Disclaimer and warnings: same as opening chapter.
A/N: I apologize for the delay—and to those who somehow plowed through the formatting nightmare that was chapter two (m'god, what happened to my punctuation marks?!) My computer died.
(Unofficial Soundtrack):"liar, you lie" (Noir OST), "Workin' in a Coal Mine," (Devo) "melodie" (Noir OST)
Chapter Three
"True, I talk of dreams, which are the children of an idle brain, begot of nothing but vain fantasy..."
--Romeo and Juliet Act 1, Scene Four
The other mercenaries gathered in a loose circle around their table. Toni slouched in her chair, jaw set at a familiar mulish angle. She refused to look at him. Another Dante trait, that. In his frequent childhood fits of pique, Dante had attempted to ignore his older brother, refusing to acknowledge him when spoken to, or to even look in his direction. Such stalwart attempts at shunning never lasted long. A few hours, a day, and once, an entire week, then Dante would return, skulking at the edge of Vergil's personal space, waiting, watching...
You will be no more successful than he was, he thought. No mere copy could surpass the original.
"Awright," Bobby said, cracking the cask. "The rules, for those o' youse too new or too hungover to remember: ya each get a glass. I fill the glass. You drink it. Simple."
The corner of Toni's mouth twitched, as if suppressing a smile. Vergil watched her narrowly. No status game, even among mortals, was this simple. But the other mercenaries had ringed them in, and it was clear he would get no further in his quest for answers until he completed this asinine ritual.
"Then let us begin."
The crowd roared its approval. Bobby began to pour a thick stream of clear liquid into each glass. Even with the sunglasses in place, the scent made his eyes water. Toni wrinkled her nose.
"Better drink fast," she advised. "Leave this stuff standing too long and it'll etch glass."
"Only glass?" he murmured, eyeing the liquid.
She laughed. "Well, there's a rumor that the secret ingredient is acetone..."
The bartender whapped the back of Toni's head with a meaty paw. "Watch yer mouth. This is good ol' Kentucky moonshine, m' grandad's recipe."
"Don'cha gotta know who your dad is to know your grandad's recipe?" someone japed from the side.
"Big talk from the guy with the big tab," Bobby said, putting the cask down. "When's payday gonna pass you by again?"
More laughter, as the mercenary in question began to sputter. Bobby ignored him.
"All right, ladies, start drinkin'!"
Toni rolled her eyes but reached for the glass. It had a narrow base but a wide mouth, perfectly designed to slop its contents all over whichever unfortunate soul dared drink from it.
"Cheers, newbie," she said, raising her glass in mock salute.
Her casual dismissal was beginning to rasp against his nerves. "I have a name," he said.
Her eyes glinted in the dim room, the mix of shadow and fire that came only from mixed blood. "So earn it. Newbie."
Annoyed, he lifted his own glass. The fumes were even worse close up, searing his nose and blurring his vision into uselessness. Still, he put the glass to his lips and took the first swallow—and just barely avoided spewing it across the table. It burned like lye and ammonia. He just managed to set the glass down before his lungs and stomach seized up with wracking coughs.
"Ah, for fuck's sake!" somebody in the crowd yelled. "He didn't even make it past the first glass?!"
"Not even the first swallow," another agreed mournfully. "Last time I lost money this fast, I was in divorce court."
Bobby gave a theatrical sigh and gave Toni a pointed glance. The mirror-doll ignored him, drinking steadily. A minute later, she smacked her empty glass down on the scarred tabletop.
"Yup." She gave a sharp nod. "Acetone."
Bobby gave her a glare as poisonous as the drink and announced, "An' now we come to part two of the Dead Man's Party House Rules!"
Vergil, head bowed, continued to cough. Rage simmered in the back of his mind. It was not for humans to seek to humiliate the blood of Sparda. A race of cowards, spawned only to serve, should know in the marrow of their bones to whom they owed their allegiance, and the penalty for transgression. Pain and misery were the only lessons these creatures retained--
A firm hand pushed against his shoulder, urging him upright. "C'mon, sit up. Can't breathe through the tabletop," Toni said.
"The fumes alone are challenging," he wheezed.
"Adapt or die, newbie," she said cheerfully, "'cause we're not done yet."
"Now, if you two are done with your little chat..."
Toni raised her hands, still grinning.
