Chapter Text
His name was Dio.
Enrico didn't know how he knew but he knew his name just as surely as he knew he needed to see him.
'Why do people meet?' If anyone knew the true answer to that, it was him. The answer was most definitely the strongest power in the world. It must also be the truth.
His heart ached looking at his sister's disk. He kept it with him and held back his tears at her funeral. Days later, he confronted his brother who had also developed a power of his own and took his memory disk as well. A man without any memories was as good as dead. He kept those disks with him always.
Then he took the arrowhead in hand.
'If you ever want to see me again,' He'd said, placing the arrowhead in his hand then placing his hand upon it, his hands enveloping his. 'Just with upon this arrow and call me.'
Would it work? He had no reason to believe that it wouldn't. Wasn't it gravity that drew people together? He felt it, like a physical force, lurching him forth and towards him. Towards Dio.
'I want to see you.' He felt it too strongly for it to not be real. He'd met Dio for a reason.
'Why do people meet?' He'd go to every length to know the answer to that question. He would not waver. This resolve was all he had left. And it was telling him that salvation lay with Dio.
A night later, he met Dio again.
Enrico had left the church later than usual that night. It was cold, much colder than it had been lately. He walked through the brightly-lit streets of his city, his hands stuffed his pockets and turned onto a quieter street to take the shortest route home. Not that it'd be much nicer back at home. His parents were still reeling from the loss of Perla. He didn't think they would ever heal from it.
Guilt tightened around his heart like a vice. The fact that his sister's death had been his fault hadn't gotten any easier to live with, despite his newfound purpose in life to find the answers he desired. She'd been innocent. All she'd done was fall in love. Why it had had to be with Weather just led him back to that one question: Why did people meet? No matter what, he'd find the answer.
"Enrico Pucci."
He stopped in his tracks.
Dio's voice.
A nameless sensation took hold of him, like the relief of finding a hint of light in absolute darkness, like the endless bliss of seeing your path laid out before you lying in wait for you to simply walk down it. So he took his first step. He turned towards his voice.
And there he was.
Illuminated by the single streetlight on this street corner, Dio smiled at him. He looked exactly as Enrico remembered him, though he'd almost forgotten about him till he'd held Perla's body in his arms. He was young and beautiful yet had the countenance of a man who'd lived for centuries. What knowledge, what secrets lay behind the deep, dark gold of his eyes? Enrico would give up anything to know.
"I'd hoped we'd meet again," Said Dio, his voice as deep and dark as his eyes.
He'd hoped? Or had he known? Enrico had a feeling he knew the answer to that. So he didn't ask. There was so much more he needed to ask him. He didn't even know where to start. Without knowing why, he took the arrowhead out of his pocket and held it out to Dio. It had done its part. There was no need for Enrico to keep it anymore.
"I have questions."
Too many too count. Too many to be answered in a single night. He needed to make this night count. He couldn't be so sure if he'd ever see Dio again after this.
"I know," Dio said and held out a hand for the arrowhead and Enrico returned it to him, reminding himself to thank him for it later as well. "Come." With a smile, Dio turned and Enrico followed.
The fire burning in the hearth had warmed the room Dio led him to. Enrico took off his coat at the door though Dio didn't shed his jacket, making Enrico wonder once again how long he would have with him. Even if he got all his answers tonight, he didn't want this to be the last time he'd see Dio. There was more to this path that lay before him that he couldn't yet see but one thing was for certain. His and Dio's fates were intertwined. Maybe they were meant to walk down this path together.
Dio poured himself some wine and told him about Stands and the power of the arrow, every word of which Enrico committed to memory. He told him his Stand had the power to stop time which Enrico marveled at. Enrico told him about his own power, how he'd been able to retrieve his sister's memories after she'd died and showed him the disk which greatly intrigued Dio. Enrico didn't tell him how it'd felt like he'd heard Dio's voice at that moment. When the arrowhead had impaled him, through the excruciating pain of both losing Perla and feeling like something was being wrenched out of his soul, he'd heard Dio's voice, as surely as his blood had stained the water around him red.
'This is your awakening.'
He knew what that meant now.
Dio poured himself another glass of wine and Enrico's spirits surged. He still had time. He needed to ask his question, the question that had tormented and torn him apart for what felt like forever. His heart started racing at the possibility of it being answered. The answer was the strongest power in the world. The answer would make it all make sense. He would no longer have to tear himself apart asking 'why'. If anyone had the answer, it was Dio.
