Chapter 11: Feast or Famine
The low thrum of the Inferno’s dance floor was a distant, muffled pulse beneath the thick velvet drapes sealing the VIP lounge. Dante swirled amber liquid in a heavy crystal tumbler, the ice clinking like tiny, cold bones. Vincent sat opposite in a deep burgundy armchair, his presence a solid, grounding counterpoint to the simmering energy Dante usually radiated. Tonight, that energy felt coiled tight, contained, almost brittle. The air hung thick with expensive cigar smoke and the cloying scent of demonic pheromones leaking in from the club below.
The hidden door slid open silently. Sapphire slipped through, a vision of predatory grace in a shimmering, barely-there dress the color of midnight. Her sharp grin sliced through the haze as she claimed the arm of Dante’s sofa, close enough for the slit in her dress to reveal a dangerous length of leg. She traced the rim of her martini glass with a perfectly manicured nail, the gesture languid, calculated.
"So, brother," she purred, her voice like smoke and honey, "when does your pretty little pyromaniac discover you need to feed on three souls and hearts to keep those pretty wings?" She took a slow sip, her violet eyes glinting with a mixture of mischief and something sharper beneath.
Vincent’s glass froze halfway to his lips. His gaze snapped to Dante. Across the low obsidian table, Dante’s hand tightened on his tumbler. Not a tremor, but a controlled spasm. With a soft, metallic shink, obsidian-black claws unsheathed from his fingertips, scoring faint, screeching lines into the thick crystal.
"He’ll probably see tonight," Dante stated, his voice flat, devoid of its usual rich timbre. He didn’t look at either of them, staring instead into the depths of his whiskey as if seeking answers in the peat smoke.
Vincent lowered his glass slowly. "He knows?" he asked, his calm voice carrying an undercurrent of tension. "Knows you come with a lot, right? The... requirements? The reality? He’s okay with all of that?" His gaze was steady, probing, the protective older brother assessing the potential fallout.
Dante finally lifted his head. The gold of his eyes seemed dulled, haunted. "He says he is," Dante murmured, the claws retracting as abruptly as they’d appeared, leaving the scored glass as the only evidence. "But he hasn’t seen it. Not the true abilities. Not the... feeding." He took a long, slow pull from his drink, the ice cubes rattling slightly against the crystal. "Not what I really am."
Sapphire watched him, her playful smirk softening into something more genuine. "Wow, Dante," she breathed, leaning forward slightly. "You must really like him."
Dante didn’t respond. He set the tumbler down with a soft clink on the obsidian table, the sound unnaturally loud in the tense silence. He ran a hand over his face, the silver piercings glinting dully, the gesture betraying a fatigue deeper than physical. Sapphire reached out, her hand hovering near his arm but not quite touching.
"Please don’t hate me for this," she said softly, her voice losing all its usual teasing edge, becoming almost gentle, "but... is this the first person you’ve felt love for since Azazel?"
Vincent went utterly still. The name hung in the smoky air, an invocation of ancient pain. Dante didn’t flinch. He didn’t snarl. Instead, his shoulders slumped infinitesimally. He took a deep, shuddering breath, filling his lungs as if starved for air. For a fleeting moment, millennia of control slipped. The invincible Prince of Hell looked terrifyingly, heartbreakingly vulnerable.
"Yes," Dante whispered, the word raw, scraped from the deepest, most scarred part of him. He lifted his gaze, not to Sapphire, but to some unseen point across the room, his golden eyes swimming with a depth of emotion rarely seen. "It... it scares the shit out of me, Saph." He glanced at her, then at Vincent, his expression open, lost. "I never once... not a flicker... for anyone, after Az. Centuries. Millennia. Empty. Numb. Then... Dabi." He shook his head slightly, a bewildered gesture. "Why him? Why is he different? Why does it feel like..." He trailed off, struggling. "Why do I care so much? Why does the thought of him seeing the monster..." His voice cracked. He looked down at his hands, the hands that could rend souls. "I’m fucking terrified. Terrified he’ll see... and run." The admission hung heavy. The jazz melody filtering faintly from below seemed grotesquely cheerful in contrast. Sapphire moved then, laying her hand firmly on his forearm. Her touch was warm, anchoring.
"It’s going to be okay, Dante," she said, her voice thick with conviction. "I know you. I know the depths of your love." She squeezed his arm. "The way you’d rip the fucking cosmos apart to protect him. The way you’d burn worlds before letting harm touch him." Her violet eyes held his, fierce and unwavering. "Everything will be fine. He can handle it. He chose you, knowing the shadows. He chose the demon prince. Trust him."
Vincent shifted forward in his chair, his own expression resolute. "She’s right." His voice was quiet but carried the weight of bedrock certainty. He met Dante’s haunted gaze. "She’s right."
Dante stared at his siblings, the raw vulnerability slowly receding, replaced by a flicker of desperate hope beneath the terror. He picked up his whiskey again, the scored glass cold against his palm. He didn’t drink. He just held it, grounding himself in the familiar weight. The echoes of Azazel’s name still vibrated in the air, a ghost momentarily acknowledged, but Sapphire’s warmth on his arm and Vincent’s steady presence formed a fragile bulwark against the rising tide of dread. He looked towards the hidden door, towards the club, towards the chaotic energy where Dabi would soon be. Tonight. The word echoed in his mind, heavy as lead, sharp as claws. He closed his eyes, leaning back into the plush velvet, the taste of whiskey and fear sharp on his tongue.
