Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It’s 10:03 in the morning, and the blasted teacher is late.

It’s bad enough Dio had to reassign one of his clients to a lesser lawyer to come to this inane parent-teacher social to discuss his son’s disruptive behavior and fighting problem — and he was adamant that fighting was not a problem, as his son would likely pick fights with the children who deserved it. He taught him how to throw punches from the earliest possible age, and if Giorno wanted to exercise that talent, he could. He told them as much over the phone, that he wasn’t paying for Giorno’s private schooling to be distracted away from his work, and that there would be consequences if they darkened his doorstep with the topic ever again.

But they did, and threatened expulsion if Dio didn’t come to discuss terms. So he was there, clutching his off-menu Starbucks coffee with a bitter face and makeup that looked like it was done to accent his anger. He was told the parent of the child he’d been fighting with would also be attending, as the meek teacher hoped they would settle it between themselves. Dio Brando was a bit of a celebrity in their town, a lawyer who took headline cases and won them. Rumors flew that he ran with the mafia, that he was the mafia, or that he was blackmailing the mafia. No one who met him really wanted to go out of their way to upset him. Even people who bagged his groceries did it with somewhat frantic silence, having recognized his face from national news and having zero courage to ask him if he wanted paper or plastic.

The teacher walked into the room like they drew lots to pick which lamb to send to the slaughter, and she looked at him with eyes pleading for his cooperation or mercy.

“I’m sorry,” She started off with, a usual stern tone already absent from her voice. “Gio is a wonderful child… on most days, and with most people. His teachers adore him, and he’s so clever and smart, but—“

“But.”

Dio had only said one word, but it drew down the gravity of the room, and Mrs. Lauper could feel it.

“But he has a rivalry with another student that’s disrupting classes… she’ll seek him out, and—“

“She.”

The weight doubled. The teacher swallowed the knot in her throat.

“She… yes… she tries to initiate fights with him, and—“

“So my son isn’t at fault." 

“Please— please allow me to finish. Giorno is ordinarily well behaved, but the girl has started getting him to brawl back. He’s a lot more… visceral than her. I had to stop him from sticking her hand under the paper cutter and pushing the lever down. Rest assured, we have brought her father in today so we could discuss an adequate resolution. I believe he’s—“

She pushed her glasses up and called out into the hallway. “Mr. Kujo?”

Dio could have sworn time froze for him in the seconds between her calling his name and the doorknob starting to turn. He knew there was only one Mr. Kujo that dared to breathe the same air as him, in the same town as him, and it was so completely clear that of all the shitty kids to pick a fight with his son, it would be Jotaro-fucking-Kujo’s. 

They had to settle a fight in court in their younger years. Dio had lost it, the only blemish on his record. Ever since then, he’s fantasized about making him eat the curb.

Jotaro, and his impressively bulky torso and tundra stare pressed into the room, bringing even more pressure with it as the two fathers locked eyes. What use did a marine biologist have for shoulders so wide you could land an airplane on them? What use did a grown man have for a dolphin pin on his stupid hat?

(Dio thought this, conveniently forgetting that his suit today had no less than three golden hearts— two cufflinks and one lapel pin.)

They— the teacher and Jotaro— shook hands and exchanged pleasantries, and it seemed like the good teacher felt that Jotaro was backup as opposed to opposition, and it pissed Dio off further. His awful child was the one starting fights, why was he so comfortable? 

“Anyway—“ Mrs. Lauper sat in front of the desk as the two were comically wedged into children’s desks far too small for them. “Jolyne has started instigating these fights by means of… insulting you, Mr. Brando. She tells Giorno that you’re a… an—“

Frantically, she scribbled something onto a post it note and passed it to Jotaro, whose face remained stoic for a few moments before cracking a thin smile.

“I’ve never seen ‘assface’ written in such fancy script.”

The teacher tittered, but was immediately silenced by Dio’s violent stare. “Anyway— she, I— I’ve tried speaking with her, but she won’t give it up.”

“Did she learn that from you, Jotaro?” Dio interjected, deciding finally that the teacher was useless, and his real opponent was crammed into the small seat next to him. “Do you walk around your house muttering that to yourself?” 

