Disclaimer: I do not own Hellsing, Alucard, or Anderson. I did this out of enjoyment, nothing else. Promise. No profit here.

Dedication: This fic is written for Shehcelciudat.

Splinters

The sunlight is serrated by the grate of the sewer, hanging down in threads of golden silver like the wisps of a dew speckled spider's web. Shadows twitch and shift to disturb the brilliant, ethereal fibers, but it still remains flawless when they pass, untouched, undisturbed. Alucard stares intently at the light through vampiric eyes, trying to see beyond the crimson sheen that coated his world, to see through the red, to the untainted gold. But no matter what he tries, he just sees red, and the threads of sunlight almost look like rivers of falling blood from the sky.

Red is everything, but Alucard still sees color; he knows certain shades of the blood-soaked hue aren't really red, but they instead represented other colors, colors he is blind to now. The honey pink color that fills the day was gold, he knows it is, but it looks distinctly like fresh blood smeared on a pale surface. The darkest red, the color of blood after years of rest, represents black. Alucard oft wonders if Seras is used to the red that coats her world yet. Wonders what colors she truly sees beyond the crimson barrier; is she able to truly behold the crystalline sapphire of Integra's eyes, the silver of moonlight?

On the ground, Anderson stirs from his deep unconsciousness. Alucard hasn't bothered to deposit the man on a cleaner surface; Anderson doesn't deserve the consideration. It wouldn't be in the spirit of their rivalry anyway, and the muck Anderson is slowly sinking into will only irritate the paladin's capricious temper further. At the very least, reasons Alucard, it was only beneath a storm drain, rather than anything less sanitary. Even Alucard has his limitations.

'Fool,' purrs Alucard quietly, nudging the tip of his boot against the paladin's ribcage. 'I thought you were above this kind of weakness.'

The languid jibe does nothing to awaken Anderson from his sleep. The complete hypohemia is obviously too much for even Anderson's regenerative capabilities to handle, but he is still alive, chest rising and falling in slow, pained exhales. Alucard stays patient, though; it wouldn't be long before he learns the truth. Was the paladin a true man of God, a virgin as his oath promised, or has he given into carnality at some less than pious moment in his life?

Alucard has never had to reanimate a dying monster using his own blood. The results, he knew, will be unlike anything he can expect.

The nail has been reduced to mere splinters now, a few pieces of it are still tangled in Anderson's clothing. Alucard can smell the holy wood tangled in the fibers of his clothes, a strong fragrance, a rich scent of thorns and moist earth. For something that holds such a clean scent, it has reduced Anderson to nothing but a damned monster. The thought of it still causes Alucard to sneer in utter disgust.

The paladin will never be human, and maybe he never really was. At the very least, not since he had become a regenerator. Those eyes of his, which appeared as emerald green against a tapestry of blood red to Alucard, are the not the eyes of a human. They have never appeared human, would never appear so. They weren't hard or shuttered like a warrior's, but wild and ferocious like a stalking tiger, a beast's after catching the scent of blood.

It has always reminded Alucard of a tiger he had seen decades ago, a vicious creature staring at him with eyes that seemed to look beyond what any mere human could see. The creature had not submitted to his crimson gaze, as Anderson has not. The feline creature had stared him down with wild, untamed passion.

Gingerly, Alucard kneels next to the paladin and waits, infinitely patient. Anderson himself no longer smells clean, no longer smells like the deceitful essence of the nail. The only scent Alucard detects from the priest's inert body is death, the detestable rot that tearing the nail from the man's chest had left. But it is not quite death; Alucard had tempered the beast's soul with his own vampiric blood, pieces of his own self to repair the mistakes inflicted on the priest's human form.

Neither vampire, nor messiah. There is very little human left to speak of.

