Fic The World's Heart Part E
Jun. 9th, 2005 08:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jessara40k_ljNext part of The World's Heart.
Alucard muttered a curse as he felt another pull at his power. He'd thought it was a postive sign when Sir Integra had begun taking Alessandra to her bed. He'd thought she was showing the sense to make sure fewer - almost no - mideons could make her nosferatu, and learning to enjoy her body from the best person to teach her, an experienced, skilled woman, thereby also avoiding the risk of pregnancy.
:I should have known better. She was far too interested in the prospect of learning how to draw on and use my powers for me to assume she'd let any chance slip by. I never thought she'd whore herself to learn how to use my powers as if they were hers, but then I never expected my little brother to...: He refused to think about what Radu did to himself, for the chance to be any sort of vampire. :But she doesn't realise how dangerous this is, pulling at my power like this could distract me enough that I let a nosferatu or FREAK escape, and worse, her body can't handle my power, it will damage her, perhaps even kill her.: There was only one option, and he began to look for the Dark Guardian, to make a petition.
He was alone in his bedroom, so it was safe to show him proper respect. Alucard fell to his knees, and bowed to press his forehead to the ground, then waited for Xander to notice him.
"Get up, Alucard." Xander sounded weary, but even so Alucard only raised himself to his knees, still looking at the ground at Xander's feet. "What is it?"
"Lord World's Heart, I humbly petition that you will be generous enough to modify the seals binding me to the service of the Hellsing family."
"I thought you wanted to keep the seals?" The Dark Guardian sounded a bit confused, he pulled Alucard to his feet, then to sit by him on his bed. "What do you want me to do, and why?"
"Sir Integra asked about drawing on and using my power, I talked her through an exercise that will let her accelerate her healing, but without drawing on my powers. She turned to Alessandra. I've felt her draw on my powers, but it's the portion I can't access at the moment, so it isn't too bad. But I'm worried. If she draws more than her body can handle..." He let Xander fill in the rest.
"Do you want me to stop her drawing on your powers at all?"
"No, it will help her, but can you limit it to what her body can handle, and that portion of my power I cannot access at any one time?"
"You mean that if she for some reason lets you access all of your power you want to make sure she can't draw on any of it under those circumstances?" Xander's voice made Alucard reconsider his request.
"No, I didn't think about that, she'd only do that if she was in desperate trouble. Set it up so that even under those circumstances I can't access however much power her body can handle. But don't let the ammount of power she has access to change, keep it at what she can handle now."
"That won't be a problem. Kneel in front of me, bow your head and shut your eyes." Alucard obeyed, he knew that Xander was giving those orders to make it easier for him to do what he needed to when he felt the Dark Guardian's hands on either side of his head, and his sensed the World's Heart's power running through his own and into the seals. Then that power withdrew from him, and Xander pushed him away.
"I'm done. And you can still break the seals the way you could before."
"Thank you Lord Dark Guardian." He nuzzled at Xander's hand to show some of his gratitude, and was rewarded when Xander began running it through his hair.
"Two of my old friends from the Hellmouth will be in London shortly. I want you to tell Sir Integra that I'll be meeting them for drinks at some point next week. They've been asking about my new duties. We'll be meeting in daylight of course, but...you wanna come along and shock them?"
"Yes please. And you should wear your guns. Has Shinigami got your Casull Autoloader together yet?"
"Yes, I need to figure out where to wear it, but that's a good idea. Sir Integra's arranged the permits I need."
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander checked that his guns were all in the right holsters, easy to access, and that he had the blades he'd taken to carrying on him too. He could throw a knife with quite a high degree of accuracy, if he had to, but he preferred to actually use them in hand to hand, and his choice of blades reflected that. The one at his belt, the one he kept hidden with a minor glamor, was long enough to almost qualify as a short sword, and the ones in his forearm sheathes each had a six inch blade. And they'd all been blessed, by the same priest who did the blessing for Hellsing's bullets, so he knew that it would work even on a True Demon. He'd also got the head of the Wiccan coven Willow had studied with to bless them as well, she was their equivalent of a christian Bishop and he'd been able to sense how very devout she was.
He threw an open shirt on to cover his weapons, relieving him of the need to use glamor for the guns and smaller knives, and the long coat he put on next would cover even his belt knife if he'd been willing to keep it on all the time. And then he picked up Alucard and headed out.
They met Buffy and Willow at a coffee shop, one he'd visited, and knew was good. He also knew that it didn't do the sort of custom it deserved and he was determined to encourage as many people as he could to go there in the future.
"Buffster, Wills, what do you want to drink? My treat."
"Double mint mocha."
"Cappucino, decaffinated if they've got any."
:Of course Willow wants decaf, she's trying to get into the whole body as temple ethos that coven taught. If she was really into it she'd ask for herbal tea, and a specific combination of herbs, but...: "This is the best coffe shop in London, of course they've got that. What about you, Dragonling?"
"A double espresso please, Heart." A stubborn twist to Alucard's lips told Xander that the No Life King wouldn't budge from that nickname without an express order, and he had the feeling that it would catch on quickly at Hellsing. "I'll be lucky if I manage to get it all down of course."
"You can help carry them. Buffy, Willow, grab a table, preferably in one of the boothes." That would make it much easier for Alucard to keep people from hearing them talk about vampires and demons. He got an expensive hot chocolate with lots of whipped cream for himself, and let Alucard carry them all when the girl put them on a tray, along with the pastries he'd asked for.
Buffy and Willow had managed to find a booth for them to eat and drink in. ~Mask our voices with shadows.~ Alucard obeyed the order as he set the tray on the table, and served the drinks and snacks from there before putting the tray to one side and sitting down himself.
"What just happened? W-who is that?" Xander hadn't expected Willow to be so timorous, or overawed by Alucard's power, on the scale of pure power she had more than he had access to at the moment, and there was no way that she could be reading Xander's power. :But perhaps she senses Alucard's full power, and can't tell how much of it is sealed away from his use.:
"Our Dragonling just made sure that nobody will be able to hear us talking about demons and vampires. He's the Hellsing Organisation's best weapon, the No Life King Alucard. The Hellsing family changed his name when they enslaved him." ~Which one do you think will make the connection first, Vlad?~
~I dont know them, but witches tend to be smarter than Slayers.~ "The name I used when I became a mideon was Vlad Tepes." He took a tiny sip of his espresso.
"Vlad Tepes - are you saying that you're Dracula?" Alucard was right, despite Buffy's high SAT scores she never had been too fond of thinking and she didn't remember apparently unconnected bits of information the way Willow did.
"He can't be Dracula, I killed Dracula, remember?" Buffy sounded outraged at the idea.
~~~oo()oo~~~
:So that's what happened to Radu. I mourned him 600 years ago. But I can get away with teasing The Dark Guardian a little.: "You never said that you'd encountered a demonic using my name, Heart?" He leaned back in his chair, raising an eyebrow at Xander.
"That's probably 'cause he was controlled." Buffy was almost giggling.
"No, it's because this 'Dracula' was irrelevant to the larger events of the year. He wasn't exactly tied in with dear deranged Glory, was he?" Xander's voice was cutting, and then he turned on Alucard. "Dragonling, could the demonic's actions have anything to do with your reputation? And why did you let him go around using your name?"
"Well, it's not as if I had a choice the last hundred years or so..." He faltered under Xander's expectant stare. "My little brother, Radu, wanted to become a mideon like me when he learned how I'd been changed. But I couldn't make him nosferatu back then." ~He'd been disqualified even younger than I had. And he'd enjoyed their attentions.~ "So I taught him as much of my magic as a human could master. Then he let one of the demonic vampires turn him, as a childe. I mourned his death then, but he still wore my brother's face so I gave him a day to leave my lands. Then I began killing every demonic who came into my territory - or that I came across when I was hunting my elders."
"Just like I couldn't bear to kill Angel when he lost his soul." Willow was disapproving despite Buffy's support, but Xander didn't seem to be too upset.
"Had he killed anyone when you let him go?"
"No, he'd wanted to seduce me into helping him get stronger, faster. So he'd only fed off an animal, a peasant's ox, and he hadn't even killed it. I knew that my brother was dead, that all that was left was a demon wearing his corpse, but...he felt different to the others. I did kill the piece of filth that had killed him."
"That's one way Alucard's situation differed from yours Buffy. Another is that he didn't have a calling to defend humanity, he still doesn't, any more than any Hellsing operative does. And third, it sounds like Radu still had a soul, meaning that he deserved the benefit of the doubt. It does happen very rarely with demonic vamps, that the soul isn't replaced by the demon, but joins with it. Usually if the new vamp was a powerful magic user or something else special beforehand. Like two of the three Slayers who were turned."
"But...all of the Slayers who were turned became the most dangerous..."
"They might not have been if the Council had been willing to help them keep from becoming monsters, but you don't have to lose your soul to become a monster. You know that Wills." The Dark Guardian's voice sounded saddened, he was probably remembering how the young witch had tried to end the world, and thrown her magic at and into him.
"Are you saying I should have kept Radu with me, Heart?" It had hurt so much having to send his brother away, even if it had just been a demon wearing his face, something he'd repeated to comfort himself every time he heard about Radu blackening his name. The idea that he actually had sent his brother away, not just the demon who'd taken over his body... "Could I have prevented him from becoming what he did?"
"No, you did your duty, to your people, to those under your protection. And you didn't know about that, how could you? But even if you had, when he was first given his soul Angelus continued to slaughter, and even those demonic vamps who keep their souls usually act like the older No Life Kings you hunted down."
