerable. It was a small comfort to her to know that they were as bored and restless as she was.
Hours went by . . . . . few of the men had managed to do as she asked (such a simple thing to ask), but it was time to pack it up and move it inside. It was about time, in her opinion. Victoria was tired, her throat hurt, and she was sorely disappointed. She wanted to go to bed.
“Victoria.”
She turned to face the owner of that unmistakable voice.
“Hm?” she mumbled as she started to tear down the cardboard targets.
“Come with me,” Alucard said in that soft tone he used so rarely, holding out a hand to her.
Victoria dropped the shredded pieces of cardboard. Cleaning it up was someone else's job, anyway. She closed the distance between them and took his hand, smiling for the first time in days. He led her away from the manor and then phased, pulling her with him through shadows and nothing, till he detected the opening he wanted and slid through with her in tow.
They were in an alley off a dimly lit street. He tugged on her hand gently as she stood trying to get a feel for their location, and led her down the street, towards the the smell of trees. Victoria was intensely curious now. They rarely ever left the manor, much less together, and they were rarely ever alone. Alucard didn't seem to crave the closeness and quiet time alone with her that she wanted so badly with him.
They walked down the street hand-in-hand, almost like any other couple, except that . . . well, okay, so they weren't anything like any other couple. He was monstrously tall, walked with the grace of a predator and looked every bit like the prince he had been once. His crimson eyes were uncovered, the sunglasses stored away till he should need them, and his long, long hair fell down his back in smooth waves. His face, devoid of the violent, hysterical expression it usually wore, was smooth and calm. He looked like the twenty-nine-year-old he had been when he was turned. Victoria, for herself, was slightly taller than the average woman, though nowhere near as tall as Alucard. Walking around with her eyes uncovered made her uncomfortable, as it normally attracted strange looks, but tonight it was too dark for any normal person to see the color, so she didn't mind. She, too, walked with a deadly grace common to all vampires, every step looking more like a great cat stalking its prey than a normal person walking. The innocent expression on her face was tempered by experience and pain, making her look more mature than her eternal twenty years.
It was the way they held hands that threw it all off.
“Alucard, where exactly are we going?” Victoria asked him softly, leaning into him as she spoke.
He didn't answer her. A small half smile curved his mouth, and he shook his head. He was walking so carefully, slowly, and unusually noisily, making sure that anyone who saw them would only see a man and his lover walking together at night, nothing at all unusual.
“You'll see,” he told her quietly.
“Should I be worried?”
He shook his head, and the small smile grew, baring his white teeth ever so slightly.
After a short walk around several street corners, and a longer walk down a dark, lonely dirt road, he stopped. They were standing in tall, wet grass that brushed her thighs and smelled like rain, in the middle of nowhere, it seemed, though the city really wasn't that far away. He tilted his head back to look at the sky.
“Where are we? What is this?” she asked softly, curious.
He out a finger to his lips and ssssshed quietly, then pointed up at something in the sky.
She looked up. The breath she was taking escaped her.
The moon was full.
And not only was it full, but it was big. Bigger than usual, it seemed, with the stars shining in a way she could never see in the city. The sky had never seemed so full of light. The moon, the bright stars, and then, the softer light from stars much, much farther away, creating depth in the blue-blackness that was the sky. It was so beautiful . . .
“Oh . . .”
Alucard smiled, pleased that she appreciated it.
It was then she noticed Malakai. He was standing at the top of a small hill not far away, the highest elevation to be found in the open space they were standing in. His arms were spread, lifted up to the sky, and his head was tilted back. He seemed so unreal. He was standing there shirtless, his pale skin almost glowing with the moonlight, silver in color, and his hair seemed alive in the soft breeze. The look on his face was ecstatic. He looked as though he couldn't take his eyes off the sky, the moon, couldn't tear his eyes away even if he tried. He didn't seem to notice them at all, so enraptured was he.
So they were all there together then. It felt right. It felt good.
“I'm glad.”
She looked at Alucard.
“It feels nice. I can't explain it. It's a serene feeling. Like all the pain is gone from my body.”
“Wonderful, isn't it?” he grinned.
“Yes!”
But she knew this wasn't what he had brought her here for. As beautiful as it was, as much as things like this seemed to mean, this wasn't it. It would be a stupid mistake to think it was.