"if a glass touches the table an' it's still got enough to cover the bottom of the glass, that drinker's round is cancelled. Both glasses gotta be empty before we go to the next round." Bobby splashed a little of his noxious potion into Vergil's glass. "So Toni's one ahead of ya, Gilver. Catch up or pay up."
Vergil glared, but took up his glass again. This...moonshine had an oily aftertaste, reminding him of turpentine fumes. He did his best to drain the glass, though his throat threatened to close in protective reflex. This time, when he set the glass down, it was empty.
Toni sat across from him, pointedly toying with her empty glass. Were she truly the human she played at being, he might suspect this was all some manner of trap. No human of her weight and build could down such a potent intoxicant with so little visible result. Men of the human underworld used women like cheese for mousetraps, and for much the same purpose.
But Toni was her own power here, in this room, this city. His eye fell on the amulet's heavy chain as Bobby refilled their glasses. Her own power...stolen from his brother, and twisted by her master.
"Round two!" Bobby bawled. "Bets close when the glasses are full!"
There were wagers involved in this stupidity? Well, he had heard that humans with an innate weakness for gambling would bet on anything—such as which of two raindrops would first strike a pane of glass. Mercenaries, who bet their lives on equipment, terrain, and hired support, were gamblers playing for the highest stakes.
It still made for an asinine display.
Vergil snatched up the re-filled glass as soon as Bobby set it down. The sooner he ended this farce, the better. He would have his answers, or he would have this city in ashes. Ten years was time enough. The moonshine hit his stomach like diluted napalm. He felt some of the liquid spill past the corners of his mouth. His stomach roiled.
Two mouthfuls remained in the glass when it hit the table. Toni just kept drinking. How can she do that, he wondered, glaring at her through blurring eyes. If he hadn't seen Bobby fill both glasses from the same cask, he would swear she was only drinking water for all the effect it on them. Her. Them. Wait... there were two of them, now?
Vergil blinked and squinted behind the dark lenses. It certainly looked like Toni had a twin beside her. A twin... He and Dante were the true twins, not these soft-shell mannequins! Bad enough some grubby human hedge witch had stolen his brother's blood and bone, now the fool had the temerity to flaunt both of his wretched creations in front of him?
He had to be here, the sorcerer, the thief. Vergil placed his hands flat on the table, wondering why the floor was pitching like the deck of a sailing ship. All part of the test, no doubt, he decided. Now, he just had to drink one more stupid glass, and he--
One of the Tonis sat up straight, raising a hand in warning. "You leave the table, it's a complete forfeit," she warned.
There was something ominous in the way she said 'complete'. Vergil relaxed, sinking back into the chair. Some of the tension drained out of the mirror-doll—dolls. Wait, where had the other one gone?
"And another do-over for the newbie!" Bobby announced.
Two glasses appeared before him, brimful of the noxious brew. He couldn't seem to pick the first one up, to the crowd's amusement. He ignored them concentrating on the table. Glass was transparent, that must be why he was having such difficulty. Glancing across the table, he saw that each Toni had her own glass, and each one was empty.
Bitches, he thought, trying to focus. They probably didn't even have stomachs, just hollowed-out spaces where human organs would be. He'd find out for certain when he took one of them apart.
He got both hands on one glass, gripping it firmly so it wouldn't float off or fade away like the other. The moonshine went down a little easier this time. He still didn't see where the other glass had floated off to and decided it didn't count. It might be full, but it wasn't touching the table, so it wasn't his responsibility. Let one of the hecklers poison himself with it, with Vergil's heartfelt blessing.
"Round three!" Bobby said. "The record's five, you louts think he's gonna make it?"
The white noise around him roared. All Vergil could focus on was the woman across from him. The other mirror-doll had disappeared too, perhaps chasing after the phantom glass. He worried for a moment she might come back with yet another copy. Triplets made from Dante. Humanity need not fear Hell with Chaos on Earth.
"Glasses're charged," Bobby said. "Go!"
The swaying floor shook the whole room, made him shake, from his feet to his hands. He could not keep his grip on the glass. The clear splinters felt nothing like bone and the liquid spilling through his fingers had never been blood.
"That's a new one," Toni said, eyeing the broken glass. "Gonna use the rules for a dropped round, Bobby?"
