Chapter 64: The King is Gone
The warmth lingered first. That heavy, possessive warmth of Dante beside him, the solid heat of the demon prince’s body against his back, Dante’s arm slung low over Dabi’s hip. Dabi stirred, pushing back instinctively into that heat. His hand slid across crisp, cool sheets – sheets that smelled faintly of ozone, expensive cologne, and the lingering, unsettling tang of sulfur that clung to Dante since… since yesterday.
He hit empty space.
Dabi’s eyes snapped open. The vast expanse of Dante’s penthouse bedroom materialized around him – all sharp angles, obsidian surfaces, and floor-to-ceiling windows showcasing the city’s glittering, indifferent sprawl far below. The space beside him in the enormous bed was cold. Deeply cold. Just rumpled black silk sheets. Dante was gone.
A grunt of annoyance escaped Dabi. Typical. The bastard could vanish faster than smoke. Probably slunk off to brood in his study or terrorize Mammon over club finances before dawn. Dabi pushed himself up, scrubbing a hand through his sleep-tousled dark hair. The silence of the penthouse was absolute, a stark contrast to the Inferno’s usual thrum. Too quiet. He swung his legs out of bed, feet hitting the chilled polished stone floor. He snagged his discarded jeans from the floor, yanking them on without boxers, the denim rough against his skin. He didn’t bother with a shirt.
Padding barefoot through the cavernous living space, the sheer emptiness pressed in. The minimalist luxury felt sterile, hollow without Dante’s simmering presence. He headed for the sleek kitchen, aiming for coffee, when a flicker of movement near the panoramic windows caught his eye.
Someone was already here.
Leaning against the obsidian frame, silhouetted against the city lights, stood a man Dabi knew only by reputation and Dante’s rare, grudging mentions. Tall, effortlessly imposing, radiating an ancient kind of calm that felt… unnatural. Adam. The First Man. He wore modern clothes – a charcoal sweater, dark trousers – but they couldn't disguise the ageless weight in his eyes, the quiet arrogance that seemed woven into his very posture. He was examining an abstract sculpture of twisted metal, his expression unreadable.
“What the fuck?” Dabi snarled, stopping dead. Alarm bells, faint at first, started clanging. How the hell did Adam get in? Dante’s wards were legendary. “What do you want? Where’s Dante?” His voice echoed sharply in the vast room.
Adam turned slowly. His gaze, unsettlingly direct and seemingly ancient, swept over Dabi – the bare chest, the sleep-mussed hair, the possessive brand of Dante’s power subtly humming beneath Dabi’s skin. A flicker of something unidentifiable crossed Adam’s face. Not quite disdain, but a profound weariness. “That’s precisely my question, young man,” Adam replied, his voice a smooth, deep baritone that resonated oddly in the quiet space. “Where is your demon lover?”
Dabi bristled at the term ‘young man’ and the casual ownership in ‘your demon lover’, but the question itself was mundane. “Wasn’t here when I woke up,” he shrugged, turning towards the brutalist espresso machine. “Probably down in the club vaults counting damned souls or something. He does that.” He started fiddling with the machine, the mundane act a shield against the weirdness of Adam’s presence.
Silence. Thick and heavy. Dabi glanced back.
Adam had frozen. Utterly still. The ancient calm was gone, replaced by a sudden, stark rigidity. The arrogance had vanished from his face, leaving behind something raw and unsettlingly human: alarm. Deep, profound alarm. “What do you mean,” Adam asked, his voice dropping, losing its smoothness, gaining an edge like flint, “he wasn’t here?”
Dabi paused, hand hovering over the coffee grinder. The genuine urgency in Adam’s tone cut through his annoyance. “I mean he wasn’t in the fucking bed,” Dabi shot back, turning fully to face him. “Like I said, he does this. Vanishes. Pops up later smelling like hellfire and trouble. Why the fuck are you so serious?”