Feather light, Alucard's finger ghosts over the broad jaw of the unconscious man. The face looks different to Alucard without the round spectacles. Different without the endless tide of passion and fury that Alucard has come to associate the man with. Anderson is simply sleeping, eyebrows arched ever so slightly with exhaustion, lips parted as strangled breaths depart them. Even through the fabric of his glove, Alucard feels the cold of the priest's flesh. But it is still flesh, whole and untainted; a welcome improvement from thorns and oil-colored blood.

The body's state is of no concern to the vampire; he has seen Anderson in worse shape times before, and yet still climb to his feet, as utterly proud as he has always been.

The state of Anderson's soul is the only thing Alucard is concerned about.

'Did it hurt,' hisses Alucard, the faintest sigh of words passing his lips. 'To lose your soul?'

This does rouse Anderson, as Alucard's question seemed to slip from his very essence into the priest. The words are far beyond just a simple spoken sentence. Alucard feels the priest's body tremor, pale eyelashes fluttering just enough for Alucard to know that his question is heard. He waits for a response, but Anderson says nothing, and the priest's eyes remain closed.

'Answer me,' growls the vampire. He fists his hand in the paladin's shirt and lifts him from the moist grit, not gently. He stares into the blood stained face and shakes the man. 'Did it hurt, priest?'

The answer is there, just at the tip of Anderson's lips, but he loses it as unconsciousness reaps him from the world of the living once again. Alucard drops him and waits, patient and unmoving. Anderson still needs time.

An hour passes, and neither of the beasts have shifted. Alucard is still kneeling, eyes lightly closed as he listens to the slow heartbeat of the priest and absorbs the elusive scents of smoke and blood drifting down into the sewer. Alucard breathes deeply, so deeply he can almost capture the scent of departing souls.

They smell of moonlight and dust.

A sigh captures Alucard's attention, a weak groan deep in the priest's throat. Alucard's crimson eyes open, instantly focusing on the face of the creature lying next to him. He says nothing, just patiently stares as the dry lips soundlessly move, cracked and bleeding. The priest's eyes remain closed.

'Yes,' comes in a faint, broken whisper, and Alucard knows he's received his answer. There is no strength behind the word, no power, and it sounds like someone else entirely. But Alucard knows that many things will change. After all, Anderson's soul is lost in the splinters of the nail, somewhere in heaven, hell, and purgatory. The pieces will simply be lost forever with no place of rest.

A soul in splinters.

Anderson tremors again, hands weakly raising as if to embrace something unseen, but Alucard knows he will not recapture what he is reaching for. The starved infantile vampire will not be able to find solace within himself for his sins, he will not be able to forgive himself. It's doubtful he will ever understand his actions.

'A lost shepherd,' laments Alucard, sounding far more pitying than mocking. 'Who will you turn to now that you have forsaken God, priest?'

Anderson doesn't answer, just gives a weak sound in response, a broken cry of pain that must be beyond any agony humankind has ever felt. Monsters endure more pain than humans simply for being, for existing, but Alucard cannot bring himself to feel true sorrow for Anderson's plight. The paladin had brought such misery upon himself willfully, out of pride and foolish desperation.

He should have died as a human.

The priest's body writhes sluggishly as his nerves slowly reassert themselves; it's a slow process, but Alucard does not want to spare the priest any pain. He needs to feel the penalty for so foolishly casting his soul into the abyss.

'What were you expecting?' purrs the vampire, fingers threading through the priest's pale hair as he speaks, never breaking the physical connection. 'Were you expecting to cast me down and that it would just end?' the vampire scoffs. 'You became more monster than I from the moment you stabbed the nail into your heart.'

Anderson lacks the strength or will to respond, but a bloody tear slips down his face, staining the pale hairs of eyelashes. Alucard reaches down, tentative at first, before he slides his gloved fingertip against the moist trail of crimson. The blood beads onto the hard cloth like a raindrop, and Alucard licks it away, unable to resist the delicacy.

It tastes bitter, like rotten flesh and metal. It is not a pleasant taste, but Alucard endures it easily; it is no burden, just a broken body still recuperating. Most of Anderson is still a corpse, and it will take time before the fresh vampire blood mends his injuries.

