Walter C. Dornez

Walter C. Dornez
Publication information
Publisher	Young King OURs
First appearance	Hellsing volume 1
Created by	Kouta Hirano
In-story information
Alter ego	Walter C. Dornez
Team affiliations	Millennium, Hellsing, British Crown
Notable aliases	Angel of Death
Abilities	Old Walter: wields high-velocity microfilament wires with incredible skill and precision, Martial artist, Acrobat. As Millenium's weapon (so far): restored (possibly eternal) youth, regeneration + the previous.

Walter C. Dornez (ウォルター・C（クム）・ドルネーズ, Worutā C. (kumu) Dorunēzu) is a fictional character in the Hellsing anime and manga series created by Kouta Hirano. Walter is a member of a fictional organization called Millennium. He previously served as a member of the fictional Hellsing Organization, and also as the retainer of the Hellsing family. In the TV and OVA series, his seiyū is Motomu Kiyokawa, and the English dub is by Ralph Lister.

As a Hellsing operative

Walter has lived with the Hellsing family for perhaps his entire life. Hellsing: The Dawn records Walter and Alucard (in the body of a little girl) storming Millennium's base during World War II in Warsaw, Poland, and putting an end to their first attempt at creating an army of artificial vampires.[1]

In modern times, Walter serves primarily as Integra's butler and also makes special weapons for use by Hellsing's vampires, Alucard and Seras Victoria. However, he is still one of the organization's most capable operatives, wielding high-velocity microfilament wires with incredible skill and precision. Walter's efficiency and power was so great that he earned the nickname the "Angel of Death," and even at the age of 69, Walter can still rip his way through hordes of the undead. In the manga, he also helps Integra make numerous difficult choices that Alucard occasionally poses, such as whether or not to kill innocent humans in order to achieve mission objectives.

Some have also noticed that Walter possesses a somewhat vicious and possibly even sadistic attitude before being openly revealed as a Millennium operative. This is shown in the battle against Jan Valentine where Walter repeats Jan's end of life suggestions back to him and also chooses to inflict non-fatal and even superficial wounds instead of completely immobilizing or killing him. Examples of these less than necessary attacks are that in place of removing Jan's leg as a viable target, Walter instead takes off his arm and also for no apparent reason rips out one of Jan's lip piercings.

Also in his youth he displayed a similar attitude when insulting and mocking the Major and gleefully slicing up the Millennium soldiers. He even refers to the artificial vampires as babies when they threaten Integra.

As Millennium's secret weapon

In the latest developments of the main Hellsing storyline, Walter is captured by The Captain of the Millennium Organization during their invasion of England. He has gone through a similar process to the Major and the Doc troops (although hastily conducted, according to the Doc), and now appears thirty or so years younger, serving as Millennium's new, brainwashed, secret weapon (when the Major sees the finished product, he remarks "It was determined 55 years ago that you would join us"). Whether or not this brainwashing is permanent remains to be seen. In the one of the most recent chapters of Hellsing, Walter has leaped from his perch on one of Alucard's stakes to confront him, crushing what was left of Alexander Anderson underfoot, saying that people become trash once they are dead, and that trash should not be mourned for. He then tells everyone he was brainwashed and rejuivinated. Enraged by his desecration of Father Anderson's remains, Yumie attacks him, but is easily outmatched and cut into pieces in a single move. After listening as Walter explains himself, Alucard criticizes his decision, saying that his old, aged body was many times more beautiful than his new, unaturally youthful one. The fanbase tends to refer to this version of Walter as 'Dark Walter'.

In the TV series, Walter is never artificailly rejuvinated, instead saving Integra and then crashing in a helicopter. He later appears on a stretcher and mentions Alucard as "the true immortal vampire."

Recent events

In chapter 75 of the Hellsing manga, Sir Hugh Islands, the acting leader of the Convention of Twelve, comes to the conclusion that Walter had in fact been betraying his superiors for quite some time, even before the second coming of Millennium and possibly even since the days of the World War II. He mentions that he had foresaw Richard Hellsing's attempted coup of the Hellsing Foundation and also Richard's assassination attempt on Integra, and had quite specifically warned Walter of it, charging him with protecting her; and yet, despite his warning, Walter was nowhere to be found on that day. Therefore it is suggested that Alucard's awakening was also orchestrated by Walter; his convenient absence left Integra with no other choice but to release Alucard, whom Arthur Hellsing (Integra's father) had purposefully sealed away, thinking him to be too dangerous to use as a weapon.

Walter's motive for forcing the release of Alucard, if true, remains to be seen. Other bits of evidence suggesting that Walter is a traitor include the Valentine brothers' mysterious knowledge of the location of the Hellsing mansion, Walter's suspicious memory lapse when Millennium resurfaces (he does not seem to remember storming and destroying Millennium's base in World War II, but claims that he does after Alucard prods him), and the strange omission of the fight scene between Walter and his apparent rival, the Captain.