Adam took a deliberate step forward. The air around him seemed to crackle faintly. “Yeah?” Adam’s voice was low, intense. “He does that after having forced psychic visions ripped into his skull? After full-blown panic attacks that leave him partially transformed and weeping on the floor? He just… ups and gos?”
Dabi stared. The words landed like physical blows. Forced visions. Panic attacks. Weeping on the floor. The image of Dante, broken and trembling in his arms yesterday, flooded back – the raw terror in his eyes, the desperate clinging. Dante hadn't just vanished for a sulk. He’d vanished after that. After whatever Asag had shown him, after the horrifying ultimatum that had shattered his invincible facade. The cold emptiness of the bed suddenly felt menacing. The sterile luxury of the penthouse transformed into a stage for disaster.
Panic, cold and sharp, stabbed through Dabi’s gut. It unfolded fast, like ink dropped in water, darkening everything. Nobody knows what he saw. Who forced their way into his head. What he might be doing. The realization was a sucker punch. Nothing. Dante could be anywhere. Doing anything. Driven by terror, by despair, by some fucked-up sense of duty or sacrifice Asag had planted.
He fumbled his phone out of his back pocket, fingers suddenly clumsy. Scrolled past stupid memes and club contacts with trembling thumbs. Found Dante’s name. Hit call. It rang. Once. Twice. Three times. Dabi’s heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drum solo threatening to break bone.
Then, a click. Static, faint. Then Dante’s voice.
“Dabi.” Just his name. But fuck. The sound of it. Broken. Ragged. Like stones grinding together. Not the King of Hell. Not his arrogant, possessive lover. A voice scraped raw by unimaginable strain, thick with an emotion that made Dabi’s blood run cold.
“Dante! Where the fuck are you?” Dabi demanded, his own voice tight, high with fear. “Tell me. Right fucking now!”
A pause. A shaky inhale crackled down the line. “Doesn’t matter,” Dante whispered. The words were slurred, heavy. “Just… listen. Listen to me, Dabi. I love you. So fucking much. More than… more than anything. More than eternity.” Another ragged breath. “I’m sorry. So sorry. For… for everything. Bringing you into this… mess. My fucked-up world.”
“Stop it!” Dabi yelled, pacing now, the phone clamped to his ear. Adam watched him, face grim, arms crossed. “Just tell me where you are!”
Dante ignored him. His voice dropped lower, thick with unbearable sincerity. “Thankful. So fucking thankful I met you. Got the chance… got the chance to love you. To know you. To feel…” His voice hitched, choked. “To feel what it’s like… to be loved back. Properly.”
Ice water flooded Dabi’s veins. This wasn't reassurance. This wasn't a check-in. This was… valedictory. A fucking goodbye. Spoken from the edge of some unimaginable abyss. The panic, already a storm, became a hurricane inside him, tearing at his control. “Dante, no! Don’t you fucking dare—!”
“I love you, Dabi,” Dante breathed, the words a final, devastating blow. Soft. Utterly certain. And then, silence. A dead, hollow tone.
“Dante? DANTE!” Dabi yelled into the void. Nothing. He stared at the phone screen, the call ended. The words echoed in his head, beautiful and horrifying. I love you. Thankful. Sorry. Goodbye. He lowered the phone slowly, his hand shaking violently. The polished stone floor seemed to tilt beneath his bare feet.
Adam stepped closer, his ancient eyes boring into Dabi’s. “Where was he?” Adam asked, his voice devoid of its earlier arrogance, stripped down to urgent necessity.
Dabi looked up, meeting Adam’s gaze. The panic was there, a wild animal clawing at his insides, but beneath it, cold determination crystallized. Dante’s raw confession, his farewell… it wasn't an end. It was a fucking starting gun. He shoved the phone back into his pocket, the movement jerky but decisive. “Doesn’t matter what he said,” Dabi rasped, his voice surprisingly steady despite the tremor in his hands. “We need to find him. Now. Wherever he is…” He met Adam’s unwavering stare, the unspoken truth hanging heavy and terrifying between them. “…it’s not good.”