Memories of a Forgotten Hell
(Yes, another DMC fanfic from me, so sue me, it's what I'm comfortable with. A/N: I do not own DMC or any of the characters, weapons, yada, yada, yada, you know the drill. All rights belong to Capcom ~M.G.~)
"Wait, wait, wait, you're not going to tell her?" A female voice asked.
"After what's happened, don't you think its best that she's forgotten him completely?" A male voice replied somewhat bitterly. "He already thinks he killed her so he won't be coming back for her, this is over with. I've had enough of his shortcomings over the years, I won't stand by and let him do this to her."
"But Dante, she's-"
"This is why I feel that this is the best course of action." He replied again. "He can trek through Hell for his sins for all I care; you don't treat family this way."
"So, that's it, we just lie to her?"
"For now, it's probably the safest route we have until she recovers."
"I sure hope you're right."
~THREE YEARS LATER~
"Are you trying to get yourself killed?!" Dante, a devil hunter in the now post-apocalyptic world, chastised his wounded female comrade. "Dammit Ailie-"
"Behind you!" the woman yelled, aiming her still smoking Beretta over his shoulder and letting loose a barrage of bullets.
Dante turned, easily slicing through the nearby demons with his giant broadsword, Rebellion. The creatures disintegrated into sand before disappearing into the ground. Soon they were all slain and the two hunters were able to regain themselves.
"Showoff…" The woman named Ailie muttered as she leaned against a nearby light post, fighting to catch her breath.
Dante turned to her, his cerulean eyes worried as he took in the woman's disheveled appearance.
She was hunched forward against the wave of pain that radiated through her; a long gash in left side just beneath her ribs was still seeping blood. Her usually flawless pale complexion was now sallow and splotchy; her breathing was slow and labored as well. Her delicate features scrunched in concentration as she fought to stay upright.
But the most disturbing part of her appearance was how dull her normally bright green eyes were. As if she was already dead.
"C'mon, we need to get you back." He tells her, placing the large sword back into its holster on his back.
"I'm…okay." The words were forced, as if speaking hurt.
"Hmph, like hell you are, quit being so damn stubborn."
Before she could reply with a scathing retort, another wave of pain flared again and she groaned against it.
"No more talk, we're getting you back now."
He walked up to her and put one of her arms over his shoulders; he would have rather picked her up, but she would have protested fiercely against it, instead he just helped her walk back to the shop.
A small gust of wind picked up as they made the trek back, ruffling the coal black tresses of Ailie's hair.
"How are you feeling now?" He asked after they had walked a few blocks; knowing full well she was in a lot of pain and probably didn't want to talk. But these city streets had grown quiet over the past years. Surviving a near apocalypse had a tendency to make the world a lonely place when nearly three quarters of it had been eradicated.
"No better." Ailie answered slowly, her voice still strained.
"Well, we're almost there, then we can get you tended to and you can rest."
"'Kay…"
They were only a few more blocks from the shop when another of Dante's colleagues, a youth named Nero, who bore a strong resemblance to the half demon, joined up with them.
"Nothing on my, what the hell happened?!" He exclaimed when he was close enough to see Ailie was hurt, he quickly took Dante's place as the woman's helper, only he was able to lift her into his arms.
"Ambushed." Dante replied in a clipped tone. "No they still haven't gotten past Lucia's borders."
"Low levels?"
"Mostly Sloths, a few Marionettes and Scarecrows, and a Wrath. Guess what caused the most damage, as per fucking usual."
"Trish and Lady said since there was no activity on their end, they were going to look for supplies." Nero said after a moment's silence. "Which is good, ammo has been getting short lately."
Dante grunted. "Anyone hear from Lucia?"
"She said she needs one of us to go over there." Nero replied slowly.
"I ain't leavin' kid, you're gonna have to go."
The younger one nodded and cast the woman a downward glance, as if asking what, specifically, was wrong with her.
Dante didn't answer as they reached the cement steps of his home slash business, the devil hunting agency known as the Devil May Cry. He opened the door and scowled at the annoying bell that range overhead.
"I really hate that thing…" He muttered.
"Aw, it loves you." Ailie had tried for sarcastic, but ended up sounding hopeless and drugged instead.
"And on the couch she goes, it's closer and faster."
"You calling…me fat?" She panted as she was placed as gently as possible on the dilapidated red couch that had certainly seen better days. Stuffing fell from its sides and one side had been completely ripped open.
Nero chuckled quietly to himself. "Someone's in trouble…"
"You, shut it." Dante growled at him. "And no, I'm not calling you fat, Ailie; I don't have a death wish."
