i'll drown in your darkest storm

Yamato sliced through the air with ease, tearing through space to create a temporary escape from the demon wasteland he called home.

Vergil sheathed the dark blade while stepping through the jagged portal, and for a moment, it was as if he were staring at the world through an amethyst glow.

Once he emerged from the other side, he'd reverted to his human form, fresh air rushing into his lungs, allowing him a reprieve from Makai's toxic ozone.

The landscape had shifted from a grey wasteland to a serene forest, moonlight filtering through lush canopies. Vergil followed the upstream river until he came upon a grand waterfall, a deep pool at the base of it.

He didn't need to glimpse his reflection in the water to know he looked every part the executioner of Hell, blood-stained red from head to toe.

Vergil spotted a suitable boulder to prop the Yamato against before shedding his coat and the rest of his soiled attire, making a mental note to purify his blade afterwards.

Based on his previous visits, the area seemed to be isolated, aside from the town nestled deep within the valley. Due to this, Vergil was able to unwind even more so than in his quietest moments on Makai. No jesters or succubus skulking about in the shadows, hellbent on testing his patience.

Vergil slipped into the pool, his body immediately submerged in frigid water. His blood naturally ran hot, especially so from his endeavors on Makai, so he found the icy sensation soothing.

Water lapped at his cut waistline, then around his ribs until he was shoulder-deep, plunging beneath the white water to reach the inner sanctum of the waterfall.

Recalling his late mother's words— it was the most dangerous part to swim in— but now he had nothing to fear.

Vergil breached the surface, finding himself in the alcove, the rush of water echoing off the stone walls. It did little to drown out the memories of his childhood, time spent racing across lakes with his twin brother in Red Grave before his home went up in flames. A lifetime ago, or so it felt.

Vergil exhaled sharply before finding his footing in the shallower part of the inner pool. When he pushed his hair back from his eyes, his hand came away smeared with damning crimson. The world outside this waterfall could wait for the half-devil to cleanse himself of sins he'd never ask forgiveness for.

It had been an impossible day, one that compelled you to risk a beating by sneaking out of town after the brothel house had settled after hours. Trekking up to the cascades was a chance you were willing to take to get away.

Once you reached the falls, you kicked off your sandals and immediately waded into the pool with a splash, welcoming the numbing sensation.

The edges of your robe became drenched as you scooped a handful of water and pressed it between your tacky thighs. You tried to focus on how the water soothed your sore skin.

For a moment, all that filled your ears was the rushing current until you heard a sob and realized it was your own. Slapping your palm against your mouth, you swallowed your voice, working to steady your breathing. Crying failed to change anything in your experience.

With this grave reminder, you tossed your robe onto a rock by the riverside to resume cleansing your body of filth.

Moments later, you were curled up beneath your damp robe, staring up at the stars ahead, worn. How much had you made today? Whatever it was, it hadn't been enough; your Mistress made that much clear. There was no other choice but to push yourself harder once business resumed the following day.

Absently, you ran your hand over your body, a weariness sinking into your bones. You had scrubbed your bruised skin raw. It was sensitive to the touch, but it still didn't feel spotless enough.

It was easy for you to dissociate during your work. To stare up at the ceiling past the shoulder of a stranger and imagine yourself on another planet entirely.

Even more so now, surrounded by vast skies and stars twinkling overhead, all tauntingly beautiful.

Silently, you dragged your hand down your sternum, finding the heat between your thighs. It was impossible to get a moment to yourself back at the brothel, but you felt more at ease out here anyway.

Enough to feel like you could take back some semblance of control over yourself, to tend to your needs on your own terms. Your eyes fluttered closed as you attempted to lose yourself in the sensations, even if just for a brief moment of reprieve.

Vergil had gone still upon sensing a single, lone presence beyond the river. His brows furrowed, not out of worry but annoyance. He had grown attached to the location and was far from enthused about being interrupted in the midst of his session.

Then again, the presence didn't feel anything like an overwhelming threat; the scent of a sapien female in the air muddled with fouler odors. If he kept concealed, perhaps he could stay until they vacated the premises sooner or later.

