Hellsing - Blood Heritage

Wow... Micheal Jackson died. I'm honestly shocked. I didn't expect him to go out like he did... but I guess it's only a matter of time when you live the kind of life he did. There's a lot of things I could say about that, but I'll keep them to myself. It's tacky to speak ill of the dead. I wish his family all the best - especially his poor kids.

There's been a crap ton of celebrities dying lately. Hope there's not something in the water they're drinking. 0.0

Anything in this chapter that is not historically accurate was changed intentionally. It's not because I got lazy, I promise. :)

HAPPY EARLY 4TH OF JULY!!! Don't blow yourselves up people!

And I am very sorry for how long it took to update this. I've been pulled every which way for the past week helping make arrangements for a family reunion. ~sigh~ I love my family, but I really don't like putting stuff like this together. It's just too complicated...

----------------------------------------------

Red walls flickered with strange shapes as candelabras cast their dim light upon them. Strange looking men in strange uniforms stood at attention against them, forming a gauntlet that any visitor would have to pass through to walk down the corridor. A man, dressed similarly to the others, stepped around a dark corner, pulling a small teen aged boy behind him. His black hair was tangled and plastered to his face, while the shirt covering his back was stained with blood. The fabric clung to many open wounds - evidence of a recent and very vicious beating. Though it was obvious he was in a great deal of pain, the boy's face remained expressionless. His hazel eyes peered at the uniformed men as he was dragged past by a handful of his hair. They neither pleaded for mercy nor begged for intercession. Rather, his eyes studied his surroundings with a cool calculation that was far too mature for a boy his age. Like he had seen and experienced more suffering in his short life than most men did in a lifetime...

The man dragging him came to a sudden halt at the end of the corridor and tossed the boy to the floor. He landed roughly on his knees, wincing at the impact against stone.

"Ah, the little dragon." a booming voice rang out, mocking the boy's plight.

The boy's eyes narrowed at the words and shot up to the source. Sitting on a throne before him was a man clad in regal looking robes with a feathered turban wrapped around his head. 'The sultan...'

"You cause more trouble than you're worth, little prince. And you're not nearly as pretty as your brother." the sultan commented, letting his eyes wander over his form. "Do you realize the men you attacked lay dying at this very moment?"

His expression never changed, but a flash of satisfaction appeared in the boy's eyes at the information. The two soldiers had snuck into his younger brother's room with the intention of raping him as he slept. He had waited in the shadows until they came close enough, then slit the throat of one and plunged his knife into the chest of the other. His only regret was that he was not strong enough to have killed them instantly.

The man lounging on his throne was perceptive enough to catch the flicker of emotion. "You are proud of what you have done? I see your beating has done little to improve your manners, boy. But I have other ways of dealing with your defiance." he motioned to one of the men standing nearby. "Bring the younger one." he commanded. "We shall finish what those two began, and he will bare witness."

The boy's eyes went wide with understanding and he shot up from the floor. "NO!! I will not let you take him!!"

The men around him laughed at his outburst, and one of the sultan's eyebrows went up. "You would offer yourself as a replacement then?"

The boy faltered for half a moment. He was the eldest. He had a responsibility to protect his siblings at all costs. Surely this was a test of his strength. A way to prove he was worthy of his birthright. He considered the situation from all angles, analyzed it with his powerful young mind, then straightened his shoulders and nodded.

Every man in the room burst into wild fits of laughter. The sultan leered at him, then rose from his throne and grabbed him roughly by the front of his shirt. He forced him over to the chair, then pushed him down on his stomach. The boy swallowed and clenched his fingers around the cross he wore around his neck as he felt the man tear at his clothes.

'I will not beg for mercy.'

Silent tears escaped his eyes at the pain. He didn't move, didn't fight, didn't do anything but endure for the sake of saving his brother from this fate. When the sultan finished with him, he readjusted his robes and called out for his men to take their turn. The boy clenched his eyes shut and pulled the cross closer, taking a small bit of comfort from the feeling of the metal biting into his hands.

'God... Dear God. I will never ask for anything. I will not beg for mercy...'

