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There should only ever have been one.
A single virtue would always rise above the rest; without order, even the mighty fall from delight to despair. There simply wasn’t room for another option—that which grew from meek and mild should inherit everything.
(“Stop it! I wrote my name on it, so it’s mine.”)
Manacles crept like thorny vines across his throat, arms, legs; the agony kept his mind focused on that searing swell of infinite hatred. The human form divided like so much useless, bleeding meat.
Not human anymore. No longer weak.
Different, changed piece by piece into something so much more and so much worse, filthy and twisted and begging for it all to end, barely the shadow of what he used to be. Until he could only silently beg for the torture to end. Make it stop. Stop.
The last edict was to bury that sick crimson rose, by this point hardly more than a pile of rot. Apathy, the strongest of poisons. A black, creeping sickness under his skin, crawling and skittering like a thousand tiny insects.
The surroundings here were too dark, no audible sounds beyond the roar of the rushing tide. Demon-light shone off the sluices of water spraying into the endless void. Nobody would be able to tell if someone something ever reached the bottom. Do not fall, and do not forget.
Two sides of the same coin; something greater, and something lesser that should have been sawn off like flesh from the bone. Weak. Pitiful. Desperate.
He stood at the precipice because he had yet to move; never forward, never back. There was no way back anymore.
If only you never existed, a familiar voice cut deep and vicious. Somewhere further down than anyone had ever thought to look, he couldn’t help but agree. (Only one.)
His hand tightened, ignoring the steady drip, drip, drip of blood but god, it hurt so much. There was nothing left for him here. The only thing that remained was that same vast, open emptiness. It would only take one step. Do not forget.
Maybe there won’t be anything waiting for him. There never was.
He took one breath, two, and jumped—
Dante wakes up.
He lays still and groans, eyes staying firmly closed to fully bask in the luxurious feeling of being warm, cosy, and safe. Somehow, it feels like it had been a long time coming.
An unidentifiable feeling starts niggling incessantly at the back of his mind, almost as if he’s forgotten something really important, but grogginess catches up a moment later and sweeps it away. Another five minutes.
“‘S a nice dream,” Dante mumbles to himself, just because he can, and snuggles down further in the hopes that those awful things like duty and responsibility will wait a bit longer, too.
Unfortunately, whatever he’s lying against stiffens up, lowering the comfort factor and setting off a number of internal alarm bells. Adrenaline immediately shoots through his veins and he rears back, muscles clenched in preparation to fight, only to sit up and see—
“Vergil?” Oh, shit. Dante blinks the sleep from his eyes hastily and looks around the room: blinds open to let in the late morning sun, empty glass by the side of the bed, scattered piles of neatly stacked books. Huh.
And, of course, directly in front of him: a sleep-rumpled and rather irate-looking twin.
Vergil’s voice is rough when he speaks. “This place… Dante.” Vergil stares at him intensely for a long moment. A really long moment. Too long a moment.
Dante clears his throat awkwardly.
“Uh… look, sorry for ending up in your room again, I guess. Not that I did it on purpose or anything,” he adds hastily, “because I didn’t! It’s just warmer here and I, um, sleepwalked or something.” He peters off at the end and crosses his fingers behind his back.
Dante knows they’re supposed to be way too old for this kind of thing by now—it’s been years since they shared the same bedroom, after all—but sometimes he can’t help it. When those tough days turn into tougher nights, he needs to know that his twin is nearby.
Vergil continues to stare at him with an odd look of disbelief, eyebrows raised, before finally biting out, “Ridiculous.”
Dante waits, ready for the inevitable tirade, but… that’s it?
Wow. That’s practically a ‘go ahead, I approve of your plebeian cuddling ways’ from Mr. Uptight. Dante grins.
“You’re in a good mood today, huh? Hey, you wanna go and—”
Vergil interrupts him. “I will allow you this much for now, brother, but do not mistake my leniency for approval, nor encouragement.”
Dante opens his mouth, then closes it again. “Yeah, okay. Whatever. Do you want to go spar after breakfast? I bet we can get father to loan us some of the cool swords.”
At that, Vergil seems to almost… deflate. Dante would even go so far as to say he looks a bit confused, which is kind of silly considering that he’s only been asking the same question just about every day for literally years.
“Yes,” Vergil says after a beat of silence, “perhaps I do.” He clambers off the side of the bed, and tacks on as if it were a mere afterthought, like Dante couldn’t possibly catch the tense note in his voice, “The Rebellion? Yamato?”
Dante makes a face. “I mean, I’d totally be up for that, but you’d have to be the one to try and convince father.”
Vergil frowns but nonetheless nods his assent, so Dante quickly scurries away to go and get ready for the day. He’s still smiling fifteen minutes later after getting showered and dressed, simply because he must be in for one lucky day if Vergil’s decided to give in that easily.
Even if it had been because Vergil wanted to let off some steam, hell, Dante could work with that. He practically lived for that. Some of their best matches came from when he’d pissed Vergil off to the brink of murder.
Dante meets up with him again for breakfast in the eastern dining room—the one with the opening to the garden, since Dante usually likes to run off some post-meal energy and Vergil gets to lean against the railing and read until he stops pretending he can’t be goaded into a game of Make Dante Shut Up.
It is, unfortunately for Dante, one of Vergil’s favourite games. Perhaps that should be less than surprising considering he always wins in the end, one way or another.
By the time he gets there, breakfast has already been laid out in a decadent spread of golden toast, ripe fruit, and thick slices of honey-baked ham. Dante immediately swipes a piece from right under Vergil’s nose and chews it obnoxiously, savouring the taste which is all the sweeter for his twin’s baleful glare.
“What? Something the matter?” Dante asks innocently. Good mood and winning streak be damned, he has a job as the younger sibling to annoy the ever-living shit out of his brother. And Dante takes that particular job very, very seriously.
Vergil remains strangely silent, his plate untouched. Dante huffs an annoyed sigh and slows his eating, paying more attention to the way Vergil’s eyes roam over the room restlessly, dragging a slow circuit over the soft furnishing before coming to rest on Dante once more.
Vergil demands, “Dante, what is this?” as if it’s a totally normal and not at all confusing question.
“Breakfast?” Seriously, this guy.
Vergil scowls, making no motion to eat whatsoever. “Unforgivable. Of course you would create this kind of charade. What do you hope to accomplish like this?”
Dante lowers his fork, bewildered. “Gee, I don’t know. Not being hungry? It’s really not that complicated. Not everyone’s looking to solve all of the world’s problems before noon, you know.”
Vergil goes quiet again for a moment.
“Dante… doesn’t it strike you as odd that we are the only ones here?”
Something ominous rings out with that question, a reverberation caught within the suddenly cramped walls of the dining room. A feeling of foreboding churns in Dante’s stomach. Inexplicably, he wants to say don’t do it. But that wouldn’t make any sense, so he doesn’t.
Instead, he replies, “What do you mean? Of course it’s just us.”
Vergil’s hand curls on the tabletop. The rising tension coils tighter until it feels like all the crockery has begun to shake, vibrations running through the floorboards. Dante wonders distantly whether they’d both be punished if something got broken again, especially if it’s the set of plates with gold trim that mother favours.
Vergil lets out a slow breath, not quite a sigh. “Answer me this, then,” he says, “who made this food?”
Dante blinks slowly, time crawling like molasses while he mulls over the question. He must still be tired because his mind stalls on the answer, struggling to remember. To be fair, it’s not the kind of thing he usually pays attention to. “The kitchen staff,” he answers lamely. “I forget their names, though.”
Mother would probably smack him for that. After all, they are employees, not servants. Heck, in their remote countryside home, they’re practically family. And yet he only has vague memories of begging for leftover pastries from the cook. A clean white apron and the smell of freshly baked bread, but nothing more specific than that.
Vergil unclenches his fist carefully and straightens, a purposeful display of calm. “Oh? And where are they? Have they left the premises entirely?” He leans back in as if he’s sharing a secret and Dante, helplessly, hunches forward as well. “Pay attention to your surroundings. Can you hear it?”
Dante shifts uncomfortably, disconcerted by the way his brother now seems to be treating him like a schoolchild in need of lessons, and yet strangely lacks the usual condescension and ire. He tilts his head and strains, to no avail.
“You’ve noticed now, haven’t you,” Vergil confirms with some satisfaction. “Not a single sound. No footsteps, no heartbeats, not even the chirping of an insect. We are completely alone here.”
Isolated. Vulnerable.
That’s not right, though. His own heartbeat thunders in his ears. The shaking grows more intense, but when Dante looks up—how long had he been staring at the tablecloth?—everything is completely still, not a teaspoon out of place.
The table is set for four.
“Who’d want to be alone with you?” Dante mumbles, but he can hardly hear his own voice. What’s going on?
The world before him is fuzzy except for Vergil’s eyes; sharp, almost cruel. “Wake up, Dante. If you dally anymore, I will leave you behind.”
His words cut through like a knife. Left behind again, like it never even mattered, like he never mattered. Always one step behind, a pathetic little lost boy gnawing at the scraps. Of course Vergil would say that, when he’s only ever cared about one thing and it sure as hell isn’t family—
Something is cracking and Dante can’t tell if it’s the wood turning to splinters beneath his hands or reality itself.
He’s forgetting something. White and red, a motorcycle revving somewhere in the distance. The loud boom of thunder followed by that never-ending rain. A fractured photo frame.
If only you never existed.
(Half of an amulet, lost forever.)
Dante jolts in his chair as the patio doors swing open with a sudden gust of wind and slam against the walls, glass rattling.
Voices drift in, echoing threads of sound filtering through rustling foliage. Two intonations, one dark and rough, the other a lighter, honeyed lilt. Both of them are so familiar it makes his heart ache.
That’s silly. There’s no reason to feel nostalgic when he hears their parents every day. Dante blinks, looks down at his barely-touched food, and shovels another bite into his mouth.
Vergil continues to disregard his own plate, gaze now focused unwaveringly on the source of the disturbance. Dante frowns.
“Geez, you’re so rude. It’s not like anyone put effort into making the food you’re ignoring or anything,” Dante drawls, spinning the knife idly in his fingers before flicking it in Vergil’s direction with a twitch of his fingers.
Vergil’s hand snaps up and catches the blade neatly. “Clearly, one of us is being uncouth. Don’t pretend this is some kind of carelessness on your part, Dante.”
So much for the good mood. He really just can’t help himself sometimes.
“Want to take it outside then? Since you’re so against unnecessary mess and all that.” Dante smirks as Vergil’s eyes flash a menacing, predatory blue, feeling the answering pull in his own body undoubtedly mirroring his twin.
The distant murmuring stops.
“Boys! No fighting at the table,” one of the voices from outside cuts in, shattering the moment. Vergil stills immediately.
“Mother, I’m not the one who started it!” Dante calls back, angling his head so the sound carries better. “Not this time, anyway.”
The last part is quiet enough that she probably didn’t hear him past the dense layer of trees, dappled sunlight barely peeking through. “Even so, you should have better restraint, Dante.” Her voice echoes faintly with a note of laughter. “I’m not asking you to be like your brother, just the best version of yourself.”
Dante rolls his eyes at that because sure, she says that, then kicks Vergil’s chair leg when he continues his impression of a statue. He hisses, “C’mon, tell mother it wasn’t my fault.”
If anything, Vergil only seems to get even angrier.
“You would dare,” he snarls, then visibly restrains himself yet again, muscles relaxed even as his eyes have yet to fade back to their regular shade of blue.
Dante worries about him at times like this, his self-imposed leash pulled tight enough to choke. That shit can’t be healthy.
“So this is the path you have chosen,” Vergil says, no doubt ignorant to the way it makes him sound like an over-the-top dramatic douchebag. “So be it. I can only guess as to what game you would have us do next. Shall we continue to play house like two good little children, or do you want to hold hands and go skipping into town?”
Such a douchebag.
Still, Dante considers. “Going to town might not be too bad. We could try and find a lesser demon nest, like maybe some Shadows or Kyklops. You could even go to that bookstore you’re always sneaking off to,” he adds soothingly, silently praying for his brother to take the bait.
Vergil actually seems surprised. “You knew about—“
“Hold on,” that other voice interjects, a low rumble of disapproval. “There have been some… disturbances in town recently. Those with ties to the Underworld are not welcome there for the time being.”
It doesn’t matter how far away he is. Their father’s voice has always had a certain quality which makes it sound like he’s standing right behind you.
Mother murmurs something indistinguishable but consoling. Sparda’s voice continues, “This is not a punishment. However, know that for the foreseeable future, the two of you are not to leave the mansion grounds.”
Dante’s mouth drops open, ready to argue the point, but when he turns to see what Vergil’s take on it all is, he notices that his brother is strangely pale.
Yet Vergil’s tone is completely steady when he asks, faux-casually, “Why do our parents not show their faces, Dante?”
Dante scrunches his nose, listening to Eva’s laugh ring out joyfully amidst the morning birdsong. “I guess they’re busy being gross and mushy.” He slumps over his empty plate, nearly knocking over the pitcher of juice. “What do you want to do instead? Since we can’t go out or whatever.”
Vergil quietly pours himself some tea and swirls the liquid around in the cup. “From what I remember, I’m surprised we don’t have any other obligations,” he says slowly, “since these things are usually planned ahead of time. Most people don’t spend every moment doing exactly as they please, Dante.”
Eva’s voice returns, this time from even further away. “You can rest for now, boys, but your new tutor should be arriving soon, and you should both go and say hello when he gets here!”
Dante jerks upright immediately, utterly appalled.
“I don’t remember having to do this,” he complains. “It’s the weekend.” Also, aren’t they past the age of having to listen to tutors? Home-schooling might just be the worst part of being half-demon.
Dante tries to calculate when normal teenagers stop having to go to school, but he can’t quite recall. Ugh. And the day had started off so well, too. Talk about everything going downhill at breakneck speed.
Vergil sips at his tea, looking thoughtful. “This should be interesting.” And then tacks on, “Because you’re such an idiot.”
“Hey, now, that’s just uncalled for.”
After that, Vergil disappears for a while to do god only knows what, and Dante putters around aimlessly, accomplishing very little in a manner which in no way resembles sulking.
By the time their tutor arrives, it’s already late afternoon. Despite his earlier misgivings, Dante perks up at the sound of three sharp raps on the front door, if only due to the fact that he’s now bored out of his mind and desperate for any kind of stimulation.
But hey, whoever it is wouldn’t really be teaching them this late in the day, right? …Right?
Dante ambles down to the entrance hall and slumps against the wall, drumming his fingers idly against his thighs. It should feel like victory to be the first one there for a change, but there’s no one around to gloat to.
Less than a minute later, he senses the presence of another headed in his direction and straightens, now disconcerted by Vergil’s pointed absence. Alarmed, he considers the terrifying prospect of having to make small talk alone. With a teacher.
Damn it, Vergil.
A tall, bespectacled man enters the room from the side door and seems visibly relieved to see him. “My apologies for the run around,” he says politely, “I must have missed you on the way in.”
Dante resists the urge to fidget uncomfortably. “Nah, it’s my fault for leaving you waiting. Don’t worry about it.”
“On the contrary, I was far too impatient to introduce myself properly. My name is Bradley.” They shake hands and Dante notes a surprisingly firm grip.
“Shall we find somewhere to sit? I’d like to go over some things with you first.”
Dante leads the way to the lounge room, dithering briefly while Bradley takes a spot at one of the plush armchairs. He clears his throat. “Just so you‘re aware, we’re also waiting on my brother to turn up. So, uh, we can’t start anything too complicated without him here as well,” Dante explains hopefully.
His intentions must be naked on his face because Bradley chuckles warmly. “Not to worry. Today will be for introductions and to get a feel for where your learning is at. We won’t begin lessons just yet; it would be rather cruel to do that while it’s still the weekend.”
Dante takes everything back. This guy is awesome!
They chat for a while and Dante discovers that Bradley teaches a bit of everything but had specifically been hired for his expertise in manners and etiquette. Dante tamps down on his knee-jerk despair and reflects that at least he wouldn’t be suffering this fate alone. Although Vergil might actually enjoy learning about that kind of thing, the weirdo.
It’s at that point, his thoughts inevitably turned to his wayward brother, that the hair on the back of his neck pricks up at the feeling of being watched. He breaks off from the conversation and immediately notices said twin lounging at the door, eyes trained directly on him.
“We had real tutors, you know, Dante,” Vergil says derisively, ignoring Bradley’s presence like a complete sociopath.
Dante, already halfway through beckoning him over, stops and stares at him in horror. “Rude, Vergil,” he admonishes, shooting Bradley an apologetic look.
“Sorry for my brother. He’s not usually like this, I swear,” Dante lies through gritted teeth. “Dropped on his head one too many times as a baby. It gives him uncontrollable bouts of acting like a total dick.”
He feels guilty straight away for swearing in front of the guy who’s going to be teaching them manners of all things, but Vergil just has to steamroll right over his good intentions.
“You trust far too easily, little brother. Would you let any demon into your home so long as they wear a human skin?” Vergil asks mockingly, approaching him one step at a time. “Are you even aware of his nature, or do you delude yourself into painting everything an acceptable shade of human?”
Dante grimaces. “I’m pretty sure that’s not something you’re meant to point out but yes, I do know our new tutor is a demon. Also, I’m not so deep in paranoia that I’d refuse to let him inside. Like you are, I guess.“
Vergil hums in apparent understanding, but the prickle of warning refuses to dissipate.
“Perhaps I have misread what you intend to accomplish. You do get so needy when it comes to companionship, after all.”
That last sentence comes out with a grudgingly sour undertone, meaning that Vergil might actually be showing more honesty than he meant to. Strange, considering Dante doesn’t have a damn clue what he could possibly be upset about. A normal sibling might want some friends of his own, but Vergil? The very thought is laughable.
All things considered, Dante’s surprised he hasn’t started monologuing about human weakness and how showing a single emotion is beneath them or some other nonsense.
“Jealous, huh? Come on, I’m sure you could be as popular as me if you put some effort into it,” Dante jeers, refusing to get up even as Vergil comes to a stop right next to him. Nothing pisses Vergil off quite like refusing to engage him on the rare occasion he feels like being the instigator for a change.
“I suppose my company does not afford you the diversity that you crave. Such a pity the replacements you find are so… lacking,” Vergil says delicately. Not a hint of remorse as the words land between them with all the weight and subtlety of a brick.
Dante sees red.
He’s on his feet before he even realises it, snarling right into Vergil’s stupid, unmoving face. It’s one thing to insult him and something else entirely to imply that his friends are somehow unworthy.
Trust Vergil to know exactly where to hit to make it hurt the most. Dante doesn’t even care that less than a minute ago, he was the one determined not to react. He knows his own weaknesses. When it comes to his twin, he just can’t hold back.
Dante’s fist clenches at his side, longing for the grip of a sword handle. The last wisp of rational thought barely prevents him from punching Vergil right in his smug, self-righteous jaw, no doubt pleased that little brother has once again given him exactly the response he was looking for.
It takes everything Dante has not to act, simply because he spitefully refuses to give Vergil what he wants.
(His actions don’t even make sense. This whole situation is because Vergil is the one who didn’t want to fight earlier.)
“I really don’t get you,” Dante grits out. “What is it that you actually want? I’m absolutely down to kick your ass if that’s what you after.”
Vergil hardly responds, merely rolling his eyes.
Dante clenches his teeth so hard his jaw starts to hurt. “So, are we going to fight or not?”
“Don’t we always,” Vergil says dismissively. It’s not even a question, like it hardly matters to him. Dante wants to tear him to pieces. “Right now, I, for one, am far more interested in sorting out the mess that you’ve started. As much as I dislike our current position, we’re in this together. And as detestable as I find it, the way things stand is only mostly your fault.”
Without consciously intending to, Dante’s hand reaches up and yanks Vergil closer—not that there’s much room left between them at this point—so he can yell right in his stupid face, “Vergil, what are you talking about—are we even having the same conversation? Can you stop it with your cryptic bullshit for once?”
He shoves Vergil aside and walks a good metre or two away just so he can turn back and glare. “I swear I’d be better off talking to a wall. We’re in it together, huh? ‘Cause it sure as hell doesn’t feel like it.” Dante catches his breath and seethes for a moment. “If you’re on my side then maybe you should try a little harder because some days it feels like we’d be better off if we weren’t related at all!”
How dare he try to pin the blame for—for whatever on Dante’s shoulders. And yet, Vergil is the one to retreat now, shock flitting across his features before they shut down completely.
Dante instantly realises exactly what he’s done, reflecting that if ever there was a line they had implicitly agreed never to cross, he’s just done it.
Regret comes crashing down. Dante’s mouth flaps uselessly, excuses crowding the tip of his tongue. His hand stretches out in a pathetic grasping motion, but it’s too late. Vergil, stiff but holding onto a veneer of dignity, leaves the room without another word.
A quiet, polite cough.
Dante whirls around with a horrified, sweeping realisation that this whole time, their new tutor has been sitting in dumbfounded silence as his two students blew up at each other. Kind of an awkward first introduction.
“Uh,” Dante stutters, “So that’s my brother, Vergil.”
He wants to die.
“Yes, I can see that now,” Bradley says agreeably.
Dante has a brief out-of-body experience wondering whether their parents are going to be mad that he and Vergil are having yet another spat, then simply sighs in defeat and returns to his seat. The soft, plush armchair has never been less comfortable.
He doesn’t know entirely what to expect; probably for them to finish going over the lesson plans and wrap things up. It’s been a weird day, and by now it’s very clear that Vergil isn’t going to be re-joining them any time soon.
Instead, Bradley seems oddly hesitant and asks softly, “Pardon my rudeness if you do not wish to answer, but it seems to me that you usually get along better with your brother?”
Dante snorts. “If we do, that’s news to me. To be fair, I’m usually the one acting out and Vergil’s constantly telling me off, but… well,” he shrugs, “Sometimes you’ve got to spice things up.”
We’re so different that if we didn’t look alike no one would believe we’re brothers anyway, he doesn’t say. I want to understand him but I’m afraid of what I would find.
There’s a lot of things he should say, and to people other than a guy he’s barely known for more than a couple of hours. Things he should say to Vergil, if he thought for one second that there was a chance of—
It doesn’t matter. He won’t. The truth of it may as well be written in his bones.
“You should try and clear things up with him later,” Bradley coaxes gently. “Misunderstandings can lead to more hurt feelings down the line.”
Dante makes a noncommittal noise. Just a misunderstanding, huh. “Never mind that for now,” he says, gesturing for them to move on, and tries, “I heard that demons aren’t allowed in town at the moment. You going to be alright?”
Bradley accepts his feeble attempt to change the subject. “It’s not so much that they aren’t allowed. Rather, there have been a number of attacks lately, so the townsfolk have become wary of anyone with ties to the Underworld. I moved here only quite recently, though, and I have yet to experience any problems myself.”
Dante frowns, considering. “Has there been any news on who’s behind the attacks?”
“Oh, nothing particularly definitive. Most likely it is someone your father once knew.”
Great. Given how chatty Sparda is about his past exploits, that narrows things down not in the slightest. “Probably someone with a grudge, then. He’s always been part of the in crowd.”
Bradley nods. “Likely they are strong enough to provide some resistance if he has not defeated them by now.”
“Or whoever it is has enough underlings to toss around as cannon fodder,” Dante muses. It’s by far the more likely option. Demons are pretty universally egotistical; nobody would pop into the human world to wreak a little havoc, get defeated, and go back home, only to repeat the process a while later. But the stronger ones inevitably gathered followers like flies, power drawing to more power. By process of elimination, the mastermind would have to be more than merely a formidable opponent: tactical, intimidating, a leader of the flock.
“Like Mundus,” Dante wonders aloud, then freezes. How does he know that name?
A storm is brewing nearby, tree branches smacking against the outer walls with heavy, rhythmic thuds.
“Mundus… the king of the Underworld?” he hears faintly, but the buzzing in his ears only grows more intense.
Of course he knows that name. But when he tries to pin down why he knows it, what it means to him, all he finds is a blank wall. No, not quite. It’s like he’s in a bar and someone’s told a great joke, but every time he tries to listen in, the guy next to him is speaking even louder.
It’s unbelievably frustrating. There’s definitely something, it’s right there, barely out of reach, if only he could just—
The lounge room snaps back into focus. Dante shakes his head to clear out the cobwebs. “Sorry about that, I must have dozed off for a second. So this guy’s meant to be a pretty big player, huh? I don’t see why I couldn’t give it a go myself.”
“No, Dante,” Bradley says, kindly but firmly. “No. I have a duty of care to make sure you and your brother are safe. I dare say that directly defying your father’s orders and encouraging you to hunt down a demonic serial killer might just go against that,” he clarifies with good humour.
Dante groans, slumping against the armrest. “No one ever lets me do anything fun around here,” he gripes, but what should have been a joke comes out with a heavy tang of bitterness.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Bradley says consolingly. “When this is all over, I promise that things will definitely have changed for the better.” He pauses and shakes his head. “You’re a good person, Dante. If things were different, I would have been honoured to call you a friend.”
Rain starts battering against the roof, beating an increasingly faster and louder drumbeat. “If things were different,” Dante repeats wistfully. He gets it; Bradley’s too old for them to be real playmates, plus he’s getting paid to be here.
That’s not the part that irks him. It’s the existence of those invisible lines itself that he dislikes, those arbitrary distinctions between right and wrong when he knows for a fact that nobody has a clue what they’re doing anyway.
(In another life, if they were more of a matching set, less black and white, two puzzle pieces trying to fit in the same spot—could he and Vergil have shared a quiet moment like this, indulging in companionable silence?)
Outside, the storm rages on.
The next day, Dante gets up bright and early so he can go hunting for Vergil to—well, maybe not apologise, but certainly attempt to recalibrate their version of normal. He knows from past experience that leaving it to Vergil won’t get them anywhere, his brother being far more likely to simply abandon the situation as a lost cause.
Not a single soul could say that Dante is the type to enjoy openly talking about his feelings, but needs must. All the better if he can substitute that with diverting Vergil’s wrath to something more productive than running away, even if that something is watching how fast Dante can regrow his fingers.
Somehow, it still takes hours to track down his scent. Naturally, Vergil had gone to the last place Dante would ever be willing to tread: the library. The trick comes from the fact that Dante had already made that connection and looked there first thing in the morning, but hadn’t thought to double-check until noon, eventually peeking in and noticing a displaced pile of books towards the back of the room.
Dante grins. Vergil should know by now that the one thing Dante isn’t ever likely to do is give up on his brother.
Right when he’s gleefully contemplating whether or not to sneak up behind him and give him a scare, Vergil interrupts his thoughts by scoffing, “If that’s your attempt at camouflage, it is pitiful at best,” not even bothering to look up.
“Aw, don’t be like that,” Dante says sweetly. He goes over to drape his full weight onto Vergil’s back, but Vergil pre-empts him by tossing his current reading material backwards, nailing Dante right in the forehead.
“Ouch,” Dante drawls mockingly to cover the shock that Vergil actually threw a book at him. “Isn’t that bad library etiquette or something? I thought books were precious and all that jazz.”
Vergil rolls his eyes. “Ironic, hearing those words come out of your mouth. If I hadn’t seen it for myself, I would hardly believe that you had ever picked one up in your life.”
Coming around to face him fully so Vergil could appreciate the face Dante is making at that moment, he notices exactly how tense his brother is despite the casual banter, knuckles white and starting to make a noticeable dent in the hardback cover of the next book he’s picked up.
Losing control like that, around the one thing that usually calms him down the most? It’s not like Vergil at all.
Dante decides to take the high road and forego mentioning it. He reaches over to pick out something for himself, mostly just to make a point, when Vergil says, “Don’t—” before cutting off abruptly.
“What?” Dante asks, surprised. It’s not like Vergil could complain about Dante theoretically ruining a novel right after he’d been damaging them himself.
“It’s nothing. I doubt you’ll be able to find something here suited to your tastes,” Vergil says indifferently, looking away. But when Dante pulls out a random novel, he can almost feel eyes boring into his back.
The first one he pulls down is a large tome, something he would never even consider reading normally, but his eyes catch on the brilliant shade of red along the spine. He flips it over to read the title, but gets drawn in by the stylised, hand-drawn art, lingering for a good few seconds on the sweeping lines folded into angelic yet macabre imagery.
Then Dante actually reads the title and grimaces, shoving it right back onto the shelf. Not a chance in hell.
Of course, the second is equally dubious, but he gives it a go anyway. This one unmarked, he figures it’s probably one of mother’s personal collection. He cracks it open and sneezes at the small plume of dust, then reads, ‘…exceedingly rare, not entirely due to related prenatal complications which often result in premature ejection. If enough time elapses without impediment, the dominant of the pair will typically consume the other before birth, with or without substantial damage to the carrier. Should both survive conception, the likelihood of fratricide increases significantly as…’
He shuts that one too. Thanks, mother. Him and Vergil get along just fine most days. Well, occasionally.
Exasperated, he yanks out a third book, not even bothering to check the front this time. He’s surprised at first and says without thinking, “It’s blank,” feeling Vergil make some sort of aborted movement behind him.
“Oh,” Dante corrects himself, “Nevermind. I forgot to skip the foreword.” He hears Vergil click his tongue in annoyance and flicks ahead, subsequently letting out an involuntary laugh.
This time, he’s the one to chuck a book at Vergil, who catches it with effortless grace. He thumbs open the page to where Dante had left it and looks up at him in something approaching disbelief.
“That’s right, it’s your dumb poetry book,” Dante cackles. “I found it for you! Don’t know why you put it away, though, when you’re always carrying it around. I bet you lost it and someone did you the favour of putting it back where it belongs.”
Vergil ignores him, already consumed by the words in front of him. What a nerd. He reads aloud, “The night was dark, no father was there; the child was wet with dew. The mire was deep and the child did weep, and away the vapour flew.” He snaps the book shut. “Little Boy Lost. You really don’t know a whit about subtlety, do you.”
Dante raises an eyebrow at the lack of inflection. “It wasn’t on purpose, the pages just happened to open like that. Although I am interested to know what you thought I was trying to imply through coded poetry.”
“Of course. You’re hardly the bookworm type, after all, so there’s certainly no way you’d go browsing through somebody else’s books without their permission. Isn’t that right, Dante?” Vergil asks, saccharine if not for the smouldering glare.
“Books are meant to be read, dear brother,” Dante says loftily. “Also, you need to chill. I only had a peak. It’s not like there was a lot of time to meticulously browse through your beloved diary.” Curiosity starts to well up, but chances are he isn’t going to get another opportunity to figure out why Vergil’s so protective of it. Pity.
“If all of our time together has taught me anything, it’s that your version of looking tends to lead to doing something that I will make you regret. It would be in your best interests that I do not find out that you’ve defiled my property. Again.” Vergil’s aura of demonic menace expands, hot against Dante’s skin and sulphurous on his tongue.
It’s far too tempting. Dante practically vibrates on the spot with the desire to make the most of it, but Bradley had strongly suggested that he avoid goading Vergil into a fight at all costs.
Better hope he doesn’t check the last few pages, Dante thinks to himself. “Now why would I do that?”
“I suppose I should be grateful,” Vergil goes on, ignoring that comment, “since reverse psychology might be the sole reason you haven’t succumbed to brain rot yet.”
“Hey, I’ve read Shakespeare!” Dante protests. “Sort of.” You didn’t necessarily have to understand what you were consuming to enjoy it.
Vergil says dryly, “That was required reading.”
Dante sticks his tongue out petulantly. “Okay, so I’m not that big on the whole,” he waves his hand vaguely, “book thing. That’s only one way of measuring smarts! I’ll have you know I would make a killing in theatre.” He spins into a pose on one knee with a flourish.
Vergil snorts.
“Ugh, whatever,” Dante grumbles and finally flops into one of the chairs, kicking his feet up onto the coffee table. “When I’m living by myself, you can bet I’ll never read again just so that I can revel in your contempt from the other side of the country. Unless it has pictures, maybe. Something even you’d hate, like a magazine.”
“When you’re on your own, I’m sure you can do whatever you want,” Vergil says coolly. It occurs to Dante then that he’d made the hasty assumption that his brother wouldn’t be living with him in the future. He tilts his head back to stare at the ceiling, pondering over the unfamiliarity of that thought. Why wouldn’t they be together? Dante, at least, had no aspirations to go off on his own any time soon. Did Vergil?
The idea feels cold and uncomfortable, like an ice cube lodged halfway down his throat.
Quick, what other advice did Bradley give him? Connect with his interests, don’t ask him to fight unless he brings it up first. He’d already done both of those things! “So,” he throws out randomly, “what is it about poetry that you like, anyway?”
Vergil’s eyes narrow in suspicion. “Are you really interested in the answer?”
“Yyyes?” Dante affirms hesitantly. It isn’t technically a lie.
“Hmm,” Vergil says, “I’d believe it more if you weren’t so obviously using another person’s words.” The last part comes out with an unexpected amount of bite, and Dante realises with dread that Vergil’s simmering anger has taken another dip for the worse. It was a perfectly normal question! How did he know?
“There are better ways to seek understanding,” Vergil sneers, reproachful, “but you’ve always had trouble if things aren’t explicitly spelled out for you. Lost in the woods, you could say.”
“I know what a metaphor is, thanks,” Dante snaps irritably, then frowns. The way he’d said the last line—“Wait, was that a reference to that Blake poem?” If it is, he’s honestly kind of surprised he got it. Also, way to reach newfound heights of pretentiousness with your everyday dialogue. If Vergil starts quoting Blake all the time, Dante may just have to murder him out of sheer embarrassment.
Vergil’s hand stills halfway through turning the page. Well, that’s confirmation if ever he’s seen it. Dante prods further, “What does that even mean? Besides the obvious.” Even he knows enough about poetry to recognise it isn’t actually about a kid getting lost, but it’s unclear if Vergil had meant to imply anything deeper.
Bizarrely, Vergil retorts, “You tell me,” and gives Dante a challenging stare. “Since reading is only one way of measuring intelligence, in your own words.”
Dante asks him to hand over the book so he can check it again and predictably gets summarily rejected. Damn, a grab and dash would have been an easy way out.
He props his chin on a closed fist and struggles to remember what the poem had been about. It had been one of the short ones, if he recalled correctly, which made it a lot more digestible than the regular long-winded drivel. The rhythm of it stuck in his mind like a song, but the words kept flitting out of reach.
Dante finally has a breakthrough when he realises that the key is to focus on the feelings it inspired in him at the time rather than trying and failing to recite every line verbatim. “It was about uncertainty,” he decides finally, “and unnecessary cruelty.” Those themes didn’t have anything to do with what they were talking about before, though. “Did I get it right?”
Vergil looks a little nonplussed at first, then makes a wordless sound of exasperation. “There is no right answer in poetry… unless you count the part where you essentially confessed to going through my things.”
Oh. Yeah, he did do that, now that he thinks about it. Whoops.
Fortunately, Vergil seems to enjoy being on a roll. “Every interpretation has its own merits, but so far as the original meaning is concerned, the intentions of the author often reflect nascent social issues. This one,” he taps the page, “was likely intended as a critique of the church.”
“Ah,” Dante says, hiding a wince. It didn’t take a genius to figure out why their family tended to avoid that subject. As kids, they’d spent an awful lot of time sneaking onto holy ground just to see if it would burn.
(As teenagers, they quickly learnt the truth of the matter: the real dangers lay inside, lined up at the pews with their eyes closed in prayer.)
The thing is, though, the longer Dante listens to Vergil go on about the tedious intricacies of poetry, the more it dawns on him that his brother really, genuinely loves this stuff. A slightly guilty pang echoes in his chest with the realisation he may have unintentionally done his twin a great disservice all these years that he didn’t have anyone to talk to about it.
But that’s a road full of regrets he really doesn’t want to go down right now. Not to mention he’s already filled this week’s quota for depressing retrospection.
“Are you even listening, Dante?” Vergil demands icily, and Dante snaps out of the reverie he’d been stuck in, which had been about… not upsetting his brother by ignoring him. Crap.
“Yes, definitely. I heard all of that,” Dante lies. “It was just a bit complicated. Can you repeat that last bit again?”
“I said it’s meant to make you think. But I can understand why you would have some difficulty with that concept.” There is palpable disdain. “Stupidity is one thing, but purposeful ignorance is a choice, brother.”
Vergil’s voice is so dry, it’s a miracle Dante doesn’t immediately turn to dust.
The flow of conversation is getting away from him, so Dante attempts to reel it back in. “My bad, my bad. It’s just that imagining forests and churches and stuff serves as a reminder that we’re not allowed to do anything fun.”
Oh. That implies Vergil’s hobby is super boring (which it is), but the whole point had been to try and get on his good side. Damnit.
“My apologies for not being entertaining enough,” Vergil says in that carefully controlled tone which spells his imminent doom. He taps his book against his knee, settling into a more forward-facing posture. “Allow me to try something different. Consider this… a thought exercise.”
The setting sun paints swathes of contrasting light and shadow around the library, and in the darkness, Vergil’s eyes glitter. “You’re in a theoretical situation where you’ve been captured and rendered utterly defenceless. Yet within the bounds of your captivity are a number of fellow prisoners. You know one of them is likely your captor in disguise and thus may possess the key to your escape. How many prisoners do you kill in order to get the right one?”
Murderous intent is an upsettingly good look on him. Still, Dante shoots him an expression of complete bafflement because why is he like this. “Gee, I don’t know, maybe you try not to casually slaughter everyone? Attempting to decide whether or not to become a mass murderer—even if you really, really want to—isn’t a moral dilemma, Vergil.”
It’s almost funny how quickly such a quiet, erudite person is capable of flip-flopping into borderline manic, ruthless brutality. Almost. Mostly it is just deeply concerning.
He’d worry about his brother’s future, but it’s a cruel and unfair world, so he’ll probably end up as a Fortune 500 CEO or something. Jerk. “I’m never saying this again, but yeah, you’re the smart one. You figure it out.”
Dante had figured Vergil would enjoy being praised like any normal person, but once again his twin proves to be a freak of nature, instead showing visible annoyance with Dante’s response, merely replying with a curt, “Very well.”
He had also, for the briefest second, looked rather taken aback, as if he hadn’t honestly expected someone could possibly have a problem with his plan.
Really, Dante should stop finding instances like these so shocking; Vergil had proven time and time again that he’d always take the path of cold-blooded efficiency. It’s only a matter of time before he ends up in jail.
Whatever his motivation had been, the matter is apparently now settled because shortly after, Vergil kicks Dante out of the library and that is that.
Cool shade suddenly covers his form and Dante opens his eyes, squinting up at the figure blocking out the sun.
Unexpectedly, it’s Bradley.
Dante reluctantly sits up, shaking the loose strands of grass out of his hair. He makes a move to stand, but Bradley is the one to lower himself instead, taking a seat next to him in the open yard. “Oh, Dante,” he says lightly, “what are you doing?”
Dante groans, and elects to cut to the chase. “Look, I know what you’re going to say. But I did exactly what you said! Everything was going just fine until Vergil went back into hiding again. Like a coward!” He shouts the last line into the air, fuming.
“Perhaps you’re going about this the wrong way after all,” Bradley says, nudging the two wooden swords lying to the side with his shoe. “Some people cope with stress differently. It could be that you’re trying too hard to get his attention—maybe the best thing for your brother right now is to give him some space.” And your forcing the issue is only making things worse, Dante hears.
