It seems that although I had taken the semester off, I had even less time to write or when I do, I am greeted by a brick wall. And now that I'm back in school, which starts Monday, this pops outta my head. Let the randomness begin! (Nothing like the threat of school looming to get those brain juices flowing)

I'll get an update done for "Pretender" one of these days… I promise! Enough talk. DMC doesn't make me any richer, so...

A'ight y'all! Peep this and enjoy!

Chick Flicks and Psychics

Another slow night met the demon-hunting agency known as Devil May Cry. Rain poured down in buckets from that morning and well into the evening, a far cry from the sunny Saturday that the Meteorologist forecasted. Not even the demons dared to troll the rain slicked streets of Capulet City. This proved to be a great fortune for the innocent humans that slept under their false senses of security, but bad for business. At any rate, Dante and Lady took the night off, feeling that it was better suited to watching movies.

So, the two found a comfortable position on the old couch in front the soft glow of a tasteless romantic comedy. Lady sat up, nearly erect, craning a small handful of popcorn into her waiting maw. In her lap, rested Dante's head as rest of his long form stretched out, along the rest of the couch. He yawned and she dipped her delicate hand into the bowl on the end table to the right.

"Aw boo!" Lady jeered as she launched a handful of popcorn at the TV screen, "Like that would ever happen! Just because he admitted his feelings for his lesbian friend, she's automatically straight?! Dante, your taste in movies suck."

Dante looked up and cocked a pale eyebrow at the raven haired woman cradling his head, "What makes you think that I'm into any of these chick flicks." He motioned to the small stack of Netflix DVDs before them on the coffee table. "Between Trish and Patty I can't get a decent movie in. A man needs to see someone blow some shit up every once and a while. Ya know what I mean?"

"Not really, Dante. You fuck up stuff on a daily basis, so I don't know why you would want to be entertained by something you do practically every day. I say you're better off summoning your Doppelganger if you really want some third person action."

With a roll of his ice colored eyes, Dante turned back to movie that was already two hours too long.

Don't you know that you had me when I first saw you; Dante mouthed the line along with the onscreen character.

"See? Tell me they did not totally steal that from Jerry Maguire?! I thought you didn't watch this stuff," Lady jabbed in an incredulous tone.

"Like I said, these types of movies are always sent our way. I can't help it if I've seen it a couple of times. "

Lady arched a brow.

"Okay, fine. Ten times," Dante confessed.

The two sat in near silence for a while longer as the movie progressed.

"See," Lady once again interjected, "That will never happen."

"What? They both see the same carnival psychic and by chance, she tells the main characters that they are meant to be together."

"See? Even you don't find that plausible."

"I don't know… why not? I mean if the guy finds out through a friend that the girl he broke up with in the beginning became gay because of it, then I guess he deserves the chance to turn her straight." He twisted and poked a sour lip out at his own reasoning, but accepted for whatever sense he thought it made.

"Yeah… whatever. Just for saying that, it proves that you're still a little ornery that you in fact turned a poor girl to lesbianism."

"What?! No! Noel made her choice to be with Elizabeth. I'm not at all mad with her decision. In fact, I'm actually a little touched that she will never love another man like she loved me." With Dante, put a smug spin on the fact that two women he once dated became lovers.

For all of Dante's ability to flip the script and get under everyone's skin, he could have been a lawyer. His spins and turn of phrase. He would have a full prospect of hanging up the leather and weapons for suits and legal briefs... Or find some way to put Fox News or CNN to shame. Well, if he wanted to.

Some parts of Lady found that about him endearing and also infuriating on the same token. So she acted on what recourse she had left, punching him in his exposed back.

"OW! What the hell was that for? It's the truth."

"One for being such a jerk," Lady punched him once more.

"Ouch! Abuse! Stop abusing me," Dante rolled onto his back and blocked as much as Lady would allow.

"And a kiss," her lips met his, "for being the jerk I fell in love with."

They became locked in a frenzy of tastes upon each other's tongues and lips. When they came up for breath Dante replied with, "Ain't that sweet. I thought you didn't do cheesy romance."

"Shaddup," she gave him a playful shove.

Dante rolled into a sitting position with his arms stretched across the back of the sofa. The platinum haired hunter sighed, "The stuff in this movie might be a stretch, but psychics ain't."

