Disclaimer: I do not own Devil May Cry, just my oc's.

Authors note: Sorry for the long wait, note at the very bottom.

Recap: Lullabies, the sound of screams and the music of betrayal, all a lullaby that someone has sung to me since I was born. All of those lullabies sung by the monsters with faces of angels.

The fire Nelo wielded made all that he desired turn to ash, ash to dust, and the dust drifted away into the air to where you could never see it again. The bodies and the blood just seemed to erode away as the blue flames licked at them. Pillars of sand, pillars of salt. Oh wait, I think I butchered that phrase or adage. A fun fact about the flames, they tickle like mad. I couldn't help but giggle as they crawled up my legs. Nelo did his ghost of a smirk as Mom only rolled her eyes in a good manner. I spun around and laughed as the flames crept higher and higher up my body.

The blue Muck monster fuzz screamed in agony. Have you ever seen Alien? You know the scene where one of the babies pops out of the guys chest? That's what Muck looks like right now. The flames licked away at its body, the tendrils of fire buried into the corpse and seemed to rake it apart with claws. Dante's room was a variable battlefield of blood, guts and echoes of screams. Not sure how everyone downstairs handled the noise, lord knows they could have heard it through the music. "Goodbye Earl…" was what The Dixie Chicks sang in a good ole southern twang over the sound bar.

"How on earth did this song get on your playlist?" Mom asks as she starts flicking off bits of bad guy from her fingers.

I shrugged. "I pick songs I like, not whole albums." She rolled her eyes and rotates her shoulders.

"Yeah, well turn it off, music times over and done with."

"Excuse me for liking more than just pop and metal." I grumble as I hit pause on my ipad. The plastic bag over the ipad had burned away along with the blood that had splattered it, the sound bar was perfectly fine though. A lick of flame went up my back and I jumped up as a flurry of hushed laughter tried to escape. I could practically hear Nelo laughing behind that ghost smile. I turned around to glare at him and found the entire room void of flames and anything that would merit a second glance from a homicide detective. Monk would probably sleep in this room, as long as he supplied his own furniture.

"So this means we're done?" Nelo nodded and Vergil came back to surface.

"Indeed, though we probably have to put Dante's bed back in here." He visibly suppressed a shudder at the thought. I only smirked at his discomfort and flashed my arm sling.

"Yeah, that sucks… bye!" The door was open and I was on the stairs in no time. When I hit the last few stairs I saw Dante walking away from the open door way and an insanely stupid, yet fun idea came to mind. I launched myself off the last couple of stairs and latched onto his back. My working left arm went around his neck as my short-ass legs went underneath his arms. "GIDDY UP!" I cackled madly as he pitched forward at the imbalance.

"WHAT THE HELL?!" he yelled loudly as he leaned back and attempted to grab me. "GET OFF!"

"NEVA!" I pronounced loudly into his ear, making him flinch. I attempted to hook my ankles together to give me better support, but Dante's got a well defined chest. Bully for him and kudos to Nero.

"Hey, get off my horse." Nero exclaimed in well mannered annoyance. Dante glowered at him and tried to pry my arm off his neck.

"I'm not the fucking horse, I'm the cowboy." He exclaimed proudly as he puffed up his chest, making my feet slip slightly.

"You realize the cowboy rides the horse." Lucia said calmly as she shined her Klyamoor. Dante's bravado slipped up and his puffed up chest deflated slightly as Nero and Lady burst out laughing. My feet slipped away from their moorings completely and I was left hanging by Dante's neck. He reached back and grasped my ankle and pulled sideways.

"GUH!" I exclaimed as I was turned upside down and held a few feet above the ground. Dante raised me up higher to where we were face to face- or is it eye level? "Hullo handsome." I said with a wide smile.

"Hello kitty cat." He said with a wicked grin, and then shook my slightly.

"GAH!" I exclaimed as the world shook and my shirt seemed to slide down over my head. "Watch it, my arm's broken!" And it echoed my protest in a silent wave of pain that only I could hear. He stopped for a second, smiled evilly, and then did a quick shake of his wrist that made my brain hurt. When he stopped I glared at him. "You are an evil, evil man."

"Thank you, but the evil one after your attention is upstairs." He replied with a grin, then in all seriousness his eyes darkened. "So, guess this means it's over and done with?"

My silence was enough for him. "Are they…" Nero started to say. I swiveled my head to look at him and saw the little hint of disbelief in his face.

"Dead? Yeah, they are." The look he gave me was confusion. "What? I got something on my stomach?" I looked up to see my pasty stomach and saw a slightly discolored hole bigger than a half dollar above my belly button. "I mean, besides the center target spot."

"Nothing." he said with a roll of the eyes. Okay then…

"So who are we dealing with?" Lady asks as she sinks an eight ball into the corner pocket. Wait a sec, where's Trish?

