A/N: We've always seen Vergil in a position of power because of his standing as the elder brother to Dante. What if there is a third sibling in the family, and Vergil becomes the middle child? Enjoy the first update since the New Year! Hope you're having a good year so far and don't forget to vote and comment :)

[The Better Brother]

"This way." The direction given from his brother when the front door opened made Vergil look up from the spell book that he had been reading closely and carefully. The fact that Dante had invited someone over to their office was a short cause of surprise –particularly against Vergil's knowledge of how he knew his brother hated people annoying him and disturbing his daily life.

Dante had matured over the years, and eventually invited less and less women to the office –mostly because Dante couldn't be bothered with dealing with the women that ended up camping outside the office, demanding to get an answer or money following their one-night stands. It wasn't to say that Dante no longer engaged in the humanely cardinal pleasures of the fairer gender, but Vergil supposed that he was doing it outside of the house –very similar to how Vergil attended to his own needs as well. With the both of them well into the adult years, the simple understanding of respect for each other's space was something that had settled well into both of them.

The first thing that struck Vergil at the sight of the woman who had followed after Dante into the office was the fact that she was not Dante's type. Vergil couldn't exactly say for sure how he knew Dante's type was like, but he certainly could feel that Dante and this new woman did not fit well with each other. The second thing that struck Vergil was that the woman didn't look very scared or uncertain to be introduced to somewhere that was infamous for being the home of two half-demons. Vergil had seen too many of scared expressions whenever humans realized that either he was a half-demon, that he worked as a demon hunter, or simply because he was acquainted to the demon-hunting joint Devil May Cry. Over time, Vergil had eventually learnt to not bother himself with those humans who didn't understand the nature of a world that they didn't dare to embrace. Besides, in Vergil's point of view, most of them were too weak to survive learning about the Demon World as well.

Thus, it was short cause of curiosity for Vergil as he kept his eyes coolly on the woman whose eyes roamed the room appreciatively. Dressed in a casual dress that fit her rather well, Vergil, too, noted that she kept a nice figure. What struck him odd, however, was the fact that she had some lean muscles that took a trained eye to see in places where women usually complained about gaining fats in. Her arms were thin but lean, and so were her nicely toned legs. Vergil could clearly see an athlete within the frame that was dressed in a simple but fitting white dress, the hem fluttering around her knees.

"Probably not what you thought, huh?" Dante asked as if in search of an opinion, but took off his coat, dropping it on the coat stand by the door. Rebellion came off next and Vergil watched in silence as his brother left the woman standing close to the door, admiring the atmosphere while not realizing that Vergil still sat directly in front of her, waiting to be spotted.

"It's nice. Very guy-ish, but I've never really needed a feminine environment my whole life." The comment came back quickly, a hint of approval in her tone of voice. "It's really nice to know that you've been surviving well by yourself."

"Not by myself. I had help." Dante replied, leaving his sword on the stand, and then removing his guns and holsters, putting them back on the display shelf where Yamato sat as well. When they had been younger, their weapons had been thrown in utter disarray, but one day Vergil had decided that the mess was no way to go and had gotten them a display shelf in the office. He had forced Dante to learn how to keep his weapons away nicely, and it was an added plus that Dante's array of devil arms displayed in the office also gave off the feel of a very capable joint in dealing with demonic problems to any potential customers.

"Yes, you mentioned that you had a twin." The woman replied, clearly intending to turn to look at Dante, but finally catching sight of Vergil sitting there. She paused, looked over to find Dante a good distance away at the display shelf, then back at Vergil. "That him?"

"Yeah." Dante replied easily, and Vergil remained silently watching despite the fact that he was obviously an object of interest for the lady. Stepping in on low, practical heels, the woman approached him at the table with a friendly, open smile that Vergil immediately did not trust. As she crossed the office in approach to him, she passed a small pocket of light casted through the window at her side, and Vergil saw a glint in cool blue eyes.

His wariness immediately increased at the sight of something demonic lurking beneath the surface, though he neither moved nor spoke, displaying his clear distrust only through his eyes.

"He's wary." The woman noted with another smile, as if his reaction amused her very much. He could clearly see on her perfect pale face that she was at least a few years older than he and Dante, but yet somehow the age was maintained perfectly on a matured face.

