Title: "Dawnbringer"

Rating: 'T for Teen', potentially 'M for Mature'.

Chapter 2: Let's Welcome Chaos

Kira took a slow breath before she placed her hands on the handles of the double doors leading into the building, then- with a grin- she flung them open and strolled in like she owned the place. "Yo Dante! You got company!" Her eyes dusted over the office slowly, coming to rest on the nurse that had sprawled himself over the couch, arms and head leaning across the back of it. She could see, even from here, the tension in his position. He'd lost his shoes at some point, likely leaving the possibly blood-tracking devices by the door. A sentiment she didn't share, as she walked over toward the newly placed desk that sat in the center of the room. She placed both hands on the front of it, then swung herself over and landed in the massive chair that sat behind it- spinning it with the landing until it faced the door leading to the back of the building. She heard the steps long before Dante pushed open the door- a dingy towel in the other hand.

"Was starting to wonder if you were gonna' show up, what took you so long?" He grinned from under the towel as he roughly buffed his hair to some semblance of dryness. "You missed the hot water, and cold showers really don't do anything for me." The grin turned just a bit more devious, even as Kira lashed out and kicked him in the thigh playfully- planting a faint boot-shaped dust-print on his leather pants. He hadn't even bothered to finish buttoning the damn things, she noticed.

"I'm sorry, do I need to give you boys thirty minutes? It might help sourpuss over there with his attitude." She returned her legs to their crossed at the knee position, resting her hands across her bosom with laced fingers. A sharp gaze turned to the man on the couch, who'd lifted his head up and moved his shoulders so he could comfortably address the two from his spot. She noticed, then, that his eyes held a hard edge... One far worse than what she'd received outside.

"Dante, for one, I believe I asked you to keep the offers to a minimum with my charge present." The laugh that he received- from Kira oddly enough- made him pause only briefly. "Two, we have business to attend to, unfortunately." His eyes slowly followed Dante as the larger man took a seat on the edge of the desk, pushing a pizza box out of the way to do so. A pair of frosted blue eyes gazed from under the towel as he put the finishing touches on his hair, a chill to them that Kira did not miss when they passed over her to rest on Lash.

"Business. That's something you don't normally bring me. Something haunting the hospital?" He snapped the towel off his head, the end cracking the air, before he threw it over his shoulder and rested one elbow, one hand on his thighs. She took easy notice of the tension that now plagued him as well... It was then she realized she was missing a few pieces of information on this situation.

A small laugh actually lifted off of Lash's lips, bringing her attention back to him immediately. It was not a happy laugh. "Would that it were that simple, but no... A few months ago, you confided something in me, Dante... That you'd seen someone you once thought dead." Kira practically heard teeth click as Dante tightened up beside her. Lash gave him a very slow, lazy grin... One that she had often seen when Lash thought her not looking. When he was lost in thought... One that made him look completely insane. "I've seen the same specter, and I can assure you, he's very much alive. He, and someone else. Someone I'd rather keep away from Kira, at all costs. I find it far too 'coincidental' that they are both here. I find it far more concerning, however, that the catacombs under the hospital were broken into in the same night that I laid eyes on him." She let her eyes wonder from Dante, to Lash, and back again. The set in Dante's shoulders, as Lash spoke, made her wonder exactly what she had missed.

"Someone care to fill me in on what this means, darlings?" The words left her before she could stop them, and she almost, almost, regretted it immediately when Lash's eyes turned to her. Her skin made a run for it, as those jewel-colored eyes locked onto her own mixed match ones. There was something very wrong about the way his eyes looked in that moment. Something that truthfully made her want to run. She would pride herself later, however, on holding that gaze as she continued to speak. "Someone's back in town, fine. Someone who's supposed to be dead, isn't. Fair enough. How does this warrant my attention, and what am I missing that's got you both ready to jump at a pin drop?" She shuddered, almost imperceptibly, when Dante's cold eyes landed on her skin. She didn't have to see them to know it was not a good look.

"You'd be ready to jump too, if you found out your brother was alive- and trying to open the gates to Hell." Kira froze, very carefully breaking her gaze from Lash to look at the silver-mane beside her.

"His companion is the one who worries me the most, however." Dante's near silver gaze slid back over to her guardian, and her's followed. Lash had moved, she noticed, and sat in a position very similar to hers. Or rather, hers was similar to his- she'd picked it up from him. "He travels with Arkham."

Kira swore she heard her own pulse skip a beat. "Who's that, and what does he have to do with my brother?" She almost didn't hear him, over the sound of her own blood rushing in her ears.

"We both have our ghosts, it seems... Arkham is my... donor. I refuse to acknowledge what he was, at one point. He lost that right when he killed my mother." She reached up, pushing burgundy bangs out of her face- only to have them fall back over her eyes. There was a very potent ache behind her eyes, suddenly... "And if he's working with your brother, who's trying to open the gates to Hell, then it means he's trouble."