“So why are we here?”
“Because you can see them now,” said Malakai from where he suddenly was beside her, pulling his shirt on over his head.
“See . . . who?”
“Our enemy,” Alucard replied, the dark viciousness in his tone intertwined with absurdly violent delight.
His face was split in an absolutely evil grin.
She glanced around, suddenly alert, angry because he had led her into danger without warning her, and a little afraid, because she didn't know what to expect. Goosebumps rose on her skin.
Malakai put a hand on her arm, his eyes telling her not to be afraid, and he pointed silently to an area shadowed by trees and an old shack that was falling apart.
She looked, staring intently into the shadows her vampire vision should have had no problem penetrating. But she couldn't. She couldn't see through it. And suddenly, she realized . . . Malakai wasn't pointing at something hiding in the shadows, he was pointing at them. The darkness that had once looked natural was not what it seemed. It was moving, writhing.
“Shit,” she swore, tensing.
“They won't come over here, Victoria. They cannot,” Alucard told her.
“Why?”
“Because they are afraid.”
Afraid? Of what? She wondered.
And then, looking up at Alucard's face, she understood a little better. She had been with him so long she had almost forgotten what it was like to be afraid of him.
“What are they doing?” she asked softly.
“They're watching. And hiding,” Malakai said.
She looked at him questioningly.
He saw her look and explained.
“They are watching something in the city. They are waiting for something. I don't know what it is they're seeing, but they're afraid of it, and us being here only makes it worse.”
“What are they?”
“They used to be vampires.”
Victoria looked at the shadows, then looked at Alucard and Malakai.
“I don't get it,” she said bluntly.
She still couldn't see what they were seeing. All she saw was shadow. Alucard touched a hand to her face, fingertips at her temple. And then . . . she saw.
They were twisted, ugly. The pale, silvery vampire flesh was now a sickening doughy white, rotting about the mouth. Their lips were gone, their mouths gaping open, black clotted blood dripping in places. Their hair was patchy and grimy, when they had any at all. Some of them had no eyes, but she knew somehow (a shiver went up her spine) that they could see. They could see through those bloody, empty sockets. Their jaws were slack, much like a ghoul's when it wasn't biting down on something. They moved strangely, almost like a jerky limp, but she felt certain that if they got it in their minds to chase her they could catch her so easily. They were naked, and she could see that one each of their bare abdomens, there was a single raw, gaping wound in the shape of a hand-print, and she was reminded of the night when Malakai had awoke from a dream with a bleeding, sickening burn on his chest in that same shape. It seemed also that with her new sight came smell, as well, because from them she smelled rot and blood and burning flesh and something she couldn't put a name to but that her mind wanted to call hatred.
“Oh, God,” she said, gagging, a hand flying up to cover her nose.
This was why they kept themselves invisible. It made perfect sense.
Alucard let his hand drop to his side. She had obviously seen all that she needed to see. She looked about ready to puke.
“I-I want to go,” Victoria muttered, wrapping her arms about herself as if cold, “I want to leave.”
Before she could blink, Alucard's hand grabbed hold of her arm and he phased them into the safety of their home. She dropped numbly into a chair.
“Is she okay? I could hear-” Abigail's voice came from the other side of the door.
“Come in.” Alucard cut her off abruptly.
Abigail opened the door. Victoria looked up at her as she did, and something in her eyes told her that the blonde vampire had seen . . .
“So you saw them.”
It was not a question. And Alucard offered no answer.
“What were they doing? Where were they?”
“Hiding outside the city.”
“How did you find them?”
“Malakai and I found them last night. We guessed, correctly, that they would still be there tonight.”
Abigail nodded, watching Victoria carefully. She wasn't surprised, really, because she had had nearly the same reaction the first time she saw them, and deep down she wondered how Alucard could be so unaffected by them. They were ugly, evil, tormented, and they had a way of sickening a person right down to their very soul. Maybe Alucard just didn't have one.
“Is this something you should be telling . . . your-err, master?” Abigail asked awkwardly.
She had not yet come to fully grasp how Alucard could be a servant to a human, much less to the Hellsings, especially when she could feel his power and knew that he could kill everyone in this household in a second if he wanted to.
“Yes.”
“I can stay with her, if . . .”
