𝔦 ﹒ 𝒍𝒆𝒕'𝒔 𝒅𝒂𝒏𝒄𝒆
.̸̢̜̞̖̞̤̐̿̉͆̿.̶̮̟̂̌͌́̌͗͂̇̚.̶͕̭̠͉͇̠͇͔̹͗̈́̍͐̽̾s̶͉͉̬̻͆̽̒̔͒̀̾t̸̤̟̝͇̖͙̒͆̅̄̈́̂̓͘ͅȧ̷̠͎̬͖̬̣̙̏͌̔̿̓͝ŕ̸̫̖̹̤̦̽̾̄̈́̒̐͂͠͠t̴̡̢̟͔͖̙̀̾̆̓̊͋̽̏̈́͝ ̴͕̻̹̥̮͔̫̩̹̀̄̂̉͘͝͠t̴͓͛̌̇̈́͝r̶̪̈́̄͛̔̓͐͋̋͝a̴̖̬̹̹̟̬̒͊̅̽̎̃̑̅͝n̴͖̝̟̻̣̳̟̿̽͑̽ș̶̨͈̼̠̜̤̳͎̅̅̒̏͛́m̵̞̈́̑͆̀̓̆̚͝i̸̱̹͖̝̰̱̺̍̄s̶͉̝̰͗̋̑̏̈́̇͘s̶̛̫͕̺̟̖̊̃͋̈́͐̑̏̈́͠ĭ̶͕͎́͛͘o̷͑́̐̎̒̃ͅn̸̖̭̩̹͉̭̺͑̿̊̄͜͠.̶̯̣̳̼̙͓͍̩̓̈́͗̉̽̑̅̉̊.̷̨͉̫͓̈͑͑͠͝͝.̴̯̩̠̬̗͇̿̈́̈̌̒͗͊̎̏̕.̵̨̭̼̱̙̝̞̔̌͘
The voicemail started before she hit the corner of Southridge and 7th — where the lights always blinked half a beat off rhythm, like the city itself was trying not to be caught watching her.
“Hey, Indie. I know you hate voicemails, which is why I left one. You can't ghost me if it's already playing.” His voice filtered through the earbuds in her hood — velvet and gravel, cigarette-wrapped and grinning. She didn't roll her eyes, but it was close.
"Got a thing. One of those things I can't shoot, so I figured I'd let you decrypt its soul or whatever it is you do. You know, the spooky brain stuff. Bring pizza if you're feeling nice. Or don't — not sure if you're capable of the whole nice thing."
The song bleeding in the background caught her ear — synth-heavy, unmistakably Poison. Her lip curled.
“And don't give me shit about the music. It's a classic.” Click.
She exhaled through her nose. "If I hear 'Every Rose Has Its Thorn' one more time," she muttered, “I'm setting the jukebox on fire. With you in it.” She moved like shadow and leather — a sin in motion.
Low-slung cargo pants fastened with silver clasps, black fabric pooling over combat boots worn down by holy places and hellholes. Her top was sculpted with militant grace, straps twisting over her ribs like silk-strangled prophecy, her arms sheathed in battle worn gloves laced to the elbow, the threads fraying just so. A hood crowned short, dark curls, falling low over dark lashes that didn't blink enough. The mask covered half her face — black and form-fitting — but her eyes? Electric. Unreadable.
Everything about her said: Do not approach unless you know your own sins by name.
The pizza box in her hand was the only human thing about her. She paused just outside the Devil May Cry office — narrow building, flickering sign, paint still chipped from the last demon that tried to scratch its name into the door.
The smell hit her first. Gun oil. Cheap cologne. Memory.
With one gloved finger, she tapped the comm beside the entrance.
"Tell me you're not still playing that song."
There was a long pause. Then his voice again, rougher this time, barely holding back a smirk.
"Would you have come if I wasn't?"
She pulled down her mask with a sigh that could cut glass. "You called and texted. And let me guess—" She held up the pizza box. "You knew I was walking past Gino's."
The door buzzed open. Her boots hit the floor like punctuation. Dante was waiting in the main room, lounging against his desk with the casual posture of someone who could kill ten things before finishing his drink. Shirt half-buttoned, Devil Trigger barely asleep behind his eyes, Rebellion propped up beside the jukebox.
