Big Beta props to Mike Brown and Shadow-of-a-Wolf. And now I'm going to leave this right here. :flees:
Letting Go
Chapter One: Best Laid Plans
New York City – November 24, 1989 2:15am
The small brass bell rang as the glass shop door opened. A young man entered and paused at the threshold. He was soaked to the bone and trying in vain to shake some of the rainwater off of his red leather coat. Voices lowered, lulling the conversations as eyes flitted into his direction, glimpsing the platinum haired teenager. Once they had their fill of the odd looking teenager, the conversation resumed and eyes redirected their attention elsewhere. The native New Yorkers that occupied Eddie's Diner were rather used to seeing strange things and people at this late hour; but that didn't stop the establishment's patrons from inserting their two cents about the boy. He stepped into the busy late night diner, dripping of dirty city rain and wading through the offensive half-whispered remarks coming from the tables closest to the door.
"Damn punk! Wettin' up the damned place!"
"Who does he think he is bleaching his hair like that?"
"A trouble maker if I ever saw one."
"Michael Jackson called; he wants this leather coat back."
The muttered insults and stares failed to bother him, despite his sensitive hearing. He only grinned at the attention his appearance briefly garnered.
The young man made his way further into the diner and greeted the blonde waitress at the counter pouring coffee into stained, off-white mugs.
"Morning, Angel," he flirted.
She didn't have to look up from her task to know who was speaking to her.
She used her best deadpan. "The answer is no, Dante," she said.
"Morgan, how do you even know what I was going to say?"
"You're easy to read. You call me Angel when you flirt and you flirt when want something. What do you want, Dante?" He normally either asked for money or a date; neither of which she would indulge. She could roll her eyes at the routine. But, Morgan had to give Dante some credit; he was anything but a quitter. She loaded the cups of coffee onto a tray and wiped her free hand off on her brown and white apron.
He leaned onto the counter, grinning. "Who says that I want something?"
Her lips pressed together, her eyes narrowed, and her right eyebrow quirked upward.
"Make it quick," she said, "I have to drop off the coffee while it's still hot." She huffed as she shifted her weight to one leg.
"What time do you get off? How 'bout we catch a movie or something? I heard that Back to the Future II finally came out."
"How many times are we going to go over this? How do you expect to take me out on a date when you can't even pay off the tab you ran up here?"
"Morgan, you and Eddie know that I'm good for it," he drawled.
"Right… Look, kiddo, you're sweet and charming, but you're just too young. To be frank, I'd rather not be tossed into prison because I'm with somebody that needs a fake ID to get into bars and clubs."
Dante paused, as he tried to form a witty remark.
Morgan smiled and poured a cup of coffee and slid it in front of him. "You're gonna get sick if you stay in those wet clothes. Drink up and get warm. We wouldn't want you to catch your death of cold, now would we?"
She began to walk around the counter and down the aisle, but paused, glancing over her shoulder. "I'll tell you what, Dante, why don't you try again in a few years. Ya know? When you're not jailbait anymore."
He flashed a smile and she continued to her table, serving the now lukewarm beverages.
Moments later a rotund, middle aged man emerged from the kitchen dressed in cook's apparel, which was stained with sweat and grease.
Dante spotted him first. "Eddie, my man, how's it hanging?"
"Business is boomin'! Can't complain," Eddie said. He then paused, scratched his graying hair, and looking about the room with an agitated look on his face.
Dante could tell that he wanted to say something, but couldn't quite find the words. "What's up?"
"Ya know yer gonna catch a cold if ya stay in dem wet clothes."
"Your wheels are spinning a little too hard just to tell me that I'm going to get sick." Dante motioned his index finger to his head as he spoke. "'Sides, this isn't the first time I got caught in the rain during a job and I haven't gotten sick yet."
"Lucky you," the man mumbled. He glanced to the back of the diner before he spoke again. "He's here. He's been waitin' fer ya."