Vergil remained hidden behind the wide curtain of rushing water but went about his business, striving to quiet the thrumming in his veins from battle.

Just then, a small, grieved sound reached Vergil's ears, prompting him to pause. The pleading cries of demons were all the same to him. He'd been the cause of plenty in the throne room of the castle at the feet of Mundus. Humans were even less of his concern, yet he wrestled with the infuriatingly curious part of himself.

Seldom did Vergil interact with humans unless it was to trade for items used to maintain the Yamato and aid his dark rituals. He had no intention to do so now. Instead, he shifted behind the thinner edges of the cascades, where they parted slightly, allowing him a view of the sapien beyond the falls.

Sharp blue eyes rounded at the sight before him. The woman was lost in her self-pleasure.

He quickly tore away his gaze, but the image flashed in his mind, his pulse quickening in succession. Lithe fingers dancing across soft curves, doing unspeakable things.

Let us taste her flesh.

His demon side bristled— senses sharpening, clawing at his skull, the sapien's mouthwatering scent reaching him more clearly now. Vergil never entertained himself with the depraved demons of Makai, though Mundus' shameless consorts have thrown themselves at him since he was a child.

Never once felt compelled to satisfy his needs amongst demons. But for some reason, that woman's damp warmth cut through the mist in a way Vergil had not experienced before, leaving him in a rare, lightheaded state.

Vergil knew he was still keyed up from combat because his body was responding to the human's moans in troubling ways. Nothing he wasn't able to handle on his own, surely.

Realizing his effects were still strewn about on the boulders, the half-devil considered his options for escape.

Pulled from reverie, your eyes snapped open at the sound of sloshing water from an unknown source nearby. You freeze, eyes scanning the opposite side of the pool before settling on a shadowy figure emerging from behind the falls.

Blood running cold, you silently berate yourself for letting your guard down. You slam your thighs shut as you scramble for a shard of rock, anything to defend yourself.

The second moonlight illuminated the figure, your eyes widened. You recognized the silhouette was a man's as opposed to a monster's. Suddenly, you see red.

How long had this pervert been spying on you?

Self-preservation urged you to remain silent, but some weak semblance of pride came to your aid to cover up your mortification. You had been interrupted after all.

"How dare you?"

Your voice rang through the clearing, over the roar of the cascades… and seemed to fall upon deaf ears. You inhaled sharply, anticipating retaliation from the intruder.

But he didn't spare you a glance, nor did he shy away from your gaze, either. He reached for his clothing, unconcerned.

Puzzled, you swept your gaze across his body and realized his physique was that of a warrior. Not a single scar littered his pale skin, but it was the most honed body you've seen in your entire life.

With that stoic yet handsome face, he may even be a royal. Possibly one that's never seen the front lines, but the way he moved and took up space somehow felt earned.

Your gaze briefly dipped beneath his waistline just to confirm your suspicions. Ridiculously well-endowed, unlike the glutinous and vile males that passed through the brothel.

Swallowing thickly, you recognized your mistake and observed him closely. As the man dressed, you began to realize it was unlikely that he was from around here.

His slicked-back hair was as stark as the moon. It contrasted with his dark attire that appeared strange yet aristocratic. Pieces of armor fell into place above his shins and around his chest, broad shoulders filling out a long blue coat emblazoned with gold. You felt even more vulnerable as the sole one nude now, but it also gave you an idea.

You decided to try again more tactfully, tugging on your robe, allowing just enough bare skin to appear tempting. "Where do you come from, traveler?"

Ignored without so much as a glance.

You gnawed on your cheek. "Does one normally spy on women bathing from where you—"

His gloved hand retrieved a long, sheathed katana from behind a rock, and you faltered slightly.

"I was here well before you arrived."

Oh. The low timbre of his voice settled somewhere behind your ribs. Attractive-sounding despite his attitude. This only irked you further.

"Surely you were. For what cause do you wield your blade?"

Glacier eyes finally pierced yours from across the river. "Are you that desperate to find out?"

"Amongst other things."

He fell silent at the faux sultry lilt injected into your voice. All you heard in the silence was coins falling into the palm of your hand.

