~...~

"Everything's just gone crazy. I'm still waiting for Sparda to, I don't know, climb out of the ground wearing a pink tutu or something," I said, paging through the collection of Marvel comics stacked in careful piles around me.

"If it sets your mind at ease, that's highly unlikely," Roman muttered. "You're overreacting about this, Cora."

I sighed and looked up from the drawn scene of Spiderman kicking Dr. Oc's butt. Roman's tree house seemed to be shrinking in size as we grew up. The walls were plastered with girls in bikinis and other revealing attire. The remnants of our childhood was every here and there – the sketched map of all the houses where old bullies used to live was still tacked to the wall, in between two centrefolds. There were cobwebs in the corners of the square space, and heaps of magazines littered the floor.

We were both lying on our stomachs side by side. I was the only girl allowed up there, only because I never said anything about the state of it. Lorry complained once about the suggestive poses on some of the posters, and it got her banned from the tree house. I never really noticed. It looked almost as bad as Dante's room – evidently I'd become immune to the 'gasp and stare in shock' response it evoked from other girls.

"He's a jerk. He's playing Dante like the fiddle," I said.

"Maybe you're jealous. You and his brother were pretty good friends before he took off, right? And while he was gone you and Dante hit it off. Maybe you're intimidated that having them reunited will stuff things up for you?"

"Don't be stupid. I'm not jealous," I said. "Guess what he did yesterday."

"Tell me."

"He gave Rebellion and the twins to him," I said, and elaborated when Roman sent me a confused glance. "Ebony and Ivory. His sword and his guns."

"Right," Roman said, and returned to ogling at the motorbike magazine spread out in front of him. "That's bad?"

"He achieved the impossible and convinced Eva to give them back," I said. "How am I going to compete with that?"

"You're Dante's girl, right? That ought to count for something."

"I'm not officially his girl," I said. "And any way, you didn't see his face. He was so happy he almost went bananas. When it comes down to choosing, boy's toys reign supreme over any girl."

"Not necessarily."

"Yeah? If I was trapped in a house caught on fire, which would you go for first? Me, or your guitar?" I asked, nodding my head toward the black and silver electric guitar mounted on its own little stand next to us.

Roman's grey eyes flicked back and forth for a moment. "Is that a trick question?"

"See my point?" I said. "His weapons are his pride. You just don't go around screwing with that unless you have a death wish. I can't beat that," I said, and added sulkily, " And now Vergil has him wrapped around his finger."

"Cor, spare yourself the hassle of trying to win him over. It's more than just materialistic things, y'know. They're brothers. Nah, scratch that – they're twins. Nothing you say or do is going to break that bond," Roman said.

"I know. I'm not trying to break anything," I said defiantly. "It's just that Vergil is doing these things to persuade Dante to join him."

"Join him to do what?"

"Family business," I said and dropped my head on the comic with a thud when Roman groaned in annoyance. "The moral of the story is, Vergil is going to use Dante, and then probably ditch him once he's gotten what he wanted. He's not being a good brother for the sake of being a good brother."

"Don't be so quick to judge. You don't know for sure he's got bad intentions, do you?" Roman said reasonably.

I thought about Vergil first breaking, and then chopping off my hand in a cold alley. What sane person would do such a thing, and threaten to harm his own flesh and blood, if they didn't have bad intentions?

"If it bugs you so much, why don't you just tell Dante?" Roman said when he noted my expression.

"Are you kidding? Vergil will kill me."

"Well, Vergil doesn't have to know Dante knows."

"It's too risky."

"I don't know what to say," Roman said, exasperated.

"I want Dante on my side. So if anything does happen, he'll know I wasn't the bad one."

Roman sighed. "Well. I've been looking at giving my guitar a good home recently."

"What?" I frowned at him, at his guitar, and back. "Why? It took you a year to save up for that."

"I'm getting a new one next week. You can have it," Roman shrugged and gave me a bashful grin. "It might help you out a little, it might not. It depends. I don't know what Dante is into, but if he doesn't like it you can keep it."

"Roman," I said, gaping at him and then staring at the guitar in awe. I knew how holy he's always been over it. "You are the best guy ever."

"Don't mention it. Really, don't. Van will be pissed if he finds out I gave it to you," Roman said. "But I'd rather have it serve a good cause with you, than give it to Van and see it in one of the pawn shops before the end of the month."

We exchanged smiles, and returned to our reading matter. My eye kept wandering to the guitar, though. What would Dante do if I gave it to him? I didn't think presenting him with something like that would have much effect – not any time soon, I mean. He was still on a high from getting his weapons back. My efforts would go unnoticed and unappreciated.

"You staying over?" Roman asked when the sun began to descend beyond the city towers and cast ominous shadows across town.

"No. Eva said she wanted to talk to me when I got home from school. I'm just playing for time. She'll be mad if I don't come home tonight, and she'll send Dante to fetch me," I said, and reached for a special manga edition of Cobra.

