The Devils Cry Ch 1-4

[eiahmon]

Title: The Devils Cry Chapter 4
Category: Devil May Cry
Rating: PG-13
Devil May Cry and it’s characters and situations are the sole property of Capcom. I am making no money or profit off of this fanfiction and no copyright infringement is intended. On the other hand all original characters and situations are mine so please don’t run off with them without my knowledge or consent.
Summary: A daughter’s dreams of a place that Dante doesn’t want to remember make him recall things that he had once tried so hard to forget as the skeletons in the Sparda family closet come out to play. Lost family history is revealed, and people once thought long gone return.
SPOILER WARNING!!!: Spoilers for all three Devil May Cry games.

4.

Dante rocked back in his chair and put his feet up on the desk. He could feel a headache coming on - no doubt in part to him letting Alastair go off on a job alone. It was only Shadows - which Alastair loved to fight, (She even had a pin on her coat that said “I like cats, big honkin’ HELL cats.”) but still he couldn’t help but worry. Shadows were nasty, especially when they came in packs, but somehow she always managed to come out of fights with them with nary a scratch and a big grin on her face. Dante on the other hand hated Shadows with a passion, even more so after the “lion” at Mallet Island had tried to turn him into cat food. And had nearly succeeded too. Still, he reasoned, he had to let her go off on her own sometime. She was powerful, not as powerful as him, but powerful enough to take care of herself. Plus, she was smart enough to know when she was outmatched, and when it was time to bail.

Her dream had not repeated for the last month or so, for which he was grateful. She needed to be quick on the trigger and even quicker on her feet to survive five Shadows at once, and she couldn’t be if she was tired. Though, he had to admit to himself that part of that was only worry and paranoia on his part, as he and his children needed only a fraction of the sleep that humans needed - Alastair and Vergil less than him as they were 3/4 demon, not half. The three of them slept more out of habit than anything, and if necessary they could stay awake for three days before they would even begin to show signs of fatigue.

How in the world did my old man ever get used to living as a human? Dante wondered. As a full demon, Sparda would have only required a few catnaps a week, with maybe one full night of sleep a couple times a month. Though to maintain his powerful body, he would to have eaten often and in a big way. Adjusting to humans, with their different styles of living, must have been difficult and confusing.

Dante’s glance strayed over to the flaming red sword, hanging on the wall, where the poster of the naked model had once hung. The sword was lying dormant for now, the essence of Sparda that resided in it quiet. As soon as Dante was called into action it would awaken and begin to burn with power. Sometimes he could fancy that he was feeling emotions from the sword, which, he guessed, was not unlikely considering that his father had actually sealed a tiny portion of his own soul into the blade. At different times, in different situations, Dante had felt: anger, sadness, rage, contentment, and on at least one occasion - the night he had found Vergil - smugness. Alastair and Vergil had experienced the same things whenever they used it as well. The day Alastair had been born, Dante had picked the sword up and could have sworn that somewhere his father was smiling over the birth of his granddaughter.
 

Trish, now there was a different story. For a year and a half after Mallet Island, when he and Trish had lived together, the sword had been oddly silent. There had been one occasion where it had put forth a feeling of confusion, but nothing more. For seventeen months, Trish had used the Sparda and got not a drop of power out of it. This had confused both of them to no end as both of them were fully aware of the sword’s power. Trish had suggested that it would only respond to someone of the Sparda bloodline, but that hadn’t worked either. It had not responded to Dante when he used it. He had even spoken to it, feeling silly at the time, and demanded that it behave for Trish, and he had gotten nothing. He had though ruefully that if the Legendary Dark Knight Sparda didn’t want to do what he was told, then no one was going to force him.

In the end, things had not worked out for him and Trish, and she had moved out. The sword had done the same thing that the Yamato would do to Vergil years later, and had refused to be picked up. No matter how hard she tugged, the sword had not come off of it's wall rack. The day after she left, feeling oddly relieved about it, Dante had picked the sword up, held it up to eye level, and said plainly: “She’s gone now. You can come out.” Immediately, it had begun to burn with it’s smoky fire, leading Dante to guess that Sparda had not liked his former girlfriend, though he was at a loss to explain why. Needless to say, he hadn’t had any trouble with it since.

