It was early afternoon when they returned to the house. Kyrie's relief at their safe return was quickly eclipsed by concern as she took in their condition. "Everyone, into the kitchen," she ordered. "I'll get the first aid kit."

"I'm not sure we need it," Lady protested. "I'm not injured, just dirty. Trish can heal herself, and Nero—"

Kyrie seized Nero's right hand and pulled his arm into view. The burns showed an angry red against his pale skin. "Kitchen. Now."

Nero knew his wounds would heal on their own within a day, but he also knew better than to argue with Kyrie. While she couldn't fight demons herself, he knew she saw caring for him as her contribution to his work. And he had to admit, there were times it was nice to be fussed over, even if he had more pressing concerns just now.

Rosso and Zaffiro followed the crowd into the kitchen, curious, but Kyrie quickly shooed them away. "Can you two stay in the living room for a little while, please?"

Rosso leaned closer to peer at Nero's arm. "Oh, you got hurt bad. What'd you do?"

"It's not as bad as it looks," Nero assured him.

"Boys, out," Kyrie said firmly. Rosso made a show of sulking, but they obeyed. Trish positioned herself in the doorway to keep watch for young eavesdroppers.

Kyrie waited until she'd cleaned and salved Nero's burns before asking the obvious question. "Tell me what happened. Did you kill the Nilepoch?"

Nero shook his head. "We did some damage, but it got away."

She looked up, anxious. "Does that mean it will be back in another thirteen days? Or…"

"We don't know," Lady sighed, dropping into a chair opposite Nero. "We don't know if it will be back, we don't know where, and we don't know when. There are a staggering number of things we don't know. First and foremost of which…" She set an empty lemonade bottle on the table. Within it glimmered the shards they'd collected from the Nilepoch.

Kyrie squinted into the bottle. "What are these?"

"We think they may be crystallized fragments of the power the Nilepoch stole from Dante and Vergil." Nero kept his voice low despite Trish's watchful eye. He didn't want the twins listening in on any of this until they had decided what to do about it. "There's a chance it could help restore them to their actual ages."

"There's an equal chance it could do something else," Lady added. "It could do nothing, it could contain the wrong kind of power, it could overwhelm them and kill them."

"It didn't kill me," Trish pointed out. "Admittedly, I only touched a small fragment, but my body only reabsorbed as much power as it had lost."

"So calculating from a sample size of one, it appears that it could restore them." Lady shook her head. "I'm not saying we absolutely shouldn't try it, but I'm not sure I'm ready to risk Dante and Vergil's lives without at least taking some precautions."

Kyrie nodded. "There are the logistics to consider, too. We can't unleash any kind of unknown power with the other children around, for example."

From down the hall they heard Nico, who had been out refueling the van, enter the house and greet the twins. She joined them in the kitchen a moment later and immediately began scavenging for food. "That sandwich was great, Kyrie," she said. "But I'm still a mite peckish. Do you mind if…?"

Nero rolled his eyes. "Of course the one who wants more food is the one who was sitting on her ass in the van all morning, and not the three fighting tooth and nail with a killer demon."

Nico scowled back at him, "I can't help it if I get hungry!"

"It's a shame that pizza place doesn't deliver out here," Trish commented. "I could really go for something with extra cheese right now."

"Ooh, that sounds yummy!" Nico brightened. "I could go pick up a couple o' pizzas."

"Is food all you people think about?" Nero shook his head. "Fine. Go feed yourself. We'll decide on the twins' fates without you."

Nico looked over at him in surprise. "You mean I get a vote? I kinda thought that was all up t'you, it bein' your family, an' all."

All eyes shifted to Nero. "I… thought it would be a group decision," he managed. "I mean, you two have known Dante and Vergil a lot longer than I have, and Kyrie's got a good point about logistics…"

"I don't think it needs to be all-or-nothing," Kyrie said gently. "Let's all discuss it, and maybe we can come to a consensus without forcing any one person to make the call."

Nico edged toward the door. "I don't really have an opinion, so I'll, uh, go get that pizza."

"Fine." Nero waited until he heard her open the garage door before rolling his eyes. "I guess it's easier to say 'I told you so' if you didn't take part in the decision-making process."

"I think she has a point." Trish finally left the doorway to sit at the table. "Of all of us, her relation to Dante and Vergil is the most tenuous, and she has the least experience with…" She waved her hand toward the lemonade bottle. "The vagaries of demonic power. If she doesn't wish to be involved, I don't see any reason to insist on it. It's not as though she has any great insight into what's going on. We're all flying blind here."