In chapter 78, the battle between Walter and Alucard begins. Alucard lunges at Walter amidst a flurry of bats, reaching out to grab his face, but Walter easily severs Alucard's arm with his wires. The wires then wrap around Alucard's leg, and Walter tosses him into a building. Alucard then attempts to shoot Walter with the Casull, but Walter deflects the bullets with square, mesh-like barriers, formed from his wires. Alucard summons his hellhound, which Walter calls Baskerville, and it is sliced in two. Finally, Alucard aims the Jackal at Walter, but it explodes and maims his remaining hand; Doc is shown holding his remote control, which has a button marked "JACAL" (sic). Although we do not know exactly how long Walter has been betraying Hellsing, we can confirm that Walter's betrayal occurred before the beginning of the manga storyline, since Walter gave the Jackal to Alucard in volume 2.

On the last page of chapter 78, Luke Valentine emerges from the remains of Baskerville.

In chapter 79, Walter, using his wires like puppet strings, gains control of both Alucard's Hellhound and Luke Valentine, and uses them to attack Alucard. Alucard makes short work of the two however, and we are then shown Walter falling to the ground and coughing up blood. His wires, for the first time, go slack. It is implied that Walter's time is short as his conversion was a rushed and flawed process.

In chapter 80, Walter summons up the last vestiges of his strength and uses his wires to sever Alucard's arms and legs, to cut his torso in half, and to suspend him helplessly in the air. Walter once again falls to the ground, seized by pain. When he stands up, his age has regressed, and he appears as he did during Hellsing: The Dawn, as a 14-year-old boy. Walter then grabs a piece of rebar and attacks Alucard, impaling him through the chest. It is revealed that the Alucard that Walter had attacked was a decoy, created by Alucard from Luke Valentine's remains. Luke Valentine (supposedly) dies, and Alucard appears behind Walter. Alucard now appears as he did in The Dawn ("Girlycard"), although the reasons for this are as yet unclear (it is assumed that he assumed his form on his own accord, perhaps to psyche Walter out). Alucard punches Walter, and now appears to have the upper hand.

The battle continues with Alucard releasing his full strength, drinking up the blood of the entire city. As he does so, the manga spends a few chapters with other characters. Upon chapter 87, Alucard brags that he is victorious, and teases Walter about being the only servant to his mistress (Intrega) and having a servant of his own (Seras) which might be implied that Walter might be jealous of the lack of attention in the Hellsing Organization. Behind Alucard Schrodinger commits suicide, and drops his body into the blood that Alucard is drinking, the Major having stated that he planned to poison Alucard. After Alucard brags about Millennium's inability to defeat him, a voice states, "No, you lose, Alucard." Walter knows of this, and begs the Major to stop, to let him beat Alucard on his own, to no avail.

Fans have yet to see whether or not Walter is permanently a villain, it was not explained very thoroughly whether Walter had been planning this from the beginning or if he has been simply brainwashed. It is mentioned that Millenium erased his memories of Hellsing, yet his hatred and rivalry toward Alucard seem to stem from far back. Fans commonly make the mistake of thinking the new Walter turned vampire like the many Millennium soldiers. However it is never mentioned that Walter has become anything of the sort, even Hirano himself explains at the back of volume 7 of the manga that he has had his youth restored. This is relevant to the fact that neither the Doc nor the Major have aged since the events of The Dawn.

Powers and abilities

As a human, Walter possessed tremendous skill and speed. Even in his old age, he was able to easily dodge bullets from assault rifles at inhuman speeds. He was able to take out several low-ranked artificial vampires and a large amount of ghouls with ease.

His primary weapons are a pair of razor-sharp wires, which he controls like an extension of his own body. These wires are shown to be able to cut through steel and easily slice through the Vatican helicopters. These have been nicknamed the "Dental Floss of Death" by Hellsing fandom, presumably from the many images of Walter holding the wires clenched between his teeth.

Considering that he himself had remarked that he had been not as good as he used to (This might be just an intimidation tactic used to frighten Jan Valentine), he demonstrated superhuman abilities at advanced age. One can only wonder how powerful Walter might have been in his prime. And fan's get to see this when Walter's youth restored by Millennium, all of his potential was also restored, making him an opponent strong enough to fight a fully-powered Alucard one-on-one. He is so strong, that when the transformed walter first appears in the manga, his micro-filaments wrap around several buildings and slice them in half, with no evidence of any physical strain on Walter's part.

Name

Walter's middle initial, C., is pronounced in full in the OVA series as "クム" (kumu). "クム" also accompanies the "C" as furigana in chapter 74, Relics. This is the Japanese transliteration of the Latin word cum, which means "with". There is much disagreement over the romanization of his surname, with the most common variants being Dorne, Dornez, Dornes, Dolnez, and Dollneaz. This is confused even more by the addition of a second "d" in some variants of his name (i.e. Ddollneaz). But on the back cover of the original Japanese version of manga vol.4 Walter's name is written: "Walter Cumm Ddollneazz"