The unspoken advice hits the hardest. This whole time, he’d assumed that leaving Vergil to his own devices would be the biggest mistake he could ever make. Heck, his track record certainly spoke for itself, previous arguments having led to days of stony silence and cold shoulders, Vergil opting to stew in his own anger and perpetuate the ugliness of the situation until it became something truly hideous.
Could it be possible that he doesn’t know Vergil as well as he thinks he does? It’s hardly even conceivable. The two of them aren’t just siblings, they’re twins. Half-demon twins. Oftentimes, their connection ran deeper than either of them were comfortable with, bleeding into something not unlike true telepathy if they weren’t careful. They’d come to a tacit agreement early on to suppress that aspect of their physiology as much as possible in order to prevent it from developing to any substantial extent.
Even so, Dante holds no illusions that if it came down to it, he would be able to find Vergil no matter where he is in the world. It would take something truly extreme to break that bone-deep connection.
“No,” Dante decides. “I know him better than anyone. If I leave him alone, Vergil will just get stuck inside his own head.” Privately, he acknowledges that he also knows himself and his own tendency to go kind of crazy if he isn’t allowed near Vergil for too long.
Bradley claps him on the shoulder. “Fair enough. It’s important that you make the best out of your youth. These things take time, but someday circumstances may change, and you will find that all sorts of complications can get in the way of decisions like this.”
Dante blinks at him in confusion, cocking his head in query.
“The truth is that you can’t always assume that the two of you will get to be together no matter what,” Bradley says, smiling sadly. He lies down to next Dante, who resumes his earlier position and together they watch the clouds float across the sky.
“There’s a woman in town who I love, but her father disapproves of our union,” Bradley explains. “Rightfully so. I didn’t intend for him to find out, but he knows what I am.”
Dante notes that the next amorphous shape looks like it has devil horns protruding from the top. Fitting. “You’re not so bad, though. There’s plenty of demons out there that would just eat the father and be done with it. Most of them are a lot uglier, too.” It’s hardly a compliment given how inhuman most demonic biology tends to be, but still.
“If she returns your feelings, then either make her dad like you or marry her and be done with it,” Dante declares.
Bradley huffs a startled laugh. “Now, when did marriage come into the picture?” he says, shaking his head in bemusement.
Dante dismisses his response with a wave of his hand. “You’ve thought about it. Regardless, I guess I owe you some congratulations. You’re raising the bar for the rest of us hot, young singles.”
The next cloud to roll by is ambiguously circular. A wedding ring, maybe. Dante’s never really put much thought into it himself, but he gets that most guys are out there looking for love or sex at this age. Personally, it doesn’t seem all that appealing—but then, he’s never wanted much more than what he already has: family, friends, a place to call home. His brother.
Bradley departs as quietly as he came, leaving Dante alone in the garden to continue wistfully mulling over his reflections. No, marriage probably isn’t on the cards for him, but…
Change. The two of them won’t be together forever. Who knows, maybe Vergil wants to strike out on his own, leave them all behind and have half a dozen little white-haired babies.
Dante jumps up, feeling restless all of a sudden. He stretches out some of the itchy, buzzing energy in his limbs and breathes deep, concentrating on nothing more than the simple mechanical motions of it. Then he trots over to the house and hops onto the nearest window ledge.
“What do you think, is there hope for more demon-human couples like mother and father?” Dante asks nonchalantly. Vergil, obviously irritated at having been discovered so easily, scoffs from his position off to the side of the room.
Dante beams. “Were you listening in the whole time? I’m touched.”
An annoyed look. “I’m sure they could hear your whining the next country over,” Vergil says in complete deadpan. “And for the record, I absolutely do support the idea of you leaving me to my own devices.”
“Aww, but if you were serious, you would have gone further away to conceal yourself,” Dante coos, squashing down a kernel of gleeful hope. Vergil, aggrieved, releases his demonic aura to let it flow naturally, instantly weaving seamlessly into Dante’s own.
Something buried deep in the back of his mind, primal and animalistic, purrs in satisfaction.
“I wonder if we’ll end up having to get a new tutor,” Dante muses, tucking his hands behind his head. “That sure would be an incredibly quick turnaround.”
The last thing he expects is to hear Vergil laugh, but when he looks over, his twin is staring at him with genuine incredulity. “Be serious, Dante. You are getting far too caught up with insignificant details. It is beneath us as sons of Sparda.”
That one maddening phrase rings out, a sharp, judgemental divide between them.
“Insignificant,” he says flatly. “Can you even hear how needlessly elitist you sound?” It always comes back to the same damn issue. “Why? What’s your problem?”
Agitation returns and he fidgets, shifting around to find a better position.
Dante isn’t completely oblivious. He gets that Vergil doesn’t trust Bradley for some strange reason, even though it doesn’t make a lick of sense. Vergil’s barely even met the guy. But there’s a festering wound pulled taut at the trigger finger, pure fury that Vergil won’t trust his judgment. Won’t trust him.
He doesn’t get a reply. That hurts, too.
“Come on, stop running away all the time. You really are a coward,” Dante hisses. It feels inescapable, like omnipotent forces conspiring to push them into conflict time and time again. He tries, but it’s just never enough.
This, finally, is enough to inspire action.
“You dare accuse me of cowardice? You, of all people?” Vergil’s figure blurs. There aren’t any direct openings to the room other than the window Dante is taking up, yet somehow he reappears on the other side, standing tall above the wooden practice swords they had used since they were children.
No, the worst part isn’t how they keep falling into this pattern of endless violence. It’s how much Dante enjoys it.
Vergil kicks one of the swords with the toe of his shoe, flipping it into the air so Dante can catch it. “Out of the two of us, I’m not the one running away.” A statement said with total, inarguable conviction.
Dante bares his teeth, revelling in the bloodthirsty anticipation now permeating the air. He was wrong. How could he have wanted anything except this, right here? “Then let’s settle this!”
He charges forward, fast and relentless. Their swords—barely more than wooden bludgeons—meet with a resounding crack, inimitable forces colliding in the way they were meant to for so long.
Dante tries for a hard swing, but Vergil knocks it aside. Not good enough.
He scarcely has time to recover and raise his guard before Vergil responds with a series of rapid blows, more to test his defences than deal actual damage.
Hit. Block. Hit. Dodge.
He should have known from the start that this is the only way they could ever truly communicate. A familiar back and forth which Vergil keeps nonsensically denying, even though he can sense with crystal clarity how much he wants to let loose every moment of every day—caged animal instinct, prowling in endless circles when all he has to do is let it out.
With every step of their savage dance, Dante can feel Vergil’s answer in the vibrations running down his arm, the stinging sweat trickling into his eyes.
This is Dante’s kind of poetry.
He swipes low, aiming for an unbalancing manoeuvre, but all Vergil has to do is retreat half a foot and he’s out of range. They circle each other, crunching on the leaves underfoot.
Something is missing, though. It clicks when he aims again, purposefully wild, and Vergil reacts with textbook precision, an angled block and nothing more. No follow up.
And yet, when they both step back, Vergil is the one absolutely seething with rage.
“Weak,” he spits. “Absolutely pathetic. This is nothing like how we should be.”
It’s Dante’s turn to get angry again. “Oh yeah? If you’re so dissatisfied, then maybe you should stop holding—back!” He dashes in, feints, and strikes hard.
“We are so much more than this, Dante,” Vergil growls, blocking with one hand. Dante leans into the parry until both of their arms begin to shake from the exertion. The wood creaks.
It’s like Vergil isn’t even listening to him. Well, if that’s the case, then Dante will make him put more effort in. “You’re always so obsessed with power, but for what purpose? You got a retirement plan?” he asks mockingly. “Or are you so blind you haven’t even thought that far ahead—can’t stand the idea of losing to someone like me!”
Dante twists his grip to the right, but Vergil is faster. His twin backs up and slams forward in the same instant, jabbing his sword point-first into the flat of Dante’s blade. The timber shatters, splinters flying everywhere.
He’s at a disadvantage now, but at least Vergil is finally taking him seriously.
Dante adjusts his grasp on the handle, picking up the broken-off tip in his left hand. “Now look what you’ve done. This one is all your fault, Vergil.”
He twirls the damaged stick like a baton while simultaneously pointing the shortened stump straight at Vergil with his dominant hand, heart hammering with anticipation.
The bait should have been ridiculously obvious, openly flaunting how unguarded his left side is, but Vergil goes for it anyway. Near the peak of his lunge, Dante twists on the balls of his feet, trapping the blade between his side and elbow.
In a single flash of movement, Dante flips the broken sword end one last time, letting the sharp, jagged edge bite into his palm. As Vergil’s sword catches on the cross-guard, Dante thrusts in with the blunt end of the other half, directly towards the centre of his chest.
Dante grins. Shorter reach, more force. Half the thrill is figuring out new and interesting ways to fight, anyway.
Unfortunately, the hit doesn’t land. There shouldn’t be enough room for Vergil to back away, but before Dante knows it, he’s out of range again.
“Your priorities are skewed,” Vergil informs him irritably, coat billowing out behind him. “Is this what you want, us fighting all the time?”
Dante falters. “Of course not.” A sour taste fills his mouth. Is their understanding so one-sided after all? He had thought… but if Vergil couldn’t feel that connection, then how can he possibly get him to understand?
All he had wanted, all he had ever wanted is—
Vergil continues, “This, too, is a pointless waste of time. As I said, you are distracted with issues that do not matter. There are much more important things at stake here.”
Pointless. Screw you, Vergil. “A waste of time, huh. And here I thought you were the one practically begging me to kick your ass.” Dante flicks away one of the splinters that had been embedded in his wrist. “And stop saying that everything is so beneath you. Other people are worth a whole lot more than you think.”
The corner of Vergil’s mouth curls in disgust. “People, maybe. You look, but you don’t see, Dante.” What?
Rather than explain whatever he means by that, Vergil just shakes his head. “Foolishness. It is far past time to depart from this place.”
The entire world screeches to a halt.
Dante gapes, dumbfounded. He splutters, “You—you really do want to leave?” Without me?
All of those buried anxieties he’d told himself would never come true burst back to the surface. “You can’t leave. We have to stay here!” A childlike voice echoes within him, father said so and he’s the one you listen to!
His grip tightens anew, the razor digging in deeper, blood pouring down his closed fist.
“Nobody tells me what to do,” Vergil spits, “and certainly not you, Dante!” His weight switches to his back leg in a familiar pose, palm pressed to the hilt of the shoddy wooden sword.
(A distant memory—You can’t change what I am, but he can’t recall the time or place.)
Helplessly, Dante crosses both sticks in front of him to defend, but as Vergil approaches, every muscle reacts out of pure instinct, forcing his whole body down and out of the way.
Vergil’s stab whips through the air above him, narrowly missing his head and smashing into a tree. Dante hadn’t even noticed how he’d gradually been backed into a corner, but he takes the time now to whirl out of the way. Vergil withdraws his blade with a spray of loose bark and wood shards.
Impossibly, its form holds. He must be channelling his energy into it, allowing his own power to strengthen the integrity of his weapon. Filthy cheater.
“Now we’re talking,” Dante taunts, then wavers for half a second. Is it cheating? He could do it too, but… father never taught them that much. Of course he didn’t; why would he have needed to?
He shakes it off. Bloody flecks splatter the ground, and he winces at the sting of skin trying to close around shrapnel. That’ll be a pain to clean up later.
Vergil snaps, “Perhaps you should talk less.”
The point of his sword trails the floor, similarly damaged. Like Dante’s, it no longer resembles the shape of a real blade by any stretch of the imagination, chipped and fraying at the end. If he got gored by that thing, it’s going to hurt.
Dante wouldn’t have it any other way.
He knows Vergil is expecting him to be the reckless aggressor, so he waits instead. It doesn’t take long for Vergil to lose his patience and charge—where one lingers, the other follows, incontrovertible magnetism damning them both.
Predictably, Vergil goes for his favourite spot, right in the middle of Dante’s chest. He responds with the same twist and snare combination as before, but Vergil wisens up with a clever feint, spearing Dante through his side—off-centre, at least—and straight out the back.
“You bastard,” Dante coughs. God, he better not have nicked a lung.
Then he smirks, watching for the lovely dawn of realisation on Vergil’s face before deliberately clenching down, muscles tightening around the blade and keeping it lodged in his flesh. The hubris of a rough-edged sword, so much more difficult to extricate.
Excruciating pain dulls his senses, but he can see well enough through the haze to loop his sticks around Vergil’s neck in the morbid parody of a loving embrace, and then—
—headbutts him with every ounce of strength in his body.
More blood sprays into the air, as well as something that looks vaguely identifiable as a small lump of meat. Ha, maybe you should talk less, Vergil.
In the next second, they separate again to maintain a respectable distance from each other. Dante stumbles as his body tries to heal around the sudden gaping hole.
Vergil works his jaw for a moment before commenting, “You planned that move to pierce the area with the most subcutaneous muscle.” And then, unexpectedly, “Well done.”
A vicious feeling of pride immediately bubbles up, insubordinate delight even as Dante tries frantically to cover it with a scowl. “Don’t need to hear that from you,” Dante says, but it’s a brazen lie. He breathes praise from his brother, all the more priceless for how rare it is.
Another feeling, worryingly foreign, rises up steadily in a creeping wave, terrifying in its overwhelming dominance. Something he’s never felt before, couldn’t possibly put a label on, but nonetheless draws his eyes inexorably to the slight dribble of red liquid on Vergil’s chin.
Hunger, but in a shade that leaves him uncertain if it could be satisfied with regular food. If it could be satisfied at all. Dante beats that down too, unsettled.
Their fight continues. Vergil swipes at his kneecaps but Dante guards and hits him on the rebound, getting both his elbows broken in the process. Inadvertently, they move towards muddier ground from the previous night’s storm, kicking up a surge of tainted moisture and ending up filthy and soaked.
Finally, hours after they had started, Dante finds himself flat on his back, wheezing with exertion, limbs too heavy to lift off the ground. Vergil’s form slumps against a tree less than a foot away, similarly drained.
Nothing has been resolved, he reflects. Dante still doesn’t get why Vergil is being so baselessly negative about everything, nor why he’s suddenly picked up the habit of periodically dropping infuriatingly cryptic statements. He’s still pissed at him. But, in true Sparda family fashion, beating the shit out of each other has helped to relieve some of those frustrations.
Dante wiggles his toes to check for movement and manages a weak kick at Vergil’s shin. “Don’t think this is over. I’m not done with you yet.” His taunt barely lands under the overt layer of tired satisfaction.
“I’ll never be done with you, brother,” Vergil replies, a dark promise behind his words.
That’s all it takes. Dante’s a big fan of witty banter, but even he gets tired of thinking up new puns every time Vergil decides to bring an aerial facet to their battle and kick his teeth in from above. He drags himself back to his feet, ignoring the crunch of broken ribs, readying a stance to counter Vergil’s next—
A sudden gust sends leaves scattering, a bestial screech rising into the air. They both pause to watch as an enormous shape takes flight overhead, showering them with black and navy feathers.
Vergil startles, then looks oddly contemplative. “That creature… it shouldn’t exist anymore.”
Speaking of cryptic statements. Dante tosses him a sceptical look. “Really, that’s what you have to say? Since when are you interested in birds?” Although it had looked kind of familiar, now that he thinks about it. Maybe it’s listed in one of mother’s books; that might explain why Vergil cares.
“I am familiar with that one. I’ve seen it before, though I cannot remember the time particularly well,” Vergil says slowly.
“That’s awfully convenient. Maybe you’re getting some memory problems.”
Dante cracks his spine with a wince, missing the exact moment Vergil stares over at him, absolutely speechless with dumbfounded indignation.
The moment to restart their fight has passed now. Other bodily functions are starting to make themselves known, that feeling from before returning with double force.
God, he’s starving.
Dante wrestles his attention back to the present. “Man, at this rate you’re gonna ruin all my good clothes,” he tuts, stretching out the material to survey the damage.
Of course, Vergil looks infuriatingly put together, hair still slicked back in his signature style, significantly less muddy than Dante. “My sympathies to your wardrobe. I know you must go through an awful lot.”
Wow. Did he really just—“Not nearly as many as you think,” Dante informs him crisply, then flips him off.
Vergil ignores the childish gesture, turning to leave, and Dante really shouldn’t, but seeing him unguarded from behind is just so tempting. Screw it, he thinks, and takes a running leap at Vergil’s retreating back, sending the both of them tumbling to the ground.
It ends quicker this time, Vergil pinned to the grass but with the last shard of Dante’s sword at his own throat.
I win, Dante wants to say, even though it’s realistically more of a draw. But as he opens his mouth to speak, a fresh drop of Vergil’s blood spills from his neck, rolling a slow track down his skin.
His stomach cramps, eyes dilating to follow the bead’s sticky trail. Dante licks his suddenly dry lips, mind gone completely blank.
Beneath him, Vergil raises an eyebrow, then smiles cruelly. “Ah, this, I understand,” he practically purrs. “I bet you don’t even have a single clue what this signifies, Dante.”
Some kind of demonic instinct, then; Vergil would be the expert on that subject, since it had always been a dividing matter for the two of them. Dante had struggled to resist in the past, but it had never been this strong before, completely overpowering every other sense.
Don’t do it, he thinks detachedly, don’t give in. But it’s like someone else is whispering it from afar, a faint and distant quality to his thoughts, lost behind the steady thump-thump-thump filling his ears, temptation beyond words. He wants to bite. He wants to tear. He wants to rip Vergil apart and suck on the marrow.
Dante tries to pull away, but this time Vergil yanks him back, fingers clamped like a vice on his forearm. Too late, he says, “Of course I know what this is. I don’t want it.”
A blatant lie.
Vergil’s nostrils flare, scenting his weakness, the slight waver in his voice. “Liar. It is everything.”
Dante is beyond lost, desperately hyperaware and flinching uncontrollably as instead of pouncing, Vergil reaches out with deliberate slowness, a quiet contradiction to the frenetic tempo under his skin. His fingers curl gently around Dante’s neck like a collar, barely enough pressure to make contact. Dante shudders.
Helplessly, he tilts his head to the side under Vergil’s direction, internally struggling with frantic incomprehension. Painted obedient by his brother’s touch, a paradox rumbling in his stomach.
“I will not have you denying this later,” Vergil says suddenly, vicious and possessive. “It is a gift from our father’s blood. Our inheritance.”
Dante still has no idea what it is, but he can’t say that. Maybe that’s Vergil’s plan: if he can’t pin a name to it, how can he truly reject whatever this sick, twisted desire is?
Against his will, he leans into Vergil’s touch, nudging against his palm, lips brushing against his wrist. His eyes flutter closed, then open again. “Glad you’ve finally learned to share,” he rasps.
“Will you insist on going first, then?” Vergil offers generously, all the while knowing that Dante has to give in, couldn’t possibly lead on a path never walked.
The smug face of someone who believes everything will go their way. A flicker of rebelliousness ignites, unspeakably comforting in its familiarity.
“Winner gets to choose,” Dante contends. His body still refuses to obey his commands entirely, but he can’t lose this. He won’t.
Vergil counters calmly, “It was a draw.” Glowing blue eyes trace Dante’s face lazily. In an uncharacteristic show of agreeability, he proposes a compromise, “On the count of three.”
But Dante understands this part of his brother too, sees his own hunger reflected back at him and knows he won’t wait. Before a single word is said—or rather, because neither of them ever intended to count to begin with—Vergil acts, and Dante joins him, because instinct doesn’t need direction.
He feels Vergil’s teeth close on his neck at the same moment he leans down, biting roughly at sweat-soaked skin, copper exploding on his tongue.
It’s easily the best thing Dante has tasted in his life.
A quiet part of his mind struggles to justify the inhumanity of it, but is subsequently drowned out by pure, unadulterated gluttonous joy. Monstrous hunger, finally being sated, and beyond that, connection in its most basic form. Here, he can feel Vergil at last, in his mouth, his stomach. It’s rapture. It’s paradise.
He wants more.
Vergil growls greedily against his skin, vibrations pressed into his bones, and Dante groans in return. He can feel Vergil’s throat convulsing rhythmically to match his own swallows. How had he not known it would feel like this? All those times they had fought and spilled blood with wild abandon; precious ambrosia, wasted.
He’s very possibly going a bit insane, because right now Dante would happily go back to every instance and lick it off the floor.
That dogged restlessness which has been following him for hours, days, finally subsides. When Dante finally takes his next breath, he finds his forehead nestled in the hollow of Vergil’s throat, a great feeling nestled in his breast of being more centred than he has been in a long time. Maybe since they were born.
He can feel Vergil’s essence inside him, and he feels whole.
“That was…” Dante attempts, but a suitable descriptor evades him. It was perfect. Nothing else could possibly compare.
He’s always trying so hard to prove the best of his own humanity, yet his next thoughts unavoidably turn the worst side of demonic: how he can convince Vergil to let him do that all over again, depraved and dirty and hating himself all the more for it.
With surprising tenderness, Vergil rolls him off, takes a steadying breath, and says, “We’re never doing that again. Not so long as we’re still in this world.”
Dante says, “Right. Yeah. Of course, I feel the same. Obviously.”
He waits for Vergil to leave first so he can work his way up to standing on wobbly legs without judgement. It’s a long trek back inside.
The clock ticks slowly, hours before the sun is due to rise. A strange, ominous feeling rises in the air, the calm before some unspeakable tragedy.
Dante stirs—or had he been awake the whole time?—eyes already open in the dark. Thunder echoes in the distance, tremors rattling through the foundation of the house like heavy, booming heartbeats. In the pitch blackness, muted flashes of light give birth to surreal shapes of writhing colour, shadows thrashing in a manic, laughing dance.
He feels off, somehow. Wide awake but only halfway to actually being present in the moment. Dante’s mind wanders, that familiar drifting quality drugging his movements as he slowly gets out of bed. Yesterday’s downpour had been going on for far too long… or had it started the day before? Perhaps it had never stopped.
The oddest feeling, like those thoughts should fill him with a crawling sense of dread. Like someone trying to yell a desperate warning before being cut off in sudden silence. But instead, the cold barely penetrates his feet as he creaks open the door and patters down the hallway, cotton-brained and still so tired.
So very tired.
Dante blinks. He’s sitting at the foot of Vergil’s bed, feet dangling off the side. When did he get there? Before everything had started, he had blamed this impulse on sleepwalking—but Dante had never once sleepwalked in his life.
He doesn’t remember how he got here, then or now. How strange.
A cracking, resonating boom. Dante’s gaze crawls over bleached-white sheets, all the way up to his brother’s face. Completely dead to the world.
He clambers up, barely avoiding accidentally leaning his entire weight on Vergil’s outstretched hand. His brother is peaceful like this, creases smoothed out and edges softened, unnaturally calm and still.
Unmoving, exactly like a corpse, and very unlike his usual bad-tempered self. Dante pokes his cheek in consternation. “Vergil?” No response. “Veeeergil.”
His voice changes to a slightly higher pitch. “Dante, stop that.”
Back to normal. “Stop what?”
“Stop bothering me this instant, I mean it.” Innocently, “Or else you’ll do what?” Grumpily, “Or I will make you regret annoying me. The world will shake beneath the power of my snoring.”
Dante falls back in a fit of laughter, fist crammed into his own mouth to stifle any errant giggles. The sound dies off, slumping back into the creeping hush of night.
There is something deeply unsettling about being alone at this time, in this place. Even his brother’s anger feels like it would be a welcome balm to soothe his nerves.
Vergil should have woken up from that. He’s a light sleeper at the best of times, with demonic hearing besides. Dante had joked in the past that he often seemed to be made of stone, but like this, he’s hardly more than a lifeless statue.
Dante fidgets uneasily. Is Vergil definitely breathing?
He pats the blanket until he finds Vergil’s hand again, hidden in the folds, and then presses a thumb lightly to his wrist, just to feel it for his own sake of mind.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Relief is short-lived. He realises now that it was a mistake to come here like this.
That low-lying hunger bursts back to the forefront, an endlessly gaping wound. Slow horror spills from the cracks, born not from the monstrous urge itself, but the gradual awareness it brings: how he has, without question, carried it his entire life just beneath the surface.
Exactly like he had always feared, a monster wearing human skin.
For a brief second, the room lights up with a too-bright white glare, the parody of a holy vision. Divine judgement.
But Dante can still hear that beating lifeblood, flowing so close by he can practically already taste it.
He swallows thickly.
No! No, no, no. Bad Dante. Vergil might be sleeping pretty deeply now, but he would for sure wake up if Dante attacked him in his sleep. No way would demon instincts let him do anything except immediately home in on the threat and probably murder him violently without question. Haha. What a terrible idea.
Dante looks away. Looks back.
The thought rises to the surface unbidden, but what if he doesn’t?
Dante scours the room with his eyes for literally any distraction, flickering aimlessly from object to object. Panic unravels his mind in fraying threads with each increasingly depraved suggestion, whispers of he would never have to know and maybe he’d like it too.
Nope. Shut up, Dante.
He suddenly becomes conscious of the way his fingers are stroking steadily at Vergil’s pulse, and forces himself to stop. God, had he been doing that the entire time? It really is a miracle that Vergil hasn’t woken up already.
At that moment, he finally notices the other bombshell in the room which had so far gone completely unnoticed.
Dante stares, completely gobsmacked.
“Ha, who was the one going on about getting all distracted with—with unnecessary things? Damn it, Vergil,” Dante hisses accusingly at his brother’s unconscious form. “You massive hypocrite.”
It could be a coincidence, or maybe Vergil really had enjoyed the blood thing as much as he had. No, don’t think about it like that. Shit.
Hysteria churns like a heavy sickness in his gut. Dante almost wants to laugh again.
Really, there’s only one thing that could have possibly made this situation even worse. One thing that’s able to bring him down to a level lower than zero, that much more unforgivable.
The fact that Vergil has an erection in his sleep should be something he can laugh about, tease his twin for in the morning, maybe get playfully stabbed a few times for mentioning it. That’s a normal brotherly response, after all. It shouldn’t make him want to—want to—
(—do something truly terrible.)
Dante gathers his legs up and hugs his knees, half-burying his face in them. Too dark to see anything, he tries to convince himself, but it’s a miserable lie.
None of that stuff should matter, anyway. It’s a can of worms he buried a long time ago. Hell, it’s supposed to be gone for good. He hasn’t thought about any of that in years. He hasn’t.
Heh. What a bizarre scenario to be stuck in, where a genuinely frightening compulsion to maul his twin is somehow the lesser of two evils. What a joke his life has become.
There isn’t even a punchline. At least the creepy blood thing seems new. There really isn’t any excuse for this. The one rule that must never be broken; a sin never to be born into reality. It would ruin everything.
So, naturally, the next thought invariably slithers its way into being: Vergil might not sleep through being bitten, but would he sleep through something else?
Oh no.
It’s too late. The idea is in his head now, words unspoken but no less heavy in their meaning. His mind’s eye kaleidoscopes with a hundred different immoralities flitting by at lightning speed, spiralling into the filthiest kind of debauchery.
This, too, feels like a dream. One he used to have all the time but could never admit to, not to anyone. Long nights of shameful and guilty pleasure juxtaposed against the recent memory of that effervescent connection in the garden, beautiful and sparkling and alive.
It’s impossible to separate from that mess of hunger and attraction. Intense, devastating longing. Vergil is right here in front of him, but he feels so far away, somehow. As if a single touch would make everything evaporate into smoke.
Prove this isn’t a dream, Dante thinks to himself. It’s too warm, like his body is still under the covers in reality and he’s only fooling himself with a fiction of what could be. But there’s a storm outside, so it should be cold.
He peels back the blanket covering Vergil, because surely the chill should wake him up, too. A quick and easy test. If his brother finally opens his eyes and punches him in the face, then everything is back to normal and he can forget this ever happened.
Vergil doesn’t wake up.
Shit.
Dante starts to panic again because now he can see the tent in Vergil’s sleeping pants pyjama pants with even less obstruction. He tries vainly to rationalise it: he just doesn’t have a lot of luck with women, so this is just… pent up hormones, curiosity. Nothing weird. What’s a little bit of body exploration between siblings, right?
Blatant lying isn’t working. God, he’s so hungry. His entire body is aching with the need to—what would mother and father think?!
That should be enough to end it right there. But even the thought of their parents feels so vague and distant, a worry for another time. Here, It’s just him and Vergil, totally alone. Isolated. Their own little world with no one to tell him to stop, and bestial energy raging away under the surface.
“It’s just curiosity,” Dante repeats to himself, almost in a daze. His body moves for him, careful little motions to avoid brushing against skin as much as possible.
Vergil is—well, he’s certainly—he must be dreaming about something really good, because he’s huge and hard as a rock. The head is shiny and slick, purple with blood. Blood.
Dante swallows heavily. The exact last way he wants to die right now is justified murder for biting his twin’s dick off. It kind of reminds him of that thing where try as hard as you might, you can’t help but vividly imagine in graphic detail all the ways things could go horribly wrong.
It takes a worryingly long moment to stop thinking about it, though.
His teeth itch and he has to swallow another mouthful of saliva. He’s not crazy enough to do something like that, but… maybe just a taste.
Dante understands where he is now. Right at the precipice, no turning back; it would be weird enough if Vergil woke up now to see his brother staring at his dick like this. The snowballing of his own actions feels almost like an inevitability, forced to go all or nothing. Maybe this is just another test.
(But if it had been meant for Dante, he’s already failed.)
The bedroom is eerily quiet now. Dante recalls being told that you should count the seconds between thunder and lightning to see how far out the electrical strikes are, but the room lights up over and over again, psychedelic explosions of blue and red, all without a single sound.
Heart pounding, Dante painstakingly wraps his hand around Vergil’s cock one finger at a time, marvelling at the heat and softness of it. He gulps, screws his eyes shut, and takes a slow, shaky lick.
Just one small lick, barely a taste, and that hunger simultaneously recedes and intensifies in a hot wave of contradiction. He wants more.
Fortunately, the violent impulse dissipates, so Vergil’s future children get to live another day. Unfortunately, that can only mean it’s not the bloodthirst that makes it so good—it’s that other thing, the feeling he doesn’t want to name.
Dante wants to blame it on their messed up biology, but he knows deep down inside that it’s all him. Vergil had said as much the day previous, and to an extent in all their interactions before. There’s no way he could feel this same perverse desire as well. Not in a million years.
It’s the very definition of inhuman, like their souls are always trying to recombine but the gears are broken in a one-way madness. Every cell in his body wants to crawl inside Vergil… or have Vergil inside him.
Oh god. Would it even fit? Shit, don’t think about that.
Dante shudders, the sheets rustling beneath him, and licks again. And again. Desperate for it.
Under his attentions, Vergil’s cock gets bigger, harder, a drip of precome leaking from the tip. Dante pauses as Vergil makes a quiet groaning sound in his sleep, a short note of appreciation. He waits for a short eternity, aching to move.
He doesn’t have the patience to make sure Vergil has stopped squirming entirely, diving back in with less care than before to lap eagerly, spurred on by the giddy power imparted by Vergil’s subconscious receptiveness. It’s a heady, drunken feeling of delight; he’s the only one able to bring Vergil this pleasure, no one else.
Dante has no idea if he’s doing this right, if Vergil would have any kind of comparison to judge him on. But for Dante, the act itself is shamefully good in a way he can’t quite explain—it’s not like he’s on the receiving end, but then despite all of the complaining he does for show, Dante has always been ready and willing to do pretty much anything to please his brother.
Drool trickles sloppily down Vergil’s length. Dante pulls back for a moment to admire the absolutely obscene sight. How the heck is he going to hide the evidence for this? There’s no way his brother won’t know exactly what he’s done when morning comes.
Shit, forget that. Even if he makes an attempt to clean up, Vergil will be able to smell Dante on him no matter what.
(Rubbed into his skin and down his thighs and god but Dante likes that idea so much it hurts.)
Dante suddenly realises that he’s also rock hard, his own erection trapped between his stomach and the bed in his sprawled position between Vergil’s thighs.
He breathes out shakily.
It’s all moving too fast. Getting too far away from him before he can comprehend what’s happening. Dante props his head up by his elbows, forcing himself not to lean in again.
He needs to stop. If he raids the bathroom for something, he might be able to find some sort of chemical spray to cover up the scent, claim it was all a prank. He could leave right now. At any moment.
Dante has never been particularly in tune with his demon side, cannot possibly understand the nuances and instincts as naturally as Vergil does. But there’s something inside him, human and demon together, which insists that he finish this with brutal finality. It has to be done.
And god, he wants to keep going.
Vergil is leaking steadily, a wet sheen left only partly by his tongue. It would be so cruel to leave him in this state. Dante wouldn’t be surprised if it physically hurt from how hard he is.
He knows unfulfilled very well—it’s the nature of that emptiness he’s carried his whole life. He needs this.
The world around them is muted, sensations dragging minutely behind when he knows they should be happening in real time. Tiredness, perhaps, or the result of some internal conflict beyond his current level of understanding. The ticking of the hall clock doesn’t fit, incongruent with expectation like he’s still caught in the clutches of a waking nightmare.
This should be a nightmare, but it’s not. Dante isn’t scared, except maybe of himself, how badly he wants to do this. In one movement, he leans forward and takes the head of Vergil’s cock into his mouth.
His eyes flutter closed, swallowing around the shape of his brother. It fits perfectly, just like he knew it would. As if he had been made to do this.
By this point, Dante’s itching to touch himself, to relieve some of the unbearable pressure, but he can’t bear to make a noise and ruin this. To strip back even one layer of unreality. Quiet and slow, he hollows his cheeks incrementally, the painstaking increase in suction so incredibly frustrating, but undeniably all the more thrilling for the challenge.
It’s a terrible thing, to like the taste of your brother.
He goes a little lower, breathing carefully through his nose. The more he takes in, the more he realises that Vergil’s dick is a lot bigger than he thought it would be, a suddenly daunting task to swallow it all.
The clock ticks, one second for every two heartbeats. Perspiration gathers at the back of his neck.
Another inch down, Dante freezes when Vergil, for the first time, mumbles something in the shape of words. Terror—or is it hope?—immediately washes over him, unfathomable panic burning in his veins. He holds perfectly still, not a single muscle so much as twitching.
Vergil slurs, “Weary of time… steps of the sun…” and turns his head on the pillow with a whisper of rustling fabric, eyes still firmly closed.
Oh, that bastard. He’s really thinking about Blake at a time like this?!
Mild hysteria takes the span of several breaths to reduce to a manageable level. All the while, time continues to tick by, and Dante has the worrying thought that he has no idea what hour it is. How long from now until Vergil usually wakes up? Outside the windows is still pitch black, but that could mean anything.
Even more carefully, Dante continues, finally reaching as far as he can go. Vergil’s cock nudges the back of his throat even though he hasn’t managed the full length, barely reaching the hand he has wrapped around the base.
His jaw aches, drool escaping messily down the sides. Logically, he knows it should be disgusting. Instead, Dante loves it; the smell of him, the weight of Vergil on his tongue.
Inside, something purrs with overwhelming satisfaction. Vergil is inside him. Vergil is his.
He begins to pull up, lips dragging against silk-smooth flesh. Despite his earlier noises, Vergil has gone quiet again, back to making those small, intoxicating grunts of pleasure.
Dante makes the biggest mistake of his life, far too confident in the assumption that he’s in the clear now. He can’t help it. It’s too wet, his tongue swiping along the underside of Vergil’s cock without conscious intent, hopelessly trying to mop up some of the escaping slickness.
Apparently, that’s all it takes. Vergil thrusts up, forcing his cock even deeper, lodging the head right past the back of Dante’s throat.
Panic. Suddenly, he can’t breathe, choking on his brother’s dick.
Dante’s throat reflexively convulses around the intrusion, swallowing frantically, massaging Vergil’s length and eliciting the sweetest, loudest moans yet. This is so bad. Dante claws at the sheets wildly, can’t manage a coherent thought around the blood rushing in his ears, tears leaking down his cheeks.
His own groans escape, not even trying to be quiet anymore, so sure that Vergil’s going to wake up at any moment and see this exact scene: Dante, prostrated before him, devouring his brother’s cock without consent in the middle of the night, laid out on their childhood bed, so desperate to be filled.
There’s no way to explain this, no way to excuse what he’s done. The only possible outcome is for Vergil to—
Salty liquid explodes at the back of Dante’s mouth and he chokes on that too, helpless to do anything except swallow. Nothing he can do except wait, rhythmically gulping it all down before finally dislodging Vergil’s cock with a wet pop and pulling away, breathing raggedly. He’s a filthy mess, covered in tears and sweat and saliva.
“Vergil,” he rasps, “I’m—” sorry, he wants to say, even though that hardly covers the start of it.
Dante braves a look up and stops dead.
Unbelievably, Vergil is still asleep.
If anything, he’s sleeping more soundly than ever, a healthy sheen of colour high on his cheeks. Contentment looks good on him even in unconsciousness, a glowing contrast to the way he’s so unrelentingly uptight when awake.
Incredible. Dante brushes a shaky hand through his own sweat-slicked hair, unable to comprehend the reality of the situation. He unsteadily licks the last drops of Vergil’s come from his lips and thinks wildly, well, at least that’s one way of hiding the evidence.
In spite of the shock—or, hell, maybe because of it—his own underwear is completely soaked through, so close to coming himself.
He ignores it, energy thrumming in his chest. Dante pulls Vergil’s pants back on with as much care as he can still muster, resettles the blanket over his shoulders, and creeps out of the room, waiting until the door creaks closed before running back to his room at full speed.
It’s only when he flops onto his own bed, adrenaline pumping in his veins, that Dante realises he forgot to wipe up the rest of the mess and cover the smell. Shit.
But he can’t go back now. It’s far too late. Already, the barest hint of light is starting to peak across the horizon with an accusing glare. He doesn’t even want to think about how little sleep he must have gotten in the end.
Guilt, shame, exhaustion—
(He wants to do it again.)
The lingering taste in his mouth is unpleasant, but just like the moment after their fight where he gorged himself on blood, an overriding sense of supreme satisfaction subsumes everything else.
There’s a part of Vergil inside him now. Something about that fact is calming, reassuring in a way he can’t quite grasp.
Dante, still hard and aching in his pants, grimaces and hobbles to the bathroom to wash it off with a cold shower. A small discomfort is the least of what he deserves for all the sins committed tonight.
But evidently, Dante’s real area of expertise is finding new lows to sink to, because as he stands under the freezing cold spray, he manages to horrify himself even more by wishing Vergil had woken up.
By the time the sun has fully risen, Dante has concocted a plan to exercise the full of his abilities to avoid Vergil instead of the other way around for once. The mere thought of facing him after… that… is flat-out impossible. There’s no way he could keep a straight face, let alone maintain a regular conversation.
It would be better for them both if Dante just left for a bit, got his head on straight. Stopped having these weird thoughts and went back to acting how a proper brother should.
Breakfast is unquestionably a no-go, so he skips that entirely and goes straight to the garden, figuring that he can hide away from Vergil in the endless wilderness if nothing else.
He should have known better. Their connection goes both ways; if Dante can find Vergil when he’s trying to hide, then naturally the opposite rings true as well.
With barely a moment’s notice, a figure appears behind him and Dante jumps in surprise, leaping further up the giant magnolia and belatedly hoping he doesn’t too closely resemble a frightened cat.