“Yare yare, so what if I do? I don’t ask why you leave the house in Halloween makeup, that’s your business.”

“Please,” Mrs. Lauper, much like her namesake, just wanted to have fun, and she wouldn’t have it if these two grown men kept trading barbs in her classroom. “Let’s just talk about behavioral therapy and how it—“

“Tell me, Jotaro, do other marine biologists bedazzle their clothes with ocean wildlife, or is it just you?”

“Those are big words coming from someone who I’ve never seen not wearing a heart-shaped belt buckle.”

“Well thank god, in that case, that your daughter seems to be following in your cantankerous footsteps. Do you think she’ll do us a favor and take after you even further by throwing herself in jail? Save the rest of us from the trouble of doing so?” 

Jotaro stood up at that, and his emotions were unreadable from there. He circled around toward the back of the classroom, presumably to cool off, and Dio looked victoriously at the teacher. “I think you’ll find this train of questioning rather futile. Instead of calling us in, you should have settled this yourselves by putting them in different classes. And if you’ll excuse me, I have someone to meet by noon—“

“Mr. Kujo, NO—!“

Her warning died on her lips as Dio only had a few seconds to guess what Jotaro was doing before a child-sized desk chair came crashing down onto his head.

—

Dio was home, resting a frozen steak on his now blackened eye, because Jotaro knew to aim for the face to make him look disreputable in court. In return, Dio had broken no less than two fingers on each of his hands, ensuring he wouldn’t be able to do his worthless job either. Giorno watched him with a look of guilt on his face, knowing even at seven years of age, he was likely responsible for the scuffle ever happening in the first place.

“‘m sorry,” He mumbled, still a bit unsure of what exactly he should be apologizing for, as Dio was the one who taught him to defend his family’s honor. “I won’t fight with Jojo again.”

The words bring back memories, and the memories brought a sneering smile to Dio’s face.

“Don’t apologize. Do the opposite. Make her eat the gravel in the playground. Frame her, plant evidence, get her expelled first. Don’t let her walk all over you like she won. Do you know what you are?”

“A first grader?”

“A Brando, and the first lesson is to never take shit from a Joestar.”

Chapter Text

“Hey!”

Giorno looked down from his place on the playground tower. Jolyne Kujo was the kind of girl who didn’t let anyone bully her— she was tough, she knew how to fight back, and in Kindergarten he remembered her stuffing a boy’s face in the toilet because they kissed her cheek. Unfortunately, six-year-olds weren’t equipped to deal with power or the respect of their peers responsibly, and the result had been her taking it out on Gio Brando for the first few weeks of first grade. Her dad hated his dad, and whenever his stupid, ugly face was on TV, she could hear Jotaro mutter his favorite name for him beneath his breath as she ate her cheerios and he turned the pages of his newspaper. 

That was enough for her to push Giorno around. If his family was gross, then he was gross, and a child didn’t need much more rationale than that.

But today, Jolyne didn’t look like she wanted to fight, and while Giorno was happy to glower down at her, she only puffed up her cheeks a little bit.

“My dad beat up your dad really bad,” She started out with, not even trying to hide the slight edge of pride in her voice.

“Yeah. I saw. But he didn’t get away with it.”

He was playing with something quietly in his hands, pretending not to notice Jolyne or care about what she was saying, just like his dad told him to.

“Right… my dad was really hurt. He can’t go back to work for a few weeks. He wouldn’t tell me what happened, but I figured it out.”

Giorno drew his leg up instinctively, not giving her the leverage to grab his ankle and drag him onto the playground.

“I’m sorry, Gio.”

He glanced her way, finally curious, throwing Dio’s instructions out the window.

“If dad is going to fight because we fight, I don’t want to fight. The only reason I picked on you was ‘cause— anyway… let’s stop. I’ll stop if you stop.”

She was hugging her arm with one hand, not looking at him because swallowing her pride because her father told her to was one thing, but doing it on her own was entirely another. The bandages and splints wrapped around his knuckles looked like they hurt, and it bothered her to watch him get frustrated with something so easy as changing the remote. It was like she was the one who hurt him, in a weird way, by starting the fights at all.