"Not inclined to answer? Fine," You continue boldly, riding high on his undivided attention, "I have considered the possibility that I'm not your preference, but one shouldn't assume."

You peered at him expectantly, noticing him track the way you crossed your legs with a pinched expression.

"While you may have arrived here first, it wasn't very courteous of you to interrupt my bathing session—"

The white-haired man cut you off with a scoff, "Should I have bided my time in the shadows and waited until you finished?"

You gave him a tight smile, "Ignorance is bliss."

"Wise words to heed." The stranger deadpaned, resting his hand on the hilt of his weapon and turning on his heel.

"Wait." You licked your lips, choosing your next words carefully, "What I meant to say is that we can both glean something worthwhile from this chance meeting."

He paused in his tracks.

"It's obvious that you could easily buy out my town's entire brothel if you so wished, but I can offer you a better deal than my Mistress could. Right here and now."

"A sapien has nothing of value to offer me."

A what?

"You don't converse with women often, do you?"

His stoic face remained imperceptible, but you noticed his jaw clench.

"I thought so." You lowered your lashes, openly appraising him now. You rolled your shoulders slightly, ensuring the loose collar of your robe revealed more of your cleavage. "I just might have something of value to offer you then."

In a millisecond, he disappeared from your sight, and then you were eye to eye with the hilt of his blade hanging at his waist, your hair strewn about from a large gust of wind.

He was just across the river pool a second ago, and now…

The unmistakable scent of blood immediately infiltrated your senses, emanating from his looming figure. Fear shot through your spine.

"Enough."

Demon. The word formed on the tip of your tongue, but your voice faltered.

"Still desperate for my coin? Leave now, and don't come back." A test dressed as an ultimatum.

Anybody in their right mind ought to obey. Nevertheless, your daring gaze crawled up his body until you met his challenging expression. Eyes narrowing, you decided to stand your ground.

"I'm not going anywhere. I risk plenty just coming here, and I come here often. In fact, this is my favorite waterfall in the entire valley."

Your audacity earned you a cocked silver brow. While the man exuded danger and power under control, something supernatural resided within him. Nothing human moved like that.

Regardless, you had already made up your mind, and could sense he hadn't, not really. Why entertain your conversation if he wasn't the least bit curious about your body?

"Maybe I'll allow you to stay and satisfy your curiosity if you pay me what I'm owed."

That earned you a chilling stare from the demon.

Unflinching, you waited with bated breath, hoping for an outcome that would at least leave you with your head intact and heavier pockets. The details of how could be spared, as always.

"Pay you what you're owed..." He rolled the words around his mouth, his eyes trailing over your face, assessing.

Sure, you knew you were being brazen, but it wasn't like you could afford to be anything else. If he accepted your offer, all the better. You'd scrape together any coin to lessen your debt to the whore house.

If he said no, well, you might escape with your life if the demon was still feeling generous—

"Deal."

Your brows shot up, and then determination crossed your features as you reached for his belt. Turns out good-looking men were still men after all.

However, he swiftly caught your wrist; a grip you couldn't break if you wanted to.

You froze as he lowered to his knees, pressing a gloved hand to your chest until you were displayed to his liking against the sloped boulder. The panels of your robe fell open, a shiver wracking through your body at the breeze.

Most patrons wanted you to service them and do the heavy lifting, but if he wanted to call the shots, so be it.

"Skip out on payment, and I'll chase you to the ends of the earth," you warned.

The man gathered your wrists above your head with a single hand and used the other to tug his katana from his waist, making your stomach drop.

Seeing the color drain from your face, he inclined his chin and set it aside, lips curling subtly in amusement.

"Your blade won't come into play later… will it?" As intriguing a concept as that would be, you weren't prepared for it.

"It may."

"What?"

He took hold of your chin, his touch blazing. It was startling, but his fingers felt good against your chilled cheeks.

Static flickered behind his irises. "Beggars can't be choosers. Can they, human?"

"You are a demon." The accusation escaped you in a breath.

Unfortunately, the blue-eyed stranger didn't deny it. With ease, he dragged his free hand down your throat to rest over your thrumming heartbeat, keeping you pinned against stone.