'Open your eyes, priest,' growls Alucard, hand descending to ghost over the closed eyelids. 'Look at me.'

Anderson complies, eyes fluttering and slowly focusing to the light breaching the close confines of the tunnel. Had Anderson been feeling less somber, he might have laughed. The eyes staring up at him now are the eyes of a tiger, broken by two black slitted pupils against translucent emerald.

No, Alucard amends. They are the eyes of a snake.

It seems Anderson truly has fallen.

'Where?' chokes the priest, voice uncharacteristically frail, quivering with pain, but no fear. Alucard's fingers move to the vocal cords to silence him, brushing over the vulnerable flesh as lightly as the brush of a butterfly's wing. Anderson, even as soulless and lost as he is now, does not give up his pride by flinching away. He stays perfectly still, new serpentine eyes staring up at Alucard, filled with more questions and words than he can ever possibly verbalize.

The spoken question is unimportant, and Alucard does not bother to answer. He instead answers a more pertinent question staring at him from those new eyes. 'The dawn broke,' Alucard says. The sunlight will protect the humans for now, but he can smell rain in the air. The daybreak will be despairingly short-lived, the darkness swift to return.

Anderson looks warily relieved by this news of morning. The priest does not yet know that he will not be able to see the sunlight again, but it is no matter; Anderson was and always will be a creature of the night, whether he acknowledges this or not. He will adapt.

'The Iscariot?' rasps Anderson, and the two words strung together reveal the pain wracking through the priest's damaged body. A few specks of blood leave his lips as he speaks, eyes lidded, and Alucard watches with rapt attention. The deadened organs are wrenching back to life; the pain must be unbelievable.

'Dead,' says Alucard. The flash of pain the rips through Anderson's eyes is nothing short of beautiful, an angry flash of bottle green that looks much like the Anderson he knew before the nail. A sharp cry of agony and fury tears from the priest's throat as he fights to regain his body and sanity, to make sense of the shattered pieces of a whole he once had.

'How?' the priest manages to ground out, fingers twitching as he again tries to grasp something unseen and unheard. Alucard grabs the outstretched hand. The priest recoils with disgust, but Alucard does not loosen his grasp.

Alucard sees no reason to mask the truth. 'You killed them,' says the vampire quietly, no cruelty or viciousness marking his tone, just plaintive fact. 'They gave their lives for you, one-by-one, because of your foolish, faulted pride.'

The restless fidgeting, the sounds coming from the paladin stop immediately as the memories flood back into him. Memories of bombs and Iscariot priests torn asunder as they fought to protect their leader and their honor. Sacrifice that Anderson had not deserved or earned from them after such a betrayal to humanity. His mistake had devoured their souls along with his.

'The nail,' whispers Anderson. Realization dawns in the man's eyes, red tears of anger and fear gathering on his bottom lashes as he begins to realize the magnitude of what he's lost. Anderson's fingers slowly, uncertainly move to the ripped cloth on his chest, where the nail had pierced him. Alucard can feel the fingers he's grasping tremble ever so slightly.

Anderson is scared now; the air is thick with it, and Alucard savors the taste. It's still a deadened taste, but it's beginning to improve. Anderson's body is finally beginning to mend and reform.

'You sold out,' murmurs Alucard irately, but Anderson barely seems to be listening as he explores his wounds. His fingers touch the decayed flesh over his heart, still polluted with sharp thorns and splinters. Black, congealed blood sticks to the ends of the priest's fingertips as he pulls away.

Alucard reaches for the strand of blood, capturing it with deft fingers before bringing it to his lips. He tastes it, tolerating the bitter, slimy substance on his tongue. He tastes infection, and the slightest fragments of splinters that burn his mouth. The nail has no further power, and he doesn't fear as he swallows the blood.

Disgusting or not, it is still Anderson.

'How did I–' Anderson struggles with the question, hand clenching protectively over the gaping hole on his chest, shielding his exposed heart. He looks frustrated and cornered, but still subdued. 'How did I change back?'