And she was a good kid, even when it went to her head. So Giorno looked up from whatever was in his hands, trying to tell if she was telling the truth or waiting to put him in a headlock. Eventually, he extended his hand.

“Deal.”

They shook, only for Jolyne to jump back with a slightly startled shriek when a bug crawled up between their hands. Instinctively patting herself down, she glanced back up to see him sighing and smiling.

“I managed to find five of them, and you threw one away. It was just a ladybug, it wasn’t anything gross.”

Sheepish that she’d gotten scared over something so childish, she was quick to puff out her chest.

“I’m not scared of bugs! I caught a TON of butterflies and moths and spiders this summer. Even when dad told me to put them down, I wasn’t afraid at all.”

(Jotaro would never forget the evening Jolyne proudly brought home a black widow spider, caught in a shoe, because she thought the red bit looked really cool.)

Sliding off the plastic playground equipment, Giorno started to walk in the direction of the shallow forest just to the side of the school.

“Then help me find some more, okay?”

—

It took Jotaro exactly one hundred seventy-four and a half days after moving to realize that he was next-door neighbors with Dio Brando. It was a ludicrous amount of time only feasible as a direct result of their natures and their desire to staunchly not take any interest in the people who happened to buy houses sitting next to theirs.

The circumstances fell as such: Dio had been on vacation when the house had been moved into, and afterwards always left early in the morning and returned late at night. His son spent more time at luxurious daycares than with mere babysitters simply because he could afford it. As he got older, he began letting him sit and play with a tablet in his office while he worked, in no small part due to his rather quiet and polite nature.

Jotaro began his days at ten and ended them at midnight, leading his slowly-becoming-estranged wife to become the only one visible watering the plants, taking care of her child, refilling the bird feeders. There were days when they just barely missed each other, when their curiosity was piqued enough to ask about the mysterious neighbor only for their attention to be diverted to something else. Those narrow gaps of fate prevented them from seeing each other just soon enough.

He kept the house after the divorce, and with his wife’s decision to go reconnect with her family across the country, kept his daughter as well. It demanded a swift rearrange of his schedule— he couldn’t work all hours, chasing leads, tethered to his desk and unwilling to get up. Ruefully, it gave him a newfound appreciation for all the shit he took for granted as things he only had to do sometimes as opposed to all the time; like taking his daughter to school, making sure she was fed, doing the laundry, doing the housework, doing the everything.

It went without saying that Jotaro started to work from home a lot more often. He regulated his lab days to shorter shifts and started finishing his paperwork at home, amidst the never-ending errands. Just as he was getting used to the schedule, as he was outside at seven-thirty in the morning, watering the flowers Jolyne planted with a garden hose in his pajama pants (we can’t all be perfect), Jotaro looked up and saw a Lamborghini in the driveway of his neighbor’s house.

Weird that he never registered that this was an exceptionally nice neighborhood. Jiji had swung it for him with his real estate company, as a sort of belated wedding present that came at the tail-end of his marriage.

Turning his gaze back to the flowers, Jotaro’s attention was only caught again by the sound of a voice too self-important to ignore.

“Be here at eight to make sure he gets to school on time,” Dio’s commanding tone was unmistakable, harsh even against the sound of a rather desperately weak voice on the other line. “Well, you’re going to have to figure it out. If I were you, I wouldn’t be concerned. It’s a funeral, and your brother isn’t going anywhere. That’s the point. What would you prefer? Losing your job, or being fifteen minutes late to something you already don’t want to go to?”

The voice became a soft murmur, and Dio hung up the phone, turning his attention toward the doorway.

“Never mind, Giogio. They’ll be here at the regular time, you don’t have to ride with me. Go back inside.”

His son said something that Jotaro couldn’t completely hear, and it gave Dio pause before setting his briefcase on the hood of his car and walking calmly back his way, crouching to place a kiss on his forehead and guiding him back indoors. It was only then that Dio noticed whoever was across the way had been watering the exact same spot for what felt like too long. His eyes connected from the water, to the hose, to the person holding it.

“…”

“…”

The silence, only permeated by the chirping of birds on the otherwise sunny day, stretched for what felt like an eternity, or at least a very long wait in a doctor’s waiting room.