----------------------------------------

Syn woke up with a start, shooting upright in bed. Her body was covered in a cold sweat, and she pushed the heavy weight of her hair out of her face. She noticed two things immediately after realizing she was no longer dreaming. The first was that Alucard had changed her out of her uniform and into a more comfortable nightdress. The second was that the vampire in question was watching her intently. Her wounded leg was propped in his lap, and he had obviously been tending to it before she woke so suddenly. She could see faint traces of her blood on his lips.

'Is it really that bad?' she wondered, glancing worriedly at her leg. Alucard could close the wounds from his own bites within seconds. Either he was deliberately keeping it open to feed from her, or the damage was greater than she first imagined...

"Rebuilding lost muscle is more complicated than healing a superficial bite." He said smoothly, answering her unasked question.

His crimson eyes traced over her carefully, taking in her haggard appearance. It seemed to her that he knew exactly what she had been dreaming about. Though she had progressed quickly in learning to control her thoughts when she wished, she was still unable to keep them blocked as she slept. In fact, the longer she studied him, the more apparent it became that he had not only seen it - he was affected by it. There was something... 'cautious' about him, as if he were carefully choosing his words to prevent revealing something he knew. Suddenly, the odd sensation faded, and he traced his fingers over the unhealed area of her leg.

"You have far too much empathy for your own good." he said finally. "You would place yourself in danger for your comrades when there are few who are worthy of the sacrifice."

Syn had the feeling that he was talking about more than pulling an overconfident mercenary away from his death. There was a much deeper meaning to it than that. But she had too much going on in her head to figure out what it was. Her muscles were tired and sore from exertion, and her nose was still throbbing from the break. She glanced around a moment, frowning when she saw no trace of her uniform.

"Where are my clothes?"

Alucard quirked a brow. "You don't need them." The corner of his mouth twitched, threatening to pull into one of his famous smirks. "Are you afraid I'm going to take advantage of you?"

Syn snorted. "Considering that you've already changed my clothes, I would think you would have done it by now."

He did smirk then. It was a welcome change from the more serious look he had been wearing.

"What makes you think I didn't?" he asked in a playful threat. "You were sleeping quite deeply for a while..."

If she didn't know him as well as she did, she might have considered it. But Alucard honestly wasn't the type to molest someone while they were unconscious. He was the sort to revel in every reaction - which would make it meaningless if the 'victim' was asleep.

"Oh please." she said, waving a hand through the air. "What fun is it to take advantage of someone if they aren't able to fight back?"

"Indeed." he purred in agreement. He leaned forward until their noses were almost touching. "I do believe you are developing quite the sadistic mindset, my dear."

Syn hummed thoughtfully. "Maybe the mental connection has started to rub off on me."

The sudden spark in his eyes made her imagine that wasn't the only type of 'rubbing off' he was thinking about.

"Hmm. How fascinating. We shall have to explore what else this connection can do..."

"Um." she began, suddenly acutely aware of every ache and pain in her body. "Could you wait until I don't feel like a giant bruise?"

The corner of his lip quirked in amusement, but he didn't say anything else. It was odd. Syn would have expected a smart ass comment or something perverted from him. But he simply pulled away, still wearing that mysterious smile, and went back to closing the wound on her leg.

--------------------------------------------------------------

After the next day's training with the men, Integra called Syn and Edmund into her office to discuss ballistics on rounds that were recovered from the scene of the attack. Syn was less involved in the discussion part of it than simply catching up on what had been discovered. Needless to say, she found nearly everything about the information weird.

"Are you sure?" Syn asked, looking up from the documents Edmund had just handed to her. "Those guns are obsolete. No one wants them for anything other than collections now..."

Ed pushed his glasses up his nose. "Positive. The stress lines and compression patterns are a match for the Luger P.08."

Her brows furrowed as she went back to the ballistics report. 'Why the hell would anyone use a Luger?' she wondered. The particular design he was talking about was something that had primarily been used as a side arm by the German army during the second World War. It's what the Luger was famous for. Nazi enthusiasts and gun collectors lusted after them for that very reason. But the design was archaic by modern standards, and Syn couldn't think of any reason why someone would want to carry one nowadays...

Her expression darkened further when she read his analysis of the bullets. The rounds showed faint traces of silver on their exterior. She looked at Edmund in blatant confusion.