“Haha. Hello, brother. What’s up with you this fine, uh, morning?” Dante stutters awkwardly, struggling to phrase his words like a normal person would. It would be a hell of a lot easier if he could just channel the cheerfully ignorant Dante from before.
He can’t be doing a terribly good job because Vergil seems rather perplexed, staring up at Dante’s hiding place. Admittedly, it’s kind of an awkward position, clinging upside down to one of the taller branches, but then he’d kind of hoped Vergil wouldn’t find him at all while he crawled to another location out of sight.
Dignity is lost amidst all the internal screaming because what if he knows, but it doesn’t stop Vergil from approaching the bottom of the tree and raising an eyebrow at him. “What are you doing?”
His voice is completely flat, but Dante can tell how baffled he must be. He swings around into a sitting position. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I love doing this. Climbing trees, I mean. Yup, that’s me. Nature is great,” Dante chatters nervously, picking twigs out from below his ass.
He sweats under Vergil’s scrutiny, feeling distinctly unbalanced.
“I see,” Vergil says, even though he clearly does not. “How very like you to be so… adventurous.” A pause. “Far be it for me to presume that perhaps something might be troubling you.”
He’s squinting in Dante’s direction, either because of the bright sunrays or to better discern Dante’s reaction. Not good.
“What’s that? You think something is bothering me? Nooo. Nope,” Dante denies, popping the last syllable with his lips. “Everything’s totally fine and dandy around these parts.” He sweeps his arms out to the sides and laughs in a totally natural and convincing way.
Up until this point, Vergil had seemed unusually relaxed, the picturesque image of a teenage boy out for a quaint countryside stroll, but Dante watches from above as his short fuse strikes again, razor-thin tension wire pulled tight with displeasure.
“Get down here now. We need to talk.” His words are crisp and clear, no room for misinterpretation.
Well, that’s an ominous cliché if Dante’s ever heard one before. Does he want to talk about what Dante did or something completely different? Best to play it safe. “No, I don’t think so. Wouldn’t want to lose this lovely view. Hey, maybe you should come up here instead!” Please don’t, though.
Thankfully, it doesn’t seem to cross Vergil’s mind to ask why Dante’s doing this, as if he’s simply used to his brother committing utterly nonsensical and humiliating acts.
“I refuse.” Vergil sighs and states in an undeservedly long-suffering tone, “We’re not children, Dante.”
“What, is this another one of those things you find beneath our station or whatever?” There’s something to be said about the juxtaposition of Vergil acting so high and mighty when he’s a good twenty or thirty feet below. Really, it’s surprisingly much easier to deal with his scorn from this distance.
Vergil mutters under his breath, just barely audible, “I should have known you would act like this.” Then, louder, with a hard edge to his voice, “Pointless antagonism has gotten us nowhere so far. Stop avoiding the issue and face me, brother.”
Oh, has he figured out Dante’s secret technique, otherwise known as Piss Vergil Off to Avoid Talking About Things? It suits him right to get a taste of his own medicine for once.
To be fair, all he has to do to beat it is stop responding so readily. It’s not Dante’s fault that Vergil is so prone to blackouts of murderous rage these days. Then again, maybe it’s just Dante who inspires that kind of fury in him.
“I have no idea what you mean,” Dante says, then adds, mockingly, “brother.”
There’s a foreboding cracking noise from somewhere below, though Vergil doesn’t seem to have moved from his position except to place a hand flat against the bark. Vergil speaks in a low tone which makes threat prick at Dante’s skin like goosebumps, “Dante. You need to get a move on.”
He didn’t even bring a weapon, but the black expression on his face promises that Dante is in for a world of hurt if he doesn’t come down imminently. Dante clings harder to his branch, knowing that if he delays for much longer, there probably won’t be a tree here at all to hide on, anyway.
Well, let it be known that he can take a hint. That doesn’t mean he’s going to concede to doing it Vergil’s way, though.
“Oh, wow, look over there!” Dante exclaims, pointing abruptly in a random direction. “Something only I can see from this amazing vantage point.” Is that too much? Ah, whatever. “Welp, I better go and see what it is!” In one swift movement, he gets to his feet, runs along the length of the branch and springboards off, leaping to the next tree over with a loud whoop.
He spins in mid-air, tossing a salute to the blur of colour below. “See ya later, Vergil!”
Dante lands on the next tree and continues sprinting, putting as much distance as he can between them as fast as possible. Ironically, something actually does appear to be making a ruckus nearby, an indiscernible dark flash of fur or feathers or—scales?—not more than a hundred yards from their current position, but it’s probably just his imagination. Father wouldn’t let anything dangerous this far into his territory, after all.
He swan dives into freefall, catching himself on a vine with a reflexive shout of laughter. Behind him, a frustrated growl, “Dante, come back—” laced with an underlying note of worry, but Dante hardly notices, too busy relishing the freedom of movement.
And, possibly, the pure bliss that only comes from consciously putting off something you don’t want to do to another day.
Just to be safe, he makes a few laps around the estate, spreading his scent trail thin and staying high up all the while to keep tracking to a minimum. Weirdly, he doesn’t pass by Vergil again, even though there isn’t actually that much wiggle room. He must be waiting for him back inside, aware that Dante will inevitably have to return at some point.
That, or he’s given up and decided to let Dante chase his own tail like an excited terrier. That’s… what he wants, right? But it pulls hard at that buried insecurity, dumb little brother being shaken off to play by himself.
It’s also undeniably something Vergil might do. What a jerk.
On the other hand, accepting that possibility as the truth and committing to it as a course of action would mean forfeiting if Vergil really is still chasing him, so Dante quietly darts from the tree line to an open window, slipping neatly inside.
He reorients himself to the direction of Vergil’s demonic energy—somewhere on the west side of the estate—before quickly suppressing his own. It wouldn’t do to give the game away just yet.
Dante shakes his head. No, this isn’t a game. Stop getting confused; this is for his brother’s sake more than anything else.
With that, he decides to up the ante and backtrack out the window again, circling low around the house until he spots the side entrance to the kitchen. Carefully, he pries the door open so it doesn’t squeak and latches it behind him. Not that it would stop Vergil by any means, but the prospect of getting yelled at for breaking things might slow him down for that crucial half-second.
Looking around, it doesn’t seem that anyone else is in this room either, though an enormous pot bubbles away on the stove, wafting delicious waves of beef and herbs. Dante’s stomach growls.
Reluctant but unashamed, he grabs a couple of premade pastries from the counter, prying them out from under the plastic wrap and crunching down on the golden crust. Piping hot strawberry filling oozes out and Dante licks it up quickly before it can fall out, already eying the crumbs on the floor nervously.
He scarfs four of them down, then guzzles water straight from the tap to cool his throat. Despite being filled, his stomach continues to grumble, unsatisfied with this kind of nourishment. It doesn’t even make sense. Dante’s body doesn’t technically need food, period, but he wants—
More than anything, he wants—
But he doesn’t need it. That’s messed up. Dante exits out of the kitchen, peering left and right. Vergil’s somewhere nearby, he can tell.
Making a wide berth around the library, he ducks from room to room, senses prickling with awareness. His older brother is on the move too, somehow always either one step behind or, as per several moments of quick ducking and breathless fear, in front. Never quite aligning with Dante’s exact location, like a bizarre dance or a two man game of musical chairs.
It’s exhausting. Dante is having the time of his life.
He really shouldn’t be enjoying this, but there’s an animalistic thrill in chasing and being chased, outsmarting his brother by a hair’s breadth of movement or an extra helping of luck. Mostly luck, if he’s being honest. He can’t help it; there’s never been a more intoxicating feeling than having all of his brother’s attention focused solely on him, even—or especially—when he knows the outcome will most likely be bloody and painful.
Dante doesn’t have any illusions about his ability to outwit Vergil for long, though. Already, he’s riding on several near misses, a flash of his brother’s visage impossibly appearing down corridors he was so sure had been empty just seconds ago.
It’s a miracle he hasn’t been caught yet. Wedged behind the doorframe, he listens as Vergil’s steps fade out in the hallway beyond, heavier than his usual gait with frustration.
Dante lets out a slow breath to calm his racing heart, grinning despite it all.
Somehow, he’s ended up in the music room. Huh. Dante… had actually kind of forgotten they even had a music room. Although, the more he thinks about it, the sillier that idea seems. The two of them had spent countless hours scribbling down musical theory and practicing their fingers raw until mother was satisfied. Mezzo piano, piano, pianissimo, pianississimo. Whether or not there was a specific reason to put in so much effort hadn’t mattered much at the time; their parents’ rules had been set in stone and playing music had been yet another field to compete in, at least for him.
Failure had not been an option. It hardly mattered that Dante never particularly showed much natural aptitude for it, let alone in the shadow of his elder brother’s extraordinary talent.
How strange, the way that events which had once seemed so important and all-defining are now scarcely more than a wisp of memory. The simplicity of childhood, perhaps, as rote learning became less and less relevant once they grew older.
But here the room still is, just a few doors away, perfectly preserved as if no time had passed at all.
Melancholic with nostalgia, Dante taps idly at the keys of the piano. Everything had been so much easier back then, though the younger version of himself certainly hadn’t been aware of it at the time.
He stops tapping and runs his fingers lightly over the tops of the keys, appreciating the smooth texture of ivory. Both he and Vergil had learnt piano for a time, hilariously even performing a handful of songs as duets, childishly fumbling to reach around each other before eventually settling on different instruments altogether. Vergil, to the classical majesty of his violin, and Dante, to… well.
Dante grins, catching sight of his old guitar in the corner and strides over. He picks it up to strum a few bars, humming under his breath. Common sense catches up less than a minute later and he places it back down, apprehensively glancing towards the door.
A pity. If he had the time, he wouldn’t mind letting rip a good solo tune, but then he’d probably need an electric guitar rather than an acoustic one for that.
He blinks. Not that he had ever played an electric guitar. Mother might be awfully lenient at times, but there were a few topics that she took with dead seriousness, their schooling being one and traditional music another.
Vergil’s violin case hangs from its wall mount nearby, and Dante briefly relives a vivid memory: small hands clutching at the doorframe, peeking anxiously in at a slender portrait of grace, straight-backed in front of the open pages of sheet music, swaying gently in place. Envy, for his mother’s approving smile. Despair, for only being able to watch longingly as his most important person drifted further out of reach.
He should go now.
Dante retreats back to the doorway, pausing at the sight of a colourful bloom of poppies in a vase to the side just long enough to notice something small and round peeking out from under the base.
“Well, would you look at that. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you,” Dante remarks out loud, pocketing the coin with a quirk of his lips. Never hurts to have a trick or two up your sleeve.
A sudden bang at the door startles him, followed by another. The lock jiggles in place. Dante steps back, adrenaline rushing through his veins.
Luck strikes again—if he hadn’t stopped to pick up his coin, he would have been caught totally unaware. Take that, Vergil.
At least, he thinks it’s Vergil. Dante can’t feel him nearby so he must be suppressing his presence, but it’s not like it could realistically be anyone else. Neither mother nor father would knock on the other side of the door like this with increasing fervency, louder and louder.
Come to think of it, it doesn’t really seem like something Vergil would do either, but who else could it be?
It suddenly occurs to Dante that he doesn’t remember locking the door when he came in. Weird.
No time to worry about minor details, though. Dante fleetingly considers dragging the piano over and holing up inside the music room, but mother would just get mad if he scratched the tiles and it’s not like it would hold Vergil for long, anyway.
Without another moment’s hesitation, Dante rips open the sliding window and jumps out, crouching low and dashing along the side of the house. Should he climb onto the roof? No, that will just make it easier for Vergil to catch him if he looks there. The best approach is to keep moving.
With the majority of his attention focused on the faint caustic fizz of demonic energy left in Vergil’s wake, Dante rounds the corner in a rush and very nearly smacks headfirst into another person, reeling back in shock at the last possible millisecond and flailing clumsily for balance.
“Bradley!” Dante blurts out, registering the other man’s appearance. “Wait, shit. Uh. I mean, sorry about that, didn’t expect to see you there,” he stammers, fumbling for composure.
Their tutor seems just as surprised to see him, before shaking his head and smiling wryly. “Dante, it’s good to see you again. I hope I haven’t bumped into you at a bad time?”
“Um,” Dante says. “No?”
Technically, Dante is the one who nearly ran him over, but this is obviously one of those etiquette things where you’re meant to apologise and take the blame regardless. Which Dante was probably meant to do first. Whoops.
Shit, he’d also just said it wasn’t a bad time when he’s kind of in the middle of running for his life.
“Is there something you wanted to talk to me about? Because otherwise—” Dante’s already shifting on his feet, antsy to get moving, but the excuse dies in his throat when he sees another figure peek out shyly from behind his tutor’s back.
Bradley’s smile turns softer as he places a hand around the stranger’s waist and says, “I wanted to introduce you to my fiancé, Angelina. Angelina, this is Dante, one of the boys I’m teaching here.”
“You finally popped the question, huh? Nice to meet you,” Dante says, and means it. He shakes her hand, still a bit flustered and trying hard not to compulsively glance back over his shoulder. He edges subtly to the side to keep out of view from any point beyond the corner of the house.
Angelina returns his polite greeting and looks up at Bradley to remark, “I’m glad you brought me to meet your students, they’re all so lovely.” The way they stare at each other is sickeningly sweet.
Bradley turns back to face him. “Is your brother around as well, perchance? I would like to introduce Angelina to him as well.” Dante carefully doesn’t flinch.
“Afraid I don’t have a clue. He could be anywhere.” And he really could be anywhere. Dante starts to sweat nervously.
Bradleys squints at him. “I realise I may have caught the two of you at an off moment in the past,” did he ever, “but I really do get the impression that you and Vergil have a close bond.”
Given how Vergil has acted around Bradley so far, Dante really can’t understand how he’s managed to obtain that idea. Must be the twin thing. “Did something happen between—”
“Nope,” Dante interrupts swiftly because The Incident is right at the forefront of his memory and he cannot talk about that oh my god. “Nothing is wrong at all. In fact, everything’s totally fine.” Apart from how Dante crawled into his bed and sucked his di—“Let’s not talk about Vergil right now,” he says desperately. “Did you guys want to have a look around the house?”
Luckily, they respectfully decline so Dante isn’t roped into giving them a guided tour or anything. He can’t even fathom what Vergil would do if he got caught in the middle of doing that. Hopefully not throw another hissy fit in front of Bradley, this time with even more witnesses.
The tension in his limbs gradually dissipates as the minutes drag on and Vergil fails to make an appearance. Stuck awkwardly at the stage of waiting for a reasonable excuse to leave, it turns out that watching Bradley and Angelina murmur gently to each other is a surprisingly enlightening experience.
A demon and a human, so different from his own parents yet undeniably the same in every way that matters. Proof that there’s still some good in the world even for people like him, just so long as they hold onto the parts that make them truly human.
Something settles and clicks into place alongside a mix of different emotions: peace, longing, wistfulness. A hint of something darker, jealousy or despair, but only the fleeting dregs which are easy enough to brush aside.
This is what a real relationship should look like, pastel shades of gentle affection and mutual trust.
It’s like the universe is still trying to teach him the same lesson, years later: don’t screw it up. When you do anyway, dial it back. Keep everything in check because you’re not just hurting yourself, you’re hurting him too. He doesn’t need you like that. He doesn’t want you like that.
It hurts to let go.
But it’s a happy moment, even with misery simmering quietly underneath all the banal small talk. Bradley admits in a more serious aside, “Angelina’s father made his misgivings known, but has stepped down from his ultimatum since we got together and talked the matter through a few days ago.”
A few days ago? Something seems wrong with that, but Dante can’t place it.
“My father isn’t the kind of man to let things go easily,” Angelina explains. “Once he has an opinion, he tends to stick by it regardless of any evidence to the contrary, so it’s been hard-going to convince him otherwise.” She looks a bit depressed but musters up enough cheer to ask, “You must tell me, what is it like to grow up as a half-demon?”
“Well,” Dante shoots Bradley a look because really, he shouldn’t be the one answering a question like that. Maybe this is the real reason why Bradley brought his girlfriend here, so Dante can belay any worries she’s been having through a second opinion.
If that’s the case then he should probably give her the clean, child-friendly version. “It’s not all that different from growing up as a human? Honestly, there’s not that much that sets us apart, at least in our family. I guess it kind of depends on whether there’s, like, a succubus in the family tree or something, but we’re not exactly going around doing weird things like drinking bloo—” ABORT, ABORT, “—I mean, eating human flesh,” Dante finishes weakly.
Despite his best efforts, even the mere thought of it is enough to make his stomach growl again in warning. Hastily, Dante casts his mind around for a solution when a brilliant idea suddenly occurs to him.
“Hey, you guys must have driven here, right? Would you mind giving me a lift into town?”
Bradley and Angelina share a glance before turning back to him, consternation on their faces. In particular, Bradley looks like he’s going to argue the point so Dante hastens to add, “I know it’s probably not the best idea right now, but I was really hoping you might have a free minute to drop me off. It doesn’t even have to be in town, just somewhere near the outskirts would be fine.” Somewhere far away from here.
His brain feels a bit fuzzy. Isn’t their house in Redgrave? No, that’s not right. Somewhere remote, below city level. Above?
“No,” Bradley says, but his voice is a bit strange, deep and echoing. “You are not to leave the mansion grounds.”
Crap. Bradley can’t say no. How else is he going to leave this place?
This is bad. His brother could be here any minute and who knows what will happen then. He needs this, needs to get away, needs to not ruin everything—
“Of course,” Bradley says, but his voice is a bit reluctant. Angelina pats his arm comfortingly, and he tells Dante, “I’m not much of a fighter, you know. I do hope you’ll try and stay safe. I will try my best, of course, but these are dangerous times.”
“Don’t worry, I trust you,” Dante assures him. “Let’s go now.” The sooner, the better.
He walks past, expecting them to follow him to the front of the property, but falters when he realises that they haven’t moved an inch.
Just standing there, facing him. Not talking. Not moving.
A chill runs down his spine.
Dante spins around, somehow not surprised at all to lay his eyes on the sight directly before him. Expecting it, like this is what he had been waiting for the whole time without realising it. Vergil, dressed in his long coat, stupid poetry book in one hand—
Yamato in the other.
He doesn’t understand what’s happening at all, why it feels like the trees have stopped swaying, the air suddenly gone cold and still. All the colour leeched out like a black and white film reel, everything completely lifeless except for Vergil and his blue coat.
His lips move numbly to shape words he can hardly hear over the sound of his own heartbeat. “You promised.”
Vergil smiles, and Dante’s muscles clench with the fight or flight response. (With him, it’s always fight, but if Vergil has Yamato, then where is the Rebellion?)
“You should know better by now. I never promised you anything.”
His voice is smooth, calm. Controlled. Of course it is. Vergil has always been the most at peace when he’s decided on a course of action. It never matters if Dante has anything to say about it. That’s just how Vergil is, hellbent on seeing it through to the end on his own terms.
But he has it wrong. That’s not what’s happening here at all. Vergil approaches and Dante jerks as he comes closer, getting ready to—only to watch as Vergil walks past him, one step at a time.
“No,” Dante says. “You can’t.”
Vergil doesn’t bother turning around. “I think you’ll find that what I can and cannot do is none of your concern, Dante.”
This is a nightmare. He wants to wake up, but instead he can only watch on in horror as Vergil keeps going, casually unsheathing Yamato in a slow glide of metal.
Relaxed, almost lazy, Vergil says, “I gave you enough warnings. You have only yourself to blame for forcing my hand in this, brother.”
Dante’s muscles strain uselessly against nothing. He tries to scream, shout at them to move, but his mouth won’t open. As if Vergil doesn’t believe he has anything important to say, and now the world has bent to his will to make that idea a reality.
“Inaction leads to the downfall of the weak. I will not be defeated because of someone else’s failings, nor will I simply allow my enemies to walk the earth unhindered. You were foolish to think otherwise,” Vergil chides. One more step and a deliberate slide of movement, his blade slipping neatly between Angelina’s ribs.
Dante jolts into motion, released from whatever prison he had been trapped in. He rushes over, a hand outstretched to wrap around Vergil’s throat, but Vergil acts before he can get there.
Four blue swords melt into the space between them, glistening with demonic energy. Vergil stretches a hand behind him, not even bothering to look, a dismissive wave to guide their trajectory.
They dive towards him and it’s too late to move, one blade for each limb. The momentum rockets Dante backwards and traps him in place, pinned to the ground by Vergil’s summoned blades.
“Vergil!” Dante roars, and the world shakes with him, fire and fury both. His vision blurs with rage, sparks jumping from the tips of his claws scrabbling uselessly against the pavement. Smoke and ash further obscure the sight of Vergil withdrawing his blade with a sickening squelch, Angelina’s body slumping heavily to the floor.
“You have had your fun. If anything, I have been incredibly lenient to allow you these sickening delusions of what could have been.” Dante can’t even recognise him anymore. It’s like a stranger has crawled inside Vergil’s skin and stolen his voice.
Dante tries to rip at least one hand free, but the hilt of the shimmering blade prevents him from ripping straight through the fracturing bones, his own healing factor being used against him. Teeth gritted against the pain, he spits, “Don’t you dare, Vergil. If you’re going to kill anyone, kill me instead!”
Those words, raw and bitter with disgust, are enough to give Vergil pause. “How unusual to hear such self sacrificial drivel from you for once. Or perhaps this is another attempt of yours to divert my attention from what must be done, since you’re clearly so unwilling to take on the responsibility yourself?”
Vergil shakes his head as if amused. A vicious smile curves his lips. “And make no mistake, I can kill you any time.”
I can take it any time.
Dante can only watch, head lolling to the side in his own puddle of blood as Vergil methodically grabs Bradley’s hair in one hand and slowly hacks his way through his neck with the other, blood spurting messily from the wound. It’s unlike Vergil to be so unnecessarily cruel, drawing out the pain from his victims with unyielding brutality. Bradley stays frozen, trapped the same way Dante had been. The way he still is. Dante wonders if he can feel it and prays to any uncaring god that he can’t.
His brother is a monster.
A wet thud as Vergil releases his grip and Bradley’s severed head falls to the ground, blank eyes staring at Dante accusingly. You could have saved him. This is your fault.
Everything is still so quiet, the fading hiss and sputter of dying flames in the distance. Vergil’s boots fade into view through the ash and he kneels down, the faintest splatter of red at the hem of his coat.
Vergil leans in, just like that first day before everything had gone so wrong, as if he’s going to share a secret. Dante closes his eyes.
“This is what you wanted, Dante. Isn’t that right? Everyone you care about gathered together in a neat little box. Family.”
Fire, red and blue. Scales. Vergil, leaning in even closer, just barely within reach to bite or be bitten. Dante wants—
Nothing changed. Months had passed like this, stuck in a stalemate of blood and unspoken words. Tiptoeing around what he really wanted to say because there weren’t enough excuses in the world to make things right between them anymore.
No, that wasn’t true. This was how it should be between them. A new baseline, a different breed of understanding. He wouldn’t give it up for the world, this small smidgen of warmth. Less than he wants but infinitely more than either of them deserve.
But he had changed. They had both changed. No longer the same person he once was, if he was ever a person at all. The shape of him twisted into something new, more powerful and more deadly, finally able to match up along the only dimension that mattered, the one thing he had always craved since the very beginning.
They didn’t look the same anymore. Tiny cracks spiderwebbing outwards in the mirror: simulacra. False imitation.
Hunger, endless and unforgiving. Such a pity that there was nothing that could possibly fill it. He was already fulfilled with what they had. He didn’t need anything from him anymore. Say it three times and it became reality. Deny, deny, deny.
Something was awake inside of him that should have stayed asleep.
Hyperaware and focused on that missing limb, like a sunflower turned to the shade. Stupid. Courting the impossible, and not for the better.
(Changed by what had become of him, but no guilt for all of the destruction left in his wake, no remorse. Death was always an option where they were now, but not forgiveness.
He could see it now, the way that blame had finally fled his form after so many years, a weight lifted from aching shoulders. But maybe that was worse, because without that blistering fury, what remained to tie them together?
What else was there?)
Indifference, the slowest of poisons. Blinded by his faith in the ultimacy of destruction, turned into nothing more than a paragon of his fragile ideology. Not family.
That one childish wish, never born into this world. The past was set in stone, childhood a transient memory of someone else’s happiness. He knew that now.
And yet if he could change one thing, erase one moment from time and scrub the despair from his skin like bleeding filth… he had been alone for so long. Agony in the silence, abandoned and left to rot.
Circles and dead ends. That moment when the other half of his soul had looked at him and said I don’t need you, and left again. The worst possible thing. Apathy, more corrosive than any black hate.
Dante would choose Vergil every time, in every possible iteration of this world. For Vergil, Dante had never even been an option.
Same record on repeat. Vergil letting Dante down, and Dante letting Vergil let him down. Foolish, traitorous hope crushed underfoot every single time.
Pull him in. Push him away. Don’t get too close. I want to be closer.
Don’t leave me.
“Wake up!”
Dante’s chin slips off his upraised palm and slams down onto the table. “Ouch,” he grumbles belatedly, sitting up straight to rub at the rapidly healing bruise on his jaw with a wince.
Damn, looks like he fell asleep in the middle of their group tutoring session in the library. Again. Dante casually glances down at the textbook under his elbows to try and figure out which topic they’re covering right now.
Oh, it’s the extra boring kind of mathematics, barely distinguishable from every other kind. That checks out, at least. It figures that the most banal stuff would end up giving him the weirdest dreams.
“Do you have anything to say for yourself?”
Dante raises his gaze cautiously. On the other side of the table, Vergil gives him an inscrutable look, the type that Dante knows for a fact actually belies deep inner turmoil as his brother struggles to process complicated emotions. Well, shit. He doesn’t feel like getting yelled at right now.
Vergil isn’t the one whose voice had rung out with accusation, though.
“Sorry, Miss—” What was their tutor’s name again? “—uh, Mary,” Dante apologises hesitantly, unsure if he guessed correctly or not.
He receives an unimpressed look for his efforts. “My students are to refer to me as Lady,” she informs him. “Now, what was the answer to the question?”
“Um.” Dante panics, scanning the page to see if there’s any clue as to which question they’re currently on. “I… er. Can you repeat the question? I didn’t catch it the first time.”
“I suspected as much, given how loudly you were snoring,” Lady tells him drily. “Question fourteen, part two. If you take a loan for three hundred and fifty dollars at a ten percent interest rate per annum, how much do you owe after twenty four years?”
“I don’t like this question,” says Dante.
Lady smiles sweetly. “Too bad.”
He quickly scribbles down some of the working out, but it’s really more for show than anything. “About… eight hundred and forty dollars?” he asks, frowning at the page.
Vergil lets out a weary sigh, eyes closed and fingers pinching the bridge of his nose. “You forgot to add on the original amount, Dante.” Under his breath, his brother mutters in a resigned voice, “I suppose this is what we’re doing now.”
Wow, rude.
“Correct. So what’s the answer, Dante?” Lady demands, idly wiping a sturdy-looking pistol with a dry cloth. She flips it over to admire the shine under the overhead lights.
“Are you sure you’re qualified to be a teacher?” Dante asks her suspiciously. Tutors don’t usually bring firearms to lessons, right?
“Don’t worry about this,” Lady assures him, casually spinning it in the air with one finger on the trigger, the way all teachers apparently handle guns in front of impressionable minors. Algebra takes precedence over gun safety. “Consider it… incentive to get the questions right.”
Then she shoots him in the head.
“What was that for?!” Dante yells, trying in vain to keep any blood from spilling onto the open pages. Although, that could be a good excuse to—no, father would never let him get away with wasting stationery like that.
“My hand slipped.” Lady tilts her head delicately as if she could hear the full list of insults running through Dante’s mind. “But like I said: incentive. Don’t get another one wrong or I might slip again.”
Vergil stays completely silent throughout their exchange, lips narrowed into a thin line of displeasure. Dante gets the impression that there’s something he wants to say, but nothing comes of it.
“Next question,” Lady announces dismissively, going back to wiping residue from the barrel. “Moving onto gambling and probability, what is the chance of rolling a triple snake eyes?”
Dante squints at her. “I don’t think that’s what it’s called.”
“I said what I said,” Lady states, returning his gaze with a challenging look.
He raises his hands in forfeit and considers the question seriously. Three dice, all with the same value, so that’s… he frowns. Is there an equation to plug the numbers into, or is he just meant to be able to figure it out somehow?
Dante looks over at Vergil pleadingly, who merely rolls his eyes with visible disdain. So that’s a no go, then. Dante pouts at him, then doodles mournfully on the graph paper to pass the time. Tiny stick figure Vergil gets slowly crushed to death under a slot machine, stick figure limbs flying everywhere.
He’s busy colouring in the text bubble when Lady finally interrupts boredly, “Time’s up. Oh, would you look at that. Vergil got it right. Dante got it totally wrong. How shocking.”
Vergil still looks visibly annoyed but nevertheless goes so far as to explain in a slightly pained tone, “All you have to do is consider all of the possible outcomes, then add together—”
Dante cuts him off with a distressed yelp. “Gah! No more learning, please. I can’t deal with this anymore; my brain is totally fried.” He lays his head down on the table forlornly. “Whoever came up with this idea is the worst. Is it time for lunch yet?”
From his sideways position, he sees Vergil’s expression change to one of perplexity. “We just started, Dante.”
“Any amount of time spent doing this is torture,” Dante complains. “Only a nerd would actually care about—binomials and stuff.”
Vergil sputters at the unintended insult, which by itself gives Dante a warm and gooey feeling inside. Yeah, little brother knows exactly how much of a closeted geek you are.
“Look, I’ve got my own shit to do, so feel free to hang around for a bit and pretend to do your homework or whatever,” Lady says with a flippant wave, pushing out of her chair and sauntering out the room.
Dante is momentarily taken aback by how easy that was, but then the lesson really had only just begun, so a temporary reprieve now probably means more work later.
He drops his head back down onto his folded arms and groans.
Without Lady around, the library lapses into silence. The only audible sound Dante can hear is the scratching of pen on paper, so he raises his head curiously to catch a glimpse. Surely, Vergil can’t really be working on their homework now.
Glancing over, it doesn’t look like math, more like—Vergil notices his staring and stiffens up, eyes narrowed in a cold stare. Dante shrugs nonchalantly.
“What are you working on?” he can’t help asking.
Vergil replies tersely, “A maze puzzle.” His fingers tighten around the pen, enough that Dante has genuine worries about the plastic cracking. Almost as an afterthought, “Not that you would know anything about that.”
“Hey, I know plenty about mazes,” Dante refutes easily, unfolding to stretch his arms over his head. “They have an entrance and an exit, and a whole lot of unnecessary complication in between,” he adds with a grin.
Vergil sighs. “Sometimes more than one entrance and more than one exit. And typically a lot of dead ends.” He sounds weirdly frustrated considering Dante is pretty sure these kinds of puzzles are usually for kids.
“I’m sorry you’re a nerd.” Wait, that didn’t come out right. “I mean, I’m sorry I called you a nerd.”
Vergil gives him a nonplussed look. “It’s rare for you to apologise at all, let alone out of the blue like this. Do you really think yourself so capable of hurting my feelings?” he taunts, and Dante suddenly understands that it must be a reflex to deal with a situation he doesn’t understand, like, say, the bewildering process of trying to figure out what Dante’s actually going on about.
That’s okay, because he doesn’t have a clue, either.
His brother makes a derisive sound with his tongue and adds, “You apologising to me at this point in time may top the list of unexpected occurrences coming from you recently.” What does that mean?
Generally, Dante has no problem admitting when he’s done wrong, he just doesn’t like doing it with Vergil. That’s different. “Whatever, I just—“ he huffs a sigh. “It’s not fair, okay?”
He must be in an odd mood today. For some reason, Dante feels tired of edging around the problem like usual, years of frustration building up in his chest.
How long have they been playing this game, running around in aimless circles? There must have been a reason to hold back in the past, but he can’t for the life of him remember what could have been so important as to merit this level of avoidance.
“You’re always ahead of me in fighting and learning and—” Dante gestures vaguely. “And I get it. It’s fine. But…”
Vergil exhales slowly, loosening the grip on his pen. “Of course. I know you’re always trying to wrest the top position.”
“No, it’s not like that,” Dante refutes with a shake of his head, and tries to phrase it in a way that will unstick the words from his brain. He settles on, “We’re brothers. We’re meant to stay together.” But that’s not quite right, either.
In the end, he relents, “I just want to be by your side no matter what.”
The sheer honesty of that statement rings out, too raw and heavy in the still air. An excess of emotion, especially for them. If Vergil is surprised, it still wouldn’t match up to the shock that Dante feels for having finally put that feeling into words.
“Even after…?” Vergil clears his throat. “Even after all this time?” Dante’s not sure who the question is directed to.
“You were never this honest.” The look Vergil gives him is close to trepidation, like he’s unsure what Dante might do next; hug him, maybe, or something equally preposterous.
Dante shrugs, internally struggling to comprehend his own actions as well. It is unusual, but so far, his spontaneous bought of sincerity may have ended up leading to what might legitimately be their first non-violent interaction in months.
His brother drops his pen to the table where it rolls back and forth before coming to a stop. Vergil, unreadable and unmoving as a rock, says, “Things don’t stay the same forever.”
How many times has he heard that phrase recently? Dante frowns. “I know that, but I want to hold onto the important things while they last.” He twists in his seat uncomfortably. “I… miss you. It feels like we never get the time to really hang out anymore.”
Is that too revealing? Probably no more than what he’s already said. Certainly, it had sounded less like he was laying his heart bare when the words were still in his head.
“It’s pointless to attempt to make up for lost time like this, especially if you’re always going to be living in the past,” Vergil chides lightly, but his eyes bore a hole straight through Dante’s skull.
Dante chews the inside of his lip. “That’s not it either.” If anyone’s living in the past—“It’s not one or the other. You can try to hold onto what matters and keep moving forward at the same time.”
This has gotten way more involved than Dante ever expected for them to get today. Disconcertingly out of hand, since he hadn’t even wanted the conversation to go this way, careening wildly off course from where they started.
Vergil’s voice is brusque, the way he gets when he’s conflicted but trying his best to hide it, “I suppose you’re not… completely hopeless.”
For a few seconds, it is unbearably awkward.
Dante cracks up. “Ha, you are so bad at being comforting. If that’s what you were trying to do, anyway.” The palpable discomfort with which Vergil had said that line had been comedic gold. God, sometimes he can’t believe how much he loves this guy.
After the longest smoke break in the world—seriously, how much are their parents paying her—Lady returns at last. Dante is fully set to call her out on taking so long until he sees another figure following close behind.
“Hey brats,” Lady greets them. “Look who I met out the front. This is your cousin, Trish.”
Dante eyes her warily, because there’s no doubt that she does absolutely resemble their mother to a frankly disturbing degree, but—“I didn’t think we had any cousins.”
“Shut up, Dante. I’m your cousin.” There’s a hard edge to her voice which somehow makes the point totally inarguable.
Dante concedes, “Well, okay then,” and sits back. Didn’t their mother’s entire extended family excommunicate her for the whole marrying a demon thing?
Ah, whatever.
Lady informs them with a distinct lack of enthusiasm, “What do you know, it’s lunchtime now.” Yeah, no shit, she’s been gone for like an hour. “Our next lesson is going to be how to cook pizza.”
Dante jumps immediately to his feet, the chair screeching out from under him. “Pizza?! Hell yeah!”
Attention now fully diverted, he barely hears the sound of Vergil smacking his palm against his face, mumbling, “Ridiculous.”
The four of them make their way down to the kitchen, clearing out a space on the broader side of the granite counter to dump out all of the different ingredients. Despite Dante’s misgivings, it seems Lady really had put some amount of forethought into it, treading over to the pantry and pulling out a wrapped bag of pre-made pizza dough.
Chatter fills the room as they navigate around each other in the limited space, sorting out who wants which toppings. As it turns out, not a single one of them shares the same preferences, which Dante learns the hard way when his hand gets smacked for the third time in a row, reaching over the assorted bowls of fresh ingredients to grab the one furthest from him.
“What? Do you have a problem with mushrooms as well? They’re all perfectly normal pizza toppings,” he insists, rubbing gingerly at his wrist.
Lady stares him down judgementally, then stabs the chef’s knife right in between his fingers like some sort of gangster. “Use the knife, Dante.”
“I did!” Although looking at the chunks now, they’re admittedly a bit mismatched in size and shape, but still. “So it’s not my best work. It’s all getting eaten anyway.” Dante frowns. He’s usually so good at knife work, too.
He yelps a moment later when an electrical zap sends up the smell of burnt fish. “Trish, what are you doing?!”
She glares at him. “No anchovies.”
“It’s not even your pizza!” Getting bullied is the worst, and Vergil isn’t even joining in (though he’d probably help more than hinder their cruelty), sitting sullenly to the side and watching it all unfold with a faint aura of disgust.
“Stop it, I don’t want olives,” Dante hisses at Trish, who looks at him innocently. Seriously, the one ingredient he can’t stand. The casual way he’d caught her knocking it over in his exact direction speaks volumes, too.
Miffed, Dante turns to his brother and asks plaintively, “How come you never get treated like this?” Then, noticing the glaringly blank space on his side of the bench, “You haven’t even started on yours. What do you want? I’ll get it for you.”
“I’m not hungry,” Vergil says flatly.
“Oh. Well, alright then. Don’t complain to me later when you regret skipping lunch.” Dante frowns and stuffs the handful of bell peppers he’d gotten for Vergil in his own mouth instead, crunching them down in a matter of seconds. He’s been snacking on bits and pieces nonstop, but his stomach still churns with an acidic burn like he hasn’t eaten in days.
A craving that can’t be solved with grease and pepperoni? Pizza sacrilege, is what it is. Dante decides to smother his woes in another layer of four cheese mix.
Lady fiddles with the oven to fit all of their trays in at the same time, so Dante and Trish hang around idly while Vergil scarpers to the other side of the room, poetry book clutched in his hand like a true introvert.
Trish leans in to whisper, “You know, I can’t say that I don’t see the family resemblance between you two,” Dante feels weird hearing those words coming from her, of all people, “but you sure as hell don’t act anything alike. Are you sure you’re really twins?”
Dante laughs. It’s definitely not the first time he’s heard those exact words, but somehow the question never stops feeling like a stab to the chest. He might be overly familiar with both of those things by now, but that just means he can attest that it hurts like hell.
At least she hadn’t said the phrase “fire and ice”, which often got bandied around on these occasions. Dante had always hated it when people talked about them like that, mostly because he couldn’t think of anyone less suited to being cold and unfeeling than his twin. On the surface, sure, but Vergil is definitely fire through and through, steadily burning away with fury and passion in equal measures.
(As kids, he’d liked that nobody else seemed to notice Vergil’s true nature, a secret all of his own—now it just seems like a hardship when others don’t want to put in the effort to break through his tough outer shell. And all the while, Vergil had only grown more and more skilled at hiding away.)
Disheartened, Dante bites back to Trish, “Hey, better than two of you or two of Lady. The human world wouldn’t be able to take the strain, I bet.” He gives her a friendly punch on the shoulder as reassurance that he doesn’t really mean it.
Lady chips in, “I think we’re all grateful you don’t have an exact copy running around, though I doubt much would change. Twice the grocery bill, maybe.”
