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“You did this to me, you take care of it”.
Vergil barely had time to register the words before the bundle was shoved unceremoniously into his arms. The object was warm, and its body shifted with the clear intake and exhalation of breath. There was a faint demonic aura radiating from it.
Vergil shifted one hand to the hilt of Yamato as he pulled back the blanket for closer inspection. It was an infant.
An Infant with unmistakable wisps of white hair. But that was impossible. It’d only been the one time…
Vergil’s grip on the sword loosened.
But how exactly was he supposed to ‘take care of it?’
Him? A father? The very notion was ridiculous. Vergil already had a future planned out for himself, and it did not include caring for a useless freeloader. Besides, humans, partial or otherwise, were primates, and learned by example. His father hadn’t exactly left him much to follow.
He searched, vaguely, for the woman in the red cloak. But she had taken advantage of his momentary surprise. She was already gone.
That settled it, then. The woman was mistaken. Their tryst had been a one-time affair, the babe couldn’t be his, the odds were against it. He would simply draw the Yamato and prove it.
The infant barely stirred in its sleep as Vergil unsheathed his sword and held up the blade to its head. What a stupid creature. He could easily slit its throat, and yet it continued to sleep peacefully in his embrace. Did it know the things he’d sacrificed? Did it know the crimes he’d committed with the same hands that held it now? If it did, it did not seem to care.
The Yamato glowed a faint blue and hummed in acknowledgement of his bloodline. It confirmed only what he already knew, but desperately hoped to deny. The child was his. He felt sick.
Had he been this little once? This fragile? It was hard to believe.
Vergil should give it up. The babe was not his responsibility. It had been a mistake. It had only been one night. Why should he have to give up everything now for one minor inconvenience? He doesn’t. An orphanage would be far better suited for it. Vergil doesn’t have what it takes to be a father.
He began searching the streets of Fortuna for a children’s home, pulling up his hood a little more to shield himself. The child huffed quietly, but resumed its deep slumber. It was completely unaware of Vergil’s inner turmoil.
Vergil was not fond of babies. They were red-faced, loud creatures that stared unabashedly at him with ugly faces and drooling mouths. Perhaps it was the fact that it was his own, but this one seemed to be the exception. Its face was angelic, almost cherubic, with its soft cheeks and its lips that naturally rested in a smile. Staring down at the infant, Vergil could understand Blake’s Cradle Song just a little. At least he would gain some things from this experience. A newfound appreciation for that particular poem.
There was an ache in his chest as Vergil rounded the steps to an old building. The dilapidated metal letters over the large wooden doors declared it as an “Orph n g ”.
Well, he certainly wasn’t choosing it based on looks.
Something within him was hesitant to approach the entrance. A biological drive, that was all. His evolutionary need to ensure the survival of his gene pool. But the child would be safer here than with him. Vergil could not hope to give it a good life. Still, his trepidation did not lessen as he shifted the bundle in his arms. He had thought himself above base human desires. The idea occurred to him with a detached sort of disappointment.
No matter, he would rid himself of his pitiful wants. He would start by removing his spawn. It would be more human than demon, if his assumptions were correct. They usually were. It was too weak to stay with him, too fragile. Vergil had learned just how easily humans died a very long time ago.
Vergil would simply overpower the pain of the gesture. That was what he did best, after all.
He took one last, lingering look at the baby, and steeled himself. He hoped that it would survive, that it would grow strong. Of course, that was simply his pesky human urges again. He raised his hand to knock at the front door. No sense in leaving it out in the cold, after all. He couldn’t keep it, but there was no need for cruelty. The black blanket that it was swaddled in was too thin to keep out the chill.
The child chose that moment to finally stir. It yawned leisurely and finally opened its eyes. It regarded him calmly. Perhaps too calmly, considering that Vergil was a strange man holding it, and that its mother was nowhere in sight. He certainly wasn’t complaining, though. He couldn’t abide wailing of any sort.
It seemed to finish its appraisal of him, with intense blue eyes that bored into one’s soul. The infant reached out its little hand and wrapped it around his index finger. (When had he reached out his hand towards it? When had he moved his knuckles from their position of hovering at the door?)
Its grip was surprisingly strong, and its own fingers left indents in his flesh. No, not fingers. Claws. The baby’s right hand ended in pale talons that glowed with a dim light.
Ah.
Perhaps that was why his mother had been so quick to discard it. Had she thought the infant a monster when she had seen proof of its heritage? (Vergil ignored the familiar ache that the sentiment left in his chest. He could not afford to feel sympathy).
He had not seen the hand before. It had been tucked tightly into the blanket.
He stared down at the child, and the child stared back at him. Fortuna was as superstitious as it was backward. They feared demons, despite their worship of Sparda. The child would be branded an anomaly for its arm, and it would be tormented. The nail that stuck out was hammered down in a town like this.
“Let go of me,” he hissed at the creature. It had not lessened its hold on him. He hated the conflicting emotions that bubbled up inside of him.
Vergil was not Dante, and so he generally did not swear. The very act was beneath him. These were extenuating circumstances, however. He allowed himself a few short moments to curse that blasted woman for bringing him this bundle of existentialism. Things had been so simple.
If Vergil left the child to this fate, if he willingly allowed his protégé to grow up in an environment that would bring only pain and loneliness, was he any better than Eva? He didn’t have the luxury of concerning himself with other people’s needs, but he could not stand the idea of being anything like her.
Vergil had made something of himself and had become a man with ambitions. But if he had the chance to undo that fateful day, would he?
If he had the opportunity to ensure that his child could feel the protection and love that he lacked, would he?
“Damn it all,” he whispered bitterly.
Vergil descended the orphanage steps and turned the corner.
The infant had the audacity to smile up at him, as if it was satisfied with derailing years’ worth of sacrifice and planning.
“That smug aura doesn’t suit you,” he muttered.
The realisation that he’d just spoken to a being that was years away from speech capacity set in rather quickly. It didn’t even have the ability to understand a word. Ridiculous.
Though, it did seem perfectly content with him. If this was all it took to keep his child happy, if holding it close to him was enough, then perhaps this wouldn’t be so difficult after all. Perhaps Vergil did not know how to be a father.
But he could learn.