An update in...I think a week! I'm proud of myself, even though this one is kind of boring...I hope it doesn't put all you who have managed to stick with me to sleep .. I apologize in advance if it does. But at least it didn't take me months to update again!
As always, thanks for reading, commenting, and subscribing! All make me happy!
And now for chapter 11 of Devils' High School! :D
Dante heaved his millionth bored sigh of the night as he leaned against the door frame of the dorm room. His eyes kept wanting to close. On several occasions he had actually considered just sitting on the floor, resting his face against his knees and sleeping. But his stubbornness kept him awake; he knew he wouldn't be able to live with himself if something happened while he was on guard duty.
But the fact that he got to sleep next sounded better and better as each minute ticked by.
To fight off sleep and boredom, Dante had engaged himself with any activity from counting cracks in the walls to carving his name into the floor with Rebellion. All of these were only temporary fixes. In each activity, he would either finish or lose interest within a few minutes. With time moving at a snail's pace, jumping from boring preoccuaption to even more boring preoccupation was wearing on his nerves and causing him to check down the hallway for any sign of Vergil every half minute or so.
The only solace the red-clad devil found from the immense boredom were the occasional noises his demonic hearing picked up. Any sound had made his heart beat faster and adrenaline pump through his veins. It made him almost hope for some unlucky demon to cross his path so he could dice it up like a tomato. A few times Dante heard what sounded like World War II happening in the small space of a classroom. These times really got his blood pumping, but also made him worry. Was Vergil in danger? Should he go find him? Unfortunately, the answer to the latter question could be voiced in two words: hell no. For one, Vergil would kill him for running to the rescue if he didn't need it and probably have an even more massive freak out if he acctually did need assistance. Secondly, his place was here by the door making sure nothing attacked the sleeping Nero upstairs. Again, death would be eminent if he even thought about leaving his post and Nero died or was mutilated beyond recognition.
When the school was quiet once more, Dante let out the pent up breath he had been unaware of holding. He couldn't help but wonder what had gone on...or if Vergil had been involved. No matter how much Vergil annoyed the crap out of him at times, they were still brothers. Twin brothers. Even if the two were polar opposites, losing Vergil would be one of the worst possible things to happen to him. He would never admit anything like that aloud though. He had appearances to keep up.
Dante's eyes immediately shot to the end of the corridor at the sign of movement, his hand gripping Rebellion's hilt instinctively. His grip on the blade slackened when the figure approached. Vergil's expression was the same as always: cold and emotionless. Dante noticed his blue t-shirt was ripped in the side and the smell of blood met Dante's sensitive nose. He stared at his brother, trying not to look too concerned. "What happened to you, Verg? Trip and fall on Yamato?"
As expected, Vergil glared at his twin. "No, Dante, that is not what happened." The elder twin glanced down at his side, relieved to see that it was completely healed. "Now, if you'll wait until I am able to wake Nero, I will tell you what happened."
Without another word, Vergil went up the stairs to the dorm room. Dante rolled his eyes. Vergil should know patience was not his best virtue, especially not after waiting four hours for him to return. The younger of the twins followed his brother up the stairs, closing the door behind him.
"Wake Nero up," Vergil ordered as he pulled off the torn shirt and inspected it. The whole right side of the t-shirt was soaked in blood along with the rip the demon had made. Vergil frowned and tossed the piece of fabric in the trash can since it was a useless article now.
Dante moved over to Nero's bed, finding the youngest half devil sprawled out on his bed in a deep sleep. His arms were spread above his head, and one of his legs was dangling off the edge of the bed. The fourteen year old was snoring lightly and a small amount of drool was trickling out of the corner of his mouth. Dante chuckled at the humorous sight and slapped him on the chest. "Hey, kid. Wake up. Vergil has some juicy news for us."
Nero scrunched his nose in his sleep and swatted the air with his human hand, mumbling something about five more minutes. With a growl, Dante pounced on him and punched him in the face. The youngest devil awoke with a jolt, looking around the room in a disoriented manner. "Sorry kid. But I loost my patience with you," Dante informed his victim with a cheesy grin.
The sound of Dante's voice caused Nero to finally register what had happened and to realize there was blood dripping from his nose and onto his lip. Nero snarled and tackled an unprepared Dante off the bed. "You fucking bastard!"
The youngest hybrid raised his Devil Arm to punch Dante in the face, only to have Vergil catch it just before making contact. "That's enough you two. Believe me, we do not need to be expending energy on beating each other senseless."
The red half devil snickered while Nero shot Vergil a glare. "But that's not fair! He punched me for no reason! It does not take a damn punch to wake someone up!"
Vergil narrowed his eyes at his laughing twin. "Fine. One punch is all you get, Nero. Then you both will listen to me."
