Author: Moiranna
Beta: -
Title: Moon
Theme: #47 - Moon
Rating: PG
Realm: Devil May Cry
Pairing: Vergil/Dante if you're really really squinting, but not meant as such
Characters: Dante, Vergil, Trish
Genre: Drama, general
Warnings: Some minor language
Word-count: 1295
Summary: More dead than alive Dante found his brother. But will wounds ever heal? Of realizing that sometimes it's better to just let go. Post DMC 1.
Notes: I know, I know, I write far too many depressing DMC stories. Can't help myself, really.
Something made Dante wake up. At first he didn't know what it was that had disturbed his sleep, and he had already turned around to throw an arm around his brother's waist, only to notice that there wasn't anybody there, when his mind drifted to full consciousness.
Pillow still nuzzled into his face Dante groped around the bed, blindly feeling for that other warm body, finding nothing. He rose his head slightly from the pillow, looking very much like he'd slept for two hours. He blinked, looked around the room, and found the door open. As if magic, the sleepiness vanished, at least for the moment.
Ah, it was one of those nights.
Dante rolled over to lie on his back for a moment, contemplating on what to do. Vergil had been like this ever since Mallet Island. Dante had found his broken and bloodied form and had, despite Trish's complaints, brought him home.
"Dante, you're insane," she had pointed out. "What're you going to do? He's not going to be like he used to be." Her voice had had that condescending note that had started to grate on Dante's nerves from the moment he'd met her.
"Trish. He's my brother. I don't know what that means to you, but even though we mostly can't stand one another we're there for one another. Besides," Dante had continued in a voice more to himself than to Trish. "Mom would never forgive me if I hadn't tried."
As the weeks passed and Vergil's body slowly mended Dante came to realize that very little of his brother's sanity was intact. There would be days when he ranted and raved, viciously attacking Dante with all of his strength (which once he regained his physical strength was not something to lightly overlook). Then there would be days when he screamed in pain, rambling on that he was the ever loyal servant of the all-mighty demon King Mundus. Sometimes he'd scream wordlessly, then growl that he'd never be a servant, never bow down to someone unworthy of him. Those days often ended with Vergil in a small heap on the floor, gasping in remembered pain.
After days when he defied the imaginary Mundus came the parts which pained Dante the most. Vergil was himself. Sardonic, cool to the point of ruthless. Brilliant.
At those times Vergil would tell Dante that he was a hopeless fool for doing what he did, and that he should give up.
In the last week, however, Dante had seen a decrease in his brother's insanity, replaced by a quiet loathing of himself. Vergil never voiced it out loud, but Dante noticed his brother's sulking silence and the incessant wandering around for hours without a goal.
He had also noticed, with mild surprise, his brother's attachment to him. At some times Vergil seemed to have reverted to his childhood behaviour, back when Dante and Vergil had shared a bed when nightmares tormented them.
Which brought Dante back to the present, lying in his large, empty bed. Vergil had actually started the night here, and from what Dante had seen in the past three months of nursing his brother back to health it usually stayed that way. Drawing a hand through his hair Dante sighed and rose. Walking bare feet, not bothering to dress in anything but a ragged pair of jeans, he soon found his way up to the roof-top of the Devil May Cry building, and he paused just by the ladder, watching the scenery.
It was quiet outdoors, the stars and moon illuminating better than any gas-light. A mild breeze rustled his sleep-tousled hair, telling him of that though it was warm outdoors soon winter would come and take it all away.
In the far most corner from the ladder, just to the right of the flickering neon sign Dante had sworn he'd fix sat a figure, his back to Dante. On that edge he sat, long legs dangling against the red-brick wall.
For a moment Dante contemplated on leaving him alone, as he had done on some previous occasions. Then, with an ease he didn't know where it came from, Dante walked over and sat down next to Vergil, maybe two feet away to keep a proper distance as to not intrude. He didn't say a word, just stared up in the sky, daring his brother to speak.
Some minutes passed, and then he heard Vergil give a low chuckle.
"Just look at her," Vergil said.
Dante blinked and looked at his sibling, a questioning sound forming in his throat.
"The moon," Vergil added as if it explained everything.
Dante obliged and looked up at the moon. It hung bloated in the sky, the many craters visible. Dante had never really reflected on how the moon looked, and just shrugged his shoulders.
"Don't you ever wonder why people find the moon so fascinating?" Vergil asked, not really waiting for an answer. "It's really just a secondary light-source, leeching its light from the sun. It cannot even support itself. Everything it sends out is cold, distorted and leaves the world in a grey light."
A "huh" was Dante's reply. Scratching himself on the nose he murmured softly after some moments, "I've never really thought about it. Why does it matter anyway, Verge? It's there and always will be. Better to have some light than no light in the night."
Vergil was quiet, but Dante didn't worry too much about it. As he stared up in the sky he connected the dots between the stars, creating constellations of his own. He'd just created Cerberus and was well into creating Nevan, a particular cluster of star looking just like her hair, when he felt a cold chill run down his spine. Ignoring it, he looked for Alastor, but couldn't quite find something that really represented it.
"You know that I will never heal."
Dante blinked and twisted his head, staring at his brother who sat with a kind of twisted smile on his smile. He was silent for a moment, looking down on his hands that rested on the rough concrete.
"... Yeah."
A long time passed, in which neither of the two said a word. Silence ruled the night, a quiet, peaceful silence that allowed the two to think things through without disturbing. Dante shifted his position so that he lay down on the small wall, his head just a few inches from Vergil's right knee.
"What'll you do?"
Vergil laughed at that comment, a sound containing no mirth whatsoever. He absentmindedly patted Dante's shoulder, something Dante hadn't found his brother doing since they were little. It should have been comforting, but it wasn't.
"I'll find a new host, one who hasn't been sullied by madness."
Dante gave a "hmph"-ing sound, idly watching a cat search through the garbage bins down in the alley below.
"Won't be you, though," he murmured. Dante closed his eyes, feeling the wind pick up, raising the fine hairs on his bare arms.
"I know." The words so faint that if Dante hadn't been paying attention he would have missed it. Something in how it was uttered made him look up, only to find that Vergil was gone.
Later on, Dante would laugh at the irony of that his proud brother actually had done what he'd said he would do, and he'd laugh at a stuck-up kid who reminded him all too much of how himself and Vergil when they'd been young, but right there and then, when the moon hung bloated and the wind told of that winter was all to near all Dante could do was to stare up at the moon and realize that yes - it was only a dead wasteland that was a shadow of its sibling.