Brutal frankness or not, when Dante’s in need of a pick-me-up, her trash-talking somehow never fails to lift his spirits. “Excuse you. If it was up to me, this house would be all takeout, all the time.”
“We know,” Trish and Lady say simultaneously, and he can’t help but chuckle at that.
Dante leans forward to watch the crust slowly turn golden brown through the oven door, impatiently awaiting that perfect gooey stretch of melted cheese. Mmm.
He looks to the side but misangles it and ends up with an eyeful of Lady’s exposed hip instead of her face. It is a very nice hip though, he thinks privately, giving it an appreciative once-over.
She notices and cocks it to once side, humouring him with a wink before reaching behind her back and pulling out the same pistol she’d had in the library.
“Whoa, hey now,” Dante placates, trying to deescalate the situation. “Don’t shoot a guy just for admiring the view. Beauty is beauty and all that.” If he’s being honest, her handgun is the real looker here—it is a very nice looking gun—but there’s no way he’s going to admit that out loud any time soon. He does, after all, enjoy being shot ever so slightly less than being stabbed; bullets can be a tremendous pain to dig out later.
A quiet snort of derision meets his ears. Thanks for your input, big brother.
It’s all in good fun, though. Lady lowers her pistol and sticks her tongue out at him playfully, whereas Trish, ever the type to see a challenge where there isn’t one, harrumphs and flips her hair dramatically.
Dante raises an eyebrow. “Yeah, no. You look way too much like my mother. If you want to pump up your self-esteem, go somewhere else.” Unless she was actually trying to get a reaction from Lady instead of him, anyway.
Trish says something very rude and Dante pretends not to hear it.
“Hmm, you know who might actually have low enough standards to give you a second look?” Lady slides in with a sly smirk.
Hypnotised once again by the slow ooze of mozzarella, Dante replies distractedly, “Who?”
“Lucia.”
Dante startles, then laughs uneasily. “Wow, that’s a name I haven’t heard in a while. When do you guys talk? Do you know how she’s doing?”
Lady helps him take the trays out of the oven first before responding. Juxtaposed against the awfulness of this line of conversation, the crispy bacon, ham, ground beef and sausage smell heavenly.
“Doing as well as any other half-demon around these parts. Kicking ass, toppling the patriarchy. Still single.” Lady grins predatorily.
Well, he can’t exactly tell her or Trish the real reason he’s mostly ended up breaking off contact from Lucia. Their relationship is still struggling to recover from how unbearably awkward it got last time the two of them met up. “Enjoying the bachelorette life, I take it,” he says weakly.
“She’s definitely interested and it’s not like you have great prospects otherwise, what with your being broke, a slob, trailing pizza boxes everywhere you go, penniless, that unfortunate tendency you have of getting mauled by demons in public…” Lady counts off on her fingers.
Dante desperately wants to change the topic to literally anything other than his love life, but it’s hard to think past the wave of blistering heat that’s suddenly crept up on them, accompanied by an odd sense of foreboding. Did they accidentally leave the oven door open?
No. This is something entirely different.
From the back of the room, Vergil abruptly stands up, flickering from view and reappearing right in front of Dante, radiating compressed energy like a star on the verge of implosion.
Sweat trickles down the back of Dante’s neck. Had he gotten so distracted that he hadn’t even noticed this building the whole time, so out of tune with Vergil and his motivations?
“You say one thing, brother, but your actions do not reflect your resolve. Is your attention span still so short-lived?” Vergil says, quiet fury and doom, his eyes glowing blue under the dull overhead lights of the kitchen. “It occurs to me that what you might need is a little bit of discipline.”
At that, a shiver runs down Dante’s spine and he reflexively tries to take a step back, but Vergil follows, crowding into his space with relentless momentum, as inescapable as gravity.
Too close. Vergil’s hand runs a burning line up the length of Dante’s arm until the tips of his fingers are pressing lightly under his chin, the searing edge of a branding iron. Dante shudders involuntarily.
“Oh, I see,” Vergil hums, intrigued. Dangerous. “To think I had originally put a stop to this for your sake. The first time was unintentional, I will admit. I was unaware that the base form could evolve into something so much more. And such a discovery had to happen in this place, no less.” He sounds mildly annoyed at that. “But you don’t mind it this way at all, do you?”
Vergil’s rubs the pad of his finger in a slow circle and Dante’s spine arches like a cat, his head jerking upwards to allow better access.
God, what is happening to him?
“So responsive,” Vergil chuckles lowly, his voice an indulgent purr. “As usual, you are nothing but surprises at every turn, brother. And yet your body is so honest about its desires even without the compulsion of our father’s blood.”
Finally, Vergil’s words edge ever so slightly closer to an explanation, but that doesn’t—he can’t—Dante struggles against the invisible weight pressing down on his tongue, trapping his limbs in place. The overwhelming desire to expose his throat and beg for more.
He manages to rasp out, “You’re crazy. No one would want this.”
Vergil’s grip turns punishing, nails digging crescent shapes into his skin. Immediately, Dante’s entire body locks up again, muscles refusing to budge. Shit.
Vergil hisses into his ear, “This is unique to you and me, Dante. Nobody else. We are Sparda’s only sons. You will learn to accept the truth of our heritage for what it really is.”
No. This isn’t happening again. Dante refuses to follow the same damn script, bowing to Vergil’s weird moon logic and giving in to these bizarre demonic rituals he doesn’t even understand.
Dante braces himself for one final push against invisible bonds. Tearing himself out of Vergil’s grasp, he staggers backwards until he bumps into the granite bench top, knocking over the trays with a series of earth-shattering bangs.
The residual burn of hot metal is almost cooling to his skin.
What does he do? What should he do? Stop letting Vergil lead. Break the spell. Dante grits his teeth and snaps, “Nobody but you and me? Don’t try and tell me you’re jealous. You’ve told way better lies than that before.“ He’s still trembling, struggling to deny the lingering phantom of Vergil’s touch, so gentle he might as well have been cruel.
His hands clench into tight fists until the pain drowns out anything else. “If you wanted to join the cool kids, all you had to do was ask.”
Focus on the facts. Like always, his brother had been given every possible chance to turn back before the breaking point. This is all his fault.
Vergil snarls. “As you well know, I don’t enjoy sharing. I am not one of your little friends, Dante. This is the truth you don’t want to admit: I am your brother—”
He closes the distance between then in a flash, yanking Dante by the collar to reel him in until their lips are almost touching. “And you are mine.”
Fangs close around Dante’s neck, piercing deep. Dante jerks, animal instinct to dislodge him, get away from the unexpected stab of pleasure-pain. Vergil just bites harder, more vicious, teeth sinking into his flesh with indomitable strength.
It’s different from last time. Dante gasps, an indescribable haziness overtaking his mind, his will to move, the need to make this stop. He sags into Vergil’s embrace, the kitchen scene swimming blurrily in front of him. His head feels fuzzy.
Submit.
This is what it feels like to be owned, punished. A thick, viscous daze of surrender, giving in and letting judgement roll over you.
In this moment, he would give Vergil anything. Spread his ribcage open and let his brother pluck out his heart and eat it, easy as pie. The victor wins the right of conquest.
The strangeness of those thoughts should be jarring. Instead, it feels right. Warm, comforting. The way things should be. Family. Family?
Dante’s eyes snap open, stomach abruptly roiling with nausea. He shoves at Vergil with everything he has left, sending up a spray of blood as Vergil’s teeth are unwillingly extricated.
It splatters messily over the both of them, speckling their surroundings like grotesque confetti. Vergil lets out a feral growl, inhuman vibrations of dissatisfaction.
Lurching backwards on wobbly legs, Dante rebels against the intangible force trying to push him to his knees. Go back to him, make things right. You can do better.
He tries to put more distance between them, but in a flash of movement, his brother lunges forward again.
Dante grapples desperately, struggling to push him off, but—why isn’t anyone reacting? Aren’t Trish and Lady still in the room? Help me, he wants to scream, but he can’t even bear to look, afraid to witness that same dead-eyed stillness from last time.
No, not last time, that never happened—
Vergil tears at his throat again, white-hot agony sliding against his skin, penetrating through muscle and tendon. For once, his brother isn’t holding back, but he didn’t want it like this.
Or did he? After all, this is what they both crave, fighting for dominance, an even match, the coppery taste on his tongue.
He realises now it was never really about the blood. Like calls to like, an echo chamber of bad ideas. (Pay attention to me, brother.)
Lungs fill with sticky goo and he can’t breathe, choking on gore and death, chest slowly being crushed under an immense flowing weight which dissolves steadily into an unending stream of tight red slick pain wet stop.
The slightest hint of regret on his brother’s face but still no one reacts, so he tries one last time to push Vergil away and he falls—
Rushing forward but it’s too late, his brother is falling and there’s nothing he can do to stop it, reaches out his hand to try and grab him but reaches out his hand but reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand reaches out his hand
reaches out
too dark no sound demon-light sluices water endless void something greater flesh bone desperate precipice forward no way anymore never existed familiar vicious further thought look agree only one hand tightens drip blood hurts so much nothing left only thing vast emptiness anything waiting never was
one breath, two, and jumps—
Dante startles into waking, a choked inhale caught in the throes of whatever the hell that dream had been about. Nightmare? It’d been too abstract to really make that distinction, but whichever way, it left a gross, oily feeling behind like some sort of foreboding warning from the great beyond.
…Yeah, right. He probably needs to stop eating so much junk food before bed.
Tangled under the covers, his feet twitch restlessly, so Dante presses his legs together in hopes of tamping down on the lingering agitation so he can get back to sleep.
Slowly, the combination of quiet and darkness lulls his mind back into a half-sleep, soothed by the comforting sensations of warm cotton, the faint ticking of the clock down the hall, breaths on the back of his neck.
Wait, what?
Dante’s eyes shoot open, and he stares in horror at the blank wall in front of him. Oh, damn. Shit. Now that he’s paying attention, the details are unmistakable, from the barely visible layout of the room all the way to the pattern of breathing behind him.
He’s in Vergil’s bedroom again. Goddamnit. Isn’t he supposed to be past this by now?!
Burying his face in the pillow, he muffles a noise of despair, then stills when he feels movement behind him.
Until that point, Dante hadn’t realised just how close Vergil is, how little space there is between them. Turned on their sides, his brother’s body presses a hot line down his back, soft layers of material providing the thinnest, flimsiest barrier.
Not weird, Dante thinks to himself firmly, willing away the tinge of hysteria. This is totally normal. They used to do this all the time as kids. There’s nothing weird or sexu—weird about getting spooned by his big brother.
“Vergil?” Dante whispers just to check, then nearly chokes when his twin responds with a small, jerking motion of his hips, grinding against Dante’s hip.
Vergil’s hard. Of course he is.
God. Dante closes his eyes again for the little difference it makes. His breathing speeds up as apparently this is the moment Vergil decides to really kick it into gear—or maybe he had been already while Dante was sleeping? Oh, wow, don’t think about that—humping rhythmically into the crease of Dante’s waist.
He bites his lip hard, trying to focus on anything else, but Vergil is everywhere, invading his senses from every angle. Inescapable. His scent alone is overwhelming, so much closer than their usual cautious distance. The sound of his breathing. His touch.
Dante can’t hold it in, lets out a shameful whine. It’s not fair. Why does Vergil always have to feel so good?
His brother’s hips stutter at the sound, coming to a stop, and Dante’s not disappointed, he’s not—but then the movements start up again, harder, rubbing directly against his ass.
Pleasure jolts up Dante’s spine like live wire electricity. So close. Helplessly, he grinds backwards, a slave to the thrumming zing of sensation reverberating between the two of them, getting stronger and stronger.
Sweat beads on the back of his neck, scalding air from Vergil’s mouth heating the skin to burning. Pushes back again.
Then, unbelievably—
“Dante,” Vergil murmurs, a near-silent prayer into the night. True damnation, rocking Dante’s earth to the core in one fell swoop. If only he hadn’t said that. If only.
No need to worry with concerns about his brother waking up. There’s no way he would allow this if he were anything but deeply asleep.
It’s not consent, not by a long shot. Dante is undeniably the one in the wrong here, taking advantage of the situation in a truly despicable way. And yet somehow he can’t even imagine wanting this to stop.
Unbeknownst to him, Vergil’s hand manages to blindly reach its way across Dante’s hip, a surprisingly firm grip digging into the flesh of his outer thigh. Dante gasps.
Now it doesn’t even matter; he could hardly escape if he tried, trapped under Vergil’s arm, his head hooked over Dante’s shoulder, a leg sliding between his own. Covered and coveted, like something worth owning, something worth wanting. Please, please let him want that too.
Vergil, unquestionably still fast asleep, turns his head in the crook of Dante’s neck, right over his pulse point and sucks.
Nearly jackhammering in the bed, Dante shivers desperately with overstimulation. Again, he pushes his hips backwards to feel the hot line of Vergil’s cock perfectly aligned with his ass, cotton underwear and thin sleeping pants the only thing stopping his brother from rutting straight into him in the middle of the night.
Dante’s so turned on he might be dying. Holy shit.
Forcing himself back down from the precipice, teetering at the very brink of insanity, Dante can do nothing except ride it out, lets Vergil rub right up against his hole, no doubt carving marks onto his hip, his neck.
Like this, his brother feels so eager to take Dante for real. As if he could really want him, even for one night. Passion told in the lines of their bodies, side by side, close enough to become one.
The minutes crawl by at an agonising pace as Vergil’s rhythmic movements gradually slow, rolling thrusts petering out until nothing is left. Nothing but the empty silence of the room, save for Dante’s harsh breaths, still trapped in an endless moment of vicious want.
Outside, a deafening crack of thunder cuts through, followed by an absolutely blinding flash of pure white light. A beat, and then the rain starts hammering down on the roof with heavenly fury.
Dante carefully lifts Vergil’s arm, delicately extricating himself from their tangle of limbs, and hobbles over to the window. He glances over his shoulder once at Vergil’s unmoving form, then jumps out, leaving nothing behind except the slight rattling of the frame.
Sprinting a short distance to the garden shed and then it’s a quick series of hops onto the overhanging roof of the house; the safe way to climb up since that time Eva yelled at Sparda for teaching them to just brace themselves and jump.
He stands there atop the rafters, soaking in the pouring rain, a pile of regrets puddling at his feet. All the things he should have done better.
This has to stop.
Dante paces along the rooftop and finally speaks the words out loud since no one else will: “So I’m attracted to him. Okay. So what? That’s just textbook narcissism. That’s all.” Frustration and catharsis intertwine, carried away by the howling winds. “All that means is I have excellent taste. No, terrible taste. Shit.”
He kicks a pebble off the roof. “What kind of moron would like Vergil for his personality, anyway? He’s a total asshole! He’s manipulative, selfish, stubborn, has absolutely no sense of humour,” Dante rants, throwing his hands up in the air at the grey sky like the dark expanse itself can understand his suffering.
“I mean, except when he does, but talk about the rare exception!” Those few moments of genuinely hilarious dry wit are almost better than the times he’d managed to catch Vergil off-guard, which is unfailingly hysterical and kind of cute because of that face he makes and how flabbergasted he gets—
Dante stares directly upwards, letting the ice-cold blasts batter his face. He spends a few minutes just breathing, then swallows a painful lump in his throat. “Fine. Fine! So I’m not just attracted to him. Big whoop. Like this could possibly end any other way than—than—‘by the way, Vergil, I used to be in love with you.’ Bet that would lead to a real happy ending.”
Used to be in love, like he could remember the time it had stopped. Dante tries to withhold a scream.
He spits out, “Did you know that, big brother? Did you? Sometimes I thought you did and that’s the real reason you keep pushing me away. Sorry. Like I could add anything more to the mess that our lives have become.”
Restless, he climbs up even higher, balancing along the topmost ridge of the roof. Prowling back and forth, “Why can’t I get this to stop? There’s nothing to read into. He doesn’t think about me that way. We’re brothers. Hell, Vergil barely tolerates me half the time,” bitter, because he doesn’t like to acknowledge that particular truth, “so there’s nothing there.”
Huffs of air like icy daggers. “Get it together, Dante. He doesn’t need this shit from you. No one does.”
Dante lowers himself to sit on the edge, staring desolately over the monotone landscape. Something is falling apart, cracks from so long ago finally being torn into rancorous shrapnel, glittering shards of non-existent hope he’d never admitted to having.
A foul truth slots into place instead. Unwanted, unwelcome, but as unavoidable as the darkness of the clouds yet to follow.
Fine. So maybe this isn’t going away any time soon. Dante closes his eyes and feels the rain drip down his cheeks, imagining that he can hear the soothing whisper of his mother’s voice in his ear. That’s okay, too. This isn’t the end of the world; nothing has changed. There was never any chance of Vergil reciprocating and… and he just has to deal with that.
The plan is still the same: lock it down, be the brother you’re supposed to be, the brother Vergil deserves. If that day someday comes, then you damn well apologise and try to get out of there before he kills you first. It’s fine. He never expected anything more.
This is his secret to deal with. If Vergil finds out and decides on a suitable judgement—well. It would only be right.
Eventually, the rain starts to let up a bit, though the sky remains a heaving mass of shadow, not a single star in sight. It would be hard to tell when morning finally comes, if it ever does.
A quiet sound, footsteps on slate tiles. Dante’s eyes dilate, tracking his steady progress up the roof. There’s no way he heard any of that, right? No. He doesn’t look mad. If anything, he looks… malcontent, exasperated, but not angry. That’s a good sign.
Dante waits. As always, Dante waits.
Vergil takes a seat next to him, a sound of annoyance escaping his throat at either the gross dampness or Dante for being up here. And yet, bizarrely, his brother does not verbalise a complaint.
“You didn’t have to join me,” Dante says quietly. It probably would have been for the better if he hadn’t.
His brother just looks at him, and Dante tries to guess what’s going through his mind. What he could possibly see besides the pathetic, bedraggled figure in front of him.
He must appear really and truly pitiable, because Vergil actually asks him, “Are you well?”
Dante laughs. “Am I—how about you?” He shakes his head. Maybe that’s giving too much away, but he needs to know now, needs to be told just how far he’s gone this time. “Have any good dreams?”
Wow. What a phenomenal question, you absolute moron.
Vergil pauses, answers slowly, “Not the worst I’ve ever had, I suppose,” and joins him in watching the forest shake under the blustery gales. He adds pensively, “Although even the best dreams must have an ending. It just so happens that this one hasn’t quite gotten there yet.”
“Maybe if you’re lucky, it will continue the next time you have a dream,” Dante replies automatically, then wants to punch himself in the face because he knows exactly the kind of dream Vergil had just had. And Vergil cannot know that he knows. He doesn’t want to know what he knows.
Vergil makes a considering sound. “Eventually, all things must come to their natural conclusion. Far be it for me to say now whether it will be one that is desirable.”
Is that almost an innuendo? Dante squints at him, not knowing how to feel about that.
Letting out an agonised groan, Dante flops over to lay his head on Vergil’s knee—a safe distance from anything incriminating—and tells him, “That’s so like you to overcomplicate stuff like that. Just say you want a happy ending, too. I bet it’s all that emo poetry that’s turning you into such a downer.”
His criticism is ignored, but that’s to be expected. Dante continues, “Maybe you should read something with a nice happily ever after for once. Or write your own! You creative types tend to be able to cross-skill like that, right?”
“Poems don’t have storybook endings, Dante.” Vergil sounds exasperated but fond, which is kind of a shock in and of itself. He seems to be in a weirdly contemplative mood tonight. “Neither devils nor humans were made to withstand a world so close to the ideal. I wonder if even you are able to find happiness like that.”
What the hell. His brother notices Dante’s incredulous look from below and says dryly, “Forgive me. I should have realised that would go above your head.” And then makes no move to explain any further. Typical.
Instead of pushing him off, Vergil indulges him by threading a hand through his hair, which is nice. Very nice. Dante enjoys the gentle sensation for a long moment before throwing out, “There’s this story I’ve been hung up on for a long time, and I’ve come to realise that just because it isn’t going where I wanted it to doesn’t mean that it’s bad. Well, no, it’s bad, but…”
That’s generic enough, right? It could be about anything, even if Vergil can tell that he’s talking about real life. It’s hard enough trying to figure out his own thoughts without having to disguise them.
Vergil sighs. “We both know that you will always want a happy ending, Dante, as you so put it.” He flicks Dante on the forehead, causing him to sputter indignantly. “Impossible though it may sometimes seem.” His voice is all too knowing.
Oh. So he’s not even going to try and pretend, then. “It’s just that I thought I knew it already, but apparently I have to learn all over again to be happy with what I’ve got.” That’s the crux of it, isn’t it? Happiness. To be truly content and not just reluctantly complacent with your lot in life.
Perhaps it would be different if she knew the details of this exact situation, but he knows precisely what mother would say: one-sided love is a gift freely given, Dante. Whether you are on the receiving end or not, there should be no expectations and nothing to be upset about. Denied love isn’t anyone’s fault and it doesn’t change the things about the other person that makes them loveable.
She would say that, and she would turn to look at father and smile.
Dante turns his head on Vergil’s knee to look at his visage from below and thinks with deliberate firmness, this is enough.
With enough time, he can convince himself of anything.
Not looking at him, Vergil speaks over the last pattering drops of rain, “I think I may also be coming to a realisation about something which has been long overdue. To what you have said before, I do have some… regrets. That we haven’t spent as much time together as we could have.”
The very idea of Vergil admitting he could possibly have been wrong about something, even apologising for it, is rather—well. It probably shouldn’t come as this much of a shock, but that’s just a testament to the tremendous levels of sanctimonious bullshit Dante has had to put with on an everyday basis.
This time, Vergil does take notice, and returns his gaze with a penetrating look that makes Dante want to break away, pretend he has nothing to hide and nothing left for Vergil to see. He buries that feeling right at the heart of him, because the last thing he wants to do is show his hand early and be found wanting.
In any case, since he left himself open for it—
“I told you so,” Dante says with dead seriousness.
Vergil pushes him off the roof.
On the way down, though, Dante could swear that he’s able to hear a sound that chimes with nostalgia from ages past, a sound that makes his heart ache with some long-lost emotion. A beautiful sound which brings forth memories of two little boys laughing together, running around in emerald fields, fighting and playing and living life to the fullest.
(Happiness.)
But maybe it’s just the wind.
The next day, something terrible happens.
Dante had finally cajoled Vergil into joining him for a game of hopscotch. At least, that’s what he thinks it’s called. Admittedly, Dante had only heard of it from human children in passing, but he understands that the rules included balancing on one leg and getting from point A to point B. Together, he and Vergil had deduced that the normal setup must be for one of them to call out a location for the other to aim for in one jump, and then try to get there while avoiding any attempts at interference.
There might be another way to play it, but Dante honestly can’t think of how else you would do it. Humans probably wouldn’t have to worry about causing too much structural damage, anyway.
So there he is, in the middle of tussling with Vergil on the ground (not strictly part of the rules, but they adapted), one knee digging hard into his brother’s spine and trying to stay out of reach of grasping hands, when they simultaneously hear the sound of a car pulling up the winding road to their house.
“Get off,” Vergil growls, and Dante hurries to comply, but not without one last kick. Of course, his brother predicts that level of pettiness and grabs his outstretched foot, flipping him over with enough force to make stars briefly swim before his eyes.
After that, Dante really wants to continue, but is far too aware that he tends to be the one more in tune with human sensibilities than Vergil, so together they manage a surprisingly competent if not rather rushed job of covering up all the pools of blood strewn around the yard with loose leaves and tossing away the uprooted tree trunks.
They might have gone a little overboard with the ‘interference’ part of the game. Whoops.
They finish just in time for their unexpected guest to notice them from over by the gate, sending a wave in their direction. Dante jogs over.
“Oh, it’s you! Morrison, it’s great to see you again,” Dante calls, unlatching the gate to let him in with a broad smile.
The older man lifts his hat with one hand in greeting. “Dante. It’s been a while.”
Vergil ambles over and offers a nod of acknowledgement, a flicker of familiarity creasing his face for no more than a second.
Had the two of them met before? Dante brushes it off and decides to introduce them regardless. “Morrison, this is my brother, Vergil.” Then, to his brother, “There was this infestation of Hell Sloths downtown. Turns out, he’s the guy who keeps track of whoever’s willing to pay to get the job done.”
Morrison chuckles. “That was a long time ago now. You might have cleared that place out for nothing, but it would have been a damn shame when there was already a willing customer.”
“It can’t have been that long ago,” Vergil comments idly, “unless you were in diapers at the time. How very like you, brother.”
Dante shuffles his feet, abashed. “Ah, whatever. So what brings you to these parts?”
“There’s a bit of a funny story there. You see, I’ve heard about your little situation. Important for my kind of business, as you well know. And while you might be the one who currently owes me a debt,” Dante avoids eye contact, “I figured I could do you a little favour and bring the town to you for a change.”
He chuckles, and Dante suddenly gets a very bad feeling. “Well, that and I can’t turn down a request from our dear Lady Patty.”
Morrison steps to the side to reveal, apparently standing behind him this entire time, an absolutely fuming blonde teenager. “Dante, how dare you try to skip out on my birthday party!”
Dante has never backpedalled so fast in his life. He nearly rams into Vergil, who seems alarmed that his brother is suddenly tripping over himself to get away from a petite human girl.
“Patty,” Dante squeaks, then scrambles to reply, “It wasn’t my fault! There’s a lot of stuff going on right now.”
Technically not a lie, but to be perfectly honest, he also really, really hadn’t wanted to go in the first place. Sue him.
Patty’s lip wobbles, then straightens out into an unyielding line. “I don’t believe that excuse for a second, mister. But don’t you mind that anymore, because you’ve underestimated Patty Lowell for the last time!”
She crosses her arms over her chest and does a pretty spot on villain laugh. She must have been practicing. That’s not a good sign.
“There’s no running away this time! I’ve already decided—if you can’t come to my place, then I’ll just have to hold my birthday party right here!” She points at him dramatically like an arrow to the chest, and not in a fun way.
Without another word, their two guests walk straight past them and up to the front of the house where they are let inside by one of the staff.
“But I didn’t—what?” Dante turns to look at Vergil with wide eyes. “How did that happen so fast? This is a nightmare.”
Probably lacking a more sufficiently violent option, Vergil flicks him on the forehead. ”You do this to yourself, Dante. If anything, I am starting to become concerned at your worryingly masochistic tendencies.”
“Ugh.” Dante grumbles to himself. His kingdom for a drop of sympathy.
He tries to drag his feet on it, but Vergil remains thoroughly indifferent even though this affects him too, the jerk. Patty has apparently evolved into a surprisingly entrepreneurial young woman, though, because the second they enter, a swarm of hustle and bustle swallows them whole.
Patty had only informed them of her plans less than five minutes ago. Geez.
A whole lot of people, maybe half of whom Dante recognises, are already busy heaving furniture in groups of three and four, clearing space for Patty’s lavish extravaganza.
And, okay, Dante gets it. Sometimes people who were raised poor end up in a position where they unexpectedly find themselves with excessive amounts of wealth and they feel the need to make the most of it. Or so he’d read in a magazine once. More power to them, whatever.
But did it have to be here?!
Lady struts over to them—she might have been convinced to help Patty out of the kindness of her heart or, more likely, she’s getting a kick out of adding to Dante’s torment—and demands, “Dante, hold out your hands,” then dumps a stack of paper into his waiting arms. He stares at it blankly.
She motions for him to read it, so he turns over the first page which just has a single letter printed on the front. ‘D’.
The next page: ‘R’.
He looks up at her uncomprehendingly. She leers. “It’s your list of chores for the upcoming party. Go on, I made it easier for you to read. We all know how you struggle.”
Dante scowls and flips through them rapidly. ‘DRESS BETTER’.
“Lady, you—” She’s gone. Dante’s mouth flaps uselessly and he tosses the papers to the floor, not caring for the mess.
“Dante, you pick those back up again right this instant!” Patty shouts, trotting over on high heels. “I won’t stand for you throwing a temper tantrum and ruining all my preparations.”
Dante gapes at her, practically overflowing with flabbergasted indignation. She says haughtily, “This is my eighteenth birthday, you know. That means I’m older than you now, and you have to listen to your elders.”
Then Patty pulls down her eyelid and sticks her tongue out at him. Dante is speechless.
Wait, that can’t be right. He whirls around to Vergil. “She’s not older than us, is she? Is she?” He tugs desperately at his brother’s sleeve for a response. No way is the blonde brat his senior.
Vergil chooses not to answer, seeming to be stuck in a state of pretending that nothing is happening around them. Apparently satisfied that her message has been delivered, Patty leaves them alone.
The next few moments are a bit of a blur. Morrison shows up again to shoo them off since they’re blocking the doorway and sends them ahead to their rooms to get changed into appropriately formal attire.
Somehow, Vergil ends up in Dante’s room this time, curled up in a spare chair to read his book. Dante stands in front of the closet, still feeling profoundly nonplussed about the whole affair. He opens the door and stares blankly into the void.
Vergil turns the page. “There’s not that much choice, Dante. You’ve only ever had one suit.”
Dante looks back at him, betrayed. He’d make a jab at Vergil’s fashion sense, but unfortunately his brother has never been anything less than impeccably dressed, and he knows it. Probably the only reason he’s in Dante’s room is so that he can hide out until the last possible minute by being in the one place no one would think to look for him.
Picking up a bundle of socks and throwing them at Vergil, which he subsequently dodges, Dante says, “Excuse you, I look fabulous in anything.”
Ignoring the way Vergil’s judgemental silence speaks for itself, Dante pulls out a hanger at random. Eh. It could do. At least it’s red, anyway.
He sneaks another glance over his shoulder, but Vergil still has his nose buried in his poetry book. Well, whatever, they’ve changed in front of each other before. There’s nothing to be nervous about.
Changing quickly, Dante warily looks over the cut of the fabric in the freestanding mirror. “Is this formal enough, you think?”
Vergil glances up and actually does a double take.
Dante frowns. “What, you don’t think so?” Man, he hates picking out a wardrobe. Life would be so much easier if everyone could just forego clothes altogether, and not for any sexy reasons. Although he does love his signature red coat, of course.
“Hmm.” Slowly, Vergil gets to his feet and makes his way over, coming to a rest behind him. Dante blinks, disconcerted. Since when had Vergil gotten taller than him?
His brother’s eyes trace the outline of his suit in an unnervingly intimate slide up and down his body. A tight, jittery feeling bounces around in his stomach, not unlike the sensation right before the drop on a rollercoaster. Vergil never looks at him like this, openly admiring. Considering.
Considering what?
Dante shivers as Vergil finally reaches out to touch him, one finger running along the seam at his waist. There’s more than one layer of fabric between them, but it feels too close, too sensitive. Like the galvanic electricity in skin, brought to the surface just short of turning into static shock. A gentle jolt of awareness, how close they are in the mirror.
Vergil’s eyes reflect back at him, coloured with predatory satisfaction.
Swiping at Vergil’s wandering hand—wandering where, he’d like to know—Dante clears his throat awkwardly. “So too formal or no?” Uh. “I mean, not formal enough or, um, not?” he stutters, the pretence of playing it cool rapidly melting at his feet.
A chuckle, also far too close. Dante swallows.
“You look… adequate,” Vergil teases, finally taking a step back.
Keep it together, Dante. Totally normal brotherly interaction. Nothing weird to see here.
The lax atmosphere suddenly freezes in place, an unsettling buzz of energy trapped in a moment of perfect stillness.
“What,” Vergil says, “is this?”
Once again, he reaches out, a single finger pressing against Dante’s neck. Caught in the reflection, high up on the right-hand side, a small blemish in shades of faded red stands out. One or two little dents in the middle, akin to an insect bite or sting—
Or teeth. Because Dante abruptly knows exactly where that mark came from.
He coughs, throat muscles flexing and causing the skin to shift ever so slightly. Vergil’s eyes follow the minuscule movements, narrow with some unknown razor of emotion.
Crap, crap, crap. “I hadn’t even noticed until you pointed it out. It’s probably nothing.”
“Nothing,” Vergil snaps, “would have faded by now. So why has this one lasted so long, Dante?”
His finger raises slightly to press directly onto that spot, rough and unforgiving. “Who left their mark on you?”
His brother’s touch sends a jolt of arousal straight to his groin and a groan rips itself from Dante’s throat unbidden. Horrified, his eyes fly open to stare at Vergil’s expression, a mix of surprise, thunderous fury and—something else. Something that he couldn’t possibly name.
Panic. What had Vergil just said? Doesn’t matter, make an excuse and get the hell out of there.
“Haha, wow, look at the time! Better get back to help out with the party,” Dante stammers, and slips out of Vergil’s loose grasp to make a run for it.
Turning the corner outside his room, Dante lets out a shaky exhale and adjusts his collar, a suppressed flush only now rising to his cheeks. His heart continues to beat double time, embarrassment and arousal warring for dominance.
Shit, that had been far too close.
If only he actually knew why the mark actually was still there, then maybe he could get rid of it. Dante presses a hand to his forehead and wipes it all the way down his face with a grimace. “What the hell was that,” he mutters.
No, he doesn’t know why it’s lasted until now, but he can make a pretty good guess. The only possible reason a bruise wouldn’t heal would have to be because Dante himself wants it to stay, enough to subvert demonic functions via a method he cannot consciously control. That, or the laws of reality have straight up decided to flat out not work today.
Not good. Not good at all.
Trying to blend into the crowd is a good distraction; it’s difficult enough when you have white hair, but thankfully Patty has bent time and space to set the ball in motion. Already, there are enough people milling around to elicit a slightly claustrophobic feeling despite the wide space and arched ceilings, light streaming in through the open windows combined with the bright glow of the chandeliers to create an atmosphere of cheery midsummer revelry.
Seriously, when did all these people even get here? Dante is pretty sure he would have heard half a city’s worth of cars pulling up.
Maybe he’d be less reluctant about the whole affair if he recognised a single face. As it is, a few inspire a vague feeling of familiarity, along with no small amount of distaste due to the fact that he’s pretty sure the older folks wandering around belong to father’s crowd. Underworld historians, demonic artifact sellers, weapons dealers—pretty much the sketchiest people imaginable.
That’s what you get for building up underground connections over the last few centuries, he guesses. Dante gets unwillingly dragged into some greasy small talk a couple of times despite his best efforts, ulterior motives practically rising off of them like an odious stench.
Clearly, they’re not the most amicable crowd; it’s beyond his understanding how they ended up at a teenager’s birthday party.
Lady sidles up to him just as he finally catches a glimpse of the blonde across the room, chatting with a cohort of similarly dressed teenagers; most likely the progeny and relatives of said rich douchebags. She seems happy, though.
“You clean up well enough, I suppose,” Lady heckles, leaning an elbow on his shoulder and looking over in the same direction. “Keeping an eye on the birthday girl?”
“Don’t neg me,” Dante says, frowning. That’s what they call it, right? “I’m not worried about anything happening here, but I just don’t get it. She was in charge of the invitations, right?”
“That she was,” Lady confirms, smoothing a wrinkle out of her scandalously short cocktail dress with her free hand.
“So how come a nice young girl has ended up with company of this calibre?”
“How judgemental. That includes you and me, you know,” Lady feigns a reprimand, pressing down on her elbow until it starts digging in uncomfortably. Dante shakes her off. She continues, “There’s a rumour going around that the young Lady Lowell has been trying to revive her family’s reputation ever since she reconnected with her long-lost mother.”
Dante interjects, “Do the rumours say whether those efforts are out of her own free will?”
“Ostensibly,” Lady flicks her gaze to him, then back at Patty, who has now split off from her group of peers to converse with a couple of older aristocratic men. “Happily ever afters don’t come easy to abandoned street urchins. Kids like that sometimes feel like they haven’t really earnt it, or that their happiness could be taken away at any moment.”
“And those feelings survive the journey with them into adulthood,” Dante concludes for her. Lady nods in affirmation.
“Well, then. Much as I’d like to stay quietly by the sidelines,” or disappear from this godforsaken party altogether, “It looks like my presence may be required after all.”
He can keep screwing things up with his brother repeatedly, but this, at least, he knows how to do.
Not wanting to be bogged down with any more pointless niceties, he beelines towards Patty, who seems to be increasingly uncomfortable under the weighted judgement of the old fogeys she’s fumbling to impress. Lady whistles loudly behind him in encouragement, earning herself a number of confused stares.
Luckily, Patty doesn’t appear to have been in hearing range, since she whirls around in astonishment when he asks, “My Lady, may I have this dance?”
A second stroke of fortune means that the ambient music switches to a smooth waltz, so the crowd starts to clear away from the centre of the floor to make way for various couples. Perfect.
Patty looks momentarily befuddled, then settles for glaring at him and saying stiffly, “Of course I would love to,” and, “Please excuse me, gentlemen.”
Leading her out to the open space, Dante refuses to wince when she grinds her heel into his foot. Despite that, they manage a half-decent waltz, distant memories of dance lessons flickering in between each step, weaving just enough foresight into the present to allow some modicum of skill.
It’s all a front to get down to the real business, of course. “You’re still mad at me?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Why would I be mad at you?” Patty challenges. “Maybe it’s because you tried to duck out of my birthday party without even saying anything, Dante!” Her tone is both pointed and accusing; it’s hard to deny that he deserves it.
“Ah, well…”
“You’re not even going to try and make an excuse, are you? Geez,” she huffs. “You never explain anything, you jerk.” A genuine note of sadness colours her last bitter remark.
Dear god, she sounds exactly like he did when he was criticising Vergil not that long ago. It feels so wrong, but maybe they really are about the same age. “You know me too well, Patty.”
“It’s funny you should say that. I never knew you even had a brother until Morrison told me.” Patty sighs, finally winding down in her tirade. There’s an absolutely unbearable glimmer of disappointment buried in her words, too. “You need to open up more, Dante. Every relationship has two sides and you’re not pulling your weight, buddy.”
Surprisingly sage advice, but maybe not. She’s done a lot of growing up when he wasn’t looking, enough to make him look bad by comparison. Dante exhales slowly. “I really am sorry, Patty.”
“Hmph. Like that makes up for it.”
With the next beat of the song, he gently spins her into a short twirl, their hands clasped above her head. Dante considers the wording of his next question. “Why did you need me here for this, though? You seem to have it pretty handled.”
Her cheeks pink up at the compliment. “I guess you wouldn’t understand.” Patty chews on her lip for a minute, then blurts out, “I just didn’t want to do this alone.”
Dante squashes down a fond smile. “That, I do understand.” Far, far too much. “All right, then. I think it’s time we changed up the beat a little, don’t you think?”
“Dante, what are you—” Patty tries, her voice hitching in query, but he takes the opportunity at the next step to duck out of the ongoing throng of dancers, making his way over to wherever the music is coming from.
Remarkably, he spies a jukebox nestled in the corner of the room. It’s weird because his parents never were the types to get something so non-traditional, typically preferring old-fashioned vinyl players at the very least, but Dante finds that he likes the look of the slightly gaudy contraption quite a lot.
With a quick twist of his wrist, he pops out the disk and swaps it for a notably lesser used one in the stack, all before a single beat of silence can interrupt the rhythm of the party.
The harsh guitar riffs of Mermaid Rock blast out just as he steps back to retake his place at Patty’s side. She stares at him in horror. “Dante, what have you done?”