"Where is the fair blonde maiden?" I asked in a horrible rendition of a medieval knight's speech. Nero and Dante grimaced and the latter of the two shook his wrist again. "GYAH! Stop it!" I whined as I tried to kick him in the chin with my free foot, useless, utterly useless.

"She went out to check on Cassie and Patty." Lucia replied as she attempted to wipe away some miniscule smudge. "Cassie is fine, though irrationally angered at something or another. Patty on the other hand had visitors during the night." I couldn't help but show my fear at the possibility that something bad happened to the semi-ditzy blonde. "She is fine, you seem to forget that she works here and is the descendent of a magic user." Lucia said calmly with a small smirk as I sigh in relief.

Dante only snorted. "If you think she hasn't learned anything over these years, you'd be sore the next morning. Warranted that her barriers didn't vaporize any idiot that attempted to attack her." I heard footsteps coming down the stairs and found Mom and Vergil looking at everyone in a calm, albeit minutely disturbed manner. "Did you clean up after yourselves?"

Mom rolled her eyes and came forward. "As if you could tell, that shitty mattress of yours oozes dirt and grime. The minute we set it back down in there, entire room was engulfed in dirt." She then put her hands on her hips and leaned over to look at me. "How's it hanging?" I stuck my tongue out at her. "That well huh?" she smirked. Next thing I know, she's grabbing my other ankle and throwing me over her shoulder.

"OWWWW!" I yelled as Dante let me go and my leg stretched. "CHILD ABUSE!" Vergil looked at me with a mildly amused grin.

"Pssht, please, I did this to you all the time when you where a baby." Was her reply as she started for the couch. I could of sworn I heard her mumble 'little masochist' under her breath. Okay, now that's just mean. "Where's blondie?"

"Shopping." Was Dante's reply as he sat on his desk. "What did our humble guest say?"

"A club called Obsidian, catering to rich pricks who can't get it up an honest way." Garoukin responded as she turned around swiftly at the couch and started to sit down.

"WOAH WOAH WOAH!" I exclaim and punctuate each word with a smack at her back. "You ARE NOT sitting on me!" Nero snickered at that one, I blew raspberry in response. Mom chuckled as she dropped me on the couch, face first, and then actually plopped down on my lower back. "GACK!" I could tell she wasn't using her full weight, but still, she's heavy. "VEEERRRGGGIIILLLL!" I called out as if I was dying, reaching for him. His response was to roll his eyes, march over and try to yank my arm out of its socket. "Love… it is so… painful." I say dramatically in a William Shatner like monotone.

"You want painful?" Mom asks with a smug grin, next thing I know she leans back and lies down on top of me.

"Guh." Was my response as she put her elbow on my good arm and crossed her legs over mine. Okay, now it was hard to breath.

"I WUV YOU!" Mom says in a cringe worthy creepy voice as she rubs her nose in my hair. I hear multiple people gag or snort in laughter.

"Slowly… dying… life force … fading… tell my family… I hate them." I say and then melodramatically slam my head onto the couch, which is painful since I really can't breathe.

Mom sighs and pulls herself off of me. "Geez, I see how it is."

"You know surprisingly he can act better than most of the Syfy movie actors." Nero says boredly.

Lady snorted. "My left foot can act better than those assholes. Now quit getting sidetracked and cough it up." I let myself sit up and Vergil sits down next to me.

"They were under orders to obtain us for their clients who requested us." Vergil informed her in a serious yet bored manner. "Apparently, we are quite popular among people in the manner of being playthings." He chuckled in disdain at the thought and I'm pretty sure I saw flashes of what he'd do to those people if he got his hands on them.

"Meaning?" Lady asked impatiently as she tapped her foot.

"Meaning people wished to strip away all meaning of humanity and morality from us and turn us into personal toys of pleasure and pain just for those who are willing to pay for it." Vergil waxed poetically.

Mom rolled her eyes and snorted. "Humanity and Morality… now that's just funny coming from you." Dante and Nero snorted at the thought as well.

"Anyway, the guy said that each team were given a target or targets and supposed to initiate them into their future lifestyle." I continued on with Vergil's poetic way of saying they wanted to turn us into prostitutes. "By that I mean they just-"

"Kid, uh…" Dante pointed at his face and that is when I felt a little bit of a blush. "Prudes a prude kid, but we get the picture." Now that made me just blush more. How the hell could I be embarrassed by just saying the truth about something? My response was to just look down and swing my legs in different timed circles. Something clanged and when I looked up Lucia was holding a pair of rusted and old shackles. Mom growled in a feral manner at the chains and attempted to push me as far as way from the chains as possible. She didn't have to cause I was trying to crawl up and over the couch and bury into the wall.

"Jesus Christ, what the hell can these things do?" Lady asks as she takes it away from Lucia, who was holding it by pinching her fingers on the outside of a link. Vergil remained silent, didn't even seem to glare at it, oh wait, red eyes. Devil is in the house, what what!

