Ascension.05 - Down the Rabbit Hole

Two weeks later, I found myself on a narrow street in Camden, a street with nothing to suggest its sinister nature but a cluttering of garbage and an unnatural quiet. No cars, no people, only black-shaded windows that gaped at us like sets of empty eyes. If one looked far enough down the street, east or west, to the closest intersections, one would see government vehicles with tinted glass; they were my closest refuge.

Before me, was a metal cellar door, with a red "x" roughly painted on it. Funny, how we used that symbol; like woodcutters cutting out the rotted, dead trees. An analogy my father would have liked, I'm sure.

Walter put a hand on my shoulder and turned me around, setting a radio into my hand. "Don't part with this. If you need us, call. Even Frandon won't let you come to harm in there." Both of us had traded our usual wear for the Hellsing military garb; he managed to look more distinguished in it than I, but then, he had had a long time to get used to it.

Frandon hadn't been so cruel as to leave me unarmed, either. I was more limited, however, by my size and how much I could carry. I had, of course, the pistol Alucard had gifted me over a year ago, and plenty of silver ammunition for that. Walter had wisely pointed out that my fencing skill might be useful, as well, and had pulled out and dusted off my father's military saber, and used his weaponsmithing skills to hammer a fine line of silver along the blade. I was equipped with torches, as well. Quainter than a flashlight, true, but most undead still weren't terribly fond of fire.

I still felt vastly unprepared, even if Walter had assured me that Alucard had probably been exaggerating about the head-snapping beast within. He gave me a brave smile, and left me with the typical Hellsing mantra: "May God and the Queen bless you."

I reached for the handle of the cellar door, and drew it back suddenly. The metal door was heavy with magic, magic I recognized as distinctly un-Hellsing, and it stung. I looked to Walter. He looked unconcerned, which led me to believe thathe wasn't aware of it.

Must be a family thing.

I reached out again, bearing the stinging this time, and swung the door open. Nothing but darkness, and musty smell before me. I waved--probably more confidently than I deserved--to Walter, and stepped in.

The light from the doorway illuminated a spacious room with a dirt floor. It looked like it might have been a workshop at some point, judging by the workbench along the right wall. It couldn't have been too long abandoned; only a thin layer of dust lay on the tools there.

The light from the door was fading behind me as I came to a stairway leading up to a closed door. The door was gouged from top to bottom with long nail imprints, and from the blood that accompanied it, I guessed that they weren't the work of a family pet.

Walter had assured me the upstairs had been secured by our prior teams, and my task lay below the house. I puzzled at what he meant by that, until I noticed a pit in the far left corner of the room. It looked more like the work of a giant, over-eager badger than anything else. Excavated dirt was piled up beside it, and, on closer inspection, the walls of the pit were rough-hewn--definitely not cut with an pickax or dug with a shovel.

And, just my luck, there was no convenient way down that I could see. I couldn't even tell how deep it was. No sounds emanated from it, which stilled my beating a heart a bit, certainly. I took the opportunity to light one of the torches and inspect it, but I grew more worried as I realized that, even with light, I couldn't see the bottom.

I dropped the torch, watched it fall. It landed about five meters down, and sputtered out in the dirt below, but not before showing me a clear space about two meters wide, with a tunnel extending another direction.

I sighed. Down the rabbit hole it was.

--

I fell as only a fourteen-year-old can--with no grace whatsoever. I bounced off the walls of pit and landed, not far from where my torch was sputtering out in the dirt.

Blackness surrounded me, and I hurried to light another torch, my hands shaking at the thought of what might be waiting in the darkness to grab me. It was all well and good to talk about beings of darkness in the safety of the manor, but it was quite enough to feel them breathing around you.

The torch came to life, revealing, thankfully, that I was alone in this pit, with a branching tunnel to the left the only way out. It looked as if it slanted downward; and from the reflection of light I could see that the texture of the walls changed considerably up ahead. What was under this basement? It was growing warmer in here, too, rather than cooler; another notable oddity.

I walked down the left tunnel about ten meters before I noticed what was causing the changed reflection. It seemed that the dirt tunnel had broken through the wall of some other structure, made, it appeared, from limestone. The hallway here was wider. I remembered castles in France I had seen, and how the limestone there had worn the stone in similar patterns. //Old// That was all I knew. There had been designs on the walls, once, I could see; but they were worn away now.