"Vergil is the more cautious one between us both. That's how I've survived with him over the years; really." Dante answered honestly, and though Vergil appreciated the indirect compliment made at him, he did not understand why Dante was telling a stranger something like this. "Vergil, do you recognise her?"

At the question addressed to him, he finally snapped his eye contact back to his brother, who had now approached and reached him at the desk, leaning his hip against a corner.

"No. Should I?"

"Nope. I didn't recognise her either. But it's okay." Dante answered, waiting for the woman in topic to reach the desk, standing at the other side and watching the twins close to each other.

"He's distrusting." The woman noted again, as Vergil frowned. Was the woman treating him like a specimen of sorts? She was making comments about him while looking at him and standing right in front of him.

"Vergil and I have had a rocky history. He isn't really like Dad or Mom in that sense."

"I see. Then again, I see a little more of Mom inside him." The woman answered, her smile never wavering. There was something peaceful there, and even though she looked genuinely happy to see him, Vergil didn't share the emotion as he could only look on suspiciously, remaining silent as he was being commented upon. Her comment about 'Mom' disturbed him a little, but what also threw Vergil off his stride was the fact that Dante was openly talking to the woman about 'Dad' and 'Mom' on the assumption that she knew the dead Sparda and Eva beforehand.

"Dante," Vergil finally broke the silence spell. "Will you tell me what is going on?"

"Of course." Dante laughed once. "This woman's name is Thaide. Thaide Sparda. She's our elder sister."

Vergil blinked once, then twice. The words didn't sink in at all, swimming on the surface as Vergil tried desperately to grasp at them, to make meaning out of them.

"If this is a joke from you, Dante, it isn't funny." Vergil warned. "I don't remember having an elder sister."

"About that; I can explain." The woman in topic spoke up. "I was there for the early months of your lives. But when the two of you were one years old, I fell into the Demon World. Mundus dragged me there, and I fought back. I was still a little girl back then, so when I finally broke out of Mundus's grasp, I got lost. I couldn't find my way back and after wandering for very long, I was adopted into another family. They loved me and treated me like their daughter so I cared for them back. But I knew deep down that I was a Sparda, so when I was old enough, I began to search for my family again."

"But why don't we remember a single thing?" Vergil demanded, not so ready to believe a story that sounded so convenient. If a story like that could be possible, then surely anyone could possibly come up to them and declare themselves Dante and Vergil's siblings. "Even if we were too young to remember, there should be images. Photographs."

"Do you remember when we sneaked into Dad's study when we were three even though he always warned us not to and fell asleep on his chair? The next day Dad burned many papers and books." Dante spoke up.

"Yes?" Vergil answered in a question, not sure what his brother could be trying to link to.

"He was burning pictures of Thaide."

"Why would he? If the story goes, then she is as much his daughter as we are his sons. Even if Dad was heartless, Mom would never have allowed him to do something like that."

"Mom was brainwashed, and so were the two of you." The woman now introduced as Thaide answered. "When Sparda couldn't find me no matter how hard he tried, he made the painful decision to pretend as if I never existed. He cleared all memories of me from Mom's head so as to save her from the pain of losing a child. Then he cleared your minds as well –though I guess there's not a lot of clear in the first place. He kept the photos of me in his study, but when the two of you broke into the room, he panicked. He was afraid that you would start asking questions, and that Mom would start to remember and break down completely. So he burnt the pictures of me to erase all possibility of thoughts."

"And how would you know about that?" Vergil questioned, doing his best to not sound as accusative as he felt on the inside. With no concrete evidence, anyone in the world could say that they were close relatives to Vergil and Dante. "According to you, you were supposed to be missing at that time."

"Yes, but I never forgot that I am a Sparda. And before the two of you were born, Dad told me about this secret alcove that he created somewhere close to the portal between the human and demon world. When I was old enough and remembered enough to try searching for that place for any clues of the family that I was separated from, I eventually reached it. It turned out that Dad –being the only one left in the family who remembered me –wrote his apologies to me every day and tried to pretend that I was alive, that I would be reading his letters everyday though he never could send them. The alcove was almost bursting with his letters, and I spent months there reading about stories of everything that happened to the two of you as your grew up. He was actually writing a diary, but it was always directed towards me, and he always apologised for giving up searching for me, apologising for thinking that I was dead, apologising for erasing me from the minds of my own mother and brothers."