He closed his eyes, leaning back into the plush velvet, the taste of whiskey and fear sharp on his tongue. Hours later, the bass thumping through Inferno’s foundations felt like a physical pulse against Dabi’s ribs as he pushed through the sweat-damp crowd with Shigaraki and Toga. Toga’s delighted squeal pierced the noise as she spotted the stage first. "Ooh, look! Dante's singing!"
Dabi’s breath hitched. Dante stood center stage under shifting emerald spotlights, microphone held loosely. Beside him, Vincent leaned against a grand piano, fingers dancing across the keys with deceptive ease, while KJ, a wiry demon with obsidian skin, coaxed a low, throbbing rhythm from a stand-up bass. It wasn’t the usual club beats; it was something older, deeper, a melody that seemed to slither into the ears and coil around the spine. Dante’s voice, when it rose, was a revelation: rich, resonant, layered with impossible harmonies that vibrated in Dabi’s bones. He hadn’t known Dante could sing. He certainly hadn’t expected this – a voice of devastating beauty that commanded the chaotic room into a hushed, almost reverent stillness.
Dante’s eyes found Dabi’s across the sea of bodies. They weren't the familiar molten gold. They blazed with an unnatural, sickly neon green, like toxic waste illuminated from within. Recognition flickered in that chilling gaze. A voice, smooth and clear as Dante’s singing yet utterly private, resonated inside Dabi’s skull: "Remember how I said I come with baggage? That I do cruel things? I’m sorry for what you’re about to see."
Dabi froze. What the fuck? The telepathic intrusion was jarring, the apology terrifying. Dante shifted seamlessly into a third song, the tempo slowing, the melody becoming hypnotic, a siren call woven into the smoky air. Dabi scanned the rapt audience. Dozens of eyes, scattered throughout the crowd, now mirrored Dante’s sickly green glow. They stood utterly motionless, faces slack, stares vacant and fixed… fixed directly on him. Trapped in a terrifying trance.
Mid-note, Dante began to change. Four thick, obsidian horns erupted from his temples and crown, curling wickedly. Massive, leathery wings, the color of dried blood and shadow, unfurled from his back with a sound like tearing canvas, displacing air that reeked suddenly of ozone and grave dirt. Black claws, longer and sharper than Dabi had ever seen, slid from his fingertips with lethal grace. Dante kept singing, the monstrous transformation seamless within the haunting melody. As the final, lingering note faded into silence, Dante vanished. Simply poofed.
Dabi’s heart hammered against his ribs. He spun, scanning the club frantically, a cold sweat prickling his scarred skin. Shigaraki muttered something sharp beside him, but Dabi ignored him, eyes raking the frozen crowd, the shadows, the rafters. Nothing. Then, movement near the bar – Dante materialised soundlessly behind a burly, green-eyed man frozen mid-sip. Dante’s movements were a blur. He spun the man effortlessly, one clawed hand gripping the back of his neck, forcing his head back. Dante’s mouth hovered inches from the man’s lips. A thick, glowing white smoke, shimmering like liquid pearl, streamed from the man’s slack mouth, drawn inexorably into Dante’s. The man’s body convulsed once, then went utterly limp, held upright only by Dante’s grip.
Before Dabi could fully process the soul-siphoning act, Dante’s free hand shot forward. It plunged into the man’s chest with a sickening, wet crunch-thud, moving faster than thought. Dante withdrew his hand, claws slick with dark blood. Clenched in his fist pulsed a raw, glistening human heart. Without hesitation, Dante brought it to his mouth. Dabi watched, stomach churning, as Dante tore into the organ with sharp teeth, consuming it in three brutal, wet bites, the sound obscenely loud in the surrounding silence. Blood smeared his chin.
Two more times. Dante vanished, reappeared behind another green-eyed victim – a woman this time, her face frozen in a rictus of vacant bliss. The same blindingly fast movement, hand plunging into her chest, withdrawing the pulsing heart, devouring it whole. Vanished again. Appeared behind a third man near the VIP curtain. Soul smoke consumed. Hand thrust deep. Heart ripped free. Consumed. Three souls. Three hearts. Gone in less than thirty seconds.
The unnatural green glow faded from the eyes of the remaining entranced crowd as the connection snapped. The stillness broke. People blinked, shook their heads as if waking from a dream, the music abruptly shifting back to pounding techno. The three victims Dante had touched slumped to the floor like discarded puppets, vacant stares fixed on nothing, chests gaping, ruinous holes where their hearts had been. Security demons moved with practiced efficiency, discreetly dragging the bodies towards a service door, their passage ignored by the reviving crowd.
Dabi stood stock-still, nausea warring with a cold, detached fascination. The raw brutality of it, the casual consumption… it was monstrous. Yet, intertwined with the primal fear tightening his throat was a sharp, undeniable intrigue. Why? Why did Dante need this? What power did it sustain? The sheer efficiency, the terrifying beauty of the monstrous transformation intertwined with the haunting song… it didn’t repulse him entirely. It didn't send him running. He watched Dante, back in his human guise now, horns and wings vanished, casually wiping blood from his mouth with the back of his hand as he stepped off the stage, his toxic green eyes finding Dabi’s again. The dread Dante had confessed in the VIP lounge hung heavy in the air between them, answered now by the carnage cooling on the club floor. Dabi didn't flinch. He held Dante’s gaze, the scent of copper thick in his nose, the silent question burning in his own eyes: What are you? But beneath it, a stubborn, dangerous truth: he wasn't scared off. Not yet.