"Trouble is one word for it, yes." Kira turned her eyes, half lidded, toward the man on the couch. "A threat is another. You are... unaware of your bloodline, Kira. A fact I apologize for, and planned to remedy- I have run out of viable options in that category, however." He moved slowly, and Kira took notice this time of the grace with which he moved. Her breath hitched and she gripped the arm of the chair a little bit tighter.

He was doing that thing again. That thing where he stops being human. It unnerved her, every damned time. Even as Lash turned his gaze to her, and gave her a heart stopping smile- one far too perfect to be real- she had no desire other than to run. To get up, and get out of there as fast as she physically could... She knew better, however. She knew it would be completely useless. He'd have her in a heart beat, and there would be nothing she could do. Kira took a moment to close her eyes, take a breath, and lick her suddenly very dry lips. She let that breath out very slowly, and composed herself before she spoke. "What the flying fuck are you talking about?" So, maybe composed wasn't the right word- she'd warded off the panic, at least.

A chuckle snapped her eyes open, and she was suddenly staring into a pair of perfectly blue eyes. The color almost reminded her of ultramarine, that shade they used to make all the others when it came to dyes... "You carry a bloodline that makes you the perfect host. Sparda slew a priestess in sealing the tower, the physical gateway to the demonic world- and you carry her blood. You, and Mary." Lash stood from his stooped position, reaching a hand out to rest it on her head. "I have no doubt Arkham chose Kalina for that very reason, for the children she could create for him. She did just that, in giving him you, and your sister. The perfect set of sacrifices for the tower. One, to be the key to the gate. One, to be the gatekeeper's vessel." Lash ruffled her hair, slightly shaking the shell-shocked woman in Dante's chair.

"Heh, and here I thought I was the only one with a horrifically fucked up family." She blinked, suddenly quite thankful for the man's sarcasm. It gave her something else to respond to, other than the painful truths that her not-so-human guardian was giving to her.

"Seems we have something in common, on that front. Score, for being the sane one in the family?" She smiled, though it certainly didn't reach her eyes, and relaxed immediately into the chair, falling slack and closing her eyes.

It seemed, however, that fate- or rather, a certain blue eyed devil- would not let her rest. "Sadly, Kira, I didn't bring you here to inform you." A blue eye fluttered open, fixing Lash with a withering glare. "I brought you here to protect you. I know no one better to guard you against another devil." A bright ruby eye opened to join it's inverted twin, and she arched a brow slowly. "Ah... Yes... You don't know about that, do you?"

The laugh that suddenly left Dante hit the rafters. She sat up a bit, giving the silver-mane a strange look until he spoke. "You seriously haven't told her?"

"I've had no reason to do so." Lash looked, for all the world, like he was talking about the weather or something equally mundane. "Had I a reason to tell her you were a half-devil, I'd have told her sooner. After all, it's only just now becoming relevant." Kira blinked slowly, then rubbed the corners of her eyes as Dante chuckled again. She slowly looked up from staring at her palm.

"You mean to tell me, the man you've been fucking isn't human either?" The tone was not what surprised Lash. Nor was the accusation. It was one little word, tagged onto the end, that froze him where he stood. 'Either'. Kira smiled softly, her eyes resting on the perfect statue that now stood in front of her. "Why doesn't that shock me, Lash. Of all the shit you've spewed at me tonight, that honestly shocks me the least."

The blonde stood there for a good minute, before he smirked slowly and let go of a chuckle. "You took that a lot better than I thought you would."

"You'll have to do better than that, after telling me I'm a key to the end of the damn world."

"A gate, actually." Just like that, he'd snapped back into seriousness. "You... unfortunately, being the first born, are more suitable as a vessel to the gate keeper. A task with a possibly much darker fate than simply being the blood key to open the said gate." He gave a small sigh, seemingly a bit less tense than he had only moments before. "There is a reason I took you, and only you, away from Arkham. Kalina would be rendered barren by age, and without you, Mary would be useless. There are other factors, aside from just your birth order, that play into your roll as the keeper's vessel, but they are isolating factors. She can not take your spot; nor you, hers. I figured that to be the best, easiest, manor of preventing this plan from coming to fruition..." Kira heard the unspoken word at the end of that sentence.

"Something changed, right?" She lifted herself in the seat, shifting and curling a leg under herself as she snuggled into the leather. She had no idea why, but some of the tension was gone from the room. A factor she was very grateful for.

"He succeeded in recruiting Vergil." Her brow tilted slightly, and she gave Lash a questioning look. "Had I thought he would successfully gain your brother's aid, Dante, I would have prepared another set of safeties. I had not anticipated the prideful elder son's joining in this matter. I had honestly expected him to fight against it." The scoff that left his lover's lips actually made Kira look up at him.