"We certainly are." Lady picked up the bottle and examined the shards. "In any case: We have three fragments, of varying size and unknown ability. What do we do with them?"

Kyrie gave a thoughtful hum. "The first question seems to be, do you think it's worth exposing Dante and Vergil to something with unknown consequences, even if it's the only way to restore them to adulthood?"

"I don't think it's the only way," Nero said. "At the rate they've been growing, it seems like they'll eventually recover on their own. They've aged about nine years in, what, three months? So if they keep that up, they'll be back to normal within a year." He sighed. "But as much as I hate to admit it, we just about got our asses handed to us today. If the Nilepoch comes back, I don't know if we'll be able to kill it without their help."

"And if the Nilepoch returns, it will likely be much sooner than a year from now," Lady added. "It's probably still out there even now, since it didn't succeed in absorbing any demonic power to jump forward in time. If we're lucky, it will find something else to feed on and stay away from the city, but I don't think we can count on that."

Trish leaned back in her seat. "So we gamble with Dante and Vergil's lives in order to have a chance of protecting the people of Fortuna."

Kyrie glanced between them. "Is that something you're willing to do?"

"I know what Dante would choose," Trish said quietly. "It's what he's always chosen."

Nero snorted. "Somehow, I have the feeling that's not the same choice Vergil would make."

"Not if you put it in those terms," Lady said. "But if you told him there was a demon more powerful than himself out there? He'd absolutely want to go fight it, just to prove you wrong."

"Oh, definitely," Trish agreed. "We're talking about the prize specimen who challenged the lord of the underworld to a duel, after all."

Kyrie blinked at that, and Nero recalled that she was the only one who hadn't heard the story of Vergil's defeat and enslavement. Perhaps, once everything settled down, he could fill her in. "So it sounds like we're all leaning toward trying to use the shards to restore them. Am I reading that right?" Nero glanced around the table. "Kyrie? You haven't stated an opinion yet."

"I'm not really comfortable with it, but if there's no other way to stop the Nilepoch…" She bit her lower lip. "I've always hated those hypothetical ethics questions about sacrificing a small number of people for the greater good, but I suppose that's the real dilemma we're facing here. I just wish the ones at risk of being sacrificed weren't children in my care."

"They're not really children," Trish pointed out. "And they risk their lives every single day, doing what we do."

"I know. I know they wouldn't even be in this situation if they hadn't gone to hunt the Nilepoch in the first place. I just… I don't want it to win." Kyrie's hands, folded on the table, clenched until her knuckles were white. "If they die now, after everything we've done, if they become victims of the Nilepoch like the others you found… I don't want these past three months to have been for nothing."

Nero covered her hands with his. "Hey. You're always telling me that even if a kid is with us for only a short time, we become part of each other's lives, right? That even the little things we do with them matter? Nothing is gonna take away these last few months. No matter what happens from here on out, that time means something. Rosso and Zaffiro will always be a part of our lives."

She gave a tight nod, but the tension in her hands remained. "How does it work? The… crystals, or whatever they are."

"I don't understand the mechanics of it," Lady admitted. "Trish? What happened with you?"

Trish shrugged. "I touched one of the pieces, and the energy just seemed to enter my body. Undoing the damage wasn't a pleasant experience, but at least it was brief."

"But you were only healing from a small injury. Given the extent to which Dante and Vergil's bodies will have to recover, it could involve a lot more physical stress." Lady tipped the lemonade bottle to one side, considering the shards within. "I think we need to start with just the smallest fragment and see how it goes. Too much change at once could be devastating."

"Sounds reasonable," Nero said. "Which one do we give the first piece to?"

Silence fell across the table as they all eyed each other, unwilling to state a preference. "We don't know how much power these fragments contain," Lady said at last. "There may not be enough to restore both of them. If we want Dante to be able to fight the Nilepoch, we should start with him. With… Tony, I mean."

"But if something goes wrong, and Dante is…" Trish hesitated. "…unable to fight because of it, we'll be no better off. If we start with Vergil, we can see how the restoration works, and then know how to proceed with Dante."

Lady rubbed her eyes. "Trish, I know you want to be sure Dante is safe—and so do I—but we can't just treat Vergil like a guinea pig."