"Either destroy those now, or I will, you along with them as well." Was his response to Lady's question. I shivered at the sudden air of danger and pure malice. Lady took that as a challenge and started swinging the chains in a wide circle as she pulled a gun out.

"You sure you wanna say that again?" She asks as she takes a step forward. Dante steps forward and grabs ahold of the chain, it wraps around his arm and he drops to the floor. "Shit." Was Lady's exclamation as she shot the chain. It separated and Dante jumped away from it at a human slow pace.

Devil smirked and I shivered as I climbed off the top of the couch. "Happy now?" I ask her bitterly.

"What the fuck… was that." Dante asks as he shakes away the feeling of humanity in his arm.

"They're called Atlas Chains." Garoukin said solemnly as she glares at the rusted broken metal, and in a flash she had Annie out and fired countless rounds at the chains. Each one peppered the chains, but did nothing to it. "Demonic rounds, hell anything demonic really, are useless against these chains. The only real way to destroy them, is to use something akin to a sledgehammer you haven't touched before." She continued to glare at the chains as everyone else looked at her. "What I want to know is, where the fuck did they find these, cause I am damn sure I destroyed all of them." Her face contorted in a snarl and she's up on her feet and bringing her foot down upon the rusted metal of the cuffs. It shatters into millions of pieces and a wave of something stifling inks out from the metal.

"You say you thought you destroyed them all?" Devil asks darkly. The way he said it made it seem like she's responsible for kicking puppies and skinning kittens alive, what the hells his problem? Garoukin only stared down at the cuffs and stomped on the next cuff.

"The man who originally made these shackles thought he could rule his kingdom through the power of demons. A very obscenely gifted alchemist that was able to create something grafted from the remnants of angelic weapons. His twist on it was that any living thing with demonic power would feel human, no, even less than humans. You feel as if the weight of the world was squashing you, pinning you down."

"Atlas." Lucia said absently as she stared at mom. The last cuff snapped and crumbled into pieces underneath the onslaught of her foot.

"Exactly." Was her only reply.

"Wait," Lady interjected. "if you basically loose all your powers, then how the hell did you two get out of them?" She throws at Vergil and I. Devil snorted in replacement for Vergil's smart remark, and my response was to unzip his vest. Devil merely smirked as if he was answering some sort of question or proving a fact as I showed his bare chest.

Liberacion was imbedded partially in his chest, near his collar bone. The pale skin of his chest seemingly attached to the metal bat pendant in a manner like how roots of a tree embed itself into the ground. The tree allusion is probably the best one, cause a tree can grow around or on anything. "Vergil took her away when he went to the bathroom, making a detour through Dante's bedroom." Speak of the blue eyed devil, and here he comes.

"I don't regret my decision." Was all he said with a Gaelic shrug.

"Even though you broke your boy toys arm?" Lady jibbed. Red alert, red alert! Devil has been seen off the starboard bow! "Is the whole eye color change due to that as well?" Guess where she's pointing?

"It is." Mom replied with a roll of her eyes. "Has something to do with her residual powers still lying inside the weapon. So the emotional and mental manipulation can still be used. The red eyes belong to Vergil's Inner demon, gold means Nelo Angelo."

A blatant silence was the answer to her statement. "Oh you have got to be shitting me." Dante said in annoyance in more than disbelief. Our collective answer was nodding our three heads in confirmation. "Well… shit."

"So wait a second, are you telling me Vergil has split personalities?" Nero asks trying to figure out what all we've said.

"Duh." Was my response, Devil smirked and ruffled my hair, I smacked his hand away. He growled but didn't bother doing anything else. "And as long as that's stuck in his chest, those other personalities are here to stay." Everyone stared at the pendant and we all thought the same thing. I slide my hand up Vergil's stomach slowly, Devil gave me a weird look. I looked him in the eyes and felt truly crappy about what I was about to do. "Sorry." I grabbed ahold of Liberacion and yanked as hard as I could the moment Devil teleported away.

I was left sitting on the couch with Liberacion in hand, blood and skin hanging from the odd demonic metal. Something whispered into my mind, a small little wind that keep whispering something unintelligible. Uh oh. I threw it across the room as fast as I could, unfortunately the pendant became a real bat and started flying around, hissing and chittering. "Huh… how often does shit like this happen?"

"Oddly enough, not that often." Lady remarked as she and mom both shot at the bat multiple times. It dropped onto the floor as it's scythe form and we all watched, waiting for something else to happen.

"So then, whats the game plan for our friends who want our asses?" Dante asks as we continue to eye the weapon.

"They never call to confirm or deny capture, they just go to their drop off and wait." Was all Vergil said as he limped in through the front door. His hand was on his chest and he glared at me slightly as blood wept through his fingers. "That was uncomfortable." Was all he said as he walked towards the couch. He looked like he had the mother of all migraines.