Dio's eyes glanced over at him as if waiting for him to ask, as if he knew the storm the notion of getting his answer had ignited inside Enrico, which he likely did. Dio was more powerful than Enrico was yet aware of. There was something transcendent about him, something that induced equal parts fear and joy inside of Enrico. He sat in his high-backed chair, making it look like a throne, crafted like a spectacle and Enrico couldn't help thinking that all the thrones in the world must've only been made for him.
His breath stolen from lungs, his heart racing in his chest, he asked his question, his voice barely any louder than the silence.
"Why did we meet?" He watched Dio intently, like he couldn't move his eyes away even if he tried. "Why do people meet?"
Dio didn't meet his eyes, letting Enrico gaze at him as much as he liked. Transcendent was indeed the correct word to define him. He was unlike anyone Enrico had ever met, unlike anything he'd ever seen. How did someone like him exist in the world? Why had he and Enrico met?
Enrico sat, eagerly waiting for his answer and not a hint of doubt crept into his racing heart. He was so certain that he was about to find his answer. Dio took a moment to reply but when it came, it wasn't at all what Enrico had been expecting, even though he wasn't sure what he'd been expecting either.
"There may be a way," Dio said, solemn but pensive, like it was something he'd come to talk to Enrico about. "to reach heaven."
It took Enrico aback but also very much piqued his interest. Still he was skeptical and was sure it showed on his face. It wasn't at all what he'd been expecting to hear after all.
"Don't look at me like that," Dio said, glancing over at him with a slight, fleeting smile. "I'm not talking about death. The heaven I’m talking about pertains to our souls."
As he explained, Enrico found himself caring less about not getting whatever answer he'd thought he'd desired and more about the heaven Dio desired. What happiness was and what it couldn't be. How it could be achieved and how it couldn't. It all urged a part of him he hadn't even known existed to understand.
"Surely you understand what I'm talking about more than anyone," Dio said and Enrico wanted to tell him that he was starting to but he needed to know more. "True happiness lies there." The heaven Dio sought was something he could put his entire belief in but he needed to know more. "True victory belongs to those who have seen heaven." Dio turned in his chair to look deeply into Enrico's eyes and Enrico saw a resolve much stronger than his mirrored in the bright gold of his eyes, along with a power like nothing else etched into every part of him like a language only he could read, calling out to the 'him' inside of him that he was always meant to be.
"I will do everything to achieve that end." Dio said, those words spoken like a pledge to himself and to Enrico.
Extraordinary. Enrico was rendered near breathless. Starving to know more, he asked, "Can you be more specific?"
"I've recorded it in a notebook," Dio said, his tone casual again and finished his drink. "Come visit Egypt sometime. I will show you then," He put down his glass and stepped over to Enrico, smiled and bending down, spoke in his ear, his voice low and smooth.
"I will need your help to test my theory."
Enrico's breaths shuddered. Not only because of how close he was, how his words sent a thrill through him and lit an undeniable, enticing fire deep within his soul. But also because he knew what the answer was.
After another long, lingering look into his eyes, Dio left. Enrico wondered what Dio saw in his eyes but he knew what he saw in Dio's eyes. Dio was meant to give him the answer but not in the way he'd expected. With Dio's words, he'd realized: Dio was his answer.
Why did people meet? Because they were meant to. Fate was something he'd never delved into too deeply but fate was all there was. The ultimate force that ruled their paths. And gravity that drew people together worked hand-in-hand with fate.
Why did people meet? Because fate and gravity deemed it so. And Enrico knew. He'd been meant to, made to, born to meet Dio.
Spring had just started to bloom in his city when he left for Egypt. He couldn't stay away from Dio any longer. He couldn't watch his mother place a plate on the table next to her for Perla, only to remember she wasn't here anymore. He couldn't watch his father grab his car keys, saying he needed to drive Perla somewhere, only to remember she wasn't here anymore. It . . . hurt.
There was still so much he needed to know. With Dio, his path would become clear.
