Chapter Text
Vergil snaps upright with a sharp breath. His eyes flit around the room in search of threats, but he finds none. Instead, he stares at the wall of his childhood bedroom. Vergil rubs his eyes.
Wait a minute. Why are his hands so tiny?
Heart leaping into this throat, Vergil jumps from the bed and runs to the bathroom. Or rather, he tries to run. He stumbles on the first few steps, his legs significantly shorter than he's used to. Vergil picks himself up with a flutter of panic and consciously walks down the hall. It takes an eternity. Once there, he peers at himself in the mirror. He can't be more than six or seven years old with his skinny limbs and round face.
"What in Sparda's name...?" Vergil whispers, his voice frighteningly small and high-pitched.
On wobbly legs, Vergil tiptoes toward Dante's room and opens the door. He reaches up rather than down to grab the handle. Vergil tilts his head when he sees a small library inside instead of a bed and a horrifying armament of red clothing on the floor. Right. If they haven't turned eight yet, they still sleep in the same room. It's still strange. Vergil doesn't recall there being a library in here. It was on the second floor, yes, but not here. The library always hung just off of Sparda's study.
"Dante?" Vergil whispers, creeping into their shared room.
The bed sits empty—also strange. Vergil could've sworn they switched to two twin beds when they were a tad under four. Vergil frowns at the room itself. The walls are painted a mix of blue and soft grays, not a hint of red anywhere in sight. Their halves of the room were always color coded.
Both Rebellion and Yamato lean up against the wall in their cases, safe and sound, but it doesn't put Vergil at ease. Not even a little bit. "Dante?"
He hears footsteps on the floor below and slinks toward the banister. He peers through the wooden bars, not tall enough to see over the top. Walking by on the floor below him is a tall blonde woman. Vergil's mouth falls open. He casts one last wary glance at the oddly uniform bedroom before skirting down the stairs. Stealthy as he can manage in his childish body, Vergil follows the sound of footsteps to the kitchen.
When he enters, the woman turns. She smiles at him. "Good morning, Vergil."
Vergil can't speak. He can't move. Was this some strange heavenly illusion?
"Vergil?" The woman crouches down in front of him and presses the back of her hand to his forehead. "Are you feeling all right? When you slept in past seven this morning, I assumed you stayed up too late reading. Is your stomach okay?"
"Mother?" Vergil squeaks.
Eva tilts her head and smooths Vergil's hair back. "What is it, sweetheart?"
Unable to control his emotions, Vergil surges forward and hugs her as tightly as he can. No matter if this place is a vision or a torment, his mother is here. She's alive and warm. Vergil breathes in her scent, a subtle mix of honey and nutmeg he forgot entirely when he grew up. Or, perhaps, he buried any good memory of her when he turned away from the house and left.
"Vergil, honey, what's wrong?"
Would she understand if he told her the truth of his presence here, or would she think he had his head in the clouds? "I.... I had a bad dream. Father's enemies came here a-and you left me behind."
Eva hugs him tighter. "Never, sweetheart."
"I-" Vergil hiccups, tears falling down his cheeks. His young body does not handle stress well. Hell, his older body doesn't either, but at least he can usually avoid an emotional breakdown. "I couldn't find Dante. I got scared."
At that, Eva falls quiet. After a minute, she pulls back with a confused expression on her face. "Who's Dante, honey?"
And suddenly, this place was hell.
Vergil fumbles to come up with a response, nervously mumbling about a toy he lost. 'Who is Dante?' How can she ask that? Dante is and always will be his twin brother, so the only reason for Eva not to know about him is if... he....
"Was it that little dragon plush that disappeared a week ago? If it ended up like a lot of your toys, it might've gotten thrown out, sweety."
Breaking down in tears might be the most embarrassing thing to happen to him in a while, but at least only his mother is here to see it. She apologizes for the toy's disappearance, and he almost feels guilty for lying about it. Eva rubs his back, promises that if she could've repaired his beloved Dante she would have and that if he wants another dragon, he can have one.