"Sorry… is um… are-" he stops me in mid sentence by gracefully flopping down on the couch. Didn't even know that was possible.

"No they are not gone." Was his response as he glared at me out of the corner of his eye. "Nelo doesn't really care, but I'm sure it's obvious how the other feels." He sighs and closes his eyes as he rubs the bridge of his nose. "And you only managed to delay another surfacing by taking away a steady power source. They will resurface at any point one of them has power or the will." I leaned over on him and rested my chin on his shoulder.

"Sowwy." Was all I could say doing the puppy dog pout. He raises his free hand and flicks my forehead. "Ow." I said with my puppy dog pout still in place.

"So the drop off's tonight?" Lucia asks as she wipes away at some invisible stain on her blades.

"No, tomorrow night is the date. At a warehouse about thirty minutes away from here." Mom replied as she sat down on top of me.

"GAH!" was my protest.

"Oh, excuse me." She said as she bounced slightly and chuckled.

"MY SPLEEN! MY SPLEEN!" I cried as I clung to Vergil for support, he only stifled a groan as he pinched the bridge of his nose once again. Mom cackled madly and scooted over to my opposite side and I crawled into Vergil's lap to get away from her. He growled slightly but pulled me closer to his chest with his free hand. "Am I the only one thinking that these guys are too sloppy for their jobs?"

Lady pulled out her phone and flicked through something, and then came forward and showed us the screen. In one continuous scroll was a picture of each and every survivor that they had captured from their hunting parties. Next to and underneath their pictures were descriptions. "I got their records sent to me. None of those pricks where in the military for more than an a few hours due to attitude and past records." She pulled away the phone and started scrolling again. "Most worked as bouncers or bodyguards for clubs or small time celebs. Some I may note are more along the illegal or rich side, oil sheiks and the like. But none are truly professional enough." She locked her phone and put it away and cocked a hip as she leaned against Dante's desk with him leaning onto it as well.

"My guess is that this club hired these assholes thinking it'd be clean for them. Get a few groups of expendable, nameless criminals with mild… okay, BARE minimum of training. Load them up with guns and a set plan and let them go loose." She shrugged and adjusted her sunglasses. "More than likely, these 'clubbers'" she said with air quotes. "have real professionals working as their own personal guards. These guys that they hired have no connection what so ever, probably paid them in cash from the club's membership fees or one of their members launders money. No paper trail, all word of mouth and set arrival times. No communication besides the drop off point. It's impressive on how arrogant and somewhat well planned they are."

Nero gave her a blank stare and shook his head as he got to his feet and pulled Red Queen out from its resting place behind his chair. "Whatever, I'm going to head out for my job now."

"You must be joking." Was Vergil's response as he gave a flash of recognition towards the other hybrid. "After all that has happened, you're still going to just waltz out without another glance towards who these people are?" Nero's withering glare was answer enough. Vergil sighed and turned his piercing if not mildly hateful gaze towards his younger brother. "He's perfect for you brother, shares almost the same ideas and logic."

"Why thank you for the approval." Dante replied sarcastically. "I seriously don't know how we are related." He jibbed half-heartedly.

"Neither do I." was his brother's response. Garoukin and I both snorted in laughter.

"Now that is a fresh pile of bullshit if I've ever heard it." I said as I leaned further back into Vergil and looked up at him. His upside glare coming from his barely open eyes was mildly threatening "shut up or nothing special is going to come your way in the near future". I shrugged. "What, It's true. Especially after a lot of crap you said last night." Oh crap, rewind, rewind. Abort, ABORT ABORT!

Everyone's eyes and possibly ears waggled towards our direction as Vergil glared at me and my cheeks suddenly got hotter. "Now what is this about last night?" Lady asks, her voice oozing like honey.

I blew a raspberry at them as Nero smirked knowingly. "Well, looks like some people had fun last night." He sang as he headed for the stairs. Vergil reached into his pocket and sent something flying at his head. Nero caught it after it bounced off his head and glared at it.

"We definitely won't be needing that." Vergil said as he opened his eyes fully. "The sentiments are… appreciated," he cringed saying the words. "but that is not necessary what so ever." My face heated up even more when I realized it was the brown paper sack Nero had given me last night, it was rolled up into a cylinder.

"You carried that in your pocket?" I ask bewildered as I stared up at him in disbelief. "GROSS!" Nero shrugged and threw it at Dante, who had moved behind the desk. He caught it and threw it in a desk drawer and slammed it shut.

Vergil merely shrugged and leaned his head back onto the couch and closed his eyes. "So you guys had fun then?" Dante asks, a similar knowing smirk that was related to Nero's.

I had to look down and grumble my answer. "Oh come on, you enjoyed it." Mom said ribbing me with her elbow.

