⚜️ Saga 0: The Ash Years
📍 Location: Devil May Cry Bar — Lower East Side, NYC
🕯️ Year: Spring 2007
🎯 Theme: Territorial Love, Found Family Pressure, Slow-Binding Threat
🛡 Sin System Status: Anchor Field Engaged | Storm Gate Breach Detected
⚠ Phase Designation: "Quiet Before Convergence"
"Fire isn't abandoned just because others feel the heat. You gather close, and keep it alive."
— Dante
The place had worn many names.
Long ago—The Hollow Thorn.
Now? Devil May Cry fit better. The new name felt like a sigh after a long story.
It had harbored them—Wanda's soft magic woven into the floor, Jean's psychic strength patched into its corners, Pietro's restless checks around the perimeter, Dante's steadiness at its heart.
Yet since Xavier had left, nothing quite felt as safe.
—
Jean never unpacked.
Wanda cleaned even when things gleamed.
Pietro disappeared more, saying little about where he went.
Dante hung around the bar, thumb idling on Ruin Reaver, not to show off, just to stay certain the world was still here.
The System's background hum had grown louder, even if no new instructions came. The air felt crackling, tense.
[Sin System: Uncertainty Detected]
- Dante: 74.6%
- Wanda: 90.0%
- Jean: 78.4%
- Rivalry: Not hostile, but cautious
—
As dusk melted the city's bones, they sat together at their usual spot—a tired round table, no music, no smiles, just a habit of belonging.
Jean gripped her cup too tightly.
"I've traced movement off Cooper's. Not Charles, but something that wore the memory of him. It's as if someone's using pieces of what we once were."
Wanda barely whispered, "A script broke on the northeast ward, but not with force. It unraveled, almost like memory slipping."
Pietro, turned sideways in the window seat, mumbled, "Might be mirror-ghosts. Maybe something that's hungry for what we've built here. Maybe just something curious."
Jean only watched the steam rise.
Dante gently set his cup down, eyes on the fire. "This isn't only about finding us. Maybe it's about testing what keeps us real."
A silence landed—heavy, expectant.
Jean broke it.
"What if they're not after us at all? What if it's who you've become, Dante, that's drawing them?"
He nodded, voice calm.
"If they're searching for answers, they'll have to face all of us. That's the only way we work now."
Wanda squeezed his hand, Jean's palm pressed beside hers. Not fear, just trust.
They weren't defending a hideout. They were choosing each other, again.
[Sin System Update:
- Unity: 76.0%
- Wanda: 90.0%
- Jean: 78.4%
- Mood: Shared resolve, rivalry soothed.]
—
That night, no one slept alone.
Jean wrote symbols on napkins, searching for meaning she didn't need to share.
Wanda kept near the fire, threading hope into the fringe of an old scarf.
Dante cleaned his blade but watched the back room shadows, as if waiting on a voice that could call him by every name he's had.
Pietro sat at the entrance, pretending his bat was all they needed.
No one was afraid of a fight. What they braced for was things changing, again.
—
Near dawn, a brittle sound—a break, barely a noise—cut through the hush.
A line of protection over the north hallway flickered, twisting in on itself.
Jean stood up without a word, wide awake.
Pietro was at the door before anyone else moved.
Dante took Ruin Reaver in hand.
He wasn't quick; he was resolved.
The Sin System's warning went silent, but every sense sharpened.
[Sin System: Disturbance]
- Mirror echo inbound
- Dante: Focused
- Status: On alert
In the dim, broken line of the north wall, Dante saw a shimmer—a reflection not his own.
A younger self, free of scars, wearing a different coat, grinning with too many teeth.
Not a ghost. Not a twin.
A possibility, come to haunt.
The shade murmured,
"You've kept this place bright, Sparda's son. But what did you leave in the dark to do it?"
Wanda stepped beside him. Jean hung just behind.
Pietro locked the door and waited for the story to write its next lines.
Dante felt a strange, tired hope.
This was different than old battles.
They watched each other's backs now.
He nodded—not for courage, but for what they'd all found here.
"We didn't just survive the storm.
We decided it was worth standing in the rain."
***
*End of Chapter*