A couple more meters, and the texture of the place changed psychically, as well. I felt a pulsing in the far corner of my awareness, ahead of me; and was suddenly *certain* that I was in some kind of danger.

Much to my chagrin, I was spot-on with that assessment.

Barely at the edge of the torchlight I could see a figure approaching me, lurching, even. I wondered if this were one of the ghouls of which I had heard spoken; those leavings of vampires, with no will of their own.

No. Ghouls were still mostly human-like in appearance, from what I had heard. This most certainly was not. It looked, in fact, like a horrible chunk of distorted flesh and muscle, mounted on skinny little legs. Three-fingered hands with sharp claws protuded from its upper body, and it glowed with foreign magic.

This was something's creation; something's summoned servant. And--theology aside--where there's a creation, there's undoubtedly a creator.

The Desert Eagle was out instantly. I cut it down with two silver bullets. The first bullet evoked a terrible squeal; the second felled it most effectively. My, my aim was improving.

Unfortunately, from the look of the hallway ahead, more were coming my way. Almost in single file they shuffled towards me. Thankfully, their distance was great enough still that they didn't yet pose a danger.

I was, of course, not looking behind me.

I felt immediately what those claws could do as one ripped into my back, stinging triply. I yelped, and spun around immediately, in time for it to aim another slash across my left arm.

It didn't have a chance to land another blow. Its cry faded as the magic animating the flesh fled the body.

I had only enough time to notice the break in the wall from which it had come, before I turned to find three, no, four of them almost upon me. By my count, only one bullet was left to me; and I discovered I was right, as I emptied the last one into the closest creature, and then came up blank.

With no time to reload, I switched to the saber. Lucky that that had been my weapon of choice back in my fencing classes. It was effective, but much more work. Fencing had--of course--been nothing like this, and while my arm might have been prepared for the swinging, it wasn't prepared for the impact.

I was left panting for breath, my heart in my throat, as the last one fell before my blade. With a moment of respite, I reloaded, noticing the stinging pain in my back from where the filthy claws had cut into me. The wound on my arm was no better, and I could see that it was red, and, in a day or so, would be ripe with infection.

All the more reason to get out of here, faster.

--

It was clear that my mission here wasn't finished. There way no way that these weak creatures had been the death of an elite Hellsing team; they were mere nuisances, dangerous only in their number. I knew I had at least their creator to contend with.

Two paths remained to me: the wide limestone hallway stretched ahead of me; as well as the crack in the wall from which the assault from behind had come. I chose the forward one.

Although I was well on guard at this point, torch in one hand, and pistol readied in the other, I soon came to realize that if there was danger in this maze of tunnels, it was not to be found in this direction. Within another ten meters of empty limestone tunnels, narrowing all the way, I reached a wide room.

It was a most unusually shaped room--pentagonal. Unlike the hallways which led to it, it was lit by torches mounted on the walls at equal distances. I would have proclaimed it empty at first, had I not noticed that it was crawling with that same foreign magic. I expected that to herald the coming of more of the magical creatures, but when nothing appeared, I moved closer to the center of the room, more curious and yet more confident.

As I approached, I noticed designs on the floor. No, not really designs--for they weren't really there, were they? They were a crawling pattern of magic, floating a few centimeters above the floor--they would have been invisible to me had they not been so violently opposed to the Hellsing magic. Of them, I could say no more, except that the pattern they outlined seem somehow familiar, though I couldn't place it.

What became clear is that this room was a gigantic pentagram. Logic dictated that one gigantic pentagram meant one giant spell. The question then became, to what purpose?

Since the room itself failed to answer my question, with more apprehension now, I turned to leave. It was then that I noticed how the tendrils of magic had wrapped themselves around my legs, clinging to me like a cloud of dust. At first, they didn't seem to impede me, but as I approached the door, they began to slow me, and I stopped dead at the doorway, trapped by their cold grip on my ankles.

In a panic, I sliced at them with my blade. The silver made them withdraw as if stung, but this spell was made of sterner stuff than the monsters I had fought, and they finally persisted, despite my most frantic efforts.

I was trapped; trapped as I was a year ago--in a cellar, at dead end.

Unlike a year ago, I didn't have a demon prince to wake and save my life. My demon prince was a city away, in the basement where I found him. Were he here, I had no doubt he would sneer at my stupid human ways.