"Still a few things I want to take back." I snapped back at her. Oops, arwooga, arwooga, prepare for evasive action! Vergil snapped his head back up to glare down at me. I smiled up sheepishly at him. "Well… only a few things." I said even more sheepishly.

"What per say?" He growled back. Uh oh, DIVE DIVE DIVE! I shrunk further down into his lap and tried to act innocent, wasn't working.

"Well, a few things I said… a few ways I acted, NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU!" Wait a minute.. "Okay, a little to do with you, Mr. Let Me Take This Emotionally Manipulative Devil Arm and Wear it on my person!" I snapped back finally. For a moment, he seemed hurt, but then he shrugged and slid his head back to its resting spot on the couch.

"Valid argument, for once." He grumbled. HEY!

Lady sighed impatiently and got up. "Alright, we don't have time to hear you kiss and tell."

"HEY!" i barked in protest. She waved me away as everyone else got up and got ready.

"We've all got jobs set up outside of town, including one for you." She glared at me, but turned to mom next. "You willing to give up a few hours of borrowed life to earn some cash?" It wasn't an actual question.

Mom looked at me, and then shrugged. Okay, now why is she giving up so easily? "I haven't had some fun in a while, and you both seem to need a little time alone together." NO WE DON'T! DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE WITH HIM! She patted me on the head and kissed my cheek. "Have fun sweetie, and remember, don't be too easy." She said with a smile.

Vergil and I both gave her a look. "I believe that line is far too unnecessary in this situation." Vergil remarked sardonically. "I may enjoy your son, but there is a bit of an issue involving those lines of enjoyment." He then motioned to all less than four feet of me. "I am not, nor will I ever be scum that preys upon children." Good to know where those morals stands, he can kill children but he won't sleep with them. Okay… why does that seem more morally acceptable? Oh, what the hell am I talking about, it's acceptable to me so why should I care about everyone else caring?

"Why are you guys going up the stairs?" Mom asks.

"Cars are parked on the street in front of the building behind us." Dante says as he steps foot up the stairs first. "Don't want to exactly give away that we're not captives be…." Why did he pause? And why the fuck is he looking at me? ... Oh. "Anyway, less chance of being seen."

"Watch your step on the fire escape, it is a bit rusty." Lucia quipped as they disappeared one by one up the stairs. I heard them move up into Dante's room. "My, it is actually quite clean in here." Lucia remarked, muffled of course. Vergil smirked and I snickered as we heard the window scrape open and then it shut a little bit later.

After a considerable time, five minutes, of silence and Vergil's slow and steady breathing, I got anxious. "Soooo, what now?" I looked up at him, him down at me. The look basically said 'What is it you want, you incorrigible worm?'

"What do you mean 'What now?'? Would you be implying that I am in the mood to accommodate your boredom? That I have any idea other than lying here to rest and recover from yet another migraine inducing incident?" Well, at least someone's back to their usual prissy self. I looked down at the floor and calmly kicked my feet back and forth, just barely coming close to Vergil's shins before pulling back. After a few minutes of that, Vergil sighed in defeat and picked me up and displaced me on the other side of the couch and got up. "Fine, a few minutes if you are able to wait that long." He didn't sound all that prissy that time, more stuck up and somehow slightly amused.

"Okay~!" I said, mimicking the Little Rascals salute and tone of voice. He grimaced and disappeared upstairs and left me to swing my feet. I heard a door open and some very muffled rustling. I shrugged and jumped off the couch to my feet and raced to my official bed and grabbed a bottle of lemonade. I sat down on the platform above the lobby and swung my feet out over the edge and observed the entirety of the damage dealt to the shop. With my stunt that I had pulled yesterday, there where holes in the walls and ceilings that had a continuity line of cracks expanding and connecting all the holes together. Four major cleanly cut lines created an axis along the floor that was off center and spread up the walls, barely missing Dante's desk as it passed by. Smaller, shorter cuts that didn't have the depth similar to the major cuts decorated the walls at odd intervals.

The windows on the right side of the front doors where busted, one being from when they jumped out of them to fight me in the streets yesterday. The other was from the 50. Cal that had done it's works on my stomach. Both windows were boarded up by black garbage bags duct taped around the sections of broken window panes. I looked around the walls and found random spurts of bullet holes, all focused on the area behind Dante's desk with a few in the desk as well. The jukebox was oddly enough the only thing that suffered mild, if minor, damage. Even more odd, there was a giant scorch mark on the wood floors a few feet away from the door, with bits of embedded metal shrapnel stuck in the wooden slants.

"Huh, must be from the visitors." I theorized as I took a big gulp of lemonade. Ahh, black cherry. Something flashed, a brief and subtle light coming from the corner , near Dante's big ass desk. The light was puzzling, but then again there are bullet cases littered about on the floor and they caught the sunlight whenever they rolled by.