"You spin a likely story." Vergil crossed his arms, looking up at the woman who was claiming to be his sister coolly. "You might have Dante's trust with just that, but it takes more than words to convince me."

"I'd thought one of you would say that." Thaide answered with a hint of a smile, then clicked her fingers. There was a short influx of powerful demonic energy –energy with such strength and intensity that Vergil was internally shocked to feel (but refused to show it on the outside). Then, before anyone could react to that demonic energy, it was gone as a bright spark appeared, and quickly cleared to reveal a small stack of papers in the woman's hand.

Without much of a flourish, the stack of papers were dropped easily on the table between them, and Vergil could not help his curious instincts as he took his wary eyes off the woman. The handwriting was impeccable, and even Dante made a sound of slight surprise as the younger twin reached forwards fearlessly to retrieve the letter sitting on the top of the stack.

"Those are only a very small part of what I took with me when I left the alcove. If Dad's words doesn't convince you, then I don't know what else will."

Vergil took a short time to peruse through one of the letters in the stack, speaking of a day where 'Vergil' and 'Dante' had learnt how to hold their swords properly, and how this said Dante kept dropping his sword to run away to play. It had been addressed to a person named Thaide.

"How am I expected to believe that these letters are handwritten by our father?" Vergil looked up from the letters. "You could happen to have a very close handwriting to his, or copied his handwriting."

"I appreciate you being resilient and cautious, Vergil, but there has to be an end to your refusal to trust a stranger." Thaide finally said, clearly losing her smile at the insistence of Vergil's rejection. Vergil's readiness to make a reply was taken away from his lips when the woman stepped back once, as if to allow herself some space, and strong wind stirred up within the office.

A purple mist began to rise from the woman, and Vergil and Dante both found themselves suddenly choked by a force of demonic energy so strong that a chill set in their necks. Sister or not, this woman was clearly not a force to be messed with, and both Sparda brothers could only watch on in muted shock as the thin mist continued to rise. The blue eyes of the woman's turned red, and in another small flash of light, she had transformed.

Her form was terribly similar to what Vergil and Dante were familiar with. Her scales were patterned in almost the same way, and she even had wings on her back.

Her form looked the closest to their father's.

"If you have any more protests after this, Vergil, then you are an idiot." The dislocated voice said, and neither of the brothers had any doubt that the voice came from the devil-figure standing in front of them.

"We get it, we get it." Dante said, because Vergil had lost words. "You didn't have to scare us like that with a sudden devil-trigger."

At Dante's words of assurance, the woman was equally quick to de-devil-trigger, appearing back in her prim and proper appearance as she smiled once more.

"I didn't mean to scare or anything, but I just wanted to make you see. I've been looking for the two of you for so long, and I was a little afraid that you two might have passed on without my knowing. Mom died without knowing me. Dad died without ever seeing me again. I didn't want the two of you to pass on forgetting me. If you did, then it would really be like Thaide Sparda never existed. I don't want that."

"Okay then, I acknowledge you as our sister. But what do you want from us by coming to us and revealing the truth? We're already all grown up. If you're thinking of bringing us to amusement parks to gain our favour, you're too many years late." Dante answered for Vergil's sake –more because Dante knew that Vergil was still doing his best to accept the fact that they had another elder sibling that they never knew about in their entire lives.

"I wasn't thinking of any amusement park." Thaide answered with a secretive grin this time. "I'm thinking of an all-you-can-eat-buffet demon-hunting session to break down our walls. Because I'm here to stay."

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Vergil sat stiff in the café, his back completely straight despite the air of casualness that hung all around him. He tried his best to relax, but anxiety and worry was something that unconsciously clouded his head as he waited impatiently. Vergil was usually a very calm and composed man, and he absolutely hated feeling so uncertain and so disturbingly worried even though he knew that he shouldn't be.

Still, ever since Thaide had bulldozed her way into his life, making her spot permanent in their strange family dynamics, Vergil had been forced to accept the strong woman as a part of his daily routine. And like what had happened with Dante, Vergil had unconsciously normalized the idea of having another person living with him, that seeing Thaide at home was something normal and natural.