Dante stopped laughing in time to see Nero's demonic fist flying toward his face. The force of the punch caused Dante's head to collide with the ground hard. He hissed in pain and grabbed his now bloody nose. "Fuck...okay, okay. We're even now." The red-clad demon shoved Nero off of him and made his way to hos own bed, nursing his new wound.
"Now that you two have stopped being imbeciles," Vergil began bitterly as Nero climbed back on to his bed, "I will tell you what happened while i was on patrol."
The eldest of the three scanned his audience, making sure they were paying attention. Nero had a scowl set of his face, still ticked from Dante's method of waking him, but had his full attention on Vergil. He was surprised to find that his younger twin was actually paying attention as well, most like only to find out how Vergil had managed to get his side sliced. Satisfied enough, Vergil went on. "Now, I found out that we're definitely dealing with more than one demon here. It's probably many lesser demons-"
"Is that what cut your side?" Dante unterrupted, smirking, "'Cause if it was-"
"No, Dante." Vergil sent one of his signature, icy death glares at his twin, immediately shutting him up. "Anyway, I tracked one of the lesser demons to one of the classrooms where it was tearing the room apart almost as if it were searching for something..."
As Vergil trailed off, Nero piped up: "But what could they be looking for? I mean, we're probably all that's of interest here and they could easily just lock on to our scents, right?"
Vergil nodded, having been confused by this as well. "I would think so. But I suppose all in all, it doesn't matter. We have to stop these demons no matter what." The elder of the three partial humans crossed his arms, not wanting to re-live his embarrassment from earlier. "And this brings me to the even larger concern."
If Dante hadn't been paying too much attention before, he was all ears now. The small fries didn't interest him much, for he could slash through them fairly easily he was sure. It was the big baddies he wanted to hear about.
"There's a demon roaming around here that is practically undetectable because I believe it can materilize from shadows. As far as I could tell, it made no sound when it moved and didn't have a scent that I could lock on to." Vergil paused, noticing the flicker of concern flashing through each of the younger hybrids' eyes. "And, to add on to this, it's a stronger demon."
A silence fell over the room when none of the partial demons wanted to voice the tingle of regret each of the felt with their decision to stay. Right now, they could probably enjoying milk and cookies at some old ladies house without a care in the world. They could be far away from the school that was most likely infested with demons that wanted their heads on platters. Basically, they would be safe.
But there was no turning back on their decision now. Whether any of them would admit it or not, they each had their own reason for staying besides the fact that what happened to Rina wasn't right and possibly partly their fault in a roundabout way. Dante wanted revenge for what demons did to their mother and their family as a whole. Vergil saw this as an opportunity to test his true power and learn more about what it meant to be part devil. Nero wanted nothing more out of this venture than to prove to his older room mates that he wasn't just a kid.
"So...what are we gonna do, Verg? Just run at this thing, swords blazing, and kick its ass?" asked Dante, attempting to relieve some of the tension from the room; it was almost suffocating him.
The eldest half demon rolled his eyes at his twin's inane suggestion. "No. That is not what we will be doing. All we can do now is try to learn about our opponent. What it wants, its weak points, what all it can do. It will do us no good to run into this like blind barbarians."
Quickly losing his patience and attention span with this conversation, Dante hung upside down off the end of his bed, grinning cheesily up at his brother. "Well, when you get right down to it, we're probably not far off from barbarians when it come to our sword skills. We only know what little dad could teach us behind mom's back. Hell, Nero here's got no sword experience at all!"
A bright pink blush crept into Nero's cheeks as he swiped his nose in embarrassment. "Shut up, Dante..."
"I agree with Nero," Vergil growled. "Shut up, Dante." When the middle devil didn't raise anymore arguments and simply flipped his brother off, Vergil went on. "For tonight, we'll forget about patrolling. We'll sleep tonight, and tomorrow, you two will search the school like we did today and I'll do research and try to find out about what we're dealing with."
Nero made a sour face at the thought of spending a whole day by himself with Dante. The guy was just insufferable to be around for lengthy periods of time. Hell, sometimes even just a small increment of time with the red devil could drive a man to madness. But, the youngest devil nodded all the same, glancing down at his Devil Arm. He supposed if Dante became too much to bear he could always just punch him in the face a few times with his demonic appendage. And this time, there would be no Vergil around to stop him.
Dante returned to his pillows, smiling like a lunatic. "Awesome. Then I gonna go to sleep. Night." And with that, he closed his eyes and pretended to snore, informing his room mates that this conversation was over.
With an annoyed sigh, Vergil flopped down on his own bed, not in the mood to deal with Dante anymore. Deciding it was useless to attempt reviving the dead conversation, the eldest son of Sparda switched the lamp off, pulled his comforter to his chin, and tried to get some shut eye.