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Pannacotta’s never been able to sleep well. Restless nights spent tossing and turning are far too familiar for his well-being to remain intact, and he’s tired all the time, which doesn’t help his temperament. After Passione’s overhaul, he found himself able to rest a little easier when the threat of death at any moment was no longer hanging over his head like the sword of Damocles, and as Pannacotta jolts awake in the heart of Giorno’s inherited mansion (that someone has probably died in), he is reminded exactly why Giorno is able to lead all of Passione with an iron fist.
Gold Experience Requiem stands tall at the foot of his bed, eyes sunken in their sockets wide and unblinking, a red poppy held delicately in its hand. The moonlight streaming in through the gaps in Pannacotta’s curtains reflects off of its carapace and shimmers. How long has it been watching him? He doesn’t know. Requiem doesn’t say anything, so neither does Pannacotta. It steps closer, and he pulls the duvet up to his chin. “Hello, Panna,” it breaks the silence. The nickname is said out of a mouth that should not be able to sound like Giorno, and it feels wrong, nails on a chalkboard. This is weird, this is so weird, like looking at something that shouldn’t exist but did anyway.
“Hi, Gold Experience,” he says, tentative.
“Requiem,” it corrects.
Pannacotta rolls over and faces it, reaching for the light on his bedside table. He’s not going back to sleep. “Right. Hi, Gold Experience Requiem, what are you doing in my room?”
It tilts its head and sits down on the foot of his bed. The mattress doesn’t depress under the weight that should have been there. “Watching over you.”
“...Why?” He won’t pretend to understand Requiem’s esoteric motivations, but it’s nice to know that it’s not here to punch him into a spacetime vacuum. Pannacotta adjusts the old Prince t-shirt he uses as pajamas.
“Just in case.” Requiem points the poppy at him like a knife. “Do you want this flower?” It makes the telltale weird whistle-squeal of Giorno’s Stand ability and it shapeshifts into a fat toad. “This frog?” It drops the amphibian in his lap without waiting for an answer.
He doesn’t really know what to do with it but picks it up and holds it gingerly as it ribbits. That seems to please Requiem. Was he supposed to do that? “Thank you for the animal, he’s very nice, but can you please leave? It’s....” he twists to look at the digital alarm clock by his bed, but it’s not there for some reason, “very late, and I’d like to get my rest.” If Pannacotta were anyone else, he wouldn’t dare mouth off to this nightmare given form, but he’s tired, and wants it out of his room so he can have a chance of going back to sleep.
“Of course, Panna,” it says, taking the frog back, and then fades back into nothing.
“GioGio?” Pannacotta begins, sliding into his unassigned assigned seat at the kitchen table. It’s Narancia’s turn to cook, which means breakfast is going to be good, and Abbacchio and Buccellati share a seat like they can’t bear to be seperate for more than a moment. Mista is nowhere to be found. He sleeps until noon every chance he gets. Trish’s music plays softly through the radio on the counter. “We need to talk.”
Giorno takes a deep sip from his coffee. Pannacotta knows it’s decaf and he drinks it to keep up appearances. “About?”
“Your hell Stand showed up in my room last night and stared at me, then gave me a frog. It was very disruptive and was not conducive to getting a good night’s sleep.”
“Well, that would explain where this came from.” He pulls a familiar looking poppy from nowhere and it shifts into Pannacotta’s alarm clock as Giorno drops it on the table. Abbacchio snorts and hides his grin in his mug of tea. It’s not subtle and Fugo glares at him. The Stand had tried to give him his own clock? The tips of his ears went red. “This is yours, I presume?”
He scrabbles to grab it and clenches it so hard he thinks it might break. “I--yes.”
“How sweet of Requiem,” Giorno stays neutral, which really means he’s silently embarrassed. If he was ashamed of Requiem’s actions, then why would the Stand, the manifestation of his will, have acted on them in the first place? “Don’t worry. It won’t do that again.” He still struggles to control Requiem, everybody knows it, and it was partially luck that he hadn’t death-looped any of his allies yet.
“You know... if Requiem wants to give me flowers when I’m awake next time, I certainly wouldn’t mind.”