For the few times Vergil wondered what it would've been like if Dante never existed, he never imagined he would feel so betrayed when his little brother was taken away.
Eva picks him up, likely for the first time since Vergil turned five however long ago and declared himself too old for such behavior. She carries him up to his room and lays him down. She must be incredibly worried over him, her stoic child suddenly inconsolable over a toy he never owned in the first place. Or maybe in this life, he did. Would she ever believe him if he told her the truth about himself? He, who lives with his nose tucked almost into the spines of fantastical books and adventures, could never explain his all too real horror story of a life.
His mother leaves his side after an hour of tears and heaving breaths and disappears into the reaches of the house. He hears the front door open and close.
Vergil presses his face into the pillows.
Eva returns an hour later with a shopping bag and a tight smile on her face. "I'm sorry, honey. I couldn't find the blue one. I know it won't be the same, but it's close."
She pulls a four-winged stuffie from the bag. Vergil's next sob wheezes out of his chest as a hysterical laugh because the toy really is reminiscent of Dante's devil trigger. Aside from the fact that it stands on all-fours, has a long neck and tail, and horns that curve back instead of up, they're similar. The smile stitched onto its jaw is crooked, just like Dante's.
With no other recourse but to accept the only reminder of his twin, Vergil clutches the toy to his chest. Eva settles on the bed next to him and holds him close.
"I'm sorry, sweetheart. You never seemed so attached to Dante before."
Vergil chokes on another laugh, burying his face into the plush's soft wings and curling it closer to himself. Eva strokes his hair and whispers another apology over his head. She stays until Vergil exhausts his tiny body and drifts off to sleep.
Over the course of the next week, Vergil faces the reality of being an only child.
He hates it.
Vergil carries the plush dragon with him everywhere—when he reads, when he eats, when he sleeps. He takes care of it better than any toy he ever owned. And Vergil cries. He cries a lot. His young body full of raging hormones and a lack of life experience treats each mood swing as though it may be his last. Eva worries about him more that first week than any other he can remember.
Today, Vergil hides away in the library, the one in Dante's room, and sits on the floor holding the toy. A book rests in his hands, but he doesn't even look at the words in front of him. Instead, he remembers when the walls in here used to be red halfway up. He remembers the dresser in the far corner that held more dirty clothes than clean ones. He remembers Dante used to keep the Rebellion on the shelf above his headboard.
"Vergil, it's time for lunch."
Vergil stands and leaves the Not-Library.
At the table, Vergil picks at the sandwich his mother made him while staring at the side Dante used to sit at. He considers placing his toy there instead, but like Eva said, it's not the same.
"Vergil?"
The boy looks at his mother. He hates worrying her like so.
"I know you were upset about Dante, but you've been behaving differently this entire week. Are you sure there isn't something else bothering you?"
This is the opportunity to tell her.
But he can't. Every time he opens his mouth to try, his words fail him. He attempts to tell her the truth several times after, every time she asks if he's okay or if something is bothering him, but the well of his extensive vocabulary dries up and he just can't.
A month passes, then six, and then ten. The stuffed dragon remains by his side throughout. The leathery wings have grown smoother with wear. Vergil thought maybe when he got used to being alone, truly alone, it would get easier. He was wrong. The endless quiet when he reads still throws his mood into a sour silence instead of the peace he once experienced in the twenty minutes he could get Dante to leave him alone. If he possessed a better distraction from his thoughts, he might've stopped reading entirely. Without Dante, what distraction does he really have?
When Vergil goes outside to practice his swordplay, he holds fast to the Rebellion. She hums in his hand, a low and rich reverberation of two blades clashing together. Rebellion feels the same as she once did, and not at all. This version of the Rebellion only knows him, cherishes him and no other. On some level, he thinks the Rebellion recognizes that he keeps her close for someone else. She and the Yamato both try to comfort him.
Some days it works.
He sits in his room most others, one wall painted red for reasons Eva couldn't fathom.