"Shouldn't you get going before it gets too dark then?" Roman frowned. "With all the demons running amok, it will be pretty stupid to go out at night."

"Don't worry about me, I can take care of myself," I said dismissively.

"You're not invincible, Cora," Roman said.

"I know," I said, thinking about how my hand had regenerated itself within minutes. I pouted at the look he was giving me. "Come on, Roman. I've got wheels now. Home is just a five minute ride from here."

"A lot can happen in five minutes," Roman said warningly. "Get going, or I'm calling Eva."

"Oh, spoil sport," I snapped, and pushed myself off the floor. I snatched up my slick red helmet and yanked it over my head, smacking and wriggling it until it sat comfortably.

Roman watched me put the guitar in its casing, and I fixed it securely to my back. "Catch you tomorrow!"

"Yeah. Hey, drive safe!" Roman said when I grabbed hold of the thick rope and abseiled down the trunk of the tree.

"Whatever," I called back up, and quietly rounded the house.

My red Kawasaki Ninja looked lonely in the dawning dusk. It took me two tries to get my leg swung over it, because I'm petite – or an oversized midget as Dante put it – and the motorbike was enormous. I was getting better at getting onto it lately, though. I was on tiptoes trying to steady the beast under me when I turned it on and revved it a couple of times.

It didn't matter that I got laughed at by my friends for looking ridiculous, and I didn't care for the discomfort it caused to get onto it in the first place, because say what they want, my bike performed excellently. I could outride demons. Easy.

I pulled onto the street and steered homeward. I kept my eye out for demons, and flew past them in a flurry of red and black. In reality, it was a fifteen minute drive to the Sparda residence.

Once I got onto the straight stretch of road that led from the city to the forbidden countryside, I started to open full throttle to get home in a couple of minutes. The length of road was deserted of any other traffic to keep out for, so I could do this safely.

Or so I thought. I was working my speed up to a hundred and eighty miles when something huge rolled across the road in the blackness. It couldn't be tumbleweed. Tumbleweeds weren't that big.
Two pairs of glowing red eyes glared back at me from the mass, and I had to swerve sharply to avoid the tentacles it extended toward me. I was going too fast, and the bike was leaning too low to the road.

The bike tipped onto its side, and trapped my leg between metal and tar. I skid across the ground for several feet before the momentum of the crash flipped the bike one way, and sent me in a painful summersault off the road. I nearly blacked out from the pain. The world became sluggish around me when I finally came to a halt.

It hurt. Once the dazed realization that I was still alive and breathing sunk in, I noticed the demon rolling toward me through the shattered lens of my helmet. I struggled to yank it off my head, and then in a burst of adrenaline I scrambled to my feet and threw it at the approaching demon with as much force as I could.

"Go to hell!" I screamed at it, releasing the terrified scream that had been locked in my throat during the crash, and collapsed hard onto the ground when the demon changed its course. I spotted my bike lying pathetically on its side several yards up the road, barely illuminated by a dim streetlight. The guitar case was scraped and battered a few feet away from me. I tried to crawl toward it, but my leg rendered me immobile when a scorching pain seared up my thigh and into my side.

My pants were shredded, and the flesh I could see was nearly deformed, that's how bad it was. Something hot and cold all at once tickled down the side of my face, and I touched my fingers to my temple. In the faint moonlight, I could make out the red liquid on my fingers.

That's when something really awful stood out to me. I hadn't noticed it properly before, because it was hard to see well in the dark. My leg was bleeding profusely, but it wasn't the same colour as the drops on my fingers. It was a mouldy, yucky green with a thicker consistency. I restrained myself from gagging at the sight of it.

The certainty that I was going to bleed to death if I didn't somehow get help, and soon, was a severe burden. It was with a heavy heart that I grappled for my phone and dialled the house. Eva was the first to answer with a placid 'Good evening, Eva speaking'.

I didn't talk to her, only put her on hold, and again dialled the same number. The house has several different extensions that calls get put through to when one line is busy. The next person to pick up was Dante. "...be calling at this hour, but they've got damn bad timing. I'm still going to show you a thing or two, just you wait and see." By his tone of voice, I'd interrupted a play session with him and his brother. "Hello, who is this?" He snapped into the phone.

I put him on hold, and once more dialled the number. There were several rings before, finally, Vergil answered.
"What do you want?" He said in a voice that made me feel very inferior. Clearly, they'd decided someone was pulling prank calls on them.

It was demoralising that he was the one I was calling for help. Whether he would actually give a damn about helping me was a chance I was willing to risk. I didn't want Dante to see me like this, especially because he was still fighting my case as a witch rather than a demon. I was hoping Vergil thought of me as a vital enough part of his plan to not let me die. "I had an accident. Can you come help me? Please don't tell Dante."

He hesitated, and the bite in his words dwindled into surprise. "Where are you?"