"Who," Dante took a sip of the bitter coffee, "Another job? Can't it wait 'til tomorrow?"
"No," Eddie shook his head, "Not another job. Him."
Dante stood frozen for a few moments. He felt a familiar presence, an aura similar to his own, tip-toeing around the edges of his senses.
"Vergil," Dante's lips quirked into a smirk, "He's back." He drew away from the counter and walked deeper into the diner. Soon he approached the last few sets of booths where there were no other customers, but the lone figure wearing a hooded sweatshirt. He didn't have to see the wisps of white hair poking out from under the hood to know that was his twin there.
"How's life, Vergie?" Dante said, sliding into the last booth.
"All will be well once you stop insisting on these ridiculous nicknames, dear little brother."
"Ah whatever. Ya know you love it! Just admit that your day just wouldn't go right without having me around to lighten things up. What's with the get up? Aren't you a little more underdressed than usual?" Dante eyed the Vergil's clothes. He was dressed in a pair of blue jeans, sneakers, and a blue, hooded pullover, which partially obscured a white tee shirt.
Vergil would have like to be better dressed in perhaps a suit or some other manner of dress. "It doesn't suit my tastes, but sometimes one must take steps to remain incognito, 'low-key,' if you will."
"I take it no one else knows you're back?"
"And I would like to keep it that way. No matter how little power I use, or how much I distance myself from other people, Mundus and his minions always seem to find me."
"Look, Verge, I—"
Before Dante could get the rest of his words out, Morgan placed a tall strawberry sundae at the table with a can of whipped cream.
"Enjoy," she said.
"I didn't order that," Dante said. It took every ounce of his self control not snatch up the sundae and gobble it up before Morgan realized her mistake.
"No, you didn't—" she said.
"—I did," Vergil finished.
"Enjoy it, but don't get fat," Morgan said. She then returned to the kitchen
Dante stared at the pink, creamy treat.
"It's going to melt. Dig in before it does," Vergil said.
"What's the catch," Dante glanced between his twin and the ice cream.
"Nothing. Think of it as an early birthday gift."
Dante scooped up a huge glob of the dessert into his waiting maw. His mouth was practically overflowing with the stuff as he spoke. "We habent celebrated sinth we were lirrle."
"Swallow, please." Vergil rolled his eyes.
Dante gulped the ice cream and continued. "Now I gotta get ya something…" Dante paused and then his eyes suddenly brightened. "I'll clean Yamato. Or maybe a totally bitchin' trench coat? I saw a blue one with silver trim along the chest in a shop near here. It looks good on ya."
"How would you know?"
"Slicked my hair back and tried it on the other day. It really does look like something you would wear."
Vergil thought for a moment, but quickly pushed it away. "I couldn't. Besides, it's just ice cream, Dante."
"Then take some." Dante shoved the spoon into Vergil's face.
"You know I'm not that into strawberries." Vergil gently pushed it aside.
"They got tea here. I know how much you like that."
"And choke down the swill they sell in Lipton packets? No thank you."
"Then what? I hate owing debts. The tab I have here is enough. Trust me."
There was a pregnant pause before Vergil finally spoke up again. "Help me take down Mundus."
"—ACK!"
A half-frozen strawberry slice slid down the back of the younger twin's throat the moment the words were uttered. Dante coughed and began to pound his fist into his chest in order to dislodge it. When he was no longer choking, he finally rasped, "Uh what? Excuse me?"
"You heard me."
"No, Vergil. What I thought I heard was Suicide Mission! That's nuts! You do realize he is just as powerful, if not more so than Dad, right? If we somehow combined our powers and went up against him on a good day, I don't even think that— Fuck that! He'll crush us with his pinky! Do you want to be crushed by a pinky, Verge?!"
"Believe me, Dante, I fully understand your trepidation, but he has to pay for what he did to Mother. Isn't that why you wanted to become a demon hunter in the first place? To find the one who tortured and killed mother; the one responsible for Father's disappearance?"