Alucard disappeared. Well, there was her answer. Abigail moved closer to Victoria, kneeling in front of the chair so she could look at her face. It was expressionless, blank.
“They just suck it all right out of you, don't they?” Abigail smiled understandingly.
Victoria nodded. Even though she wasn't exactly sure what “it all” was, it was true, she knew. She didn't understand why she suddenly felt so . . . cold, so depressed, so numb.
“It goes away after a while. It's not a big deal.”
“What do you mean?”
Abigail pulled a worn chair to her side and sat in it.
“It's sort of like . . . I don't know. They are so full of hatred for the world, so angry, so violently sick inside and twisted, that all nonhuman creatures are affected by it, vampires most especially. They are ugly, unnatural . . . but, being away from them gives your mind time to recover from their presence,” Abigail said, twirling a strand of hair between her fingers.
Victoria thought that over. It made sense. She was not strong enough in her power to see these creatures, but . . . apparently she could feel them. And sitting there in the safety of her lair, her home, she could feel the chill on her soul begin to fade away and the spark of life in her body to grow bright again. Suck it all right out of you, indeed.
And . . . that was when she noticed . . .
“Where is Malakai?”
Nights came and went without incident. For a normal person, that was nothing out of the ordinary. For Integral Hellsing and the Hellsing Organization, it was disturbing. For the vampires, it was boring.
But anxiety plagued Victoria constantly anyway, a little voice in her head told her to be ready, be on her guard, keep watching. She knew something of monumental importance was going to happen, and by God she was going to be ready for it. This, however, annoyed the hell out of the human units under her command. She was irritable and it showed.
“All right. That was good. I want you to hit them in the exact same spot as before. Remember, the head or the heart, and only the head or heart. Blowing their legs off won't do you any good,” she called to the humans.
She had moved them outdoors, spent several hours giving careful instructions, telling them exactly how she wanted the targets set up. She wanted them to move. Real vampires and real ghouls didn't sit still, she told herself, so it was important to her that her men could hit an unpredictable, moving target, every time, in the same place. More importantly, was that they could do it easily. These soldiers were not like the ones who had served when she first joined Hellsing. Those soldiers, those brave servants of God, had taught her so much. These soldiers, on the other hand, were learning from her. Thirty seven years had opened her up to aspects of her powers she had never known before and shown her new ways of ending a life that thrilled her vampire soul to the core. Despite her vast knowledge on the subject of vampires and death, she doubted that these men would ever really learn enough from her to keep from dying in battle in the end. They would not be as lucky as the fifty-odd soldiers she'd thrown retirement parties for over the past few years.
It saddened her a little to think this way but that was how it was. These men only worked for Hellsing. The soldiers she'd fought with when she first arrived had lived for it.
“Now, what the hell are you doing? I told you, we're staying out here until at least one of you lazy, worthless bastards can hit the target in the same damn place every single time!”
. . . they wouldn't live very long at all. But this, of course, was just one unit. There was one other under her command. An elite unit made up of soldiers from the old days and new soldiers who had had very intense special training and took their job seriously. The dedication and diligence of this unit made the day-to-day stupidity tolerable. It was a small comfort to her to know that they were as bored and restless as she was.
Hours went by . . . . . few of the men had managed to do as she asked (such a simple thing to ask), but it was time to pack it up and move it inside. It was about time, in her opinion. Victoria was tired, her throat hurt, and she was sorely disappointed. She wanted to go to bed.
“Victoria.”
She turned to face the owner of that unmistakable voice.
“Hm?” she mumbled as she started to tear down the cardboard targets.
“Come with me,” Alucard said in that soft tone he used so rarely, holding out a hand to her.
Victoria dropped the shredded pieces of cardboard. Cleaning it up was someone else's job, anyway. She closed the distance between them and took his hand, smiling for the first time in days. He led her away from the manor and then phased, pulling her with him through shadows and nothing, till he detected the opening he wanted and slid through with her in tow.
They were in an alley off a dimly lit street. He tugged on her hand gently as she stood trying to get a feel for their location, and led her down the street, towards the the smell of trees. Victoria was intensely curious now. They rarely ever left the manor, much less together, and they were rarely ever alone. Alucard didn't seem to crave the closeness and quiet time alone with her that she wanted so badly with him.