“Even I didn’t peg you for the type to sleep around,” Dio said, pressing the unlock button on his car keys. “And she’s making you water her plants, too?”

“I live here.”

Another stretch. This one felt comparable to a dentist’s office wait.

“For how long?”

“Half a year.”

That was half a year too long, Dio thought, to have to tolerate a presence he didn’t even know was there. “I see your hands have healed quickly. A shame I wasn’t more thorough.”

“Amazing how you still look like a common raccoon even without a black eye. How much makeup did it take to cover it up?”

The barbs were the reason Dio hadn’t pressed charges. He’d fought back and caused the worse injury, with a witness present no less. Even more importantly, having all that paperwork would prevent him from getting revenge, should the need arise— comfortably knowing he could kick Jotaro’s ass without throwing away his career was definitely a motive there, one Jotaro seemed to share.

“You’re a dead man if I ever see you cross this yard. Understand? I won’t waste anyone’s time with a restraining order. I’ll just clear away some space in Giogio’s garden for you to sleep in.”

“Jolyne has one too,” Pretending not to hear Dio speak was an insult in and of itself— to not acknowledge his power or threats was a heftier smack in the face than posturing back. “Planted flowers that specifically attract butterflies. She’s not very good about watering it, though.”

Turning the hose back on, Jotaro manually ended the conversation by shifting the nozzle to a much louder volume. Dio snorted, taking his diversion as his victory, throwing his briefcase and jacket in the back seat of his car before turning back towards the other man.

“Jotaro.”

“…”

“That goes doubly for your daughter.”

Without even a second’s hesitation, Jotaro lifted the hose at full blast and sprayed him in the face. Letting go of the trigger after a few seconds, it was quite a mystifying sight to behold: Dio, with what had to have been two or three hours worth of styling, preening, and makeup running down his face, perfectly enhanced by an expression of unbridled rage. Not letting the opportunity go to waste, Jotaro held his arms aloft, the universal sign language for ‘bring it’.

“Are you going to try to bury me in your garden or not? A piece of shit like you would make great fertilizer for mine.”

—

Rohan Kishibe peered out between the blinds of his house, eyes wrinkled with his deadlines and a firm lack of sleep. Though it took him a few moments to focus against the sunrise falling across the peaceful neighborhood, he was quick to pick out the unmistakable shape of two men brawling on their front lawns across the street. Never one to let an opportunity go to waste, he immediately yanked the window open, pulled his notepad into his lap, and started furiously sketching. After about five or so minutes of gesture drawing, satisfied he now had a good reference for one man strangling another with a garden hose, he picked up the phone and regretfully punched in a few quick numbers.

“Hello, police?”

—

Jotaro fumbled inside, closing the door behind him. Feeling along the scratches on his face, one of them deep enough to leave a mark, he muttered something like ‘got the talons of a god damn harpy’ as he made his way to the refrigerator, taking out the carton of orange juice and tipping his head back to drink from it.

“Don’t be gross, dad!” Jolyne chirped from her place on the sofa, having forsaken the breakfast table to eat a plate of waffles balancing on her knee.

“You do it, too.”

“I do not!”

“I see it all the time.” Jotaro closed the refrigerator door, making a mental note to try to be less of a bad influence, especially if a habit like this would get them both sick around flu season. “I can see into the kitchen from my office, you know.”

Jolyne huffed, apparently not having heard the scuffle from over the television blasting cartoons. Despite being deep in the throes of attempted murder, the two managed to clean up and pick up quickly enough to wave off the cop car that slowly drove by. They’d parted with one last round of obscene threats before Dio finally pulled away in his car and Jotaro finished with the plants just in time to see a woman in full mourning attire drive by and pick up Giorno. The entire half-hour felt like an eerie premonition for how unreal his life was about to become.

“Wait. Jolyne. Why are you still in your pajamas? Your bus will be at the stop in two minutes.”

“…” Jolyne’s chewing slowed into a guilty stop. Jotaro sighed.

"Get dressed, I’ll drive you. But don’t get used to it.”

