Summary: His family shattered before his eyes, the first time he ever took a life. The events that would steal Dante's innocence, making him the hunter he is today...

Disclaimer: I do not own squat. I know the twins, but I cannot claim ownership over them. Only the almighty Capcom can dare to do that, which is reasonable. They own the games, after all.

Innocence Lost

Dante bit his lip to keep from screaming as the cloud-thing and his demons departed his home from the front door, followed by a pale woman dressed entirely in white. They couldn't have…..

His mother, his brother couldn't have been…..

NO!!!

That feeling of mingled pain from his twin, he had to have imagined it! This had to be a dream! Some imagined night terror that would release him before shattering like so many pieces of glass. He clutched his head and rocked back and forth, digging his fingers into his soft silver hair. Wake up, Dante, WAKE UP!!!! his mind screamed.

Nothing had changed when he opened his eyes. He pinched himself as hard as he could; it hurt brutally.

This wasn't a dream.

Slowly, trancelike, he rose from the bushes. His footsteps took him back to the house – why hadn't anyone noticed the demons, or heard Vergil scream? Why hadn't anyone seen his mother running down the street, pursued by terrors spawned out of the depths of Hell? – and he stopped at the door.

He didn't want to go in. He knew that the boy he had been all these years would die if he saw how thoroughly his life had been destroyed.

But he had to see.

LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

He saw Vergil first, lying cold and still before the television set. Dante froze, and went to his twin, fell to his knees beside him. His hand trembled as it reached out to touch the blood-washed white hair. "Vergil…." he choked, tears filling his eyes. "I always thought…..you were the stronger one…."

He dropped his head, and he cried. His grief bent him forward so his head touched Vergil's, and his brother's blood smeared across his forehead and into his own hair. He mourned his twin brother for many long minutes.

You weren't supposed to die, Vergil! We were supposed to be together forever! Mother said so!

Mother….

He got up, tears, snot, and blood mingling on his face, and dragged a blanket off the back of the couch. Vergil deserved some honor in his death, and shrouding his body was the only decent thing Dante could think of with his mind mired in shock and grief. He covered him with the brightly-embroidered afghan, then rose and went through the dining room, into the kitchen, and up the back stairs.

LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

He found her in the hallway, his tall, beautiful mother laying facedown on the carpet with a horrible, gaping wound in her back. "Mom…." Dante felt tears streaming down his face again, but this time he did not cry.

Falling to his knees beside her, he threw back his head and screamed his sorrow into the still night air, a wordless protest against the murders of the people he had loved more than anything else in this world.

Hopeless despair transformed into darkest rage, and he got up from her side and paced down the hall to his father's study. The door slammed open, and light from the hallway spilled across the floor to fall upon a sword. A sword with metallic bones for a hilt.

Rebellion's eye sockets seemed to flare with crimson light as Dante approached its case.

He picked up a heavy metal paperweight from his father's desk, and heaved it at the locked sword-case as hard as he could, putting his rage, his loss, his fear behind the throw.

The glass shattered.

He crossed the floor and grabbed his father's sword, heedless of the glass slicing into his bare feet. The blade was heavy, but Dante was very strong for his age, and he lifted it out of the case with minor difficulty. Rebellion flashed and glowed briefly when he touched it, but in his emotional state Dante didn't notice. He never saw the sword accept him as its wielder.

He dragged the sword out to his mother's body, stabbed it into the floor and knelt before it, somehow knowing that he had to take this position for what he had in mind.

Dante slid a hand down one side of the blade, growling through the sharp pain, and let his blood drip onto the floor beside his beloved mother. An oath of blood.

"I swear, I will hunt down your killers," he ground out. "The demons will pay, all of them, until I have destroyed the one that took you both from me. I will kill them all, to avenge your deaths."

Then he got up and fled the house, not even bothering to put on some shoes. The trail was still fresh. He had to get at least one this night, to sate him until he could grow stronger.

Strong enough to kill them all.

LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

Nalasmil relaxed with a glass of red wine on her bed, watching the candlelight dance through the crimson liquid. She had not been able to retrieve the blood this night, but she would get it tomorrow. The blood-power would not wane for several days, and the spells laid on that street would ensure that none of the neighbors would know that which had transpired for many weeks. She could retrieve the blood at her leisure.

Mundus and his demons had departed back to Hell, but Raksh was still with her. He was always with her.

She sipped her wine and picked back up her book and flipped to the next page.

Her window blew apart, spraying her skin with slivers of glass and wood.

She shook herself free of the glass, and turned furious eyes to the window. Who would be foolish enough to dare disturb her?

A silver-haired boy stood in the hole, a massive longsword held ready in his hands.

Nalasmil's eyes widened, and she scrambled off the bed. He was only a boy, and she was far more powerful than he, but there was a fierce, implacable rage playing in his eyes that made both her and Raksh draw back.