He, already in his early thirties, by technicalities should be completely mature about the entire affair, but even Vergil Sparda could not escape the distant feeling of abandonment, of loneliness that invaded his heart insidiously when Thaide had announced one day that she was getting married. Dante had congratulated their sister with utmost heartiness and some level of teasing, but Thaide had replied in kind while Vergil remained silent. Eventually he had doled out on his congratulations, but what both irritated and amazed Vergil was the fact that inside his heart, he felt a little sore at the imminent disappearance of Thaide from their lives.

As if that wasn't enough, Vergil had had the misfortune to stumble onto a secret that now, in retrospect, he realized that he didn't want to know about.

The man who had been engaged to his sister for the past month; he had been dating Thaide for her money, and was planning to make a no-show on the day of the wedding after receiving the money transfer from the wedding planner that had prior arrangements with the man to con innocent women. Vergil had unfortunately been accidentally nearby when the same man who was supposed to be Thaide's fiancé had proposed in public to another woman, and Vergil had overheard –by equal amount of coincidence –when the man had called his accomplice to say that another woman had been caught in their conning net.

"Vergil?" Thaide's curious voice interrupted his introspection, and Vergil blinked to see his sister –fashionable as always –taking off her flashy sunglasses and resting them on the top of her head. She had a good amount of makeup on, and if nobody asked, Vergil was sure that no one knew that she was already 35. "What's the matter? It isn't like you to ask me to meet at a café. Drinking coffee and chatting isn't exactly up your and Dante's alley."

"Thaide..."Vergil started, but hesitated before he could get further into the sentence. How could he break it to her? If not done tactically, Vergil could easily see his elder sister flying into a fit of rage about how he was being impossibly distrusting of her fiancé. It truly did not help that Vergil was a naturally suspicious person –that characteristic trait had been established long ago –but this time, Vergil really had not intended to find out more about Thaide's fiancé. It had just happened somehow to him.

"What is it? This isn't like you, Vergil." Thaide asked with clear concern.

Ever since tearing her way into their lives, Thaide had given both men a strange sense of feminine warmth that both had missed since their mother's death. It was rather strange mix, because Thaide was both a rough woman –thanks to her profession of demon-hunting –but also a gentle and caring person whenever it came to her two little brothers. As if the instincts of caring for them was still very much alive within her, both Vergil and Dante could see Thaide constantly struggle to not treat them like the little toddlers that they were when she had first been torn away from their side. The brother-sisterly relationship was still something that took getting used to, but Vergil would have to admit that he appreciated the effort one way or another. That was the only reason why Vergil was also putting in an effort to accept and see Thaide as more than someone who had just barged her way into his life and home.

"Exactly how much do you know about your fiancé?" Vergil started with a question, crossing his arms while his sister took a seat across him, crossing her leg elegantly. It was simply just like Thaide to attract the attention of everyone in the vicinity, and Vergil could easily feel the eyes of the other diners in the café watching the both of them.

"Zakiel? He's 25 years old, and he's currently working as a financial advisor to some company. Why?"

"Which company exactly?"

"I don't know. I'm not really interested in the business world anyway. Even if he worked for a big famous company, I wouldn't really know or bother." Thaide shrugged. "What's wrong with Zakiel?"

"Does he work office hours?" Vergil pursued further, hoping to lead his sister into some form of enlightenment through his indirect means.

"No. He goes around meeting clients according to their schedules, so unless he has to rush out reports and paperwork, he's more or less fine with time."

"Do you know more about him other than his work? What is his background like? What was his past like?"

"Why are you asking this, Vergil?" Thaide's curious blue eyes tagged on him, clearly not understanding of the reality. Vergil wouldn't like that say that he was more intelligent than his siblings, but sometimes he honestly felt that both Thaide and Dante needed to think a little deeper into some things to get the real picture.

"Have you asked him about ex-girlfriends?" Vergil ignored the question and replied with another question of his own.

"No. We haven't be going out for very long in the first place. Asking about ex-girlfriends is something that you can't ask so early in a relationship."