What did he want to know? He asked himself on the way to Egypt. Surely, Dio would ask him the same question. Surely, he'd give him more answers than he'd ever expected to find. He wanted to know about fate and gravity, the world and heaven; he wanted to know everything. The irrefutable fact that Dio had the knowledge and power to give him the everything that he desired filled him with an exhilaration more intense than anything he'd ever felt before. That same exhilaration sparked anew when his eyes met Dio's again, bright gold, in a dark street in Egypt. This . . . Was this night that surrounded them even aware of what it was witnessing? Because this; this was the start of something extraordinary, a one-of-a-kind event that fate had crafted with an excited smile, the kind that God had whispered to the universe about so it'd be ready when this happened.
This . . . was his fate.
Dio's mansion was a lovely, dark and ancient place, coloured by candlelight and soft incense. Dio made it feel like a palace as he led Enrico through its halls. Enrico took in its contours, something akin to wonder brightening in his chest, though that same feeling lit up like a flare going off when his eyes returned to Dio.
In the beginning, he visited Dio every few days after Sunset. They told each other about themselves, their lives and their truth. Enrico's life had been mundane until recently and Dio didn't lay out his life chronologically to say the least. He still hid secrets, most of his life remained a mystery to Enrico except the past few years which he said he'd spent traveling.
'I travel to meet people.' He'd told Enrico the first time they'd met.
"Though I've never met anyone like you." He said, gold eyes looking into his like he was mapping out a constellation across the sky of his soul. Things like that said in his low, dark voice sent a thrill through Enrico, made him believe that this was where he was meant to be. How many other people in the world could say that?
Dio's mansion was frequented by a variety of people, men and women, young and old. Unsurprisingly, they intrigued Enrico as he watched them glance at him with keen interest from the corners of their eyes. Once again, he didn't have to ask Dio to get his answer.
"I have an army of Stand users at my disposal." He said, casually working on his model of a ship. Enrico watched his hands catch the light, rings adorning slender fingers, riveted by the way the model came to life shaped by those hands.
As the days passed, Enrico got used to staying up past sunrise, talking with Dio about anything and everything. They would make each other think and laugh. Enrico would ask Dio about his thoughts on some of the most obscure books to see if he'd read them and he always would've. Enrico loved seeing his gold eyes glitter with delight as he explained something using words that captivated him, making him think of things in a way he'd never even imagined before. Usually, they would simply sit in each other's company and read. And in those moments or hours, Enrico would feel more serene than he ever remembered feeling.
"Broken wings," Dio said under his breath, eyes on his book, lounging on the settee while Enrico read, lounging on the couch across from him. He'd said those two words thoughtfully, like he did when something he'd read baffled him.
"What does that mean?" He mused to himself, resting his book on his chest.
"Tell me the context." Enrico said, lowering his own book to look at him. Shadowed by candlelight as it cast bewitching patterns across his bare arms and shoulders, Dio raised his book again, the scar around his neck dragging Enrico's eyes towards itself again, urging him to ask about it but he held back for now. The scars one could see with their eyes were never all that they were.
"The poet talks about his pain and fear and regrets with his lover and how impossible they are to let go," Dio said, his long, dark lashes casting shadows over his cheeks. "It ends with the words, 'Broken wings, his lover says.'"
Poetry was a beautiful thing, though not always understood by most. Enrico always felt like he didn't read enough of it and what he did read, he didn't understand yet felt it resonate with something mysterious deep inside his heart. He couldn't always explain it but the fact never frustrated him because that part of his heart at least knew what it meant.
'Broken wings' though, he understood.
"Broken wings are," He felt the weight on his shoulders, heavy and unrelenting. "useless. You can't fly with them; they'll only drag behind you and slow you down," He met Dio's penetrating gaze, those eyes fixated on him like a beacon through the darkness Enrico surrounded himself with. "Just like pain, fear and regret."
Just like Dio could see those things inside Enrico without even knowing the cause for them, Enrico could see them inside Dio. Of course, even Dio, transcendent though he was, was not immune to those things. It wasn't exactly a revelation, more of an acceptance. Enrico accepted the storm of darkness roiling just beneath Dio's ethereal beauty and power, just like Dio had accepted his untameable darkness, maybe the first time they'd talked.
A few days later, Dio poured him a glass of wine as well which Enrico initially refused but then accepted because there was no reason he shouldn't have and because Dio so endearingly tilted his head with a slight frown and a smile, saying, "Please."
