One would have sworn that he was saying "Ave,"
Since she who turned the key to open up
Love on high was also imaged there,
--Dante wrote about Mary, finally assenting
in Divine Comedy. from Purgatory, Cantos X
Up in the sky, the sun stood still in its glorious light, hidden obscurely with wisps of those stray clouds. The Twin towers sharpened like a chiaroscuro painting, the glassy edifice silhouetted against the backdrop of its canvas, which created a fantastic imagery for the two arrivals.
Below, a Devil hunter had answered the call to the demonic energies that had plagued the Twin Cities. She was not alone. Demons disappeared in and out of the buildings, afflicting citizens. They came out of sewers and hidden crevices,out from the darkened corners of the near abandoned streets.
From an aerial perspective, one could see the cities as magnificent as any modernized architectural beauty. Judging a book by its cover is fatal as upon closer look, the scent of blood and death basked in the charm of the red glow of the drowning sun. When a building had been decimated, it transformed back to its original form. There were very few helicopters and tanks that had made its way through the haphazard of the sections of each district.
The noises came from the humming of turning mechanical wheels and the bombs of canons that hit the side of great powerful glass buildings. They broke in a billion pieces only to shatter deadly rain down the street. The power who wields the reversal of broken glass back to its original construction lived high above the top most of the towers.
At least that's what the Lady and her companions were assuming.
The ebony haired woman took out her precious Kalina Ann and fired into the oncoming spiteful imps. The ears on these imps were elongated and possessed eyes that slanted, darkened. On their faces - painted a malicious and malevolent nature. They cackled noisily as their arms pushed their smaller bodies upon the gravel, scooting their way to the humans.
The impact of the blow sent several of them into the metal railings and made huge indentions. Some exploded upon contact while others scrambled for another attack. By then the men had fired into them rounds of bullets that pumped holes in their bodies.
Lady's companion, a man with an army colored attire and sun kissed brown hair held a rifle and fired into the rest of the imps. He and his buddies, two other men, bigger in build, carried different weapons to shoot at the onslaught of demons.
After the imps had been decimated, they all stood there observing the quiet calm of the streets. Many of the humans were put under a cover of protection inside a safe dwelling. They were afraid that there were still a few humans running around the street, hiding in fear from demons that came at will.
"Looks like we took care of these demons, Lady." The man beside her replied in a breathless tone. He looked over at the woman whose serious expression belied her innocence. She was recharging her demonic gun, the one which Dante, her once best friend gave her a long time ago.
He walked over to her, "Are you ever going to use that?" The man scanned around then and saw his buddies search the perimeter for any more demons and found that he could relax for a moment. Taking out a crumpled packet of smokes from his front shirt jacket he placed one half broken cigarette between his lips. He noted that she was quiet.
"Something troubling you, Lady?"
She turned to look at him. Her eyes always held fascination to him and found that he would stare and stare at her not hearing a word she said. But she half smiled, something else that she didn't often do, "Yes, I will use it, but only for the big boss up there." She looked up at the sky, her eyes focused on to a sight at the top most towers as the descending sun peeked from behind.
Then her expression hardened again, "He'll be sorry he ever wanted to be a demon…"
She cursed and spat on the ground, the man next to her grinned and lit his smoke. He held his two cupped hands to light the cigarrette, which created a yellow glow, illuminating his hardened, strong features. The days growth on his beard began to itch and he rubbed on it subconsciously after he took a long puff, "Want to go up now?"
"No. He's expecting us. Not now. We'll go when he least expects it."
"Now how do you expect we do that?"
Lady looked at him again, approached him, she shook her head, "Tch tch, have some faith in me, Joe." Her hand reached up to touch the bristles on his day growth beard.
"You didn't fall in love with me, because I can shoot better than most men."
He half grinned and wanted to touch the hand with his lips, but she pulled away. Joe was too shy deep down and unsure of her affections. Instead he choked out, "I'm just waiting until all this crap is over so we can have some time together."
She finally laughed, "I want that too." There was a soft glow on her face. "But we got to take care of this before we do. Come on; let's go catch up with the others. I think Joachim took a big blow on his arm and needs it patched up. I gotta take care of you guys."
As his grin widened, Joe watched her depart towards the rest of the men. Even the destruction and chaos around and how dark the days were, seeing the deaths and people suffering made a grown man like him wince. But knowing the future was with her, it made everything all worth while. He took a moment to look around, the quiet stillness was like a death ray, or that they were inside the eye of the storm.
If he could fight to live with her, through her thorny attitude and the thorns of this world, it would be worth it. He could inhale the sweet smell of roses as he closed his eyes- she was a glimpse of that heaven.
She met him through Lucia and he was everything she hoped and wished for. He was kind and good, and most of all he was human. Everything that her father wasn't. Her visit with Lucia proved to be satisfactory and she received all the weapons and refills of special bullets that would help her along the upcoming missions. In the meantime, the two girls became fast friends. Lady gave Lucia a special phone number and password of her old friend, Dante. That if Lucia ever needed help someday, Dante would prove to be her most powerful ally.