Alucard sneers in response, immediately releasing his grasp from the Iscariot. The hand curls slightly, but remains outstretched. Anderson is staring at him with an expression, a desperate expression that only softens Alucard's words minutely.

'You didn't change back,' he says, crimson eyes narrowing. 'You began to decay and die after the nail was ripped from you, and I gave you my blood to compensate. You're nothing but a soulless, empty shell of a vampire now, priest. As is your penance for becoming one of the fallen.'

Anderson starts at this, makes a violent move to get up that is brutally cut short when his body refuses to accommodate such a task. He falls back, weakened, panting heavily.

Alucard laughs at this, but he still somehow sounds unamused. The vampire rises to his feet, kicking the ground to unearth a few lone bayonets that had sunk beneath the sewer's grit. They reflect silvery sunlight up against the ceiling of the sewers, but it is not enough to burn even a vampire.

'Get up,' growls Alucard impatiently. 'Get up and fight me, paladin! If you want to preserve any of who you were, then get up and fight me.'

He can see it in Anderson's eyes, the familiar spark of fire. Anderson struggles to rise, fingers digging into the ground of the dank sewer as he tries to push himself up, but the movement is met with defeat; he hasn't yet mastered the vampiric form.

No matter.

Alucard simply grabs the priest by the cassock, hoisting him to his feet with startling ease. The priest struggles and gnashes, young fangs bared as he tries to resist the forced help, but Alucard doesn't relent.

'Heal yourself, Alexander,' snarls Alucard, harshly jerking the priest close. 'If you are even a fraction of the man I knew, then you will pick up those bayonets and try to strike me down!' The vampire scowls. 'Prove to me you are not simply another monster, rank with cowardice and arrogant pride!'

The vampire pushes the paladin back violently, fully trusting the hate in Anderson's eyes to motivate him to catch his balance, to heal himself with the powers Alucard knows he has. If Anderson can no longer fight for righteousness, he can at least, at the very least, fight for hatred.

Anderson stumbles against the wall, breathing heavily, but his clouded, pained eyes are beginning to clear. The wounds are slow to heal, but Alucard watches as the flesh mends together, and the sickly, infected stench lessens. The scent is replaced by the scent of sweat and adrenaline. Far closer to the authentic Anderson.

'Pick them up,' says Alucard, hand immediately falling to the Jackal at his side. 'Now!'

The paladin snarls in response. 'I can no more pick them up than you can, vampire!' he snaps, holding out his hands, palms upturned. Vampire hands.

'Coward,' taunts Alucard again, holding up the Jackal, leveling the barrel to Anderson's temple. He considers shooting, but decides against it; patience is key, and Anderson is still learning his limits. This fight would be on Anderson's terms, for now.

The first attack is not nearly as clumsy as Alucard had expected; the bayonet had been in Anderson's hand in a flash of angry movement, a downward arc of silver that nearly has Alucard beheaded for the second time in the last few hours. The jackal blocks the sharp blade, a flurry of gold sparks jumping as Anderson's bayonet screeches against barrel of the gun.

For the few moments of battle, it feels familiar. It feels how it used to.

The first rip of the blessed blades into Alucard's flesh is almost a relief, the familiar scent of his own blood soaking the air. Alucard laughs; the pain is nothing, he can barely even feel it. He feels the wrath of the blows, though, as he stares at the vicious eyes boring into him like acid. He can feel Anderson's hate, utterly and completely tangible.

'Is this the best you can manage, traitor?' mocks the vampire with a laugh. The pain rips through his gut as the blade violently twists, and hot blood runs over his abdomen superfluously, but he pays no heed. In this form, blessed blades will do nothing to stop him. Alucard is, however, deeply impressed by how well Anderson is fighting. There was still so much damage… Anderson is still barely held together, a broken doll of a human. He is willing himself to fight on pure determination.