"There was silver on the 'outside' of the rounds?" she questioned, not sure if she should be offended or ask if this was a joke. "What the hell?"

Integra cleared her throat. "Is there a 'reason' why this is strange, other than the fact that they knew to expect my vampires?"

"Silver is a very malleable metal." Ed explained. "The stress and heat from a gunshot would warp the bullets until they were practically useless, and do a hell of a lot of damage to the gun itself."

"Which is why the bullets we use have a core of silver jacketed with a stronger metal." Syn piped up. "Anyone with a working knowledge of metallurgy would know not to put silver on the exterior of a bullet..." She glanced at Ed. "Were they standard issue aside from the traces you found?"

Her cousin nodded. "It looks like these guys just took whatever they had on hand and dipped them in sliver as a precautionary measure. The heat melted most of it off, so it didn't do any good against Alucard and Seras..."

"But they still 'knew' we were coming." Integra interrupted. She blew out a puff of smoke in irritation. "Damn it. Everything about this is 'wrong'. Vampires don't act this way naturally..." She looked at Syn expectantly. "You say the vampire you killed didn't put up much of a fight?"

She nodded in response. "Yes sir. It knocked me off my bike as Alucard and I were tracking it. It knew exactly where we were and when to attack. I know I've gotten used to Alucard being so much stronger... but it was way too easy to kill. I expected a full fledged vampire to be more difficult..."

"Seras' unit encountered a vampire as well." Integra informed, sitting back in her chair. "She reported the same thing - the vampire knew their exact position, but was an easier kill than usual." the knight frowned. "Which means that the two that attacked Captain Bernadette's unit were using them as a distraction to get the group made entirely of humans alone."

Syn frowned at the idea. There was so much about the situation that just didn't add up. It was true that human soldiers would be an easier target than men who were accompanied by a vampire. But most vampires who knew about Hellsing also knew that their human ranks were just as deadly as the vampires. Unless they knew that these particular soldiers were new additions...

"This wasn't random." she declared finally. "These vampires knew that the soldiers were new, and probably wouldn't be able to defend themselves as well."

Integra nodded in agreement. "This was obviously a way for this... 'Millennium' to lure us out after the attack on the manor. To test our capabilities no doubt."

"Is there still no word on what they might be?" Edmund asked suddenly.

The knight shook her head. "Walter has conducted a thorough investigation. The Round Table even approved MI5 and MI6 to pull anything they might have that could be of use to us. The only thing we've found so far are a handful of supernatural interest groups and a Star Wars fan club."

Syn and Edmund exchanged a look, both thinking the exact same thing. There was no way in hell that a group with this level of weapons capability could go unnoticed by the government. It was a mystery that neither of them were comfortable with - and they were set on figuring it out.

"Okay, let's look at what we have on these guys so far." Ed stated, a look of sheer determination on his face. "One - they are creating artificial vampires using some sort of computer chip technology. Two - they've used military and guerrilla tactics to attack the members of this organization... which means they probably have a vendetta against Hellsing."

"When they attacked the house, they knew exactly when and where to hit to do the most damage." Integra added. She flicked the tip of her cigar into a nearby ashtray. "Either we have been under surveillance for some time and never noticed, or they have an informant somewhere."

Syn chewed on her lower lip. "They obviously have some powerful weaponry at their disposal... The ghouls that attacked us were heavily armed and carried shields. But the vampires in this latest attack carried an obsolete German handgun from WWII..."

Integra blinked in shock. Syn worried for half a moment that her cigar would fall right out of her mouth.

"What did you say?" she asked.

"The Luger P.08 was a standard issue sidearm for Nazi Germany during WWII." Syn explained. "It's not a..."

The knight cut her off with a raised hand. She pressed a series of buttons on her telephone, then spoke into the receiver.

"Walter? I want everyone in my office immediately. We have some very important information we need to discuss."

------------------------------------------

Alucard appeared in the office within seconds. Walter stepped in a few minutes later, Seras and Pip trailing behind him. Integra ordered everyone to sit, then went over the information she had recently discussed with the munitions experts. She followed the briefing with her theory regarding the identity of Millennium.

Sir Integra thought they were remnants of the Nazi party.