They walked down the street hand-in-hand, almost like any other couple, except that . . . well, okay, so they weren't anything like any other couple. He was monstrously tall, walked with the grace of a predator and looked every bit like the prince he had been once. His crimson eyes were uncovered, the sunglasses stored away till he should need them, and his long, long hair fell down his back in smooth waves. His face, devoid of the violent, hysterical expression it usually wore, was smooth and calm. He looked like the twenty-nine-year-old he had been when he was turned. Victoria, for herself, was slightly taller than the average woman, though nowhere near as tall as Alucard. Walking around with her eyes uncovered made her uncomfortable, as it normally attracted strange looks, but tonight it was too dark for any normal person to see the color, so she didn't mind. She, too, walked with a deadly grace common to all vampires, every step looking more like a great cat stalking its prey than a normal person walking. The innocent expression on her face was tempered by experience and pain, making her look more mature than her eternal twenty years.
It was the way they held hands that threw it all off.
“Alucard, where exactly are we going?” Victoria asked him softly, leaning into him as she spoke.
He didn't answer her. A small half smile curved his mouth, and he shook his head. He was walking so carefully, slowly, and unusually noisily, making sure that anyone who saw them would only see a man and his lover walking together at night, nothing at all unusual.
“You'll see,” he told her quietly.
“Should I be worried?”
He shook his head, and the small smile grew, baring his white teeth ever so slightly.
After a short walk around several street corners, and a longer walk down a dark, lonely dirt road, he stopped. They were standing in tall, wet grass that brushed her thighs and smelled like rain, in the middle of nowhere, it seemed, though the city really wasn't that far away. He tilted his head back to look at the sky.
“Where are we? What is this?” she asked softly, curious.
He out a finger to his lips and ssssshed quietly, then pointed up at something in the sky.
She looked up. The breath she was taking escaped her.
The moon was full.
And not only was it full, but it was big. Bigger than usual, it seemed, with the stars shining in a way she could never see in the city. The sky had never seemed so full of light. The moon, the bright stars, and then, the softer light from stars much, much farther away, creating depth in the blue-blackness that was the sky. It was so beautiful . . .
“Oh . . .”
Alucard smiled, pleased that she appreciated it.
It was then she noticed Malakai. He was standing at the top of a small hill not far away, the highest elevation to be found in the open space they were standing in. His arms were spread, lifted up to the sky, and his head was tilted back. He seemed so unreal. He was standing there shirtless, his pale skin almost glowing with the moonlight, silver in color, and his hair seemed alive in the soft breeze. The look on his face was ecstatic. He looked as though he couldn't take his eyes off the sky, the moon, couldn't tear his eyes away even if he tried. He didn't seem to notice them at all, so enraptured was he.
So they were all there together then. It felt right. It felt good.
“I'm glad.”
She looked at Alucard.
“It feels nice. I can't explain it. It's a serene feeling. Like all the pain is gone from my body.”
“Wonderful, isn't it?” he grinned.
“Yes!”
But she knew this wasn't what he had brought her here for. As beautiful as it was, as much as things like this seemed to mean, this wasn't it. It would be a stupid mistake to think it was.
“So why are we here?”
“Because you can see them now,” said Malakai from where he suddenly was beside her, pulling his shirt on over his head.
“See . . . who?”
“Our enemy,” Alucard replied, the dark viciousness in his tone intertwined with absurdly violent delight.
His face was split in an absolutely evil grin.
She glanced around, suddenly alert, angry because he had led her into danger without warning her, and a little afraid, because she didn't know what to expect. Goosebumps rose on her skin.
Malakai put a hand on her arm, his eyes telling her not to be afraid, and he pointed silently to an area shadowed by trees and an old shack that was falling apart.
She looked, staring intently into the shadows her vampire vision should have had no problem penetrating. But she couldn't. She couldn't see through it. And suddenly, she realized . . . Malakai wasn't pointing at something hiding in the shadows, he was pointing at them. The darkness that had once looked natural was not what it seemed. It was moving, writhing.
“Shit,” she swore, tensing.
“They won't come over here, Victoria. They cannot,” Alucard told her.
“Why?”
“Because they are afraid.”
Afraid? Of what? She wondered.
And then, looking up at Alucard's face, she understood a little better. She had been with him so long she had almost forgotten what it was like to be afraid of him.