The jukebox, which was still playing Poison. She shoved the pizza into his chest.
"You owe me," she said, tone flat, eyes sharp. Then a wink, a flash of flirtation that reignited that frustrating sparkle in Dante's eyes.
And just like that, she was scowling again, stepping past him to drop her rig bag onto the worktable without a glance. He watched her move like a man who'd just seen something sacred.
"Eyes up, Sparda," she warned, voice like static honey.
He laughed — low, warm, delighted. "I am looking up."
The screen on her wrist lit up with the signature she came to decrypt. The mark on her neck flared quietly, like it knew something she didn't. The object was no bigger than a deck of cards, slick with circuitry and symbols that pulsed like veins beneath its surface.
It sat on the desk like a wound waiting to open.
Indra unzipped her rig bag with precision, pulling out a modular keyboard that unfolded like a weapon. Her gloved fingers moved fast — delicate, mechanical — already bypassing the surface encryption as if the device were too slow to be worth her time.
She slid the mask fully down around her neck, exhaling like it tasted better without it.
The room shifted.
Dante's posture didn't change, not perceptibly. But his eyes did — flickering from the artifact to her exposed lips, the flush of her cheek still warm from the rain. He tilted his head like he wasn't staring. Like he wasn't already cataloging the way her lashes cast shadows on her cheekbones.
"You know," he said, voice too casual, "if I'd known you looked that good under the mask, I would've pissed you off a lot sooner."
She didn't look up. Just arched a single brow and typed faster.
"Keep talking like that," she murmured, "and I'll choke you with it."
Dante grinned, one of those low-burn things that made it all the way to his eyes. He turned to the pizza — avoiding the heat in the air like it might brand him if he let it linger.
"Kinky," he said through a bite. "Noted."
On the desk, her screen glitched.
The Enochian script began to unspool — not clean lines, but stuttering glyphs that rearranged themselves mid-character, as if the text knew it was being watched. The artifact pulsed once. A low sound hummed in the base of the room — not from speakers, but from the walls themselves.
Indra didn't flinch. She flipped open an ancient tome with one hand — the leather cover cracked and curling like it had been flayed off something alive. She balanced the reference page against the corrupted data feed, eyes scanning both at once.
Her fingers never stopped moving.
"It's written in mirrored Enochian," she muttered. "Modified. Layered. They encoded it inside a liturgical structure. I've seen this before..."
Dante didn't pretend to understand. He just watched her work — legs kicked up on the desk she was using, slice of pizza in hand like it was an offering to the gods of apathy. He took another bite, chewing thoughtfully.
"You want some?"
Without looking up, she reached over and shoved his boots off the table — a smooth, practiced motion that said you knew better.
His feet hit the floor with a satisfying thud. "That's a no," he said, licking his fingers. "You're mean when you're decoding forbidden scripture. I like it."
Her smile wasn't visible, not fully — but the corner of her mouth lifted, barely, the curve tucked behind the wild fall of loose curls. She kept her eyes on the screen.
"You owe me a bottle of tequila if this melts my rig."
"Noted," he said again, voice lower now. Watching her like he'd say more — if he wasn't already saying too much just by staying quiet.
The glyphs suddenly restructured.
A full sentence snapped into place across her screen in blood-red typeface, burned onto the interface like branded flesh:
She froze. The lights dimmed. And somewhere inside the relic — something moved.
The screen stilled.
The Enochian froze in place, no longer shifting — just one phrase burning across the interface in a red that wasn't digital. It looked... wet. Fresh. Still steaming from a source unseen.
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑉𝑒𝑠𝑠𝑒𝑙 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤𝑠 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑛𝑎𝑚𝑒. 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑂𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟.
Indra's spine stiffened.
It began the way old machines warn you they're dying — quietly. A hum. Soft. Subtle. Insidious.
The kind of warning you don't hear so much as feel — a whisper beneath the skin. A phantom throb at the base of her neck where the mark slept, inked in a language too old to be written, too cursed to be spoken.
Indra didn't react at first. Just a breath—small, precise, sharp as a scalpel pulled through silence.
Her eyes narrowed slightly, lashes casting crescent shadows across cheekbones drawn tight with restraint. A single inhale through her nose. Not panic. Preparation. Her gloved hand rose with mechanical elegance, brushing over the back of her neck like a woman trying to ease a phantom itch. But her fingers hesitated over the skin. Hovered. Pressed.