It was delicious, its taste so warm and layered and sweet. No wonder Dio never seemed to get enough of it. And no wonder he'd insisted that Enrico drink, because he asked about the part of his life that Enrico hadn't told him the details about, those near-impossible chain of events. He asked him how his sister had died.
And Enrico told him.
From hearing that woman's confession to waking up in the hospital to find that his brother was still alive, he told him everything. Throughout his recitation, his voice remained even, his eyes on a random dark corner of the room as he slowly downed two glasses of wine. His heart though, it underwent a whole myriad of things; how it'd hurt when he'd held Perla in his arms, how it'd seemed it like it was on fire when all his grief had turned to rage, how it'd turned leaden when he'd felt it be burned away, leaving a hole full of darkness, the darkness he harbored within.
"All of it," He finished, "prompted me to contemplate the force of gravity."
"And so you thought of me." Dio spoke for the first time since asking his question.
Enrici met his bright eyes and nodded. Dio finished his drink and put down his glass, gold eyes pristine and pensive again.
"The cause for why people meet is indeed gravity," He said, "But do you know? There is no cause for gravity. There's no questioning why gravity exists. It exists because it does," Enrico felt those words in his bones, the undeniable truth of them. "No one knows where it came from, not even the man who discovered it."
The truth, something Enrico had craved ever since his awakening. Of course, all of it was meant to be revealed if only he was at Dio's side.
"We're not subjected to it," Enrico spoke the rest of the truth. "Nor is it imposed on us. We're only the subordinates of fate."
"That's right," Dio's eyes bore into his before he smiled and stood up. "But Pucci," He sat down beside Enrico, his eyes alight. "Gravity doesn't always lead to disasters."
Gravity made things fall. It made things break. It had turned his life inside out, made it into something it should never have been. But it had also—
"After all," Dio's smile softened, a gentler, happier kind of smile. "It drew us together. It's the force from which whole worlds are born, from which the universe was born." Enrico smiled because he loved it when he talked like that, the light behind his gold eyes, that gentle glow of joy, his smile born of untainted happiness.
"Fate is a powerful thing," Dio said. "Those who accept it are already a step closer to reaching heaven."
To be in heaven next to him. Enrico would do everything to realize the heaven Dio sought.
Enrico was enraptured by the content way Dio accepted the inevitability of fate. How he not only invoked it for smaller things but also talked slow and at peace about things like entropy, smiled at the fact that they'd made such a beautiful word for chaos and disorder when all it led to was the heat death of the universe and ended up with everything they'd ever known buried under its ruin. Hearing him talk like that incited a sort of comfort; it was haunting yet breathtaking at the same time. Enrico only grew to crave it more.
Sometimes, he watched him sleep so deeply during the day and wondered how someone as impossible as him existed in this world. Someone who, ever since Enrico had learned his name, had become everything for him. He traced the shape of his pale red mouth with his eyes alone and marveled at the spectacle that he was, scars and all, both seen and unseen. The feelings he stirred to life within his chest . . . were impossible. The feelings he stirred to life within his chest . . . were a marvel too.
The first time he saw Dio's bare torso, he blushed. Standing in front of a mirror, Dio looked at him over his shoulder and smiled. Enrico managed to hide how flustered he'd gotten well enough though he was sure Dio saw right through it. And he made sure to make a habit of leaving his upper half unclad afterwards. Enrico somehow managed to get used to it. They read sitting on the same bed more often than not anyway. It wasn't like he had any choice but to get used to it.
Enrico read a poem collection, hoping to improve his interpretation of the verses poets scrawled out at the worst and the best of times just to convey a single feeling but maybe this simply just wasn't something he was good at. He told Dio who lay on the opposite side of the bed that he liked how lovely the words sounded but he didn't understand the meaning of most of them. Dio asked to take a look at the book and read a verse of a random poem, holding the book over his face.
"The golden day is not for me," Somehow hearing those words in his smooth voice made them even lovelier. "The half-light of a body fascinated by its desire to die. I'll know if you love me, even if I don't survive."
And just like that, the meaning was clear to Enrico. One's interpretation mattered more than what the writer intended, didn't it?
"That's . . ." He looked at Dio as he smiled at the words.
