Hellsing Fan Fiction ❯ Drowning in Darkness ❯ Sorry! ( Chapter 11 )

Drowning in Darkness.

By: Lazeralk.

Standard disclaimers apply.

In the name of God, impure souls of the living dead shall be banished into eternal damnation. Amen.

Part 11

To my reviewers, my muse came out of her closet and told me to tell you that she's supposed to be getting the credit for this story and to please direct all comments to her and not her puppet. I locked her back in the closet. Anyone want to leave a message?

*

There was something moving, oh so slowly, like a slug crawling painfully across a pane of glass, leaving a trail of slime behind it. There was no color, only gray and black and white and a fuzzy splotch of something else he couldn't quite name.

"Oh, wake up Arucard." Came a voice to his ears, agitated.

He opened his eyes and stared up at an unfamiliar ceiling, made of beautiful oriental tiles.

"What happened?' he asked groggily. Shadow sat beside him, her arms crossed and giving him a blank stare.

"You tried to read the minds of about six-thousand highly psychic people all at once. Your brain overloaded and you blacked out."

"Who were all those people and where are they?"

"Those were my people, and they're here, in the Deep, trapped and half formed." Said Shadow, crossing her long legs.

"Oh. The energy of this place…..."

"You felt it too did you? I've been thinking, and I came up with a few ways this could have happened. The first thing I thought of was that someone brought a demon here and killed it and the energy the death released sort of trampled my people. The other is that a demon came here on it's own and my people killed it not knowing what the result would be. Either way, a demon died here and for some reason any demon energy that comes in contact with the Deep gets absorbed into the thing that keeps my people hostage."

"I don't think it was unintentional. I have a few hundred years experience with ritual magic like this and it's more likely that someone cast a spell on a demon and had it come here to die. Some one who wanted the Shadow Walkers out of the way." Arucard said as he sat up, grabbing his hat and glasses off a nearby table.

"Why? Walking worlds is no easy task, massive amounts of energy are needed to even pierce the barriers, let alone walk through them. When a Shadow Walker goes Beyond, they have the will of all their people behind them to open the barriers. A demon has it's own will, but it must walk quickly or it will be drained." Answered Shadow, waving her hand in the air and scowling at the idea.

"I don't know, I'm just guessing. This whole shadow world-walking thing is all new to me. I don't know how you would incorporate it with ritual magic."

"Is it possible that information about Shadow Walkers became available to your people?"

"Don't know, get us back to the house and we'll check the Internet." Arucard said as he swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood up, stretching his arms over his head.

"The what?" asked Shadow as she too moved to stand.

"Never mind, let's just go." Said Arucard.

Shadow stilled herself and made a small gate that grew to accommodate Arucard's height. She walked through and the vampire followed her. They came out of the gate in the Shallows of his room and he phased out of them, waiting for Shadow to do the same.

He turned to her and gave her a cursory look, remembering his master's orders about seducing her. He didn't think it would work though; he took her to be the kind of girl who would value friendship over lust.

"Lead on nosfaratu." She directed with a smirk.

"As my Lady wishes." Returned Arucard, happy that someone would play court games with him. He offered his arm which she laughingly took before her smile grew more subdued and then turned to a frown.

He said nothing; just led her along the halls to Walter's room, the Hellsing retainer had the best computer equipment in the house. He knew what she was thinking about anyway, how could he not after the episode in the Deep?

*

Seras awoke extremely hungry, and not in the normal sense of the word either. Well not normal for a vampire anyway. She reached for a packet of blood, so kindly left out for her by Walter, and stared at the dark red liquid for a moment. She didn't want to drink it and it wasn't her normal moral hesitation either. Having to drink the stuff almost non-stop for a few days had cured her of that.

`You're on your own in this police girl, we've thrown you in and it's up to you to sink or swim.' Her master had told her, right before bursting into his malicious laughter and babbling about making a rhyme. She hadn't paid much attention to the comment then but it was beginning to make sense. He'd thrown her to the sharks with her blood morals and she'd learned to adapt and even like the stuff a little.

Now, however, she just stared at the blood pouch and couldn't bring it to her lips. She just couldn't.

She wanted something else, something much more potent. She needed something that slid down the throat like mulled wine and settled in the pallet like a good cour don bleu.

Seras jolted back to reality, those weren't her thoughts! She'd never had a drop of wine in her life let alone a courdi-what's it called.

-Allen! -

-You called mother dear? -

-You keep out of my head Allen, you keep your own impulses to yourself! - She demanded.

-Mother, I haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about. - The blade replied.

-Have you ever had wine before? -

-Of course not mother, I don't have a mouth. -

-Oh. What about cour, cour did something…..? -

-Cour don bleu? -

-Yes! That! What is it anyway? -

-Some kind of human foodstuff, I don't really pay attention to that kind of thing. Will you please let me out of here mother? -

-I have to go now Allen. -

Seras pushed her thoughts, and Allen's voice with them, to the back of her mind and dressed her self. She looked down at the packet and forced herself to drink the entire thing even though it tasted sour and thick.

She tried to feel satisfied with it but she couldn't, she hungered. She was filled with such a hunger that it became a physical pain, twisting inside of her.

-Master! -

-Police girl? - Came the lazy reply.

-Something. Eating. Me. Master! - She grit out in her mind, fighting her hunger.

-Police girl? - Arucard's voice was much more worried now, he phased through the wall and ran the rest of the way to his child's room, throwing the door open to find her crumpled on the floor, her knees pulled to her chest and shaking violently.

He reached out to her and turned her in his arms.

"Police-"

Seras was on him, digging her nails into his chest, hissing and flashing her fangs. Her eyes burned like black coals, glowing with a darkness that consumed all. She drew her hands back and pulled with them his power, his energy, sucking it into herself. She fed on his power, drinking down his essence like wine, like blood, spilling it into herself and drowning in it.

