Title: Small Sacrifices
Fandom: Devil May Cry
Characters: Vergil, Lady, Arkham
Prompt: #22; Spatter
Word Count: 872
Rating: R
Summary: Vergil and Arkham are partners, and yet, their mutual dislike runs deep.
Author's Notes: Requested by my sister. I think she wanted something funny. She, um, didn't get it. This is based on the manga, and if Code:3 ever comes out, will probably be completely contradicted.

Thank you, tenshiamanda1987, and good luck to you on your challenge, Bustahead!

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"…I've done it."

The small windowless room was coated in blood; from the ceiling to the floor there wasn't a square foot of wall that was unmarred, not a patch of ground that wasn't spattered with fluids and painted with morbid runes.

There must have been several victims – no one human could have produced that much blood, and there were too many body parts. Fingers and toes were scattered around like flower petals, eyeballs of assorted colors were strung up by the cord of nerves from the ceiling. Five, six people.

A circle of candles surrounded the star of this show, a female human corpse. She was naked from the waist up, dressed in only a long white skirt streaked with crimson, yet there was nothing pornographic about her. Indeed, the director of this scene had traded one kind of obscenity for another: the flesh of her torso was all but removed and her heart had been carved out.

It was impressive for an old man. Really.

Vergil found it distasteful.

He stood in a corner, away from the grime and careful to keep his boots out of the muck. He'd seen more than his share of butchered bodies, and he knew more than most what some of the rituals of the Underworld entailed. He still didn't understand why he was required to indulge Arkham in his sick hobbies. "Are you quite finished?"

Arkham's hands were coated in a layer of blood so thick he appeared to be wearing gloves. Human bits were clumped on his chest, and the splatters of blood around his eyes made him look even more deranged than normal. "Vergil," he said. "I have only begun."

Vergil waited for the monologue. When it didn't come he scowled. "Are you planning on making me beg for the story, old man? I honestly don't care what it is you've done here."

Arkham's eyes glittered, they almost looked like they were glowing. "I have gained power like no man ever has before."

"I'll bet." Because the man was willing to sink to depths of depravity previously unexplored by humankind, most likely.

"You don't understand."

"Considering that you refuse to speak to me in anything but the most cryptic of sentences," Vergil said, "then I would have to agree. I have no idea what is it you're talking about." His patience was running out, and the smell was getting to him.

"I have become a monster."

He said it with such pride. Such unrestrained ego, such obvious pleasure in the carnage he had created.

Vergil snorted. "I see no difference."

Arkham's eyes flashed furiously, and this time there was no doubt. They were glowing. Perhaps he had gained some powers, after all, and Vergil half-hoped the old man would think to test them on him.

But the anger faded with his eyes. "Of course," Arkham said, his voice as oily as ever. "I am nothing compared to a son of Sparda, now, am I?"

Vergil could almost hear the words on Arkham's lips: Not yet.

The day Vergil no longer needed him could not come soon enough.

"Father? Father, where are you? I can't find Mother anywhere…"

It was a girl's voice, lower than Alice's, and coming from the hall outside. Light footsteps were coming closer, and the intrusion stopped the conversation cold.

Vergil expected Arkham to panic, but the man hardly seemed to notice. He started wiping his hands on a handkerchief, and didn't blink when the door swung open.

As the voice suggested, it was a girl, about sixteen years old and dressed like a Catholic schoolgirl. "Father, I'm looking for—" She broke off in a strangled yell.

"Mary," Arkham said, mildly. "I'm working now, be a good girl and wait outside."

Vergil had never laid eyes on the girl, but her identity was painfully obvious, with her strangely colored eyes. The shock was settling in, her hands were shaking and her eyes were glazing, her gaze fixed on the body in the center of the room. Her mouth moved without sound.

"Mary," Arkham said, "I told you to wait outside."

Vergil could read the word on Mary's lips, though he didn't really need to. He'd suspected as much, already.

Mo… Mo… Mother…

"Arkham," Vergil snapped. "Clean up this mess." He wasn't talking about the body, he was talking about the girl.

Her head snapped up at his voice, her eyes met his. And still, he got the distinct feeling that she wasn't really seeing him.

She turned on her heel and ran.

Arkham finished wiping his hands and placed the handkerchief back in his pocket, despite the fact that it was dripping with blood. "That's not important," he said. "Come, we have work to do."

Vergil ground his teeth at the order, but he followed. He needed Arkham, he needed to know how to open the seals, he needed Arkham to lead him to Temen-Ni-Gru. He needed Arkham in order to regain his father's power.

Vergil paused at the door, and gave the corpse one last look. One more victim to the pursuit of power.

One more human woman fallen victim to a demon.

No, the day Vergil was free to kill Arkham could not come soon enough.

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