Lady only scoffed. "Really. For every carnie with tarot cards… there are ones out there that are the real deal."

"Whatever Dante. Then you'll be telling me that the Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy exist and hold weekly meetings in your shop."

He rolled his silvery blue eyes, "Look. I know you don't believe this stuff…" He didn't see why she didn't. Slaying demons every night should have been proof enough of the super natural world.

"How about I prove it to you?"

"Prove what? I don't need to be a real palm reader to say something like, Dear young Capricorn, lend me your right hand," Lady led into a spooky, yet poorly done Eastern European accent.

Dante obliged and allowed Lady to examine his hand.

"Ooh. Such strong hands." Her fingers traced over his pale palm, touching every line and callous. "I see you working vast fields in a past life, perhaps even mighty hunter. I see you standing tall with a great ancestor guiding your blade." Lady fingered a line curving diagonally, almost uninterrupted from just below his index finger to the opposite edge.

"Your lifeline… It seems," she continued, "You have a long, very long and healthy life ahead of you."

"Aww... I bet you say that to all the demi-devils," Dante crooned a joke.

Lady only gave him a pointed look. "Oh, C'mon! You and I both know that there's no such thing as a true immortal."

She continued to stare.

"Apologies. Please do continue, o-wise-one."

"As I was saying, before I was interrupted, this line," she pointed out a vertical line nearly bisecting his hand, "tells me that you are a bit of a klutz."

"Oh really?" Dante quirked an eyebrow.

Lady dropped the accent for a moment, "As many times you've been impaled or shot, you're going to pretend that you're not just a tad clumsy?"

Dante's mind flashed through a montage of the many times he had been shot in the head or run through the chest. As his memory rolled towards his meetings with Lady, Nero, Trish, and Alastor, he had finally lost count of the many, many stabbings and bullets he endured throughout his lifetime.

Dante fingered an imaginary bullet hole in his forehead and then began to unconsciously rub his chest as if it had begun to hurt at the memory. "Not my fault you all treat me like a friggin' bull's-eye," he muttered.

Lady continued the reading, deciding to completely do away with the voice she used earlier, "You leave yourself open to attack." Her tone and facial expression softened, "Not only physically, but also emotionally. You attack yourself all too readily."

She watched his eyes as his thoughts retreated to the previous week. She wasn't going to push the issue any farther, but…

He was doing it again and she couldn't stand it, but she figured he needed the space to fight his own battles. She knew where he went; to that evening when he was unable to convince a possessed woman not to kill herself. It was all outside of his control, but it didn't stop him from beating himself up for it.

"Meh," he gave a noncommittal hum.

And you are quick to put up that mask of apathy, she wanted to utter.

Lady brought her attention back to his hand, tracing a long, horizontal scar to the right of the vertical line. It was long faded, but still present; a ghost of a long forgotten gash. She never asked him about, but figured it had something to do with the glove in his drawer with the tear in it.

He pulled away as if her touch was burning him. "A gift," he utter in a low voice as if he sensed her questioning thoughts, "from my brother."

"Vergil?"

"The one and only. Believe it or not," he held up his hand, scrutinizing the scar, "he saved my life that night… more than once. He awakened my powers and protected me from Hell itself. His motives may have been fucked… but he meant well. I guess I get that now." He didn't like the direction the conversation moved and sought to lighten the mood, "V wanted power and knowledge in all things."

"So let me guess," she saw what he was getting at; "you're gonna do a reading of your own."

"Yes, little Taurus," he returned with an accent of his own, "I will do a proper reading this time around. But first I require the devil's hand to better align my powers of foresight with the evil eye."

She eyed him for a moment, secretly impressed at how authentic his faux accent sounded. It was actually a turn on. She would have to keep that in mind for… later.

"Huh?"

"The left hand, Lady," he whispered seeing the confusion in her eyes. She gave up her hand and his fingers gently went to work.

He outlined a line curving between her forefinger and thumb to her wrist, "This is your lifeline. You weren't always concerned with your lifestyle. You always knew what had to be done. Without hesitation. Now it branches off," Dante slipped out and completely strayed from the accent, keeping with a more serious tone, "and you're not sure what's right and wrong. You lead yourself to a crossroads at nearly every decision. Even when the end result should be clear. It seems like you're wavering in your judgment to something else. You need a rock to lean on, but you're too stubborn to stand by it. It's closely connected to your head line."