“Well, in payment for your advice, I thought I’d give you some of my own.” He smirks as most of the older couples raise their noses and shuffle off the floor in disdain, leaving room for Patty’s friends to take their place. “You see, if there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s to see someone looking so miserable at their own party. Look around! Everyone’s here to celebrate you, so why are you the one doing all the work?”
He sweeps his arms out and shakes his head sadly. “You gotta leave something to your friends, especially the part where we’re the ones in charge of making you happy. There’s no need to justify your place here, Patty.”
Ducking her head to hide teary eyes, Patty laughs wetly and then cheers with her friends when the song hits the chorus.
Maybe that had been a bit cliché, but sometimes kids need it a little more straightforward. Give them a push when they need it and send them on their way, so to speak.
Mentally patting himself for a job well done, Dante tries to back away from them, only to get pulled into a complicated twisting manoeuvre, saved only by the grace of his own reflexes. The last step ends with a low dip—this time, for him. He looks up, seeing a face framed by blonde hair staring down at him amusedly.
“Hey there,” Trish says, and drops him.
Dante lets his body bend backwards, then turns the momentum into a rolling spin, wrenching himself back onto his feet. He sticks his tongue out at her. “Nice try.”
Trish laughs and sidles a little closer to whisper in his ear over the thumping bass, “You have an admirer.”
His head jerks up in shock, and in less than a heartbeat, his view narrows in on one particular person standing off to the side of the crowd, watching him with simmering intensity.
“He’s fairly possessive, it seems. You would probably do well to limit any interactions with others that might upset him.” Trish grins, her voice still quiet but nonetheless audible to his ears. A small blessing that the noise generated from the surrounding bystanders prevents it from being carried any further.
Dante pushes her away by the shoulder, giving her a warning look. “I don’t know what you think you’re implying.”
It sounds an awful lot like she’s telling him not to flirt with anyone because his brother will get jealous, which is wrong in so many ways.
“Vergil isn’t like that.” Not sick the way Dante is. It hurts a little to admit it each time, but that doesn’t make it any less true.
“But you are?” Trish asks, and Dante slams his mouth shut, averting his gaze. She motions for him to join her in dancing and he does so only very reluctantly. This feels suspiciously like a trap.
She speaks again after a moment, “I understand how you see it, but it doesn’t have to be a bad thing.”
He gives her a look.
Trish scoffs. “Human taboos do not exist the same way for demons. You know this, Dante.” She spins around him, a murmur at his back. “More to the point, you are different when you’re with him. Even when it comes to Lady and me, it’s like you have an image of your ideal self based on the expectations of others, and he’s the only one who can strip that away from you without even trying.”
Dante’s skin prickles uneasily. Trish isn’t usually the type to psychoanalyse him, he had assumed, purely out of respect for his boundaries, but this feels too close to another truth he’s been trying to avoid.
Trish’s voice persists, “You are truer to yourself with him around. As violent as the two of you tend to get, and the way your worldview shrinks down until there isn’t room for anyone else—well, I dare say that the end result cannot be anything but a good thing. No one likes to see someone looking so miserable, after all.”
Dante whirls around, ready to call her out on stealing his words, but she’s already gone, a laughing echo in her place. Another turn sees a distant flash of blonde hair sauntering over to invade Lady’s personal space instead.
Friends like these, sheesh.
Breathing in to recover composure, he journeys over to where the assorted section of cakes and pastries are laid out, mostly void of guests since the dancing started. It really isn’t the best time to have a confrontation, but it’s not right to leave his brother by himself, either. All he has to do is push the memories of his earlier mistakes down and suffocate them under a mountain of denial.
It still counts even if he acknowledges the fact that it’s denial, right? Right.
“Are you enjoying this as much as I am?” Dante asks brightly. No answer, so he ploughs on, “I sure hope not. Just in case you’ve forgotten, we’re family, and that means we suffer together.”
That earns him a snort. “Of course. How could I possibly forget.” Vergil’s tone is drier than the surface of the sun.
Dante breaks into his first genuine smile since entering the room, feeling suddenly a whole lot lighter and more tolerating of the situation.
Oh. That’s probably what Trish was talking about.
Scanning the table next to them, he picks out a few goodies onto a napkin and holds it out for his brother to share. Vergil shoots him a look of distaste, but nevertheless reservedly accepts a small treat.
Dante eyes the way Vergil nibbles delicately and rolls his eyes, swallowing his own choice whole. The shell crumbles apart in his mouth, spilling out sweet-tasting goo which mingles pleasingly with the raw cacao. Mmm.
And yet it’s his brother who lets out an unwitting noise of pleasure, seeming honestly surprised at either the taste or texture. Dante grins. “I know, right? Probably not all that shocking, but Patty’s got good taste when it comes to sweets.”
Vergil blinks and states, “You remembered that I like chocolate.”
Why would that be unexpected? “Yeah? Who doesn’t,” Dante says dismissively, chomping down on another one. Ooh, dark chocolate and cherry liquor.
“I suppose so,” Vergil agrees, but stops there.
Dante looks over, expecting him to be staring out over the masses in judgemental dismay, but finds his brother returning his gaze instead. Eerily intent.
“Your friends have a positive influence on you,” Vergil observes, like that’s earth-shattering news. So smart, and yet so lacking in social awareness. “They ground you.”
Dante chews thoughtfully. Orange crème. “I guess so? I know they have my back when it counts, so that helps. When the going gets tough and all that, I know they’ll be there.”
Bizarrely, that makes Vergil seem to close off a bit, and Dante reviews his words for a misstep. Nope, still sounds pretty normal to him.
He nudges his brother’s shin with a foot. “I’d be there for you, too, you know? If you ever needed me.” Unlikely as it sounds, given how much better Vergil is than him at just about everything.
The next bite tastes appropriately sour. Dante powers through it regardless. Vergil’s silence lingers.
There’s not much to see from their corner, but the writhing movements towards the centre of the room are still unmistakable, albeit slower than before. Someone has switched the tracks yet again, settling on a middle ground of upbeat fervour couched in classy, Spanish-inspired acoustics.
It would be nice, Dante thinks wistfully, to dance with Vergil. Just once. Just to see if they can move together with the same fluidity they have while fighting monsters, fighting each other. A gentler, warmer give and take than their usual vicious power struggle, though he wouldn’t say no to a more passionate ballad. Temptation of a different sort: a smoky image of two halves folding into one.
Yeah, Vergil would never go for that.
Better that he doesn’t ask. Doesn’t so much as entertain the thought for a minute, even with the certainty of getting shot down immediately. It would be too easy to let the fantasy wrap around his crooked heart, dig the taint a little deeper. Feeding the fever, hurting for hunger—
So he doesn’t. Dante stands like a stranger in his own skin and merely wonders what it would be like.
“A pity the rest of our company is so lacking,” Vergil comments balefully.
Dante blinks. “Not including me in that description? You’re turning into such a softie in your old age.”
A sliver of uneasiness worms away at his conscience, some misplaced desire to please his big brother. “I would’ve thought this would be your kind of crowd, actually. Plenty of rich schmucks to look down on or, I don’t know, chat about the history of devils with.”
Dante wrinkles his nose at the very thought. If anyone could find a way to make Sparda’s previous conquering exploits sound excruciatingly boring, doubtless it would be some of those uppity religious types hanging around the fringe of the festivities.
Vergil picks up one of the chairs by its back and Dante, quickly recognising the impending violence, grabs onto the other end until Vergil is forced to let it go.
“Is that what you think I get up to in my free time? Lording over the masses like some kind of ethnic purist?”
He sounds awfully incredulous for someone who literally cannot shut up about their proud demonic heritage.
After checking to make sure no one noticed that split second of near-murder, Dante informs him flippantly, “What can I say, you just come across as that type of guy. If I hadn’t been there myself, I would have thought you were incessantly bullied by a wild pack of humans as a child or something.“
Vergil smack him across the back of the head. Hard. “Ow.”
“Do you mean the way your friends treat you?” Vergil asks in a flat tone, crossing his arms loosely.
“Whoa, hey now. Glass houses,” Dante says, even though it doesn’t make much sense. Vergil is the one harassing him right now. He reworks it into, “Anytime they talk shit about me may as well be about you, too.” Take that.
“It doesn’t work that way, Dante. For one thing, you are severely overestimating the length I will go to for filial pride. For another, we’re twins, not clones. That has been your exact argument for years.” Vergil looks heavenward as if searching for strength. “Or else you’ve insulted yourself a hundred times over.”
Dante frowns, conceding that point. Damn it.
It was a silly statement in the first place, but the more he thinks about it, the more he comes to realise that he can’t recall Lady or Trish ever really interacting with Vergil, at least beyond the superficial. It’s as if Vergil has the unspoken status of ‘outsider’, someone they can only glide around without touching down to make contact. Or that they just plain don’t know how to react to him.
Ugh. If only he could be convinced to reach out and make one genuine social connection, then maybe he wouldn’t be so set on leaving one day.
Dante clears his throat, crushing the empty napkin in a fist. “So are you going to sulk over here forever? It wouldn’t kill you to let loose and have fun for once. Might do you some good, as a matter of fact.”
Vergil stays quiet for a moment before retorting, “I can’t enjoy some time alone with my brother?”
“Uhhhh.” What? What?! Dante feels himself flush nervously. “I-I mean… Sure, suit yourself.” He coughs, thoughts whirling. Just like before, it feels kind of like Vergil is testing him for something. Is he getting off on riling up Dante’s fluster, or does he know something he shouldn’t? Does he remember—?
It’s probably just a fluke. Rare as it is, Vergil might actually be trying to extend an olive branch for once. That’s not totally beyond the realms of possibility.
“I just thought you might want to try out something new for a change.”
Vergil gives him a sidelong look, impenetrable. “Are you going to re-join your party, then?”
Dante pauses. “My party? I think you mean Patty’s. And nah, I’m okay here for now.” Infantile not-arguing: You first, I don’t want to. Do you want to? No. Then I don’t want to, either.
Tentative, but not uncomfortable.
“If you want to enjoy this moment with your friends, you should.” Vergil sounds uncharacteristically hesitant.
Would it be presumptuous to sling an arm across his shoulders? Dante settles for nudging their elbows together, a short-lived brush of contact. “Like I said, I’m fine here. Brothers have to stick together no matter what.”
Something he might say normally with a slightly mocking lilt, but this time he means it. Vergil seems to sense that undercurrent of sincerity, though he does not outwardly express it. “Unless you want to join me, anyway. It’s always a bit hectic hanging out with the babes, but we could make room for you.”
Maybe not the best wording, because Vergil gets a look that says he’s none too pleased with that suggestion. “A stabilising influence or not, you allow them far too much leniency. Those of Sparda’s bloodline should not allow themselves to stoop to such depths.” Then, grudgingly, “If you must make a fool of yourself, I may choose to involve myself as a spectator to your humiliation.”
Dante should be annoyed, but it’s a marvel in itself to see Vergil actually trying for once. Any insult feels softened by the happy-drunk feeling of good food and better company, which probably contributes to the way his mouth runs away from him: “It feels good to let them have control sometimes. That’s how I know they care, and it takes my mind off of…”
His brain catches up, but it’s too late; the sentence completes itself, regardless. “How easily humans break.”
Not the best thing to admit to his brother, infinitely moreso if he has to listen to his words being used against him in the future. But the biggest shock of the evening comes when Vergil shakes his head, eyes glazed as if in memory, and says, “On the contrary, humans can be surprisingly resilient.” Once more with that note of unsurety, “Mother taught us that, did she not?”
A swell of emotion rises in Dante’s throat and he chokes out, “Yeah. Yeah, she did.”
Overcome, Dante is suddenly so fiercely glad to have his brother next to him. Screw the rest of the world, the places Vergil will someday go and the people he’ll meet. For now, at least, he belongs here. With Dante.
“I suppose you taught me that as well,” Vergil tells him quietly. Not a whisper, simply a marked level of contrast to the casual, meaningless flow around them. “Tried to teach me, at least, though I did not understand it at the time. Usually, I would find it vexing for someone else to take the lead, but perhaps when it comes to this—” Vergil cuts off, as if he can hear Dante thinking stop and it’s okay and you don’t have to.
Dante loves his brother, but not for his benevolence. He already asks for far too much; he’s well aware that it can be nerve-grating at the best of times. But not once has he ever asked Vergil to change, not at the core of him, not where it really matters, even when he probably should have. And yet, his words could almost be described as—are almost—
“You’ve grown up well, brother,” Vergil says.
Face bursting into flames, Dante hides behind both hands and groans into his palms. “You can’t just say that,” he mutters. “Shit.”
It’s not fair.
It’s not fair.
He loves this guy so much, rough edges and soft underbelly and everything in between. Every part of him, every shape that the universe molds him into, Dante would take it all. He could live the rest of his days in the corners of Vergil’s smile. There would be no better place on earth.
Maybe in another place, another time. But this is good, too. More than good. They’ve been at each other’s throats for so long that an instance of true understanding feels completely foreign, something he’s only heard of in the throes of battle, seen reflected in the gleam of Vergil’s blade.
Dante lowers his hands, but he purposely doesn’t turn to look at Vergil again. Afraid that if he does, he’ll say or do something that will shatter this delicate equilibrium.
A murmur rises above the crowd and heads turn to follow the approach of a new couple taking their place on the dance floor. Not interested, Dante nearly misses a glimpse of red and yellow, white and black, and—oh.
They both watch in silence as a new tune starts up, something achingly familiar that brings to mind tranquil breezy days spent laughing and enjoying the majesty of life. A melody that feels like a snapshot of youth and having a place to call home, soft strands from a radio drifting over the garden like petals in the wind.
One takes a bow and holds out his hand; the other smiles and accepts. Under the fire-glow of the chandeliers, they dance.
Mother and father always look so happy together.
Dante watches with a lump in his throat, too overwhelmed to say anything at all. It’s funny to think he had almost forgotten what they look like on these occasions, how easily they could turn anything into a space fit just for two.
He nearly startles when Vergil’s hand brushes against his wrist. The lightest, most inconsequential sway of motion which could so easily be construed as an unthinking mistake. Nothing even remotely close to holding hands, but somehow undeniably the ghost of a sentiment not entirely dissimilar. It feels like gratitude.
Perhaps this makes everything worthwhile in the end, Dante thinks to himself. No matter what happens, at least he can have this. One beautiful, golden memory.
“We should get a move on.”
It’s the middle of the day and they’re having lunch outside at the glass garden setting when Dante says it, half-heartedly kicking his feet up under the table. Between the two of them, an enormous platter of leftover roast meat has been completely obliterated, along with an entire loaf of crusty bread and the less exciting bowl of steamed vegetables. All that remains is the fruit salad which is slowly getting picked apart and Dante is so bored.
Drowsy but determined, Dante pokes at Vergil’s newspaper, making like he’s going to rip it apart, but his brother ignores him, undeterred. He scowls and pops another blueberry into his mouth, and it doesn’t make him feel any less grumpy at all.
Vergil, of course, uses a fork, probably so he doesn’t end up smearing juice on the pages. A fork. For strawberries.
“If you’re going to take so long, you could at least try something outside your comfort zone,” Dante complains, slumping forward and eying the leftovers, a mix of every fruit except their two of choice.
“All in due time,” Vergil says dryly but with a hint of humour. If there was a joke in there somewhere, Dante missed it. “This is fine for now.” He flips the page and Dante seriously considers whether he’s prolonging it just to annoy him at this point.
“Just fine, huh. Definitely not your favourite or anything.” Even using a fork like a heathen, the way Vergil bites into the flesh of the fruit is kind of obscene. Dante averts his gaze and guiltily wonders if he’ll ever be able to separate Vergil from the taste of strawberries. Best not think about it too much.
Vergil gives a belated response, enough time passing that Dante had almost forgotten, “Most likely it would already be too late, but sometimes it’s best not to tempt fate.” It would be confusing if he wasn’t eying the pomegranates warily. (It’s still kind of confusing; Vergil is weird.)
“Stomach issues? That sucks.” Aren’t pomegranates meant to be good for that? “I get you, though. Don’t know why I’m still so tired today.” Maybe he has a stomach bug of his own. They literally just ate, but hunger still gnaws away incessantly. Usually he can go weeks without even thinking about food.
Vergil lowers the newspaper an inch and frowns at him. “You should take better care of yourself, Dante.”
He has trouble identifying the emotion colouring his brother’s voice at first and is a little surprised to realise it may actually be concern. Geez, he must look worse than he thought.
“Hey, I’m the one who just recommended getting some variety in your diet. It’s supposed to help with your digestion and stuff,” Dante offers helpfully, and hides a grin.
Given how much pizza and ice cream he consumes, it’s an incredibly hypocritical thing to say. Vergil knows that, and Dante knows he knows that. The point is that there’s nothing Vergil can say without also admitting hypocrisy.
“Fantastic advice,” Vergil eventually settles on.
“I know, right?” Dante says emphatically, really milking it. “Hey, give me one,” he says, nodding towards one of the last remaining strawberries.
Mostly he’s just expecting Vergil to refuse, a deliberate provocation to tear him away from whatever boring article has his attention. Instead, Vergil places down the newspaper to pick the berry up with his fingers, holding it out for him to eat.
Dante stares. Is he—no, there’s no way Vergil expects him to eat out of his hand. That would be, uh. Kind of. Is that allowed?
The table isn’t that large, so they’re sitting pretty close together. All Vergil has to do is lean forward that little bit in order to press the end against Dante’s mouth. Dumbfounded and faintly aroused, Dante bites down, a small burst of sweet juice flooding his mouth.
Vergil relinquishes his hold, returning to his newspaper.
Dante chews, his mind refusing to process what just happened. So this is their new normal. That’s fine. Nothing weird to see here.
“How did you end up as such a spoiled brat,” Vergil muses, still looking down at the page. There’s a glint of satisfaction, which implies that maybe this was his real goal. Another test, maybe? Dante still doesn’t get it, but whatever.
“Takes one to know one.” Dante laughs to hide his confusion. He’s learnt from his mistakes, now—don’t retreat to hide something, that will only rile his brother up; instead, embrace the moment head on and play it off later. So with that, he scoots over and leans bodily against Vergil, burying his inner turmoil in favour of nuzzling obnoxiously into his brother’s collar.
The side benefit of parodying aggressively cuddly behaviour is that you get to actually cuddle, and it feels wonderful.
Once again, Vergil surprises him by allowing this to happen, though he turns his head and says wryly, “You’re not going to ask me to fight you?”
Dante thinks about it, tempted despite himself. “Mmm. Not feeling like it today. Good napping weather.” Maybe another snack in a bit, too. For a reason he can’t quite put his finger on, leaning into Vergil’s personal space like this makes his stomach churn with hunger. A vague memory of something sweet and coppery flits out of reach.
Vergil’s shoulder shifts under his ear and Dante reads the vibrations as ‘slight unease’. “We can’t resign ourselves to accomplishing nothing.”
Ugh. What a busybody. Vergil really needs to learn to relax more. “What do you think we should do, then?”
“I don’t know.” He sounds… resigned, maybe. The coiled-tight tension in his body feels like way too much stress.
Quick, what can he do to help Vergil chill out? “Hmm. We could make up another game.” Hopscotch had been pretty fun, if a bit simple. Human children must not have much imagination when it comes to rules. Maybe they could find a ball and play a round of Ricochet Head Duck, as Dante liked to call it.
Immediately, Vergil responds with, “Of course. Go hide and I will come and find you.”
Dante muffles a snort of disbelief. “Liar. I’m not falling for that trick again.” Then, “You’re lucky I don’t fit in the closet anymore.”
He had a lot of feelings about that closet. Most of them ranging from ‘never again’ to ‘for real though, never again’. It was small enough when he was eight. Now it just felt like a bad memory.
A really, really bad memory.
“Wait, look,” Dante exclaims, slapping Vergil’s hand out of the way.
Vergil trails over to where Dante is pointing and says, exasperated, “A gun shop?”
“I think I’ve heard of that place before,” Dante muses. There’s a black and white picture below the article of the storefront which showcases some pretty quirky spelling. Maybe it’s on purpose for better branding or something. “Might have been there once. I forget.”
“Oh?” Vergil prompts, not sounding particularly interested.
Damn, so close to remembering. “Or maybe I saw it in a magazine… Speaking of, you should read something fun for once. Look at this, ‘stock prices in Redgrave fall’. Could it be any drier?”
“That’s quite enough advice from you.” Evidently, it can. “This is why your brain is turning to slush.”
Dante scowls and sits up finally so he can punch Vergil lightly in the forearm. “Whoa, whoa. Is not. My noggin gets plenty of exercise, I’ll have you know.”
Vergil is unmoved. “I’m sure magazines provide ample stimulation. Have you considered that this is the reason mother never offered to let you join in on extra lessons?”
Extra lessons? That’s an option? Dante wrinkles his nose in distaste at the very thought. “Meh. Maybe I would’ve liked to give them a try, at least,” he grumbles lightly. Vergil has enough mandated Dante-less time as it is.
“No, you wouldn’t.”
“Yeah, okay, I wouldn’t,” Dante admits. “Hey, this might sound unrelated, but you know that gun shop?”
“No. I’ve completely forgotten.”
“Shut up,” Dante says fondly. “Anyway, I used to have this awesome pair of guns. Actually, they’re probably still around somewhere. Nevermind. The point is, you know the mechanism can only move so fast, right?” He motions with one hand, pulling an imaginary trigger at relatively human speeds. Vergil nods, showing some amount of interest.
“Well, these guns were made so the hammer pulled super smooth, enough to keep up with either of us.” That had been a huge paradigm shift, actually being able to use a gun properly for the first time. Like seeing the face of god or some shit. “But it didn’t matter if you have to reload every couple of seconds anyway, and it’s not like I’m going to walk around with a belt full of bullets. They’re only pistols,” he explains. “Anyway, so I talked to this guy who suggested making my own, you know?”
There’s no way Vergil should be able to guess the point he’s getting at, so it comes as a bit of a shock when he interrupts with, “I see where you’re going with this. Loading the chambers with your own energy as ammunition,” he tilts his head slightly, some kind of analysis going on behind his eyes. “That’s still unrelated to mother’s craft, Dante.”
It is? Damn it. However… “I’m getting there! So the thing is, this guy doesn’t use the word ‘bullets’, he says ‘magazines’, and I thought he knew because I was wearing them at the time, but all I’d said at first is that I kept running out of something.” Dante grins, watching as realisation dawns on his brother’s face. It all comes full circle.
“Dante,” Vergil says, a warning note in his voice.
“Here, let me show you,” Dante crows. “It’s awesome, I promise. It might seem a bit dumb, but I know it works.”
He’s not referring to the results so much as the spell itself which does, admittedly, come off as kind of dumb. Tearing off a small shred of paper, which Vergil reluctantly allows, he pierces his thumb ever so slightly on a tooth and scribbles down a hasty summoning circle before the wound heals up. It kind of looks like a demented smiley face, but the sheer simplicity is the real source of its genius. Dante doesn’t really understand the whole process of it, but apparently there’s meant to be specifications in the runes for where you’re summoning from, when you’re summoning from, safety procedures and all that. Uninteresting trivialities.
All you need is the what, and bam, job done. He funnels a thread of demonic energy into the slip of paper, which sets alight immediately. Dante keeps holding it, ignoring the tingle of burning flame against his skin so it doesn’t catch the tablecloth.
As the last spark fizzles out, an ambiguous shape manifests and lands with a sudden whomph.
Dante’s smile morphs into a frown. There’s not much he won’t read, but the newfangled technology and science jazz isn’t really his cup of tea, especially the stuff aimed at kids. That’s the crux of his workaround, though—the chance to roll the dice and get something you don’t want is, if anything, higher than getting something you do. At least this one is in English, which certainly isn’t always a guarantee. That said, even the front page text goes way above his head. Kids have to cheat at video games now? But then what’s the point?
He looks back up at Vergil, who hasn’t uttered a single word this whole time, mouth slightly agape.
Finally, Dante has reduced his brother to speechlessness via the pure absurdity of his actions. Tick one in the win box.
Vergil rehinges his jaw enough to say, “This is the sum of what you learnt. This.”
He doesn’t specify any further, but then an explanation isn’t exactly needed.
“What can I say, I knew you’d be impressed,” Dante replies airily. He flicks the magazine open and settles on admiring the art. Wow, computer graphics sure have come a long way.
“You’re insufferable.” Dante glances up, but Vergil’s face is hidden behind the newspaper again. Even so, there’s a warm note to his voice which makes Dante’s leg twitch.
Dante clears his throat and decides to change the topic. “It’s around the same time of day that we saw that bird from before. I wonder if it’s still hanging around.”
The sky is a clear azure expanse, so it’s not unthinkable that they would be able to see it fly past if it came in their direction. It’s an odd thought to hold onto, wondering where it went, but there’s something almost itchy about it. Unfulfilled in a way that screams of some hidden importance, if only he could figure out what.
Vergil dismisses his query. “Who knows. It’s probably gone by now.”
“You can’t say that for certain, though,” Dante points out. “I know you’ve been thinking about it too. You sure liked that bird, huh?”
He’s uncertain exactly how he knows that, but it’s clear as day to Dante. Maybe because inexplicably, he feels the same. When two moons collide, he and his brother occasionally have a similar line of thought.
Vergil places the newspaper face-down on the table, seemingly giving up on reading thanks to all of Dante’s interruptions. “I wasn’t aware you knew about that.”
“You underestimate me. I can read you like a book, brother,” Dante retorts, sticking his tongue out, hoping to make Vergil a little bit nervous. That would definitely be a laugh riot.
He declares, “I’m going to go look for it.”
Instantly, Vergil rejects the idea. “Stay here. That species is… out of season now. It’s moved on.”
The way he’s says that is testy, like the last thing he wants is for Dante to go out and do something stupid. Too bad, Dante does what he wants, and if that means falling ass-first into another bad decision, so be it.
“Out of season, huh? You’re such a nerd,” Dante teases affectionately. “And it hasn’t been that long. Might as well give it a go.”
Vergil looks at him cautiously, something intent behind his eyes. “It’s not worth it. You won’t be able to find it, Dante.”
“That sounds like a challenge.”
“You—” Vergil cuts himself off and gestures at the magazine under Dante’s elbow. “…Pass me that for a moment.”
“Really?” Dante can’t refrain from adding, “What will you give me for it?”
One look and he’s forced to quickly amend, “Okay, okay. Here you go. Hey, while you read that, I’m going to go ahead, all right?”
Vergil grip creases the cover. “No. It has flown away so it’s gone forever.”
Dante clicks his tongue in annoyance, then has an amazing idea. “Let’s leave it to fate to decide, shall we?”
It seems like a century ago that he found his old trick coin in the music room, but luckily it’s been in his pocket the whole time. “I call heads!” he shouts, and flips it high into the air, catching it in one motion and slapping the face onto his arm.
Tails.
Dante stares. This is his fake coin, isn’t it? He had been so sure, too. But if that’s the case, then this result would be impossible, so it can’t be. A trickle of uneasiness slides down his spine.
His gambit ruined, Dante loudly proclaims, “What do you know, it’s heads! I win,” and pops the coin back in his pocket before his brother notices any differently. “I’ll see you later, Vergil!”
Running straight for the tree line, Dante kicks off the last dregs of lethargy and barrels on through, the rustling leaves carrying behind one last call of, “There’s nothing out there, Dante!”
And then he’s off, away from the echo of Vergil’s panicked disapproval. What’s there to worry about? Dante knows his way around the forest surrounding their estate. After all, he’d been exploring it only days previous, hopping from branch to snapping branch, trampling through the undergrowth and tiptoeing past mother’s award-winning tulips.
Saying that, the glade he finds himself stumbling into is a bit further south than he’s been before, wreathed by unfamiliar foliage and haunting birdsong. Dante makes the mistake of turning in a slow circle to try and reorient himself, only to realise that now he’s not quite sure which direction he came from.
Damnit. At least there’s a creek nearby, bubbling cheerfully amidst all of his mounting regrets. Dante wanders over, gulping down a few handfuls of water, ears pricked for any disturbances.
“Hello?”
Dante stills, muscles tensing in a low crouch, readying himself with—well, he doesn’t actually have any weapons right now, but that’s not a particularly significant setback.
“Is someone there?”
In any other situation, that voice would warrant a reaction of concern, maybe some heroic badassery. But there’s something just that little bit off about it, like they don’t really need help. The kind of warning that only sinks in right before you figure out a knife has lodged itself in your gut.
“Please, is anyone out there? I’m lost.”
They’re certainly persistent, he’ll give them that. It’s almost like they know there’s someone within earshot. Dante heaves a sigh, curses his compulsion to occasionally try and not act like an asshole, and shouts back, “Yeah, I’m over by the water!”
Whoever it is must have had the same idea, because soon he hears rustling footsteps approaching from further upstream. As they get closer, their pace quickens, until a guy roughly the same age as him enters into view.
Dante exhales with a touch of relief. Baseline human. Not that he couldn’t take on a fight right now, but that nagging itch has yet to fade, his nerves teetering on the cliff face of anxiety. Is this the presence he’d sensed watching him?
The boy heedlessly approaches him. “Tony? Is that you?”
“What? No, my name is Dante,” he corrects, completely thrown. What the hell?
Still, the stranger smiles. “It’s been such a long time, Tony. I’m so glad to see you again.” He spreads his arms in a welcoming manner, looking for some kind of reciprocation. It’s weird. Dante has never once been mistaken for someone else; the hair alone is kind of a dead giveaway.
Maybe he should try dying it black for a while. At least then he’d probably only get confused for some wannabe edgelord.
Dante lets out a forced chuckle, distancing himself with a couple of steps. “That’s real funny, buddy, but as I said,” he explains through gritted teeth, “my name is Dante.”
Push and pull, the other approaches. “Tony, why are you—”
“I am not TONY!” It escapes him with more force than is warranted, sharp and cutting. The aftermath ricochets in their ears, high-pitched desperation and caged ferocity. All too revealing.
The tense atmosphere weighs heavy between them, a stony not-quite-glare piercing through him in the resounding silence.
Dante coughs, struggling to contain the impression of being put so off-balance. “…Why are you out here, anyway? And who are you?” he adds for good measure.
“My name is Ernest. I got lost on my way home.” A polite smile, walking the thin line of honest and calculating.
He kind of wants to pinch himself. Just a normal human, nothing to worry about. “All right. Cool. Do you need a hand getting back?” Dante asks, reminded suddenly of all the rumoured demon attacks. Pretty stupid for a random kid to be wandering about by himself, he decides not to point out.
“I’m afraid so. I live just on the edge of town, if you know the way,” Ernest clarifies, head lowered apologetically.
At that, Dante perks up. Finally, an opportunity he can get on board with, and this time with a genuine reason, too! “Oh, that’s cool. Would you know the way if we got back on the main road?”
He motions for Ernest to follow him and manages to catch a scent trail that should lead them back to the area with the most recent human foot traffic.
Ernest offers him another smile, this one less timid. “Yes, that should be fine. Thank you so much, Tony.”
Dante stops in his tracks. His shoulders tense up. Turning to look him dead in the eye, Dante grinds out, “It’s this way, Edward.”
“That’s not my—”
“I know!”
Fortunately, Dante’s senses are correct in determining the shortest route back to the gravel road, though it would be difficult to choose wrongly out of ‘straight ahead’ and ‘try again, dumbass’. Above them, the branches weave a tight thicket, shrouding the view ahead in a cloak of eerie gloom and making it difficult to tell the time of day.
Demons have definitely been through here recently; scuff marks in the dirt, suspicious rusty smears, as well as a distinct lack of animal sounds can only tell one kind of story. The two of them trample onwards, Dante’s hands tightening in his pockets, holding onto a projection of casual nonchalance whilst secretly maintaining hypervigilant awareness.
There’s definitely someone or something out there, watching them. It hasn’t made a move yet, but if Dante knows one thing, it’s that it is only a matter of time.
“Sorry again for the inconvenience,” Ernest mumbles, breaking the uncomfortable stillness.
Dante loosens his shoulders in a half-shrug. “I needed to stretch my legs anyway.”
“…I went out to look for my friend.”
That must be Tony, he guesses. Dante says nothing, mindful of the stare boring into the back of his head. Eventually, Ernest seems to get the message and switches to, “I made a mistake.”
“Yeah?” At least the kid could admit his own wrongdoings, unlike… but Vergil did, in the end. Sort of. Well, he did if it was really—
“A terrible, unforgivable mistake,” Ernest elucidates gravely. Even without turning to look, Dante can tell that his body language is tight and closed off. In his experience, the overly genteel kind often have a habit of talking around the problem without addressing the issue head on, preferring not to name names.
Yeah, Dante can relate. “Sounds pretty serious.”
“Have you ever committed a wrong so bad you know you’ll never be able to atone, let alone make things right again?”
The gentle slope downwards becomes a bit steeper, curving into precarious potholes in places. Dante slows down and treads carefully around them, hoping Ernest follows his example. “We all make mistakes. Sometimes it turns out to not be as bad as you think it is in retrospect,” he says comfortingly, helping his companion hop over a muddy pit. “But yeah, I know what you mean.” Oh boy, does he ever.
“A long time ago, my home was attacked by demons,” Ernest explains, adding, “Nobody knew why. It was like a natural disaster; they just swept in and demolished everything. Everyone lost a family member, a friend, someone they cared about in the assault.” He goes silent for a long moment.
“But no one knew what caused it to happen in the first place. Did someone open up a portal to Hell? Cast a spell on some sort of cursed magical artifact? At the end of the day, there was nobody left to blame.”
The shrubs to the side of the thinning path rustle. Dante’s body jerks, preparing to fight whatever pops out, but in the span of a second, an enormous breath of wind picks up and gusts past them, the whole forest shuddering under the strain.
In the next moment, it dies down as abruptly as it came. After checking in on Ernest’s huddled figure behind him, Dante gestures for them to continue, commenting, “I know it doesn’t help, but I’m sorry to hear about what happened. Hope you got some help after the fact.”
“You would hope that, wouldn’t you?”
He couldn’t have heard that right. Dante glances back, brow furrowed. “What did you just say?”
Ernest returns his look, hesitant. “I was telling you about what happened to—“
“Ah, thought I heard… nevermind.” Dante shakes his head, says, “You been doing okay since then?”
Ernest is quiet, mulling over the question. “A lot changed that day. I wanted so badly to find the ones responsible for causing so much destruction, but in the end, I just… kept living my own life. Went home. Ate, slept, even if it didn’t feel the same anymore.” A laugh. “It really put my relationships with others into perspective. I could have run off and been the hero, some grand, noble gesture, but instead I went back to the family I had left and watched the days go by. So that’s something, I suppose. We never would have gotten that close if I’d run away.”
Somehow, he’s ended up listening to the guy’s entire life story, but it feels wildly inappropriate to tell him to stop talking about his dead friends and family. Dante listens, feeling a bit awkward, and considers the wisdom in Ernest’s decision.
“You’re a real adult, huh? Got things all sorted out.” Didn’t particularly sound like a happy ending, though. A question slips out, “Did it ever stop hurting?”
“Not really.” They’re quiet for a time, navigating around the broken debris left either by a natural landslide or a rampaging beast. The large rocks are still wet, suggesting they rolled down during the storm.
What storm?
“I was an angry kid,” Ernest continues, and Dante forces a noncommittal sound. “Sometimes I’d get so stuck in my way of doing things that I would forget how other people might see it. You think you’re doing right by them and making the hard choices, but really you’re just taking away their opportunity to make decisions for themselves. That kind of thing.”
“That’s awfully specific,” Dante notes. “Hanging onto some regrets there?”
Ernest doesn’t answer, but Dante can still track the sound of his footfalls not far behind. The atmosphere is pulled taut, paradoxical layers of honesty and tight-lipped caution keeping the conversation from flowing smoothly, pitted with clumsy stops and starts.
This time, Dante is hit with the urge to break the uncomfortable stillness. “We must be nearly there by now,” he says out loud, more for his own sake than Ernest’s. The road has changed over the course of their journey, standard thoroughfare becoming thinner and rougher, lost to the wilderness and time.
It seems never ending. How long have they been walking by this point?
“We’re nearing the end of the road, don’t worry,” Ernest assures him. “It will all be over soon.”
It’s hard to pretend that they’re traipsing along on a jaunty adventure with statements that ominous.
“It’s kind of funny,” Ernest says casually. “I left today to find my friend, Tony. I haven’t seen him since the demons attacked.”
Dante stops, the woods gone quiet except for the quickening palpitations in his ears.
“I thought that happened a long time ago?” he asks, mouth dry.
Ernest’s voice echoes, “It did.” Dante turns in a slow circle, but he can’t pinpoint where the sound is coming from. “You remember, don’t you? The devils came and everything burned.”
Nothing except trees shrouded in shadow, stretching endlessly in every direction. “The mistake I made was not realising who led them to us. You were the one who brought the demons to our town. You killed us all.”
Dante swallows. He wants to shout something in return, but no words come to mind.
Two directions left. Forward and back. No real choice except to descend further into the abyss.
Ernest’s voice fades to a whisper. “Why didn’t you ever explain anything, Dante? You could have saved us both so much misery. Now we’re both hurting and it’s all your fault.”
The wind carries away the last murmur until a low hush settles once again. Dante resumes the journey alone, now the sole source of sound in the murky forest. No rustling except for the leaves under his feet, no insects buzzing or movement in the undergrowth. Empty.
A forbidding ambience haunts his steps, the offbeat cessation of resistance more prohibitive than any obstacle. Stop it right now. Don’t go any further. You will regret the choices that have led you here.
Finally, the branches split apart and curl upwards, allowing starlight to fall through open air. A rusted gate swings wide, squeaking on a broken hinge. He has arrived.
Rows of macabre statues, each carved with a delicate inscription. Little stone soldiers standing tall and raising prayers to the heavens, but nobody answers their pleas, their sorrows. Names upon names, a desperate cry for help which never came. At the far end, slivers of something blue flash mockingly.
“Vergil?” Dante calls out stupidly, treading past grave after grave. A few wilting piles of rot leak out of torn plastic wrap. Rot and decay, everywhere.
One more step, two. Everything judders in place, a swirl of incomprehensible despair. The scrap of blue fabric sways in slow motion, caught on the arm of a stone cross.
Far off in the distance, roaring flames burn a scar into the night sky.
Dante stumbles back, nearly falling in his haste to get away. He doesn’t want to be here anymore. It didn’t happen like this.
“You have to go back.”
A voice he doesn’t recognise. Hellish rumbles like spider legs crawling across his skin, feeling each little fragile prick right before the bite. Dante shudders.
There’s something familiar about it. “…Father?” Dante asks shakily, lurching sideways again when the tremors roll through the ground. Something presses solid and unyielding against his back. He turns.
Sulphur-brimstone-lightning. Demonic energy in its purest form, crackling and spitting with fire-bright fervour. “You have to go back.”
Not father. Not Vergil. Red fissures like molten lava peeking through the earth, agony following devastation. Another hope lost. A scar on its left hand, the same spot where his own begins to itch.
Claws wrap around his throat, razor tips digging in, squeezing, squeezing—
“—go back,” he hears, but he can’t breathe, can’t see through black spots clouding his vision. Choking, hacking up red bloody slime, struggling but the walls are so tight, he can’t move.