As it turns out, he is seven years old, so when his mother wakes him up on his eighth birthday, he dresses in his blue shirt and a dark red jacket. He clutches his dragon plush to his chest and steels himself for his first birthday without his twin's existence.
By no means is it his first one spent alone, but this? This is worse.
Any control he had on his emotions falls away when he sees the cake. It's chocolate, of course. Both Vergil and Dante always agreed on chocolate, but the frosting is only blue. It's not neatly bisected down the middle with one half red and one half blue, eight candles on one side and eight on the other. It's not smudged at one corner where Dante stole frosting off of Vergil's side of the cake. It doesn't have Dante's name on it at all.
Eva rushes to his side when he breaks down. He knows he's scaring her like this, his emotions volatile in every waking moment. Were he a human child, she might've taken him to a therapist.
"Vergil? Sweetheart, please," Eva whispers, tears in both her eyes and his. "Please, tell me what's wrong."
"I want my brother," Vergil says finally, looking her in the eyes. His voice cracks and scrapes over the plea. He can't do this anymore. He can't pretend Dante didn't exist. "I know you don't understand, and you won't believe me, but I had one. I had one, and I just want him back." He cries into Eva's shoulder when she holds him. "I want my little brother back."
Eva pulls away and brushes the tears from his face. "Honey-"
"No! I had one. I swear, I had one." Vergil shakes his head and steps away from his mother. She doesn't believe him, just like he thought. "I tried to live this life. I tried, but I can't. I had a life, a brother, a son, and I can't keep living like this!"
He runs before she can deny him his own memories. Unthinkingly, he ends up in the playground where fate met him last. He stumbles down beside the green horse.
Vergil stares up at the sky, sobbing. It's not fair. He tried everything he could possibly think of over the last ten months to wake himself up and go back to his old life, but there was no way out. He has his mother, yes, but at what cost? He lost everything else he ever cared about. Was he so predestined for ruining lives that trying to turn his own around cursed him to this?
Eva finds him that night curled up beside the sandbox, his plush grubby and hair dirty. "You're freezing, sweetheart."
"Please, believe me," Vergil pleads. "Please."
"I do, baby. I do, I promise, but I've been looking for you all day. I looked everywhere I could think of. Promise me you won't run away from me like this again."
Vergil trembles when she picks him up. "I'm sorry. I promise. I'm so sorry. Please, forgive me."
"Always, Vergil." Eva rubs his back and carries him home. After she makes Vergil a cup of cocoa, she sits him down in the den and cradles him close. "Now, tell me everything."
Vergil does. He tells her about her impending death, and his subsequent mistakes. He tells her about Dante, the real Dante, and how his brother saved him in more ways than he knew.
He tells her about his child, his bold and courageous Nero.
The story pours out of him, indiscriminate between good or bad. Eva listens to all of it, making him realize he was a fool for ever thinking she wouldn't believe him. Even now, after being the only subject of her love and attention for almost a year, he projected the mother he thought abandoned him on her. He has nothing and no one to compete with, yet still, he assumed.
Vergil sinks against Eva's chest. "Mother?"
"What is it, sweetheart?"
"I'm sorry I didn't trust you."
Eva hums and presses a kiss into his hair. "I love you, Vergil. I've never known you to lie, and no matter how brilliant your imagination is, you were obviously feeling something real. Something you had no control over. I just wish there was something more I could've done for you."
Vergil clutches his dragon plush tighter.
"This really reminds you of your brother, doesn't it?"
"Mhmm."
Eva threads her fingers through his hair and uses her other hand to tip the dragon's head. She traces a thumb over the crooked smile. "Dante looks like a troublemaker."
Vergil laughs softly. "Yes."
"Then again, he was your twin. So, I suppose that makes you a bit of a troublemaker, too," Eva muses, poking Vergil in the tummy until he caves in a fit of giggles. He can't remember the last time he laughed like so. "There's my Vergil. I knew there was still a smile in you somewhere."
