Fan Fiction ❯ Functional ❯ Chapter 1

Disclaimer: No weapons allowed in the dorms. So it's a safe bet I don't own either Dante or his weaponry.

 

First in a series of drabbles about the `weapon-tachi', Dante's helpers. They keep the hunk alive and not ugly scarred, so they deserve the thanks of all fangirls everywhere.

 

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

 

The Wyrd Sisters:

 

Clotho - Ivory

 

HE had started building them when HE was thirteen. They had been redesigned over and over. Once, HE had put `cameos' in the handles, ovals with pictures of little girls. Everything else changed, but the cameos stayed, covered over.

 

And so they stayed eternally ten.

 

Once HE had said HIS mom had once said that she had wanted to have twin girls just like them, before…. And then HE hugged them and took them out for ice cream.

 

But getting to make demons die later was the best. But HE needed her to be sweet, so she was.

 

Lachesis - Ebony

 

Ivory scared her, sometimes.

 

She really liked the Powerpuff girls `cause there was a yellow like Ivory and a black like her and Nevan could be Blossom and they saved the day and helped their daddy, just like them. HE said they were just like them. But not really.

 

She said the tough things because Ivory couldn't without the hate leaking through. And Nevan… Nevan needed cheering up as much as HIM.

 

But Ivory was slipping, and slipping was bad. It made you fall out of HIS hands, being bloody.

 

She wondered sometimes if Vergil had scared HIM like this.

 

Atropos - Nevan

 

HIS hands were fast and sure, yet gentle when in battle, and equally artful, but even gentler when HE played songs on her so that she might learn them.

 

Then HE would play HIS drums and she would play herself and the others would clap and when it was over HE would take her hand and they'd both bow.

 

HIS hands didn't hurt even when HE had claws. It was very different.

 

She almost wished HE would touch her like she had been made to be. She could almost believe it wouldn't hurt. Maybe HE could make her not remember…

 

 

 

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

 

Composition notes:

 

DMC1 takes place in 2001, and DMC3 in 1991 with Dante being 18, I'm pretty sure. As of 2001 then, Dante has been without his family for 20 years. All people need people they can talk to. I'm guessing that after his mom was killed and Vergil ran off when they were 8, Dante was taken in by Tony and Aisha from the artbook. Tony is a gunsmith, and Dante dedicated Ebony and Ivory to him (inscription in the artbook), so Dante probably knows weapons-making. DMC3 takes place when he's moving out on his own.

 

Dante has a rather fucked-up family situation. His father was killed possibly before he was born, but certainly when he was young enough not to have any clear memories of him because he only knows him through what his mom said about him. His mom dying and his brother turning evil… Dysfunctional. Whereas, weapons are tools, functional by definition. Hence the title: what works in Dante's life, what allows him to live up to his name and endure. He lives with them, he works with them, they save his life, they're the only ones around for a long time he can talk to about being a devil and so on… there's a deep bond there.

 

In the Artbook, Ebony and Ivory are designed very differently, and have cameos, jewelry pictures, of girls on them: Ivory blonde and Ebony brunette. I'm guessing the cameos belonged to Eva, Dante's mom. In the game, the guns are rather different. Since guns are a very un-devilish weapon, according to Vergil, they are probably made on earth. Since Dante would certainly prefer enchanted weaponry, and they must have at least some magic to survive channeling the powers of Alastor and Ifrit in the first game, my theory is that he made them, and they contain devil magic, hence the instant reloading. Guns that were smart enough to auto-target vital points so he could concentrate on strategy would also be helpful. He also does talk to them. So, I don't see them being sentient as unlikely.