Nearly sending the waffles off her knee and to the floor, only a splattering of syrup hit the carpet as Jolyne left the plate on the coffee table and ran upstairs to change and gather her things. Jotaro sighed, sinking into his chair, wondering if pants were worth the effort or if he could drop her off in grass-stained pajamas that might have a little bit of someone else’s blood on them. He’ll just be sitting in the car, right? No one would see them. He could even go through a drive-through and get a breakfast sandwich. He felt like he earned one.

Pretending not to hear the specific ringtone he gave his boss’s number, Jotaro gathered up his car keys and headed toward the garage.

Chapter Text

[FEB 7, 20XX, 3:24 PM]

DIO: Diego

DIO: Diego respond immediately

DIO: You basically live on your phone I know you have read this

DIO: Have you forgotten the ‘read at 3 pm’ feature? You utter dunce

DIO: Imbecile

DIO: Pick up

DIEGO: sup

DIO: It took you long enough

DIO: Come over

DIEGO: absolutely not

DIEGO: why

DIO: We are suck

DIO: *sick

DIEGO: too late

DIEGO: guess you’re going to have to deal with being suck now

DIO: I’m going to kill

DIEGO: me?

DIEGO: or just

DIEGO: in general

DIO: Hit enter too soon

DIO: You

DIO: I’m going to kill you

DIEGO: why do you need me anyway

DIEGO: i thought you were above my help

DIEGO: or just other people as a whole

DIO: Flu is difficult to manage when both members of the household have it

DIO: I require you to pick up some items from the store and to take care of Giogio while I rest

DIEGO: cant finals

DIO: IT IS FEBRUARY

DIEGO: midterms

DIO: I’m cutting you off

DIEGO: so do you like gatorade or powerade more

“I’m impressed you made it over so quickly,” Dio commented idly upon opening the door, “considering we both know you would have continued to blow my messages off until I made the threats more serious.” He was putting on the most magnificent display of acting like he didn’t look like a garbage disposal got a hold of him. One of the things that made Dio, Dio was the fact that he took complete pride in his appearance— so when he didn’t, it was the difference between night and day, or the difference between immaculate Greek statue cleanliness and unkempt stubble with bleary eyes. Somewhere behind him, Diego could hear Giorno’s cartoons on the television, and saw his blankets piled up on the edge of the sofa. Dio must have relocated him for ease’s sake. 

“What’s more serious than my older brother and nephew being sick?” Despite the caring words, there was no sweetness in them, not even the fake aspartame kind. Striding past Dio, he made a beeline for Giorno, taking a bottle of obscenely neon-looking purple liquid out of one of the plastic bags he carried inside. His nephew looked strange without his hair done up impressively and without his reserved, but oddly dignified-for-a-seven-year-old expression.

“Your favorite is grape, right?" 

“Yeah,” Giorno reached for the bottle, and Diego held it just outside of his grasp in a motion that pissed Dio off in an indescribable, but immeasurable way.

“I skipped class to bring this for you. You should thank your favorite uncle.”

Indeed, because he had two to choose from— there was Diego, Dio’s brother by blood, and Jonathan, his brother by adoption. And Jonathan was amazing. Hanging out with Jonathan meant learning something cool about archaeology, or being treated to ice cream, or riding on his shoulders and being taller than everything and everyone. Dio might not have been the best suited to raise a child, but he was by no means a deliberately awful parent— but he couldn’t come even close to the pillar of safety and happiness that Jonathan was, and that he seemed to radiate. Diego was more like Dio in miniature, because the apples didn’t fall too far apart from the Brando tree.

Which meant he also shared his desire to conquer Jonathan in trivial, meaningless things, like being Giorno’s favorite.

“Thank you, Uncle Deego." 

This time, Diego harmlessly passed him the bottle, along with a few other snacks he knew Giorno liked. Cups of pudding, yogurt, those little mushroom crackers his mother used to give him. Being a sweet labrador of an uncle was Jonathan’s job. Diego much preferred to tease him— with Dio always handling him like glass, he deserved to have someone who’d gladly roughhouse with him if he wanted to. Most days, his nephew really liked that. He liked knocking down his smugness a peg and standing up to him, especially when he’d relent and declare Giorno the victor. 