Vergil emerged from the open doorway leading upstairs and immediately looked up at me. "What are you doing up there?" The way he said it meant there was no deliberation on not answering.

I layed my chin on the metal bar that acted as the railing and hummed. "Trying to make heads or tails of this craptastic, utterly unbelievable life." Vergil merely acknowledged that I had said something, I don't think he even-

"If you are contemplating on how unrealistic our lives are as of late, even by usual standards that Dante, Trish, Lady or I myself hold. Then yes, I completely agree with your sentiments." He set something down on the desk as I was left staring open mouthed at him. While he was busy pulling something out of a box and placing it on whatever he was placing it on, he continued talking to me, not even looking over his shoulder. "But then again, this life just seems to be nothing but aggravating. Well, what life isn't?" He shrugged in a Dante like manner.

"You sounded like Dante for a second there." I pointed out as I got to my feet and headed to the platform's stairs. "And it's been happening frequently if you haven't noticed." Vergil looked over his shoulder to glare at me.

"If you are done insulting me now, I have found our source of entertainment." And with a style and flourish of his own, he turned and his coat swished. Sitting on the desk was a chessboard, a pure wooden chessboard that had seen it's better days but none the less it was indeed a beautifully crafted masterpiece. Mahogany? Oak? It's not marble, that's the chess pieces, pure yet chipped solid black and white sculpted pieces of marble.

Chess, of course, why am I not surprised? Okay, I am actually surprised… surprised that Dante actually had a chess set in this place. Wait a second. "Something of your fathers?" A curt nod was my answer. Huh, I wonder if it's got some hidden sort of power. I twisted my face up in a frown as I remember plenty of times getting annoyed as hell while fighting the chess pieces in DMC 3. "That thing doesn't open up a sub dimension to where we end up playing a demonic version of Wizards Chess, does it?"

He merely cocked an eyebrow in question. "Wizard's Chess?" Oh yeah, I don't think… no he doesn't know about Harry Potter.

I reached the floor and shrugged my broken arm's shoulder, and cue mild pain. "It's from a book series about wizards and everything else in between. Well, except for demons I think." I pondered the thought as Vergil pulled a high back padded chair from around the coffee table and placed it in front of Dante's desk. I shrugged and took another swig of lemonade. "Think of a… less intense version of the Dammed Chess Board world in the Nether World."

He raised his head up to ponder the idea as he sat down in Dante's chair and I pulled myself up into the one he pulled up for me. I sat cross legged and scooted the chair as close as possible to the big wooden block of furniture and leaned onto it. I had white, he had black. Figured he would have wanted to go first. "Sounds childish."

"I'll show you a clip from the movie, made it seem more fun for me." I put down my bottle and picked up the white knight on the left and put it forward, up two spaces and one to the left. And that was how the game began.

One after another, pieces were moved forward and back, side to side. Taken away on the concept of doing this for doing that. I managed to take away his pieces first, somehow. And one by one, or one and then by two, pieces were taken on either side of the board. Black and white lines of pieces were formed on the sides of the chessboard. I don't know why, but I was just becoming more and more frustrated, and it wasn't on the principal of that I was losing the game fairly to someone who was better. I moved one piece that I knew was a bad decision that moment I took my hand away and saw all of possibly three ways for it to be taken. Only for Vergil to avert his attention to another piece on the opposite side and move it to where it did absolutely no good for him, but set it up to were I could take it for my own purposes.

He did that three times in all before I realized what was happening. He was letting me win, on purpose. I looked into his eyes as I placed my rook in the direct line of fire in front of his king and declared "Check". He merely looked at the bored, grabbed ahold of his king and attempted to move it somewhere out of the crosshairs. Only for the first three attempts of moving it, the king was in direct lines of fire from my knight, bishop and a pawn. He finally sat it one miniscule square away and left his queen, which had the advantage of being pointed at least two of the offending pieces on my side that was threatening the king. I blinked and furrowed my brow at the thought of him actually losing on purpose and started to rack my brain on possibly ideas as to of why. And all that came back were plot devices from fanfiction to where it was how he manipulated the persons, mainly Nero, he was playing against into instigating something.

I picked up my bishop and prepared to move it in the direction to where it would put Vergil's king in a direct check, and would allow me to move another pawn forward to entrap the king my next turn. But instead I moved my bishop back a total of three spaces, placing it in line of a remaining pawn that was stalemated with one of my own. Vergil's eyebrow raised only a hair before he moved his king forward one square in a seamless action. I stuck out my tongue to play as if I was in deep thought and picked up the pawn near Vergil's king and moved it forward one space, making it in danger of being checked. I didn't say a word about the status of the game, just sat there and drank some of my untouched lemonade.