Vergil had called a couple weeks earlier, saying that things between he and his new girlfriend - Adele - were serious now, and he was wondering when it was safe to tell her about his family history. He and Alastair were infamous for using their grandfather’s story to run unwanted girlfriends and boyfriends off, and he was concerned that if he told her about even a fraction of his heritage, then she would run screaming in the other direction. He was torn between telling her now, before they became any closer, or waiting until later when they were closer, and thus less likely to separate over it. He had jokingly asked Dante what he had done to reel in his and Alastair’s mothers, and Dante had countered by pointed out that that was the beauty of dating demons; he didn’t have to convince them that he wasn’t crazy, because they were already fully aware that he was the Son of Sparda. (A title that he hated. As he often said: “You know, no offence to my father or anything, but he did give me a NAME!”) Dante had cautioned Vergil to be careful and had told him he could tell her whenever she felt she could handle the news, but to also make sure she was fully aware of the danger she was in just because she was close to him. Dante did not want another nice young woman to share his mother’s fate - brutally murdered just because she was married to, and a mother of, a Sparda.

The sound of Alastair’s motorcycle startled him from his thoughts, and he had to resist the urge to jump up from his chair and run outside to see if she was alright. But he imagined the look of irritated disgust that would appear on her face if he did so, and he made himself stay put. Soon enough, but not soon enough for Dante’s tastes, the doors to Devil May Cry - he’d changed the name back after Trish had left - swung open and Alastair strode in, looking quite pleased with herself. She casually took Alastor from her back, flicked the gore from it and put it on the wall. She then pulled up a chair across from her father, flopped down, took her guns out, and set to work cleaning them.

“How did it go?” Dante asked when he couldn’t stand the silence anymore.

“Fine.” was her reply “About a dozen more Shadows than we were told there were, but it went fine.” She grinned cheekily. Dante spit his beer across the desk.

“DAD!”

“Sorry, but a dozen more!”

“Yup, twelve more than they said there was. But I fixed ‘em. Seventeen in all, and, damn, was it fun!”

"You have a warped sense of fun, Alastair.” She snorted and looked at him.

“And whose fault is that?” she asked sarcastically.

“Point taken.”

“So anymore jobs come in while I was gone?”

Dante shook his head. “No, and that worries me.”

“Why so?”

“Because I’ve been in this job for thirty-nine years, and it has only been like this twice.”

Alastair put Ombra down on the table looked directly at her father. “Like what?”

 

“Mostly quiet with bursts of activity.”

“What were the two times?”

“Just before the Temen-ni-gru and,” Dante took a deep breath. “Mallet Island.” He shuddered.

“Was it that bad?”

“Worse than you can imagine.”

“That is bad. Very bad. I guess it says something for my imagination.”

Dante did not smile at her little jab at herself. He leaned back in his chair and began to stare at the ceiling, frowning in worry over what the Underworld was scheming.

“Why won’t you talk about the Temen-ni-gru or Mallet Island?” Alastair’s question, spoken so quietly that it was barely audible, started him from his thoughts, and very nearly from his chair, a bit later. He looked at her, getting a little angry that she kept bringing it up when she knew that he didn’t like to talk about it.

“Why do you keep bringing that up?” he growled.

“Because I want to know.” Finished with her guns, she put them back into the holsters under her coat and waited for him to answer. He glared at her, his eyes glowing just a bit, something that had always creeped her out in the past. She just smiled serenely at him.

“Because I lost someone.” he said abruptly. He rose swiftly from his chair and strode angrily out of the room to the back of the shop - which hadn’t been used since Rachel had given Dante their house in the sticks. “Mind the phone!” he shouted from somewhere behind the door.
 

Sighing, feeling a little guilty for upsetting him, yet at the same time a little annoyed for not getting more of an answer, Alastair switched chairs so she would be closer to the phone and waited, casting worried glances at the door that her father had disappeared through every now and then. She was tempted to go back there and check on him, but he would not welcome her presence, and she did not want him angrier than he already was.

She had seem him truly angry only a few times in her life, and never had it been directed at her, but that was enough to convince her that she would never do anything to infuriate him like that. Like the time the old slob four times her age had tried to pick her up when she was only fifteen. When Dante had intervened, the idiot had gruffly told him to “go get his own girl.” Wrong thing to say. By the time all was said and done, the guy had ended up in the hospital with twenty-two broken bones, a concussion, collapsed lung, and bruised heart. Needless to say that no guys, not even those of her own age group, had dared to look at her sideways after that. She didn’t think she was ever going to get a boyfriend.

