Downfall

Lady Luce

Disclaimer: Dante, Lady and everything Devil May Cry belong to Capcom I'm just borrowing them and promise to return them unscathed :)

A/N: This is a rather dark fic which came to me... in fact I can't honestly remember when or where it came to me, but it was most likely in that time between waking and sleep when most of my ideas hit me and make me jump up from bed and race for the laptop. I was wondering what would finally kill Dante, because in the end something has to, right? And though this is set post DMC1 and therefore AU it seems to me that the perfect motives are all there - and hopefully well explained. Well I'll let you be the judge of that...

Edited 17/6/07 - Origionally I put that this fic is post DMC3 by mistake, I meant 1. I've also edited some typos.

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Her face was wavering in and out of his vision, blurring one moment and sharpening a second later as he tried desperately to focus. Lady's bi-coloured eyes were swimming with an unnatural light, one he had never seen before in her eyes or anyone else's for that matter. It was not a cold look; he could tell she was trying to be disconnected, heartless, but she was failing miserably. No there was something oh so very human in her eyes accompanied by the sad, almost apologetic, downward quirk of her lips; to him it only made her look all the more beautiful. Sad, wistful, it suited her. Her whole life had been some bitter twisted mess and now she was doing the only thing she knew how to do; killing.

Maybe it was the poison flooding his system, or just some quiet silent understanding but he was feeling strangely relaxed. Reality was fraying around him as he lost himself in the conflicting emotions of her eyes. The pain from the dagger embedded in his back became a dull ache, and his eyes slid shut.

Dante opened them again a moment later head hanging slightly to the side gazing at her blearily through the unruly white bangs which hung in his eyes. His hand moved up to brush her cheek lightly marveling at the smoothness of her skin in his dazed state. His lips still hovered barely an inch below hers, head tilted upwards as she kneeled in his lap.

"I should have known," he whispered hand slipping from her cheek to rest on the arm of his chair. His breath ghosted across her lips making them tingle with slight anticipation and she pressed them together trying to quell the urge to close the distance between them. She couldn't, not now.

Lady's hand shook on the hilt of the dagger she had driven into his back just below – and slightly to the left of – his heart. She didn't know whether she had missed deliberately or because of nerves. Had she wanted to, oh so selfishly, draw his life out for those few agonising moments longer just to explain herself? The shock in his icy blue eyes when she'd quite literally stabbed him in the back, the surprised cry which had passed his lips, the sudden hurt realisation which had flashed across his features… she'd tried desperately to conceal the pain from her face, to fill her heart with nothing but ice. She knew from the smile which quirked his lips moments later that she had failed. Or maybe that was just the poison dulling his senses; giving him that lopsided, goofy, grin which she had so often loved.

She had been considerate enough to make sure that there wasn't any pain; she'd gone to no ends to find a demonic poison which was supposed to cause a nice peaceful death. The search had taken her months; put her in many a sticky situation and it had cost an arm and a leg to boot. Demons weren't known for their kindness or any form of fair play, but eventually she'd found someone selling a watered-down form of demonic poison. It might not have been enough to take out a full demon, but it was over the fatal dose for a hybrid.

Her plan had been so perfect and she'd carried it right out to the end. Half of her had thought she would fail, half of her had wanted to, but she was strong willed and she had sworn on her mothers grave to kill every demon she met; every last one. Deep down inside she knew that maybe she could have let him live if they had simply remained friends. Dante had never quite over-stepped the boundary between harmless flirting and a serious relationship, but her heart had. That was why he had to die, that was why she had to do this; no matter what she couldn't fall for a demon – even if it meant killing a completely innocent man and breaking her own heart.

Her lips trembled with the mockery of words and each time she broke off before a sound left her lips. How could she even begin to apologise, to explain? She had led him blind into her sordid little game and he'd followed her mindlessly, willingly. Maybe he really had wanted it as much as she did. The first advances had been slow, cautious, and then each time taking it a little further until now. She hadn't kissed him for fear of bringing about her own down-fall, no; she'd been coy and clever, making him come to her – making him love her. Each day she'd worn him down a little more and each day she'd torn a piece of her own heart out – until now.

Now; she had climbed into his lap as he sat at his desk waiting, like some bored child, for the rain to stop. It had been raining for days only serving to darken her mood further. But rain, it suited her, sad and dreary sometimes glinting with the promise of snow. Snow, like the pure white of his hair, which she had threaded her fingers through moments before, whispering sweet nothings into his ear staring into the darkened depths of his eyes, knowing how much he wanted this. And he got just what he asked for; he hadn't seen it coming and she had been his undoing. That trusting, caring, human side had won out in him and she'd betrayed him right then and there.

The sudden sibilant hiss of a blade being whipped from its sheath on her thigh, the visceral squelch of tearing organs and flesh, a shudder up her arm as the blade lodged between bone, imbedded to the hilt. His eyes went wide, his jaw slack as he gazed disbelievingly at her confusion quickly replaced by betrayal. There was a moment – a moment which seemed to last for eternity – when all sound fled the room into a spiraling vacuum, even the persistent, driving, clatter of the rain was nothing compared to the blood pounding in her ears.

She hadn't even had the guts to stab him in the chest so she could see the wound she had inflicted. As she had predicted he had been lounging in the chair, it has been easy enough to find an unguarded spot on his back. Lady had thought that maybe not seeing the wound would help, but now when she looked into his eyes she realised that she could see what she had done anyway. In fact maybe if she could see the wound – it would have drawn her mind away from the pain in his silver blue orbs.

Blood spilled over her palm; she could feel the viscid liquid pouring from the wound, coating her hand and the golden hilt of the dagger in a deep sanguine red. It wouldn't clot – a side effect of the poison – and even Dante's demonic healing ability was no match for its potency. He was a dead man and by god did he know it.

His breaths were becoming shallower, shorter, but there was no panic to his movements as he watched her inner battle. That arrogant smile was creeping up into his eyes; if the situation had been different Lady would have been infuriated, but now it only filled her with a deep sadness.

"I'm so sorry," finally the shaky words formed on her lips a lump knotting itself at the back of her throat. "I had to… you wouldn't understand…"

He grinned taking a ragged breath, his voice light and airy. "I wouldn't have wanted it any other way."

She didn't know what made her do it, but in that instance she leaned forwards and pressed her lips to his, eyes closing. The kiss was tender, gentle, and he returned it with that same slow pace. No anger, no resentment, only love. If the world had been kinder to both of them then maybe they could have been together; but then again maybe they would have never met.

They parted eventually, Dante's head falling back to rest against his chair as he looked at her through half-lidded eyes. A hand once again rose, shaking this time, to brush a tear she hadn't noticed from her cheek.

"Thank you, Lady…"

She would forever be left wondering what he had thanked her for. His eyes frosted over, hand dropping to hang limply over the arm of the chair, and just like that his heart stopped and her own heart shattered.

Lady pulled the blade free slowly and it slipped from her trembling hand clattering to the wooden floor of Devil May Cry. She stared at it for what felt like millennia then just like that she shifted slipping from the chair. Tenderly, lovingly, she brushed some of the stray hair out of his eyes and smiled; he looked peaceful, happy. He always had been, always would be, an enigma to her.

Now there was one less demon in the world. Sighing, she hefted Kalina Ann onto her shoulder and left the shop walking out into the dull grey of a starless night streaked with rain.

-Luce