"And for some reason, marriage comes before that?" Vergil questioned, wary of the frown that was beginning to tug at the sides of Thaide's lips. In the role of a little brother, Vergil didn't like to piss his sister off –particularly when Thaide was a half-devil much more powerful than he was. But this was a situation where he was sandwiched between pissing Thaide off now, or suffering from seeing his sister's broken hearted from being left alone on the altar by a conman who probably didn't love her at all.

"What is all this, Vergil? Are you trying to say that you disapprove of our marriage? If so, why didn't you say so earlier?"

"I didn't really bother about it as long as you loved him and he loved you back. I didn't realize what kind of a man he was until recently." Vergil answered honestly. "If you don't want to be heartbroken, Thaide, break up with him. Save yourself the heartache."

"What are you talking about?" Thaide jumped to her feet now, clearly angered by Vergil's direct words.

"He's no good man, Thaide."

"And you're better?" Thaide fumed. Within a second, Vergil blinked in realization that his sister had grabbed the cup of –thankfully –cold coffee on the table and thrown it straight at him, a face of murderous and thunderous rage glaring back at him. "I love Zakiel, Vergil, and if you don't approve, then don't turn up for the wedding. I thought my little brother would be delighted that I finally found a man suitable for me, my profession and my background, but it appears that you're worse than Dante."

"Thaide." Vergil tried to inch in more words within his sister's rage, but nothing more could be heard as the woman simply turned around, fixed her sunglasses back over her eyes in a move that even seemed angry, and walked off without a second word.

"Are you okay, sir?" A quick-moving waitress approached Vergil quickly with a stack of serviettes, but Vergil simply stood up –still soaking through his shirt and coffee still dripping from his white hair.

"I'm sorry for the mess." He apologised numbly, withdrew a few notes and left them on a dry patch on the table, and left.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Vergil was in the middle of studying a new spell book that he had found on accident in the library of one of his previous client when the door opened, and in stepped the Sparda woman who had moved in to live with them years ago. Because he had looked up to see if it had been Dante or Thaide who had returned, they made eye contact for the short period.

Then Vergil closed his spell book, and stood up to leave the room. Ever since their argument at the café a week ago, Thaide had been blatantly hostile to him while refusing to listen to him. Though Vergil had thought that something like this would happen, he still thought that it was rather unfortunate that his sister was acting very much like a child. He couldn't exactly blame her for being in love, but Vergil simply silently wondered when she would stop and realize that the flowers were not always just pretty.

Roses always had thorns.

His venture to leave the table was stopped halfway by the call of his name from his sister, but he didn't turn back around to look at her. Keeping his eyes on the floor to escape further eye contact –to avoid the look of anger and hurt that he could always see in her eyes –Vergil waited for more insulting, more hurt words slung his way.

"You were right." The unusually small voice didn't sound like it came from Thaide at all. It simply didn't sound like the usual Thaide, didn't sound like the sister that was loud and confident, strong and proud. "You were right all along... Why do you have to be right? Why..."

"What do you mean?" Vergil couldn't help but look up now. What sent a shock through him was the fact that his sister was now leaning against the closed front door, her hands covering her face while her shoulders shook in sobs. "What happened?"

Any concerns about being insulted flew from his mind as Vergil tossed his spell book lightly back on the table and rushed to where his sister was. By now, she had already sank to her knees, her crying louder and more intense. The perfect blue-dyed hair that was usually kept very nicely around her shoulders was now ruffled –a reflection of her internal state of turmoil.

"Thaide, what happened?" Vergil knelt on one knee in front of his sister, holding one of his sister's hand and pulling it forcefully away from hiding her face –which was a pretty wreck at the moment. His sister was crying uncontrollably, and on her face now Vergil could no longer see a confident 35 year old excited at marrying a man who she loved, but a heartbroken 19 year old teenager who had just realized the painful truth of reality.

"You were right!" Thaide repeated, crying hard. "You were right! Zakiel was just out for my money and prestige! You were right, and I was the world's biggest idiot to not have listened to you!"

It was here. The heartbreak that Vergil had known was imminent was finally here, and he was dealing with the first sights of his sister being crumbled into a crying mess. It was almost hard to connect this woman to the strong, self-confident Thaide that Vergil was used to. It was almost hard to see this Thaide as his elder sister.