She collapsed forward, breathing hard, but her eyes were normal. She looked down at both her position straddling her master's hips and the wounds she'd given him and her eyes filled with horror.

"Master….."

"What the hell was that?" asked Arucard slowly, the claw marks on his chest closing almost instantaneously. He sat up, his child still looking at him like she was afraid he'd hurt her and sitting on his lap.

"Seras?"

"Allen. He's feeding through me." She whispered, having felt her child grow full and sated on her master's power.

Arucard scowled, he picked her up and put her on her bed. He stared down at her and crossed his arms over his chest, debating what to do about it.

"Stay here, I'll be right back."

"Yes master." She whispered.

Arucard gave her one more hard look before walking out the door and up the stairs to the library. It wasn't until he closed the door behind him that he collapsed to the floor, drained and angry. His pride wouldn't allow him to show his weakness but he felt like he'd been turned back to human and had all his long years catch up to him. It was hard to move, to see and hear. His limbs were numb and he knew he was going into shock. His vampiric body couldn't keep going with out the otherworldly energy to support it.

*

Allen was quite happy, he was full of power, filled to the brim and this energy wouldn't leak out and be sucked away like that demon energy had, he could do what ever he liked now, if he could only get that stupid woman to let him out of this god forsaken pit! He'd been very angry with her when she refused him and had forced his hunger on her savagely. He'd meant for it to hurt her and he'd succeeded, pitiful vampire wench. If this were normal for her, she'd spend the rest of her death cowering in her room in a little ball, shaking. Weak. How could the Fates make this utter disgrace his mother? How could they bind him to someone so pathetic? It was sick.

His existence was some sort of cruel cosmic joke, it just had to be.

*

"Sir Integra, we have the information you requested on that demon summoning vampire we fought yesterday." Said Walter as he handed her several thick files.

"His name was Marcus and he was a member of some sort of cult. All the members are vampires and practice demonics. Apparently, they all can summon demons. It's called the Dark Inferno and lead by a vampire called Mauve."

"Mauve the Tormentor?" asked Integra as she studied the files.

"Apparently, she went on a killing spree a few hundred years ago and tortured sixty-nine people to death. Each victim had died differently, no one knows why she did it, but her victims were all very carefully chosen and had a history of mental illness."

"She tortured crazy people?"

"That's the gist of it, yes." He replied, frowning.

Integra said nothing more, simply looked at the files and tried to make the new information fit with what was going on. She finally threw them down on her desk and rubbed her temples.

"Shadow!" she called, hoping the other woman would be able to make sense of it all somehow. She'd proven herself to be nothing short of miraculous so far.

Shadow stepped in through the door, not bothering to open it and came to stand before her desk.

"Take a look at these." She said waving her hand over the files. Shadow took them and sat down in one of the plump chairs and began to read. When she was finished she placed them back on the desk and pulled a piece of paper out of thin air.

She handed the paper to Walter, who took it and studied it a moment before smiling and wandering off.

"What was that?" demanded Integra.

"Design specifications for my blades. I want them made out of melted down crosses so I won't be leaving a pile of bodies behind me. You want me to take this cult?"

"Do you think it's a lead to your culprit?"

"Yes. There is demonic energy in the Deep. And no demon would do this on it's own."

"Why not?" asked the leader of Hellsing, lacing her fingers in front of her face.

"Nothing in it for him." Explained the Shadow Walker.

"Take Arucard and Seras and destroy it, do whatever it takes." Commanded the blonde.

"With pleasure." Returned Shadow, a slow smile curving her lips.

"Dismissed."

*

Arucard had recovered maybe half of his energy when Shadow walked in with Seras in tow. The blonde looked highly uncomfortable, but Arucard had managed to pull himself off the floor and was actually seated in a chair when they came in. He was very proud of himself.

He smiled, his normal, I'm-going-to-rip-your-heart-out-and-eat-it smile. See? Nothing wrong with your master girl. Nothing at all. They bought it, thank the stars.

"What's up?" he asked, frantically thinking of ways this could go wrong. He refused to be humiliated before his child, and his rival.

"Mission." Said Shadow.

God damnit.

*

Malikai backed up against the wall, the insanely tall figure of Father Anderson looming over him, blades gleaming wickedly in the light of the computer screen.

"Confess, Olsen, and let the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit cleanse your soul of the sins you have committed." Hissed the priest.

"I have committed no sin but that of letting myself be lead along." Declared Malikai hotly, striving to buy time.

"I've let myself be blinded to the truth by seeing only what I wish to see. I've let people like you show me lies and turn me to hate and for that I will not be absolved. You're a dog Anderson; you have no mind of your own. You do what you're told, think what you're told, believe what you're told, and know only what you're told. You're just a dog that can't think for itself."

"Oh? Is that so? And what, pray tell, brought on this astounding revelation?" sneered the regenerator.

"I opened my eyes, I saw what God showed me and I made my own decision about what I believe in. I saw a father risk his life for his child's with out hesitation; I saw a monster fall in love. I saw the truth. There is no black and white Anderson; there is no right and wrong, no good and evil, the world is shades of gray. Some are light and some are dark, and all are ever changing. The dark become light, the light become dark and then they go back again only to shift once more. Don't you understand me?" Asked Malikai trying desperately to covey his new understanding to the priest.

"I don't Malikai. I don't understand. But you were my friend once, and for that I will try." Anderson put away his blades, pulled up a chair and gazed expectantly at his target.

*

End part 11. I know, I'm evil; I just left you with more questions. My muse has let me in on the plot and I can safely say that all of this does have a point and that it will all make sense in the end. I promise. Really. Don't look at me like that.