Trapped in a shimmering crimson shell like the inside of a fly’s eye, geometric shapes guarding the outside from coming in and the inside from getting out. He has to get out. He has to go back has to go back to go back to go back to go back to
Go back to—
—bed, Dante.”
It’s late. He knows this before opening his eyes, can feel the certainty of it in the chilly air. Exposed skin ripples unpleasantly, caught at the edge of upturned blankets, extremities right on the verge of going numb. He breathes in a comforting scent, sinking into the space left behind by his brother’s warmth.
“You sh’d go back t’sleep, Vergil,” Dante slurs, face mushed against the pillow. Reluctantly opens one bleary eye. “Y’ look tired.”
Vergil sits on the side of the bed, facing away. His reply sounds far too coherent for this hour. “I am not.”
Dante yawns, stretching out an arm until it lazily grazes his brother’s back, a gentle prod. “Liar. Are you having nightmares again?”
He wouldn’t make fun of him for it if he did. Not anymore.
The charcoal lines of his brother’s silhouette look slightly pained, no answer immediately forthcoming. “What do you remember happening before you went to sleep, Dante?”
His question shakes loose a few cobwebs, enough that Dante grumpily shifts onto his elbows to better enunciate a reply. Vergil’s words take a moment to process. “Huh? Um… I don’t know. We have lunch, I went for a walk. It was a good day.”
Vergil’s voice drops, a serious rasp, “We’re losing time. Both of us. How long have we been here, Dante?”
It occurs to him now that Vergil never asked why he was sharing the bed with him again.
“What do you mean? This is where we’ve always lived, Vergil.” Dante adds, pleadingly, “Please come back to sleep.”
Please let them stay like this for just a while longer. Please, brother.
“You’re right. I am tired,” Vergil states, too blunt to be admitting to anything. “But you are the focus of this, brother. If we wait much longer—”
Dante interrupts. “Look, I’m sorry I went off on my own yesterday. I won’t do it again, I promise.” He leverages himself into a full sitting position, reaching out to make Vergil face him, at least.
He stops at the last minute. Curls his hand back onto his lap.
Vergil’s lips move in the dim reflection on the windowpane. “Why did you want to go there? What does it mean to you?”
His voice is strained, frustrated.
Dante fidgets unhappily. “Why? Well… I don’t know. I was just curious, I guess.” There’s nothing weird about that. “I can’t really remember it very well and that doesn’t… feel right, somehow. I wanted to see it for myself.”
Except not really. It never made sense to him that humans supposedly remember bad things more easily. Nothing has ever been as clear as the memory of the two of them together in this place.
The sheets rustle as Vergil shifts fully to face him, one leg lifted onto the sheets, nudging against Dante’s through the blanket. Vergil’s gaze piercing, intent, the same feeling carried by his words, “Memories are precious. When something is completely forgotten, it may as well be gone forever.”
Gone forever. Dead. A lump of guilt settles in Dante’s throat, though he isn’t sure exactly why. Sorry, kid.
He forces a weak laugh, then stops abruptly when it rings out awkwardly. “At least I’ll never be able to forget you,” he says, trying for decisive and landing somewhere closer to timid, which doesn’t suit him one bit. “Not like it matters. I want to be by your side for the rest of my life.” Dante smiles at him, earnest and reassuring.
Always, he reaches out and chooses precisely the wrong move to make. Vergil’s eyes flash angrily, his tone going accusative, “Is this the real reason we’re stuck like this, so you can say these things to me that you’re too afraid to otherwise? For your own self-gratification and sense of what is right?” Practically dripping with condescension.
Dante can’t even muster up any reflexive indignation, too taken aback by how wrong Vergil’s accusations are. “What? It’s how I feel. I’m not sorry for not wanting to let go of you.”
For the first time, honesty like this feels comfortable in a way it never has before. In the space between breaths, Dante wonders if you can grieve someone who is still alive. There’s a beat missing, a discordant note that makes him miss the boy Vergil once was.
Vergil calms down, his features softening under the streaks of moonlight. Carefully, he smooths a hand over Dante’s head, ruffling his hair. Dante startles, not expecting it in the slightest, but nonetheless enjoys the sensation.
“I apologise for upsetting you.” Vergil leans back for a moment, reaching for something out of sight on the bedside table. “Here, drink this. It will help you go back to sleep.”
The rim of a glass presses to Dante’s lips and he drinks obediently, trusting his brother’s calm confidence. Still, he can’t help but mumble, “I’m not a kid anymore, Vergil.”
“Just drink it.”
“Fine, fine.” He gulps it down to the last drop, slow warmth spreading to the ends of his fingertips. The aftertaste lingers, something spicy and sweet, oddly nostalgic in a way. Good enough that he thinks about asking Vergil for more, but his tongue feels heavy and rubbery in his mouth, a light doze seeping into him while he listens to Vergil reading quietly,
“O! the cunning wiles that creep
in thy little heart asleep.
When thy little heart does wake,
then the dreadful lightnings break.”
The click of a book snapping shut. It’s nice. This is nice. Poetry had always been something that Vergil hid away, one of many things that they had each so earnestly tried to make their own and no one else’s. A ritual Dante loved and hated for the simple joy of breaking a taboo, crawling into his brother’s space as inescapably as the most persistent of insects.
A moth drawn to a flame, Dante considers. Is that what they are? Which of them would be the more likely to burn? He’s thinking too much, trapped on the maddening precipice of slumber. Oh, how unusual for you to think at all, Vergil would say. Haha.
His feet wiggle, trying to kick off the comforter, suddenly stifling with uncomfortable heat. Dante draws in a huffing breath, only to feel the air scrape unpleasantly at his lungs. Did someone leave the stove on again?
“Wha’sss happening, Vergil?” Dante manages, his lips shaping the words seconds after he thinks them. Why is it so dark? Oh, his eyes are closed. He should probably open them. Yep. Any minute now.
“It’s nothing,” he hears, and gravity pulls at his limbs, his neck, until the weight shifts and he’s held in a tilting, curved embrace. His head lolls against a firm chest, surrounded by a comforting scent. “Everything is fine.”
The world moves like a ship rocking at sea, so he snuggles in closer to stop the spinning behind his eyelids. The hold around him tightens, proprietary or merely to ensure a firm grip, he isn’t sure. Each movement stretches longer, a lullaby of creaking wood and soft puffs of air.
“I’m not sure if it will work from this side, but you have to pull through, Dante. You are the key to seeing this to its conclusion.”
The key to escaping everything once and for all. But that’s not how this is meant to go.
Dante struggles to move, fighting against the lead weights pinning down his arms, his legs. In reality, he barely manages more than a kittenish pawing as Vergil lowers him to the floor, a vague blurriness of light-shadow-light shifting into view. Wood grain.
Creaking, the closet door starts to close. Vergil says with solemn finality, “All things must come to an end.”
No.
“No!” Dante forces his eyes to focus, adrenaline tearing through the—oh, that bastard, he drugged him. No wonder. “Vergil, stop it!” God, he should have been way more suspicious when Vergil gave him ‘a drink to help him sleep’. What kind of moron would fall for something as obvious as that?!
It’s not quite enough, though. His body is still painfully slow to respond, and it takes all of Dante’s strength just to gather enough force so he can kick out one leg, wedging it painfully in the opening just before it slams shut. “Vergil,” he breathes. “Vergil!”
Light flickers through the slat door, blocked by his brother’s figure on the other side. A shifting sound, and the pressure on his leg lifts. Vergil must be opening the cupboard door, just enough so that he can—
SLAM. Once, then again. The blunt force is excruciating, more than the solid wood should be able to realistically withstand without cracking, but it holds and so does Dante. He refuses to give out, keeps flailing as much as his recovering body will allow, frantic to prevent Vergil from locking him away in the place of his worst nightmares.
The door smashes against him one more time, even harder, and the bone in his leg snaps.
A howl rips out of his throat, born not from the agonising pain but from pure, unbridled fury. “You asshole!” Dante keeps kicking, rams his broken leg continuously against the wood, uncaring of the damage he’s causing to himself. Bone chips and blood splatter the inside of the cupboard, swathes of skin tearing into a mangled mess beyond recognition. The door stays closed.
Vergil had to lock him here of all places. Panic bubbles up, hiccups of rage and fear and confusion. Why here?
“Stay still, Dante,” Vergil orders, tucked away on the other side. From what little he can see, Vergil must be sitting down against the door, keeping it closed with the weight of his body. “It’s far past time that I ensure this progresses as it should have from the very beginning.”
Dante snarls, pressing his head against the closet floor. Spits out blood. “You don’t get it. If something is wrong, we have to face it together!” How could he reach the worst possible conclusion? There’s nothing Dante wants less than whatever Vergil is planning right now. How did he miss all the signs?
“Please,” Dante says, because he isn’t above begging when it gets this bad, even if it comes out as more of a demand. “Please.”
“That’s not how this happened, Dante,” Vergil tells him, a far cry from gentle. Unable to pretend for a single moment. “I wasn’t even here—you have to face reality now. I’ve given you enough time.”
The sound of Vergil’s head thunking against the door, the slumped shape of his silhouette moulded with either frustration or resignation. Dante wishes he had the strength to kick right through to his skull.
Vergil’s voice is a flawless contrast of measure and control. “This is killing us. We’re not children anymore.” He stops, lets out a rasping cough. “We never were. Our father’s blood flows through us; our bodies are merely informed of their age based on our state of mind.”
What? Does that mean—Dante shakes his head, twisting against the wooden floor with a wet smear of blood. No, that doesn’t matter right now. A cough escapes his own throat as well, dragged out by the acrid taste of smoke.
“Wake up, Dante.”
Dante’s eyes sting. Up until this moment, he could have almost… but Vergil—any version of him, past, present or future—is so rarely willingly do him the smallest of kindnesses, let alone one of this magnitude.
It hurts. It hurts beyond reason to put it into words.
“I know this is a dream, Vergil.”
His brother freezes, jerks once. A minute electric stutter-stop of surprise, causing vicious satisfaction to well up with the realisation that he’s managed to surpass his twin’s expectations yet again. Even at the end of the world, he can’t help his own pride at the pettiest of victories. “I’ve known for a long time.”
“Dante…” Vergil seems lost for words.
“I know you would never be this kind to me if you had the choice. I can’t even feel you here,” Dante confesses, his throat tightening up. Swallows hard, and blinks back the threatening spill of water. He used to be so grateful for their shared ability to find each other, so damn grateful he managed to fool himself into thinking it was still there the whole time. What an idiot. “None of this ever truly felt real. Right from the start.”
Of course, Vergil knows exactly where he’s going with this. “The two of us are the only real beings here.”
And that’s—but isn’t that what he wants his brother to say? The answer is devastatingly obvious. In the end, no one is capable of hurting Dante quite like Dante himself. Who else knows exactly where to hit where it really stings, leave a bruise so lasting it renders his very soul?
Dante looks at the beautiful dream stitched together into the painfully young form of the big brother he used to know and croaks, “I don’t believe you.”
The silence expands between them, filling with the hiss of flames sputtering to life, something crashing in the distance. Echoing remnants of who they used to be—who Dante used to be, and memories of the boy he could never stop loving—filling the empty halls of their childhood home, and nothing more.
“If you don’t believe me… then so be it,” Vergil says finally, his voice rough, “I will stay here with you until the end.”
Dante nearly laughs. Once, he would have killed for that. Now it just feels cheap, and he only has himself to blame. A cheap, sullied imitation, but. He still wants it, every bone in his body aching so deep and sudden he wants to cry under the weight of it.
Damn the twisting corners of his brain, torturing him like this. What was the lesson in this? Hell, what was he trying to tell himself with that recent vision of Ernest, flouncing around together in the woods: do not make decisions for others? Try not to screw things up beyond repair and pile yourself up with useless, self-pitying platitudes? A little late for that.
He lies there, crusting in the filth of his own blood, less than a foot away from his brother, and wishes there was any other place he’d rather be.
He wonders what Vergil would be feeling in this moment, head bowed and hands clenched. Blocking out the futility of it all, maybe, or blinding himself to their combined ineptitude. Well, Dante’s ineptitude. Damn it, he can’t even share the blame anymore. Figures.
A sting of copper rises over the waves of ash, pungent despite the puddling red under Dante’s body. He flinches instinctively, biting down on his lip to try and stop the way his body reacts. It’s a mystery why, at a time like this, he can pinpoint exactly which nails have pierced the skin on Vergil’s palms. “Why does your blood always smell so…”
“I can’t sense you either in this place,” Vergil explains tightly. “Blood is—connection, in its most basic form. Reaching out to form a bond.”
Oh. “Right. Because it broke when you—”
“Yes.”
Great, so his screwed up subconscious figured out a way to try and force something that couldn’t possibly exist. Could never happen, even in a dream.
Vergil’s voice is quiet, bitter. He has every right to be. “It must have been feeding on us this whole time. Softening up the meat for consumption.”
It. The monster that trapped them here. A logical deduction, despite the lack of any other presence so far. Then again, what kind of demon wants to laugh at the way its prey makes a fool of itself in its struggle to escape?
…Too many, now that he thinks about it. Maybe he should be grateful.
“You figured out a way,” Dante surmises.
“I’m not sure.”
Right, because it’s not really up to him in the end. Still, there’s a comfort to be found in mutual destruction, because at least it’s mutual. “Like I said, you’re the smart one. If anyone could, it would be you.”
“You trust that, but not…” He sounds frustrated again. Dante smiles wryly in the darkness. “I understand. Thank you, Dante, but I refuse to live in this fantasy world of yours any longer.”
Dante stops smiling. So that’s it, then. Every kind of realism has its limits; he knows Vergil just that little bit too well.
“It looks like this fairy tale has come to an end,” says Vergil. There’s something wistful about it, like he might have come close to enjoying it too. Close, but never quite enough; two points reaching out without ever meeting.
Rose-coloured glasses the whole way through for Dante. His best is never up to par, though. Not when it really matters. He couldn’t create something truly beautiful for himself, let alone for the sake of someone else; far too broken to hide all the cracks.
A fairy tale with a perfect home, family, and friends, and he still couldn’t convince Vergil to stay.
The sound of a thunderous crash resounds from the next room over. Dante can’t see it from his position, but Vergil probably can—a ceiling beam, maybe. Their childhood home falling to pieces, just like it had so many years ago. Dante shudders.
He curls in on himself, wincing at the stabbing pain emanating from his broken leg. Light flickers, the fire spreading as quickly as it had the first time. He remembers the aftermath clearly: curtains, bookcases, paintings, their ashy remains evidencing how the flames had fed in such a short time. He hadn’t been conscious for long enough to witness it firsthand, and afterwards, the memory of anything past mother’s warnings had slipped away like sand spilling between his fingers.
Paradoxically, this time feels much more real. The cupboard illuminates faintly in rows of orange and yellow, and for the first time, Dante notices the complicated patchwork of symbols scrawled up the sides of the walls. Curling script patterned a dark red-brown. Familiar.
Writing he had once seen tattooed on a stranger’s skin.
“What did you do?” Dante rasps, closing his eyes. He doesn’t want to see it anymore.
A sigh of breath. “The spell is impervious to attacks from the outside.” When had Vergil been outside? “This is our best option. You said it yourself. You know it works, so it does.”
The sound of Vergil shifting, turning to face him. Dante’s eyes stay shut. Vergil continues, “Our blood. Our inheritance from father… and m-mother.”
How dire this situation must be, for Vergil to lose a sliver of his eloquence. They’re both so tired.
Vergil tells him, too softly and too close, “This is a castle of your memories, Dante, which means you have the ability to take control over it.”
As if it was all just that easy. “What about you?”
“I have no intention of dying any time soon,” Vergil declares, because of course he does.
“But the fire—everything burns, Vergil. Everything,” Dante says, wretched. If his brother really wants to stick with how events unfolded the first time, then why isn’t he leaving, getting to somewhere safe?
It hits him then. The symbols. Dante’s stupid little magic trick with the magazine.
The crackling grows louder and louder, sweat stinging at the corner of his eyes. The heat is a searing wave against his front now, even blocked by wood and with Vergil against the door. Dante hopes he’s imagining the pungent stench of burning flesh, their mother’s screams.
Vergil answers his unspoken question, “There is only room for one.”
Dante chokes back a dry sob. The cupboard is cramped, exactly how he remembers huddling tight and speechless in fear amidst their parents’ coats. If he really was that young, maybe Vergil would fit—but his fingers scrape uselessly against the slats, too thick and stupid to reach through to his brother. A useless pipedream.
Pride and justice. The fact is that even at the end of the line, Vergil’s sacrifice is still fairly self-motivated. He can’t kid himself otherwise; were there another way, his brother surely would have abandoned him in a heartbeat.
If anything, this whole journey has been about facing all sorts of uncomfortable truths, and this is just another one in a long, long line. He could have happily stayed in blissful ignorance for another few decades.
“Don’t cry, brother,” Vergil says, but the sentiment encapsulated by his words is the opposite of comforting.
Dante lets out a short, sharp bark of laughter, and snaps, “I’ll cry if I fucking want to, Vergil!”
The door creaks slightly. “How unusual for you to use such language.”
His tone is so deliberately monotonous, unfeeling but still somehow judgemental, that it almost hits more brutally than if Vergil had berated him outright. Dante hiccups through spilling tears, on the verge of hyperventilating, breath coming in short and fast, “If I ev-ever died, I always wuh-wanted to do it at your ss-side. We’re meant to b-be together.” He clenches his teeth hard to halt the stuttering until his jaw creaks with it. “We were born together.”
An old ache. They had always disagreed on this, after all, and maybe that was the real start of it—two sides of the same coin on this as everything else; what grand purpose could there have been behind their birth, fates and destinies intertwined?
Did there have to be a reason beyond family?
But Vergil has always held his personal vendettas and ideologies above such things. His next words reflect that. “You won’t be alone. You have plenty of friends.”
As if they’re complete strangers. Bastard.
“It’s not the same!” Dante’s yell is punctuated by the deafening sound of more load-bearing struts collapsing around them. Trapping them in on the off-chance they tried to run, like that was even an option at this point.
Why doesn’t Vergil understand?
Dante confesses, voice scraped raw, “I would choose to stay with you every time.” Laying it all on the table, bleeding desperation at every angle. There’s no point holding back or bracing himself when the truth can only hurt regardless.
“Please, please don’t leave me,” he begs, “I don’t want to be alone, not again.”
Whether his brother is an illusion, a facsimile, or something else entirely—it doesn’t matter so long as he avoids any forced reminder of those endless days and nights without him, everything bleeding into one stretch of grey, dying and dead and waiting for it all to come to an end.
If Vergil turns his back now, Dante doesn’t know what he would do. It’s unbearable. The worst possible thing he could think of: his brother leaving him yet again.
“You’re the one who never understood it,” comes a low murmur over the rising cacophony, shattering glass and cracking pillars. Despite that, Vergil’s voice projects with crystal clarity.
Foolishly, Dante asks, “What?”
And like the hammer of god falling down, Vergil says, “I hate you.”
Dante gags, bile rushing up to choke him, convulses, can’t breathe through the agony of hearing his twin say those words.
He had known. He had always known. But it still hurts, even after all these years.
Naturally, Vergil can’t stop there. “I hate you the most, more than anyone else. I hate you because I—because there’s no one else, Dante. It’s always been you. You are my weakness.”
He sounds frustrated. Disgusted. Of course he does.
Dante swallows dryly, a fresh wave of tears stinging at his eyes. Too loud and too quiet, he whispers, “You were supposed to be mine.”
If there’s another meaning there, Vergil doesn’t hear it. Still, his reply is almost consoling, “There is room in your heart for others, brother. You have always been stronger in that regard.”
Dante stares ahead unseeing, blurry splotches of meaningless colour coalescing into the final spectre of his nightmares. Finally stronger than his twin, and he doesn’t care for it one bit. He’d never forgotten the one thing that he’d really wanted with all of his heart, and it isn’t this.
Decades later, he could never forget Vergil, never got over him; mourned him every moment of every day and could barely stand the idea of a world without him. Hollowed out, reliving that last stand on the edge of the waterfall and playing out how things could have gone if he’d been a little faster, a little smarter, a little bit more convincing.
The last one never works. Vergil still hates him every time. For a long time, Dante had hated Vergil, too, almost as much as he hated himself. But hate doesn’t preclude love, and it turns out you can want someone gone and by your side at the same time.
If he could choose a place to die, then maybe here isn’t so bad. Not if they’re together.
Dante clambers agonisingly onto his elbows, every movement spiking pain all the way through his body, until his back presses to the door, a mangled reflection to his twin.
This is it. The entire world splinters around them, howling and burning. An all-consuming whirlwind of infinite madness. If he ever had one regret—
Dante chokes out, “I love you,” and lets the end wash over him.
Maybe this fake storybook had been better crafted than he realised, because for one wild, impossible second, it had almost sounded like Vergil had said those exact words at the same time. An impossible, perfect, and fragile dream.
Cracks spread along the walls of the closet just as reality itself starts to splinter.
So this is a happy ending, Dante wonders—
—and dies.
There should have been one, but instead there were two.
For two halves of a soul, there could be no crueller fate than to be separated. And for what reason: to stand on opposing sides of an arbitrary moral divide, human against demon? Ever straddling that precarious balance—fighting against each other until the last breath; born for the sole purpose of hating each other, that sick and twisted yearning?
No. They should have been together right from the start. Never anything less than whole.
There should only ever have been one.
Vergil wakes up.
Before any physical senses come online, the first coherent line of thought to emerge through the cloud of dawning consciousness is how dare he.
A complicated mix of emotion immediately begins to bubble up, frustration taking the forefront alongside the prickling feeling of sensation returning to his extremities. Frustration at his infuriating little brother, starting with how he had gotten Vergil trapped in a useless form incapable of so much as defending himself, and ending with Dante’s inability to recognise him even in the face of death. Two scenarios which are starting to become upsettingly familiar.
And the whole time, Vergil had been unable to explain anything. Again.
Vergil opens his eyes, as he had in those brief interspersed moments of consciousness while fighting against the tangled web of hypnosis. Inside, the fleshy chrysalis shines the same luminous red as it had then; walls thrumming in a rhythm which makes the whole shape contract like a beating heart. A surprisingly effective prison, albeit rather flimsy without the magic keeping him docile.
He reaches down to his side and—there. It seems this creature had made yet another addition to its piling mistakes: never trap a far superior demon with its devil arm.
Yamato slides out slow and smooth in the liquid suspending him in place, one quick slash cutting the entire vessel in half.
Gravity lurches with his body as Vergil falls.
As he descends, a quick survey of his surroundings reveals that unlike the grasping roots which had originally taken Dante and himself by surprise, the structure has evolved into a branching nightmare of foliage with countless pods like his own stretching sparsely into an endless void. The eternal twilight of the demon realm is blacked out entirely by a thick wooden canopy, leaving the glowing fruits as the only remaining source of light.
Vergil lands lightly on a lower branch, immediately reaching out his senses as far as they can go. It takes less than an instant to locate the call of like to like, narrowing in on his brother’s presence without error. Nearby, though not as close as he would have assumed from the strength of their connection in the dream.
As an afterthought, he releases a short burst of demonic energy, burning off the lingering layer of filth.
Senses pricked, he notices Dante’s responding blast of power, followed by the distant sound of cracking wood and something falling into the void. A second later, his brother’s demonic form swoops into view, alit by the faint red glow.
Dante lands heavily on the next branch over, immediately reverting back to his human visage.
Wordlessly, they stare at each other. Vergil cannot begin to guess what expression his own face is making. Dante’s, at least, clearly displays the truly befuddling amount of guilt which had so obviously plagued him throughout their shared experience.
Dante’s mouth opens, then closes. Finally, in a defeated tone, “Don’t. Just… don’t.”
Vergil stays silent as Dante collapses into a sitting position, arms curled around himself defensively. Both of them have been left with shockingly little energy, and it occurs to him now that the red slime must have been comprised primarily of their own blood.
He can still smell it on Dante, thick and heavy in the air. Annoyingly tantalising.
Doubtless, Dante still doesn’t know what any of that signifies. Vergil files that issue away for later, overcome by mental and emotional exhaustion.
It takes some time to absorb enough ambient energy to refill their reserves. All the while, Dante’s façade of cocky self-confidence fails to resurface, head bowed while he quietly attempts to reconstruct it piece by piece.
He doesn’t know this for sure, but it’s obvious enough. Vulnerability radiates from his brother in a way Dante has never allowed in front of him before. With every passing second, Vergil’s instincts demand that he strike while Dante’s guard is still down, but to what end?
The purpose Vergil has always striven for has stayed the same, has never wavered, and yet. He knows now that at the core of Dante’s philosophies lies a very personal hurt rather than the all-consuming sense of justice he had once assumed for both of them.
Bereft, Vergil cannot help but compare the vision of Dante in front of him to the teenager he had seen in the illusory world. Maddening, naïve, weak—all the things he had once despised.
How dare Dante reveal that Vergil himself is not so different.
“Oh, damnit,” Dante curses, breaking the silence. He holds those twin pistols he has always prized so much, lips pulled into a grimace. “The chambers are clogged full of goop.”
He shakes them fruitlessly, clicking his tongue in annoyance.
They won’t be talking about it at all, then. So be it. “Your other devil arms?”
“Not here,” Dante replies unhappily. Interesting. Had their captor taken the others away on purpose, or merely dropped the extra weight upon their imprisonment? Yamato’s presence speaks to the latter. Perhaps the guns having been made useless is nothing more than an unfortunate coincidence.
A beat passes. Vergil expects Dante to quip some light-hearted rhetoric, you’d think a welcoming party like this would be a little more polite, but nothing happens.
Vergil wonders, a little savagely, if Dante finally understands that it was him the whole time and not some phantom of his imagination. Although Vergil had held some doubts himself at first, Dante’s sheer unwillingness to face reality had inspired an amount of ire in him that only the real Dante had ever managed before, far beyond the capabilities of any half-baked imitation.
“What the heck even is this thing?” Dante asks, taking stock of their situation far too late. He gets up, stretches, and flips upside down on the branch, hanging on by the arches of his feet.
Summoning his sword, Dante prods at a hanging red pod. With a repulsive slick sound, the membrane splits open and gushes out more red liquid until all that’s left is an empty sac gleaming wetly in the diffuse light. The corpse of an unidentifiable demon spills out, desiccated and deformed.
Vergil eyes it unfeelingly, observing the rapid state of decay for a being that once held considerable power.
Dante makes a face, stating rather redundantly, “Dead.”
“Not particularly surprising. You must have recognised it already,” Vergil prompts, gesturing briefly at their surroundings. “This is indeed another Qliphoth tree.”
“Great. I was thinking about getting into garden maintenance, anyway,” Dante remarks, clearly having recovered to some extent despite the discordant flatness of his sarcasm. He flips back up, an effortless display of whipcord muscle strength, looking around again and frowning.
“Going to need some extra-long hedge trimmers! It grows upside-down, right? But I thought the whole shtick was that there was only meant to be one fruit to rule them all,” he muses.
Vergil tilts his head in acknowledgement and mulls over the possibilities. “Most likely it was purposefully modified to feed on demon blood.” He does not feel the need to explain why; ample prey would make an easy fast track for any would-be ruler. “That may explain why it has grown like this—horizontally instead of vertically, spreading out to find more nutrients.”
“Capture more demonic shmucks, you mean,” Dante corrects shrewdly. “Though I guess that includes us.”
“Regrettably.” Given how abundantly it had grown, any agents sent to alter its course or track progress were most likely dead by now. Vergil has his suspicions about who would have wanted a power-bestowing fruit—besides himself, that is—but chooses not to speak on behalf of that theory.
Dante laughs, and if it had been with anyone else, the forced nature of his cheer might have remained undetected. “Aww, I’m gravely disappointed if that means there’s not going to be any cheesy villainous monologuing. That’s my favourite part.”
He gives Vergil a pointed look.
Vergil frowns, affronted. “I never—”
Dante interrupts him, “Yeah, you did.” He bares his teeth in something almost like a smile. “Did you even think about all the lives lost when you brought your little home improvement project into the human world?”
Months spent in the Underworld and they had never broached Dante’s feelings on the subject. Of course he would only do so now, purely as a deflection from the true source of his anger.
Thus, Vergil replies in kind with a flat, “No. Not for a single moment.” He doesn’t want to add anything further, knowing that it can only fuel the flame of his brother’s sanctimonious judgement.
“Of course. Not your style, I take it,” Dante comments coolly, waving his hand in a dismissive gesture.
Vergil lets out a slow breath through his teeth. “I do have… some regrets. Now.” Mostly for reasons Dante probably wouldn’t like hearing, especially after the reveal of V’s identity.
“Not back then, though.” Not enough to not do it in the first place. To be fair, both of them had always been prone to the adage of asking for forgiveness rather than permission. Right now, Vergil asks for neither.
He chooses his phrasing carefully. “I may not have been in possession of... the soundest of minds to consider such things after—”
Dante cuts him off again, “Right, yeah, I get that,” turning to hide the way his body visibly flinches away from him, staring off into the darkness.
Anger rises up, both at Dante’s damnable martyrism and himself, because that hadn’t been his intention. “I never blamed you for that.”
It would be a lie to say that he had never blamed Dante at all, or even that he hadn’t blamed him for things that, in retrospect, were not entirely his fault.
“It was a gamble I willingly chose to take. Do not think to supersede my conviction with your misplaced guilt complex, brother.”
Immediately, Dante snaps back, “Don’t tell me how I should feel,” because he can’t let anything go without a fight.
Trust Dante to feel guilty about feeling guilty. “If those are the lengths to which I had to go in order for us to stand here now… so be it.”
Given that it’s a truth spoken with blatant disregard for the regret that Dante so dearly wants him to express, Vergil expects some form of anger. Instead, Dante seems unexpectedly mollified. “You aren’t—”
Suddenly, the branches underneath their feet shudder violently. Dante quietens. The distant tinkling sound of hailstones stutters into being, gaining traction and volume.
There is no weather in the Underworld, and certainly none beneath the boughs of the Qliphoth.
From higher up, one of the pods falls past their position, then another. A wailing screech rises from the abyss, calling forth a barrage of similar demonic growls and shrieks until the air is bursting with it.
As a crystalline fruit rushes past, nearly smashing into them by a hairsbreadth of distance, Vergil catches a glimpse of the demon inside, watching back. Still alive.
Angry, hateful, and hungry.
Dante shakes his guns one last time then re-holsters them, obviously having given it up as a lost cause. “What’s happening?”
Truthfully, Vergil can only make a conjecture at best; the demon plant he had painstakingly researched had been immeasurably different in all aspects, including the way it had fallen upon its demise—which Dante would know, since that was something he had been present and dually responsible for.
A functional mirror image, perhaps, as well as an unlikely coincidence that the timing of their triumph over its mental hold lines up with the way it seems to now be discarding its prey en masse.
“Prepare yourself,” Vergil orders, fingers sliding to the hilt of the Yamato.
There is no more warning. An enormous pod, easily dozens of times larger than the one that had previously housed either of them, hurtles past at lightning speed.
A wall of displaced air ruffles their coats with its descent, then a second time following with the resounding shockwave as it lands somewhere far below in the screaming void.
The sounds grow impossibly louder, gnashing roars and howls surrounding them on all sides. Vergil tightens his hold on Yamato’s hilt as one presence makes itself known above the rest, something unseen approaching at a rapid pace and radiating demonic bloodlust.
Vergil jumps out of the way right as a massive entity crashes into where they had been standing, shattering the wood in an instant.
Finally. Power crackles at his fingertips, the exhilarating sensation of his devil trigger sliding over skin-turned-scales. True power, completely unlike the neutered illusion of his younger form. Next to him, Dante bursts into action as well, that familiar zing of unbridled strength so similar to his own but different all the same.
One mighty flap of Dante’s wings launches his body head on into the fight, his sword summoned mid-leap to clash against dripping fangs. The blade skitters on viscous slime, catching on yet another row of serrated teeth, their enemy’s form consisting of little more than hulking flesh and countless mouths.
“Whoa!” Unbelievably, the Devil Sword Dante—a name almost as ridiculous as its wielder—quivers in his brother’s grasp, and Vergil’s eyes are drawn to the rest of the monster’s form: dozens of fleshy tendrils, each as thick as a stone pillar, whipping around to latch dexterously onto the surrounding environment and dragging the central mass forward. Almost elastic, a living slingshot pulled tight and aimed directly at his brother.
Not that he would ever think of fighting Dante’s battles for him. The devil’s sudden arrival heralds that of another, perhaps indicating that a fight had already been underway before the two of them made their presences known. This one portrays a more typical visage of the Underworld’s natives: a bipedal, leathery creature, arms mutated into thick, bony weapons for blunt strikes.
Predictable opponents always make for easy prey.
Vergil smirks, noting the pathetic, shrivelled wings adorning its back, and simply dodges out of the way with minimal effort. The demon screeches, foaming at its rodent-like mouth, careening past any possible landing with its momentum and plunging down into the shadows.
Turning back to see how Dante is faring, he barely has time to take in the resplendence of his brother’s demonic form. The bat demon reappears, muscular hindlegs flexing with impressive propulsive thrust, and Vergil is forced to counter its next swing with a grunt of annoyance.
“Having trouble over there? If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were a bit—rusty!” Dante laughs, no doubt having borne witness to the hubris of his arrogance, only to instantaneously get hurled away from his own foe by a cluster of fleshy vines, trailing a startled yelp.
It’s impossible to say exactly how long they had been held captive, but time is no divisor between the strong and the weak. Vergil snaps, “Concentrate on your opponent, Dante.”
Paying heed to his own words, Vergil does not see Dante’s reaction, but the pout is nonetheless evident in his voice. “This thing has a lot of mouths, but I don’t think it’s the talking type!”
“Unlike you,” Vergil states flatly, albeit with far less vitriol than intended. No matter.
He waits for the bat demon to rocket into view again, prepared for an attack from any angle, but it merely repeats the same motions. From what he can tell, Dante’s opponent appears to act much the same—not mentally present nor capable of strategy, stuck on a singular setting of one-minded violence. Pitiful.
Vergil hovers in the air, flicking higher up for a brief moment. Waiting. He dives sharply right when the devil is at the peak of its upward momentum. Yamato pierces downwards, a satisfying slice neatly severing both of its arms.
An ungodly screech. Turned feral from pain and fear—though how much change can really be observed is entirely debatable—the demon tries vainly to attack with its bleeding stumps, flailing and biting.
All things considered, the difference is remarkable. Despite what Dante might expect from him, Vergil is forced to wonder exactly what it is that separates the complete psychological deterioration from their own emergent state.
The conclusion he inevitably reaches is rather grim. “Prolonged exposure,” he says, more to himself than anything, then decides to explain for Dante’s sake, “It seems the Qliphoth has drained them of any mental capacity.”
Dante’s voice travels playful and teasing, “Oh, well, I didn’t want to say anything, but—”
Vergil discards the twitching body of the dying vermin, flicking the gore from Yamato’s blade. Concentrating, demonic energy swirls in the air until it solidifies into a row of effervescent blue swords, and as easy as breathing, Vergil sends them forward in rapid succession.
Meaty tendrils spurt blood messily from the many-mouthed creature, its main body rocking from the backlash. Dante, not expecting the sudden wave assault, yelps as he gets caught up in Vergil’s attack, frantically dodging strikes from all angles until one of the summon swords finds its way into the delicate membrane of his wing. How very unfortunate.
Dante flaps once, twice, obviously realising far too late that the stretching movement only serves to exacerbate the tear. He lets out a sound not unlike a squeak. “Damn it, Vergil, you absolute bastard!”
With a burst of red sparks, Dante reverts to his human form and nosedives into the abyss, shouting obscenities all the way.
Vergil stares after his brother, bemused.
Did Dante actually forget that he doesn’t need his wings to fly? Certainly, they aided in the act, but both of them could move through the sky just as easily using demonic energy alone.
Seconds later, shockwaves pulse through the ground alit by scarlet energy, carving bright scars into the landscape. The brief illumination reveals a scuttering mass of wretched critters, all varying in size and power—braindead or not, their numbers admittedly far exceed anything Vergil had previously encountered in one place.
Perhaps this might be something close to a challenge after all.
As per Dante’s usual modus operandi, luck twists his misfortune into something far greater. A series of explosions engulf the lower level, followed by his signature obnoxious whooping. He had found another of his devil arms, then; most likely the twin rocket launchers, if the trails of fire are anything to go by.
Vergil understands, intellectually, that they apparently hold some sort of sentimental value for one of his brother’s human friends. This is a feeling that Vergil finds difficult to comprehend given their general bulk and impracticality, but then he had come to appreciate the weapons’ potential. He is, after all, rather intimately acquainted with them.
A horrible throaty screeching pierces Vergil’s ears.
The tooth and vine demon has apparently recovered, unleashing a volley of clawed tendrils in his direction. Concentrating, Vergil pulls his energy tight until it converges into a rapid spiral of summoned swords, fanning them out to make quick work of the projectile attacks.
Another screech, this one just as head-splitting as the last. Vergil scowls, irritation barely contained as he readies a judgement cut with the Yamato.
For all its elastic strength, the demon’s body slices apart easily under his blade, spurting torrents of corruption-back liquid into the air. Its form holds, but only barely, little more than a large mangled mess of bloody stumps and bloodier teeth.
A flapping sound comes from below as Dante re-emerges, chucking his newfound arsenal up onto one of the Qliphoth’s branches. Vergil watches with interest as demonic energy envelops his brother’s form, changing from a partial trigger—understandably the only way he could have possibly operated the firing mechanisms—to his fully demonic, winged appearance.
It occurs to Vergil that he had so rarely been able to observe his brother’s trigger without also being the object of his enmity. Here, even with plentiful demonic essence to sustain them both, Dante seldom chose to show off his alternate form, typically preferring to wear his human skin. A pity.
Dante reforms the Devil Sword Dante in his hand, then immediately dismisses it with a burst of red particles. He repeats the action over and over again in the span of no more than a few seconds, causing no small amount of confusion until Vergil notices some type of crystal-like spores raining down from the blade.
“It’s getting real festive down there,” Dante explains with great relish. “There’s all kinds of freaks showing up. Here, I got you a party favour.”
Before he finishes speaking, his brother is diving forward with his blade outstretched in the childish form of a sneak attack. Vergil deflects, mildly amused that Dante would try for a tactic he had commonly used in their childhood right after they had so recently been reminded of that period of their lives.
The last of the crystalline fungus evaporates from the tip and Dante pouts. “Aww.”
“Stop fooling around,” Vergil orders, taking the opportunity to send another cut with the Yamato at the bleeding devil nearby before re-sheathing. Its scream ends with a low gurgle.
“What, I’m not allowed to stab you? Hypocrite. If you don’t learn to compromise, this relationship is never going to work.” Dante winces, clearly regretting the connotation in his choice of words, perhaps worried about his twin’s reaction. But Vergil is more surprised than anything that Dante would be willing to consciously acknowledge that kind of comparison given how much time he had spent running away.
Vergil forces himself to appear unaffected while his mind quickly cycles through the possibilities.
He knows now that Dante is attracted to him; that much is undeniable. Even if he had done a surprisingly good job hiding such a thing all these years. Unless, of course, it’s something entirely new. The likelihood of that is low, given how little Vergil’s appearance had changed, especially in comparison to his own, but when had aspects such as that ever mattered to Dante?