Today, his subdued response was alarming. Normally he’d do something like thank Jonathan with a really sly expression, so if he was too tired to play-fight back, something was definitely wrong. Diego reached out and touched the tip of his fingers to his forehead, surprised something so little could get so warm.

“Has he been to the doctor yet?”

 “Do I look like a neglectful reject of a parent to you? Of course I took him in. They said there’s nothing to be done but give him antibiotics and let him sleep it off. He’s already past the highest point of his fever, but it’s still taken quite a bit out of him.”

His rudeness made it clear to Diego. He was not one to show the cards in his hand so easily, and growing up with the guy taught him all his tells. A confident and uncaring Dio was an aloof smooth talker — stress would roll off his back like water off a duck. But now, he was clearly agitated and snappish, and coupled with his unkempt appearance, that meant he was downright worried.

It was a good look on him. Almost made him look human, as opposed to Satan’s newest and most favorite meat puppet.

“I remember when you were dealing with me having the flu in middle school. You were writing your thesis, and—”

“Don’t,” Dio warned, taking the other grocery bag from him, making sure he at least got the tea he asked of him and setting about to brew it. Even if he enlisted Diego to take care of his son, he’d rather die than let Diego take care of him. He wasn’t even the most qualified— Jonathan would have been over in seconds had he so much as breathed that Giorno was ill on his Facebook page.

But he had his dignity and he had his tea pot, so at least he had that going for him. 

Like a nosy reptile, Diego slid into the kitchen after him. Didn’t Dio have a servant to handle this for him? A butler? He was sure Dio had a butler with a really strange name, where on earth did they go? Opening up the door to his pantry without so much as asking for permission, he rooted around in a few of the baskets until he found his favorite snack to never pay for. Some odd edamame crisps that Dio favored and Diego found unreasonably priced. Popping a few of them in his mouth, he finally sized his brother up properly.

“You look like shit.”

Realizing this was a conversation he’d have to have while he waited for the water to boil, Dio glared daggers at him.

“You come into my house, after I’ve generously provided for your education, tease my deathly ill son, eat my food, and insult me?”

“To be fair, I didn’t know how sick he was until I touched his head.” Another crisp. “And he’s not deathly ill. You said so yourself. Stop being so dramatic every single time I speak to you.”

Diego was one of the few people who could get away with locking horns with Dio so casually. He was, after all, the one to continually kick the back of his seat as they drove cross-country once, so their siblinghood was rather well established. In the pyramid of people Dio ‘absolutely hated’, Giorno held the coveted spot of ‘doesn’t hate at all’, and Diego was just sort of slightly beneath at ‘source of unending frustration, but would like to make sure doesn’t die’.

“This is the cheaper kind,” Dio huffed unceremoniously, changing the subject to observe the box of tea more closely. “What are you doing with the stipend I send you every month if you can’t even get the kind I ask of you?”

“I’m a poor college student,” the tone he said it in was nearly mocking, “and all of that goes into tuition and rent and stuff like that. You were the one who wanted me to go to your prestigious alma mater.”

“Bullshit,” Dio snapped, taking the kettle off the stove and pouring the hot water into his mug. “You blow all of it in the first week of the month and you pay your bills with money you win from betting on yourself at the horse races.”

Diego sneered at him, knowing he couldn’t lie his way out of that. Dio’s sources were always on point. “A perfectly legal way to make money, mind you.”

“It is not. In fact, it is very illegal. Something that worries me to hear coming out of your mouth, considering I am paying for you to go to law school so that you might work at my law firm. What are you even taking as classes? Art History? Advanced Pottery? Yoga 101?”

“I’ll have you know I’ve learned more from my yoga instructor than I have from two years of law.”

“That is not something to brag about.”

“Keep your hair on, Dio, I’m just messing with you. I’ve passed all my classes, haven’t I? And I haven’t done a shitty job about it, either. I’ve got more self-respect than fucking Johnny.”

Making it more than obvious he was tired of this conversation, Dio brushed aside him and back into the living room. It was an unreasonably spacious one, built more to accommodate company than be used very often, but it proved its usefulness today. Taking a seat on the sofa, he couldn’t stop casting wary glances to the breathing lump of blankets on the other end of it. It was the strangest thing for Diego to watch Dio give a shit like that. Have feelings in general. He had always pinned him as the most likely one to ditch a kid on some hapless woman he managed to knock up, but to see him do the opposite and essentially cut Miss Shiobana out of Giorno’s life...

