Set in the "Pulp Hellsing" timeline _not_ in the "Dances
Set To The Music Of Time" timeline.
*************************************************
DANCES SET TO THE MUSIC OF TIME
An Epic History of Humanity
From The Age of Silver
To The Age of Crystal
And Beyond
http://rakhal.com/florestica/elsa-bibat/index.html
Other fanfiction by the same author:
http://rakhal.com/florestica/elsa-bibat/index.html
Kindly archived by Larry F and
The Lost Library of Florestica:
http://rakhal.com/florestica/
*************************************************
-- Attached file included as plaintext by Ecartis --
-- File: hellp.txt
**********************************************************************
Disclaimer:
Hellsing is owned by Hirano Kouta. All licenses belong to the proper
people. This is used without permission.
The Shadow was created by Walter Gibson. All licenses and rights
belong to the proper people. This is used without permission.
This disclaimer also applies to several intellectual properties
referred to in the text. Please be guided accordingly.
This file can be freely distributed so long as it appears in its
complete form and proper credit given. No part may be reproduced for
monetary gain without permission from the author.
**********************************************************************
Chapter 5 Diogenes
"Why do I keep on doing this?"
That was the question on Harold Lister's lips as he pushed through
into the Diogenes Club's employee section.
"Because no one else would take you?"
Jack Wildman's rejoinder stung since it was rather close to the
truth. Lister was not exactly top grade material for a servant. Almost
every household he had been in had eventually thrown him out. Only in
Diogenes, where eccentricity was the norm, had Harry stayed on for more
than six months.
"Sod off, Jack."
Wildman only chuckled.
"What is it this time, Harry? Having difficulty with sign language?"
Harry Lister's primary problem with the Club was that the hundred
year rule of silence still held. Club members used a strange form of
sign language that was like no other in the world, finger twiddlings
mixed with strange positions in the air all with the speed of telegraph
operators.
"No. Some bloke came into the Stranger's Room and requested a
second-story."
Jack whistled appreciatively. One of those.
'Second-story' was the euphemism that the servants used to call the
second floor of the Diogenes Club, probably the most secretive place in
the entirety of London. Visitors had come and gone in strange hours to
that mysterious place and almost always something happened in the
newspapers.
"So what's the problem then? You've dealt with folks like that since
you've arrived. You just don't talk about it."
"This particular egg's kind of hard not to talk about. Heard of
Cranston?"
Jack blinked.
"Who hasn't? Another reclusive multimillionaire from a line of
reclusive multimillionaires. If you ask me there's something in American
water that makes all of 'em go bonkers. Pfah, give me good decent
English nobility anyday."
"Well, make three guesses who the bloke off the street was and the
first two are wrong."
"You don't mean Cranston was the fellow who requested a second-
story?"
"That's what I mean. Couldn't believe it myself, but that's what the
card from the Cobalt Club says."
Jack whistled another long low whistle. Harry was always irritated
by it, since it had that slight trilling tone that made it sound like
Wildman was imitating a bird or something. But he agreed with the
sentiment. The Cobalt Club was America's Diogenes, though he had heard
it was plenty more relaxed than it was here.
"So... what's this Cranston bloke look like?" There was a strange
glow in Wildman's eyes when he asked the question. Lister could almost
see the golden flecks in Jack's eyes dancing around. But, that must have
just been a trick of the light.
"If you want to find out, you just look, Wildman. You got leave to
go up the second-story, I don't."
"Oh, c'mon, Harry. He's probably in the room already and I can't
exactly sneak in."
"Well, you'll see him sooner or later. But trust me, be ready for
the fright of your life."
"Why's that?"
Eyes that held a strange lambent glow, like a predator's... a pale
thin hawk face like a mask, as if there was another face beneath. Harry
shook himself and looked up at the taller man's gold-flecked eyes.
"Trust me, Jack. Even you'd be frightened."
The Star Chamber of the Diogenes Club was probably the safest place
in all of London. It was guarded by the best that money could buy and
was protected by several structural safeguards from any natural or
unnatural disaster. All of its occupants had weathered many adventures
of their own and faced death in various encounters. But when the entity
calling itself Kenneth Clarke Cranston entered, all six members of
Diogenes' head council felt a tremble of fear.
"I apologize. Forgot about that."
The fear disappeared like it wasn't there. Sir Gerald Tarrant
narrowed his eyes. The being before him never forgot. It just wanted to
remind them of who had power here.
"No worry, old boy. Have a cigar." There was a smile on the lips of
the corpulent Duke de Richelieu, it seemed to be traditional for a fat
man to be on the council, as he sent a cigar flying towards their guest.
Cranston plucked it out of the air with skill.
"Ah. Forgot. Here's a lighter." Another flick of the wrist, de
Richelieu was deadly in his own manner, and the being before them caught
a bright object. The closed hand began to smoke. The duke looked almost
apologetic that Tarrant almost bought it himself.
"Sorry about that. I am getting forgetful in my old age."
Cranston arched an eyebrow as he held up his smoking hand and lit
the cigar with the offered light. Holding it up, the lighter glistened
in the dim light.
"Silver. Touche, duke." Then flung it back in a slow, languid
manner. The duke caught it deftly and Gerald thought for a moment that
he would stand up and bow.
"Now that we've established pack dominance, shouldn't we be getting
to business?" The clear voice of Miranda Mitchison was droll. Being the
only woman to have ever succesfully been admitted into the club, she
always managed to rebuke her co-members into submission. She was
technically MI-5, but the triple-digit division and the letter branches
had always answered to Diogenes in the end. She reminded him of a
tougher Modesty, another surrogate child that he had outlived.
"Oh, hush, Miranda. Can't you see we're just being friendly to the
bloke?" That was Howard Blakeney, needling Miranda again. If this were a
schoolyard I'd say those two were attracted to each other, Tarrant
smugly thought. Blakeney had mastered the art of playing the fop, but
those delicate hands of his had killed more men for Queen and Country
than other members combined. He was currently answering Miranda's glare
with a relaxed, almost sleepy, look.
"Strange name to use, Mr. Allard," John Steed, another former field
agent, declared, using the name that he knew the entity before them by,
as he looked over the card that the being before them had presented
downstairs. "'Kenneth Clarke' indeed. Any idea of where that particular
contemporary of yours is?"
"In the company of another Doctor in a police call-box, I believe."
Vagueness and obscurity, it seemed, was still the order of the day.
"Ah, yes. The legendary police call-box. If I had a penny for how
many times I have to listen to Lethbridge-Stewart..." Brigadier General
Liam Hannay just shook his snowy mane. The general looked at Cranston
with a jaundiced eye. "So, what brings the world's greatest detective to
our humble quarters?"
The hawkish face smiled. In the dim light, the shadows around him
seemed to swim and ripple. The hand, girasol ring shifting color from
blue to violet to red, ran through black hair, smoothing it back. Red
eyes glowed faintly, in rhythm with the crimson tip of the smoking cigar
in the mouth. The silence was thick enough to cut with a knife. The
council's attention was glued to Cranston as he began.
"I have some things I'd like to tell you about."
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