Dante nodded. He tossed the spoon into the goblet and pushed it aside. More than half of his ice cream remained and yet the appetite for it disappeared.
The whole notion was insane and Dante could hear the resolution in Vergil's voice. See it in his body language. Vergil sat more erect than usual, palms steady and free of sweat. He looked straight at Dante, never diverting his gaze. As the younger twin, Dante knew that once Vergil had set his mind on something there would be nothing he could say or do to change his older brother's mind. It had been the same since they were children. He was torn between wanting justice and – He would rather not think of the converse. Too perverse and macabre to imagine. He couldn't— wouldn't fathom putting Vergil in danger only to justify attaining his elusive desires. Even then, he couldn't halt his mind from formulating an action plan or from wishing to figure out what details his brother, the tactician, may have already composed.
Dante's shoulders slumped at what he was about to do. It was more reckless than anything that he ever attempted in his short sixteen years of life. It was more reckless than he cared to admit. He was about to entertain what was possibly a fool's errand.
"How would we even begin to do it?" Dante was solemn.
"A frontal assault is out of the question. He'd see us coming and we can't even truly tap into our powers, our true potential. There is no chance for survival if we choose that course of action."
"Element of surprise? Wait. No. He knows that we survived that attack from eight years ago."
"It could still work. It's true that he knows that we exist, but we can still catch him off guard. We can take the fight to him without giving him home-court advantage."
"Care to enlighten me?"
"The main reason why Mundus would normally see us coming is because he has so many eyes and ears here on Earth and in the Demon's Realm. If we can pull the wool over those eyes, so to speak, we can begin to break him down from the inside. We can chip away at his defenses and infrastructure before he can figure out what's going on. One of us will have to—"
"You mean one of us will have to get captured at one point?"
"Yes. Maybe even hope to spread rumors of defection… And I'll go since I am the elder."
"Pfft! By a measly seven minutes. Big whoop! I'll go." Dante straightened in his seat, his carefree attitude shining through.
"I'm sure that we can reach a more diplomatic conclusion."
"You mean a coin flip? No problem. I got one." Dante moved to reach into his pocket when Vergil stopped him by grasping his hand.
"Not the double sided coin. I'm not one your fool customers who are oblivious to your intentions."
Dante's shoulders drooped with a sigh. "Fine. A real coin it is. Heads: I go and Tails: you stay."
Vergil glared at Dante as he chuckled. "I'm kidding."
"Dante…"
"Verge, I am aware of the gravity of the situation; I'm just trying to lighten to mood."
"While I appreciate your ability to find humor in this—"
"— How 'bout we Ro Sham Bo this," Dante interrupted.
Vergil took a breath. "Agreed."
"Ready? On 'shoot,'" Dante advised. Vergil nodded.
"Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!" They said in unison. Both of them presented balled fists at the same time.
"Rock. Again," said Dante.
"Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!" Vergil's hand indicated "scissors" while Dante chose "paper."
"It seems that I am the victor," Vergil said.
"Or loser, depending on how you look at it," Dante added. "Dude, you can't do this alone. Let me go with you."
"No. I need you here on the outside."
"What? To bat cleanup if you get taken out the game early? No way am I going to stand by while you take on the King of the Demon Realm by yourself."
Vergil's features softened. "If we fight him simultaneously from different angles, then we're sure to win."
There was another pause. Dante looked out of the rain slicked window. His pensive stare studied the pedestrians who scurried along, undeterred by the rain. He envied them, going about their lives, oblivious that their fates were being decided by two teenage boys in a hole-in-the-wall diner.
"When do we start?" Dante was barely audible. It was almost as if he didn't want to speak the words.