"You'll know. Just head toward town," I said, staring at the lit windows of the Sparda fortress in the distance. I cut the call off and lay back to stare up at the night sky. I didn't know whether my body was shaking because of the chill in the air, or because of the trauma I'd sustained. It was really hard to stay awake. I fought hard to remain conscious, trying to concentrate on deciphering which of the blinking dots were stars and which were satellites. Part of me knew that if I closed my eyes, I wouldn't open them again.

I tried to sit up when the sound of another bike roared down the street. I thought he was going to speed right by, but the bike came to a sharp skidding stop near my own. One leg extended to balance, and Vergil climbed off the motorbike with a lot more grace than I would ever be able to manage. He wasn't wearing his helmet, and his hair was a windblown mess across his forehead when he looked at my damaged bike.

He studied it briefly, and then he was strolling toward me like he had all the time in the world. His long blue coat swirled around his ankles, and the crunch of his boots across the gravel was the only sound in the abandoned silence around us. How he could see me in the dark all the way from the road was beyond me, but I was faintly grateful because I didn't think I had the competency to call out to him.

Vergil came to a halt beside me and looked down at me, his analysing gaze raking me up and down. He slowly came down on his haunches.
"What happened?"

"A demon happened," I said, and tried to swallow when my words slurred, only to taste blood on my tongue.

"How fast were you going?" Vergil asked.

"I don't remember. Are you going to interrogate me until I die, or are you going to help me?"

Vergil moved, and for a split second I thought he was about to draw Yamato and run me through with it. His hand delved into a pocket, and then he held three glowing blue orbs toward me.

"What is that? I'm not eating that."

"Imbecile. Give me your hand," Vergil scowled.

I hesitated, and jerkily lifted my hand when a look of pure impatience crossed his face. He dropped the orbs onto my palm, and closed his hand over mine. His skin was surprisingly warm, and the orbs startlingly cold. There was a quick, bright blue flash between our hands. The pain, the shakes, and the dizziness snapped off like someone had thrown a light switch. I felt whole. I felt strong. I felt hellishly good.

"What was that?" I asked curiously.

"You're able to get up now?" Vergil answered.

I carefully climbed to my feet, unnerved by the tingling in my legs and arms. "Just so we're clear, this isn't any 'I owe you' type of thing. I'm going to find a way not to help you, you know."

"I go out of my way to help you and this is how you repay me?" Vergil demanded.

"Don't play coy with me," I said, narrowing my eyes at him. "You knew I wasn't going to fall on my knees and worship you for helping me. How could I when you threatened to hurt your own mom and brother?"

"For someone who is in a very delicate situation, you show a great amount of disregard to your own safety. Pretending to be fearless is as good as having no intellect."

"The only thing that scares me anymore is me," I spat back and brushed past him to scoop up the guitar case. "And anyway, I'm more scared you'll hurt the others than me."

"You have a selfless spirit," Vergil said, staying in stride beside me. "You wouldn't have assisted me if I merely threatened to end your life. My mother and Dante make good leverage to have you comply to my wishes."

I thought it over and lifted my bike with a grunt. "Clever bastard. What if I decide I don't give a shit who lives and who dies?"

"Then it was an error on my part to have involved you in my plot at all," Vergil said, mounting his own bike with ease. "Though, I'm never wrong." He looked like Dante right that moment, with his messy hair and the cocky, confident sneer on his lips.

"You'd hope so, wouldn't you?" I said, struggling to get onto my bike. I was still revving it up when Vergil pulled away with a squeal of tyres. I watched his bike fade into the dark.

If I was going to be stuck as a demon, I sure as hell hoped I had some kind of power. Like toasting Vergil's ass with just a glance.

~...~

Author's note, or as I call them, hiccup: Did anyone catch the mention of Cobra? I love Johnson, but I still don't get how he got to be Dante's muse, he seemed pretty dull in comparison from what I recall. Anyway! Hideki is my hero – I want to give him the biggest hug and kiss. I love that dude's brilliant mind *sigh* I still wish I was him though, so I can say 'Dante is MINE' and have copyright to show for it.

*Ahem.* I need help figuring out the timeline and the appropriate age for Dante throughout the games, so if anyone has mastered to do this, please HELP?

I know in DMC3 he was 19, but which came after DMC 3? Was it DMC 2, or DMC1? I know DMC 1 took place before the events of DMC 4, because Dante hooks up with Trish in 1 and in 4 they're accustomed to one another as a team (I'm guessing Dante is late 30's, early 40's, it's hard to tell with all that WHITE HAIR! Lol)

If anyone has figured out the right age and sequence of events, please PM me. I suck at numbers, I always get it wrong. And if anyone knows what age Nero is, that would be very helpful as well (I'm taking a guess of between 19 and 21?) I can't figure out when exactly Eva died and the boys got split up. I know Trish says something about 20 years ago, but that's not helpful since I don't know how old Dante is in DMC1.