Chapter Text
Maybe I'm mistaken, expecting you to fight.
Or maybe I'm just crazy, I don't know wrong from right.
But while I’m still living, I've just got this to say:
It's always up to you if you want to be that, want to see that, want to see that way...
You're coming along.
---
The wrong Joestar died on that rainy night in 1868.
At least, this was the opinion of Mary Joestar. The only comfort - if she could even call it comfort - was in the survival of her only son, and the fact that her husband likely died instantly, and did not suffer long in the aftermath of the accident.
There was one other cold comfort within her circumstances: she was found by a rough-spoken man and his shadow of a wife, both of whom had doubtlessly seen worse in their squalid lives than a woman in her situation, broken and filthy and lost. Their pity and judgment of her surely would never reach her social circle.
The man - he introduced himself as Dario Brando - was kind enough to lead her to the shelter of his home, not far from the road, and allow her to rest and collect herself while he went to get help.
In his absence, she was cared-for by Claire, Dario’s wife. Though her words were painfully crass to Mary’s ears, she was gentle, even groveling, in her behavior.
“What an ‘andsome little son you ‘ave there, Missus Joestar!” she told Mary, that evening. “I got a son of me own, ‘round the same age. Me sweet little Dio. Wanna see ‘im?”
“Of course,” Mary said. Her words were weak and windy.
With a girlish sort of laugh, Claire made her way to the corner of the small, dirty house, and brought back a child so pretty and so clean that Mary’s first thought was that he had been stolen from somewhere.
“Dead handsome, ain’t he? Gonna steal all the ‘earts when he’s grown, I’m sure,” Claire said. “Just between you and me, Missus,” she continued, with a wink, “‘e sure don’t get ‘is looks from Dario. Lucky, ain’t I?”
Mary forced a grimace of a smile onto her face, and tried to preoccupy herself with Jonathan, who rested, blessedly at peace, in her arms.
The police arrived not long afterward, and Mary was removed from the temporary sanctuary of the Brandos’ home and given proper care and lodgings in the nearby town. Though her purse and wedding ring had been stolen by the time of her rescue, she still had Jonathan with her, and the single case of luggage that hadn’t fallen over the cliffs and into oblivion.
She still had the mask.
Once she had safely made it home to the Joestar estate, she drafted a letter of thankfulness to the Brandos and enclosed a small sum of money within, for their efforts. The matter, in her mind, was henceforth settled.
(She told herself.)
And even if it hadn’t been settled, she had far more important things to attend to than negotiating whatever perceived debts those common folk would ask of her.
The burial of her husband, for one. His body was recovered around the time of her own rescue and transported to the estate along with her own, living self. Despite the best work of the embalmers, the funeral required a closed casket.
There was also the matter of Jonathan’s care and education. Though he was still an infant, his future as a respectable gentleman was far from guaranteed, not without the aid of governesses and fencing-masters and tutors in Latin and history and all other Classical subjects of education. Letters upon letters of commission and employment would be required, in time.
But the mask was the most immediate concern.
From the moment she had seen it there, in that Italian marketplace, it had captivated her. She had begged George to buy it on the spot. George, delightfully confused but seeing no need to question his wife, did as he was told.
Mary barely remembered anything else about the trip, not after that. She would spend hours in their hotel room in the evenings, gently brushing her fingers over the rough stone of the thing, taking in every strange, unsettling detail.
“What is it about that thing that has you so enamored, my love?” George asked her, one night, with a warm chuckle in his voice. “You’ve scarcely taken your eyes off it since I got it for you.”
“I don’t know,” Mary replied. “There’s just… something about it. I can’t quite say what.”
“As you say,” George said. “I should hope you tire of it once we get home. It’s quite a macabre little thing. Not terribly becoming of a lady.”
“Yes.” Mary’s hands rested on the delicately-carved fangs over the mouth of the mask. “Of course.”
The mask was her escape from the whole business of tragedy and indignity in her life, as the days, as the weeks, as the months went by. Her behavior - hours spent in her husband’s study, poring over books and papers - was written and spoken away as her way of grieving, spending time in a place that had once belonged to her husband. A widow was entitled to strange behavior, after all.
But, shortly after dressing herself in a dusky violet gown of half-mourning, Mary announced that she was going on holiday.
“Beg pardon, madam, but is that really such a wise thing to do?” her butler asked her, once she told him of her intentions. “Far be it for me to tell you what you can and cannot do, but traveling so soon after the accident from your last holiday seems… unwise.”
“It has been a year since my husband’s death,” Mary replied. “I am tired of this confinement. The fresh air will be good for my constitution.”
And, truly, her health had declined considerably after the accident. She slept poorly, and ate rarely, and found little joy or happiness in her old, womanly pursuits.
“I cannot argue with you there, madam,” her butler said.
Within a fortnight, she departed for Italy. And, from there, to Germany. To the mountains of the Orient. The forests of the South American continent.
Each step taking her closer to the secret of the mask that had made its claim on her mind, the mask that she carried with her always.
She would learn its secrets. She would learn the truth behind the words, written and printed in old and flaking books.
She would know immortality.
---
In her absence, the son of Mary Joestar, Jonathan, grew from an infant into a child, and from a child into a young man.