Not to mention that physical attraction is one thing, but—
“Ow!” Dante jerks back, his wings fluttering in the still air. He says accusingly, “Why did you—”
“You would know if I was the one attacking you,” Vergil immediately asserts, then frowns in consternation. Their previous enemy has already started rapidly decaying, as per the processes of devil anatomy. Below, the cacophony continues unabetted but without any particular note; no signs of a new challenger approaching.
Dante swoops down before Vergil can decide on their next move.
Instantaneously, the jumping bat demon appears from before, rocketing upwards with tremendous force. Somehow, it must have had enough remaining stamina to regrow its arms, parrying Dante’s sword with moderate effectiveness, only to then spit out lumps of molten rock at his face.
Instead of rearing back, Dante repels the attack with a blur of motion, stabbing the space in front of him with such swiftness that the air distorts until finally, he stops, a corpse gutted on the end of his sword.
It all takes place in under a second. Dante tosses the remains to the side and makes a face at the smears of gore left behind. Also pitch black. Corrupted.
Dante slaps a hand to the back of his neck. “Gah! What is that?!”
In the span of a single breath, something pierces Vergil’s chest—but when he looks down, nothing is there. No marks. Weak, then, but likely the type to whittle down an opponent’s strength from afar.
Vergil hadn’t even noticed which direction the shot had come from. He tries not to think about why his attention had been diverted, nor what it had been focused on.
The faintest streak zips towards them like a bolt of lightning, both of them dodging narrowly out of the way. Vergil bares his teeth. “Over there.”
A single miserable, scurrying creature flits from the underside of one Qliphoth branch to another, hardly more than the tiniest speck of movement at this distance: arrogance or cowardice, either more unforgivable than the last.
Vergil draws the Yamato with intent, but an enraged mass of flesh and teeth slams into him from the side, caught only by the of his reflexes. Fangs scratch a piercing shriek against his blade, viscous blood and spittle spraying messily, raising a grimace of reflexive disgust.
Dante’s figure darts past, a burning trail of scarlet energy in his peripheral, but he feels rather than hears his brother’s sudden halt of motion, followed by a throaty sound of frustration. “What a piece of—ugh. These kinds of enemies are the worst. Ouch! Annoying as hell, too.”
Vergil snorts at Dante’s unnecessary verbalisation of pain, but nonetheless hears the untold warning: it’s fast, and it can easily sense killing intent aimed in its direction. Indeed, quite the nuisance.
A second strike hits his midriff, inches from the last, and this time the pain nearly causes him to falter, grip slipping minutely on Yamato’s handle.
Exponentially greater power from consecutive strikes, then. This type had always been something of a novelty in the Underworld, requiring beyond exceptional speed to always remain out of distance, impossible to catch.
But not for them. Vergil viciously angles his sword deep into the fleshy gums between teeth, his coat fluttering against the inhuman roar, and heaves. “Dante, catch.”
“Thanks, just what I’ve always wanted!” he hears, hopefully as his brother gathers enough brain cells to use the bleeding lump as a shield while he attempts to locate…
There.
Vergil raises his sword and sweeps his fingers along the blade, hovering over the tip and widening his stance. Carefully, he concentrates a crackling wave of power along its length until the air sharpens, electric and unwavering, breathing in—
One slice with the Yamato and he crashes through like a cascade, resolution outlined in forward momentum. A second, and the vortex of blue and black quasi-dimensional space widens just as the distance shrinks, less than half remaining. Three. Four.
Travelling through consecutive spatial rips had been an odd sensation at first, everything sliding into a vague awareness of fast-slow, near-far. In the past, learning how to pinpoint destination and direction had taken precious, painstaking time, obnoxiously graceless as the first steps of a newborn foal.
This time, he emerges from the final portal and rockets to a halt, the too-sudden inertia blasting crackles of blue energy outwards in a firework of malice. Right in front of the archer’s face, stunned into stillness and all the more pathetic for it.
Vergil bisects the creature’s stony exterior in one clean cut, mildly grateful for the lack of viscera this time around. In death, all things find grace—at least to some extent.
He decides to fly back the long way, taking note of the dark, skittering masses below. Another tremor rocks through the entire stretching cavern of the Qliphoth’s reach, something unsettlingly massive moving below unseen. Faster, louder, and growing in ravenous hunger by the minute.
With a sharp flick, Vergil sends down a rain of summoned swords, relishing the pained cries of finality. Whatever large creature lurks down there continues undeterred, and Vergil clucks his tongue in dissatisfaction.
Suddenly, he notes that the smoky fog rising through the air is not exactly that—demonic insects, swarming in sparse patterns if not for the sheer number of them; uncountable millions. He extends a thread of energy and one of them immediately diverts its path, calling others to follow. Their bodies are small enough to make visibility difficult, even in the low lighting, but he manages to catch sight of extended suckers before he increases the pressure, burning them from the inside out.
Not so different from the very empusas he had once taken advantage of, collecting blood and energy for their master underneath. The ashy remains attract even more, unerringly pulling in thousands like magnetised iron filings.
Vergil cuts them all to ribbons before they can come near, not completely able to tamp down the ire at being forced to lower his blade for the eradication of mere pests. How contemptible.
With a flap of his wings, Vergil swoops in low to rejoin the battle at Dante’s side, who seems preoccupied with purposefully not looking in his direction. Vergil tilts his head, intrigued, and considers the guilty twist to the way Dante avoids eye contact, busying himself with a complicated wrist movement that sends the many-mouthed hellion spiralling away, still snarling.
Vergil feels his own mouth curling into a not too dissimilar expression and flares his aura, forcing Dante to glance in his direction, only to trap his gaze with a disdainful glare. He re-sheathes the Yamato, placing his hand on the hilt, and Dante nods wordlessly in understanding.
Together, they vault forward and swing in unison, red and blue spiralling together into a helix of potent, concentrated energy. Flesh blackens beneath the force of it, sizzling and boiling until it deflates messily under its own weight, unspeakably revolting until the very last.
Dante spits out a lump of congealed blood. “Thanks, but I could’ve finished that ugly blob on my own just fine.”
Typical. “It looked like you were in need of assistance, brother,” Vergil replies icily, and Dante winces at the clear conveyance of exactly how long it took him to finish off a single enemy. With help, no less. Still, his brother replies through gritted teeth, “Excuse you. I’ll have you know I’ve picked up a trick or two while you were preoccupied.”
Preoccupied, as if that one word were sufficient to describe—
The brittle husk shatters, a new form shining wetly and launching itself at them with abandon, shrieking mouths gaping endlessly.
This time, they are prepared. As Vergil summons a barrage of blue swords with a lazy flicker of thought, his interest piques when Dante does the same, scarlet energy spinning behind his back, building in power and coiling around his body, slicing rapidly at the flesh demon while Vergil’s swords simultaneously pierce it from the front.
It does not survive for a second chance to fake its death. Black lines of corruption spiderweb outwards until its meaty exterior finally cracks, exploding into a wafting red fog. Dante sneezes.
Not a moment to rest. In the misting gore, the mosquito-like insects from earlier becomes all the more obvious, swarming into frenzied bloodlust. Dante’s spine straightens with awareness, then his form hunches over as his wings curl forward, gold-red light bursting into bolts of fire.
This time, nothing is able to collect what remains. There is simply no trace of energy remaining other than the swampy heat of Dante’s blazing presence.
Dante extends his wings again in a slow, lazy stretch and Vergil feels his own reflecting the gesture. “Okay, I might understand now why you were so pissed about fighting in the… that place.”
Vergil withholds comment. Dante so clearly doesn’t see it from the same perspective, because it wasn’t just the simple fact of how they were fighting but the extent to which they had both been crippled. It was a violation of everything he had worked towards. Even Dante having been reduced to the barest shreds of his trademark versatility, just like a child playing pretend at being something so much greater.
He shudders, then steels himself with the determination to make Dante understand. “As you should. This is how we are meant to be, Dante.”
Their eyes lock together, something intense building in that liminal space forever intrinsic to their very making. With a grudging sliver of awareness, Vergil notices the cacophony rising to an almost unbearable level.
“Together?” Dante asks.
Vergil nods, throat suddenly dry.
As one, they dive. This—this is what he had missed, that instant comprehension which he had only ever found with his twin, be it in the heat of battle at the crumbling base of the first Qliphoth or the unspoken agreement to force Nero back in his place. A united, mutual awareness of what they could be at their best, back to back, blades drawn and wet with blood.
A prize well worth the wait, but then the fool who persists in his folly will become wise. And he had been quite the fool to deny himself this for so long. To deny them both.
The air pressure shifts, all of the remaining insects retreating as one coarse, glittering wave. The rumbling ceases and a dry cracking sound takes its place, that enormous beast finally emerging from the depths.
“Would you look at that,” Dante remarks brightly. “A pretty little butterfly.”
Vergil sniffs derisively. Any devil that had to stoop to collecting power via minions in order to obtain a second form was hardly worth fighting at all, in his opinion. Perhaps that would sound rather hypocritical to Dante given Urizen’s previous exploits, but those memories were hazy to him at best. As it currently stands, they had both been regenerating just fine on their own and the heat of battle had only served to stoke their power rather than reduce it.
Dante might agree if he could find a way to voice that sentiment in a way which wouldn’t elicit accusations of power-hungry elitism yet again.
His brother shifts his devil sword into its thinner, closed version, flipping it up into the air and catching the spinning blade by the handle. The blade splits open once more, seething with a burning orange glow.
Dante laughs joyously. “I think I’m done warming up now. How about you?”
Vergil closes his eyes for a moment to block out the loathsome rainbow glimmer of gossamer wings. He opens them again. “Hardly much of an exercise. Only the lowest of the low would bother with stealing energy like carrion, too afraid to face us head on.” He raises his chin. “We should show them the meaning of true power.”
Dante’s face splits on a fond grin and his head lowers in a wry shake. “Just can’t let that angle go, can you?”
Their conversation is interrupted when the enormous insect rushes forward with a bursting sonic boom, crashing into a full body dive—Vergil dodges rather neatly, but his retaliatory swipe misses. He scowls.
Dante, meanwhile, shifts into a defensive stance and catches the assault head-on. His forearms visibly strain with the effort of absorbing the momentum to twist it into a counterattack, only for the devil to just as quickly rebound in a completely different direction.
“What kind of enemy is a butterfly, anyway? And here I thought bad guys were supposed to have standards; am I right, Vergil?”
Dante’s chattering punctuates a quickfire series of evasive manoeuvres which repositions the battle as a whole to the upper canopy of the Qliphoth. Vergil’s attention catches on the slight wavering in his voice towards the end, as if Dante had become aware mid-sentence of his own inability to shut up, or perhaps his apparent compulsion to keep tabs on how Vergil is feeling.
It’s almost cute, in a way. Although the memories are still painfully raw, he is nonetheless reminded of a much younger Dante’s see-through attempts at begging for attention. Parallels rise closer to the surface, drawn in flashes of Dante’s childish demeanour which never quite went away as he grew older. As Dante himself had so admitted.
Conscious or not, Dante cannot help but regress at the slightest hint of doubt—conceivably not in Vergil, but in himself. Does Vergil’s opinion matter to him, even now?
It’s almost unthinkable.
Chitin bubbles grotesquely as countless smaller insects emerge from minute folds of diaphanous membrane, immediately swarming the air in a thick cloud.
“You are mistaken,” Vergil replies finally, readying his blade.
Dante balks, no doubt confused—he is the more experienced authority on demon-obsessed megalomaniacs, after all. “What?”
Vergil glances at him once and states shortly, “Arkham.”
A beat of silence and then Dante bursts into gales of laughter so strong he nearly drifts right into an oncoming attack. “Whoa!”
“Pay attention!” Vergil snaps, whipping through the movements of a quick judgement cut to eviscerate a large chunk of the never-ending swarm.
Dante’s voice calls back, “I am! You just—ugh, nevermind, I got it.” His brother dives down but the butterfly darts away again with astounding speed despite its size. Dante continues in a straight line undeterred, and Vergil realises he must have a different goal in mind.
Hefting Kalina Ann onto his shoulder, Dante shouts, “I think I have something that’ll get you to stop and smell the pollen!”
Ridiculous.
One hit lands, then a second. Each explosion serves the dual purpose of burning away the smaller insects, the monster screeching in fury as its brood are incinerated within seconds. Immediately, the speed of its movements increases to a near impossible level, its pattern also becoming more erratic, the flailing of an injured beast.
A third shot goes comically wide, just about clipping Vergil’s tail due to his sheer bafflement at Dante’s inexplicably poor aim all of a sudden.
Unless—Vergil’s gaze is drawn from the trajectory over to his twin’s smirking face. He growls warningly, “Dante…”
Dante playfully returns with a silky purr, “Vergil,” and sticks out his tongue.
Vergil wants to bite that grin off his brother’s face.
Instead, he channels his energy into a fanning array of summoned swords, carefully aiming them one by one at their enemy’s fleeing form until it passes by Dante, at which point he unleashes all of them in a flurry. Dante laughs joyfully, weaving low through the hailing blue light.
Predatory instinct has only begun to rear its head when Dante calls up imploringly, “Do your little brother a favour and cover me for a sec, would you?” and Vergil wonders what he could have spotted of interest in the seething masses of lower-level demons.
He clicks his tongue, unwillingly annoyed at the abrupt ending to their little game. “If you insist on wasting time, there won’t be any enemies left for you to fight.”
“I’ll make it real quick, then.” Dante immediately plummets as Vergil catches the butterfly’s body with a deep stab, though it remains fast enough to withdraw before viscera even manages to leak onto his blade. Convenient.
Heat prickles at his feet and a quick glance downwards reveals a flaming crack splitting the ground, recognisable as the aftereffects of the King Cerberus.
Dante returns abruptly, laughing all the while, bearing a new devil arm but bringing in a new swarm of monsters—these ones larger and stronger than blood-sucking insects, though still not of any particular note in terms of power. Interestingly, their bodies appear mangled beyond recognition, drooping threads of sinew held together by a familiar crystalline substance.
The King Cerberus flickers, a discordant zing of shifting wavelengths, and the spear collapses in on itself with an icy blast. Dante twirls it in his hands, instantly predicting the butterfly’s approach and countering with a full-coverage sphere of frost. Jagged shards rip the behemoth, smaller insects, and crystal demons alike to shreds.
Afterwards, he electrocutes them all with a devastating bolt of lightning.
“I see you’ve recovered another of your devil arms.” Vergil’s eyes track the clean twist of his brother’s hips, his hands, feeling the inevitable burn of hunger coiling in his lower belly. It drives him to shameful distraction, and he turns to find more crystal-infested mobs leaping from branch to branch towards him.
Placing his hand on the Yamato’s handle, Vergil harrumphs when he recalls the difficulty with which Dante had removed the spores from his devil sword. Rather than sully his own blade, Vergil collects the rocket launchers from their discarded position, carefully reverting his hands to a more human appearance in order to use the trigger mechanism.
The results are satisfyingly explosive, and Vergil tosses them over to Dante who dexterously switches devil arms in the span of a heartbeat, simultaneously shooting both at the hulking insect while Vergil limits its movements with a well-placed series of space-rending cuts. Dante fires again, tosses the Kalina Anns in the air, then uses the King Cerberus to launch sparking purple orbs of ball lightning.
As usual, it is an entirely unnecessary display of showmanship. Vergil wonders, slightly miffed, why Dante knows how to juggle.
“Yeah, I wonder if they’re all down here? Kind of crazy if we manage to find them all before everything falls down,” Dante ponders.
Their enemy’s momentum screeches to a halt when the devil butterfly attempts to spawn another wave of energy-stealing insects, only to be interrupted by a leaping crystalline figure which grapples for purchase, tearing at the chitinous tissue of its wings.
Not missing a beat, Dante switches King Cerberus to its fire mode again, sending forth a powerful jet of flame which swallows the entire writhing mass. Vergil adds a series of summoned swords for good measure.
From within the twitching mass of burnt corpses, the crystals shatter and their remnants fade quickly into nothingness. Interesting.
Dante finally banishes both of his newly acquired devil arms, as he should have done minutes before. Vergil eyes his brother suspiciously, wondering if he purposely abandoned the rocket launchers multiple times for the sole purpose of getting to see Vergil use them instead. That would be the kind of thing Dante finds amusement in.
Regardless, they have more pressing concerns. “The crystal?”
Dante hums. “If I had to guess, the core is somewhere down below. Probably hidden among the horde.” He winks at Vergil. “Race you?”
Vergil huffs in annoyance. “Childish.” He is, unfortunately, tempted by the challenge despite himself. He muses out loud, “It would take more than simply speed to find the controller.”
“So I’ll prove I’m smarter than you, too,” Dante says breezily. “Ready?”
They lock eyes. “Let’s go!”
In perfect unison, they both dive, sweeping low to the ground until Vergil’s vision fills with emaciated bodies clambering over themselves to reach out with grasping limbs—the infection has spread fast and far, moulding the lowest of beasts into deft, agile leapers. The test, then, would be to aim for the non-infected body parts and strike deep enough to extinguish their lives as efficiently as possible.
A fitting challenge. Dante, of course, takes this as an opportunity to alternate his devil arms for maximum ranged coverage. His signature guns rattle above the pitching screams, indicating that his brother has finally regained their use as well.
Vergil rolls his eyes; naturally, their father’s prized sword, famed scourge of the Underworld, is insufficient for Dante’s showboating acrobatics.
As each creature dies, the remaining lumps of crystal crack and disintegrate with a satisfying shattering sound. One by one, the glowing lights flicker out as they carve their way through the landscape, not unlike those blinking lights humans amuse themselves with at seasonal festivities.
Despite the repetitious tedium, his blood surges with the simple joy of fighting. It’s a rush. It always is, whether fighting beside his brother or against him.
“Whoa!” Vergil hears a low yelp and looks over to see that Dante has surrounded himself in enemies on purpose, only to become atypically overwhelmed. He’s blinking furiously, hands pawing at his eyes while trying to avoid scratching them with his claws.
The crystals glint ominously, and Vergil chokes on a snarl. With a snap of his wings, he launches himself over and yanks at his brother’s raised arms, flinging him upwards. Dante yelps again, twisting in the air, but manages to summon the rocket launchers mid-air and channel his energy into a homing attack to make up for his lack of eyesight.
Brilliant and innovative. Appreciation tugs at the corners of his mouth and Vergil stamps down on it, struggling to regain focus on his own efforts, smashing relentlessly through crystal and bone.
Dante’s momentary mistake is one born of fatigue. By this point, the battle has been going on for far too long. Stamina is one thing, considering they had fought for days without break after their initial arrival in the Underworld, but the constant strain of maintaining his trigger digs painfully into the space behind his eyeballs.
Vergil grits his teeth, grudgingly starting to contemplate alternative options when loud vibrations once again shudder through the Qliphoth’s branches.
Expecting a creature at least somewhat similar to what they had already faced—unintelligent, over-sized, with maybe one or two notable biological quirks—Vergil finds himself unprepared for the sheer behemothic magnitude ahead which, unbelievably, manages to put all of their previous opponents to shame.
Unnecessarily, Dante shouts, “Over there!”
Aftershocks resonate with each sluggish, titanic step, leading back to the cracked limbs of a beast so covered in roots as to be almost unrecognisable, save for the monstrous horns sprouting from its head.
Of course. At the center of the maze lies the minotaur, baring the entire weight of the cursed tree on its back. How very ironic that the two of them would find themselves here one day.
With every movement, countless roots are ripped from the ground, only to repeatedly burrow back into dirt and flesh on the downward shift. A milky stare gazes ahead unseeing, the demon dead twice over between the Qliphoth and the large crystal embedded in its stomach, glowing faintly beneath swinging vines.
“Thank you, Dante. I can see it,” Vergil says sternly because he does, in fact, have eyes.
A sickly pulse of light, and the core releases a wispy mist of gemstone shards. The nearby empusas and other parasites, already lacking any higher function, shudder and spasm as, presumably, the crystal spores grow directly into their brains.
Dante locks onto the minotaur itself which continues lumbering mindlessly forward. “A two for one deal, huh? I like the sound of that.”
“As do I.” Three for one, even: the minotaur, the crystal core, and the Qliphoth’s main source of energy. No wonder they had been caught in the first place—a walking fortress, though it must have woken only recently from all the chaos.
Dante hurtles forward, a meteoric trail of scarlet sparks drawing their attention while Vergil hangs back, concentrating. The core is too infectious for his blade, but beneath the thick hide of roots must lie penetrable flesh.
Vergil unsheathes the Yamato, an elegant strike with the brutal smashing force of iaido, and a cluster of worm-like strands come crashing to the ground. The vines twitch to life, squirming to close the gap, just as the fallen remnants are crushed underfoot along with a handful of scuttling parasites.
“Damn, how about this?” The Devil Sword Dante smashes against the minotaur’s skull, a world-shattering crack.
The slightest of reactions, a minute rearing back of its head, but the creature holds, lifting one clawed hand to swat his brother away like a petulant fly.
Predictably, it’s far too slow to catch Dante, but their combined momentum is lost. Vergil bites back a curse; Dante doesn’t bother. The hordes of demons, infected and not, turn as one to their newly sighted prey, launching and flying and scurrying in a seething wave even as more fleshy pods plunge to the ground from above.
A gust of freezing air blasts by as Vergil switches to a defensive stance, catching a handful of scrabbling devils mid-lunge on the flat of his blade and flinging them away with more force than strictly necessary.
Dante’s voice carries along with the sound of bodies being ripped to shreds by razor-sharp chunks of ice, “So I’ve been thinking, what’s the point of having this many apples of power again? I swear everything about this one is all back to front.”
He sounds like he’s having fun, so of course Dante wants to revisit this conversation point now.
“That would have to be due to genetic modification… or a result of ingesting demon blood. A mutation.” Vergil uses his tail to stab an opponent behind him while he directs a volley of summoned swords at the minotaur, only to be intercepted by a fresh swarm of underlings.
He frowns, and explains, “The Qliphoth should be no more aware than a regular houseplant.” Albeit a houseplant with the ability to violently defend itself, but then such things supposedly existed in the human world to some extent as well. “This is a new beast, creating such an elaborate prison. It is far beyond the capabilities of most higher level demons to act as both lure and distraction while it drains its prey dry. An unexpected side-effect, perhaps.”
“Great, a demonic GMO crop project gone wrong.” Staccato explosions signify another change of weapon, joining in on his attempt to clear a path straight to the source. “You really think it’s intelligent?”
Vergil hums in thought and clarifies, “Sentient, not intelligent. More akin to a wild beast than anything. Much like the state it seems to have reduced its prey to.” He slams his wings back, creating a spinning gust of air which forces a momentary clearing. “That illusion may have been a test of sorts. Perhaps it was trying to gain something in particular by preying on our… insecurities.”
A red figure ceases zipping back and forth, coming to an abrupt halt in order to catch a falling pod blade-first and subsequently showering the both of them with a brief rain of gore. Irritated, Vergil looks over to find his brother awaiting his gaze with an unreadable expression.
“My insecurities,” Dante corrects with a flat voice.
Vergil spares him the briefest of glares. “Ours.”
Had he already forgotten that very first nightmare, the stomach-churning mess of half-thought regrets and twisted memories? That world had barely finished forming before Vergil had made the conscious choice to cede control of the dreamscape to Dante, a decision instantly soured by distaste, yet something he nonetheless could not honestly claim to regret. After all, even at his worst, Dante’s imagination tended towards far more pleasant grounds than Vergil’s own.
No. He would never back away from a path of his own choosing.
The slick rivulets of blood on Dante’s blade seem to signify the end. The Qliphoth has clearly run out of fruit to give, all of the sacs split overripe and putrid in swathes of rotten viscera underfoot.
As if in response, the minotaur’s jaw creaks open, a great yawning pit splitting its face with the blackness of the void condensed between horrible, withered fissures.
Vergil flaps his wings once, launching into a steep upwards climb and sensing his twin do the same. Together they form a defensive wall, blades at the ready.
That monstrous mouth widens further, a dark hiss of air escaping like the rattling of a thousand dying breaths, and then—
It comes in echoing snippets, inhuman and otherworldly but familiar all the same. A nightmarish whisper, a dreadful sigh, “Please don’t leave me. I don’t want to be alone. I will stay here with you.
Don’t cry, brother.”
The two of them are speechless for a long moment.
Finally, Dante comments, “Creepy.”
Battling the fast growing wave of unease, Vergil states rather redundantly, “It seems to be imitating its prey.” Us, he refuses to say.
Once more, his mind cycles through a list of common delineators. Why put so much effort into creating a world just for the two of them, without so much as a single sighting of the rest of the imprisoned scourge? What could it possibly gain from studying their relationship?
Think. All devils are alike in their basic needs. There must be something a living but unintelligent creature would want above all else.
“Like all demons, it must have desired the ability to ascend to a higher state of being,” Vergil says slowly, trying to work it out, “In order to achieve that goal, it seems to have wanted to study—emotional responses, the way autonomous creatures react to their environment.” Could that really be the answer? His stomach twists with revulsion at the idea of their struggles amounting to little more than rats scurrying about a maze. “Presumably, its efforts were stunted by its choice of diet.”
Dante frowns, holstering his blade and withdrawing his pistols to rain bullets down below for a wordless moment of thought before replying, “What, because demons don’t have feelings? We do. So do full-blooded demons like Trish and Bradley—come to think of it, I wonder why he was there. I barely met the guy!” He appears miffed, adding, “Also, I still don’t get why you didn’t get along with him.”
Vergil side-eyes Dante, incredulous that he seems to have remained, against all odds, completely oblivious. Unbelievable.
Distractions in the middle of a fight can be costly. Their pause allows for the smallest of opportunities, a window so tight that their sluggish foe should have been incapable of seizing it.
But the minotaur is not their only enemy here.
Thousands of roots burst from the ground and from the flesh of the beast itself, tendrils whipping around and grasping hungrily. In the sudden forest of madness, countless vermin also enter an enraged state, the air thickening with demonic fury.
Dante remains unfazed. He swats away the Qliphoth roots one after another using only the blunt edge of his sword, hollering, “Hey, excuse you. We were kind of in the middle of something?” And then, “Ugh, this really is just yelling at a plant. At least most demons usually talk back.”
In any other situation, Vergil might have felt some shame at his own disregard for their enemies, but Dante isn’t wrong; there is no honour to be found with these creatures. The kindest blessing would be to end their miserable lives as quickly as possible.
“We need an opening,” Vergil directs, scouring the field for a break in the endless wave of assaulting devils. His eyes catch on something interesting—with the roots partially freed from its body, the Minotaur has less to cover itself as makeshift armour.
He dives, stretching out the Yamato in front and twisting his wings at the same time, creating enough forward momentum to cleave his way to a place within striking distance.
This time, he aims lower, targeting the sparsely covered leg joints.
Even the slightest of injuries increases the burden of the demon tree’s weight tenfold. And so he hits again, and again, with each judgement cut silently channelling the building anger Dante had peeled fresh.
Imagine that, being forced into a world where their only company was a demon that Dante inexplicably took a great fondness to over his own brother. A demon who in all likelihood was a construct or manifestation of their true captor, someone they should have destroyed without hesitation if not for Dante’s infuriating insistence that friendship with a being that did not exist mattered, and further insisting that it was up to Vergil to pull them out, entirely disregarding his own abilities when he knew full well that Dante isn’t nearly as dumb as he so often pretends to be.
Eventually, he’s forced to retreat only for the noxious clouds of crystal spores. The parasites in the surrounding area scream and shake, probably sharing distress through whatever pitiful hivemind they still have.
It’s a maddening sound. He summons a spinning spiral of energy swords and sends it rushing through the crowd until their cries lower to a manageable level.
The Minotaur judders, as if the injury has only just started to register with its decaying brain. But then it lifts a massive hoofed foot, slow and sure, lowering it to the ground with another great tremor as if nothing ever happened.
Dante bursts in without warning, riding that motor vehicle devil arm and whooping obnoxiously. At the last second, he leaps off, allowing the metal body to slam into it full-force, catching it by the handle on the rebound and swinging its entire length like a battering ram for a second blow.
They watch in united satisfaction as the Minotaur is finally brought to its knees. As it should be.
With another fiery burst, Dante flits over, continuing their conversation in blasé fashion, “Father had feelings, too! You can’t tell me he didn’t care about us. Or mother.”
“Well, these cretins certainly didn’t have the widest emotional spectrum for it to learn from,” Vergil retorts, catching the twin rocket launchers when Dante tosses them over.
He descends slightly for a lower vantage point, glancing upwards when Dante says, “Huh. Why didn’t we share the space with these guys, too? Pretty sure I didn’t see any of their ugly mugs in there.”
Naturally, Dante is slow to catch on.
He’d had the same thought, but honestly—“What other reason could there possibly be?” Vergil says sourly, catching as many of the lesser demons as he can in the same shot.
Dante leaps in for a closer attack and Vergil throws the weapons back to him so he can fire point blank at the kneeling monolith. Despite being entirely hidden in the ensuring smoke cloud, Vergil can practically hear him puffing out his chest with self-righteous indignation, “Oh, right. Because you and I are sons of the legendary dark knight Spar—”
Vergil cuts him off. “It’s because we’re twins, Dante.” All things considered, the physiological aspects of their bond had affected neither of their lives very much. Until now, he had assumed the link entirely broken if not in such a state of decay as to be practically non-existent. And yet the way he had been able to feel Dante in the dream had been entirely too real, like it was still there and always had been.
But the truth is undeniable; their bond definitely snapped when Vergil fell to the Underworld all those years ago. So how could that be possible?
Dante reappears, trailing smoke and sulphurous befuddlement. “Okay, but what broke us out of there? Was it your…” He wiggles clawed fingers vaguely, which Vergil interprets in his voice as ‘magical poetry bullshit’. Somehow, his insolence is audible even without words.
Vergil snorts with concealed amusement, but keeps his eyes trained on the pulsing crystal slowly spreading from the chest cavity and filling the spaces left by the burned and tattered roots. “It’s possible.”
Grudgingly, he admits to himself how doubtful that is given that his abilities had been mostly depleted by that point. Made by a plant or not, the illusion had an unnatural sturdiness and fought back hard.
…At least Dante would never find out that his final efforts had been largely inspired by that appalling magazine trick.
“Ultimately, it’s fairly unlikely that alone would have sufficed. By all means, we should have perished when the dream collapsed.” That truth is particularly hard to swallow, and the fact that they didn’t is nothing short of a miracle; he can admit that much. “If it really had been attempting to gain independent thought, the Qliphoth may have… overloaded from a source of power it was unable to handle. Something demons are incapable of experiencing, perhaps,” he concludes thoughtfully.
Dante begins a swooping circle around the back of the Minotaur while Vergil concentrates on cutting precisely around the crystal core, bending space with the Yamato to complete the otherwise impossible angles required. Dante completes his circuit with a violent flourish, rapidly switching through all his devil arms to unload a variety of long-range attacks to further weaken the parasitic connection.
One last combined attack and the crystal shatters completely. Dante pants for a moment, then continues, “Something demons don’t experience. What, you mean like how devils never cry? Wait, no. No, you can’t possibly be saying…”
At that moment, Vergil also catches on to the implications.
They trade horrified looks. All the while, the Minotaur reaches for the gaping hole in its bloodless chest, and with its final death rattle, groans, “I love—” and lets out an ungodly screech, spasming with unsettling paroxysms.
“This is some real Disney bullshit,” Dante says flatly.
Vergil busies himself with cutting the flailing roots frantically attempting to patch the damage, even though it’s a futile endeavour. “No. It was defeated by our… simultaneous matching wills and desires.”
Dante splutters, “You can’t seriously still be—there isn’t room for both of us in this river!”
His voice rings out with a startling amount of accusation. Vergil realises, not for the first time, that Dante has somehow managed to come to terms with his own conflicting beliefs while refusing to let go of them. Could it really be considered stupidity or some higher form of ego defensive survival mechanism? What kind of mental fortitude does that take?
Regardless, frustration swells to the forefront above all else. “Dante, you are the one who created an entire fantasy world based on denial—”
“I told you, it wasn’t about that—”
“I have never lied to myself about what my feelings are, Dante,” Vergil snaps, cutting him off. It’s an old sore spot rubbed raw with rage.
He’d known from the start how his brother made him feel, even as those feelings had evolved throughout their journey into adulthood, when he had been forced to bury all of those unwanted sentimentalities under genuine hate. Because he had hated, too much and too easily, and for the longest time, that cavernous pit of destruction had overshadowed everything else.
On the bad days, his walls would tremble under the looming weight of realisation. Love and hate could only coexist in a precarious internal war, always. Had Dante known, even then, what he does to Vergil? Base attraction had been easier to handle only because Dante never seemed to reciprocate, but now—
Dante looks taken aback. Eyes wide, he says faintly, “Oh, god. You want to talk about that? Now?”
“No, I don’t want to talk,” Vergil snarls, because that’s one of the only things they’ve ever agreed on.
It doesn’t matter. The end is inevitable, and so just as the Minotaur falters, so too does the trunk of the Qliphoth begin to sway dangerously, mile-long branches trembling under the strain of imminent demise. Thousands of smaller demons cease their struggles, a long moment of bewilderment sliding into chaos as the entire structure starts to collapse from the inside out.
Debris rains from above, sickening sounds of squelching meat and cracking bones signifying exactly how many devils had been left alive only to then get crushed under the weight of their wretched surroundings.
It’s time.
Dante leads, picking a seemingly random direction and snapping his wings back. Vergil follows, one powerful move of his hindlegs launching his body to a matching speed, and the two of them begin weaving between collapsing branches, neatly dodging demonic corpses flung haphazardly from the higher canopies.
Like this, Vergil can feel that unknowable something continuing to build between them. It feels just as it did in the dream, that uncomfortable warmth from being too close, too far apart. But the distance is smaller this time, verging on negligible—they’re no longer separated by false bounds, and that alone is…
It’s…
Vergil clenches his jaw, sharpened fangs grinding together. What is this pressure? Almost without knowing, he drifts closer to his brother, wings unfolding fully until their clawed tips are mere inches away from touching. Even still, their bodies twist against the unrelenting turbulence rocking the world around them, more of the tree disintegrating piece by piece.
That distance remains, a yawning gap he wants—needs to close.
Dante yells against the battering winds, “We need to get out of here! Do you see the way?”
But, inexplicably, Vergil can hardly bring himself to answer. Every part of him is screaming for an answer, left hanging wide open, bereft and waiting for something he cannot name. In the end, the most he can do is grit out, “Dante,” and watch as his twin’s eyes flare wide in response.
Objectively, it’s a strange position to be in, at least in a physical sense. But his brother seems to care as little about that as he does, their forms switching position once again to squeeze through a narrow opening, so much of that space consumed by their fully extended wings. Up and down, left and right—none of it means anything when neither of them can even look ahead in the first place. The way forward given entirely to chance alone, reckless freefall.
All of it has come down to this. Dante’s gaze locks onto his own, irises flickering with demonic light. A reflection of his own yearning in red and blue.
Dante speaks, his voice low and rough yet still audible over the howling calamity only because they are so, so close, “I always thought I needed you to hold me up, big brother. But now that you’re actually here, I think I can finally let go.”
What?
No.
That’s not the answer. That can’t be—but already his younger brother is disengaging, wings folded and falling back, then darting ahead and it’s everything Vergil can do just to keep up.
“Dante, no—”
Vergil can taste his own blood and it’s sickening. He doesn’t know. Of course he doesn’t—Vergil had only just come to the realisation of what was truly worth protecting himself. What he had actually wanted to achieve with power alone, the truth of it buried so deep that he’d blinded himself to it, foolishly lost sight of his own convictions. Unforgivable.
But if anyone could forgive him, it would be Dante.
And isn’t that the worst truth, that his twin would have to experience this agony as well. It had never stopped hurting. Not for him, and certainly not for Dante; another damnable blind spot. How bad would it be for Dante to learn that after all this time, their goals had been the same all along?
He chases his brother, wondering.
The Underworld has no sun, but there is something brighter to the darkness when they breach the last dying tendrils of the Qliphoth, splintering wood crashing down on the endless rocky graveyard.
Their final flight ends with an inelegant tumble, graceless and desperate as the last embers of their devil triggers leech out, leaving only tattered human clothing and the dregs of exhaustion.
Together, they breathe in the dusty air.
A long moment of wordless silence stretches out, and then—“Hey, is that my hat?”
Dante rolls over in the dirt, squinting past Vergil’s shoulder, and continues, “Huh. How did it end up all the way over here?”
“Dante,” Vergil repeats, tasting the fatigue and cursing his own weakness. He closes his eyes for a beat or two.
He looks over. Dante looks back, nonplussed, a question raised in the arch of his eyebrow.
Infuriating. Vergil raises himself to his hands and knees, breathes deeply, and leans over his brother to bite him deep in his neck.
“Wha—hey!” Dante yelps, struggling reflexively, but Vergil can tell that his body retains its sense-memory from the dream, heating up and going lax despite his efforts. “Vergil, get off of me! What are you doing?!”
He bites down harder, not daring to swallow just yet. That’s not what this is about. Patience is a fleeting thought at the edge of consciousness, but the truth right here and now is that he knows Dante better than ever before. If this is what it takes, then so be it.
Dante continues cursing, but even his malnourished instincts have some inkling as to the next step. Reciprocation feels like his brother’s teeth puncturing the skin on his own nape, completing the circle of symmetry, twin sets of teeth on skin painted whole.
The taste of blood welling up under his tongue is beyond description. Is Dante even aware of the meaning behind this ritual, how common it is for demons to share blood between trusted companions, family members, lovers?
Probably not. His brother can maintain his staunch obliviousness for years if it’s centred on something he does not wish to understand.
He tries to refrain, but it’s too much. Blunt human teeth tear viciously into the exposed flesh, a messy display of dominance. Hunger. Their rapid healing attempts to seal the wound, only to be forced open again with another bite.
True gluttony rears its head at the sight of his brother doing exactly the same, a perfect mirror of insatiable desire.
Dante seems to come back to his senses, blinking past the red haze and kicking Vergil forcefully away. In a flash, Vergil is reminded of their childish wrestling in the mud, hasty and forceful and so very devoid of any real resolution.
Vergil soothes his nerves, demonic instincts protesting the shock of rejection, rejection, but there’s only a few scant feet between them. He hasn’t run away yet. Vergil will not let him.
Vergil’s tongue swipes at the lingering specks of Dante’s blood on his lower lip. Eyes closing in a slow blink to savour the taste, he digests all the information that inhuman senses allow for: the sweet tang of raw emotion and health, depth and richness indicating a fertile demon in its prime. Most importantly, an intrinsic sense of unbelievable power.
It’s incomparable to the dull and diminished senses he had experienced during his jaunt as the frail sorcerer, V. No wonder humans continuously struggle to comprehend the basic concept of devils so much as existing—they could never possibly hope to understand when this kind of experience is forever beyond their reach.
“What is this—this feeling?” Dante asks haltingly, eyes wild.
Vergil’s voice similarly hitches as he attempts to explain, “Isn’t it obvious? We had a sibling bond when we were children. Even before this, it has been trying to re-establish itself. The Qliphoth only further exacerbated the process.”
“No, it’s not obvious at all. It never used to be like this.” Dante’s fingers curl against the ground, bare fingers digging gouges straight through the stone. “You… do you really want—that? What we used to have before?”