She sounded so nonchalant, so distant from the insanity whip-cracking around her. He had failed to impress, and just how was he ever going to truly claim his father's legacy when he couldn't conquer a female mirror-doll of his own twin?
This absurd contest suddenly felt like the far lesser humiliation.
Another glass. Another round. 'I don't have to be faster that the monster, I just have to be faster than you!' A childish taunt, from somewhere in the mists of memory. A testimony to human weakness—but this was not his type of sport. He could not win on this field, but damned if he would yield. He just had to keep pace with her, wait for her one mis-step, the one flaw in her guard.
It would come. She was more than human, but less than himself. She would falter. She would fall--
--falling, but trying to recover, hair more rust-colored than golden, bone showing through ravaged red flesh, setting a fragile shield between two young boys and slavering death--
"Get Dante! Get out! Run, Vergil, RUN!"
Something was wrong with his eyes; they would not focus. Across from him, Toni seemed the picture of calm, a point of brightness in a room becoming mottled with black and gray shadows. She was only a few feet away, yet seemed as distant as his lost brother.
He had to make her tell him where Dante was. Make her tell him what had happened, who had done this, why his brother never answered no matter how he called to him. Make her tell him where to look and who to kill, to put the world back the way it should be.
"An' it's round three again!"
* * *
'Drink like ya wanna die.'
It seemed like a marvelous option to Vergil. Blood and bile spread over the back of his tongue, and he retched and spat. His stomach heaved, trying to wring itself of the poison he'd consumed. Only the dirty brick wall kept him upright. He tried to take a breath to steady himself and immediately retched again.
When had he left the table, he wondered, clinging to the wall. Someone had to have won that contest, and he had the sure sense that it had not been him. Or had he abandoned the contest? The more he tried to focus his thoughts, the faster they broke apart, skittering away like beads of mercury on a marble floor.
He had to...go somewhere? Find... something? He looked up, but saw only a sliver of murky sky between two buildings. How had he come here? Where was here?
Rustling sounds dragged his attention back down to earth.
"Damn, Gilver. You are in some sad, sorry-ass condition," a familiar voice said.
So. She came for him now, after her bait had been taken and the poison in effect. She even hunted like a human, he thought in disgust, reaching for Yamato.
But the sword seemed to slip from his grasp. He reached again but the distances seemed to twist and warp, a Moibus strip nightmare. Her scent rose up around him, fire-sharp and blood-warm. He fell into it, and did not remember hitting the ground.
* * *
Every living creature dreamed, from domesticated felines to the most sadistic killers of men. Vergil paid little heed to dreams, for they were only the products of his own intellect, processing experiences and re-evaluating problems for solutions, certainly not the mystical, oracular experience mortals clamored of. So he did not understand why he should now be watching his eight-year-old self stalk across the front yard of their old home. Why should this memory assert itself now? What possible element of his childhood could benefit him now?
Young Vergil kicked at a loose stone, glanced up at the sky. Blue, but with thickening clouds to the west. Rain before nightfall, he judged. Just ordinary precipitation, a release of condensed water vapor. What did Dante find so compelling in all this mundanity, Vergil wondered. They were supposed to be having lessons in the conservatory, but his idiot twin had hared off to 'go exploring'. As if there could be anything left within the nearby woodlands his brother had not poked at, pried up, or tried to eat.
"You seem troubled, my son."
Sparda looked out of place on the front lawn, dressed in his formal morning clothes. The snowy cravat was perhaps a little loose, his only concession to the late summer heat. Vergil did not recognize the sword—Devil Arm—that his father bore today, but the handguns were readily identifiable. More mortal glitter to distract Dante, Vergil thought in annoyance.
He did not understand why one so powerful as his father stooped to using such...such... contrived, mechanized representations of power. Anyone could wield a gun. They were mass-produced—well, his father's guns were hand-crafted, he allowed—and required only technical knowledge to master. They had no wills, no spirit or power to pit one's self again. They were tools, not emblems of prowess.
Human things.
And they dazzled Dante like a field of crushed quartz and mica.
"What's so fascinating about all this?" he burst out, waving a hand to indicate the grounds. "He acts like today's grass and trees are somehow different from yesterday's. Once, he came home covered in dirt, all excited because he'd found some insects under a stone."