The first shot of the jackal is deafening in the narrow space, echoing down the tunnel and back in harsh waves of resonance. Anderson staggers at the shot, but does not drop. Blood dribbles from his lower lip as his lungs flood with it, but he barely coughs. Anderson retaliates with another lightning fast swipe at the vampire's head, the tip of the blade ripping through the delicate skin of Alucard's neck, blood instantly bubbling and gushing from the wound. The blood surges from Alucard in an impressive display, a streak of crimson splattering over Anderson's face before the wound darkens and begins to mend.

The motions stop in an instant, two bayonets cluttering to the ground. The metallic ring resonates against the walls before disappearing into the darkness. Alucard's hand pauses on the trigger as he watches Anderson's eyes widen, then slowly narrow. A tongue lightly brushes over the dry lips as he tastes Alucard's blood.

Even in the darkness, Alucard sees the eyes dilate black.

Alucard knows that there is no other alternative in the priest's mind. His wrist is caught in Anderson's grasp before he can react, body pulled off balance as a snap of bone deep pain shoots up the length of his arm. Alucard doesn't fight, just chuckles as Anderson's mouth hungrily descends to his throat.

There's barely a sound as Anderson's fangs piece the jugular, and Alucard relents. It has been years since he's been fed from in such a way, and it somehow feels like justice, the final rape of Anderson's tenuous strands of humanity. Anderson is utterly powerless as his mouth begins to desperately capture the beads of blood on Alucard's throat, barely breathing, fingers twitching restively. He's weak.

The trachea buckles under Anderson's bite with an audible crunch, but Alucard only feels the slightest primal apprehension as his air is cut off. He doesn't really need air; the shadows breathe for him, and he wills himself to endure the faint burn of asphyxiation. He contents himself in the feeling of Anderson's lips pressed against his throat. Nourishing the enemy, but gladly.

Alucard draws the shadows around the priest in a mock of an embrace, steadying the man as he wavers. Anderson is drinking unrestrainedly now, drawing the blood so hard into himself it was almost as if he is trying to drink Alucard's soul. His hands are grasping the vampire, not recoiling from the shadows that are slowly seeping around him, cradling his weakened body with ease.

Alucard blankets the priest in the darkness, lets him rest in its gentle grasp. The priest is only held up by them now, surrendering his complete trust to the vampire not to release him. It's almost touching.

Slowly, Alucard's fingertips caress the strands of pale hair at Anderson's temple, relinquishing his life-force to the priest. He urges the fledgling to drink all he can take, to let the powerful substance heal his body and strengthen him.

It is, in many ways, Alucard's way of giving forgiveness. Forgiveness for the foolish sacrifices Anderson has made simply to spite him, forgiveness for the priest who can no longer forgive himself. There is no use for Alucard's anger now; Anderson will punish himself for eternity, loathe his own existence with burning vigor.

The drinking ends at Anderson's discretion, although Alucard is surprised when it does, that the new vampire does not try to drain him completely. The priest is still starving; Alucard can tell by the way every breath is a deep, slow inhale, tasting the scent of blood in the air. Savoring it. But Anderson is exhausted, and the primal vampiric instincts are urging him to rest after the meal, let his body mend in silence.

Alucard kneels with the priest in his arms, embracing the now warm body within his shadows. The paladin's eyes are already closed, breathing heavy, but he no longer sounds like a drowning man gasping desperately for life. Alucard hears the priest murmur names he does not recognize, people he had lost in the night.

Alucard offers solace by caressing the restive body with the tangible darkness, soothing the loneliness, but he knows that such a gesture is not nearly enough to ease the priest's agony. It is simply a physical comfort to a tired body, and Alucard cannot bring himself to delve deeper and comfort the shattered soul; the forgiveness means nothing in that respect. He knows he cannot end the inner suffering and the karma of a man who needs punishment.

Carefully, Alucard preens away the splinters and fallen thorns sticking to Anderson's clothing, wincing just faintly at the burn of them. He tosses them into the mud, feels relieved as the fresh scent dissipates into nothingness. It is a scent he will forever recall and loathe, a harbinger of the worst kind of evil.