"At the risk of saying aloud what we're all pretending not to be thinking: Dante is the one whose safety matters." Trish held up a hand to forestall Lady's protest. "I'm not saying we don't care about Vergil, but the truth is, we mostly care about Vergil because Dante cares about Vergil, and we care about Dante. More importantly, Dante cares about humanity, and Fortuna and a lot of other places wouldn't be here today if he hadn't stood between them and the demonic forces bent on their destruction—whereas historically, Vergil has spent most of his life being that destructive force. If our entire reason for doing this is to protect humanity from the Nilepoch, we need to ensure that Dante comes out in fighting condition."

"And what if there isn't enough power contained in these fragments to restore both of them?" countered Lady. "If we divide it between them, and Dante ends up stuck as a fifteen-year-old kid with no combat skills, are you going to send him to fight the Nilepoch anyway?"

"We should let them decide." Kyrie's voice, uncharacteristically sharp, cut across the table and silenced both of them. "If we're prepared to sacrifice those boys on the altar of the greater good, the least we can do is give them a say in who goes first. We'll explain the circumstances as best we can, and they can decide for themselves whether or not they're willing to take the risk. If their characters are as you described them—if Dante truly wants to protect everyone, and Vergil is truly competitive enough to take on any challenge—then one or both of them will jump at the chance. But you can't decide their fates by playing favorites, or waging games of strategy. They're our family, and both of them matter to us!"

Kyrie's hands were trembling, and Nero tightened his grip on them. "Kyrie's right. It's not our call. They may look like kids for now, but their lives don't belong to us. They have to walk into this willingly." He attempted to dispel the tense mood with a shrug. "Besides, you know Dante would never forgive us if we threw Vergil under the bus in order to keep him safe, and Vergil would be seriously pissed that we gave Dante better odds against the Nilepoch than him. I'd rather just let them flip a coin and settle it between themselves than have to explain why we picked one or the other."

"I guess you're right about that." Lady admitted. "So. Who draws the short straw and has the fun of explaining all this to them?"

All eyes gravitated toward Nero, who sighed. "Fine, I'll do it. But I think it should just be me and them. They'll be under a lot more pressure if they have four adults staring at them, expecting them to make a decision."

Kyrie nodded agreement. "The other question is, when? We have the other children to think about. I don't think we should experiment with these shards near them, especially since we don't know how it will affect Rosso and Zaffiro physically. I hate to even think it, but if something does go wrong, it could be traumatic for the rest of the children to witness it."

"I agree, though I'm not sure where else we could take the boys." Lady drummed her fingers on the table as she thought. "I guess there are a lot of abandoned buildings around the city, but I'd prefer to be someplace with a working telephone, in case of emergency. And preferably indoor plumbing, in case of a long wait."

"We could always go back out near the mines in Nico's van," Trish suggested. "It doesn't help with the telephone, but it has the advantage of isolation."

Lady frowned. "But do we really want to take these fragments back to where we know the Nilepoch is running loose? For all we know, it can sense them, and the last thing we need is to be attacked again while Rosso or Zaffiro is with us."

Nero twisted to look at the calendar Kyrie kept on the wall. "There's a long weekend coming up, isn't there?"

"Sort of," Kyrie said. "This Friday is a conference day for the teachers, so there's only a half-day of school. The children will be home by noon."

"So… what if we take the other kids out in Nico's van?"

"Take them where, exactly?"

Nero shrugged. "Out camping, maybe? Or to one of the coastal parks? It would give them all a change of scenery for a couple days, which is something they haven't had in a long time. I'll stay here with whichever one of the twins wants to go first, and that way we have the whole weekend to deal with any fallout if it doesn't go as planned. But we'll be well away from where we left the Nilepoch, and there's a phone and plumbing here."

Kyrie considered it. "I suppose if we all sleep in the van, it wouldn't cost much. But we don't normally leave the city without you. Will we be safe from demons out there?"

Nero glanced between the other two women at the table. "Trish can go with you."

Trish looked appalled. "You want me to spend three days trapped in a van with the small humans?"

"It's only two days. I know Lady's had more practice corralling the kids, but you're the one who can actually sense demons incoming. Plus, you don't sleep, so nobody will have to trade off watches during the night. I'd feel better having you out there. And it's not as though you'd be trapped in close quarters with the kids," he pointed out. "You can sit on the van roof the whole weekend, for all I care."