Ailie could barely manage a smile as she looked at her belly to inspect her injuries.
"Oh, holy crap…that looks terrible!" She gasped.
The wound in her side should have been mostly healed by now, her healing capabilities near equal to theirs; but it was still raw and profusely bleeding.
"That means somethin's in there." Dante told her.
"No shit…I could've….told you that."
"Nero, go get some gauze or, hell a towel or something, we need to stem that blood flow, and I need to see what's in there to get it out." Dante told him. "And you," He turned to Ailie. "We're gonna have to lose that shirt."
Here, she would definitely protest, normally. But now, she just nodded and made to reach for the bottom of the material as Nero left the room to search for the supplies required.
"Uh-uh." Dante stopped her. "You'll hurt yourself; I'll have to cut it off ya."
"You had better stop where you're supposed to…" She warned before sighing and pointing to her feet. "Left boot got a knife in there."
Dante retrieved the weapon. "Alright…ready?"
"As I'll ever be…"
Dante sliced the thin cotton material of her tank top, stopping just beneath her breasts and pulling the halves apart so he could see the wound. A large chuck of metal had pierced the normally flawless creamy pale skin, now staining it dull red with blood. There was no way to tell how deep it had gone, but it needed to come out fast.
Nero returned then with the materials and even some water.
"Thought this could help too-holy shit!" He exclaimed when he saw why she was still bleeding. "No wonder why you're not healed yet."
"Stop staring…" Ailie started, her voice strained. "And get it…out of me."
"Yes ma'am." Nero muttered petulantly, setting out his armful of things for Dante to use.
Dante grabbed a towel and pressed it firmly but gently against her skin, trying to stop the blood without hurting her too much more. It seemed his care wasn't necessarily needed as she cried out anyways.
"Fuck…" She swore quietly. Dante tried to remove the towel but she stopped him. "Keep on…it's gonna hurt anyways…"
"Sorry 'bout that." Dante apologized as he sopped up most of the crimson life force that was still seeping steadily from her body. "I think I can see it now, though."
Indeed he was able to see that the metal was nothing huge, but it was very jagged and pocked with rust here and there.
"Good thing we don't require tetanus shots…" He half-joked, stopping when the female glared at him.
"Now this…is really gonna hurt."
"Don't tell me…just do it."
"You might wanna to grab onto something…" He warned her as he placed his hands on the intruding implement.
Ailie's slender fingers gripped the arm of the couch beneath her head, biting her bottom lip to keep from screaming if need be. In one swift and easy pull Dante removed the offending wedge and tossed it to the side, watching as the skin where it had been began stitching itself up slowly. Ailie relaxed a little bit at a time, beginning to feel tired now that she wasn't in so much pain anymore.
"I'm guessing it's from that Wrath you mentioned earlier?" Nero asked.
"Yeah…" She replied, trying to use her now ruined shirt to cover herself again.
"Do not move from that spot." Dante warned her as he got up to dispose of the blood-soaked towel. "Nero, can you clean her up please?"
"Wasn't planning on moving…" Ailie grumbled quietly to herself as Nero handed her a damp rag. "Why are you handing me that?"
"So you can…" He started.
"I'm kidding." She joked weakly before taking the rag from him and wiping the rest of the blood off of herself. "There, good as new, or almost anyways."
"You need me to get you anything else?" Nero offered.
"If one of you would get my blanket from my bed, that'd be great." She said, losing her battle with sleep as her eyes threatened to close while she talked. "I think I'll just pass out right here…"
"Okay."
~B~R~E~A~K~
By the time Nero had come back with Ailies blue microfiber blanket, she was already asleep, her breathing coming slowly and evenly now, which made Nero relax and feel better as he gently placed the blanket around her shoulders, Dante watching from the kitchen doorway. It was old and worn, she really should replace it, but there was so much sentimental value it possessed to not just her, but everyone else as well.
It had been the only thing of hers that survived an explosion that nearly killed her three years ago. It had been a gift to her from Nero's father, Dante's brother, Vergil. Not that she even knew that anymore. Any memory she's ever had of the last twenty or so years had been erased as she suffered from amnesia from the accident. They had all thought her memory would restore itself with time, but it never had. Dante had made the executive decision to fill in the blanks, conveniently leaving out anything to do with Vergil.
It was believed he was involved somehow with the accident, but no one had any way of knowing for sure. When her memory failed to come back, they all assumed perhaps it were better they didn't know the entire truth and were left to make their own conclusions.
Dante watched the sleeping woman that was his sister-in-law as his nephew tended to her like a fretting hen. His anger started to flare a bit as he thought about everything that had happened to her.