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander shook his head. He didn't like how much it seemed to have disturbed Alucard to learn that his brother hadn't lost his soul. "Truthfully, it takes either hefty mystical support; support you just didn't know how to provide then if you didn't think to check if he'd kept his soul when you learned he hadn't killed a human to feed at that time, support the Council could certainly provide for their Slayers; or for the vamp to have been damn near a saint before they were turned, to keep a demonic vamp, even one with a soul from becoming evil - or staying evil. Why don't we change the subject?"
"Yes, what have you been doing Xander?" Buffy sounded eager, it made him wonder what she was trying to hide.
"That's boring, training, killing FREAKs, ghouls and nosferatu, nothing special. You two have been going all over the planet, what've you been doing?" He dismissed his time with Hellsing easily.
"We haven't done anything special."
"Oooh, Buffy's been in therapy, after that jerk the Immortal tried to get into her pants while she tried to get information she needed from him."
"Willow!"
"If the old Council had any sense whatsoever they'd have seen you got therapy earlier. You managed to find a decent therapist who already knew about the oogities, didn't you? They certainly should have been able to. I mean, after the whole Angelus thing, therapy would have helped you see the differences between him and Angel more clearly, and separate them better. And you really needed it after Acathla. Faith could have done with therapy after her first Watcher died - so could you after Merrick for that matter. And you needed it at other times too. But all they cared about was having a weapon they could use."
"They sound just like Abraham Hellsing, Heart. All he cared about was that he could use me as a weapon." ~And he was too stupid to realise that I allowed him to control me, that I could have broken the seals whenever I wanted.~
"Xander, you've been hanging around and killing this weird type of vamp that I've never heard of or seen before. Tell us more." Buffy leaned over the table towards Xander, and Willow mirrored her, each girl grabbing one of the pastries to nibble on.
"Well, he's a martial artist good enough to face my fledgling, Seras, on equal terms, and a regenerator, thanks to the way he changed himself when I helped him access the power you threw into him little witch. You'd lose to him in a fight little Slayer, with regenerators you have to cut them into pieces to take them out of a fight, that or damn near kill them."
"Regenerators?"
"Here, why don't you show them Dragonling?" Xander pulled out one of his wrist knives, giving it to Alucard, and put his hand on the table.
"That would damage the table, and stain it too. You said you like this place." Xander blushed at that, accepting the return of his knife.
"Good point. We'll give you a demo when we get somewhere else - I'll spar with our Dragonling." He'd throw the match of course, but he would force Alucard to do significant damage, enough to show the girls how fast he healed.
"And he's been donating 3 pints of blood a day to my fledgling, to teach her how to feed without killing, since Sir Integra will not permit me to teach her the way I taught my other get."
They finished the drinks and pastries quickly, Xander giving Alucard a taste of his hot chocolate when he noticed the wistful look he was giving it.
"I'll remember to tell Seras about this place, she hates it that she can't eat chocolate any more."
"She can't? But I'm sure Angel and Spike used to eat things."
"Demonics might be able to eat food, mideons can only drink things."
"She'll really like this place, they make the hot chocolate by melting high cocoa chocolate, and adding steamed milk, then mixing very well."
Once they'd found a deserted enough place Xander began to spar with Alucard, operating at the human maximum, but never beyond it, and taking enough damage to convince the girls of his healing abilities.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Sir Integra cursed when she realised that this new outbreak would require Alucard and Xander, instead of any of the other people under her command. But this vampire did not appear to be a mere FREAK, and from what Alessandra had said he wasn't even 'just' a nosferatu, but a No Life King. If it had been a FREAK or even a nosferatu she'd have risked sending Seras out with Alessandra's guards and a squad of human soldiers as back-up, but she wouldn't risk sending them against a full No Life King, especially not one who obviously was a fighter, unlike Alessandra. Sometimes she regretted the fact that she'd had to give Alessandra access to her mind to learn how to use Alucard's powers, usually when she plucked something classified from it, but this time she couldn't resent it.
~Xander, Alucard, we've got a mission for you.~ She could sense that she had both of their attention, she hated to admit it, but Xander's lessons in using telepathy had been very useful. ~A No Life King is trying to take over a town in the North East called Herrington. I'm forwarding the information I got to your e-mail address now Xander.~ She acted as she spoke, since it was over the internal mail system she didn't need to worry about secured lines, and he'd said he could access all communications. ~Search and Destroy!~
~Got the information, we just need to convince the girls to stay put. You can tell whoever it is that Hellsing will start dealing with the problem in ten minutes at the most.~
:They're going to waste time coming up with a calming lie for his friends?: She must have been broadcasting, because Alessandra replied to that.
~No, they're going to make sure that two non-combatants don't try to follow them into a danger zone. From what the Dark Guardian said the witch is more than capable of a form of teleportation, and the Slayer is stubborn enough to assume that if he can defend himself from their opponents and help destroy them so can she. And she can't, Slayers weren't designed for that. They can do a little leaching of demonic energy and power, weakening any demonic enemies, and strengthening themselves, but that won't work with mideons, and those two will get themselves killed trying to 'help'.~
~Very well.~ Sir Integra nodded in reluctant acknowledgement of the logic in Xander's actions, and picked up the secured line to contact the Major who'd requested help from Hellsing.
"Major Worthing, this is Sir Integra, our two top agents will be there within ten minutes, you can withdraw your men and form a perimeter to contain the infestation. Our agents will report to you verbally and in person when they've completed their task, and they will show your men photographic identification."
"Thank you Sir Integra. Can I ask what your agents are called? And what they look like?"
"Alucard, and Alexander Harris. Both are tall dark haired men, over six feet. Goodbye."
She put the phone down on the Major's goodbye, and reached up to massage her temple.
~If you have a headache I can help with that. Come to bed, and I'll make all your pain go away. It isn't as if you have much paperwork to do now, is it?~
~I'm just about clear, except for starting the reports on this...~ And those would be a pain, but... ~I can leave them until after Alucard sends in his report - and Xander sends in his version of Alucard's report and I decide which one to use.~ She didn't actually have any real work to do so Sir Integra gave Alessandra what she wanted, and made her way to her bedroom.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander had just finished healing from his spar with Alucard when he felt Sir Integra contact his mind.
~Xander, Alucard, we've got a mission for you. A No Life King is trying to take over a town in the North East called Herrington. I'm forwarding the information I got to your e-mail address now Xander.~ He reached out to intercept the e-mail, a routine task for him, even if it was sent purely internally. And from the information given Sir Integra was more than justified in calling him and Alucard in. ~Search and Destroy!~ He passed the important information on to Alucard as he responded to her.
~Got the information, we just need to convince the girls to stay put. You can tell whoever it is that Hellsing will start dealing with the problem in ten minutes at the most.~
~Alucard, I want you to tell me that Sir Integra has a mission for us, they'll accept that you have a telepathic link to her, but not that I do.~
~Yes Dark Guardian. Do you want the No Life King, or might I kill him?~
~Go ahead, I'll take the ghouls, and any nosferatu.~ Buffy and Willow hadn't had time to get suspicious yet, telepathic communication was so much faster than speech.
"Heart, we have to cut this reunion short." Alucard was blunt and straightforward about it. "Sir Integra needs us to respond to a call in a place called Herrington. None of the others are up to it." Contempt filled the No Life King's voice, and Xander ignored it.
"Good job we brought our guns with us then. Where is Herrington? No, never mind," he cut Alucard's answer off wth a swift sweep of his hand, "just take us there, Dragonling."
"Wait, let us come with you. We can help." They couldn't, but Buffy wouldn't accept that, even if he told her.
"Do you have weapons with you? Weapons blessed by priests, and with a high silver content? If you don't there's nothing you can do."
"What about magic?" Willow was the one who brought that up, a tacit admission that they had no such weapons.
"No Life Kings like our Dragonling are pretty much immune to magic. The ghouls aren't, but you don't really know how to use your magic in combat without letting it take over. You'd be a liability like that, as much danger as our opponents. We have to go." He waited until Alucard had taken a grip on his arm, and dissolved into the shadows with the mideon.
They didn't arrive right beside the No Life King of course, Alucard needed time to lift the restrictions on his power enough to face the other. They instead arrived in one of the few areas where were no ghouls or nosferatu, a house that was empty now, even if it hadn't been before. The No Life King was called Iolaus, and he had been returned to this world nearly three thousand years ago, time enough to become more than a little insane.
~Iolaus is here.~ And he burned the knowledge of where their opponent was into Alucard's brain before he went to attack the ghouls, cutting his way to the nearest of the three nosferatu present. :I wonder what he did with the children? I hope he just killed them, but he could have defiled them before feeding on them.: That possibility increased his fury, and even if he wasn't going to use his guns yet he still attacked more fiercely, ripping the ghouls to pieces, and then doing the same to the first nosferatu he encountered, still a fledgling, older than Seras, but still weaker than she was. Alucard wouldn't need the power that was blocked from his access to defeat his enemy.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Alucard ran to eliminate the enemy, cutting his way through the ghouls and lesser creatures without thinking about it. The rage that had filled the Dark Guardian's mind when he'd burned the location into his mind scared him. He prayed that he never did anything to anger the World's Heart that much. :But then, it must feel like betrayal to him, we were all his once, and this goes against the morals he tried to inculcate in us so drastically. I never felt guilty for killing those other No Life Kings for that very reason.:
"Hello traitor." Iolaus had red-gold hair and black eyes coupled with dark skin, and his voice was full of contempt. "Are you here to protect the humans for your worthless human master? I heard that the whore Alessandra has managed to worm her way into your iron bitch's affections. I suppose she'd prefer a whore rather than a warrior, even one weak enough to let himself be enslaved like that."
