I wasn't supposed to start this 'til Heir Apparent was done, yet here we are. Is this fic also entirely about Nero having a bad time? No.
It's about Dante having a bad time too.
This was inspired by a post from sexy-androgynous-satan, who gave me permission to write this nonsense and was all-around cool, so that's rad.
I may not have had shop hours posted, but getting calls anytime after 10 p.m. was unreasonable, even if I was awake. No one would expect an answer at that time, so I didn't bother. People who tried to call before noon were plain insane, unethical even. That still left a good enough window of time, I thought.
Besides, nothing good came from the phone trilling around midnight. I knew better. So under no circumstances did I answer-
"Devil May Cry."
Except for boredom. The days had been lacking, and I'd had enough to drink that I kicked the phone into my hand more out of instinct than thought. While I wasn't too fuzzy, the world tilted enough in my vision that I struggled to make sense of what was happening on the other end of the line.
"If you'd just try talking to him-" A young lady's voice, familiar enough and pissed enough that I tensed. Sure wasn't the first time a woman I couldn't quite recall yelled at me. Except, her voice was distant too, like a wall stood between us instead of a phone line.
"He's not going to know anything!" yelled a second person, more distant than the first.
That voice I did recognize - Nero, meaning the lady must have been… K-something. And if she was pissed, he was downright nuclear.
"He might," she said. "You won't know if you don't at least try."
I was clearly intruding on something, not that it was my fault. They must have called me by accident, but that did make me wonder if that meant they had me on speed dial. We'd never talked before. I didn't even know they had my number in the first place.
"It doesn't have anything to do with him," Nero snarled.
"But he's a devil hunter, right? Shouldn't this kind of be his area of expertise?"
Alright, maybe not an accident then. If they were arguing about me, listening in seemed fair.
Dropping my feet from the desk, I set my elbows down in their place and leaned the receiver away from my mouth as Nero barked, "Just what do you think is going on?" His voice had stretched so thin that I could hear how tense he was.
K must have thrown her hands up with the phone in them because her voice faded. "I don't know! I'm trying to find out! But if you don't think a doctor would help-"
"Fine! Fine. I'll go see a doctor. Just don't call Dante. I'll take care of it. I just need to…"
Whoops. I should have felt bad for eavesdropping. I didn't, but I should have. It was too late then because I was intrigued. My pen had found its way into my hand and hovered over the notepad in case anything came up - people or addresses. Anything I might need to look into later.
I wouldn't need to, of course.
But it couldn't hurt.
My preparation turned out to be in vain when K spoke again. "Wait, where are you going? You can't leave again. Nero!"
A door slammed, and the line went silent. I took it as my cue to leave, my hand drifting toward the cradle in hopes that no sound would alert her that I'd been on the line. When her voice came through clearly, I had to stop myself from throwing the phone, a jolt tearing through me.
"Um, Dante?"
My eyes clenched shut as I pulled the phone back. "I'm here."
"Oh, sh- shoot. I didn't realize the call had gone through. I didn't wake you, did I?"
I couldn't tell if she was against cursing, or if she was trying to hold back for my sake. Either way, I had to bite my lip to hold back a laugh. "Nah, I'm a bit of a night owl. You're good."
"Did you hear anything?" she asked with a sigh. The conversation was steadily making its way up the "most uncomfortable experiences I'd ever had" list.
"A bit."
A thunk popped over the line followed by another sigh. "Sorry," she said, her voice muffled as though she'd hid her face against something.
"Oh, it's…" Fine? My fault? "Everything alright?" I regretted asking as soon as the words slipped out. This wasn't my business, or maybe it was, but I had a twisting in my gut that told me that I didn't want for it to be.
"Everything is-" She huffed. At least we were both struggling. "I don't know. I didn't mean to call. It was an accident. I'm sorry."
If I'd just let things end there, it would have been for the best. I could go back to drinking and try to ignore the nagging pull of curiosity in my head.
Yeah, right.
"How do you accidentally call someone?" I asked.
"Oh! I mean, I meant to call you, but then Nero, well, you know him." She was holding back.
"I'm guessing he wasn't thrilled with the idea," I said. Not much of a guess when I'd heard him yelling about it. Out of habit, I plastered a smile on my face to complete the charming act. "Are you and I not allowed to have a nice chat?"
"Oh, um, no we can chat, Dante."
She was so polite, so sincere that I had to put my face in my hand. I couldn't even remember her name. Giving in, I let the niceties fall from my voice and asked what I wanted to. "What's going on, kid?"
The line fell silent again until she drew in a slow breath. "Do you ever forget things?"
"Things like what? I forget my keys and my birthday, but who doesn't?" I was starting to realize we'd asked more questions than we'd given answers. "I guess I don't forget things any more than other people."
"Okay," she said to herself. "Nero's just been, um, a little off lately. I was worried. I wanted to make sure it didn't have something to do with his arm, you know?" After a bite of hesitation, panic slipped into her voice. "Sorry! I know not everything has to do with him being… I don't know the right word. Sorry."
"You don't have to apologize all the time. Take it easy." Despite my words, questions filled my head like a clog. I had to dig through to grab hold of one at a time. "What's so off about him?"
Silence again. "That's really not for me to say," she murmured. "I shouldn't talk for him. That's not fair, but I'll try to get him to call you if he needs to, alright?"
Well, someone had to be the adult, and it sure wasn't going to be me. I doubted it was ever Nero either.
"Sure thing, kid," I said. "I'm usually here all day. Let me know if you ever need to hire another devil hunter. I'll even throw in a discount."
She was nice enough to laugh before we fumbled through goodbyes.
Whatever was going on was probably fine. Nero could handle himself, especially against some spotty memory. I assured myself that if I didn't hear anything from either of them in a week, it wasn't any sweat off my back. I couldn't contact them if I'd wanted to. The lack of caller ID on my old phone was a pain at times. Sure, Lady could dig up a phone number within minutes, but it wasn't like I needed to call them. That would have been weird. Everything was fine.
It was fine.
Until two nights later when I answered another call sometime past midnight. K's voice trembled like she'd been caught in a snowstorm. "Hello, hi, it's Kyrie. How have you been?" Though it sounded forced, she was so chipper that we must have been old friends. Right, her old friend who'd just gotten her name again.
"Fine?" I answered at length. "Are you-?"
"That's great!"
Something was wrong. Beyond how strange the situation felt, Kyrie was too polite to interrupt.
"Were you still planning on visiting soon?" she asked. If she had a corded phone, I felt sure she would have been twirling it around her finger to complete the act.
"Fortuna's a bit far, but I can get there in a couple days," I said. I wanted to ask her if she could get somewhere safe in the meantime, but she spoke too quickly, rattling off an address that I had to rush to jot down. Before I could get out the word "wait," she'd hung up.
It was no wonder Nero was always so stressed about that girl. She'd left me with nothing but questions, concerns, and a pain in the ass trip. The whole situation could have been a trap, or it could have been nothing at all. Whatever it was, it shouldn't have had me so damn rattled.
But if something was wrong with the kid, it was my problem. No one else could handle someone with dear old dad's blood. I'd learned that years ago.
After tearing off the top note with the address scrawled across it, I wrote a note that was sure to land me down the barrel of one of Lady's guns. Probably the rocket launcher.
"Going on vacation. Be back soon."
I'm all about that "No, I don't care about your problems. Anyway, what can I do to help?" Dante