And he'd expected Vergil to share that excitement, to grasp whatever wonder that kept luring Dante away. As if basic natural science was worth all that energy. The tussle resulting from that comment had broken two vases and dented a table.
Sparda studied him for a long, silent moment. "Your mother was right," he said at last. "It is time that we spoke of certain matters."
Alarmed, Vergil cast back through his memory, trying to recover knowledge of an infraction that might require their father's direct intervention.
"I had expected to have more time before this conversation became necessary, but you are growing faster than anticipated in many ways." Sparda admitted.
The few times their mother had taken them off the estate grounds with her, they had learned very quickly to conceal their true years. Frequently, Eva had been stopped, her sons exclaimed and admired over. Surely these must be her siblings, went the common refrain. Eva looked much too young to have borne adolescent boys!
After a while, Eva left them home at the nest to avoid the questions, a state that made all the males snappish and upset. How was it their fault that their human age-mates were so puny? If they didn't run to obesity, they were sickly-looking things of paper-thin skin and brittle bird-bones with only the promise of muscle clinging to them.
Sparda clasped his hands behind his back. "Walk with me, my son."
Still disquieted, Vergil fell into step beside him. Father was away from home more often than not, sometimes weeks at a time. When he was home, he spent most of his time in his library, a room Vergil and Dante were not allowed to enter without express permission. What could Father possibly have to say to Vergil that could not be said to Dante? Why were they separated for this?
A familiar itch formed between his shoulder blades, an unsavory sense of vulnerability. Being alone was unnatural. He'd been feeling it all too often with Dante scampering off on his 'explorations'.
They began walking towards a stand of cherry trees—Eva's favorites. Not Eva, 'Mother', Vergil corrected himself. When he and Dante had woken from the gestating sleep, still safe within the womb, they had only heard her called 'Eva'. 'Mother' seemed a stranger to them, a person who Vergil had to remind himself of daily. It was easier if he thought of 'Eva' as their father's name for her, one he had no right to use.
Dante, of course, had adapted to the strange rule easily, calling her by several variations of the word. It irked him that E—that Mother was so pleased by that. Why should getting a person's name wrong be something praiseworthy? Didn't their mother appreciate accuracy?
His ill temper returned, and he almost kicked at another stone in the path before he remembered his father's presence. Sparda remained calm and disciplined at all times. Vergil could not remember him even once raising his voice, not even during those rare arguments with Ev—with iMother/i. What had he done to cause her anxiety? It was iDante/i who kept running off, ignoring lessons, being disruptive. Why had she appealed to Father about him?
Sparda came to a halt under the oldest tree, resting a gloved hand on the trunk. "I never anticipated meeting one such as your mother," he said. "In all my time in this world, I have never met her equal in wisdom or courage. I never anticipated I would follow the dictates of blood and bring forth progeny."
Vergil remained as silent and still as possible. He had never once heard this tone in their father's voice. He could not match it to any prior experience or observation. Change, this close to the nest, meant danger. The spot between his shoulder blades began to burn. Where was his brother? Why were they out here alone?
"Vergil. I know you've looked at the iGenus Abyssus/i. One of the Living Books."
The Living Books were mostly forbidden to anyone but Sparda. They were...temperamental. But Father had let him into the library. The tome, for once, had been unchained. The book had let him handle it.
"Yes. I looked at it. It was... like a medieval bestiary," he said, speaking slowly in the hopes that his thoughts might race ahead to something useful. "But I could understand little of the text."
"Bestiary, hmm?" Sparda gave a sharp, humorless laugh. "A stud book would be more accurate. The lineages of the highest in Hell are recorded there, and the listing of the lowest of the castes. It is the only living copy in any of the worlds. I bore it away with me after I slaughtered the rest. But you and your brother would be found no-where in its pages. Can you tell me why?"
How did one make a living book/i? Vergil wondered. How did one go about 'killing' it? Now that was an aspect of natural science that would interest him!
But Father was watching him, the late morning sunlight flashing off his monocle.
"Because we're half-breeds?"
Sparda's eyes narrowed. "Never again let that word pass your lips, not in my hearing and inever/i in your mother's."
Vergil flinched, feeling something twist deep inside. But it was itrue/i. Born from a human, sired by a demon, the result less than either. A genetic dead-end. That was basic science. A solitary creature, with no connection to either world.
"But you are not alone," Sparda said quietly. "You have Dante."
