Title: Homecoming
Fandom: Devil May Cry - Vergil
Rating: PG
Length: 611
Content notes: angst, spoilers for DMC5
Summary: A dying Vergil returns to his childhood home, with one thing on his mind...

Author notes: For the fan_flashworks challenge shelter, and the bingo square flight. Thanks to ldybastet for the beta! :)



It felt strange for Vergil to be back in his childhood home after so long. How many years had passed, exactly, he couldn’t say. Time in the underworld moved differently, the ebb and flow seemingly changing on a whim. What felt like endless torture sessions turned out to have lasted only seconds, while a quiet moment would have dragged on far longer than it felt. If anything, it had been a lifetime.

The house had changed little from the last time Vergil had seen it. Being exposed to the elements seemed to have had little effect on the burned-out husk that had been left after the attack. Every patch of soot, every strip of peeling wallpaper appeared just the way Vergil remembered it from the day he’d returned home to find his mother dead and Dante gone.

The urge to explore welled up within him, and if he’d been in better shape – if his body hadn’t been literally crumbling away with each passing second – Vergil may very well have indulged it. How much of his childhood remained tucked away within those walls? His toys, his books, the sticks he and Dante had used to duel with when fights between them had far less bitterness and much less at stake… Simpler days. He’d taken none of it when he’d fled on that fateful day, not even his beloved book of poetry.

All he’d needed was Yamato. And power. Power enough that he’d never need to turn tail and run again.

The old family portrait still hung in pride of place above the mantlepiece, only darkened in a few places by a layer of ash. Vergil resisted the urge to sneer up at it. Their mother always used to say it was there so their father could always watch over them, but what good had that done in the end? In fact, Vergil wondered, what must his father think of him now? Did he realise that one day his sons would become bitter rivals? Or how much that taint of humanity would weaken them? Worse, if Sparda were still around, would he still be seen as second-best - would Dante always have been the favourite?

A question perhaps best left unanswered.

Still, whether Sparda had intended it or not, his final inheritance might just prove the key for Vergil to finally gain the advantage over his hated twin. If his humanity was his weakness, Vergil reasoned, then he would cut it out completely. Vergil’s cracked fingers tightened painfully around the hilt of the Yamato, prompting a grimace. Becoming a true demon… It was a risk, one that even he wasn’t sure he would take if he were not falling apart from the strain of countless defeats. Now, even if it killed him, it didn’t matter. He was a dead man anyway.

No. No! He wasn’t dead yet. He would succeed. He would cast off everything holding him back, fully embrace his demonic heritage, and finally defeat Dante for good. And this, the site of his first and greatest failure, would be the perfect place for his rebirth.

Vergil unsheathed the Yamato, let his twin’s name pass his lips. Turned away from the portrait and his father’s accusing eyes, and grunted with the effort of raising the sword over his chest. Then thrust. Even as the incredible pain overtook him, a scrap of a poem, not thought of in so many years, bubbled up in his memory, prompting him to recite it aloud as final motivation for his task.

“…heavy chain, that does freeze my bones around.”

One final push. Then, in a blinding burst of light it was done.

And Vergil lost everything.