“What are they doing?” she asked softly.
“They're watching. And hiding,” Malakai said.
She looked at him questioningly.
He saw her look and explained.
“They are watching something in the city. They are waiting for something. I don't know what it is they're seeing, but they're afraid of it, and us being here only makes it worse.”
“What are they?”
“They used to be vampires.”
Victoria looked at the shadows, then looked at Alucard and Malakai.
“I don't get it,” she said bluntly.
She still couldn't see what they were seeing. All she saw was shadow. Alucard touched a hand to her face, fingertips at her temple. And then . . . she saw.
They were twisted, ugly. The pale, silvery vampire flesh was now a sickening doughy white, rotting about the mouth. Their lips were gone, their mouths gaping open, black clotted blood dripping in places. Their hair was patchy and grimy, when they had any at all. Some of them had no eyes, but she knew somehow (a shiver went up her spine) that they could see. They could see through those bloody, empty sockets. Their jaws were slack, much like a ghoul's when it wasn't biting down on something. They moved strangely, almost like a jerky limp, but she felt certain that if they got it in their minds to chase her they could catch her so easily. They were naked, and she could see that one each of their bare abdomens, there was a single raw, gaping wound in the shape of a hand-print, and she was reminded of the night when Malakai had awoke from a dream with a bleeding, sickening burn on his chest in that same shape. It seemed also that with her new sight came smell, as well, because from them she smelled rot and blood and burning flesh and something she couldn't put a name to but that her mind wanted to call hatred.
“Oh, God,” she said, gagging, a hand flying up to cover her nose.
This was why they kept themselves invisible. It made perfect sense.
Alucard let his hand drop to his side. She had obviously seen all that she needed to see. She looked about ready to puke.
“I-I want to go,” Victoria muttered, wrapping her arms about herself as if cold, “I want to leave.”
Before she could blink, Alucard's hand grabbed hold of her arm and he phased them into the safety of their home. She dropped numbly into a chair.
“Is she okay? I could hear-” Abigail's voice came from the other side of the door.
“Come in.” Alucard cut her off abruptly.
Abigail opened the door. Victoria looked up at her as she did, and something in her eyes told her that the blonde vampire had seen . . .
“So you saw them.”
It was not a question. And Alucard offered no answer.
“What were they doing? Where were they?”
“Hiding outside the city.”
“How did you find them?”
“Malakai and I found them last night. We guessed, correctly, that they would still be there tonight.”
Abigail nodded, watching Victoria carefully. She wasn't surprised, really, because she had had nearly the same reaction the first time she saw them, and deep down she wondered how Alucard could be so unaffected by them. They were ugly, evil, tormented, and they had a way of sickening a person right down to their very soul. Maybe Alucard just didn't have one.
“Is this something you should be telling . . . your-err, master?” Abigail asked awkwardly.
She had not yet come to fully grasp how Alucard could be a servant to a human, much less to the Hellsings, especially when she could feel his power and knew that he could kill everyone in this household in a second if he wanted to.
“Yes.”
“I can stay with her, if . . .”
Alucard disappeared. Well, there was her answer. Abigail moved closer to Victoria, kneeling in front of the chair so she could look at her face. It was expressionless, blank.
“They just suck it all right out of you, don't they?” Abigail smiled understandingly.
Victoria nodded. Even though she wasn't exactly sure what “it all” was, it was true, she knew. She didn't understand why she suddenly felt so . . . cold, so depressed, so numb.
“It goes away after a while. It's not a big deal.”
“What do you mean?”
Abigail pulled a worn chair to her side and sat in it.
“It's sort of like . . . I don't know. They are so full of hatred for the world, so angry, so violently sick inside and twisted, that all nonhuman creatures are affected by it, vampires most especially. They are ugly, unnatural . . . but, being away from them gives your mind time to recover from their presence,” Abigail said, twirling a strand of hair between her fingers.
Victoria thought that over. It made sense. She was not strong enough in her power to see these creatures, but . . . apparently she could feel them. And sitting there in the safety of her lair, her home, she could feel the chill on her soul begin to fade away and the spark of life in her body to grow bright again. Suck it all right out of you, indeed.
And . . . that was when she noticed . . .
“Where is Malakai?”