"Me," Dio finished for him and turned those bright eyes to him. "See? You do understand." He handed Enrico his book back and soon went to sleep. Leaving Enrico to ponder that verse for hours.
'The half-light of a body fascinated by its desire to die.' That line was hauntingly beautiful. So obviously written all for Dio, the darkly wonderful parts of him so clear to Enrico despite being unaware of the nature of that darkness, what exactly had caused it to grow so. It was the last line that gave him pause.
'I'll know if you love me, even if I don't survive.'
He didn't know which gave him more pause. 'If I don't survive'. Or that one single word: Love.
Both equally deadly possibilities. He chose to stop thinking about it for now, even if it'd torture him again later. For now, he could watch him while he slept and know that he was here and that love was not a possibility. It was the truth.
*
Dio was shaped by his desires. What he had been and what he'd become, it was all for the sake of all that he desired. And what he desired was everything.
From the moment he'd awakened his Stand, he'd known that if a power like that could exist in the world and if a power like that could exist solely for him, then surely it meant that he was fated to have the everything that he desired. With that unfaltering belief in mind, he'd begun to look for the way to heaven. And of course as if it'd only existed for him, he'd found it. The next step had been to find the one who'd help him on his way.
It was risky, to trust someone with a task so essential. That was why those requirements were just as essential. Someone with no agenda of their own. Someone who favored the will of God above all else. Simple, but he'd known finding someone like that in a world like this would be more than difficult.
And then he'd found Enrico Pucci.
The force of gravity between people was just as undeniable as the gravity that kept all things grounded to the earth. He'd felt it, despite how skeptical he'd been about it then. He'd felt himself be pulled as if by gravity towards Pucci.
Now, here he was, sitting in his favorite spot across from Dio on the couch, another book of poetry in his hands, the windows behind him tightly shut against the Sun. Dio was certain by now that he was the friend he needed to get to heaven, still he tested him sometimes, asked him questions in just the right way, carefully concealed as just casual queries to know if he could truly trust him completely. He still wasn't sure if he could ask him outright, what kind of reaction that would ensue so he withheld that confrontation. For now, he asked him something else.
"Do you think there is a power that can change fate?"
Dio had thought a lot about the expression 'change your fate'. The notion had seemed futile to him.
"No," Enrico said; the right answer. "Fate is absolute and immutable."
If more people were like him, the world would've been a more tolerable place to live. Dio had his answer but now that they were talking about it, he might as well share the things he'd heard surrounding the idea of changing fate.
"Some say that hope is strong enough to change fate," A flimsy, desperate thing like hope; the thought was almost laughable.
"It likely only seems that way to them," Enrico said, thoughts swirling behind dark eyes. "Because hope is something people tend to put their belief in when their fate is not to their liking."
Dio had never seen it that way before. This was only one of the reasons why talking with Enrico was so compelling.
"Hope is a strong thing in that regard," He said. "But still not strong enough to change fate."
"Is there something that can," Enrico asked, his eyes absently wandering around the room as he looked for the right words. "bend the course of fate a little? Not change it, just slightly alter it, maybe?"
"I think bending it would be the same as changing it, no?" Dio felt the corner of his mouth twitch into a smile. "Even if your desires are strong enough, it's not possible to bend fate to your will."
"But what if I do want fate to proceed as it will but something gets in the way, something I have no control over?" Enrico met his eyes again, grave. "Will fate just keep flowing on around it like a river around a stone?"
Dio had no idea what kind of 'something' he might be referring to but he had an inkling, though he'd like it if that inkling would stop pestering him every now and then. It wasn't likely that things like will and emotion had the power to change fate. Everything that happened was meant to happen. So even if something happened that seemed to hinder the flow of fate, it was quite likely that fate had already accounted for it before it happened. So, no, he didn't think 'something' could change the flow of fate. It would proceed as it would. He told as much to Pucci, who seemed as relieved to hear it as Dio had been to find that he believed it.
If a power like hope didn't have strength enough to change fate then surely, neither did love. Well, love was a strong word; it was more like fascination. Like the thrill of discovering something new. The sound of his laugh and the deep darkness of his eyes, so much like his own when he met his own eyes in the mirror. Except what he saw in his own eyes was an emptiness so vast, it likely reached the edges of the unmapped universe. In his dark eyes, he saw curiosity, an insatiable hunger for the truth of everything, a fondness for Dio that he'd never seen in anyone's eyes ever before, not in his life before he'd cast away his humanity, not in this life when he'd woken up in a world that was a hundred years older.