Joe never asked about her past with other demons, for it was clear to him that she received weapons of demonic origins. She spoke about her father and that it angered him that he wasn't the one to help take care of the son of a bitch in the first place. All he knew was that Lady was able to avenge her mother, but she never stopped there. Lady wanted to make sure the rest of the world would not suffer the same fate as she. Joe would follow her to the ends of the earth for this and considered himself the luckiest man to have gotten her promised to him.
He threw his cigarette with the flick of his fingers, the butt of it landed into the sewers. He didn't see a pair of red eyes that stared at him from the dark hole below.
When Joe caught up with them, the four of them made their way into the entrance of the twin towers.
Just below them, the criss-cross of the free way structure revealed three new comers. They didn't hear the low roar of the two motorcycles riding into the city streets:
XX
They passed through the yawning gateway that intertwined, like two snakes battling together, which reached to the top.
Enzo exclaimed aloud behind Trish, "Isn't it marvelous? I've never been within these city walls. The streets themselves look like they've been shined with silver and chrome."
The lights above them hung with chains of lights: red, green and yellow of the official stop and go rules. When the dust lifted from the streets, it glittered in the air and disappeared into the background. The buildings beckoned them further in and the empty streets revealed different routes and above them, spirals of freeways constructed like roller coasters and buildings set upon the side, which precariously sat on the edges.
Trish snorted, "Yeah, but you can smell the demons everywhere. It's reeking with it." She looked over at her partner, "Dante, do you want to split up?"
Dante considered it for a moment and deeply inhaled. There was a sense of something here that he couldn't understand. After a few moments, he nodded, "Yeah, you can take Enzo with you if you want. Or do you want me to take him?"
Enzo squirmed in his seat; his pudgy fingers held on to the smaller waist of his driver, "I can protect Trish, Dante. I'll stick with her." Dante saw Trish roll her eyes heavenward. Her dark sunglasses were still at the top of her blonde tresses for the sun was low and night would be making its arrival soon.
The silver haired half devil chuckled, "Right. More like she'll have to save your ass. If you have weapons, don't be afraid to use it and stick to Trish." He sharply looked at Enzo, "Oh and one more thing, don't cause any trouble."
Trish called out to Dante as he made the right turn, "Be careful, Dante!"
The demon hunter's bike made smoky clouds as he departed leaving the two of them to contemplate their surroundings. Enzo breathed out a warning, "TRISH! Look up ahead!"
His index finger pointed at the direction of the new intruders.
They rose up from underground, the ground beneath them swirled like water and their limbs were of animal nature: hooves and bent knees covered in matted down fur. Their horns on their heads were goat like in nature, but their voices carried the noises of dying cows, which echoed out to them in invitation. Trish heard their cry for blood and knew of their ilk. The language they spoke, though incoherent, she could make out their angry outbursts.
"Time to get ready, Enzo. You better get your gun out and start shooting! I can't baby-sit you right now so stay here and don't get close to them!"
Trish didn't see the horrified look on Enzo's face, but he shakily reached for his gun in his side pocket. It was a 33 caliber, which he held between his fingers pointed at the demons.
Some of the blood goats rushed in and attacked the lithe blonde, but she was nimble on her feet, going sideways as she held her twin pistols: Sparda's weapons, the Luce and Ombra. She fired away, the toes of her feet tapped on the concrete like a ballerina as her opponents slung energy balls at her. They barely missed her by mere centimeters, and Trish moved forward, double jumped, taking the Sparda blade from behind her back and swung heavy swipes at the first blood goat.
Her battle cry echoed in the air while Enzo hid behind the cover of the motorcycle shooting from his small pistol. He closed his eyes and mumbled prayers that Trish would kill those bad guys. He held his hands over his head and dropped the weapon, cowered and whimpered out, "I can't shoot! I can't shoot!"
On the other side of the city, Dante had sped his way towards the twin towers. That was where he was going to find the source of the parade of demons plaguing the city and overrunning outside the city walls. As he got closer, the smell of death was all around him. He pretended to wipe the smell of carcass as he knicked his nose with the side of his fist. His light sapphire eyes seem to glint dangerously as he heard the sound of glass breaking and saw a fast falling figure exiting from one of the towers' windows. A demon had fallen from the sound of shot gun blasts and machine guns. This demon possessed several arms, some were obviously blown off dropped from stories high into the pavement in front of him.
The glass shattered all around the dead demon as it haloed its black blood. Dante narrowed his eyes at the demon.
"Damn. Looks like someone doesn't like your ugly ass."
He noted the higher level of the fallen victim and Dante's eyes sped back up to the tower where the body fell from.
Dante's astonished light blue eyes took in the sight.
There above him, many levels up, stood a young woman. Her distinctive weapon a familiar signature with her. With his eagle eye vision, he knew instantly.
He swallowed and caught his breath.
"Lady….."
notes: If no one recognized, I used a bit of dmc2 enemies & elements here.
Also wanted to bring Nelo in but he gets his own chapter next. Long time no update, but i had these in my files for awhile. Just a couple more chapters and it's all over.