Still, no matter what she was his sister still, and Vergil could not do anything else other than to watch helplessly as his sister cried and sobbed uncontrollably at the door. It was the first time Vergil was seeing Thaide so beaten down –she had still been brimming with positive energy after a three-day-non-stop demon hunting marathon –and it surprised Vergil. It was hard to see his sister as someone weak.

It was hard for Vergil to remember that Thaide had a heart as human as his and Dante's.

Eventually, Vergil managed to coax his sister from the door, carrying her to the couch where at the very least she could cry in some form of ease. Wordlessly, he offered her tissues and drinks while she cried and ranted. At some point of time, Thaide even pulled Vergil to her, and cried against his shoulder while he helplessly and wordlessly stroked her back in effort to calm her down.

Her never-ending tears only told Vergil how much Thaide had loved Zakiel no matter how much she cursed him right now. He –as a man who had never been committed to this thing called a romantic love –couldn't really understand how someone so twisted and human as Zakiel could make a woman as strong as his sister cry so much, but Vergil didn't want to understand it on a personal level as well.

He would rather be caught dead than to find himself crying so badly over a woman who did not deserve his devoted heart.

Besides, he had Thaide in his life. One woman was just enough a number in his family. There was no need to add another.

At one point, Dante returned home as well, pausing in shock to see Thaide clinging on to Vergil like he were a pole in a hurricane. Vergil had explained the situation to Dante in whispers while calming down Thaide, and Dante had acted very predictably.

Less than ten minutes after returning home, Dante had stormed out of the front doors, intent on making a man called Zakiel suffer. Vergil let his twin leave the house, settled to know that at least one of them was dealing with the other party while he tried his best to ease Thaide.

He didn't keep track of how long it took, but it definitely took very long before Thaide had calmed down. Exhausted from her intense and long-drawn crying session, Thaide had fallen asleep like a little girl, and Vergil didn't bother trying to wake her up as he put her to bed. Then, taking a look at her swollen eyes, he quietly placed a cold cloth over her eyes while she slept.

A few hours later, the door to Thaide's room opened, and Vergil looked up once more from his spell book to find his sister coming out in modest house clothes. There were still traces of her crying, but he assumed that her swollen eyes would have been much worse without the cloth.

"Where is Dante?" She asked, seemingly embarrassed.

"He went out to do something about Zakiel."

Vergil watched as his elder sister bite her bottom lip, her tender heart still slow in trying to react to the fact that their little brother was probably not going to treat the human very politely.

Zakiel probably should have known that there was nothing good that could ever come out of breaking the heart of a Sparda woman.

"He should be glad that Dante went instead of you, huh?" Thaide finally gave a forced chuckle that didn't sound very like her, as if desperate to want to keep the atmosphere light and easy so that she wouldn't be triggered back into a crying mess.

"I wouldn't go even if Dante didn't." Vergil answered. "You wouldn't be so calm about it if I went. You still love him, and if I went, you'll be doubly worried that I might kill him. We know that Dante won't kill him, so you're enjoying him getting punished."

"Then..." Thaide took a seat back on the couch where she had been crying on hours ago. "What would you have done if Dante didn't go? You're really going to let him go free?"

Vergil silently noted that Thaide made no comment to refute his statement about her still loving her ex-fiance. Normal women would probably try to insist that they were over the man, but Thaide still loved the man, and she knew it. Denying that fact wasn't going to help.

"I have my ways of making a man pay for bullying my sister." Vergil simply answered vaguely, though the both of them knew that if Vergil was really serious, the result would be rather catastrophic. Thaide might be stronger than Vergil, but no one in the Sparda could win him when it came to scaring factor. Where he couldn't compete against his sister in terms of real power, he made it up in terms of the aura and appearance that would instil utter fear.

"That's the first protective sentence I've ever heard from you about me, Vergil. I thought you didn't like me."

"If I didn't like you, you wouldn't be here."

"I thought you only tolerated me because Dante liked me being here."

"If I only tolerated you, I wouldn't have been bothered about your marriage."

"True." Thaide nodded. "Look Vergil, I'm sorry about what I did and said the other day..."

"Don't." Vergil interrupted lowly, closing his spell book, pulling a piece of paper out. "Don't bother with the apologies, because you loved him."