"It will take some time to plan the logistics, but ideally, we should awaken our devils and our active powers before anything definitive should happen. I plan to bring down Father's barrier and raise Temen-Ni-Gru in order to ease along this process by our nineteenth birthday. However, we can't meet before then. It's too risky. We have to make everyone, humans and demons alike, believe that we are odds with each other, enemies even. "
"It took Dad nearly a century to set those seals. He had to wait for the right sacrifice to be born and mature. You can't just undo them just like that!" Dante snapped his fingers to illustrate his point. "You can't do that! People will die, not to mention the countless demons that will be unleashed because of that thing. There is too much at stake to just piss away for power."
"Dante, you are talking about a couple thousand versus almost six billion people. Remember, the fate of the world lies in our hands. We have to make the tough decisions and look to the greater good. Their sacrifices will not be made in vain."
Dante couldn't look Vergil in the eyes after he had said that. Treating people's lives as pawns on a chess board made him want to vomit. Dante was honestly mystified at how cold Vergil sounded. He fought against the rising bile and stared at his melting ice cream. He was starting to believe that Vergil had already sold his soul for power. There was not one inflection, not one sign that the proposed plan was upsetting the older teenager. Vergil's voice had been shockingly calm and even. If he had any real empathy for the humans he had just condemned, Dante wouldn't know it.
Leave it to Vergil to check his compassion at the door when he needs to be objective, he thought.
Dante shivered against the aura Vergil exuded. It came off him in frigid waves, pelting him sub-arctic sleet.
"You make it sound so easy." Dante finally returned. He watched as the strawberry syrup and the lumpy ice cream mingled into hypnotic swirls.
"No one said that it would be. But, if Mundus can be destroyed, many more can be saved." It was cold, but Dante saw Vergil's point despite still pushing his counterargument.
"Then we open up the throne to the next asshole whose bat-shit enough to take it."
"Let's not go there, Dante. If we can take out Mundus, we can take out anyone."
"I hope you know what you are doing."
Dante was now absently stirring the syrupy, pink soup in the goblet. Vergil turned his gaze to the window beside him, watching the rain die down.
"Hey, Dante."
"Hmm?" He shifted his attention to Vergil.
"Hey. Uhh. There's a real chance one or both us will die doing this and I'd hate for this cheesy diner to be the last we remember of each other."
"Wanna catch a movie? There's another Back to the Future out."
Vergil milled the thought for a few moments. "Sure. Why not? After you shower and change out of those clothes, you're starting to smell like a wet dog. And then we can check out that coat you were talking about."
"Sounds like a plan. Oh. Umm Vergil?"
"Yes?"
"Could you call and warn me or something. I'd like to get good and liquored up, possibly bang some hot chicks before you get us both killed." Dante gave a lopsided grin.
Vergil grimaced. He couldn't decide whether or not his twin was being facetious or serious. He thought for a moment and then said, "Sounds feasible. Deal."
The two brothers shook hands and then pulled each other into a hug.
. : . : . : . : .
Detroit – December 1, 1992 10:45am
Three days before Temen-Ni-Gru rises
The antique phone gave a shrill ring throughout the sparsely furnished hovel Dante called his office and home. The ringing snatched him from his dreams. He gingerly pulled himself out of bed, trying not to exacerbate his building hangover or to rouse the naked brunette and red head he slept in between during the previous night. He carefully stepped over the heavy tequila and whiskey bottles and pulled on a pair of pants that were hanging precariously over a door knob.
Dante shuffled down the hall and downstairs to the still-ringing phone. He gave his desk a stiff kick, causing the phone's receiver to fly off the plunger and into his waiting hand.
"Hello," He spoke hoarsely.
"The time is near. Prepare yourself." It took Dante's alcohol addled mind a moment longer than it should have to properly process the succinct response. By the time he did, Dante's ear was left buzzing with a dial tone. His lips jerked into a quick smirk. Dante hung up the phone too.
Thanks for the heads up, bro, he thought as he went back upstairs to his women and alcohol.