The staff of the Joestar estate struggled somewhat with how best to raise the young heir, lacking direction and instruction from their eccentric employeress. Doing their best with referrals from other, high-minded families, and half-drafted plans for the boy’s education, left behind by his parents, they hired a roster of governesses and tutors.
With regards to Jonathan’s social education, however, they failed to some degree. Having no chaperone of an appropriate social class, Jonathan was unable to fully enjoy and participate in the dinners and dances befitting of a young gentleman, and the relationships and valuable social connections that would result from them. Yes, he was a well-mannered boy, but there were some aspects of society that even a tutor could not provide.
So Jonathan was raised in a lax environment indeed, associating freely with the servants of his house, and often speaking with them as equals. In truth, he felt more comfortable around them, and their honest, open talk, to the stuffy insinuations his tutors called “proper speech.”
Therefore, when a young man by the name of Dio Brando came to the Joestar estate with a letter written in the hand of their matriarch, Jonathan, who was technically the head of the household by virtue of his blood, welcomed him into his house with open arms.
“I’m so sorry to hear about your father, Mr. Brando,” Jonathan told him, in the parlor, after Dio explained his situation. “I never really got to know mine, given the accident, so I can’t help but envy you a little, having grown up with one.”
“Spare the envy,” Dio replied. “Dying in his sleep was far better than a man like him deserved.”
A gentleman would have changed the subject, after such harsh words, or defended the noble concept of deference and respect to one’s parents.
Young Jonathan wasn’t much of a gentleman.
“Was he a cruel man?” he asked.
Dio blinked, his nose wrinkling slightly with confusion. “I would describe him as such,” he finally said. “To be completely honest, I was surprised to hear that he had done something so selfless for your family.”
“Well, regardless,” Jonathan said, with a slight smile, “no reason why his nature should get in the way of you benefiting from his generosity. However rare it was. Ah! Is his room ready?”
The maid that had appeared behind Dio’s seat nodded, and Jonathan eagerly got out of his chair. “Wonderful. Come along with me, Mr. Brando! I’ll help you get settled in.”
For the second time, Dio’s nose wrinkled. “You intend to personally escort me? Isn’t that beneath a gentleman such as yourself?”
“Of course not!” Jonathan replied, a laugh in his voice. “I’d be a terrible host if I didn’t. Come on!”
He held out his hand. Dio didn’t take it. Jonathan laughed, and continued on all the same.
---
Dio had made his way to the Joestar estate intending, wholeheartedly, to cheat them for everything they had. He’d manipulate that foolish concept of “honor” to his favor, and use it to launch himself into that world of riches and idiotic gentry.
He had expected to be received by a simpering, soft-hearted widow, based on the letter his father had given him. Someone he could charm with his words and pretty face, like he had charmed so many others in his short life.
When he was presented with Jonathan, instead, a mere boy with an easy laugh and far too much enthusiasm, he was certain he would be able to adapt and reach his goals all the same. After all, children were, by and large, idiots. Dio possessed a mind far beyond his years, he knew beyond a doubt. Jonathan’s blue blood only made him an easier target, surely.
But at every turn, Jonathan surprised him. It began with their first meeting - what business did a boy of his social standing have, associating so freely with the servants and their tasks?
...at least, that was the impression Dio had of such people. He’d never had the… fortune of knowing the company of high-born folks, certainly, but he knew what to expect. He knew.
And yet…
“Mr. Brando! Come outside, let’s have us a game of football!” An absurdly common offer as the spring rolled around, considering it always left Jonathan laughing and covered in mud. Dio usually declined, but the offer itself was… curious.
“Mr. Brando! Would you like to join me in the kitchen to help with dinner?” Another common offer, regardless of the season.
“Why would you assist the staff with the work you pay them to do?” Dio asked him, once, in response.
“I just like doing it,” Jonathan replied. “Besides, the conversation’s fantastic. And, don’t you think? It’s useful to know how to cook. Just in case.”
Dio declined, that time, and many others. But he would occasionally sneak by the kitchens, before dinner, hiding near the door, and see Jonathan, there, peeling potatoes and laughing at some bawdy joke.
“Mr. Brando! Would you like to go into town with me? I need to stop at the greengrocer’s for a few things.”
Dio, eventually, stopped asking, stopped assuming that these errands were asked of Jonathan by staff that did not know their place. This was truly a boy that took pleasure in being useful and kind, social status be damned.
It should have been dead easy to work this to his advantage, and yet…
“You don’t have to call me Mr. Brando all the time,” Dio said, after this particular question. “It’s just... Dio.”
“Haha, all right, then! Dio! Shall we go into town together?”
Once again, as he did so many times, Jonathan held out his hand in offering.
Jonathan’s enthusiasm was so annoyingly persistent. Like a dog looking for attention.
(And, like a dog, so strangely… innocent.)
“...yes, that sounds like a fine time. I’ll accompany you,” Dio replied.
“Well, come on, then!” Jonathan threw his hand over his shoulder, grinning, and led the way to the carriage waiting outside.
Dio decided, eventually, that perhaps he would have an easier time with his plans once Jonathan’s mother came back from her travels. After all, Jonathan didn’t have much access to the family’s finances, much less any social connections to the upper crust. Dio would require both of those to take on the world as he pleased.
Yes, once Mary Joestar came home, he would really get to work.
Until then, he would continue to exploit Jonathan Joestar’s friendship and hospitality and live in comfort and ease.
(He told himself.)