She had married his brother, changed him for the better, helped him raise Nero though she wasn't the boys real mom…and he had repaid her by nearly killing her before disappearing off the face of the earth. Now, she thought she was just a colleague to the business. When she had woken up in the hospital with no memory of the last nineteen years, it had crushed Dante when she'd asked him how he got so old when she'd only seen him a few days ago.
Ailie had once been called Andorra, and she had lived life on the rough streets nearly by herself. She had ended up in his shop one night cold, wet, and shivering as she took cover from a storm. She'd looked so pitiful, nowhere near the powerful woman he now knew, she was a just a pathetic looking teenager with nowhere to go.
And so he's offered her place to wait out the storm, some warm food and hot shower before she thanked him and ambled about her way the next morning. She'd floated in and out since then, coming around more frequently as she got close to him, eventually coming around just to do so and not because she needed or wanted anything.
That was what she remembered…
Dante sighed roughly as he shook his head to rid himself of the saddening thoughts.
"Hey." Nero said once Dante had come back to the present. "Now that she's asleep, we've got to talk."
"Why does the tone of your voice tell me I won't this one bit?" Dante asked, slightly annoyed now.
"Because I have unsettling news." Nero replied. "Lucia spotted someone very familiar in the next town over, the one we used to know as Noelleton."
"Wait, someone very familiar…you're not saying-"
"I am. He didn't see her, not as far as she could tell. She also said he looks very different than how we're used to seeing him. I don't know what kind of different or how, she just said he doesn't look the same."
"Oaky, and?" Dante had gone from annoyed to pissed in about a half a second.
"That's why she wanted one of us to go there, to help do recon on him."
"I ain't going nowhere with her injured, especially with him out and about now, you go on ahead, I don't want anything to with that son of-"
Nero leveled his double-barreled revolver in Dante's face.
"I understand you're obligated to your opinion, but this is my father we're talking about." He threatened the elder hunter. "I'd appreciate it if you kept it to yourself."
The two stood in silence for a moment before Nero lowered the gun.
"Y'know she acts like him sometimes." Nero said as he put his weapon away. "Some of her mannerisms-"
Dante held up his hand. "I've noticed kid. Hell, they were married for twelve years before all this went down. They each adopted some of the others quirks during that period."
"She almost seems like her old self again, like she's remembering."
"It's just her body trying to tell her mind what's really going on." Dante replied tiredly, taking his usual seat at his antique desk. "Part of her wants things to go back to the way they were, and I guess the rest of her…really doesn't want to remember. Matier guessed that's why the amnesia is so extreme, which makes sense and all but…"
After yet another moment of uncomfortable silence, Nero sighed and spoke.
"So, I guess I'll take the other motorbike."
"Go ahead, it ain't like we need it right now."
As he left the shop, the younger hunter took one last forlorn look at the woman lying on the couch, the woman who he'd known as a mother nearly all his life.
"I hate lying to her." He muttered.
"She's safer this way."
"Is she really Dante?" He asked, frustrated by all of this. "What happens if by some miracle she does happen to recover her memory? How do you think she's gonna react to all of this, to all of us hiding everything from her for this long?"
"Shouldn't you be leaving?"
Realizing he wasn't getting any answers this way, Nero slammed to door behind him.
"Get mad all you want ya little punk." Dante muttered crossly to himself as he heard the spare bikes engine roar to life before the squealing of tires soon faded from earshot. "I know what I'm doing."
The vintage rotary style phone rang just then, offering a much needed distraction as he picked it up.
"Devil May Cry, what's the- Hey Lady."
"You two make it back okay?" The female voice asked him over the line.
"Sort of, we're alive if that's what you're asking.
A sigh. "How bad is she?"
"She's fine now, resting on the couch." He answered.
"Good, glad to hear she's all right. What about the devils?"
"They haven't gotten past the borders and don't appear to be encroaching either. How much longer are you two going to be?"
"Couple of hours at least." Lady replied. "Why?"
"No real reason. Just remind me when you get here, there's something we all need to talk about."
Silence for a second. "Dante, is everything okay?"
"Just remind me so I don't forget."
"Okay…" Lady wasn't so convinced there wasn't something else going on.
"Later." He said and tossed the phone back onto its cradle.
~B~R~E~A~K~
Ailie woke up an hour or so later, her injuries now mostly healed. Her ribs were stiff and sore, and she knew she'd be bruised for a couple of weeks at least. She sat up slowly, wincing as her muscles protested against the movement, holding her shirt closed.
"Feeling better?"
Ailie looked around to see Dante sitting at his desk, a steaming slice of pizza in his hand and his feet propped up on the antique wooden surface.