The boy sobers a little, his smile turning pained.
"No wonder you've been so morose, hmm?" Eva murmurs, slipping one of her hands into his. "I've always thought you seemed a little lonely, but I never met anyone I loved quite like your father who could give you a sibling."
Vergil shrugs. "I wouldn't have wanted a sibling from anyone else. Maybe the only child you raised would have, but not me."
"You always were picky."
"I suppose so."
Eva sighs and nuzzles a little closer, rocking him so subtly, he almost doesn't notice at first. "Almost an entire year. After making up with him and losing him again, I can't imagine how that feels. That he forgave you probably meant the world. He must've loved you very much."
Vergil sniffles and wipes his face. A small chuckle bubbles from his lips. "You know, it's funny. Whenever I told him he shouldn't bother, he just glared at me and called me a dumbass."
"Vergil!"
"What? It's true."
Eva tugs his ear in playful scolding. "We do not use that kind of language, young man."
"I'm technically an adult."
"You're also technically an eight-year-old, and my eight-year-old Vergil is a polite and respectful boy, don't you think?" Eva teases, ruffling his hair as his neck turns pink. "It must be strange being in such a small body again."
Vergil shrugs. "I've gotten used to it, but yes. Going from well over six feet to barely three caused a bit of whiplash."
Eva laughs mirthfully. "I thought you were strangely uncoordinated for a little while, always watching the floor when you walked and bumping into things. It made me worry here and there."
"I'm sorry."
"I know. I forgive you, sweetheart. Just... promise you'll tell me when something's bothering you?"
Vergil quietly agrees, tucking his stuffed dragon as close as he can and nestling closer to his mother. Over the next few days, he frets over the pending incursion of Mundus's army, but Eva tells him to let things come as they may. This world is already different than before, which makes guessing at the future an anxiety-inducing pastime.
But Vergil knows.
He grows paranoid. Eva indulges him when he asks her to ward the house, and he spends his days shoring up the perimeter and working on his swordplay. His young body doesn't possess the muscle memory or the power of his past body, and some of Yamato's abilities lie beyond his reach. Vergil hates it.
Eva stares at him for a solid two minutes when he suggests stabbing himself with the Rebellion to bind himself to his demon much earlier. At least then, he'd have the enough power to store his weapons and create more than just two summoned swords at a time. Accessing his devil trigger before being stabbed several times by the enemy seems ideal.
His mother doesn't quite feel the same way.
"You don't have to look or see the blood."
Her mouth falls open. "Sweetheart, I.... I don't even know what to say. I'm not sure whether to address the fact that you want to stab yourself first, or the fact that you think I don't want you to stab yourself because I'm squeamish. One, I married your father, a demon. A little blood doesn't scare me. Two, I don't want you to hurt yourself because I love you, not for any other reason. And three, why do you want to take such extreme measures for something we're not even sure is going to happen?"
"But I do know." Vergil casts a solemn look at his mother. "I know our father's enemy. They'll come."
Eva crouches down in front of him and smooths her fingers over his hair, smiling gently when he leans into the touch. "You have no idea how much it disturbs me that stabbing yourself occurs to you as a logical solution to our problems, sweetheart." She raises a hand before he can protest. "Whether or not it just so happens to be true."
To his great surprise, she lets him.
It doesn't matter in the end.
Without Dante's scent to draw off some of the demons, all of them focus on the scent of Eva's human blood. The horde overwhelms him. Through the blood and tears, he feels himself being carried and placed somewhere where the air feels dark and close.
His mother tells him to stay hidden and that she loves him.
And then she's gone.
Vergil huddles, muffling his sobs into his stuffed toy. Eva must have placed it with him, but he can't remember her doing so. That it hides his crying so well is the only reason the demons don't find him. His little cabinet reeks of magic from the wards, but it does nothing to quell the scent of human blood on the air. He can't escape this part of his life; Eva was doomed from the start.
Like Dante before him, he runs.