"Except for making s'mores, of course," Kyrie added with a smile. "You'll want to join us for that."

Trish's eyes narrowed. "What are those?"

"Delicious," Nero said. "You make them over a campfire. They're this gooey, melted…" He saw the interest in a new food discovery kindling in Trish's eyes. "You know what, I'm not gonna spoil it for you. You can find out for yourself."

"Fine." Trish leaned back in her chair. "I can be bought."


Before long, Nico returned, arms laden with a stack of pizza boxes. "They was havin' a special," she explained as she transferred her burden to the kitchen table. "Figured Kyrie deserves a night off from cookin' once in a while. These'll stay hot in th'oven until the kiddies get home."

Nero thought he detected a trace of apology in her voice, and it certainly wasn't like Nico to spring for a family meal. Perhaps she felt guilty about running out on their previous conversation. "Thanks, Nico."

The scent of oregano and pepperoni filled the house, and in a matter of seconds, Rosso was leaning around the doorjamb. "Is that for snack time?"

"That's for dinner. Nico's brought us all a treat." Kyrie set the oven to a low temperature and began transferring the food to a baking sheet.

Rosso's tongue ran over his lips. He hadn't taken his eyes from the grease-stained boxes. "Can we have some now? I'm hungry."

"You can wait another hour. The others will be home soon."

"Actually…" Nero glanced between Kyrie and Rosso. He didn't like countermanding her when she'd already said no, but placating Rosso with food might make him more settled and attentive. "The boys can split a slice, can't they? While we have that talk?"

After a second's hesitation, Kyrie nodded. "I suppose that won't be enough to spoil their dinner. Go fetch your brother, Tony." When he'd gone, she retrieved two plates and cut one pizza slice in half. "Are you sure you want to do this now?" she asked Nero.

"There's no advantage to waiting. And we need to plan for the weekend."

Rosso raced back into the kitchen, dragging Zaffiro, who looked mildly annoyed at being pulled away from his reading. Rosso scrambled into the chair beside Trish, who watched with amusement as he fixated on the pizza Kyrie was holding.

"Some things never change," Trish murmured before standing. "Well, I think that's our cue. We'll leave you to spring the question."

Zaffiro edged away from Trish and took his seat only when she and Lady had left the kitchen. "What question?" he asked warily.

Nero waited until Kyrie had served each boy his portion of pizza and left, giving Nero a nod of encouragement. "We, uh, need to talk about something important," he began.

Rosso's mouth was almost visibly watering. "Can we eat while we talk?"

"You can eat while you listen. Slowly," he warned, as Rosso began to cram the entire slice into his mouth. Reprimanded, Rosso sank his teeth into the tip of the triangle and wrestled with the melted cheese.

Zaffiro nibbled at his slice with more reserve, and swallowed before speaking. "What's the important thing?"

Nero stared down at the table, wishing he'd taken the time to work out how best to explain the situation before jumping in blind. But then, planning ahead had never been part of his skill set. "Okay, this is gonna be a little hard to explain…" He struggled for a few seconds before amending, "Nope, it's gonna be almost impossible to explain. So you're just gonna have to go with me on some of this." He drew and expelled a deep breath. "I know you two dream of another place at night. Another city. A place where you had a house, right? And… your parents?"

Rosso's chewing slowed, and Zaffiro set down his pizza before they nodded in unison.

"Right," Nero continued. "See, those dreams… they aren't really dreams. Not normal ones, anyway. They're memories. That's why you both dreamed about the same place, and why it all felt real to you, because… because all that really happened. A long time ago."

Zaffiro sat very still, but Nero could see his mind working. "How can we have memories that happened a long time ago?"

What could he tell them? That they were really middle-aged men who had had more than forty years of their lives stripped away? "Um. Okay, you know the bad things you told me about, from your dreams?" To Nero's relief, Zaffiro's only reaction was a nod. "Well, a few months ago, a really bad one attacked you and your brother. It hurt you both pretty badly. You don't remember it because it also stole all your memories of the time before you came to live with us."

Rosso frowned as he licked the last of the pizza sauce from his fingers. "How could something do that?"

"Uh… Magic." Nero braced himself for expressions of disbelief, but the boys seemed to take that explanation at face value. Perhaps their childhood memories had included enough unexplained phenomena that they already accepted the existence of the otherworldly. "You're older than you think you are, and you had a lot more memories before that demon—the bad thing—took them. But here's the problem: The demon that attacked you came back, and now it's hurting other people. Lady and Trish and I tried to stop it, but we can't do it without some help."