"And to think you were so curious about whether or not I could properly wield it."

Before you can retort, he squeezes your breast, testing the soft flesh before running a knuckle back and forth against your nipple. The repeated sensation dampens your thighs embarrassingly quickly.

Recognition sparked behind his stare as he categorized your reactions.

His large hand flexed against your wrists while the other slid to your opposite breast, thumb toying against your nipple in slow circles. For a moment, your eyes fluttered shut at the pleasure, heat steadily rebuilding behind your navel.

When had another's touch felt remotely bearable since being sold to the brothel? It was completely foreign.

The white-haired demon released a satisfied huff before leather gave under the tug of his teeth. With one glove discarded, his hand splayed across your belly in tantalizing arcs, mapping the skin just above the junction of your thighs.

"You feel like you've been sitting in a kiln."

He'd come from that pool of ice water; you were certain of it. With how hot he ran, you wanted him to touch you all over to keep you from freezing to death.

The blue devil mused at your squirming. He cupped the underside of your breast and tentatively slid his warm tongue over the hardened nub.

His low groan rumbled against your tit, silver lashes fluttering as if taken by surprise at the taste. Considering his expression seemed to barely budge in general, that was saying something.

Distantly, you wondered how true your teasing remark was about his lack of experience with a lover.

At this proximity, the metallic scent lingering on his skin was even more intoxicating. The back of your neck prickled as a jarring thought entered your mind. How many people had this warrior slain before you stumbled across him?

So long as he paid you after all was said and done, it shouldn't have mattered, or so you kept trying to convince yourself. For all you knew, you could be next. Though, wouldn't he have offed you already had he wanted to? Maybe he was waiting until he used you up…

Suddenly, you found it difficult to look him in the eyes, but the graze of his teeth over your chest caused you to gasp, drawing your attention back to him.

That stoic expression of his had morphed into something hungry but faintly hesitant.

However, when you arched into the heat of his mouth, he swirled his tongue to soothe and drew more of your flesh past his lips with an eager suckle.

"Haah…"

At your shaky moan, he hums in approval, his grip adjusting around your wrists.

Finally, his fingers traced a light path southward, searching for your deep source of ache. You parted your slick thighs, watching his hand descend between them.

He observed you with rapt attention, stroking your soft curls with intention but lacking in precision. Dissatisfied with your reaction, he slipped the pad of his finger lower, centimeter by centimeter, until your hips finally jolted. You almost wanted to congratulate him.

"Impossibly wet," He muttered, focused on gathering your arousal and spreading it around your swollen clit in languid circles. Mimicking how you'd been touching yourself earlier to a tee.

Your chest heaved, realizing just how closely he'd been watching you from behind the cascades.

"Do you— do you draw out your victims' suffering like you do your lovers' pleasure?"

The dizzying strokes didn't cease even as he considered you with eyes that narrowed briefly in amusement.

"What do you think, sapien?" His fingers dipped into your entrance, then tapped your clit, taunting.

That unusual term again. You really had propositioned a demon from another realm for pleasure. You exhaled, shutting your eyes tight, readying yourself for the dull ache of his digits.

Just then, you felt him pause.

You fixed him with an expectant look, fingers flexing against his unyielding grip over your head. "I won't break," you insisted firmly, trying to protect your pride.

"You will for me."

Without warning, the man dragged your lower body high upon his chest and captured you against his torso as if you weighed nothing.

Yelping in shock, you blinked rapidly to see him leaning back on his haunches, fastening a steel arm around your waist to keep you in place. His other hand gripped your thigh to keep you spread for him, settling your knees over his shoulders.

Blue eyes raked over your curves like a predator surveying its prey, deciding where to partake from first. From his vantage point, he caught sight of your round eyes staring up at him in disbelief, your flushed face framed by the swell of your breasts, and the rest of you bracketed by your silky, soaked thighs.

The view was almost excessively indulgent for Vergil, who was so used to looking at rot and unsightly demons day in and day out. He couldn't have been more entranced with the way you glistened for him beneath velvety moonlight, your sweet musk suffocating his senses.