But not everything has been lost, muses Alucard. His fingertip traces another sacred crimson tear on the paladin's cheek.

There still are remnants of a soul. Broken, defeated, and incomplete. But there was still something that distinguishes Alexander from ghouls and demons. Alucard doubts he will ever find any tangible evidence of it, yet… He simply knows it exists.

The priest murmurs a name Alucard does recognize, and he quietly watches the priest's features, gaze locked and intense as he watches the lips quietly form one single word.

'Alucard.'

A memory, an unconscious plea for help, a curse? Alucard wonders at this, tempted to spy on the priest's dreams, but he knows now is not the time. He bows his head, listening closely to every wisp of breath, to the heartbeat quietly thrumming inside. The priest has fallen silent now, sleep complete. Alucard determines that whatever incarnation of himself that had appeared to the priest has soothed him enough to let his mind rest.

They are both utterly still for a long time. Alucard stares down with unblinking eyes at the man resting in the shadows. Even unconsciously, the priest's emotions seem to be projecting, and Alucard can almost feel the loneliness. He brings the creature closer, shadows of himself curling around the body in an effort to soothe the feeling away. His lips brush against the temple, and he breathes in the scent of Anderson's hair, relishing in the strange feeling that washes over him at the gesture. It is a calm feeling, unusually serene, the briefest moment of clarity.

Alucard tilts his head and breathes over the man's parted lips, letting their air, their life mingle. He can taste his own blood on the man's breath, a taste that's not at all unappealing, but there's another scent too. Living tissue, a healing body. Anderson is no longer a simple animated corpse.

Feather light, Alucard lets his lips tenuously brush against Anderson's, the faintest contact of flesh, warm and bruised from the feed. Anderson tastes alive, far more alive than a vampire, but Alucard knows that he is simply a creature of his own kind now.

The priest stirs only faintly, but Alucard can tell from the uneven breaths the priest's now inexplicably awake; the man sleeps through pain, internal agony, yet he does not sleep through a kiss. Somehow, Alucard feels contented by this knowledge, as if it explains everything about the priest in his arms, which it does and it doesn't.

Nonetheless, he does not part from the creature, kneels with him close, foreheads gently pressed together. His hair fans around Anderson in gentle waves, and he feels the tips of the priest's fingertips ghosting over the strands of it, a caress. It's only a faint touch, but enough to assure Alucard that the proffered comfort is not unwelcome.

'Beloved enemy,' purrs the vampire quietly, letting his mouth again brush against the priest's as he speaks. The words sound just as fitting now as they did in the heat of battle, just as right. He savors the sound of them, savors the pale green eyes looking up at him with an expression that seems almost too calm to be Anderson's.

Alucard isn't entirely surprised when the priest indulges in a deep kiss, but is surprised by the tenderness behind it. He has imagined, many times in the past, that Anderson's kisses would be harsh and biting. But he simply presses his lips to Alucard's, nothing forced or hurried, the moist tongue brushing against Alucard's just enough to incite his lust. Any other place, any other time, Alucard knows he would have easily succumbed to his bodily urges, but everything about the now tells him that he cannot. Not in this filth, not when Anderson is so drained.

Patience is nothing new, and Alucard realizes he may have to exercise this virtue for some time to come. But Anderson is a part of him now, bound by blood and shadows; there would be time.

So Alucard holds the priest as he sleeps, listening to the soft brush of wind outside as the morning progresses. Time passes and Anderson sleeps, hands coiling into Alucard's clothes like twin vices. The sounds of rain begin to ring through the tunnel as evening approaches. Alucard does not move from his vigil, holds the priest until it is time, until the night falls. He will have to bring Anderson to his feet when the battle arises, and he does not revel in the task, but he knows he will do it anyway.

Silently, the two monsters embrace in the dank shadows, and wait for the night to come.