Dante drew an invisible line with his fingers to a prominent crease to immediate right of the lifeline, "You are practical and headstrong. You tend to overanalyze things and it may not be a good thing. You need to learn to go with the flow."

He laid a soft kiss on her thumb and stroked with his own. "Your will overpowers your logic. That may be a good or bad thing. How you use it is up to you."

Coming down vertically, near center of her hand and intersecting with her head line, Dante traced a finger along it, "This is your fate line, AKA your career line. And boy is your career important to you. Here you're comfortable in your own skin. Your finances are well balanced. Maybe I should hit you up for cash."

She gave Dante a playful punch to the arm and he continued, "Your heart line curves under your middle, ring and pinky It is very prominent and it tells me that you gotta a-lotta love for me… but you like to play coy and hide the truth. It also crosses your fate and success lines. You believe that you never had a lot of luck with life and love, but that ain't true. That brings me to your health line, parallel to your success. I don't need to tell you how vibrant you are… and very fertile too."

He winked and she rolled her eyes.

"Umm… Where did you learn palm reading?" Lady began denying to herself that she was hanging on his every word.

"V really wanted to know everything," Dante shrugged, "He learned tarot cards, palm reading. He said he didn't believe in the stuff. Whatever. So, I picked up on it and here we are. But we can throw that all out. Words and lines pale in comparison to who you are. Besides…"

Dante trailed off as he gathered her petite hands up in his massive ones.

"Besides, what?"

"I can already tell what's in your future."

"What's that?"

"You're gonna marry me." Dante got up from the couch with a grin, presumably to get a beer from the fridge

"Well, that's cocky, even for you devil-bo—" Her lips and voice lost its momentum becoming consumed with silence. Her eyes grew to the size of dinner plates as she spied a shimmering gold band wrapped around her left ring finger. She turned hand to see the sparkling facets set upon it. The diamond was huge… at least two carats and absolutely flawless. He must have paid a fortune—, she began thinking but then jumped to, How did he—?

The thoughts weren't really about the money, but how had he had managed to slip the ring on without her noticing.

Just then, the man in question returned with two champagne flutes and a bottle of Dom Pérignon.

"Dante?"

"Hmm," he hummed as he poured the glasses.

"How did you get the ring on my finger?"

"A magician never reveals his secrets."

"Tch. C'mon."

He took a sip from his bubbly beverage and looked at her with seductive eyes. "How 'bout I show you a few other tricks," he silkily said.

"You know what," she responded, taking a few sips from her own glass, "That sounds doable."

"Mmm. I love how you think, baby," Dante moved in to nibble on Lady's ear lobe.

Sometime later, Morrison entered the unlocked doors of Devil May Cry with Patty in tow.

They were of course greeted by the sounds of lips smacking, low moans of pleasure complete the sight of clothes, namely undergarments strewn across the floor and furniture. The middle-aged contractor stood frozen in utter shock. His brain only moved him into action as he spied a white lace bra hanging from the twirling ceiling fan.

"Hey, Morrison, what's going," chirped Patty from behind his back. Of course he was the only one privy to the scene that unfolding beyond the couch due to his height. "What's going on Morrison," the girl squeaked, "I wanna see."

The poor man did his best to block everything from view as he backed the impressionable youth out of the room.

"Aww man. I wish I wasn't so short," Patty pouted.

"No, you don't," Morrison muttered but brightened his voice to change the subject, "Say, How about we stop by the diner for some sundaes? Dante's treat, of course!"

"Alright!" She shouted with glee as she nearly raced the older man to his car. As the pair buckled themselves in, the petite blonde inquired, "Are you going to tell me what was happening back there?"

"Eh. Maybe when you're a little older," the man replied as he started his vintage car.

Yay or Nay?

Maybe a 'lil too lovey-dovey. I know what you all are thinking… why didn't I just wait for Valentine's Day for this? Oh it's simple. A) I'm far to antsy to wait and B) I've got plans… BIG plans for V-day. You'll see.