"You don't know Vergil, in that case. He's always been a bit... hungry. This is too good of a chance for him to pass up." Dante slid off the desk, ruffling his now dry hair, and made his way over to the door leading to the back of the building. Lash's eyes never left the man as he stepped through the door and vanished. The sigh that left the blonde actually made Kira smile,

"Would that I had seen his coming, much of this could be avoided. Those two, however, are the bane of the Heaven's and the Hell's both..." The words were hardly a whisper, yet Kira had heard them. She arched a brow slightly before she slid out of the leather chair and walked over to her guardian. He turned those far-too-blue eyes on her, and she immediately felt the pressure from earlier return. It was not as intense, but it was certainly there... He could see the question in her eyes, likely.

"What else have you hidden from me, Lash? We're on a roll here, with all the stories and tall tales. Any more to share?" She tucked her thumbs into the belt loops by her pockets, fingers dipping into them. Mix matched eyes locked onto a pair of true blues, and they stayed there. Even as the tension in the room returned for her, she was quite proud of herself for holding the eye contact.

"What do you want to know?" Such a simple question... Such a loaded question.

"What are you? Dante's colors kinda give him away, but you look human." … "But no human has ever looked that perfect, you asshole." She was quite careful, in that moment, to keep a blank expression. And to keep her words well filtered.

The grin that lifted the corner of his eyes, however, made her falter just slightly. "I am the wall, the chaos that ruins the order of things. That is what I am." Kira glared softly, then blew out a slow breath.

"Liar." She almost heard the indignant sputter as the matching look crossed his face.

"You don't believe me?" Kira almost smiled.

"Not at all. You gave me cryptics. I want facts." That moment, she almost regretted asking... She'd asked before, after all. And she'd received a much less civil answer.

The fire that lit up behind Lash's eyes made her shudder, and she actually stepped back from him, colliding with the desk in the process. Neither of them heard the door open from the back of the building. "I am the fallen angel who's entire existence hinges on the success of my intervention, Kira. Your life, and my desire to keep you alive, jeopardizes the entirety of my own." Lash stepped into her, the grin on his face loosing a bit of it's collected edge. He placed his hands on the desk behind her, caging the young woman in place. "You are the entire reason that this is still a problem, Kira. And I am not above removing the issue entirely, if it goes too far. You understand what I am saying, correct? You're a smart girl..." The woman visibly paled as she came to grasp with what he was saying. Her mind ran in two directions at that moment:

Fight,

or Flight.

...and she did, perhaps, the most stupid option of all. Kira, in her infinite wisdom of the moment, surged forward and slammed her head into his. Of all of the possible reactions Lash had been expecting, that had certainly been on the bottom of the list. He reeled back, grasping his now throbbing forehead with guttural cry- and inadvertently, releasing Kira. She set her eyes immediately on the silver-mane that had seen her display, and moved. She was beside him in a second, and Dante had actually moved to push her behind him when they heard the cackle that left Lash's lips. They shared a fraction of a second glance- the same thought obvious on both of their faces: "What the fuck?"

"You... are just as much of a wild card as they are, Kira! And that is the reason why you will continue to live." Lash looked over to them, past his hand, before he pulled it away and shook is head with a very faint smile. His eyes were wild, but his smile was eerily sincere. "Anyone else, I would simply end. They would be too much of a gamble, too much of a risk. You, Kira, are a well calculated one... and one I have grown far too fond of. I know, without a doubt, you will fight your fate as the gate keeper's vessel. I have little fear of you falling to her, and less that she will be able to open the gate for them with your constant pressing for control if you do. I know you, and I know you will not go without a fight. Just know, that if you give up... I will end you. Swiftly, mercilessly. I will not have my existence on this plane wasted by a stubborn child. Yet..." He turned that smile directly to Kira, and it grew just slightly. She stood there, completely shocked, by Dante's side as they both looked over the blonde. She took that moment, in his delirium, to speak.

"You'd kill me, if it meant saving you." Some part of her didn't want to hear the answer to that question.

"That's right. I've waited far too long." ...and yet, another part of her needed to. She needed the truth, in that moment.

"And that is the only reason you won't kill me now, and be rid of the chance." Dante raised a hand, and rested it on her shoulder, pale blue eyes watching her slowly as she kept her own hidden under her hair.

"That, and because I have grown fond of you over the last decade." Oddly comforting, that thought... Though it did nothing to change her opinion.

"You're insane, Lash." The snort she heard from him actually made her smile- such a very human, and rude sound.

"Wouldn't you be?" And to that, she had no argument.

Authoress' Notes:

Version #3! It's also slightly more logical- I gave Lash a bit more reason to be snippy, and angry. He's stressed! Poor lil angel... I also removed some of his more physical reactions, made it more a mental thing for him. Retains the darker outlook from the original, however. :3