On a particularly slow and ordinary Sunday evening at the Devil May Cry Dante had slouched his exhausted, leather covered back side onto his warn out, second hand sofa. Dripping with the cold of the infamous Capulet City rain season he shivered, even his slightly higher natural body temperature was struggling to cope.

It had been a rough season for Dante which made business difficult to come by. Without any demons to slay or damsels to save almost no money reached his hand by the end of the month, most of what remained was paid to an unsympathetic Lady who had tired of him paying off his debt with sexual favours. Barely having the money to feed him day to day, Dante naturally began to feel much more human. His demonic regeneration couldn't cope with the lack of energy so was rendered useless several weeks ago.

Accepting the fact that he hadn't anything to eat until his next job, Dante shivered and curled up tightly in an old towel and dirty duvet on the sofa for a familiar, disappointing night sleep. It was going to be a long month.

The clock struck 1AM as a tall, slender figure began to linger outside of the cracked windows of Dante's worn and torn shop. With the rain still pouring aggressively the female stranger sought refuge under the concrete porch, clinging protectively to a bundle of towels and blankets. She looked through the window to the white haired man in plain sight in the dimly lit office as her face dropped and her heart sank. Looking down at the bundle and back up again, she drew a long, uncertain breath.

"I-I'm sorry…" She choked slightly on her words as she looked down at a peaceful infant face, sleeping soundly through the rain storm and ongoing chaos of traffic. She stroked the bangs of fine, white hair from the baby's forehead, kissing it gently before placing it under the porch light, sniffing and sobbing quietly as she knocked loudly on the door before running down the dark and empty street, and into the darkness. She prayed to every God she could think of that Dante had heard the knock, but she couldn't go back now.

The rain got heavier through the night, the thunder clapping loud enough to wake Dante from his sleep, no more than 10 minutes since the knocking – and sure enough if Dante could be woken, anyone could. Out of what seemed to be nowhere Dante heard the unmistakable sound of the baby crying, sitting up and rubbing his eyes to go out and investigate, thinking nothing much of it, he just wanted sleep.

He opened the heavy duty door and looked briefly around, almost missing the tell-tale pile of sheets at his feet. Soaked through, in the pile was none other than a young infant, no more than a couple of months old. Surprised and hesitant, Dante cocked an eyebrow as he awkwardly picked up the child and took it inside from the freezing cold.

It was a baby, no mistake about that, but something was different, and this struck the demon hunter like a brick. No child could last in the cold conditions of the Capulet streets on its own, and looked more developed than most human babies, but the most noticeable thing got Dante's heart beating like a sinner in church… White hair.

Almost in a state of shock, Dante looked over the small child, unwrapped the nude baby from the soggy, old blankets and wrapped in one of his few clean shirts to keep warm. With his dry, clean shirt wrapped around him, the baby boy soon settled, peeking open one stormy blue eye, by then this was unmistakeable.

"Vergil..? No, no no no no… Why now?" Dante stood up and held his head with both hands, laughing nervously like a madman, he couldn't cope with this now, he couldn't even feed himself! Naturally the poor man began to panic, he knew nothing about babies! "Shit, shit, shit…"

As the baby was now settled in a makeshift nest in the sofa it gave Dante time to think straight. He paced up and down the office before making one desperate phone call to the only women that would even speak to him, Lady.

Dante shakily dialled her number and drew the receiver to his ear, hearing a less than happy Lady on the other end of the line.

"What asshole..? You know what time it is…?" She growled down the phone, not noticing Dante's shaky breaths at first before hearing them when he attempted to speak. "D-Dante, whats up?" She stuttered slightly and sat up to talk to him.

"C-can you come o-over…?" He struggled to control his words as they barely made it past his lips. He sat himself down as he was still shaking in shock. Lady agreed to his plea and made her way over quickly, amazingly not waking the boy as she parked up on her gas-guzzling motorcycle. She came to the door and let herself in to see Dante sat on one end of the sofa with his head in his hands while on the other side seemed to be a young, carbon copy of the man. Lady wasn't one to hide what she was thinking, and that didn't change tonight. She took a deep breath and sighed before her usual response; "What have you done…?"

It took a while for a response but Dante finally gave her one. "Not me… Vergil."

Lady shook her head and sighed in response, not knowing whether to laugh or cry at the thought of Dante being responsible for a child. Especially one supposedly related to him, whether it be son or nephew. "Well whether its yours or not, what do you expect to happen now?" She sighed, the nearest orphanage was miles away in Fortuna.

Dante sighed heavily and shrugged, "I-I was hoping you had a freakin' idea…" Looking up hopefully at her, he chewed his lip nervously. He knew she was possibly the least maternal woman on the planet but it was his only shot. Lady shifted uncomfortably on her feet and folded her arms. "Look. Can you make do for tonight until the shops open?" She half-smiled. The things she did for him…

He nodded slightly and looked over at the sleeping child before back at her, "I think so… Can you stay…?" He was really clueless when it came to kids. She rolled her eyes and nodded, sitting beside him on the sofa and picking the baby up for a look.

"Poor kid." She laughed bluntly and quietly, "Don't be cruel." Dante huffed in reply.

"Not that, idiot!" She laughed a little more and stroked the boys hair.

"Whats so funny then?"

"He's got eyebrows as black as hell…" Both of them turned to each other and laughed a little, the poor thing had white hair and clashing black eyebrows. Looked like the pigment that ran in the family stopped after his hair, looked like he didn't have the best luck.

Lady and Dante eventually crawled into bed with the baby between them, which made them seem like a strange sort of couple. Couple or not, they both slept through the night in preparation of the long day baby shopping tomorrow.

Deciding that Dante would be no help while shopping, Lady decided to let him sleep in. Several hours later she came home with arms covered in bags and both boys still soundly asleep in bed, they could both sleep through anything. "Dante, wake up." She sighed tiredly and eventually had to nudge him to wake him up, having to spend a gruelling week teaching him how to care for a baby as they tried to get a placement at the Fortuna Orphanage.

When the time came both of them had become rather attached to the little baby, frowning as they strapped him into his car seat for the long drive to Fortuna – with Lady driving of course. Both of them remained rather quiet during the trip, it was hard to give him up but it wasn't safe for him to be exposed to demons. It was for the best.

They were greeted by a young woman wearing the usual white robes worn by the city's inhabitants as they came through the door, Dante protectively carrying the young boy to the reception desk where they asked the usual questions, most having been explained over the phone.

"…And have you named him since we last spoke?" She smiled as the two looked at each other, Dante thinking hard about his name choice before looking at his face again. "…Nero." He grinned at how perfectly it suited him, nero was the only word from a different language he knew, which happened to mean 'black' in Italian, which seemed overall very fitting as he was found in black blankets, and of course, his jet black eyebrows.

Minutes seemed to feel like hours as they approved Nero's surrender, one of the workers letting them say their final goodbyes before carrying him off to the main nursery, leaving two slightly torn up demon hunters to start their long journey home.