Vergil started. He should not be surprised his father knew the path of his thoughts, he'd seen him respond to Eva's unspoken wishes often enough. Until today, however, Sparda had never done so with either of his sons.
"Dante is—is--!" Not here.
The burning sensation became a drilling pain, as if something sharp was trying to pierce through his spine, into his heart. His twin was out there somewhere Vergil couldn't name, doing things Vergil couldn't understand, while their father was trying to speak of something of import.
"I butchered the copies of the Genus Abyssus I could find—all that I knew of," Sparda said. "But I made a critical error in sparing one. Living Books are, in a way, like you Dante: mirrors of each other. Mirrors reflect off each other. When you touched the Genus, it reflected you back to its own twins. They know of you now, both of you." Sparda turned and looked at him directly, "I believe my enemies have this knowledge as well."
No further need to explain. The nest was endangered. Eva might prevail against minor imps—but the Underworld would send some of its deadliest in pursuit of Sparda's bloodline. The nest was always the target: kill the female and the progeny, end the line. No female would take a male—even an enslaved prisoner—whose nest had been despoiled.
And his idiot twin was off poking badgers with sticks while something important was going on!
"Maybe if Dante had been born a girl, he'd show more sense," Vergil said, resisting the urge to try and reach back and rub at the burning spot. "Mother says girls mature faster."
"Be grateful he is not. A brother and sister born of one birth are a rare prize. Knowing such a pair existed, Hell would raise up such a hunt this world has never seen, not even in its darkest hours. Even without that danger, I would not desire that for you, my son. The price for that power is set too high," the Dark Knight said. "Even among demons, there are some paths that are tread only at direst need."
"Father?" Vergil took a hesitant step forward, very conscious of the darkness of his father's shadow. But Sparda seemed to have forgotten that he was there.
"There is yet one path that may avert this, one alone, if I have the strength..."
If? Father had turned back the armies of the Underworld—alone. He had sealed the gates between the worlds. What could possibly be beyond the Dark Knight's capabilities?
The cherry tree grove darkened, the petals falling as if a giant hand had thrashed the trees. The petals looked more red than pink in the strange half-light. Cold awareness spread over Vergil like a dash of icy sea spray.
He did not remember this conversation taking this turn. His eight-year-old self had not spoken of sisters, his father had not spoken of power, blood, and price. This is not a dream, Vergil realized. The pain between his shoulders had not abated.
"Father."
The Dark Knight allowed a faint smile to soften the hard set of his mouth.
"What is happening here?" Time and space had become a sticky, knotted web, and he was no longer sure where he was, or when. Was his mother still alive here? Was his brother alive at all? "Do you know of that thing that was made from your son? Where is Dante?"
An unfathomable shadow settled behind Sparda's eyes. "I know much that I never told you, my son. And I know that if you do not tread with extreme care, you will lose more than you can calculate."
"Tell me!" He had never raised his voice to his father in his life. But this was his mind, and his twin gone missing. "Who is our enemy?"
But he spoke only to shadows. The wind tossed the tree branches together like knucklebones in a tin cup. No... that was not the wind. Those were bones, scythe-wielding skeletons clawing up out of the ground, reaching for him with their splintered, bony fingers. Jawbones clacked, and the brittle sounds of aged teeth cracking sounded like thin ice giving way.
His eight-year-old body was stronger and faster than a human boy's but he could fall prey to great numbers, just as humans might fall to swarms of insects. And the skeletons crept closer, chittering like beetles, their bones scraping and grinding.
"Dante..." His brother was out there, lost among the ravenous bones. But he was trapped here. Alone. Where was his sword? He'd had his sword, then. "Dante....!"
"Shhhh." A woman's voice soothed him, cool fingers brushing against his forehead. A roiling wave of glittering, opalescent power swept through him, enough to turn aside his enemies, to heal his wounds, to snatch back his life from the death-dealers who sought it.
The shadows collapsed into a more familiar darkness. The pain vanished, as if it were no more than an unexpected memory.
"Dante's fine," the voice said.
He relaxed then, suddenly more tired than he'd been in years. This was a safe enough place, this familiar darkness. It was like home, before the dark had bared its claws. Before his brother had vanished. But the voice had said Dante was fine. He could afford a short rest. Just...
=tbc=
