A shack burns in the woods. A small child stares at the fire that takes away everything they've ever known, the only person they've ever known, their whole life, and with it the whole world. It's not the first time Mizu hardened herself nor the last. Swordfather's voice echoes in her mind that the stupid lost boy she was would not recognize her. Perhaps not, but Mizu recognizes him in Vergil. However much that the trauma Vergil needs to speak of comes later in his life, when he was nineteen at least, it comes back to the lost boy who lost his mother and brother on the same day, who became alone and hunted, who was scared and needed somewhere warm and safe, somewhere like swordfather's house. Something Mizu recognizes and also realizes she's fortunate to have received.
Her hands tighten, and Mizu focuses on her breathing. If she hugs Vergil now, if she gives that lost soul the comfort he needs, he may not be able to speak, may not be able to do what he needs for his sake and for Nero's. It's the continued painful but compassionate choice not to reach for Vergil in that moment. She sits and does not try to regain his gaze, even as she wants Vergil to feel safe, to feel— cared for. To feel something he may never have felt before. Perhaps he does feel something like it, if he's willing to speak.
Anger wells within her, a pool that's always there but deepens with new and powerful waves. Mizu takes this anger in and accepts it into her own without it overwhelming her in the moment. The very idea of what Vergil describes, she cannot know the exact pain and suffering, but her imagination coming up short is awful enough. An existence more hollowing and painful than the creation of an onryō.
That description is not the end. Vergil sits before her a man, himself, whole and alive and full of pain. A man who can remember what it's like not to be a man, whether that be only his creation as a puppet, the hollowing out, or his time in that state. A being without his own will or autonomy, without anything. For a man who sought out enough power to protect himself after being helpless, he became helpless, more helpless than that young child. To return to himself and to know that. How could he tolerate it but to cut it out himself. That is no real solution or Vergil would not be who he is before her. It isn't how he's continued his life, in the end. In the moment, however, he needed to survive. He needed to last a day, a minute, a moment longer, and that pain and that loss was unbearable.
Mizu takes deep, even breaths, the benefit of years of training.
"You cut out that part of you, the part of you that experienced that." A statement, not a question. It's what he needed to survive. It's what would crush his ability to keep going, and that is untenable. Mizu could not let Mundus win, could not let him doing that be the end of it all. It could not be all that Vergil would be, the end of his story.
"You cut out everything that would prevent you from living." Not exactly a safe, sane option that works long term, but Vergil didn't exist in such a long term state of mind, only the immediate future and his survival. Terrible. Stupid. And most ridiculous of all, it fucking worked.
Mizu rests an open palm on her knee. Nero doesn't know this, doesn't understand it, and it's not an apology for what happened to him. It's a reason.
cw: attempted child murder, trauma memories associated w/torture, brainwashing/mind control
Her hands tighten, and Mizu focuses on her breathing. If she hugs Vergil now, if she gives that lost soul the comfort he needs, he may not be able to speak, may not be able to do what he needs for his sake and for Nero's. It's the continued painful but compassionate choice not to reach for Vergil in that moment. She sits and does not try to regain his gaze, even as she wants Vergil to feel safe, to feel— cared for. To feel something he may never have felt before. Perhaps he does feel something like it, if he's willing to speak.
Anger wells within her, a pool that's always there but deepens with new and powerful waves. Mizu takes this anger in and accepts it into her own without it overwhelming her in the moment. The very idea of what Vergil describes, she cannot know the exact pain and suffering, but her imagination coming up short is awful enough. An existence more hollowing and painful than the creation of an onryō.
That description is not the end. Vergil sits before her a man, himself, whole and alive and full of pain. A man who can remember what it's like not to be a man, whether that be only his creation as a puppet, the hollowing out, or his time in that state. A being without his own will or autonomy, without anything. For a man who sought out enough power to protect himself after being helpless, he became helpless, more helpless than that young child. To return to himself and to know that. How could he tolerate it but to cut it out himself. That is no real solution or Vergil would not be who he is before her. It isn't how he's continued his life, in the end. In the moment, however, he needed to survive. He needed to last a day, a minute, a moment longer, and that pain and that loss was unbearable.
Mizu takes deep, even breaths, the benefit of years of training.
"You cut out that part of you, the part of you that experienced that." A statement, not a question. It's what he needed to survive. It's what would crush his ability to keep going, and that is untenable. Mizu could not let Mundus win, could not let him doing that be the end of it all. It could not be all that Vergil would be, the end of his story.
"You cut out everything that would prevent you from living." Not exactly a safe, sane option that works long term, but Vergil didn't exist in such a long term state of mind, only the immediate future and his survival. Terrible. Stupid. And most ridiculous of all, it fucking worked.
Mizu rests an open palm on her knee. Nero doesn't know this, doesn't understand it, and it's not an apology for what happened to him. It's a reason.