I ground my palm into my forehead. "Stupid Integra." I said it for him. It bore saying. I did, after all, walk right into the spell.

But I did have a God of Death on my side, if a more sedate one. I found the radio, turned it on. "Walter, I'm trapped," I practically whispered, showing more calm than I actually felt. I didn't know why my voice was so weak all of the sudden.

No response. I tried again, more frantic. "Please!" Still nothing. I fiddled with the channels, tried every one. In fury, I threw the damn thing across the room.

I tried to make for the doorway again. Again I came up short. Traversing the perimeter of the room, it seemed, however, that as long as I stayed in this room, I could move freely.

Thinking rationally, that was a plus. This spell had been created by something, for some purpose, that purpose being to trap stupid fourteen-year-old girls who walked into it. Which meant, rationally, that that something would come to find me at some point. If I could destroy it, I could destroy the spell.

But thinking irrationally was very tempting right about now. I bit my tongue to stop the cry that came, unwanted, to my throat.

Steps in the hallway told me I wouldn't be waiting for long, good or bad. I was immediately at attention, weapon at the ready, every muscle in my body tense. Funny, how those steps sounded distinctly //human//

As the figure appeared, shadowed in the doorway, I realized why I had recognized the sigil of the magic that had trapped me. It was, after all, the sigil that Frandon bore on his ring.

--

"Speechless, Miss Hellsing? It's so rare that I see you that way; let me savor it."

I gritted my teeth. I was in no mood for talking, not with a traitor. "I see you decided to be the Merlin to our little Round Table, Frandon."

He smiled. "A nice analogy. And while your court was being destroyed, I would be frolicking with wood spirits."

In need, but not in fear. I was uncertain if it were Alucard's voice echoing in my head, or a particularly loud memory. In any case, I shot Frandon twice.

Or, rather, shot at him. He moved fast; faster than Alucard did, perhaps. His speed, however, was unholy in a different way. The bullets flew past him and skittered on the ground.

In a moment he was upon me, and I was on my stomach, pressed to the ground, his knee to my back. His strength, too, was unholy and fueled by magic. My torch had flown out of my hand, and landed halfway across the room, sputtering on the limestone floor--not that I much needed it now. The pistol, too, disappeared into the dark. My pack, with my remaining ammunition and torches, would have remained; but in the moment I was stunned, Frandon took the opportunity to yank it off my back and toss it across the room, before pinning my arms behind me.

He yanked back my head to look me in the eye. "I think you had better listen to what I want before you start shooting, Miss Hellsing, especially since you can't leave this room without my willing it."

"You want what everyone else wants--Hellsing. Why should it be any different? You know well that you aren't the first that has tried to kill me. You should also know that you won't have it unless you kill me--and then, I would wish I were alive just to see you fight with the rest of the Round Table over it."

"Actually," he said quietly, "I would settle for that pet of yours."

"Alucard?"

"Unless you have other 500-year-old vampires in your basement?"

It was so ridiculous. How many times had I wished him out of my sight? But I doubted it was that easy, or that advantageous. "He was bound to my grandfather. I don't think he can be unbound and bound to another."

"Unless you die, right, Miss Hellsing?"

I was silent. He hit me in the head then, with something that felt dangerously like the butt of a gun. Finally, I said, "Whatever do you want him for? He doesn't obey, and he needs to be fed."

"But it's not that simple, is it? The feeding, I mean. He needs your blood."

Well, since the secret was out.... "It's what binds him."

"As I thought. Then, you, Hellsing, will happily provide it for me, and I will use it to transfer the binding to me."

"I have no idea how you intend to do that."

He leaned close to me, whispering in my ear. His right hand, the one with the gun, supported his weight. "I'm the Merlin of this Round Table, as you said. I know a way. So I will bleed you, and I will bind him, and you will go free, minus that pesky creature."

But why? I asked myself. Was Alucard really so valuable? For killing vampires, certainly, but that wasn't Frandon's job. Frandon's job, unlike Hellsing's, was intelligence, not security. "I still don't know why you want him."

"Why, Hellsing, haven't you toyed with the notion yourself? Bound as your servant, he surely must owe you, among other things, the price of immortality."

If I had toyed with that idea, I wasn't going to admit it. "He would never give it to you."

"He would if he were bound to me."