 

The title of this section is from Macbeth, a play renowned for being unlucky to perform. Many swords in it, and battles. The weapons use `evil powers' like the witches in the play, and shape the fate of man by saving it. Also `sisters' invokes the relationship. Dante would have grown up with Vergil always there, so he'd want someone around his age, because that would be normal for him. Also, given that his whole justification for his existence, why despite being a devil he is not evil, is protecting people, I think he'd want something to protect, that wouldn't be scared of him for being what he is. And making his mom's wish come true, in a way… It's interesting that Dante and Vergil look so much like Sparda. Given genetics, Hellspawn and humans can't possibly be able to interbreed naturally. So Dante and Vergil were probably designed and Eva would have had input. Also, Dante made the guns and would be teaching them, so obviously they would be `younger' than him.

 

The titles of the individual drabbles go back to the fate theme. The Wyrd sisters echo the Three Fates of Greek tradition. They weave the cloth of history. Clotho, the youngest, selects the thread. Ivory is Clotho because of the connotation of Ivory with white, and hence innocence. Yet, Ivory is obtained by killing. Clotho seems to start life by choosing who lives, yet choosing who lives determines who dies. She was created to deal death, and kills to defend Dante and avenge him, and herself. Yet, on the surface, she appears pure and innocent. Can she be happy, eternally young?

 

The second is Lachesis, who measures the threads. That involves thought and deliberation. Ebony is wood, and invokes to me the slow growth of a tree. Also, wood can be obtained from fallen branches, and there is actually slightly less death associated with it, despite logging. Also, the vegetable nature of staying in one place invokes a desire for stability. Ebony here is the one associated with the deliberate decision to kill, yet she is the most thoughtful. She's the one looking towards the future, planning it out. Yet she's also the most childish, most able to take pleasure in the small things: like a tree in sunlight.

 

Ebony and Ivory both entirely define themselves in terms of Dante, being his creations: he's all they've ever known, and they're dedicated to helping him. Not healthy for humans, but no one here is human. The number 10 I picked because I picked 13 first, as the unlucky number and the start of the teen years, when Dante would be looking to the future and wanting his own weapons. 10 is the base number of the counting system: it's a determinedly normal number. It's close enough to his age for them to be partners, yet it's also clearly younger.

 

The third Fate is Atropos, the one who actually cuts the threads. This is death, yet it is also the end of the Fates' determination of one's destiny: freedom. A succubus, Nevan was created as a sex object: a title I rejected was toy, another played. Now, that life is over, and while her fate is still in Dante's hands, it is more open. Yet she still seeks to act as Atropos, and sever her old life, to have a new fate, yet her old life is so much a part of her she puts everything in terms of it. She desires Dante because that is what is normal for her: notice her ultimate desire is not pleasure: just lack of pain. Death is the ultimate lack of pain. This desire for suicide is what worries Ebony. Nevan is new, junior as Dante's, yet she is the oldest and has suffered the most. This is her afterlife, her heaven.

 

Nevan was also created to serve: while she centers her life around Dante, there's a little more selfishness. Ebony and Ivory are both centered around Dante, their desire is to avenge/cheer/help him and even the desires they ignore stem from their focus on him. Nevan wants to `serve' him sexually for herself: he hasn't shown any desire for it. He has folded her into the sister category, recognizing her suffering, and wants to give her something else she can do well, something healthy. Dante is much more aware of Nevan's issues because she's new: Ebony and Ivory have been with him so long, and been so stable, he doesn't realize they need to be talked to as well because they are both determined not to worry him. Their function is to help Dante: he doesn't need to know how unstable his foundation is.

 

Wow. 300 words of fic and 1,128 of notes. And I only did backround info, not theme spoilers.

 

Notice: Ivory is at first deadpan, than childish as she comes to the decision to be childish. Ebony remains determinedly childish throughout, but is less so at the end, slipping out of character. Nevan is lyrical at the beginning, childish toward the middle, yet more out of wonder and rubbing off from E&I and the innocence of this new life than lack of adulthood, and deliberately vague at the end. Ivory ends on a decision, a choosing. Ebony ends with a consideration, something she is analyzing. Nevan ends indefinitely, avoiding the past, going to an uncertain future.

 

And I'm not writing one more word.