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The night had gone unusually quiet after their latest fight. That alone was strange enough.
Even stranger was the fact that Dante had not wandered off in search of another argument, another spar, or excuse to keep talking. Instead, he had simply remained where he was, sitting beside Vergil while believing him to be asleep.
Vergil had intended nothing more than a brief moment of rest. He had closed his eyes, hoping to borrow a little silence before Dante inevitably dragged him back into conversation. He had not actually fallen asleep, only drifted into a comfortable space where the body relaxed while the mind remained faintly aware of the world.
Aware enough to hear Dante speaking.
At first it had been aimless muttering, the kind that never seemed to stop around him. Then, little by little, the words became quieter, stripped of their usual humor until they sounded almost painfully sincere.
Dante spoke about their childhood, lonely nights, about a little boy who hated it whenever his twin brother fell asleep first, because being left awake meant being left alone.
He spoke about years spent without him, questions that life had answered far more cruelly than any child deserved. And when the silence stretched between them again, Dante let out a small, self-deprecating laugh.
"Says the man who spent half his life trying to kill me."
The words sounded as though they were meant for no one at all. Almost as if Dante himself regretted saying them the moment they escaped. Then, after another pause, came the sentence Vergil would carry far longer than any blade wound, the sentence that lodged itself directly beneath Vergil's ribs.
"I'm jealous of you sometimes, Verg. How could you be so comfortable without me..."
Vergil remained perfectly still. His breathing did not change. His eyes stayed closed. To Dante, he was only sleeping. To himself, he had never felt more awake.
"...while I could never without you?"
Vergil remained motionless. That sort of confession people only made when they believed nobody was listening. His breathing stayed slow and even. The picture of a sleeping man.
*Who says I ever could?*
A faint rustle of cloth. He heard Dante shifted slightly beside him.
"And you always seemed fine."
Vergil kept his eyes closed.
*Guess I wasn't...*
The words were so quiet they nearly disappeared into the darkness. A few moments later, Dante's voice came again, smaller this time, more honest this time.
"I always missed you."
Silence followed. Long enough that Dante apparently decided there would be no answer. Of course there wouldn't, Vergil was asleep, or so he thought.
In reality, Vergil had only closed his eyes to rest. The fight had been exhausting, not physically. Very little exhausted him physically anymore. But even the Alpha and the Omega occasionally desired a moment without conversation.
Without swords. Without Dante.
Just a few minutes of peace.
A brief pause before the next argument inevitably arrived, so he had closed his eyes, only for a while. And somehow ended up listening. Now he wished he hadn't. Because the question dragged him backward through time with merciless precision.
How could you feel so comfortable without me?
The memory arrived immediately. Moonlit room, a couch, a book.
And a very annoying younger brother.
Vergil almost smiled, almost. He still played the role of sleeping beauty perfectly until now. But the truth was, he remembered that night too, every detail.
The book had been open in front of him. A story he had been trying desperately to finish. The house had been quiet, their mother had been elsewhere, and father absent as usual. For once, Vergil had wanted something that belonged only to him.
A little corner of silence, a little space. Privacy.
Then Dante had arrived. Naturally, like a hurricane. He remembered hearing footsteps, then talking, endless talking, and increasingly creative attempts to capture his attention.
And suddenly little Vergil being a sleeping boy, pretending through all the words, all the couch bouncing, dramatic declarations. The exaggerated groans, endless stream of nonsense only Dante could produce. He had heard all of it. The realization still felt absurd after all these years.
Dante probably believed he had spent half an hour unsuccessfully trying to wake a sleeping child. In fact, he had spent half an hour attempting to annoy a very determined one.
Vergil had remained still through sheer stubbornness. Because if he acknowledged Dante once, the battle would be lost. The book would be forgotten. The quiet would disappear. The evening would belong to both of them again.
At that age, he had wanted desperately to have something that belonged only to himself.
People always treated them as a pair. The twins. "The sons of Sparda". Dante and Vergil. Vergil and Dante, together.
Always together.
One name rarely appeared without the other. Adults compared them, teachers grouped them, neighbors confused them. Even strangers looked at one and expected the other.
Sometimes it felt as though the world saw two halves of the same person rather than two separate children.
So Vergil searched for individuality wherever he could find it. His books, his thoughts, his routines. His careful handwriting on the cover of every novel he owned.
V
for VERGIL.
Not Dante and Vergil, not the Sparda twins.
Just Vergil.
