The demons collapsed, imploding in clouds of thick choking dust. Arcing energy spiderwebbed across the floor as the Demon of Empire City landed from above. Having scaled the wall from the outside, he'd dropped down in the enclosed arena where demons had gathered. Bits of broken glass hailed down around him as the reaching white fingers of fire retracted, spitting sparks as it latched onto anything electronic within reach.

Cole MacGrath returned the Amp to its clasp across his back as his sinuous form rose from the small crater in the floor; emotionless gray eyes swept the interior of the room, and all he could see was the dust of fallen demons. His gaze swiveled to the doorway - it was busted ajar, swinging on a frail hinge, the wooden carvings depicting demons in various articulations of agony or pleasure. Or both. He wrinkled his nose and nudged the door open with the back of his hand.

The hot copper stench of fresh blood struck him first. Then the realization: demons don't bleed and there was a hell of a lot of the stuff on the floor, thick spatters sprayed along the walls.

Cole followed the sprays of blood to the source. Dante was hooked to the wall with half a dozen twisted scythes driven through his body. Limp and bloodless, platinum hair smeared with crimson hanging over his face, and the coup-di-grace: Rebellion speared through his sternum at a grotesque angle, firmly affixing him to the statue of a demonic angel with arms outstretched, white stone painted vermillion.

"Oh, shit."

Unthinking. Hands grabbing at the metal weapons and hauling with all his strength. One at a time throwing them to the floor as the same curse gasped from him like a prayer. Each weapon dislodged coaxing a gush of fresh red vitae over his hands. Then his fingers closed, slippery-wet, on the pommel of Rebellion. He was shaking so bad he couldn't get the strength back into his arms - he could pull himself over a sheer precipice but for some reason he couldn't pull this fucking sword out-

"Shit, shit, shit."

Focus. Focus. He grabbed by the curved hand guards and gave a monumental heave - and he muttered a desperate apology as he pushed his foot against Dante's hip for leverage. With a twist, he fell backward, dropping the sword, landing on his back and Dante collided into him, heavy as a bag of sand weighing roughly 200 pounds, blood, guns, coat and all.

He was heavy, heavier than he looked. Cole pushed against the man's chest, rolling him to the floor and haplessly shoving white hair out of Dante's stony face.

"Dante." His blood was everywhere but he wasn't bleeding anymore and Cole tried to make up his frantic mind of whether or not that was really a good thing. He planted his palms on the half-demon's chest. "Son of a bitch." Volts surged through him - more than he thought a normal person could take but he had to do something.

Nothing stirred him at all.

"Dante! Wake up, you bastard!" A second, powerful pulse leapt through the half-devil's body. More volts shuddered through his arms, his fingertips, and the body - Dante's body - lurched with a sudden movement that wasn't due to shock. His eyes opened, sparked with crimson, then his chest heaved as he vomited a disconcerting volume of blood.

Cole's relief was washed away with hot, feverish fury. "Dante...? Dante! I told you to wait! I told you to fucking wait for me!" His voice, risen, was gravelly and harsh. He saw Dante swim in the mire of half-consciousness before he fixed his eyes on the Conduit.

True fear still gripped him. But a thick veneer of fury was making the Demon's hands clench the lapels of his coat and haul him to sit up. And shake him, hard.

Dante's wounds looked nothing more than superficial now. But Cole didn't /care/ about that. No. He dragged the man closer, locked his arm around his head and crushed him against his chest in a rough semblance of something like a hug.

"Fuck. Fuck, I thought you were dead, you bastard-"

"I'm not dead," Dante croaked but a perplexing sensation of gladness reached him through the haze of almost-deceased. And maybe some guilt. No matter how it happened, he'd been overwhelmed. And that fear- it was worse than water, worse than his own death. Dante grasped his arms and pulled them loose so he could look him in the face. "I'm sorry."

Cole couldn't seem to breathe properly, and he glared at the floor, at the muddy puddles of red that used to be in Dante's body. He'd seen lots of things. Lots of bad shit go down. It was a lot to take in even then. But this-

Dante grabbed his face and forced his gaze back onto him. Focus. Focus. "I'm sorry, Cole."

Those slate gray eyes had kindled. Something harsh and animalistic. A fierce protectiveness that stemmed from his own sense of duty. But that wasn't it. That wasn't why he couldn't live with himself if he lost this man, this one friend, in a plot so much bigger than just Conduits and Humans.

He grasped his fingers. Warm. Alive.

"I'm sorry," Dante mumbled again.

"Don't leave like that again."

The shock came from the hug and the fierce protectiveness behind it. The solid press of his face in his shoulder, his lips against his ear, hissing words, hissing something Dante couldn't understand. All he knew was that he clung back, bloodied and out of breath. Knew that as tight as Cole was holding him, he'd lost someone he wasn't holding tightly enough onto before.

As his head swam with blood loss, Cole pulled him to his feet, steadied him.

"We're leaving."

"No," Dante insisted. "Give me a second and we can finish this."

"Everyone's dead, Dante. Everyone in this city's been swallowed up by his nightmare." Cole was probably the most powerful Conduit in the world, next to the monster who had summoned up this Hellish nightmare. But right now, he was just a man, his faith in himself shaken. That fear when he had almost drowned was fully visible on his face, his bandaged fingers dark with Dante's blood, raked through his short hair with anxious panic.

Dante wiped his mouth, watching Cole pace, kicking aside rubble. He bent, sheathing Rebellion before he touched the Conduit's shoulder, turned him and clasped him hard to his chest. "We can save everyone and I sure as hell ain't going to be lost in the process, got it?"

The Conduit unfroze and nodded against his shoulder. "You're one scary son of a bitch, you know that?" When he looked at him, he saw Dante with new eyes - covered in blood, tousled, ruggedly dirty and attractive in a way that defied any heterosexual explanation. Any closer examination to how he felt at that moment had to wait until later, because suddenly the ceiling was falling toward them.