It wasn’t too out of line, in a very, very strange way. He never shared much about their family from before Diego was born, but he knew the one person Dio hated more than anyone had been their father. Enough for Diego to reasonably suspect Dio had something to do with the old bastard croaking so early. He was so repulsed by the idea of emulating him, in any way, that it worked out for his son. What meager cache of compassion he had was probably all spent on Giorno.

“I thought you were going to bed.”

“Soon.”

Diego could see an excuse to hover from a mile away, and deliberately made himself a pest by sitting in the generous space between them.

“And here I thought you would keep your distance,” Dio began wryly, bringing the tea to his lips, “if only to prevent getting sick yourself.”

“Are you kidding me? A legitimate doctor’s note and I get to miss a week of class with no penalty. Maybe two. God knows I could use the extension.”

“How do you already have yourself in a bind in February?”

Diego snorted, thinking that for a man who loved the sound of his own voice, he should really pay attention to what he said sometimes. He could recall on more than one occasion the various Godfather-like threats he’d send him around finals time, mostly revolving around killing his prized horse and hiding its limbs around his dorm. It was a mercy in and of itself that he didn’t force extracurriculars on him, but if he was graduating with anything less than four important-looking cords, there was going to be hell to pay.

Dio took education very seriously, because this time it reflected on him. Still, back in the day, just after Dio had moved out of their adoptive household and taken him along with, Diego couldn’t really recall a time where his brother wasn’t reading some impossibly thick textbook out of sheer desire to crush his competition. It was a trait passed from brother to brother, as being partially raised by him didn’t leave him without his influences. Diego hated losing as much as Dio did, if not more, but it was still annoying to hear his brother chastise him for something he was clearly doing good at.

“Mind your own business. As long as you get the results you want, why should you care about anything else?"

"How shrewd. I wonder where you get it from.”

“Our adoptive side of the family, clearly. It’s where I get my moral backbone comprised of 'honesty is the best policy’ and ‘aim for the top, even if it’s to be the biggest tool in the toolbox’.”

Taking potshots at the Joestars was their eternal pastime. They’d been fed, clothed, and overall given a life of luxury, yet somehow that had only resulted in leaving as soon as Dio’s college courses were fully paid under the pretense of ‘wanting to take care of Diego on his own, in honor of his mother’. It was the most blatant of lies, but just empathetic and emotional enough to fly by them. The biggest puzzle of all was Jonathan’s insistence on staying in their lives and being a good brother to them— he had no reason at all to be so persistently kind to two assholes like them, and yet he always was. Sometimes, Diego suspected it might have something to do with Giorno, but Jonathan and Dio’s history was shrouded in mystery.

Diego popped open a can of cola, deftly stolen from the kitchen.

“Go to bed, you look fucking miserable.”

“Telling me what to do in my own home?”

“Again? Piss off with that. We both know what you’re doing here. Get up, go to bed. I can handle a sick little kid and if I can’t, I can bother you awake.”

With the weight of exhaustion pressing down on him, Dio drew himself up from his seat. “But if you wake me up for anything less—“

“You’re going to sell Silver Bullet to the glue factories. I know. Go.”

It would have been the most opportune time to whip out his cell phone and snap a picture of the disheveled lawyer, dressed in an oversized robe and wrinkled sleepwear, but Diego didn’t tempt fate just yet. Once Dio was entirely gone from the room, he moved closer to Giorno, who had been staying very still. God, it was weird. Like looking down at an injured baby bird when all it could do was breathe and die.

“Here’s what we’re going to do. I’m going to sit here, play video games, and make sure you take whatever the doctor gave you. When you feel like you can sit up, you can join on second player. Deal?”

The pile of blankets made a soft mumble that sounded like ‘okay’. Diego got up and opened the TV cabinet, trying to find the wireless controller for Giorno’s GameCube. Settling back into the far-too-comfortable sofa, Diego remembered one last thing to message Dio with before settling in for an evening of doing fuck-all.