His. Something that belonged solely to him.
At the time, it had seemed important, necessary, even. The small territories of selfhood a child built to prove he existed as an individual.
And Dante...
Dante filled every empty space, room, every conversation. Though he didn't do that intentionally, that was simply his nature: Bright, loud, and boundless. An entire universe of motion compressed into that little boy.
Sometimes Vergil loved it, sometimes he felt overwhelmed by it. Usually both.
Especially both.
That night he had wanted a moment to himself, so he pretended to sleep, and listened.
He remembered the couch shaking, nearly laughing despite himself. He remembered the increasingly desperate attempts to wake him, then eventually... quiet.
Dante had finally surrendered, the couch stopped moving now the room settled.
A while later, there was only a small voice left beside him.
"What would I do if I'm without you?"
Vergil remembered it perfectly, because the question had startled him. For a moment he had nearly opened his eyes. Instead he remained still, and listened.
Dante had continued talking to himself, wondering, rambling, trying to imagine a world where they weren't together.
The memory felt painfully vivid, and so did the thought that followed it. The thought Vergil had never spoken, not then, not even now. Especially now.
Your question is ridiculous, Dante. That would never gonna happen!
The younger Vergil had thought it with all the certainty a child could possess.
And who said I was comfortable without you?
He wasn't avoiding Dante because he disliked him. He wasn't pretending to sleep because he wanted his brother gone. He simply couldn't keep up.
Dante arrived with enough energy for three people, enough conversation for five and affection for an entire household. Some days Vergil adored it, some days he needed a break from it. Those were not the same thing.
But children rarely understood such distinctions. Perhaps adults didn't either.
He remembered wanting to explain, wanting to say that solitude and loneliness were not identical, that occasionally wanting space was not the same as wanting separation, that loving someone did not mean never becoming overwhelmed by them.
But he had been a child. And children rarely possessed language for such things.
So he remained silent, pretended to sleep, and let the moment pass.
Now, decades later, he lay beside Dante once again, eyes closed, breathing steady, listening. The irony was almost unbearable, because Dante still believed the same thing, which was Vergil had somehow been content without him.
Which means his absence was better for Vergil, and the separation had hurt only one of them.
Fool.
The word appeared automatically in his head. Dante had always misunderstood that, perhaps because Vergil had allowed him to, he had never known how to explain himself. The years stretched behind him like a graveyard. Missed chances, unspoken words. Vergil thought of all the things he had pursued. Power, purpose, identity. Always searching, always convinced something was missing, just to overlook something painfully simple in the process.
Something had belonged to him from the very beginning. Something... or someone was simply, undeniably his, without ever needing his name written upon.
Dante.
Vergil had spent so much of his life claiming territory, drawing lines, separating himself.
"This is mine", "That belongs to me."
All while failing to recognize what he cherished most. The person he kept measuring himself against. He had spent years searching for things that belonged solely to him, without understanding that...
Dante belonged with him.
Foolish, Vergil. Foolish. For so many years, you had looked away from the person you treasured most. Your other half of a divided life. The person whose absence had left wounds no victory could fill.
And now he found himself wishing he had been wiser, wishing he had opened his eyes on that couch all those years ago. He would have had put down the book, joined whatever ridiculous game Dante wanted to play. Wishing he had understood how precious such moments truly were.
The regret surprised him. Vergil was not a man who indulged regret easily, yet tonight it settled heavily in his chest. Time was the one thing even he could not cut apart.
Those years were gone, the childhood they should have shared, the people they could have become.
Only this remained, this moment.
And Dante.
Beside him, Dante shifted slightly. Vergil listened to the familiar sound and felt something tighten painfully inside him. For so long he had sought distance. Now he found himself wishing he could bridge every inch of it.
If he had another lifetime...
No. If he had merely tomorrow, perhaps that would be enough.
His eyes remained closed. He did not speak, some habits were difficult to abandon. But for once, he did not seek the solitude he had spent so many years protecting. Instead he listened quietly to Dante's breathing beside him, and wished, with sincerity which would have horrified his younger self, that he had learned much sooner how precious the noise had always been.
All this time, he had been so determined to protect what was his that he never realized there was someone who had already belonged with him from the very beginning.
Dante, you were always mine.
And perhaps, he thought as he listened to the steady sound of Dante breathing beside him, the greater truth was that he had always been Dante's as well.
For the first time in a very long while, they allowed themselves to rest, not to be alone but to be no longer so.