The corner of his mouth twitched as he fixed me a glance. "I believe you need to call check." I did a double take on purpose and slapped my head after a few seconds of studying the board I had already seen. I'm stupid compared to Vergil, Dante as well if he wanted to. I only managed to be able to outsmart him, okay perplex him, by sheer randomness and stupidity as well as dumb luck. But I think even he knows that I am not that stupid. But I'm not sure if he suspects that I suspect his ploy, or that he knows that I know and will attempt to show me that I know that he knows and will still manage to play to his advantage by acting as if he has no idea, thus confirming that he knows I know yet still managing to not show he knows. I think I just pulled a Monty Python reasoning there, or is it Princess Bride reasoning? No wait, I believe that it is circular reasoning, but at those points its probably more of a pentagonal reasoning. Damn it! Keep your head in the game idiot.

"Sorry, Check." Was all I said. His usual non-committal gaze told me nothing as he merely moved his queen down one space and into the possible path of my knight. I reached forward and picked up the pawn that was about to put him in checkmate, and simply moved it forward one space, not sideways, forward. Putting him out of check voluntarily, I could hear a sharp grinding noise and saw him sigh as he used his queen to take away my rook. After my move of putting my knight where his queen used to be, he used his stalemated pawn to take my bishop and I moved my pawn forward and asked for my queen back. He gave it over as his mouth started to frown downward and then he took the pawn that was my line of defense for my king.

"Check." He declared softly, not revealing any of the emotions I was sure he was feeling. I smiled softly at him and put my rook behind his king.

"Check." I said back at him, an arrogant smirk in place. He nodded, his frown now a grim line as he moved the queen back diagonally to the left one and took another pawn directly in front of my king.

"Check." He said again as I saw that my king had a direct option was to go right. Instead of that doing that, I moved another pawn forward on the far corner and smiled. He frowned once more and moved his queen to where my king layed, and gently knocked it over on its side and placed his black queen there. It caught the passing sunlight and seemed to glow ethereally as it proudly displayed it's victory. "Checkmate." Was what he said as he sat back in his chair. My king rolled slightly and slowly crept up on the edge of the chessboard till it hit the top of Dante's desk. I watched the king roll some more till it reached the lip of the desk and then fall off and land in my outstretched hand. I sat it down on the board, put my chin on the desk and stared at the king as it lined up side by side with Vergil's face. "That was a decent game." He said nonchalantly as he sighed.

I couldn't help it, I started giggling, laughing and slamming my good hand into the desk. I put my face down on the desk and started laughing hysterically in short, manic sounding bursts. Finally in one large sweep of my arm, I sent the board and pieces flying, scattering across the room. Vergil sat there looking at me, hints of anger in his eyes as I got to my feet. "BULLSHIT!" I stared at him the eyes and I saw the anger and calculated emotions behind his eyes. "You didn't even-, no, you did try, try to let me win. What the hell Vergil, what the fucking hell?"

He let out an exasperated sigh and ran his fingers through his hair. "I figured you would at least hopefully figure it out. That was purely frustrating, if you hadn't of figured it out, I think I might hav-" I threw the lemonade bottle over his head and it crashed against the wall, nailing Agni and Rudra in one blow.

"I say, a perfect shot young sir, but-" a summon sword pierced the wall next to Agni and they both shut up.

Vergil glared at me and calmly got to his feet. "You wish to know why I proceeded through with that horrendous circus? It was because I attempted to show some sense of pity towards our plight last night." Some weird unknown emotion pass through his face as shock passed through my head.

Pity? Pity from Vergil, over last night. Over last… over… "I don't believe it." my hand clenched up in a fist and I started shaking, seething at his words. "You're pitying me… I can't believe…" a tear slid out. Great, just fucking great. Cry loser, go ahead and cry like the fucking wimp he thinks you are. I looked at him as more came and I only glared. "Why Vergil?" I stepped around the desk and started towards him. "Huh? Tell me? Why the pity? Cause of some fucked up sense that you should? Are you feeling sorry for someone who's weak just because their attached to you by some stupid bond?" I was merely inches away when I stopped and looked up at him, him down at me. "Well fuck that." A waterfall down my face, my cheeks burning in anger as I glared at him. "Fuck you Vergil." I whispered and poked him in the chest with my finger. "Fuck. You. Fuck you, and your sense of pity. I don't need it. Yours, Dante's, everyone else's." I sniffed as everything else started coming out, all the unseen aspects that Hollywood glosses over when people actually cry for real, even if they don't intend to. Cry that is.

"What happened last night Adrian-" I slapped the hand he was trying to place on my shoulder away and cut him off.

"I know exactly what happened last night Vergil." I told him mockingly. "I was there, remember!" the tears where trickling down now as I smiled at him madly. "I was the one down there on his knee's remember? The one stuck with this sense of… of wrongness in the back of mind. That undying feeling that something-" the phone rang then and I gasped as Vergil looked at me with those mildly pitiful eyes told me everything I needed to know. I wiped away snot and a few remaining tears as Vergil looked at me. The phone rang again and I turned around and my foot slipped slightly on rook that was on the floor. Vergil steadied me and the phone rang once more.