"The World's Heart took me from Arioch because he met me at Hellsing. I survived six hundred years before that. And he kept me for six hundred years himself, all in all. I had two thousand years to gain power even before I returned to this world. How long was it before you bored your owner, filth?" Alucard sneered at the other No Life King. :Even if he's older I never heard of him gaining power by slaughtering his elders.:
"I never was a slave!" Iolaus attacked, but wildly, without any control and Alucard deflected the attack effortlessly, getting an attack of his own in, hurting Iolaus. And he froze then for a moment.
:He's not used to being hurt anymore, if he ever was. We're so much faster and stronger than humans, and even than most nosferatu that we don't have to worry about being hurt as a rule. I've been sparring with the World's Heart, even if he doesn't beat me to a pulp he still hurts me enough that I'm used to it, and that Judas Priest forces me to use my regeneration a lot, so do all the trash who have the sense to use guns. That's an advantage for me, and so is his pride, and inability to control his temper.: Alucard laughed at his enemy. "Slave no, but you were someone's pet once, or you'd have died a mere human. Now you'll die as one of us. I'm almost as old as you are, and far better trained, you fool."
"You're weak. You let humans cast spells on you to control your powers, and now you can't use them properly, not without the bitch's permission." Iolaus' next attack was clumsy, and uncoordinated, and it left him so terribly open to Alucard. He used only as much power as the Police Girl had to pull the other off balance, and into his grasp, where he could sink his teeth into the other's neck.
"Skill is far better than pure strength fool."
From there it was just a matter of destroying the ghouls, giving them the final mercy. Alucard tried to find the ghouls who had been children before Xander did, he'd learned about how Iolaus had made sure there were no nosferatu children like Helena, and he didn't want the other man to realise what had happened. He knew that it hurt him to know that one of the No Life Kings he'd chosen had abandoned whatever morality he'd had, and become...this.
He left the nosferatu to Xander, so he could work his anger out on them, and even stopped trying to deal with any adult ghouls when he saw just how brutally effective Xander's techniques was at the moment. But he realised that his efforts to shield Xander were futile when a group of three ghouls who'd been little children attacked the other man, and then he just stayed out of the way, and watched as Xander worked out his anger.
Nearly an hour later Xander wasn't in any condition to give a report to the men holding the perimeter for them, he was still angry, so Alucard took the lead. His report to Major Worthing was short and blunt, simply informing the man that the infestation had been dealt with, and any details were classified - and yes that did include how they got there.
~~~0~~~
Sir Integra was shocked when she returned to her office. Alucard was waiting for her, pacing impatiently back and forth.
"Xander isn't in any state to write my report for you. You'll have to wait until tomorrow to get his, and if the report waiting for you isn't acceptable write a new one up yourself." Something was...off about him, but Integra couldn't tell exactly what. She ignored him, and the strange challenge in his voice to check her e-mail, and open the report Alucard had sent in.
"This is good!" She knew her surprise showed in her voice, this was the first report he'd actually written and submitted to her, instead of giving a verbal report for her to write up, or letting Xander submit it for him, using his powers.
"No one could be bad at something if Xander taught them. Did I miss anything?" Alucard was angry, but she still couldn't tell what he was angry about, and it was bothering her. Even so Integra read through Alucard's report completely, and noticed one glaring anomaly.
"You only killed the No Life King, a few of the ghouls on your way to him, and some afterwards? That's not like you. Normally you say ghouls aren't worth your time to kill."
"Iolaus was three thousand years old, I'm only six hundred. And you didn't even allow me to use my full power." Venom edged the vampire's words and Integra could feel herself go pale. "It's lucky my habit of stealing power from my elders, and what your family has done to me over the years made me stronger than age could account for. Isn't it?"
"Y-yes." She wasn't used to having Alucard direct accusation at her like this, and she couldn't help feeling she deserved it since he'd obviously had time to write this report since he got back, while she'd been with Alessandra, neglecting her duty in favour of pleasure and learning to use the powers she stole from him. "But couldn't Xander have..."
"Not unless he was willing to let everyone know what he was, and you know why he won't do that. What I want to know is how you knew what Iolaus was?"
"Alessandra told me." Integra found herself getting defensive under his incredulous stare. "And it's a good thing she did, isn't it? If she hadn't I'd have sent Seras out with Alessandra's guards and human back-up."
"True. I'll talk to the Dark Guardian about putting together a dossier of all the No Life Kings and Queens still alive, including pictures. But...how did she see that picture to have a chance to identify him?" Integra knew she was blushing at that.
"She...took it from my mind. I had to give her some access to learn from her and..." All her doubts came rushing back to her, especially since Alessandra had only been able to teach her one thing, and that was just a different way of sensing things.
"Alessandra was always better than I was at telepathic tricks, and anything else that could be used sexually. She does best with manipulation, it's a different skill set from mine. The only reason she can't still get into my head is because the World's Heart removed all traces of her influence when she'd taught me all she could and returned to Morrigan. You can ask him to do the same for you, or set up a mental shield that you control later." The second option sounded much better, and Alucard had apparently calmed down now.
"Very well. But what was it that affected Xander so much. You don't report that he was injured..."
"The children were ghouls." He sounded as if he was talking to a particularly dense child. "I mentioned that in my report. It doesn't make sense that all of them could have been molested before Iolaus arrived. And he taught Iolaus. You work it out." Alucard left then, walking through the wall of her office.
:Oh, bloody hell! That means that he taught a child molestor, and sent him back to this world. He wouldn't have been a child molestor then, but...Xander probably blames himself at least a bit, and no wonder he did most of the killing. He'd have been angry, and he'd have wanted to work that anger off.: Integra sighed, and got to work on the paperwork. She could try to make things easier by seeing if she could write Xander's report without involving him, at least getting a first draft ready for him to alter.
~Alucard! Give me the information I need to get at least a first draft of Xander's report written.~ The information flooded her mind at that command, what Alucard had seen of Xander fighting, but nothing of how the No Life King had fought.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander hadn't released enough of his anger by killing the ghouls and nosferatu. But he wasn't really in shape to look for another True Demon. Instead he went to London, and began to patrol, looking for any demons that were dangerous to people, and that included the demonic trash. By the time he wasn't angry anymore he was close to exhaustion, and he'd had to hide a few times to keep Buffy, Willow or the local Slayer from spotting him. He used the shadows to get back to his bed and collapsed to sleep it off.
He didn't get much sleep, he was awakened by an e-mail from Sir Integra an hour later. He'd set up a mental subroutine to intercept any messages to his Hellsing e-mail address from Sir Integra automatically when he received it, it was just like the subroutine he'd created with his Council e-mail for Willow, Buffy and Giles. He hadn't done anything so fancy with his cell phone, but he'd notice if he was in the same room, and he easily respond to a phone call, even if he couldn't reach his cell phone.
:She's written a draft report for me. How kind of her.: And it was. Xander might have appreciated it more if she'd sent it a bit later, but an hour's sleep had been enough for him, he only slept like humans out of habit and to make it easier to pass for one.
He made the changes he needed to make to the report, mostly describing the things he'd done that Alucard hadn't been able to see, and sent it back to her, before making his way to the nearest bathroom with some clean clothes.
:Buffy and Willow are probably worried about me. I'll call them both to let them know I'm alright.: He matched action to thought, ringing Willow first on his cell phone.
"Hey Wills, it's me-"
"Xander! Whathappened?Areyouallright?Whodidyouhavetofight?Youwondidn'tyou?"
"Slow down Wills. I can't discuss the mission in any detail over the phone, I shouldn't really discuss it with you at all, but yes, we won, and we're fine. I'm ringing to tell you that. I would have earlier, but I was too tired to be honest. And Sir Integra expects us to write after action reports within a day, and e-mail them to her. We have to use our Hellsing accounts for that, nothing else."
"Hellsing account?" Willow seemed to have picked up on the hint, he hoped so anyway.
"Yeah, Sir Integra fixed me up with an official Hellsing e-mail account, so I can send my reports to her with proper security. Look, I gotta phone Buffy, tell her I'm fine."
"You...phoned me first?"
"Yes, Wills, I phoned you first, let me phone Buffy now."
"Wait, she's with me, I can pass the phone to her." Willow's next words were harder to hear, he wouldn't have understood them before. "Buffy, it's Xander, he wants to talk to you."
"Xander, are you all right? Did that vampire keep you safe?"
"I'm fine, Alucard was busy killing our main enemy while I cleared up the lesser creatures, SOP. I'm not helpless. I wanted to let you know you don't have to worry about me. Hellfires, my daily sparring partner's stronger than the Master was that first year. Have you had any problems in London?"
"Well, apparently for six hours or so something very powerful was stalking the streets of London, and slaughtering evil demons and vamps. Just hope it's an ally. But it seems to have stopped now."
"Perhaps it was a one-off thing? Look, I'm really supposed to be reporting to Sir Integra now...talk later?"
"Yeah, guess they like that military shit more. And Soldier Guy left his mark on you huh?"
"Something like that." It wasn't, but if thinking that way helped Buffy understand...All Slayers were somewhat limited in their thinking, not necessarily unintelligent, they just tended to think in ruts.
"See you later then."
"Yeah, bye." He would go to talk with Integra, he was beginning to worry about her relationship with Alessandra, if the young No Life Queen could get into the knight's mind so easily. But first he sent a quick e-mail to Willow from his Hellsing account.