Maybe so. I hadn't tested the limits of the seal in such extreme ways. I somewhat doubted it, all the same. "Seal or no, he wouldn't work for such a weak bastard as yourself, Frandon." My eyes fell now on the gun he held. I recognized it immediately, for it was the twin to mine. Well, now, at least, I knew to whom one of the other three silver-plated pistols had fallen. "And neither will I," I muttered.

And then I kicked him in the groin. Unholy strength or no, that was one human weakness he couldn't deny. It had the desired effect, and as he winced in pain, I swung my free fist at his weight-bearing hand, knocking him off balance, and allowing me to grab the pistol from his hand.

I was on my feet in seconds. I still couldn't leave the room; but I now had the upper hand. His only retaliation now was the magic he wielded so skillfully. He laughed at me, from his vulnerable position on the ground, and immediately the room fill with a heavy, muffling darkness.

I fired at where he should have been, but could tell from the ricochet that he was there no longer.

"It's really not so much to ask, Hellsing. I'll take that accursed creature off your hands. Consider it a favor."

"Favors don't trap me with magic." I fired at the sound of his voice. Another richochet. He was gone again.

Suddenly, he was choking me. Though his hands weren't on me, I could feel an invisible noose closing around my throat, and I could hear him laughing. "Well, if you really want to know, I'd probably need to bleed you dry for the transfer. It would have been a peaceful death. Now, you get to die violently, in the dark."

I did the only thing I could, and fired again at his voice. They were my final shots, as I pulled the trigger and came up with the click of an empty chamber.

I knew I was starting to lose consciousness, as specks of light--impossible in this pitch black room--appear at the edges of my vision. How true he had been. I would die violently, in the dark. How fitting, for a Hellsing. I slumped to the floor, suddenly weak.

You don't want to die now, do you? Alucard had said, only a year ago. It brought a sudden clarity of intention, and, still gasping for breath, I looked up.

Stupid fool. Frandon was gloating over me, and my imminent death. In this dark, I could not see him, only feel him, but that was enough to reawaken my rage.

Gloating deserved only one thing, and that was a cold silver saber through the throat. Lucky for me, I had enough mental integrity to still manage that, and that was exactly what he got.

He fell to his knees and keeled back, and I felt the hold on my neck suddenly loosen, and the room lighten, as he lost concentration. He was probably already dead, or headed inexorably in that direction, but I pulled myself up to my knees, pulled the blade out, and swung it down on him again, and again, and again.

Blood was on my face, and yet, I still couldn't stop myself from tearing at that body, wreaking upon it an unnecessary vengeance. Call it bloodlust. Call it a storm in my head, crying for violence. Call it insanity. Call it, perhaps, being bloody sick of people trying to kill me for what I possessed, or pretended, at least, to possess.

I finally withdrew, panting. This time, unlike the last, the blood that covered me was another's, not my own. I threw the saber aside, surveyed my work. Something had fallen out of Frandon's pocket in my onslaught, and had fallen to the ground, covered in gore.

I reached for it, wiped it off. It was a silver cigar case, engraved with my family's sigil. Inside, I found what I expected--six of my father's Henry Winterman cigars. "Presumptuous bastard took my father's cigars." I stuck the case in my pocket.

I found my own pistol, and my satchel, in one corner of the five-sided room, and not far from them, the radio I had tossed away. On a whim, I tried it again. I was free to leave the room now, I knew, but pulling myself back up out of this pit would be a burden. The radio, to my surprise, sparked to life. "Walter, I'm done," I merely said.

The radio, with much static, sparked back the next moment. "Understood. We'll be in right away."

I was tired. I set the radio down, and, on a sudden whim, reached for the cigar case in my pocket.

I'm sure if Alucard had been there, he would have pointed out to me that smoking, too, was a vice. But I owed him nothing now, not even my life. In saving my own life, I had saved him his freedom, hadn't I? Quid pro quo, and all that.

I lit the cigar from a wall torch, and put it to my lips. To my credit, I didn't even choke much on the smoke.

--end--

A/N: This is the final edition, with the final chapter more neatly edited--there were a couple of inconsistencies I wanted to fix. I also wanted to make clear that this was the end, since some reviews seemed confused about that. I've thought of writing a bit of an epilogue, but that seems like it might be gilding the lily--this is really everything I wanted to write in this fic, when it comes down to it. Criticism is always appreciated, though I do prefer that it be grammatically correct ^_^