His doing.

At his mercy.

He skimmed his nose through your wetness with a growl, gaze darkening as you bucked and clutched at his arm. It was then that you noticed it: his neglected cock pressed firm between your shoulder blades, straining against his trousers.

Unable to contain himself any longer, his hot tongue followed suit, dragging through your slick folds and settling heavy against your throbbing clit.

"Ah!" You threw an arm over your face, completely overwhelmed.

"No," He rasped, capturing your hands and pinning them against your stomach beneath his forearm. "Let me watch you shatter."

Once he sealed his mouth over your pussy, it was impossible to do anything but surrender in his hold. Each lash of his tongue was more desperate than the last, intuition driven by a thirst you underestimated in him.

"Please," You pant hotly, incapable of little else but begging to be put out of your misery. "Please, ruin me."

Something wicked possessed your captor then.

He lapped a warm, zealous stripe up your slit and buried his tongue into your dripping heat with an unholy groan that reverberated through your bones. At the same time, he slid his hand from your inner thigh and found your sweet spot with ease, beginning to rub slick circles into your sensitive clit.

Nothing could have prepared Vergil for the moment your sweetness flooded his mouth. You spilled past his lips in warm pulses, and the half-devil reveled in it.

All of his demonic senses converged to a single point: the human melting in his arms. His vision blurred as he came undone, his cock pulsing against the curve of your spine, staining his trousers.

He watched your eyes flutter with ecstasy, enthralled with how you seized against him before your body went slack with pleasure.

It was impossible to differentiate the sound of blood rushing in your ears and the cresting water of the cascades. Shimmering black filled your vision as you caught your breath.

"Ambrosia…" He sighed against your mound, stealing one last taste of your essence on the tip of his tongue before gently releasing you down onto the stone slab.

After a minute, you found yourself blinking blearily up at the starlit sky, delicate aftershocks wracking your body intermittently, mind blank. And then a cool damp cloth was being swiped across your lower body, pulling a gasp from your throat.

"That's cold." You protested halfheartedly, taken aback by his unexpected gentleness. When men touched you, it was never for your pleasure, let alone for your well-being. Especially not someone like you.

Your menial complaint earned you a slow blink from the man leaning over you. "You'd prefer I use my tongue again."

Heat crept up into your cheeks, all clever comebacks dying in your throat.

"No…" A surefire lie.

He dipped the cloth into the river again and wrung it out, rising to his feet. "I see."

A few strands had fallen across his forehead, likely the fault of your flailing legs. You noticed he'd used his grey cravat to clean you up. Without it, he looked a little more undone, like a rogue knight that hailed from a netherworld. Except that the dark energy around him seemed to have settled, if only slightly.

He turned away and reached into his coat, placing an object onto a nearby boulder. From where you sat, it glinted in the moonlight. "What you are owed."

Then he unsheathed his blade, and with two slashes, the scent of ozone filled the air, a violet glow bursting across your vision. A portal.

Your lips parted then closed, astounded. A hundred questions swamped your mind, but only one thought emerged from the haze.

"Seek me out again."

He turned back slightly, expression indiscernible at your demand. "A difficult request without a name to go by."

The heir of Sparda didn't need your name to track you down. Your scent alone sufficed, but you didn't need to know that.

"You first."

'Obstinate woman,' he thought.

"Vergil."

You gave your name without fear, committing the strange mirage before you to memory. A bewitching blue devil to dwell on when you returned to town.

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A/N | I have a soft spot for NDMC Vergil (And yes, I love all versions of Vergil), so after rewatching S2 for the nth time, this is what happens when I contemplate how he might find empathy for humans who mirror his struggles but also move with bravery (i.e. vergil's interactions with lady and matilda, more on that at a later date). Albeit his version of empathy is a little more twisted in this fic.

While it's not confirmed that he had already conceived Nero by season 2, I wanted to explore his inexperience as a lover and how his demon instincts influence his desire for intimacy.

He may be the Sparda brother who has more experience in integrating his dark side, but I wonder how much that control extends into his love life, or lack thereof. So consider this fic to take place in an alternate universe.