~~~oo()oo~~~
"Hello Xander. I was expecting you to need more rest than that." Sir Integra hid her surprise at seeing the young man carefully. From the way Alucard had been acting she'd expected him to be unavailable for ten to twelve hours, working off his anger, and then recovering. :But he isn't human, perhaps he recovers a lot faster than we do.:
"Your e-mail woke me up. I don't really need to sleep, but it's a habit, and an easier way to recharge when I'm in this world."
"My e-mail woke you? I don't understand." An e-mail wasn't like a phone call after all, there wasn't any anouncement when it was sent.
"I set up a...sub-routine for lack of a better term, in my mind, so that I'd automatically intercept and interpret any messages you sent to my Hellsing e-mail account - at least as long as they came from your Hellsing e-mail account. I can only intercept e-mails as they're being transmitted after all. But thanks for writing my report, you'll have received the new version by now."
She checked her inbox, and there it was, half again the size it had been after she'd finished and sent it to Xander. "Yes, I've got it. Alucard was helpful in giving me access to his memories so I could write it, but there were parts I couldn't see." :Hopefully that hint will get him thinking about telepathy, I'd rather lead up to asking him for that shield Alucard suggested. He's right, I do need it. I am surprised Alessandra was able to identify Iolaus from that picture.:
"I wondered, just how did you know that Iolaus was a No Life King? It isn't obvious to any senses humans have, well except for witches, and the occasional Slayer - that is if they don't get the dreams."
"The dreams?" Integra took the bait, knowing what she was doing, trying to distract him from her breech of security, even though she needed to talk to him about it.
"Some Slayers have visionary dreams, they have less of the ability to sense non-humans than the others. They're most sensitive to demonic energy, but about three quarters of the ones who can sense demons would sense mideons, of those perhaps a quarter would have the sensitivity to differentiate between nosferatu and No Life Kings. Not all witches can recognise mideons, but they will recognise the power level. You're evading my question. Please tell me you didn't let Alessandra into your mind, 'cause that's not of the good."
"She said that she wouldn't be able to teach me how to access Alucard's powers unless I did." Sir Integra had believed the mideon, but now she was beginning to wonder. "Do you know how she would have recognised Iolaus from a picture?"
"She probably didn't. Alessandra tends to think in terms of gathering information, and forming networks to do the same. She tends to get information on the movements of most of her peers fairly early. So she knew Iolaus' attitude towards humans - although not his other proclivities, and that he was coming to England, and since the pictures were close enough to his appearance she made an educated guess." Xander frowned then. "Truth, she might have needed to get into your head to teach you, I never checked how she taught Alucard the basics, but I did have to clear out the...markers she'd left in his head afterwards."
"Yes, Alucard mentioned that. And he said that you might be able to help me control what Alessandra sees?" Sir Integra didn't bother to try concealing the hope in her voice.
"I could clear out her taint from your mind, you have formidable defences for what you are, and that would let you keep her out altogether - or did you want the option of letting her in, but to keep control of when?"
"I'd prefer that. I do want to learn to use Alucard's abilities as much as I can."
"Very well. Just relax." And she felt a presence in her mind, building a cage of glass held liquid somehow. Then she felt that presence show her how to move the glass to open entrances when she wanted to let someone in, and the optical cable passing through it that represented her telepathy.
"Thank you Xander, I appreciate it."
"You're welcome. Oh, and you can expect an attempt to hack into the Hellsing computer system fairly soon, by Willow, so it isn't a threat." He left immediately after dropping that bomb.
~~~oo()oo~~~
"He's got to go and talk with his boss now, Sir Integra - doesn't that sound odd to you when she's a woman, Willow?" The witch didn't look up from her laptop. She'd gotten it out when she'd handed her phone over to Buffy, but she'd seemed upset that Xander hadn't said goodbye to her personally, so the Slayer reassured her.
"Not really. I did a bit of research when I heard about where Xander was being sent. Normally women who are knights are called Lady, not Sir, but the two who actually have jobs are given the masculine title. Sir Integra took her position when she was ten, after waking her pet No Life King, the one Xander was calling Dragonling, and getting him to kill her uncle Richard who was trying to kill her, and she insisted on being called Sir Integra, not Lady Integra. I heard a story that she wore one of her father's suits for her first meeting with the Round Table, and then she had men's suits made for her. And that's what she always wears, men's suits, tailored for men, not for a woman. Now, Xander said something about e-mailing his after action report to Sir Integra using his Hellsing account."
Buffy felt a bit intimidated by this report of Sir Intera's acheivements. The other woman had had responsibility and duty thrust on her much earlier than she had, and she didn't seem to have had the problems Buffy had. She hadn't known all of this earlier, she hadn't bothered to ask.
"What does that mean?"
"That if I can hack into his e-mail account, or better yet into Sir Integra's we can get a report on what actually happened, a full report instead of just what he feels like telling us. I might not have thought of it if he hadn't given me the hint...wonder if he decided to give me a bit more help than that."
"A bit more help?" Buffy didn't understand it when Willow started talking about all this computing stuff. She could manage the basics, but not more than that, and she didn't like computers any more than Giles did. :I've got reason! First Willow meets a demon over the internet, then that robot Ted, he was a computer on legs, a sick one who wanted to hurt me and kill mom. Then there was ADAM, another sick computer on legs, Warren's robot girlfriend, and the Buffy-bot...:
"Yes! He sent me an e-mail from his account, A.Harris@Hellsing.gov.uk. Wonder what he said...oh!"
"What did he say Willow?" Buffy looked over her friends shoulder to read the e-mail.
'I know you're going to use this as a base to get into my e-mail folders - don't waste too much time, I delete my sent and received messages as soon as I've read them and printed out or saved stuff I need to keep, and my sensitive files aren't kept on any machine, they're on a pen drive, and password protected.' Buffy backed away to let Willow work.
"He might not have had time to delete his report to Sir Integra...he has." The hacker sounded pleased as much as disappointed. "But she is in his address book...I'll try her account."
"Got it!" Willow crowed. "And Alucard's report. Does it disturb you that Xander's calling this incredibly powerful vampire 'Dragonling' - he's much more powerful than I am - and that Alucard respects him?"
"Xander always did like running risks. Give me one of those reports - but print it out for me first."
~~~oo()oo~~~
Alucard was torn between wanting to hate Alessandra for seducing Sir Integra when the knight had refused him, and then abusing the power Sir Integra had granted her, and being grateful to her for at least making sure she couldn't become nosferatu the usual way, and that she was no longer qualified for the virgin sacrifice thing. But no matter what he didn't really have any say in what Sir Integra did, even if that extended to 'borrowing' the power she denied him, and Alessandra was helping to make his master strong enough to need less protection. Still he didn't want to stay in the manor when they were both broadcasting their arousal and pleasure. Not when he had another option, the permission he'd wheedled out of Sir Integra to go out and mingle with humans, even with the restrictions she put on his actions, after he'd learned how badly she'd compromised security, and suggested a way to end that security breech.
"Hello Tanya, it's Al. I know it's late, but would you like to meet me for coffee, or hot chocolate and then take in a movie, or go dancing?" Xander had given Alucard a cell phone, and explained precisely how to use and pay for it, and the vampire had loved his new toy.
"I'm available tonight, but I'd rather go for a meal."
"I've already eaten, but I'm happy to take you out somewhere and just have a glass of wine or a cup of coffee while you eat." Tanya had been very tactile, always touching and petting him, she seemed to have no concept of personal space, and that made her worth going to some trouble.
"No, you don't need to do that. I can get something on the way, or have something fast here. Where do you want to meet?"
"A friend introduced me to a wonderful coffee shop, the hot chocolate there is made from melted chocolate, of whatever type you want, and steamed milk. He's American, so of course he found the best place for coffee." Alucard went on to give Tanya the address. "Would you care to meet me there?"
"It sounds great, I can get there in an hour. What movie did you want to see?"
"I didn't plan on anything in particular, let me check which movies will be playing in say, two hours?" Alucard gave Tanya the names of six different movies, the one she chose was 'Constantine', a choice that the vampire found amusing, and he suspected it was something he'd enjoy too.
Alucard changed his clothing to fit better with the humans, and then made his way to Benedicto's, the coffe shop Xander enjoyed so much. He actually had to wait for an empty table, and managed to grab one perhaps five minutes before Tanya arrived. He waved to her, to get her attention, and she wove through the crowds to him, touching his bare arm lightly, without fear.
"Have you been waiting long Al?"
"No, not too long. What do you want? I'll go and get it if you'll hold the table?" In a way Alucard enjoyed the crowds, and he hadn't cared at all that he had to wait for Tanya, because people had been touching him, even inadvertently, while he waited.
"One of those hot chocolates you mentioned - dark chocolate, not milk please." Tanya was fumbling in her purse, Alucard reached out to stop her.
"Don't, I'm paying for everything. I invited you here, so I pay. Would you like whipped cream and coacoa powder sprinkled on top?"
"Do they do marshmallows too?" She sounded almost wistful at the prospect. Alucard smiled down at Tanya, she was beautiful, and she had the confidence not to try and starve herself.
"Yes, they do." He got them both hot chocolate, the way Tanya had asked for hers, it was easier, and he also got some chocolate pastries, in an effort to feed her. She made little noises of pleasure when she tasted the hot chocolate, Alucard only started his own when he was sure she was happy with hers, and when she'd started on one of the pastries. It tasted incredible.
