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"Patty Lowell, you're Dante's friend, eh? I remember he mentioned you once." Nero looked at the shop's door. "What's that demon look like?"
His client, a blond girl in fancy dress, was keeping tabs on the house opposite the street. Now she seemed calmer than she sounded earlier on the phone, but was still tensing up with her fists clenched with indignation at any demon dared to invade Dante's house. "I'm...not sure? It's a huge one, like some kind of lizard? ...Uhm, I just saw its tail squirming!"
Unfavourable memories of Riot and Fury came to his mind, Nero ewwed. The building of DMC was still standing in one piece though. He walked up to it, Patty insisted to follow. Knowing she was said to have a sorcerer's heritage to protect herself, Nero let her.
A board next to the front door had Nero's number on it and noted that the trustworthy mobile branch would still be operating while the main shop was having a hiatus. That was really thoughtful of them, but Nero got no extra job until today. Hell, do they even have any earnings?
And this one might as well be a duty to him, to say the least. Like, where had Dante and Vergil gone to allow random demons to nest in their office?
He got in and took a quick look around. Only one thing was out of the ordinary on the ground floor: the table and the top of cabinets being empty as fuck, even lacking pizza boxes. Ok well, some demons could have become smart enough to hoard a collection. He doubted that though, as he could still perceive the scent a powerful demon had left even when he was in human form. He quickly decided that it was not smart enough of his target to be unaware of the situation.
Between the front door and the stairway were trails of footprints, everywhere was evenly covered in thin dust otherwise. Patty did say she found the demon in the bathroom when she was about to do the cleaning. Now Nero felt kinda sorry for that girl.
"You stay down here, okay? If it was like some lizard you said, it's gonna be a nasty one."
Nero explained to Patty, and then took the Red Queen off his back as he went upstairs quietly. The bathroom door was left half open, still hiding what was inside from Nero's point of view. He could only see a corner of the sink. There was extremely slow breathing, sounding like that demon was not alert at all. No other movement had been heard so far.
He continued to play safe, not wanting to damage the house too much. It would be ideal if he could take down that demon in one assault. After all, he wouldn't want to repair the walls for his parents one more time.
As he went halfway through the corridor, something slithered across inside the bathroom. He didn't catch a clear sight of it. Nero tensed up and halted his steps, listening carefully for any activity.
The cycle of that demon's breathing became a little quicker, and an almost inaudible rustle appeared in the background. He revved up the Red Queen and immediately chose to storm into the bathroom before his target reacted.
He streaked towards the bathroom; Red Queen roared and tore the door as if it were paper, smacking down at where that sound came from. Strong scales shattered with a metallic clank on impact, but that was all the fruit that Nero's attack could bear.
Overlapped wings had their claws locked the Red Queen. Nero was just about to swear at what he saw; a long tail swished through the air and wound itself around him.
Well, shit.
Nero gave in to that like a scruffed cub. So that giant reptilian demon which Patty mentioned was Vergil who's curling tightly with the other into a really spiky ball. And that was probably why they closed the shop - to sleep in some sort of hibernation. Luckily they were not going to roll at him like a Chaos did.
With a quick pull of his tail, Vergil dragged his child closer. His and Dante's wings each moved back a little, and disarmed Nero before shoving the kid under them in perfect cooperation. And the two of them didn't even bother to wake up from the sleep. They seemed to be just doing it on autopilot.
Maybe they woke up just a little. Being furled and wrapped in the wings, close to his hibernating parents, which felt to him like being pressed face-down onto a rock, Nero saw the dim eye sockets of Dante's devil form lit up faintly. He grrred and triggered himself as Dante turned to sniff at him and the sharp fangs were getting closer. Then the devil's barbed tongue met the youngling's head, licking his cheeks lovingly...or rather washing his face.
To be honest it was not a very warm welcome for Nero. Because the troublesome twins were just cold-blooded bastards - physically cold right now. He struggled against the envelopment to avoid the lickings, and he was sure that he'd lose some skin if had not triggered.
"Hey, wake up and let go of me! I'm not a nestling!" Nero snapped, his feathers almost bristling. He knew he should at least be glad that they didn't destroy any furniture with their devastating presence, but this was just insufferable to be brushed all over the face. But the more he resisted, the firmer their wrapping on him, added with Vergil's tail. With his wingclaw grabbing Dante's horn and pushing aside, he tried to make Dante target Vergil instead. It was the only effort he had achieved.
Vergil purred and slept on, resting his forehead against Dante's, not even half awake. The tip of his tail wiggled slightly, patting Nero as if lulling a child.
"I'm not gonna sleep... What's wrong with you guys..." Nero grumbled, and temporarily stopped struggling to see if his parents would loosen their hold on him, then he'd find the chance to break away. Though he was still pressing Dante's head to Vergil to avoid getting licked. It was a fair guess that they were acting more by instinct in this state - only responding to shelter their young offspring. He thought he could go full-on devil trigger and threaten them enough to wake them up, but a crumbled house would be the last thing he needed.
His guess was proven not entirely wrong. The whole mess quieted down for a while since he stayed put; no more pressure from the enfolding wings, but they were still wrapped tightly around him. Nero then heard Patty ask from downstairs. By the sound of it, she was approaching the stairs carefully.
"Nero? Everything's okay? Were you talking to somebody?"
"Oh, hey, Patty. The job is done, in a way, you know... Have a look if you want to." He cleared his throat to respond to his client. All of his demonic features disappeared when he heard Patty cheer up and trot to him, leaving out only his own wings to keep Dante and Vergil from moving. It seemed that he wouldn't be able to get out of here in a short time, but no more licking!
Soon Patty's footsteps stopped dead. The young devil hunter managed to look up at the girl gasping at the door. He grinned with resignation. "Meet my parents, they don't usually bite."