Zaffiro was watching Nero intently, but Rosso's gaze wandered to the half-eaten slice of pizza on his brother's plate. After a few seconds, Rosso's hand darted toward it. Without taking his eyes from Nero, Zaffiro slammed his fist down on his brother's fingers. Rosso gave an indignant yelp and jerked away.

"Hey!" Nero snapped. "Knock it off, both of you."

Zaffiro scowled at the reprimand. "He tried to take my food."

"He wasn't eating it!" Rosso rubbed his hand, though Nero could tell he hadn't sustained any significant injury. "Why can't I have it, if he doesn't want it?"

"Quiet." Nero glared from one twin to the other. "This is serious. What I'm about to tell you is going to make a big difference in your lives, and depending on what you choose, you might never get the chance to eat pizza again. Ever. So listen up."

That got their attention. Zaffiro's posture grew even more rigid, and Rosso sat still and fixed wide eyes on Nero. Nero would have laughed, had his heart not been thundering with anxiety. It figures that pizza is the thing that finally gets through to him.

"Before you had your memories taken away, both of you… knew how to fight the demons. If you had those memories back, you could help us stop this thing before it hurts anyone else." Nero picked up the bottle with the iridescent shards. "These are pieces of the demon that hurt you. They may contain some of your memories, but we don't know for sure. If you touch one of these pieces, there's a chance you'll get your memories back, but…"

Zaffiro's eyes flicked from the bottle to Nero's face. "But it could hurt us?"

"Yeah. It could. It could even kill you. We don't have any way of knowing. We don't even know if there's enough pieces for both of you, or just one. So it's up to you whether or not you want to try it. Get your memories back so you can help us, but risk getting seriously hurt, or stay the way you are now and be safe. It's your choice. There's no right or wrong answer."

A crease formed between Zaffiro's eyebrows. Rosso chewed his lower lip and looked down at the table. "We're supposed to help," he murmured, and Nero was reminded of what he'd said when he was only half this size, when he'd tackled a bully in the park to protect Flavia. "We're supposed to stop bad things from hurting people, as long as we don't hurt anyone more. Isn't that what 'least harm' means?"

"Yeah, it is. I'm glad you were listening when Kyrie explained it." Nero's smile faded and he leaned forward, catching Rosso's eyes. "But none of us are going to ask you to do something this dangerous. If you want to help, even though you could get hurt, you can. If you don't want to, you don't have to. It's fine with us, either way."

Rosso frowned. "But you said if we don't help you, you can't stop it."

"I did, but…" Nero shrugged. "We'll just have to think of something else."

Zaffiro peered intently at the bottle in Nero's hands. "And there's only enough for one of us?"

"We really don't know." Nero replaced the bottle in the middle of the table and leaned back. "Even if there is enough for you both, we'd only let one of you try it at first, until we see…" He swallowed, but there was no sugarcoating the truth at this point. "Until we see whether or not it's safe."

The furrow in Zaffiro's brow deepened. "And… we could die."

Nero sighed. "I can't promise you wouldn't."

The boys were silent for a long time. Rosso stared at the shards, apparently deep in thought, while Zaffiro's furtive gaze flicked from the bottle to his brother. At last Rosso seemed to come to a decision. "Bad things… have to be stopped," he said reluctantly, extending a hand toward the bottle. "I guess I—"

Zaffiro's hand closed on his brother's wrist. "I'll do it."

Rosso stared at him, wide-eyed, and Nero tried to read his expressionless face. "Are you sure? You seemed even less keen on the idea than your brother did."

"I'm sure."

Nero wasn't convinced. "Why?"

Zaffiro's eyes narrowed. "Does it matter? I've said I would." He ripped off a mouthful of the now-cold pizza, his lip curling at the texture of the congealed cheese. For a moment Rosso seemed about to speak, but then, uncharacteristically, he shrank back in his seat.

From the front of the house came the sound of a door and excited voices, and Nero knew the time for discussion was over. "All right," he sighed, pocketing the bottle. "I guess that's the decision made."


NOTES

There was a brief moment when I thought, "Wait, are s'mores an appropriate food item for the DMC universe?" and then I remembered Nero's quip about "I'm bringin' the fire!" and knew that toasted marshmallows had to get mentioned at least once.