:Seras really will love this place.: Then he concentrated on his date.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Alucard muttered a curse as he felt another pull at his power. He'd thought it was a postive sign when Sir Integra had begun taking Alessandra to her bed. He'd thought she was showing the sense to make sure fewer - almost no - mideons could make her nosferatu, and learning to enjoy her body from the best person to teach her, an experienced, skilled woman, thereby also avoiding the risk of pregnancy.
:I should have known better. She was far too interested in the prospect of learning how to draw on and use my powers for me to assume she'd let any chance slip by. I never thought she'd whore herself to learn how to use my powers as if they were hers, but then I never expected my little brother to...: He refused to think about what Radu did to himself, for the chance to be any sort of vampire. :But she doesn't realise how dangerous this is, pulling at my power like this could distract me enough that I let a nosferatu or FREAK escape, and worse, her body can't handle my power, it will damage her, perhaps even kill her.: There was only one option, and he began to look for the Dark Guardian, to make a petition.
He was alone in his bedroom, so it was safe to show him proper respect. Alucard fell to his knees, and bowed to press his forehead to the ground, then waited for Xander to notice him.
"Get up, Alucard." Xander sounded weary, but even so Alucard only raised himself to his knees, still looking at the ground at Xander's feet. "What is it?"
"Lord World's Heart, I humbly petition that you will be generous enough to modify the seals binding me to the service of the Hellsing family."
"I thought you wanted to keep the seals?" The Dark Guardian sounded a bit confused, he pulled Alucard to his feet, then to sit by him on his bed. "What do you want me to do, and why?"
"Sir Integra asked about drawing on and using my power, I talked her through an exercise that will let her accelerate her healing, but without drawing on my powers. She turned to Alessandra. I've felt her draw on my powers, but it's the portion I can't access at the moment, so it isn't too bad. But I'm worried. If she draws more than her body can handle..." He let Xander fill in the rest.
"Do you want me to stop her drawing on your powers at all?"
"No, it will help her, but can you limit it to what her body can handle, and that portion of my power I cannot access at any one time?"
"You mean that if she for some reason lets you access all of your power you want to make sure she can't draw on any of it under those circumstances?" Xander's voice made Alucard reconsider his request.
"No, I didn't think about that, she'd only do that if she was in desperate trouble. Set it up so that even under those circumstances I can't access however much power her body can handle. But don't let the ammount of power she has access to change, keep it at what she can handle now."
"That won't be a problem. Kneel in front of me, bow your head and shut your eyes." Alucard obeyed, he knew that Xander was giving those orders to make it easier for him to do what he needed to when he felt the Dark Guardian's hands on either side of his head, and his sensed the World's Heart's power running through his own and into the seals. Then that power withdrew from him, and Xander pushed him away.
"I'm done. And you can still break the seals the way you could before."
"Thank you Lord Dark Guardian." He nuzzled at Xander's hand to show some of his gratitude, and was rewarded when Xander began running it through his hair.
"Two of my old friends from the Hellmouth will be in London shortly. I want you to tell Sir Integra that I'll be meeting them for drinks at some point next week. They've been asking about my new duties. We'll be meeting in daylight of course, but...you wanna come along and shock them?"
"Yes please. And you should wear your guns. Has Shinigami got your Casull Autoloader together yet?"
"Yes, I need to figure out where to wear it, but that's a good idea. Sir Integra's arranged the permits I need."
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander checked that his guns were all in the right holsters, easy to access, and that he had the blades he'd taken to carrying on him too. He could throw a knife with quite a high degree of accuracy, if he had to, but he preferred to actually use them in hand to hand, and his choice of blades reflected that. The one at his belt, the one he kept hidden with a minor glamor, was long enough to almost qualify as a short sword, and the ones in his forearm sheathes each had a six inch blade. And they'd all been blessed, by the same priest who did the blessing for Hellsing's bullets, so he knew that it would work even on a True Demon. He'd also got the head of the Wiccan coven Willow had studied with to bless them as well, she was their equivalent of a christian Bishop and he'd been able to sense how very devout she was.
He threw an open shirt on to cover his weapons, relieving him of the need to use glamor for the guns and smaller knives, and the long coat he put on next would cover even his belt knife if he'd been willing to keep it on all the time. And then he picked up Alucard and headed out.
They met Buffy and Willow at a coffee shop, one he'd visited, and knew was good. He also knew that it didn't do the sort of custom it deserved and he was determined to encourage as many people as he could to go there in the future.
"Buffster, Wills, what do you want to drink? My treat."
"Double mint mocha."
"Cappucino, decaffinated if they've got any."
:Of course Willow wants decaf, she's trying to get into the whole body as temple ethos that coven taught. If she was really into it she'd ask for herbal tea, and a specific combination of herbs, but...: "This is the best coffe shop in London, of course they've got that. What about you, Dragonling?"
"A double espresso please, Heart." A stubborn twist to Alucard's lips told Xander that the No Life King wouldn't budge from that nickname without an express order, and he had the feeling that it would catch on quickly at Hellsing. "I'll be lucky if I manage to get it all down of course."
"You can help carry them. Buffy, Willow, grab a table, preferably in one of the boothes." That would make it much easier for Alucard to keep people from hearing them talk about vampires and demons. He got an expensive hot chocolate with lots of whipped cream for himself, and let Alucard carry them all when the girl put them on a tray, along with the pastries he'd asked for.
Buffy and Willow had managed to find a booth for them to eat and drink in. ~Mask our voices with shadows.~ Alucard obeyed the order as he set the tray on the table, and served the drinks and snacks from there before putting the tray to one side and sitting down himself.
"What just happened? W-who is that?" Xander hadn't expected Willow to be so timorous, or overawed by Alucard's power, on the scale of pure power she had more than he had access to at the moment, and there was no way that she could be reading Xander's power. :But perhaps she senses Alucard's full power, and can't tell how much of it is sealed away from his use.:
"Our Dragonling just made sure that nobody will be able to hear us talking about demons and vampires. He's the Hellsing Organisation's best weapon, the No Life King Alucard. The Hellsing family changed his name when they enslaved him." ~Which one do you think will make the connection first, Vlad?~
~I dont know them, but witches tend to be smarter than Slayers.~ "The name I used when I became a mideon was Vlad Tepes." He took a tiny sip of his espresso.
"Vlad Tepes - are you saying that you're Dracula?" Alucard was right, despite Buffy's high SAT scores she never had been too fond of thinking and she didn't remember apparently unconnected bits of information the way Willow did.
"He can't be Dracula, I killed Dracula, remember?" Buffy sounded outraged at the idea.
~~~oo()oo~~~
:So that's what happened to Radu. I mourned him 600 years ago. But I can get away with teasing The Dark Guardian a little.: "You never said that you'd encountered a demonic using my name, Heart?" He leaned back in his chair, raising an eyebrow at Xander.
"That's probably 'cause he was controlled." Buffy was almost giggling.
"No, it's because this 'Dracula' was irrelevant to the larger events of the year. He wasn't exactly tied in with dear deranged Glory, was he?" Xander's voice was cutting, and then he turned on Alucard. "Dragonling, could the demonic's actions have anything to do with your reputation? And why did you let him go around using your name?"
"Well, it's not as if I had a choice the last hundred years or so..." He faltered under Xander's expectant stare. "My little brother, Radu, wanted to become a mideon like me when he learned how I'd been changed. But I couldn't make him nosferatu back then." ~He'd been disqualified even younger than I had. And he'd enjoyed their attentions.~ "So I taught him as much of my magic as a human could master. Then he let one of the demonic vampires turn him, as a childe. I mourned his death then, but he still wore my brother's face so I gave him a day to leave my lands. Then I began killing every demonic who came into my territory - or that I came across when I was hunting my elders."
"Just like I couldn't bear to kill Angel when he lost his soul." Willow was disapproving despite Buffy's support, but Xander didn't seem to be too upset.
"Had he killed anyone when you let him go?"
"No, he'd wanted to seduce me into helping him get stronger, faster. So he'd only fed off an animal, a peasant's ox, and he hadn't even killed it. I knew that my brother was dead, that all that was left was a demon wearing his corpse, but...he felt different to the others. I did kill the piece of filth that had killed him."
"That's one way Alucard's situation differed from yours Buffy. Another is that he didn't have a calling to defend humanity, he still doesn't, any more than any Hellsing operative does. And third, it sounds like Radu still had a soul, meaning that he deserved the benefit of the doubt. It does happen very rarely with demonic vamps, that the soul isn't replaced by the demon, but joins with it. Usually if the new vamp was a powerful magic user or something else special beforehand. Like two of the three Slayers who were turned."
"But...all of the Slayers who were turned became the most dangerous..."
"They might not have been if the Council had been willing to help them keep from becoming monsters, but you don't have to lose your soul to become a monster. You know that Wills." The Dark Guardian's voice sounded saddened, he was probably remembering how the young witch had tried to end the world, and thrown her magic at and into him.
"Are you saying I should have kept Radu with me, Heart?" It had hurt so much having to send his brother away, even if it had just been a demon wearing his face, something he'd repeated to comfort himself every time he heard about Radu blackening his name. The idea that he actually had sent his brother away, not just the demon who'd taken over his body... "Could I have prevented him from becoming what he did?"
"No, you did your duty, to your people, to those under your protection. And you didn't know about that, how could you? But even if you had, when he was first given his soul Angelus continued to slaughter, and even those demonic vamps who keep their souls usually act like the older No Life Kings you hunted down."