He called it fondness. He called it fascination. Love was a 'something' in the way of fate, not likely to change its course. He knew he believed it, and as far as he could tell, so did Pucci. Fate would proceed as it would.
*
Enrico noticed that weather had gotten colder and realized it had been six and a half months since he'd arrived here in Egypt to take a step further down the path fate had chosen for him, to be next to Dio and find the truth about how their paths were intertwined. The truth was yet incomplete but he'd hold the whole of it in his hands soon enough. Soon but not yet.
Right now, he was perfectly content, lying here on this bed reading with Dio, though he lay on the other side of the bed again. He told Enrico about the greatest pieces of art in the museum he was reading about, how they were like Stands that traversed time. Enrico sat halfway up to look at him and asked him if he thought those artists were like Stand users. Solemn, he closed his book and told him he was talking about Enrico too, his Stand. Dio met his eyes and there was something different about them, a refrain at the end of each word that Enrico couldn't guess the meaning of. Dio took his wrist, moving closer and Enrico uttered a slight gasp, feeling his heart sink a bit.
"Will you betray me one day?" Dio asked, gold eyes boring deep into his. "Why don't you attack me?" Enrico could always relax under his gaze, but right now, something was different. There was something Dio wanted to see so Enrico listened intently.
"You know that I wouldn't survive in sunlight," Dio said, "and that I lay to rest in a dark room during the day. All you would need to do is finish me off in my sleep. If you turn my Stand, The World into a disk and take it, you yourself can become king." A brief, daring smile crossed his lips, his eyes flashing with something that could've been a threat or a challenge, anger or fear. Enrico wasn't sure. He wasn't sure where this had suddenly come from. He was only sure of the truth he knew.
"Go ahead." Dio whispered fierce, his grip around Enrico's wrist firm.
The truth that he knew, that he felt in his heart, in his bones. For Dio and him alone.
"That has never once crossed my mind," He said, "I like people who help nurture my growth," He never once averted his eyes from Dio's. "Where are you going and what will you do? I want to go with you. You are a king among kings. I love you as I love God."
Some of the fierceness in the gold of his eyes softened but Enrico knew words wouldn't be enough, no matter how true. His wrist still in Dio's grip, he touched his fingers to his forehead and extracted his Stand disk. Dio slowly let his arm go and kept his eyes fixed on Enrico's. Enrico looked right back into his eyes and knew that he'd understood. He could surely read it in the darkness that Enrico saw in his own eyes. For anyone but them, it was impossible to read in darkness but that was where their fates had been written. In the darkness between the stars. So crucial, so immutable, so singular that they'd needed to be hidden from the light. Enrico was more sure if this than he was of anything. Their fates were written side by side, indistinguishable from each other, never to be separated until the end of time itself.
Dio stood up all of a sudden and turned away from him. Enrico brought his first to his chest and waited for him to speak.
"I'm sorry," Dio said. "That wasn't meant to insult you."
Enrico breathed relieved, till Dio took his breath away with his next words.
"It's that I've never considered there could be someone who could calm my soul just by us talking," Dio's voice was softer; Enrico didn't think he'd ever heard him speak like this before. "I feared losing you." Enrico felt breathless. He didn't think he'd be able to speak even if he wanted to.
"You will become a noble priest," Dio said, his voice even again and looked over his shoulder at Enrico, his eyes serene again. "Please, accept this as a symbol of my apology." Enrico only now noticed something in his hand, something hard and wet. "I extracted it out of my body just now. No matter what happens, I'll always be able to lend you my power."
Enrico looked at the blood trickling down the side of his hand then opened his fist and felt his eyes widen at the sight of a bone - his bone - in his hand. And their fates became more closely interwoven as surely as he drew his next shuddering breath.
*
'I'll know if you love me,' Dio watched Enrico stare at his bone in something like wonder, like it was the greatest treasure he'd ever beheld. 'even if I don't survive.'
Dio didn't know if they both knew what they were doing, bringing love in the way of fate. Nevertheless, fate would proceed as it would. Both of them, at least, knew as much.