"Much, yeah." She answered, standing slowly. "Sore and stiff, I'll be bruised for a while but otherwise I'm all right. Is that fresh?" She asked, indicating the slice in his hand.
"Yup, just arrived about ten minutes ago."
"Cool, I could use something to eat before I take a shower." She ambled over to the desk, grabbing a piece out of the cardboard box.
"They forgot to take the olives off again." He warned her.
Ailie shrugged. "I don't mind them, it's the green peppers I don't care for." She answered as she bit into hers. "Hmm, nothing beats a hot meal."
Dante nodded in agreement.
The pair sat in silence for a few moments.
"Hey, can I ask you a question?" She asked when she was halfway finished eating.
"Whatcha got?"
"Did I ever know someone who looks like you and Nero, but dresses differently?"
The hunter froze for a second before regaining his composure.
"Why do you ask?"
"I saw him in a dream. He was dressed in a blue coat and had spiked back hair, he was holding Nero as a kid… does that mean anything to you?"
Oh shit…how do I answer this…?
"I felt like I knew him very well, but since I can't remember anything over the last nineteen or so years, I can't tell if it were just a twisted memory; or if it were real."
Luckily Trish and Lady showed up just then, distracting the both of them.
"We have found enough supplies to last us three months!" Trish, a blonde haired demoness fabricated in Dante's mother image many years ago announced proudly as she dropped a very large and heavy crate onto the hardwood floor.
"That's great." Ailie said, finishing off her pizza. "Y'all need some help moving-"
"Uh-uh, you're not lifting up on anything." Dante interrupted her. "Besides, I thought you were going take a shower?"
"Oh come on, those crates aren't that heavy!" She defended.
"You barely got off the couch without cringing, take it easy."
"I'm not gonna heal if I baby it-"
"And you'll get worse if you over do it."
"But-"
"No!" Dante cut her off and sat up straight in his chair. "Dammit woman, why are you so stubborn?"
"Maybe because I have to deal with an over-bearing ass hat like you all the time!" She fired back.
"And that's enough out of you two." Lady, a brunette human with heterochromia eyes of blue and brown interrupted.
Ailie huffed and walked off towards the stairs that led to her room. "You win for now." She grumbled as she ascended the rickety steps.
When she had disappeared into her room, slamming the door behind her, Dante sighed heavily.
"I don't know when she got so stubborn. She's acting more and more like he used to."
"You don't think her memory…" Lady trailed off.
"I'm not sure. She told me a minute ago she saw him in a dream, well looking back now it's a memory, but yeah."
The two females looked at him, shocked.
"Oh and that's not all. Lucia called and guess who she saw in the next town."
"That's not good, especially for you." Trish said. "If she gets her memory back and finds out you lied to her, we're gonna have two rouges on our hands instead of just one."
"Now you know she won't go quite that far-" Dante started.
"And what about Vergil? If he finds out she's still alive after attempting to kill her…there's not telling what's going to happen. Have you even thought about this, prepared for it in even the slightest way?"
Dante was silent for a second.
"Look, he thinks she's dead and to her, he never existed. I can figure this out." He told them.
Both females sighed and shook their heads.
"What's that line you like to use?" Lady started.
"She's in your care, you know what's best." Trish said. "For now, why don't you come help us with these crates?"
Meanwhile upstairs, Ailie had stood in the shower, allowing the hot water to cascade down her back and hair, the water mingling with blood and going down the drain. Her muscles relaxed as the heat seeped into her skin, and she was able to bend a bit more without her movements being so stiff. As she scrubbed herself clean, she couldn't stop thinking about the man she'd seen while she'd been sleeping. Who was he? Why did she feel as though she knew him? Dante had never mentioned him when he'd tried to fill in the gaps of her memory.
Perhaps he'd been Dante's father, Sparda? No, he seemed much too young for that, besides he'd been with Nero as a kid. He had looked so much like Dante, but acted completely different. There was no way her mind was playing a trick and twisting a memory. Brother? No, she would have seen proof by now that Dante had a brother, or any living family aside from Nero.
She shook her head to clear it as she stayed standing underneath the water, depleting the hot water until it had started to turn cold against her skin. She shut off the faucet then and got out, wrapping a towel around herself. She was feeling like her old self again, and thought about what she wanted to eat.
"Hmm, since I'm injured and not feeling good, spaghetti sounds good." She muttered as she dried and dressed herself.
(A/N: yeah the ending of the chapter kinda sucks, my bad, I was running out of ideas. Anyways, please R&R so I can make sure I live up to your expectations, thanks guys! ~M.G.~)