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander shook his head. He didn't like how much it seemed to have disturbed Alucard to learn that his brother hadn't lost his soul. "Truthfully, it takes either hefty mystical support; support you just didn't know how to provide then if you didn't think to check if he'd kept his soul when you learned he hadn't killed a human to feed at that time, support the Council could certainly provide for their Slayers; or for the vamp to have been damn near a saint before they were turned, to keep a demonic vamp, even one with a soul from becoming evil - or staying evil. Why don't we change the subject?"
"Yes, what have you been doing Xander?" Buffy sounded eager, it made him wonder what she was trying to hide.
"That's boring, training, killing FREAKs, ghouls and nosferatu, nothing special. You two have been going all over the planet, what've you been doing?" He dismissed his time with Hellsing easily.
"We haven't done anything special."
"Oooh, Buffy's been in therapy, after that jerk the Immortal tried to get into her pants while she tried to get information she needed from him."
"Willow!"
"If the old Council had any sense whatsoever they'd have seen you got therapy earlier. You managed to find a decent therapist who already knew about the oogities, didn't you? They certainly should have been able to. I mean, after the whole Angelus thing, therapy would have helped you see the differences between him and Angel more clearly, and separate them better. And you really needed it after Acathla. Faith could have done with therapy after her first Watcher died - so could you after Merrick for that matter. And you needed it at other times too. But all they cared about was having a weapon they could use."
"They sound just like Abraham Hellsing, Heart. All he cared about was that he could use me as a weapon." ~And he was too stupid to realise that I allowed him to control me, that I could have broken the seals whenever I wanted.~
"Xander, you've been hanging around and killing this weird type of vamp that I've never heard of or seen before. Tell us more." Buffy leaned over the table towards Xander, and Willow mirrored her, each girl grabbing one of the pastries to nibble on.
"Well, he's a martial artist good enough to face my fledgling, Seras, on equal terms, and a regenerator, thanks to the way he changed himself when I helped him access the power you threw into him little witch. You'd lose to him in a fight little Slayer, with regenerators you have to cut them into pieces to take them out of a fight, that or damn near kill them."
"Regenerators?"
"Here, why don't you show them Dragonling?" Xander pulled out one of his wrist knives, giving it to Alucard, and put his hand on the table.
"That would damage the table, and stain it too. You said you like this place." Xander blushed at that, accepting the return of his knife.
"Good point. We'll give you a demo when we get somewhere else - I'll spar with our Dragonling." He'd throw the match of course, but he would force Alucard to do significant damage, enough to show the girls how fast he healed.
"And he's been donating 3 pints of blood a day to my fledgling, to teach her how to feed without killing, since Sir Integra will not permit me to teach her the way I taught my other get."
They finished the drinks and pastries quickly, Xander giving Alucard a taste of his hot chocolate when he noticed the wistful look he was giving it.
"I'll remember to tell Seras about this place, she hates it that she can't eat chocolate any more."
"She can't? But I'm sure Angel and Spike used to eat things."
"Demonics might be able to eat food, mideons can only drink things."
"She'll really like this place, they make the hot chocolate by melting high cocoa chocolate, and adding steamed milk, then mixing very well."
Once they'd found a deserted enough place Xander began to spar with Alucard, operating at the human maximum, but never beyond it, and taking enough damage to convince the girls of his healing abilities.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Sir Integra cursed when she realised that this new outbreak would require Alucard and Xander, instead of any of the other people under her command. But this vampire did not appear to be a mere FREAK, and from what Alessandra had said he wasn't even 'just' a nosferatu, but a No Life King. If it had been a FREAK or even a nosferatu she'd have risked sending Seras out with Alessandra's guards and a squad of human soldiers as back-up, but she wouldn't risk sending them against a full No Life King, especially not one who obviously was a fighter, unlike Alessandra. Sometimes she regretted the fact that she'd had to give Alessandra access to her mind to learn how to use Alucard's powers, usually when she plucked something classified from it, but this time she couldn't resent it.
~Xander, Alucard, we've got a mission for you.~ She could sense that she had both of their attention, she hated to admit it, but Xander's lessons in using telepathy had been very useful. ~A No Life King is trying to take over a town in the North East called Herrington. I'm forwarding the information I got to your e-mail address now Xander.~ She acted as she spoke, since it was over the internal mail system she didn't need to worry about secured lines, and he'd said he could access all communications. ~Search and Destroy!~
~Got the information, we just need to convince the girls to stay put. You can tell whoever it is that Hellsing will start dealing with the problem in ten minutes at the most.~
:They're going to waste time coming up with a calming lie for his friends?: She must have been broadcasting, because Alessandra replied to that.
~No, they're going to make sure that two non-combatants don't try to follow them into a danger zone. From what the Dark Guardian said the witch is more than capable of a form of teleportation, and the Slayer is stubborn enough to assume that if he can defend himself from their opponents and help destroy them so can she. And she can't, Slayers weren't designed for that. They can do a little leaching of demonic energy and power, weakening any demonic enemies, and strengthening themselves, but that won't work with mideons, and those two will get themselves killed trying to 'help'.~
~Very well.~ Sir Integra nodded in reluctant acknowledgement of the logic in Xander's actions, and picked up the secured line to contact the Major who'd requested help from Hellsing.
"Major Worthing, this is Sir Integra, our two top agents will be there within ten minutes, you can withdraw your men and form a perimeter to contain the infestation. Our agents will report to you verbally and in person when they've completed their task, and they will show your men photographic identification."
"Thank you Sir Integra. Can I ask what your agents are called? And what they look like?"
"Alucard, and Alexander Harris. Both are tall dark haired men, over six feet. Goodbye."
She put the phone down on the Major's goodbye, and reached up to massage her temple.
~If you have a headache I can help with that. Come to bed, and I'll make all your pain go away. It isn't as if you have much paperwork to do now, is it?~
~I'm just about clear, except for starting the reports on this...~ And those would be a pain, but... ~I can leave them until after Alucard sends in his report - and Xander sends in his version of Alucard's report and I decide which one to use.~ She didn't actually have any real work to do so Sir Integra gave Alessandra what she wanted, and made her way to her bedroom.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander had just finished healing from his spar with Alucard when he felt Sir Integra contact his mind.
~Xander, Alucard, we've got a mission for you. A No Life King is trying to take over a town in the North East called Herrington. I'm forwarding the information I got to your e-mail address now Xander.~ He reached out to intercept the e-mail, a routine task for him, even if it was sent purely internally. And from the information given Sir Integra was more than justified in calling him and Alucard in. ~Search and Destroy!~ He passed the important information on to Alucard as he responded to her.
~Got the information, we just need to convince the girls to stay put. You can tell whoever it is that Hellsing will start dealing with the problem in ten minutes at the most.~
~Alucard, I want you to tell me that Sir Integra has a mission for us, they'll accept that you have a telepathic link to her, but not that I do.~
~Yes Dark Guardian. Do you want the No Life King, or might I kill him?~
~Go ahead, I'll take the ghouls, and any nosferatu.~ Buffy and Willow hadn't had time to get suspicious yet, telepathic communication was so much faster than speech.
"Heart, we have to cut this reunion short." Alucard was blunt and straightforward about it. "Sir Integra needs us to respond to a call in a place called Herrington. None of the others are up to it." Contempt filled the No Life King's voice, and Xander ignored it.
"Good job we brought our guns with us then. Where is Herrington? No, never mind," he cut Alucard's answer off wth a swift sweep of his hand, "just take us there, Dragonling."
"Wait, let us come with you. We can help." They couldn't, but Buffy wouldn't accept that, even if he told her.
"Do you have weapons with you? Weapons blessed by priests, and with a high silver content? If you don't there's nothing you can do."
"What about magic?" Willow was the one who brought that up, a tacit admission that they had no such weapons.
"No Life Kings like our Dragonling are pretty much immune to magic. The ghouls aren't, but you don't really know how to use your magic in combat without letting it take over. You'd be a liability like that, as much danger as our opponents. We have to go." He waited until Alucard had taken a grip on his arm, and dissolved into the shadows with the mideon.
They didn't arrive right beside the No Life King of course, Alucard needed time to lift the restrictions on his power enough to face the other. They instead arrived in one of the few areas where were no ghouls or nosferatu, a house that was empty now, even if it hadn't been before. The No Life King was called Iolaus, and he had been returned to this world nearly three thousand years ago, time enough to become more than a little insane.
~Iolaus is here.~ And he burned the knowledge of where their opponent was into Alucard's brain before he went to attack the ghouls, cutting his way to the nearest of the three nosferatu present. :I wonder what he did with the children? I hope he just killed them, but he could have defiled them before feeding on them.: That possibility increased his fury, and even if he wasn't going to use his guns yet he still attacked more fiercely, ripping the ghouls to pieces, and then doing the same to the first nosferatu he encountered, still a fledgling, older than Seras, but still weaker than she was. Alucard wouldn't need the power that was blocked from his access to defeat his enemy.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Alucard ran to eliminate the enemy, cutting his way through the ghouls and lesser creatures without thinking about it. The rage that had filled the Dark Guardian's mind when he'd burned the location into his mind scared him. He prayed that he never did anything to anger the World's Heart that much. :But then, it must feel like betrayal to him, we were all his once, and this goes against the morals he tried to inculcate in us so drastically. I never felt guilty for killing those other No Life Kings for that very reason.:
"Hello traitor." Iolaus had red-gold hair and black eyes coupled with dark skin, and his voice was full of contempt. "Are you here to protect the humans for your worthless human master? I heard that the whore Alessandra has managed to worm her way into your iron bitch's affections. I suppose she'd prefer a whore rather than a warrior, even one weak enough to let himself be enslaved like that."