*
Enrico walked through the halls of the mansion next to Dio, the bone clutched tight in one hand, a book in the other and Dio's words echoing in his mind again, over and over. The kind of things that exchange had incited within his very soul, they weren't the kind of things that just went away. They weren't the kind of things one could quell. But with the bone in his hand, there was one thing he knew for sure. The truth that had yet been incomplete was whole now, the truth about the path they had to walk together. It was so clear to him now: He was essential to the heaven Dio sought. That was as immutable as fate itself.
The storm inside of him raged with a new intensity as he let that fact sink in. He wished he could stay longer but there was something Dio had said he needed to do tonight so Enrico had to go back to the apartment he was used to getting bored in whenever he wasn't with Dio. Surely, Dio didn't sit idle when Enrico wasn't with him. Usually he'd tell Enrico when he needed to go out a night prior. This time he'd likely only forgotten because of what he'd been meaning to ask Enrico today. The nature of these ventures was a mystery to Enrico but it could only be something important.
It was Sunset so Dio stopped in the doorway just outside of the light of the Sun. The Sunsets here were dazzling, gold and orange and red instead of the pink and purple Winter Sunsets back home. Right now as he stood bathed in gold, he wished he could one day see Dio in the gold of a Sunset or under the purple sky of Sunset back home. The light of the Sun would only make him more breathtakingly beautiful. Maybe it was a great wish but nothing was impossible. Maybe one day, Enrico would be able to take him out to the shore of the lake where his sister had drowned and make that place where something good would've happened too.
All careless wishes, but if there was one he wanted desperately to be fulfilled, it'd be following Dio, all the way to the end of this path.
'I want to go with you.' Both a wish and a promise.
"Listen," Dio said, standing right on the edge of the shadow of the doorway. "There's only one place I'm going: To heaven. I will do everything to reach it," His eyes softened and Enrico's heart beat faster somewhere inside the storm raging in his chest, wreaking havoc along with his blood. "If you want to go with me, if that's your truest desire, then rest assured you'll see it fulfilled," He smiled and Enrico drew a shaky breath with a whole lot of difficulty. "Your desires lie with me."
With that promise, everything changed. He'd felt this love, this ever-growing, ever-torturous love, lodge itself in the way of fate like a stone in the path of a river and he'd wondered if it'd change fate. But fate flowed on as it did around it. It made this love a part of its course. Today, he'd felt it was safe to reveal this love to Dio to see if the other half of his fate, the other half of his soul, the other half of him would accept it. And he had. With this, everything changed.
And Enrico took a step into the shadows.
"And yours with me." He made the other half of their promise, the other half of them.
Dio knew his entire truth, the way Enrico knew Dio's. He saw this love as a part of that truth, just like Enrico saw his as part of his truth. It made that happiness brighten in his eyes in the way Enrico loved and made his heart beat harder.
Dio's fingers touched the skin under his chin and something that felt like thousands of sparks erupted from that spot all throughout him. Dio tilted his face up and leaned down, those half-lidded gold eyes fixed on Enrico's lips. Enrico was vaguely aware he should close his own eyes but Dio looked too exceptionally beautiful in that moment. He closed his eyes when their lips met to fully revel in the sensation of his lips against his.
Love wasn't strong enough to change fate; nothing was. But right now, everything had changed. Because they had made this love part of their fates. He didn't know if both of them knew what they were doing but right now, it simply wasn't the time to think about such things.
Right now, this chaste kiss he knew he'd remember all his life was all that mattered.
Enrico hadn't regained his breath when Dio whispered, "Thank you." against his temple and Enrico took a step back, his heart out of control. He hadn't regained his breath when Dio turned back into the shadows, gently closing the door behind him.
Later, when he was able to think again, he briefly panicked about the kiss, since he'd sworn celibacy and all but it seemed like he'd just decided that kissing wasn't included in the number of things he was to refrain from. (Though arguably, maybe he should've been panicking about kissing a man but the thought was yet to cross his mind.) Then he felt bad about panicking about the most perfect moment in his life and that was when he decided that maybe, it was time to go to sleep. Granted, there were more pressing things to panic about but that could come later.
*
Granted, there were more pressing things to worry about, like this love and all that it entailed but that could come later, Dio decided. Right now, Dio's mind was mostly occupied by a single, solitary fact that fate had scrawled out a hundred years ago.
The Joestars had finally made their move.