His voice lilts, confusion bleeding through the contradiction.
Vergil just looks at him. “It would be different this time.”
Dante exhales, says, “No kidding.” He brushes his hair back, only for it to flop forward again. “Shit. Okay. So we’re doing this. Right.”
He appears to visibly build his mental strength for a few seconds, then gathers himself into a crouch.
“You need to know before we start anything that I.” He stops. “I’m kind of… obsessed with you, I guess. And not in a good way.” Dante chuckles as if to lighten the impact of his words, but it’s a hollow attempt at levity.
Then Dante does something so unexpected that Vergil is thrown completely for a loop. Something so very Dante that the moment he does it, Vergil feels stupid for not expecting it.
He holds up a finger.
Ah. So that’s the way he wants to play this. Fair is fair—if they’re going to be exploring untrodden grounds, they may as well shape it into the one thing they both understand. And yet, if the bond forms, then any attempts at secrecy would be rendered moot regardless. Is this Dante’s bid to show his hand early, or could he be trying to…
Vergil rolls into a standing position. He summons Yamato with a single thought and strikes hard and fast, drinking in the tumultuous flickering inside Dante’s eyes as he reflexively guards.
What is going through his brother’s mind? Would he actually be foolish enough to try and scare Vergil off? “A weak attempt,” he snarls, and steels himself for what comes next.
“I thought about killing you all the time. Of course I did.” Vergil pushes harder into Dante’s space, unwilling to lose himself in the brief flashes of Mundus’ torture. That time is past. “But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t also… grateful.” He withdraws, twists his blade into another clean stab. “That you didn’t follow me. And that you did not have to endure the same torment.”
With his other hand, he holds up a finger of his own.
Dante releases his guard to summon his sword, sending him an agonising look which is raw with emotion, “It was a shitty move, brother.” More quietly, “I would have taken on all of your suffering in a heartbeat. Don’t think I wouldn’t.”
“Unnecessary.” Vergil parries Dante’s swing, cautious but heavy. “Before that, I used to watch what you were doing. Sometimes.” Dante looks at him with incomprehension all over his face. “During the time when we were apart.”
Their fighting tempo builds, still more akin to the most basic exchange of back and forth than any real battle. Once again, Vergil is reminded of their basic childish scuffles, back when they were unable to access their powers to any real effect. This time, fatigue is the only barrier, but there’s some other delicate element to this exchange which brings to mind frozen-fingered chipping away at ice. A gradual change from one form to another.
Dante splutters, “What—you—I don’t get it. You didn’t want to be around me then, but you were fine with looking from a distance?” His next blow slams in from the side and Vergil is forced to meet at an odd angle, metal shrieking against metal. “If you wanted something, anything, then… then why did you always leave? We could have stayed together.”
His voice quivers at the last word.
“Look, Vergil, with the screwed up mind powers of that stupid demon tree, I could have imagined us anywhere, any time period or—whatever. Instead, I was practically tripping over myself to make it appeal to you. Did you even notice? That house,” Dante whirls into a spinning kick, doubling down with his blade following after, “it was the only place I could ever remember you actually being happy. I didn’t realise it then, but I do now.”
His twin breaks away, breathing hard. “Even the food was good, for you.” He frowns, then adds with what seems like genuine anger, “Thanks for never letting me finish my pizza, by the way. I bet it would’ve tasted amazing.”
Realisation strikes, dreadful and demanding. Perhaps Vergil has made the greatest misinterpretation of all. It hadn’t been a trap, not really.
Dante confirms his thoughts. “It was never about keeping either of us from leaving; it was about getting you to stay.”
Then, he blinks, reaching up absently to wipe away something from his cheek, nostrils flaring as he becomes aware of exactly how much blood each of them has already spilt. Vergil feels his teeth sharpening in response; even now, instinct is undeniable.
Dante continues, “This thing, whatever it is. Why did you put an end to it?”
He must be referring to that first time in the garden. No doubt Dante had no idea how this practice differed within demon culture, its nuances and practical applications. Even Vergil had been unaware at the time that simple blood sharing could lead to something rarer than diamond, turning a normal ritual into a full-blown compulsion even through the veil of dreams.
In retrospect, his words may have seemed final to Dante, a promise to never do this again so long as they were still in the dream world. Trust his brother to find even more anchors for his insecurities.
Vergil decides to elucidate, “The bloodthirst went dormant for a while only because the conditions for proper connection could not be satisfied in that place,” but he’s hardly finished speaking when Dante demands, “And before that?”
He lowers his sword to his side and mulls over how best to convey what is buried at the heart of the matter. It had angered him, perhaps unreasonably, exactly how good Dante’s blood has tasted given that their bodies had merely been simulating a replica of the real thing. Not to mention the possibility that either Dante wasn’t really himself, or that he was but didn’t have any idea what was going on.
That idea was… messy. Vergil had done some terrible things in the past, but he couldn’t justify forcing the issue as easily as that.
“Listen carefully, Dante, because I will say this only once. It is power alone that allows you to protect what is worth protecting, and I needed more. The difference is that I understand now that I had… lost sight of what I wanted that power for,” he grinds out, each word a torturous pull.
Dante interrupts again, “V was right when he said that you’re my reason for fighting. You must be aware—everything about my life, and I mean everything, it’s all built around your memory, and I didn’t even do it on purpose.”
Vergil feels momentarily taken aback, before irritation builds. Dante was talking over him just so he could expand on something he had already confessed, and yet somehow, it still inspires a feeling that is almost… humbling.
But he also knows himself to be a level above Dante in self-awareness, especially when it comes to issues of obsession. “Let me speak,” he orders, using the Yamato to slice at Dante’s position just to send him scurrying for his impudence. “If we must talk of such matters,” he pauses, then continues, “I would slaughter all of your companions in a heartbeat just to keep your eyes on me.” He adds with a note of grudging disgust, “I will not, but only because I know you would find that upsetting.”
“Upsetting,” Dante parrots. “You do realise you’re including your own son in that, you psychopath.” His brother rolls his eyes, the flash of a vaguely disbelieving smile transitioning into a lightning-fast combination of sword jabs, pistol whips and ending with a spray of bullets.
Vergil lunges forward, the muzzles of both guns caught at his sternum with one hand over Dante’s wrists, scowling. Dante’s laugh fills the air between them.
“You should get to know him more. Whether you knew about him or not, you’re still technically a deadbeat, and he’s a good kid.” Dante tacks on a second later, “Also, that’s pretty messed up. Seriously, people’s lives are way more valuable than you give them credit for.”
Dante mumbles something else under his breath but Vergil can’t make it out. He sheathes the Yamato briefly so he can twist Dante’s hands, forcing him to drop the pistols—he counters by chucking them into the air and ducking for a quick leg sweep, but all Vergil has to do is knock him to the side with a powerful kick, leaning over to pin him in place with his weight.
Dante’s guns clatter harmlessly to the floor behind them.
If he had been hearing correctly—“What are you talking about?”
“Uh.” Dante’s eyes dart to the side, his face warming. “Nothing? I didn’t say anything.”
Vergil shifts slightly above his sprawled body, feeling Dante’s muscles jump with his movement. “Oh? Try that again, brother.”
“All right, all right. I’ll explain if you get off me,” Dante tries to bargain, wilting when Vergil stares him down. “I said, um, that’s messed up, but still probably not as bad as… as what I did to you.”
Which doesn’t make the slightest lick of sense. “What you did to me? When?” Vergil probes, baffled.
“It was in the dream!” Dante yelps hurriedly. “Come on, get off of me.”
“I don’t think so. What could you possibly have done?” Vergil asks, intrigued despite himself. He’s not exactly unaware that for as much as he cares far more about battle etiquette and respecting your opponent (‘You look like you just had your ass handed to you’ comes to mind), Dante is the one with a tighter moral leash on an everyday basis.
“Oh, so you really didn’t know,” Dante mutters, practically reeking of guilt. He clears his throat. “So, uh, this might be a weird question, but I could’ve sworn that at some points you were asleep? In the dream?”
Vergil nods slowly, thinking back to those intermittent moments when he had experienced a false ‘awakening’—further manipulation to dissuade the notion that their reality had been false. “I may have appeared unconscious on your end while I was trying to dismantle the spell.”
He couldn’t fault Dante for that. Magic had always been his realm of interest, following in their mother’s footsteps; Dante likely had neither the resources nor the inclination to seek them out after her passing. Vergil’s initial attempts were motivated largely by happenstance alone.
“Right.” Dante coughs again. “Haha. Well, funny story, but apparently magic makes you, uh. Horny?”
A beat passes.
Vergil freezes as a series of thoughts rush by one after the other. Dante confessed to doing something he considers morally wrong. Dante admitted that it somehow involved his unconscious body inside the dream. Dante…
How far did he go? Did he use his hand? His mouth? Vergil swallows dryly.
He has a sudden feeling that if they had still been balanced on the upper branches of the Qliphoth, he might have actually fallen off.
Dante seems not to have noticed his reaction, head turned to the side and eyes screwed shut as if awaiting some sort of physical punishment. Vergil opens his mouth to speak, but his brain is still stuck on the mosaic unfolding before his mind’s eye. Dante, lost in the maze of his own denial and unreality, desperate to connect with Vergil in any way. Desperate to please him, to satisfy his every desire. Guilty and sinful but so very needy, breaking the unbreakable just for this. Just so he could touch—
“Although my body may have appeared wholly present,” Vergil explains, trying to regain his equilibrium, absolutely dizzy with it, “I left only a sliver of consciousness to anchor myself while I attempted to dismantle the trap from the outside.”
He would give anything not to have missed that first moment of Dante giving in. If only it had taken place in real life, his twin never would have managed that much discretion.
Vergil adds delicately, “And for the record, it wasn’t the magic.”
“Oh,” Dante says faintly. “Can you get off now?” His words are rushed and he quickly changes the subject when Vergil silently stays put. “How did you—right, magic, sure. There was, uh. The blood thing. It happened then, too. What was that about?”
Even this is a tactic to distract him, at least in part. Dante bucks upwards suddenly, a surprise attack to switch their positions or merely dislodge him. Vergil lets his body bow with the momentum, countering with a rolling twist and trapping Dante’s arms behind his back; their new position has Dante on top but nevertheless still at Vergil’s mercy.
Vergil wets his lips. “Demons blood each other for a number of reasons. It can be used for a simple expression of dominance,” much as he had attempted in the kitchen, “or to test for… compatibility. Over the centuries, demons have bred to wide species variation and the ability to mate has become somewhat rare, even sought after.”
He has to clamp down harder when Dante struggles in his lap, trying to break the hold. “That doesn’t make any sense,” Dante gasps out. “There’s, uh, tons of harpies and succubi in the human world. I’ve had to kill a bunch of ‘em myself.”
This, too, he can’t fault Dante for not knowing. It is, after all, another subject he hadn’t purposefully sought knowledge in. “Seeding lower beings is easy enough.” Dante growls warningly, and Vergil squeezes his wrists in reprimand—a warning so mild it only makes his bones creak and not snap. “Demonic genes simply do not work the same way as a human’s, just as mating is not limited by mortal concepts.”
He knows that this is a delicate subject, and yet it’s difficult to focus. Like this, Dante’s neck is mere inches away and his teeth throb at the temptation. Vergil clears his throat. “We are primed at a base level to recognise blood similar to our own. To crave it.”
Dante breaks away with an awkward crack of his wrists as the bones dislocate. He turns to stare at Vergil, face to face, then states, “No more pussyfooting around it. Just say it like it is.”
He’s not asking for an explanation. So far, Vergil has avoided that one word entirely for Dante’s sake. A human taboo is just that, a meaningless rule for herding the flock. “We are in the demon realm right now, Dante.”
“But we weren’t raised demon, Vergil!” he shouts, and Vergil can’t help snapping back, “I know.”
Of course he knows. He’s always known about that obstacle dividing them, separating them. Growing up and finding Dante’s location after years spent apart—it had been a revelation. An undeniable recognition of baseline attraction, that unwanted seedling which horrified him at first, and yet it had grown with every second he spent basking in his twin’s presence, as unstoppable as the rising tide.
All for his infuriating little brother, that crude smirk and swagger at the center of it. Back then, Dante had seemed to represent the worst parts of both of them, but still, Vergil found himself wanting.
And waiting. Never knowing for sure if any of it was reciprocated, knowing that Dante had chosen to suffocate himself under human morals. Aware that chances were that he wouldn’t want to give it another thought if the matter ever came to his attention, because mortals would ever fear that which they considered unnatural.
Vergil had tried time and again to crush that part of himself, to crush Dante, only to turn around and notice with growing alarm how his problems had mutated into an even bigger disaster than when he had first started.
But his desires had never manifested in a physiological compulsion this strong before. And that’s when Dante realises it, at the same time he does: “This… isn’t a sibling bond anymore.”
It all fits. Pieces of the puzzle slide into place, flashes of scenery stretching back to before they had so much as entered the Underworld. At the back of his mind, he had acknowledged the psychic connection attempting to repair itself in only the most abstract notion, but all this time, there had been something very different growing in its place. Something entirely alien, unbeknownst to either of them.
It’s horrifying, in a way. Before his very eyes, Dante’s fight or flight instinct kicks in, and with his demonic side at the forefront, it’s fight. A red glow spreads from his brother’s irises outwards, and Vergil hastily lunges forward to interrupt his transformation.
They go tumbling down a slope, a whirling mess of teeth and skin, fangs and scales.
Spilling blood is an inevitability, and finally, finally—his brother’s has never tasted sweeter. This isn’t a regular connection between siblings, so it can really only mean one thing: compatibility as mates, a true bonding.
Dante knows it as well as he does.
This is their undoing.
Vergil uses his half-formed claws to tear at Dante’s clothes, exposing one shoulder and then the other. The ironic truth to this is that they are too compatible. From a childhood, an entire lifetime of being told how different they are, converging into the single biological fact that Dante was made to be his other half.
Is it biology, or something closer to fate? As far as he knew, mating bonds shouldn’t even be possible between siblings, half-demon or not, but then Sparda’s bloodline had always been known for succeeding at the impossible.
Dante continues to push and pull, snatching away only to curl back into his space, savage and gentle in equal parts. An oscillating contradiction of desire and morality with one clearly triumphing over the other.
Vergil fights his way on top; Dante forces him to bend all the way backwards with the sudden force of the Devil Sword Dante embedded in his left shoulder.
“I think this counts as a win,” Dante gloats. His eyes are still hazy with bloodlust, and he seems unable to stop squirming atop Vergil’s thigh, a delicious rub of friction through his barely intact trousers.
Vergil grabs him by the hips, and Dante shudders. Another quick flip is all it takes, his brother unusually yielding. Pliant in a way that is unspeakably pleasing, but still it twinges something inside of him, a growing roar that says not yet.
Beauty is in the thrill of the chase, after all.
“You’re not trying hard enough.” Vergil hums, “Perhaps you need some motivation, Dante,” ending by stabbing the Yamato straight through his chest, and it feels like coming home.
Dante struggles to get a hand between them and pulls the blade down towards his face at an angle that Vergil knows would be excruciatingly painful if they were human, sticking out his tongue to lap neatly at the sharp edge.
A single bead of blood drips down the blade. Vergil feels his pupils dilate.
Dante pants, “There’s no going back, is there?” There’s an audible quiver of soft emotion even as he licks the wetness from his lips.
“It may already be too late. If we do this now, it will almost certainly cement a mating bond.” Vergil pulls out the Yamato, intending to follow through with another downwards strike, but Dante catches the tip between two open palms.
There’s a question in his eyes.
“Our connection would become much stronger than it ever has been in the past,” Vergil confirms. “It’s possible that neither of us would be able to suppress it like before. You would always be aware of where I am, what I’m thinking. And I would know the same for you.” His brother’s fingers twitch minutely.
Vergil burns for an answer. For that answer. “We’re already halfway there.”
“That’s a bit much, don’t you think? I never thought I’d have to complain about you being the clingy one,” Dante rasps, but it’s a feeble dismissal at best.
The gate has already opened. Vergil can taste unfamiliar strands of ravenous joy at the back of his throat. Despite his words, Vergil knows now with unmovable certainty—Dante is starved for it, absolutely enthralled with the idea of never being parted, not again, can’t get rid of me now, brother.
The sound of elation chimes in his head like a bell, faster and faster: always, always, always. The quickening of two heartbeats melding into one.
It’s more than enough.
Vergil isn’t sure he could stop now even if that’s what they both wanted. In all honesty, the process is probably far more than halfway along—that time spent in the dream with their cores twisted in tangled recollection of a false bond had done more to strengthen their burgeoning connection than any purposeful attempts could ever hope to.
The tightness in his chest blooms into an unfolding wave of demonic energy, and Vergil completes the cycle. Trapped beneath him, Dante’s body is dwarfed by the sheer size of his devil trigger.
In an instant, the transformation is over. Dante looks taken aback, but before he can speak, Vergil grabs the material of his shirt and rips.
His twin yelps. “Stop that! Vergil, we don’t have any other clothes!” But Vergil hardly hears. A single sliver of fabric remains, clinging from one side of his chest to the other, providing the barest illusion of modesty.
Vergil glares down at it, incensed at the unwitting reminder of that annoying holster belt Dante had worn as a teenager—an item Vergil had painstakingly set about purposely ignoring. He had more important things to be concerned with at the time; there certainly hadn’t been any reason to be bothered by his brother’s… shameless attire.
He definitely hadn’t spent long nights alone thinking about reaching out and snapping it once and for all.
Vergil slips a delicate claw under the threadbare strip and pulls with vicious satisfaction. The ends flutter to the sides, revealing the full expanse of Dante’s bare torso, perfectly still as his brother ceases to breathe.
Finally, Dante sucks in a breath, says, “You—” and chokes when Vergil bends to slide his tongue against glistening skin.
The taste of his brother.
“No, wait, you can’t,” he hears, half-hearted and weak. Dante’s chest heaves beneath him, muscles twitching with each purposeful bite and nip. His wrists twist slightly in Vergil’s grip, fingers opening and closing.
“Can’t I?” Vergil purrs, curling his elongated tongue around his brother’s nipple and pulling away so the small spikes drag a rough path backwards as it unwinds.
Dante bucks beneath him, mouth wide and gasping. “Yes! I mean, no, wait, shit—”
His body is too responsive. When Vergil sucks, Dante’s skin shines pink and wet; when he bites and licks, half-aborted whines fall from his lips, scales shimmering into existence before melting away just as quickly.
Being able to see this side of his twin is a treasure beyond measure. Vergil feels almost drunk off the power burning in his core at the dishevelled picture he presents. He is the one giving Dante this pleasure. Indomitable Dante, quivering when Vergil draws his tail up in slow, teasing strokes over his legs and up to his hips. Slayer of Hell’s strongest, his perfect other half, burning hot where Vergil touches him, shaking when his wings unwillingly burst out and Vergil pins them beneath his own.
“Yes, okay, fine! You can,” Dante bursts out, “but you don’t have to. You don’t, right? We can do this another way?” he repeats the question, clearly panicked, like the idea of continuing genuinely scares him.
Vergil knows better. Dante is stood in the shadow of a looming mountain, his own endless greed awakened and ready to take. “We could,” Vergil agrees, as if that’s a reasonable possibility. “That’s not what you want, though, is it?”
Dante looks at him with the eyes of a trapped prey animal. A false veneer—he’s starving for it, just as much a predator as Vergil is.
Restless energy fills the cracks of Dante’s internal conflict, the light in his eyes changing with a burning need to escape from Vergil’s hold, take back control.
Vergil presses down harder. The clawed tips of his wings dig harshly into soft membrane, so very close to ripping and tearing, but not quite. His tail wraps tight around Dante’s limbs as he keeps pressing down, breathing in the same air as Dante’s heavy pants.
Vergil’s gaze is drawn to the groove of Dante’s hips. Fascinated, he rubs the pads of his fingers against his brother’s skin, feeling the difference as it shifts between scale and skin. Teetering on the edge of something great.
Dante shudders. “You don’t know what I want.” The way he says it lifts at the end as if in question.
“I want you,” Vergil murmurs, tasting each word, relishing, “to beg for it, little brother.”
The response is as he expects. Dante’s head jerks, eyes blown wide in shock. A heady feeling bleeds through, arousal and outrage missing into a chemical soup, but there’s still a thread of souring panic. “Don’t—”
“Don’t what?” Vergil asks sharply, eyes narrowing.
Predictably, Dante has a problem with it. “Not like that.”
He knows it’s not as clear cut as that. A familiar storm rages inside his twin, everything Dante has been taught by the worthless humans who took advantage of him after their separation, the pressing crush of someone else’s morality. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Vergil can hear it as if the voices were speaking directly to him: he’s your brother, Dante, stop it right now.
But, perhaps more interestingly—Vergil’s mind catches on another piece of information. How curious that he objects only to this and not to the idea of begging.
Vergil files that thought away for later.
“This is only possible because of who we are, our relation to each other.” Dante cringes. He would probably move away if he could, put even the smallest of distances between them, but there is nowhere to go.
Something in Vergil rumbles contentedly at the thought even as Dante’s reticence grates on him unpleasantly.
“Hmph. I rather thought you might find it a bit difficult to forget.” Vergil has no need for such cliché, all too human concerns—Dante could not possibly imagine him as anyone else in their triggers.
A plan coalesces, and he smiles devilishly. “Very well, then. If you won’t acknowledge it, I will make you say it yourself. Brother.”
At that, Dante finally explodes into a full transformation, the orange glow of his trigger barely settling before he breaks free of Vergil’s grasp, struggling to reverse their positions.
Vergil fights it for a moment, but Dante’s bursting at the seams with a fresh wave of energy, and it’s over in a flash. Climbing back up onto his elbows, he could not say for sure if the effort he put in to prevent the change was real or if his subconscious had allowed it.
After all, the picture he presents is something else. Dante shines like glorious hellfire on his lap, armoured chest heaving, sulphurous musk and molten sweat.
Dante lets him sit up, but that kindness is simply too easy of an opening. Vergil smirks, catching the flicker of emotion across Dante’s face just as it sparks briefly in their shared connection; realisation that Vergil can still move, had not been properly pinned as Dante had.
His brother reacts quickly, infinitely faster than any other being, but that, too, is a mistake. Dante never expects Vergil to redirect his blows, endlessly surprised whenever Vergil pulls a new trick out of the bag as if he had been the one to coin spontaneity itself. He stills when Vergil’s tail creeps around from behind, looping around his thighs.
“Vergil—” Dante starts, breath sliding into a wheeze as Vergil bites viciously into his throat, the sweet pull of copper filling his mouth and nearly overtaking all senses. Dante must feel it too, their bond lighting up with the raw joy of connection, sparking and fizzing like a living creature.
Submit, Vergil wills with all his might. Just for a moment.
Long enough for the tip of his tail to rub gently between Dante’s legs and slip into that hidden softness. Slow and careful, a perfect contrast to the savagery of his fangs.
Dante bucks against him, claws scraping against his shoulders. “You really—ah!” He shakes with every alternating press of Vergil’s mouth and tail, trapped between two ends. “You really did that, huh.”
He sounds dazed. Vergil decides he likes that immensely.
“You’ve got to know that this is, hngh, all sorts of weird and—and kind of kinky, right? Who would’ve thought you would be like that?” Dante makes a soft sound when Vergil pulls back, licking at the spot to catch any remnants even as Dante skin immediately knits together.
Vergil hums. His brother’s hold has lightened, clutching loosely at his forearms. No longer trying to get away, though that might be out of sheer surprise. He considers Dante’s question for a moment, then dismisses it. “For humans, it might be. As I said, among demons, it is not that far out of the ordinary.”
“Not just that, you asking me to, mmh, to do those things.” He thrusts his tail further inside and savours Dante’s hitched moans. Inside, his brother is hot, tight, and unexpectedly wet—a result of their mixed biology he hadn’t been aware of, or possibly a reaction to the bond; reforming his body for the purposes of their mating. Made for him anew.
Like this, they cannot kiss, the shape of their jaws too wide and jagged, but Vergil is gripped with a sudden desire all the same. His tongue drags against Dante’s fangs until his brother responds, twisting together in red and blue.
Vergil withdraws, pulling further away when Dante chases after him. “To do what, Dante? You might have to clarify.”
Dante glares at him. “You know what I mean. Beg and… call you brother.” Followed by, “That one doesn’t count, either!”
He’s shifting intermittently against Vergil’s legs, little wriggles every time Vergil presses in just the right spot, pushing that little bit deeper. Every rub feels like fire against his skin, piling onto that overwhelming desire to just take him.
Vergil places his hands atop Dante’s shoulders and shoves down hard. At the same time, his tail presses upwards at just the right angle, keeps pressing without letting go, and Dante keens.
“What did I want you to do again?” Vergil asks, totally enthralled. He hadn’t known they could blush like this, Dante’s cheeks aglow with orange flames.
“Hah, you. You got memory problems all of a sudden? I mean, this. This. Just do it already,” Dante’s voice cracks, and Vergil feels each thread snapping one by one, the last guise of self-control fraying apart. He waits just long enough to hear Dante gulp, stutter, “Big brother.”
He yanks his tail out, entering Dante in one smooth motion. Dante’s own cock bobs between them, leaking messily on both of their stomachs, and Vergil purposefully ignores it, deciding right then and there that he would very much like to bring his twin to the edge with this alone.
Dante seems not to care, pushes back with matching force, slamming his body against Vergil’s pelvis until the stone beneath them cracks. Vergil barely notices.
“You open up so easily for me, Dante,” he drawls into Dante’s ear, using his tail to pull Dante’s head back by his horns, neck arching beautifully. Dante allows it, he must, shuddering against him and pulling him into a tight embrace.
“Vergil,” Dante groans into the side of his face. “God, you’re so—ugh. I can’t believe you’re like this, I’m not sure I can handle it.” Lying, even now—Vergil knows exactly how much Dante wants this to never end.
And Dante knows exactly how much Vergil wants it, too. He whines, “C’mon, give it to me. Show me everything you’ve got.”
Vergil growls, slams in with brute force until Dante’s choking. Forces the quips out of him until he can only huff and sigh, searing hot breaths of steam sinking through his scales. Marking each other from the inside out.
“More, brother?” He considers pushing his fingers, his tail in alongside his cock, splitting Dante open as wide as he can go. His twin would look so pretty like that, filled to the brim.
“I think,” Vergil pants, “that will have to wait until next time. When I take you again. And again. I’m going to have you every way I want you, Dante.”
Next time. Vergil hears it vibrate between them, feels the breath being punched out of his brother. Dante jaw clenches and Vergil tracks a single drop of blood sliding down his fangs as Dante comes, clenching around Vergil’s dick until he can’t do anything but follow.
Two beings as one, their bond resettling quietly in the background. A closeness and newfound depth that will haunt their footsteps in all future battles, all future interactions. Closing that distance piece by piece, bright and shining with possibility.
A few seconds pass in the afterglow, just long enough for Vergil to appreciate the slick sheen of sweat and come on Dante’s trigger form, muscles twitching and wings drooping low to the ground, before Dante breathes in once—
—and his demon form breaks, shards of crystallised energy evaporating into the air, back to white hair and endless expanses of pink human skin.
Two pairs of eyes widen.
“Vergil!” Embarrassment, shock, panic. “That wasn’t supposed to—oh, shit. Vergil. You gotta… I can’t,” Dante gasps, blue gaze dragging downwards with a slow-dawning horror such that Vergil is forced to look too. Down past Dante’s bare chest, his belly button, to the oddly protruding bulge of his lower stomach where Vergil’s dick stays buried inside him.
Far too large to fit inside a human body. It’s a moment of realisation for both of them, silent until their nerves flare with sudden sensation—Dante lets out an aborted wail, his inner walls clenched around Vergil like a vice. Yet Vergil can’t stop staring at Dante’s stomach, engorged beyond belief but still somehow fitting him inside. It must be painful, would be deadly to anyone else.
“Switch back! Vergil, you have to switch back!” Dante yelps, smacking human hands against his scaled chest. “VERGIL! Wake up and go back to your human form!”
Sluggishly, his mind finally processes the sight and unwittingly, his hips thrust up one more time. Dante’s mouth drops open in a silent scream.
Vergil thinks, distantly, that he might enjoy watching Dante fall apart like this one day.
Finally, he lets his own trigger fade, shrinking back to skin and blunt teeth and clothes not nearly in such a state of disrepair as his brother’s.
“Oh my god. You nearly broke me,” Dante says hoarsely. Vergil can’t help but point out, “You liked it,” because it’s undeniable; he felt it.
His twin flushes beet red. Vergil mentally compares and decides he likes the nuance of Dante’s human facial features, all the better to drink in his humiliation at being exposed. Regardless, he attempts to deny, “No, I definitely did not—”
He stops. “Vergil.” A plea, because he must have noticed Vergil’s cock hardening inside of him—and, really, he only has himself to blame; interest in Dante’s display bringing him back to life, fully prepared to do this all over again. “Already?” Dante squeaks.
There can only be one answer to that. “Yes.” Vergil rolls them over, pushes Dante flat so he can pull out and shove his full length into Dante again, watch the flickering light paint his shadow onto Dante’s body.
This time, Dante seems less argumentative and more resigned, even accepting, “This is it, isn’t it? This is how we’re going to do everything.” He yanks Vergil down and wraps his legs around his waist, rolling his hips to control the pace, a luxurious glide back and forth.
“Would you really have it any other way?”
Dante snorts, “No way in hell,” and laughs at his own joke, catching Vergil’s no doubt affronted expression with a mischievous smirk.
He leans up, casual, nonthreatening, and a stabbing pain spreads out from Vergil’s neck and shoulder, a brutal ripping sound as Dante tears a chunk out of his throat, human teeth and all. Gulping as he swallows the arterial spray, speaking through Vergil’s silence as his throat attempts to heal the damage, “If we’re going to be here a while, we might as well do it right. Tear this entire place down, find that bastard Mundus and kill him, and then maybe I’ll let you make love to me on his empty throne.”
Vergil shudders. Dante continues, confidently, “That sound okay to you?”
Burning arousal twines with something softer, tempering it to a gentle, golden warmth. Make love. It’s not anything truly incriminating, not yet. Years could pass before they get halfway through the unwritten tomes secreted away in blood and tears.
Dante’s words from so much earlier in the dream pierce through the veil, and he repeats, “We are meant to stay together,” again, “I won’t leave you, Dante. You’re mine.”
He’s never meant anything as much as he does this.
Dante looks startled for a second, blinking away a glimmer of vulnerability. “Forever.”
“Until we no longer live in the sunrise,” Vergil confirms, wondering if Dante’s eyes had always been so bright, so full of life.
A bark of laughter and Dante’s forehead presses against his. “You’re so lucky I’m used to your poetic bullshit by now. You know as well as I do that there is no sun in the Underworld.”
And if there is one, they will find it.
Together.
“Whoa, you don’t know that! What if I said the van is a devil arm?”
Burning asphalt, gasoline, and cigarette smoke is a particularly noxious combination, even more so when it’s juxtaposed with the screams of civilians diving out their way—it kind of reminds him of a certain incident months past, and also every other time Nico’s taken him literally anywhere.
Nero’s not sure how she has a valid driver’s licence. Actually, he’s not entirely sure if she has a licence at all, come to think of it.
“I’d say you’re full of shit.” Nero considers the idea for a moment. “Although, it would explain how we got out of Redgrave with so little damage.” He hesitates. “It’s not, right?”
Nico cackles.
“Why have you gotta be like this,” Nero grumbles, and winces when Nico starts hammering the horn. “Can you stop—oh my god, those are children, you nearly ran over an entire middle school. Fu—! Nico, stop driving, I swear I will walk the rest of the way.”
“You’re not my real dad!” Nico laughs, and while Nero’s glad she’s getting over her own issues, it also grinds his gears because everyone thinks they’re a comedian these days. Ugh. Case in point: “Not that you’d know anything about that, am I right, Nero?”
He scowls, plucks the cigarette from her mouth and tosses it out the window.
Several minutes later—which is an admittedly impressive feat given how far away they had yet to travel—Nero’s ears are ringing, and he’s not entirely sure whether it’s from Nico’s yelling or police sirens. He really hopes it’s the sirens.
He lifts the boxes out of the back of the van, stacking them on top of each other, and ends up knocking at the front entrance with his elbows.
“Oh, our delivery boy is here,” he hears when the door opens, preceded by the sounds of lazy shuffling as someone very half-heartedly responds to his knocking.
Nero scowls. “Not your delivery boy,” he gripes, and considers dumping the boxes onto Trish just for that, but he can already hear Kyrie’s voice reprimanding him for being rude. Instead, he gives her the stink eye and thinks regretfully about being the better person, heaving the crates over by the main desk. “I don’t know why they keep mixing up our mail. Hell, I don’t know why there’s so much mail, period—I thought the whole secret Hunter password thing meant that everybody had to call in by phone?”
Lady shrugs from her sideways perch on Dante’s—on the chair. “There used to be a post office box set up at the Hunter HQ too, from what I’ve heard. Most of the veterans are pretty old school, so they’ve been slow to update technology. Not that we know anyone like that.” She gives the rotary dial phone a light kick with her shoe. It creaks sadly.
“Not that we knew anyone like that,” Nero bites, then frowns, surprised at how lacking in true bitterness his words had been. Time really does wear everything down. “Nearly a year now, huh.”
“Just about,” Trish confirms, strutting over to sit heavily on the chair Lady already occupies, pulling a startled yelp from her followed by a hard punch to her spine. “Personally, I’m still a little surprised you’re going ahead with this. Some people wait for years, don’t they?” she asks curiously, as she sometimes does when it comes to particular human customs.
Nero scratches the back of his neck, a little embarrassed. “Kyrie’s ready for it, and s-so am I.” He doesn’t mention the whole factor that is Fortuna’s overbearing religious climate, but he likes to think it hasn’t played that big of a role in their very mutual decision. “Hey, for all we know, they’ll be back any day now.”
Lady dislodges Trish with a backwards flip, booting her to the other side of the room. “With how many problems those two have to sift through? This is practically a forced therapeutic retreat. I say we’d be lucky if they’re back in the next decade.” She resettles herself delicately with a derisive sniff. Nero gets the sudden image in his mind of a cat puffing out its fur and licking a paw, bothered but trying to play it cool. He hides a smile.
“It would’ve been amusing if they’d come back after only a few weeks,” Trish offers, shooting Lady a glare and casually leaning on Nero’s shoulder, which he automatically tries to shake off. “But you’re right. They better work out their issues first, and I don’t think I’m wrong in saying that there are a lot of issues.”
All three share a knowing look.
It occurs to Nero then that both Lady and Trish might know a bit more than he does because they had actually met Vergil, which—okay, technically he’d known that already, but it’s something else to really think about it. They’d seen him years before Nero had ever done the same; had even been born.
A million questions bubble up about what issues, exactly, they’re talking about, and he decides on, “Do you know what their relationship used to be like at all? You know, before the whole… separation thing.”
It’s kind of upsetting that his total knowledge of that can be summed up as: they lived together, then they didn’t, and then they tried to kill each other a whole lot.
Lady shrugs.
Trish twists a lock of hair contemplatively. “Not really, but demonic twins are a rarity in themselves, especially identical ones.”
Nero has to stop and blink for a moment. “Wait, they’re identical?” he asks, intrigued; on the top of the Qliphoth, they barely looked similar at all to his eye. Well, close enough to be siblings—especially with the tell-tale hair colour, but possibly being able to be mistaken for the same person? Not a chance.
“They definitely looked more like each other back when I met them,” Lady confirms, rubbing at a scuff mark on the table idly.
Trish sighs as if disappointed in their combined lack of knowledge, asking them both, “How common do you think half-demon twins are?”
Nero looks over to Lady, who tilts her head to the ceiling. “Well, Vie de Marli has those hybrids, so there must be some around, I suppose.”
“Incorrect. There are other hybrids, yes, but all of them are tracked very carefully. Full demons only have siblings—clutchmates or the like. Dante and Vergil are the only ones currently in existence. As far as records go, the only two to have ever existed.”
Lady and Nero take a moment to process that.
The way Trish said it, Nero gets the impression that it’s kind of impressive. Something that would have otherwise been a biological impossibility, finally accomplished. From what little he knows about dear old grandpa, the guy must have really wanted kids and he certainly had the power to back that up, so… good for him, Nero guesses.
A far cry from his own largely unwanted upbringing, but he banishes that train of thought before it can take roots.
Trish continues, “Since there’s no precedent for whatever’s going on between them,” she makes a vague hand gesture as if to encapsulate the full disaster that is the Sparda twins, “there’s no reason for us to intervene until they figure it out themselves.”
Nero coughs. “Unless another city is at stake.”
“Well, yes,” Trish admits, and Lady joins in with her to say: “But only if we get paid.”
They high-five. Nero ages ten years in as many seconds.
“By the way, kid,” Lady calls out casually, “you know you could’ve mailed this junk over, right?” She flicks open a switchblade to carve through the tape.
Screw that, postage is damn expensive from Fortuna. Nero snaps, “Just open it already.” Then, “Actually, don’t. I gotta get going soon,” but it’s too late. Lady pulls out the top card, because of course it’s on top, damn it, Kyrie—cooing delightedly and beckoning Trish over.
“Oh, you’ve set the date now?”
Nero turns away, hating that he feels a little embarrassed. “Well, it’s to make it all official, you know? I didn’t make the invitations, by the way. Kyrie and the kids did.”
“We’ll pass on the extras if they show up in time,” Trish says helpfully. “As long as they pass by when we’re not on a job.”
He waves that one off. “Yeah, yeah. Anyway, there’s no point in putting things off forever. Sometimes, you just have to get on with life and… Well, for all I know, Dante would’ve found a way to dodge out of it. He doesn’t strike me as a wedding sort of guy.”
“Don’t be so sure,” Lady, of all people, warns him. “He’s slow at a lot of things, but family has always been important. Don’t forget that.”
Nero mumbles something unintelligible, but it gets drowned out by Nico as she starts playing Ride of the Valkyries on the car horn outside.
It’s pretty obnoxious. He coughs to clear his throat. “Dante’s got his own life. And anyway,” he spares a thought for the poetry anthology tucked away in his room on the island, “it’s not like any of us are going to forget them any time soon.”
Unwillingly, Dante—and Vergil, for obvious reasons—had carved their way into his life in a way that he could never regret, even when it pricked uncomfortably at his worst childhood fears of being abandoned yet again.
Months ago, he had traced well-worn pages for a hint of the unknown, wondering and wondering and struggling to understand the secrets folded in tiny creases. There is a story behind all of this, he knows, but without anyone to tell it, does it still have any meaning?
Kyrie whispers to him, a muffled press against bedsheets and skin, an untold story is a little sad, but that’s just because we make those memories together, Nero.
He held those words close to his chest and tried not to let his heart leak at the edges for two lost children struggling to find their way back to each other, without even knowing that that’s what they wanted all along. Or maybe he’s just reading it wrong.
A little piece of happiness is tucked away on the last page, in slightly shaky but well-practiced cursive: Vergil. And directly to the right, significantly messier: SUCKS!!!!
Underneath: Dante
Chuckling weakly to himself, Nero had reflected that it was honestly hard to imagine that the person who wrote this would one day design the Devil May Cry logo.
In the present, he can only acknowledge that there’s something very human about that after all. The inevitability of change.