Rage could be transformed into powerful energies.

Energies she couldn't hope to shield against.

Pain slammed through her as a wave of force flew out from the boy's sword. She lay against the wall, knowing that she was hurt more internally than externally, and spat out a stream of nonsensical syllables.

She disappeared from view just before Rebellion slammed into the spot her head had been moment before.

Downstairs, she limped over to her medicine cabinet, hoping to find some green orbs. Raksh, she said to her inner demon, Heal me! Then lend me your strength, that I might destroy this impudent whelp!

There was no reply.

Instead, a black, wispy smoke flowed from her facial orifices, out of her nose, eyes, and ears. When she opened her mouth to protest, it came out of that too. A vaguely demonic shape was taken as he crouched before her, and she felt so weak, so empty, without him.

No, Nalasmil. Not if he is to destroy my master for me. Only the son of Sparda can dispose of my sire for me, where I cannot.

Nalasmil raced for him, but the oily smoke dissipated, leaving her grasping only air. Aware of how vulnerable she was, she immediately began rifling through her medicine cabinet, searching for green stars and orbs.

There were none.

Only mundane bottles of human medicine filled the cabinet.

She wanted to scream in frustration. Not fear, never fear. Raksh had left her, taking most of her accumulated power with him. She was as weak as she had been when first she had opened that book of forbidden knowledge.

Far too weak to even shield herself while she desperately searched for demonic healing items that should have been there.

She felt another blast of energy slam into her, tearing her off the floor and slamming her against the wall. She crumbled like a broken doll, and stared dully ahead as the half-devil son of her master's master's greatest enemy stalked towards her.

He never said a word, not once did he mock her or savor his victory. Rather, she was stunned to see tears streaming from his pale blue eyes.

Why was he crying?

Was it for her?

Or for himself?

Then the sword was sliding into her chest, seeking out her heart and dividing it in two. Nalasmil felt no pain, no fear. She continued to stare at those eyes, long after her breathing ceased and her blood ran still.

Even dead, she couldn't take her eyes off those tear-filled orbs of cerulean fire.

LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

Back in the house of death and despair, Dante sat in Vergil's bead and cried. Deep sobs of grief wracked his small frame, and his eyes burned with the salt of his tears. He couldn't stop seeing the woman's pale dead eyes, boring deep into his own. They haunted him, no matter how hard he tried to forget.

His first kill.

And so he wept.

For his mother.

For his brother.

For his own lost innocence.

At long last, he lifted his head and wiped the tears away. He couldn't stay here. He'd go mad if he tried.

But where could he go?

Douglas, perhaps, or Donatello. Surely one of them would take him in. Wouldn't they?

He had to try.

Dante went downstairs to get a suitcase, refusing to look at the covered, broken bodies that occupied the house now. Those were not his mother and twin. Just their mortal shells.

By rights, almost all of the objects in this house were his. The swords, the books, his mother's heirlooms….

But he didn't take very much. He packed up his clothes, his comic books, some treasured knickknacks, and some books of his father's. He grabbed Charlie, the battered old lion doll, from Vergil's bed and held it to his heart. Despite being cleaned, it still smelled like his brother. That also went into the suitcase, along with the family photograph album.

With everything he needed packed up, he grabbed a coat and shoes and slung his amulet around his neck. Vergil's he left with his brother's body. Rebellion was strapped on his back, and although he staggered beneath the weight, he managed to get the suitcase downstairs. He would have to return to his childhood home for everything else, but not until his family was given a proper burial.

As he opened the door he paused, and looked at the body of his twin. He had his sword, but Vergil didn't. It just didn't seem right to Dante. His brother ought to have his sword, too.

A quick trip back upstairs and he was by Vergil's body once more, Yamato in his hands. He held it by the sheath, never touching the ornate hilt, and laid it respectfully by his brother's side.

Then he left the house, not once looking back.

LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

Queen: Part of his vengeance is done, but it will not be completed until the events of Devil May Cry 1, which in the timeline I work with means that he and Vergil will take the SOB down together years beforehand. By the time "My Angel" is taking place, Mundus is already dead and done with. No Trish or Nelo Angelo needed. But where does Raksh fit in, you ask? Well, I said above that he is the son of Mundus. Who do you think will be getting the throne once Daddy's vacated it? Raksh was sealed away in that book Nalasmil read for a reason; his father, the Mighty Prince of Darkness, King of the Underworld, was afraid of his own son's power. Yes, Dante does still have Charlie. Vergil has no idea he has it. And on that note, I must go. Dante and Vergil are due back soon, and I don't want them to see this posting. I don't want to dredge up those memories in their heads; they deserve better than that from me.

(transmission ended)