"The World's Heart took me from Arioch because he met me at Hellsing. I survived six hundred years before that. And he kept me for six hundred years himself, all in all. I had two thousand years to gain power even before I returned to this world. How long was it before you bored your owner, filth?" Alucard sneered at the other No Life King. :Even if he's older I never heard of him gaining power by slaughtering his elders.:
"I never was a slave!" Iolaus attacked, but wildly, without any control and Alucard deflected the attack effortlessly, getting an attack of his own in, hurting Iolaus. And he froze then for a moment.
:He's not used to being hurt anymore, if he ever was. We're so much faster and stronger than humans, and even than most nosferatu that we don't have to worry about being hurt as a rule. I've been sparring with the World's Heart, even if he doesn't beat me to a pulp he still hurts me enough that I'm used to it, and that Judas Priest forces me to use my regeneration a lot, so do all the trash who have the sense to use guns. That's an advantage for me, and so is his pride, and inability to control his temper.: Alucard laughed at his enemy. "Slave no, but you were someone's pet once, or you'd have died a mere human. Now you'll die as one of us. I'm almost as old as you are, and far better trained, you fool."
"You're weak. You let humans cast spells on you to control your powers, and now you can't use them properly, not without the bitch's permission." Iolaus' next attack was clumsy, and uncoordinated, and it left him so terribly open to Alucard. He used only as much power as the Police Girl had to pull the other off balance, and into his grasp, where he could sink his teeth into the other's neck.
"Skill is far better than pure strength fool."
From there it was just a matter of destroying the ghouls, giving them the final mercy. Alucard tried to find the ghouls who had been children before Xander did, he'd learned about how Iolaus had made sure there were no nosferatu children like Helena, and he didn't want the other man to realise what had happened. He knew that it hurt him to know that one of the No Life Kings he'd chosen had abandoned whatever morality he'd had, and become...this.
He left the nosferatu to Xander, so he could work his anger out on them, and even stopped trying to deal with any adult ghouls when he saw just how brutally effective Xander's techniques was at the moment. But he realised that his efforts to shield Xander were futile when a group of three ghouls who'd been little children attacked the other man, and then he just stayed out of the way, and watched as Xander worked out his anger.
Nearly an hour later Xander wasn't in any condition to give a report to the men holding the perimeter for them, he was still angry, so Alucard took the lead. His report to Major Worthing was short and blunt, simply informing the man that the infestation had been dealt with, and any details were classified - and yes that did include how they got there.
~~~0~~~
Sir Integra was shocked when she returned to her office. Alucard was waiting for her, pacing impatiently back and forth.
"Xander isn't in any state to write my report for you. You'll have to wait until tomorrow to get his, and if the report waiting for you isn't acceptable write a new one up yourself." Something was...off about him, but Integra couldn't tell exactly what. She ignored him, and the strange challenge in his voice to check her e-mail, and open the report Alucard had sent in.
"This is good!" She knew her surprise showed in her voice, this was the first report he'd actually written and submitted to her, instead of giving a verbal report for her to write up, or letting Xander submit it for him, using his powers.
"No one could be bad at something if Xander taught them. Did I miss anything?" Alucard was angry, but she still couldn't tell what he was angry about, and it was bothering her. Even so Integra read through Alucard's report completely, and noticed one glaring anomaly.
"You only killed the No Life King, a few of the ghouls on your way to him, and some afterwards? That's not like you. Normally you say ghouls aren't worth your time to kill."
"Iolaus was three thousand years old, I'm only six hundred. And you didn't even allow me to use my full power." Venom edged the vampire's words and Integra could feel herself go pale. "It's lucky my habit of stealing power from my elders, and what your family has done to me over the years made me stronger than age could account for. Isn't it?"
"Y-yes." She wasn't used to having Alucard direct accusation at her like this, and she couldn't help feeling she deserved it since he'd obviously had time to write this report since he got back, while she'd been with Alessandra, neglecting her duty in favour of pleasure and learning to use the powers she stole from him. "But couldn't Xander have..."
"Not unless he was willing to let everyone know what he was, and you know why he won't do that. What I want to know is how you knew what Iolaus was?"
"Alessandra told me." Integra found herself getting defensive under his incredulous stare. "And it's a good thing she did, isn't it? If she hadn't I'd have sent Seras out with Alessandra's guards and human back-up."
"True. I'll talk to the Dark Guardian about putting together a dossier of all the No Life Kings and Queens still alive, including pictures. But...how did she see that picture to have a chance to identify him?" Integra knew she was blushing at that.
"She...took it from my mind. I had to give her some access to learn from her and..." All her doubts came rushing back to her, especially since Alessandra had only been able to teach her one thing, and that was just a different way of sensing things.
"Alessandra was always better than I was at telepathic tricks, and anything else that could be used sexually. She does best with manipulation, it's a different skill set from mine. The only reason she can't still get into my head is because the World's Heart removed all traces of her influence when she'd taught me all she could and returned to Morrigan. You can ask him to do the same for you, or set up a mental shield that you control later." The second option sounded much better, and Alucard had apparently calmed down now.
"Very well. But what was it that affected Xander so much. You don't report that he was injured..."
"The children were ghouls." He sounded as if he was talking to a particularly dense child. "I mentioned that in my report. It doesn't make sense that all of them could have been molested before Iolaus arrived. And he taught Iolaus. You work it out." Alucard left then, walking through the wall of her office.
:Oh, bloody hell! That means that he taught a child molestor, and sent him back to this world. He wouldn't have been a child molestor then, but...Xander probably blames himself at least a bit, and no wonder he did most of the killing. He'd have been angry, and he'd have wanted to work that anger off.: Integra sighed, and got to work on the paperwork. She could try to make things easier by seeing if she could write Xander's report without involving him, at least getting a first draft ready for him to alter.
~Alucard! Give me the information I need to get at least a first draft of Xander's report written.~ The information flooded her mind at that command, what Alucard had seen of Xander fighting, but nothing of how the No Life King had fought.
~~~oo()oo~~~
Xander hadn't released enough of his anger by killing the ghouls and nosferatu. But he wasn't really in shape to look for another True Demon. Instead he went to London, and began to patrol, looking for any demons that were dangerous to people, and that included the demonic trash. By the time he wasn't angry anymore he was close to exhaustion, and he'd had to hide a few times to keep Buffy, Willow or the local Slayer from spotting him. He used the shadows to get back to his bed and collapsed to sleep it off.
He didn't get much sleep, he was awakened by an e-mail from Sir Integra an hour later. He'd set up a mental subroutine to intercept any messages to his Hellsing e-mail address from Sir Integra automatically when he received it, it was just like the subroutine he'd created with his Council e-mail for Willow, Buffy and Giles. He hadn't done anything so fancy with his cell phone, but he'd notice if he was in the same room, and he easily respond to a phone call, even if he couldn't reach his cell phone.
:She's written a draft report for me. How kind of her.: And it was. Xander might have appreciated it more if she'd sent it a bit later, but an hour's sleep had been enough for him, he only slept like humans out of habit and to make it easier to pass for one.
He made the changes he needed to make to the report, mostly describing the things he'd done that Alucard hadn't been able to see, and sent it back to her, before making his way to the nearest bathroom with some clean clothes.
:Buffy and Willow are probably worried about me. I'll call them both to let them know I'm alright.: He matched action to thought, ringing Willow first on his cell phone.
"Hey Wills, it's me-"
"Xander! Whathappened?Areyouallright?Whodidyouhavetofight?Youwondidn'tyou?"
"Slow down Wills. I can't discuss the mission in any detail over the phone, I shouldn't really discuss it with you at all, but yes, we won, and we're fine. I'm ringing to tell you that. I would have earlier, but I was too tired to be honest. And Sir Integra expects us to write after action reports within a day, and e-mail them to her. We have to use our Hellsing accounts for that, nothing else."
"Hellsing account?" Willow seemed to have picked up on the hint, he hoped so anyway.
"Yeah, Sir Integra fixed me up with an official Hellsing e-mail account, so I can send my reports to her with proper security. Look, I gotta phone Buffy, tell her I'm fine."
"You...phoned me first?"
"Yes, Wills, I phoned you first, let me phone Buffy now."
"Wait, she's with me, I can pass the phone to her." Willow's next words were harder to hear, he wouldn't have understood them before. "Buffy, it's Xander, he wants to talk to you."
"Xander, are you all right? Did that vampire keep you safe?"
"I'm fine, Alucard was busy killing our main enemy while I cleared up the lesser creatures, SOP. I'm not helpless. I wanted to let you know you don't have to worry about me. Hellfires, my daily sparring partner's stronger than the Master was that first year. Have you had any problems in London?"
"Well, apparently for six hours or so something very powerful was stalking the streets of London, and slaughtering evil demons and vamps. Just hope it's an ally. But it seems to have stopped now."
"Perhaps it was a one-off thing? Look, I'm really supposed to be reporting to Sir Integra now...talk later?"
"Yeah, guess they like that military shit more. And Soldier Guy left his mark on you huh?"
"Something like that." It wasn't, but if thinking that way helped Buffy understand...All Slayers were somewhat limited in their thinking, not necessarily unintelligent, they just tended to think in ruts.
"See you later then."
"Yeah, bye." He would go to talk with Integra, he was beginning to worry about her relationship with Alessandra, if the young No Life Queen could get into the knight's mind so easily. But first he sent a quick e-mail to Willow from his Hellsing account.