The second pulse came harder. Hotter. Not warmth. Not pressure. Pain.
It sank into her like something searching for home — crawling in reverse along her spine, coiling beneath nerves, digging deeper with every heartbeat.
Not a blade. Something worse. A script rewritten. A name remembered.
It felt like someone was carving directly into the back of her skull — not slicing, not sawing, but etching. With knowledge. With permission. The kind of pain that isn't asking for consent. The kind that's already inside. She clenched her teeth so hard her jaw trembled. Not a sound escaped. But her hands betrayed her — twitching over the keyboard as the tremor began, quiet as a prelude.
" Indie? "
Dante's voice drifted across the room, casual at first, half-occupied with wiping grease off his fingers using the inside hem of his coat. But his head turned just in time to catch the hard swallow. The tightening of her throat. The glint of sweat ghosting her temple like a warning flare.
He looked up. Caught it. A thick swallow. Her jaw, locked.
The way she was holding something in — something red and sacred and screaming.
The tremor spread.
From her fingers to her forearm. A chain reaction beneath her skin, fraying muscle memory as her hand dropped from the keyboard. The other hovered mid-air, reaching — hesitating, like it had forgotten what reaching meant. The other rose — as if to reach out — then froze mid-air, unsure what reaching meant anymore. She blinked, slow, like someone trying to remember how to breathe underwater.
"Shit," the word rasped out low and cracked — an exhale dragged through grit.
Her knees bent, the strength in them evaporating as the desk became her anchor. Both palms pressed flat now, bracing. Her breath came shallow.
Controlled. Too controlled.
" Indra. "
Dante's voice shifted — quieter now. No warmth. Sharper. Every syllable honed like a blade unsheathed beneath candlelight.
She didn't answer. Because the pain was moving. Behind her eyes now — a static hum dressed in flame.
And behind that? Voices.
Not words. Not yet. Just pressure. Just presence. Like a crowd gathering behind the veil of her consciousness, faceless and expectant.
Then — One word.
" Open. "
It landed behind her eyes like a blade driven with purpose. Clean. Absolute. Her body seized.
Her spine arched, tendons drawn tight as bowstrings, legs folding beneath her as the world tilted. Vision overtook her like a flood breaking a dam —sudden and cruel, impossible to hold back. Her fingers clawed at the desk, but the tremor had won; the edge of the wood seemed to lunge for her temple.
Dante was already there. He moved like a thunderclap.
No hesitation. No flourish. Just presence. One arm wrapped around her ribs, the other catching her head an inch before it met the sharp edge of the desk. Her body curled into his like a live wire into grounding metal. His breath was at her temple now. His voice stayed low. Steady.
" Got you. "
She convulsed once — small, sharp. Enough to make her bones feel brittle. Enough to feel everything tighten inside her like something trying to escape.
Her lips parted, but no words came. Just a hiss — pain escaping like steam from a sealed wound.
His coat smelled of smoke and sweat and something iron-rich — like the echo of a battlefield remembered through cloth. His arms held her gently but firmly, like he was used to keeping things from shattering.
"You're okay," he whispered. She wasn't. And he knew it.
But he said it anyway, because that's what you do when gods start waking up in your favorite people.
Then — a sound. Low. Mechanical. Wrong.
Behind them, the relic groaned. Not just a hum. Not just a shift. A growl. A metallic scrape that didn't belong in this world — not audio, not human. Dante's eyes snapped up, narrowing into the kind of stare that could quiet devils.
"Okay," he muttered, voice flat with insult. "Now you're just being rude."
With impossible gentleness, he lowered Indra into the chair she'd collapsed beside, her limbs still twitching in the aftershock. She looked like a wire mid-snap, straining not to coil inward.
Then he stood. And everything about him changed.
Stillness washed over him like smoke drawn back into a cigarette. His spine straightened. One hand reached behind his back, easy. Familiar. The other cracked his neck, the sound sharp and deliberate.
And then — like a violinist setting his fingers to string, like a killer smiling in the mirror — his hand curled around the hilt of Rebellion.
"You wanna play?" his voice velvet and venom all at once.
" Let's dance. "