Walter coughed at the implication. "What would possess you to come to that conclusion, Sir?"

Integra looked at her butler curiously. "Surely you remember Hellsing's encounter with the Nazis during the war? Hitler ordered the creation of an army of the undead - soldiers that would be unstoppable on the battlefield. They only managed imperfect ghouls at the time. Millennium appears to have similar goals. Only they have managed to take it one step further."

The mention of the war seemed to have Alucard caught up in reminiscence. He nodded nostalgically. "The current situation does seem very familiar..." he said, allowing his words to trail off toward the end. He shot a sideways look at Walter. "Don't you remember Angel? We slaughtered every last Nazi we found."

The butler blinked, then his eyes flickered as if someone had flipped a switch inside his mind, allowing the memory to come forth. "Ah yes. We did, didn't we? God, it's been ages..." He shook his head, then looked back to Integra. "If what you're saying is true, Millennium would have agents planted in high levels of the government; feeding them information. But we destroyed their research facilities more than 50 years ago. There were no survivors."

There was a moment of silence as everyone contemplated that. It seemed that they had hit another brick wall. Suddenly, Pip cleared his throat.

"Zhat's not exactly true."

Every eye in the room shot to him. The Captain had remained silent during the majority of the meeting, though he had shown signs of discomfort as the discussion turned to Nazis. Integra's eyes became icy as she narrowed them at him.

"Explain Captain."

Pip shifted in his seat. "My grandfazher fought during zhe great war." he informed them. "Toward zhe end, 'e discovered zhat one of 'is men waz working as a spy for zhe Germans. 'e 'ad zhe man executed, zhen discovered papers in 'is belongings detailing zhe exodus of a large group of Nazi soldiers to an unknown location. Eet waz very 'ush 'ush. Most of zhe 'igher ups in zhe German government didn't know about eet."

The female knight's eyes narrowed further, if that was even possible. When she spoke, it was in a deadly sounding tone. "And why, Captain, was this information not passed on to Allied intelligence?"

" 'e tried. Zhe operation waz privately funded by zhe catholic church. Zhe moment 'e attempted to pass it on to a 'igher level, Vatican officials showed up and zhreatened to kill every member of our family. 'e agreed to silence in return for zhe lives of 'is children. Zhe only reason zhey didn't kill 'im waz 'e 'id zhe documents where 'e zhought no one could find zhem."

Integra looked pissed enough to shit a brick. "Of course, it would be the god damned Vatican that would do something like that!" she spat venomously.

Ed sat forward in his seat, looking extremely interested in the revelation. "Do these documents tell where they went?"

Pip shook his head. "I 'ave not seen zhem myself. Zhe only zhing I can say for certain iz zhey mention zhe names of zhe vatican officials zhat offered assistance."

The ammunitions expert's eyes lit up, and he turned to Integra. "If the Vatican offered assistance to the Nazis, they would have records about it somewhere."

Seras gaped at Edmund like he had lost his mind. "Are you suggesting that we ask the catholic church for help?! Even if they had something we could use, they wouldn't give it to us..."

"Not unless we had something to trade for it." Syn piped up. She glanced briefly at Edmund, then to Integra. "Think about it Sir. If Millennium does have agents planted in the government, we aren't likely to get accurate information anywhere else. We may not be on friendly terms with Iscariot, but they are probably the only ones with information we can trust. And just imagine how upset father Maxwell will be when he finds out someone in the Vatican assisted an organization creating vampires..."

The knight's eyes lit up in understanding. "He would want names. Names that we could offer in exchange..."

The decision was instantaneous. Integra leaned forward in her chair, and began barking out orders.

"Captain, I want you to find out where those documents are and devise a way to retrieve them. Walter, if there are any travel arrangements that need to be made, I want you to take care of it immediately."

Both men nodded their assent as the others looked on.

"And you Sir?" the butler asked.

Integra clasped her hands in front of her. "I am going to have a little chat with Father Maxwell to set up negotiations..."

-----------------------------------------------

Damn! Syn's having weird dreams about mysterious little boys and Pip's grandfather had a scuffle with the Vatican?! Things are getting kinda weird here....


Reviews are very much appreciated. No, I'm not forcing you or anything... but it would be very nice...