Thaide had known her little brother long enough by now to know that Vergil wasn't trying to be rude. Instead, still feeling a little tender on the inside after a very long crying session, Thaide moved from the couch to the desk when Vergil didn't speak for a long time, seeming to draw something intensely on the piece of paper. When she neared, she saw –with curiosity –that he had drawn some sort of a symbol and written some scribbly things that probably existed in another language that she wasn't educated in.

"What's that?"

"Just a small spell that I'm practicing." Vergil answered, completing his small drawn symbol. Then, resting his pen down, Vergil opened the drawer of the desk to withdraw a small Ziploc bag. Thaide watched in surprise at Vergil seemed to grasp the air inside the bag, but when she squinted, there were a few strands of black hair pinched between his fingers.

"What spell is this about?" Thaide asked, a little wary now. "And whose hair is that?"

"Just a spell to make sure someone gets nightmares whenever they come across a certain item, or the idea of that item for the rest of his or her life. If the target gets into contact with something related to that item, then he or she will suffer a bad sickness plagued with nightmares." Vergil spoke in such normalcy that Thaide was a little surprised at his little brother's abilities. She had known that Vergil was smart and educated, but she hadn't been aware that he could do these kind of spells. She had always assumed that they were all limited to what demonic powers they could, that their powers didn't really differ that much –only in terms of power and intensity.

She hadn't really known that demonic powers could be used to do spells like these, and she watched with silent fascination as Vergil seemed to silently mutter something (his lips were moving but she heard nothing), then he placed the strands of hair on top of the symbol on the paper. She could feel him throwing out his demonic power, but there seemed to be nothing happening to the power until the symbol on the paper glowed a bright blue.

The strands of hair began to smoke as if catching fire, and she could easily smell burnt hair.

"Thaide, can you lend me a little of your hair? And your engagement ring." Vergil asked in such politeness that Thaide obeyed automatically, not even realizing that she was putting herself at risk of some sort of weird spell until her brother had thrown the items onto the glowing symbol on the paper as well, watching as the bright blue light turned green.

Then, as abruptly as it started, it ended. The glow simply faded away, and all that remained were a few strands of hair that had gotten remarkably shorter and a ring that rested on paper that seemed a little burnt as well.

"Done." Vergil announced. "Be careful, the ring is still hot."

"What was that?" Thaide asked as Vergil slide the ring off the paper, then dropped it into the shredder beside the table. "Whose hair was that, and why did you need my hair and ring?"

"Zakiel's hair. I took them from your clothes when you came back. I used your things to direct the spell."

The implicit meaning of Vergil's words struck through Thaide like a lightning as she watched her brother open the spell book that he had left off his side just a moment ago, flipping to yet another page and perusing through it casually as if nothing much had happened at all.

Then, despite the fact that she had been heartbroken only very recently, Thaide found her grin back as she stared at her little brother over the top of his book. Vergil didn't like to show his emotions much at all –he was way worse than Dante when it came to talking about feelings. But whenever he did, Thaide could not help but feel that Vergil was the cutest little brother on the earth –no matter how old he already was.

"Thanks, Vergil." Thaide said as she skipped lightly to back to her room, ready to change back into going-out clothes.

She came out a few minutes later, all made up and ready to go once more.

"Don't get too close." Vergil warned, though his face was still hiding behind his spell book. "We don't want police on our tail saying that either Dante or you landed him in hospital. You have M.O. right now to want to do something horrible to him."

"It's okay." Thaide said, feeling a little evil as she paused at the door. "I want him to know that when he pisses me off, he also pisses off my little brothers. And out of the both of them, he doesn't want to piss you off."

"I've never even been introduced to him formally before." Vergil answered, not looking up from his book.

"It's okay. He doesn't have to be introduced to you for him to know that you're the world's best little brother."

"I thought you gave Dante that title." Vergil replied vaguely, but light-hearted chuckles replied him. He thankfully hid his face behind his book, because he knew that Thaide would once again begin to tease him about him being a softie if she saw him smiling. Of course he would smile; Thaide had been crying badly just hours ago, and now she was grinning evilly.

His sister had bounced back quickly, and Vergil was relieved.

"Today, you're officially the better brother, Vergil. You're the World's No. 1 Little Brother."