~~~oo()oo~~~
"Hello Xander. I was expecting you to need more rest than that." Sir Integra hid her surprise at seeing the young man carefully. From the way Alucard had been acting she'd expected him to be unavailable for ten to twelve hours, working off his anger, and then recovering. :But he isn't human, perhaps he recovers a lot faster than we do.:
"Your e-mail woke me up. I don't really need to sleep, but it's a habit, and an easier way to recharge when I'm in this world."
"My e-mail woke you? I don't understand." An e-mail wasn't like a phone call after all, there wasn't any anouncement when it was sent.
"I set up a...sub-routine for lack of a better term, in my mind, so that I'd automatically intercept and interpret any messages you sent to my Hellsing e-mail account - at least as long as they came from your Hellsing e-mail account. I can only intercept e-mails as they're being transmitted after all. But thanks for writing my report, you'll have received the new version by now."
She checked her inbox, and there it was, half again the size it had been after she'd finished and sent it to Xander. "Yes, I've got it. Alucard was helpful in giving me access to his memories so I could write it, but there were parts I couldn't see." :Hopefully that hint will get him thinking about telepathy, I'd rather lead up to asking him for that shield Alucard suggested. He's right, I do need it. I am surprised Alessandra was able to identify Iolaus from that picture.:
"I wondered, just how did you know that Iolaus was a No Life King? It isn't obvious to any senses humans have, well except for witches, and the occasional Slayer - that is if they don't get the dreams."
"The dreams?" Integra took the bait, knowing what she was doing, trying to distract him from her breech of security, even though she needed to talk to him about it.
"Some Slayers have visionary dreams, they have less of the ability to sense non-humans than the others. They're most sensitive to demonic energy, but about three quarters of the ones who can sense demons would sense mideons, of those perhaps a quarter would have the sensitivity to differentiate between nosferatu and No Life Kings. Not all witches can recognise mideons, but they will recognise the power level. You're evading my question. Please tell me you didn't let Alessandra into your mind, 'cause that's not of the good."
"She said that she wouldn't be able to teach me how to access Alucard's powers unless I did." Sir Integra had believed the mideon, but now she was beginning to wonder. "Do you know how she would have recognised Iolaus from a picture?"
"She probably didn't. Alessandra tends to think in terms of gathering information, and forming networks to do the same. She tends to get information on the movements of most of her peers fairly early. So she knew Iolaus' attitude towards humans - although not his other proclivities, and that he was coming to England, and since the pictures were close enough to his appearance she made an educated guess." Xander frowned then. "Truth, she might have needed to get into your head to teach you, I never checked how she taught Alucard the basics, but I did have to clear out the...markers she'd left in his head afterwards."
"Yes, Alucard mentioned that. And he said that you might be able to help me control what Alessandra sees?" Sir Integra didn't bother to try concealing the hope in her voice.
"I could clear out her taint from your mind, you have formidable defences for what you are, and that would let you keep her out altogether - or did you want the option of letting her in, but to keep control of when?"
"I'd prefer that. I do want to learn to use Alucard's abilities as much as I can."
"Very well. Just relax." And she felt a presence in her mind, building a cage of glass held liquid somehow. Then she felt that presence show her how to move the glass to open entrances when she wanted to let someone in, and the optical cable passing through it that represented her telepathy.
"Thank you Xander, I appreciate it."
"You're welcome. Oh, and you can expect an attempt to hack into the Hellsing computer system fairly soon, by Willow, so it isn't a threat." He left immediately after dropping that bomb.
~~~oo()oo~~~
"He's got to go and talk with his boss now, Sir Integra - doesn't that sound odd to you when she's a woman, Willow?" The witch didn't look up from her laptop. She'd gotten it out when she'd handed her phone over to Buffy, but she'd seemed upset that Xander hadn't said goodbye to her personally, so the Slayer reassured her.
"Not really. I did a bit of research when I heard about where Xander was being sent. Normally women who are knights are called Lady, not Sir, but the two who actually have jobs are given the masculine title. Sir Integra took her position when she was ten, after waking her pet No Life King, the one Xander was calling Dragonling, and getting him to kill her uncle Richard who was trying to kill her, and she insisted on being called Sir Integra, not Lady Integra. I heard a story that she wore one of her father's suits for her first meeting with the Round Table, and then she had men's suits made for her. And that's what she always wears, men's suits, tailored for men, not for a woman. Now, Xander said something about e-mailing his after action report to Sir Integra using his Hellsing account."
Buffy felt a bit intimidated by this report of Sir Intera's acheivements. The other woman had had responsibility and duty thrust on her much earlier than she had, and she didn't seem to have had the problems Buffy had. She hadn't known all of this earlier, she hadn't bothered to ask.
"What does that mean?"
"That if I can hack into his e-mail account, or better yet into Sir Integra's we can get a report on what actually happened, a full report instead of just what he feels like telling us. I might not have thought of it if he hadn't given me the hint...wonder if he decided to give me a bit more help than that."
"A bit more help?" Buffy didn't understand it when Willow started talking about all this computing stuff. She could manage the basics, but not more than that, and she didn't like computers any more than Giles did. :I've got reason! First Willow meets a demon over the internet, then that robot Ted, he was a computer on legs, a sick one who wanted to hurt me and kill mom. Then there was ADAM, another sick computer on legs, Warren's robot girlfriend, and the Buffy-bot...:
"Yes! He sent me an e-mail from his account, A.Harris@Hellsing.gov.uk. Wonder what he said...oh!"
"What did he say Willow?" Buffy looked over her friends shoulder to read the e-mail.
'I know you're going to use this as a base to get into my e-mail folders - don't waste too much time, I delete my sent and received messages as soon as I've read them and printed out or saved stuff I need to keep, and my sensitive files aren't kept on any machine, they're on a pen drive, and password protected.' Buffy backed away to let Willow work.
"He might not have had time to delete his report to Sir Integra...he has." The hacker sounded pleased as much as disappointed. "But she is in his address book...I'll try her account."
"Got it!" Willow crowed. "And Alucard's report. Does it disturb you that Xander's calling this incredibly powerful vampire 'Dragonling' - he's much more powerful than I am - and that Alucard respects him?"
"Xander always did like running risks. Give me one of those reports - but print it out for me first."
~~~oo()oo~~~
Alucard was torn between wanting to hate Alessandra for seducing Sir Integra when the knight had refused him, and then abusing the power Sir Integra had granted her, and being grateful to her for at least making sure she couldn't become nosferatu the usual way, and that she was no longer qualified for the virgin sacrifice thing. But no matter what he didn't really have any say in what Sir Integra did, even if that extended to 'borrowing' the power she denied him, and Alessandra was helping to make his master strong enough to need less protection. Still he didn't want to stay in the manor when they were both broadcasting their arousal and pleasure. Not when he had another option, the permission he'd wheedled out of Sir Integra to go out and mingle with humans, even with the restrictions she put on his actions, after he'd learned how badly she'd compromised security, and suggested a way to end that security breech.
"Hello Tanya, it's Al. I know it's late, but would you like to meet me for coffee, or hot chocolate and then take in a movie, or go dancing?" Xander had given Alucard a cell phone, and explained precisely how to use and pay for it, and the vampire had loved his new toy.
"I'm available tonight, but I'd rather go for a meal."
"I've already eaten, but I'm happy to take you out somewhere and just have a glass of wine or a cup of coffee while you eat." Tanya had been very tactile, always touching and petting him, she seemed to have no concept of personal space, and that made her worth going to some trouble.
"No, you don't need to do that. I can get something on the way, or have something fast here. Where do you want to meet?"
"A friend introduced me to a wonderful coffee shop, the hot chocolate there is made from melted chocolate, of whatever type you want, and steamed milk. He's American, so of course he found the best place for coffee." Alucard went on to give Tanya the address. "Would you care to meet me there?"
"It sounds great, I can get there in an hour. What movie did you want to see?"
"I didn't plan on anything in particular, let me check which movies will be playing in say, two hours?" Alucard gave Tanya the names of six different movies, the one she chose was 'Constantine', a choice that the vampire found amusing, and he suspected it was something he'd enjoy too.
Alucard changed his clothing to fit better with the humans, and then made his way to Benedicto's, the coffe shop Xander enjoyed so much. He actually had to wait for an empty table, and managed to grab one perhaps five minutes before Tanya arrived. He waved to her, to get her attention, and she wove through the crowds to him, touching his bare arm lightly, without fear.
"Have you been waiting long Al?"
"No, not too long. What do you want? I'll go and get it if you'll hold the table?" In a way Alucard enjoyed the crowds, and he hadn't cared at all that he had to wait for Tanya, because people had been touching him, even inadvertently, while he waited.
"One of those hot chocolates you mentioned - dark chocolate, not milk please." Tanya was fumbling in her purse, Alucard reached out to stop her.
"Don't, I'm paying for everything. I invited you here, so I pay. Would you like whipped cream and coacoa powder sprinkled on top?"
"Do they do marshmallows too?" She sounded almost wistful at the prospect. Alucard smiled down at Tanya, she was beautiful, and she had the confidence not to try and starve herself.
"Yes, they do." He got them both hot chocolate, the way Tanya had asked for hers, it was easier, and he also got some chocolate pastries, in an effort to feed her. She made little noises of pleasure when she tasted the hot chocolate, Alucard only started his own when he was sure she was happy with hers, and when she'd started on one of the pastries. It tasted incredible.
:Seras really will love this place.: Then he concentrated on his date.
~~~oo()oo~~~