"Feeling helpless and weak always comes with that sense." He said scathingly as he bent down, picked up the chess piece and put it on the desk. "Being violated in any sense carries that feeling." Another ring and he gave me a withering look. "Please pick up those pieces, as you theorized earlier, they did belong to my father." He grabbed the back of my neck and made me turn my head to face me. "And I'm not exactly in the mood for a child to trample over a small token that annoyingly holds sentiment to me."

I sighed and sniffed as I bent down and picked up another piece and another. He sighed and picked up the phone, stopping it mid ring. "Devil May Cry, if you are that foo- Oh, Cassie." He said her name as if it left a bad taste in his mouth. "Yes he is… yes I did… I will not humor that thought…" he tapped me on the shoulder and gave me the phone.

I thanked him silently and put it to my ear. "Cass? What's up?"

"WHAT'S UP IS THAT NO ONE FUCKING ANSWERS THE GOD DAMN PHONE!" She yelled into the phone, making me pull it away. Vergil rolled his eyes and looked around the floor and seemed to fixate on something near the wall.

"Sorry, but someone smashed my phone to pieces." Silent glare at Vergil, he didn't even bother return it. Instead he knelt down by the face plate to a phone line socket that was hanging onto only the line. Which was to say that it revealed the inner workings of the metal socket.

"Yeah, I know that one, was on the other line." She replied hastily. "But I've got a message for you on account that those assholes at the school didn't know the shops number." The school? "Guess what?" she asked huffily. "We're now officially expelled." My mouth dropped open as Vergil glance back at me slightly, a flash of red light came from inside the wall socket. A very small, weak red light.

"Yo..your joking… right?"

She snorted in disgust. "No, I'm not. They've-" Vergil pressed down on the phones cradle and cut her off.

"What the hell V-" he cut me off by grabbing ahold of my mouth and pressing a finger to his lips. He then motioned to the wall socket and I saw that he had pulled the face plate further down the phone line and exposed the inner workings even further. Inside the socket there was the major line, it's protective plastic coating stripped away. Attached, intertwined into the many smaller lines inside it, was tow metal prongs that strayed out and attached to a clear cylindrical compact device that had a thin green desk with a small, red light attached to it.

"I believe that has something to do with how everyone knows where are jobs are located at." Vergil said silently as he let go of my mouth and pulled the phone from my hands and placed it back on the cradle.

"A bug? Someone bugged the phone?" I asked in disbelief. How the hell could that have happened? The front door chose to open then, and in walked two very angry looking people in decent enough dress/work clothes. They had guns in polymer holsters attached to their hips with brass badges looped through their belts next to it.

"I'm Detective Arlent," said the tall black man with a major glare going on. "And this is Detective Cargie, we need to speak to Adrian Black." Well…. Shit.

Alucardismaster: Well, I know that some of you are probably asking for my head about now. Haven't updated in… almost exactly two months, and then have the balls to leave everything on a cliffhanger. Well my only excuse is I've been very drained as of late. Life goes on, and that includes acquiring a job and dealing with the trifles that is a college system of how they tend to bleed you dry and ask for the dust leftover in your bank account. Then only to come around and slap you with a few more papers you need to sign or else they won't accept your application.

Let's just say, I've been having a extraordinary time trying not to go postal. Though by the time I end up quitting my job, it's about two hours away from where I intend to go to college at, the ever accursed scanner shall be destroyed by the more than cooperative stapler. It took me a whole month to even work back up the energy to write something. But it took a last time together till next year trip with my friends Breezy and Melons to even aspire me to write this chapter. Driving across Arkansas, Oklahoma, Missouri and Kansas sure was fun, yeah for Chinese fire drills every hour on the side of the road. Ugh, I shiver at the thought of driving on a four lane highway once again in the near future.

The Wichita anime convention was amazing to anyone else who went or couldn't attend. The city was amazing and it really does bring about the writing mood. As does trying to unlock your car in a hotel parking lot with a coat hanger at three in the morning. Don't ask. But now I am up in the middle of the night working on this, posting from Melons house since we are having a sleepover to send her off on her family trip. She's sleeping right now and she leaves early, so that is why the last four thousand words of this chapter are riddled with mistakes. Please leave comments about how I should be hanged for leaving you all… well hanging. A true review would be lovely, oh and to guest who left that my story keeps you sane. I would love you meet you in person, I think we'd have a wonderfully difficult time trying to figure out how I can make you even further unhinged.

Ta ta for now, I must run away from the approaching torches and pitch forks. Enjoy and please don't set the shop on fire. Lady bills me for the smudges on her clothing. Au revoir, Alucardismaster.