Oh and she couldn’t forget the time, when Vergil had been seven, a bunch of schoolyard bullies had ganged up him and beaten him into a bloody pulp because of his “freakish” looks. Though he had lost the fight in the end - and ended up in the emergency room because of it - he still had managed to knock out three of his attackers, kids that were in some cases twice his weight and a full foot taller. The principle of the grade school, a skinny, overdressed woman who kept her nose higher in the air than the rest of her head, took the bullies’ word over the dozens of witnesses who said Vergil had been the victim. No matter that it had been six against one. No matter that Vergil had been sent to the emergency room by ambulance with blood flowing from his right ear. No matter that they were all bigger and stronger than him. Vergil had rendered three of his attackers unconscious, therefore he was at fault. She had called Dante - who had just pulled a few strings and muddled with a few memories to get Vergil, whose injuries were already healing, out of the hospital and home - and told him that his son was expelled from school for such “vicious” fighting. After calling Rachel to watch Vergil and Alastair, Dante had stormed up to the school and raised a little private hell in the woman’s office. No one knew what had gone on in there, but Dante had come home an hour later still crackling with demonic energy and with a smug grin on his face. Vergil had not been expelled, and within a few short days, the principle had quit and was replaced with someone who was much more fair minded.

So no, Alastair most definitely did NOT what her father angry at her.

The phone rang loudly, echoing in the large room. Not having the skill to kick the desk and make the receiver land in her hand like her dad did, she picked it up the old fashioned way.

“Devil May Cry.”

“Aw damn, Alastair!”

 

“Vergil?”

“I just tried the house, and no one was there. I tried your pager and your cell phone, but no one answered me. Ah man, am I glad I found you! Something’s happened, and it’s bad. I mean real bad. I’m mean it’s fu -”

“Vergil!” Alastair shouted, trying to stop her brother’s near hysterical babbling “Calm down!” The door opened behind her and Dante stepped into the room, looking at her in concern. She gestured for him to pick up the other phone. He picked it up and heard his son, still babbling in apparent terror, on the other end. His eyes grew wide in alarm. It took alot to shake Vergil out of his near perpetual calm.

“Vergil!” he barked “Calm yourself down right now, young man!”

“How can I?” Vergil was in full blown hysteria now. Something real bad must have happened. “How can I? They’re dead! They are all DEAD!!”

Dante’s heart froze in his chest. He had a pretty good idea of who Vergil was talking about, but he had to make sure.

“Who’s dead, Vergil?” he asked quietly.

“Adele’s family! Who else?” He laughed shrilly, making Alastair want to slap him back to himself so badly. “All of them! Her parents! Her brother and sisters! Her aunts, uncles, cousins, even her grandparents! All gone!”

Neither Dante or Alastair wanted to ask, but they had to know. It was Alastair that finally asked what had become of Adele.

“Where is Adele, Vergil?”

“Oh she’s fine!” Vergil let out another hysterical titter, but he was not outright babbling anymore. That was an improvement, Dante thought. “As well as can be expected considering she came home from a day in Paris with her boyfriend to find her family was now nothing more than mutilated, dismembered corpses! Not to mention that the words ‘We’re coming for you, Sparda.’ were scrawled in blood on the living room wall! Now she blames said boyfriend for her family’s murder, but she’s fine, just fine!”

Dante closed his eyes and sank to the floor. This was sounding all too familiar.

“I should have told her.” Vergil whispered brokenly “I should have told her the danger she was putting herself and her family into.”

Hearing the despair - and the guilt - in his son’s voice, Dante snapped to attention.

“Where are you at, Vergil?” he demanded as he walked around the office, gathering up his keys, grabbing his passport and other papers from the desk drawer. He wasn't going to France by conventional means, but it was a good idea to have the right papers anyway.

“I’m at my place. I just can’t face anyone after all that’s -” His sentence was interrupted by a watery sob.

“Does anyone think that you had anything to do with what happened?”

 

“I don’t know, I don’t think so. At least no one does yet. It should only be a matter of time before someone reads the writing on the wall.” Vergil laughed a humorless laugh at his little pun.

 

 

“Stay where you’re at.” Dante ordered “I’m coming to get you.”

 

“Alright.” Another sob and a sniffle came through the line. The hysterics were over with, now his grief was rising to the surface. Dante felt his heart aching for his son; he hated to hear his children cry.

“I love you, Vergil.” he said gently “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Alright Dad, please hurry.”

“I will. I want you stay on the line with your sister, alright? I know a few of the other hunters in the area, and she can call them if something happens before I can get there. So keep the line open and your guard up. I’m on my way.”

“Okay.” Another sniffle. Dante hung up his end and looked over at Alastair, who took up the conversation, not wanting to give her brother a chance to get hysterical again or lapse into space. She doubted that he would be able to defend himself if it came down to it, but the more he was aware of what was happening around him, the better off he would be. She heard the office doors shut and the rev of their truck’s engine as Dante started it and drove for the airport. She only hoped that he would get there in time.

Chapter 3 -- Chapter 5

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