DIEGO: msg my professor

DIEGO: [email protected]

DIEGO: if i miss 1 more day of class im booted

DIO: I am trying to sleep

DIEGO: do it when u wake up

DIO: You do it

DIO: Despite what a petulant child you are I am not your guardian and that is not my responsibility

DIEGO: excuse me but i seem to recall someone making me walk out of class earlier to babysit for him

DIEGO: this is an excuse i wouldn’t have to make had i not had to do that

DIEGO: so

DIEGO: you owe me this at the very least

DIEGO: i can hear you talking into siri from the other room

DIEGO: saying the same thing over and over because it cant parse your fucked up voice

DIEGO: learn to type

DIO: It will be dealt with

DIO: Do not bother me again

DIO: Also

DIO: Die

Flu spread like wildfire through all grades, a fact that wouldn’t change no matter how nice or affluent the school was. The only thing it would take was someone catching it and smearing their gross little kid hands all over the lunch room door knob for an outbreak. When Jolyne came home from school one day with a scratchy throat and whining that she felt cold, Jotaro knew he probably should have prepared for this. Bundling her up tight in several layers and a puffy overcoat and taking her to the pharmacy to get what she needed and see the clinic doctor wasn’t the hard part. Neither was setting up Netflix in her room so she could do something aside from curl up beneath her comforter. 

The hard part was waking up a day and a half later feeling like his house had its air conditioning at max capacity. Making sure Jolyne didn’t tamper with the thermostat in an effort to make the house warmer, his suspicions were quickly readjusted when he jabbed a thermometer beneath his tongue and came up with a spritely 102.5 fever. He could hear her gentle footsteps trod over, dragging her blanket behind her in a would-be cape of warmth.

“Are you sick, dad?”

Jotaro ran the thermometer under the water, cleaning it off. “Yes. Dad is sick.”

“Sorry.”

“It was inevitable. Go back to bed.”

“It’s four in the afternoon!”

Squinting, he glanced at the bathroom window. That was definitely daylight outside.

“… Are you hungry?”

“Not really…"

Jotaro rubbed his forehead, fighting back the sense of strain. “You have to eat something, even if it’s just soup. Have you at least been drinking the juice I got you?”

“Yeah! But we’re almost out.” 

His hand migrated to his jaw, trying to fight off the sensation of seasickness that was brimming at the pit of his belly. He needed to sit down. Lie down. Face down. Putting on his strong front, he escorted Jolyne back to her room, made sure she had something to snack on and something to drink, and told her to yell for him if she needed him. With that, he crashed back onto his bed in its classic dishevelment of blankets, knowing he should really call somebody, but who? 

Jiji was at that age where a good flu could kill him, and most of his friends were out of town or burdened with other life responsibilities. Mom was also out of town, but would be overwrought with worry and drive the whole two hours back if he dared call her. Rohan, who lived across the street, was self-employed, and owed Jotaro several favors… was firmly in the ‘doubtful maybe’ pile. There was a short blond college student who hung out at his house a lot who had always seemed responsible, maybe him…?

Then again, perhaps not. The fever must be getting to him if he was considering friends of friends for an important job like that. Maybe he’d sleep it off for a few hours and feel better, and Jolyne could handle herself until then.

At 7:13, Jotaro did not feel better.

In fact, the whole ordeal was reminding him of a trip to Nova Scotia several years back. He was taken on a rickety, shambling rental of a fishing boat around the coasts so that he could dive in freezing waters to investigate the decline of a local mollusk. The other divers had pulled up scallops from the ocean floor and cut a few raw to eat right there on the boat, offering him some just to be hospitable. That entire ride, from start to finish, felt like a fraction of the clammy, nauseous miserable Jotaro felt now. 

He needed to muster the strength to speed dial Jiji, or emergency services. As he dragged his phone over and entered in Joseph’s number from memory, he felt a soft bump nudge into his side.

“Dad?"

“What?”

“I’m hungry now.”

Just the mention of food was enough to send him back to the deck in his memories, but he fought it off to look her way.

“Nothing in the kitchen?”

“Nothing good,” she emphasized, and Jotaro didn’t have the will or energy to fight it. Concentrating on rubbing his two functioning brain cells together, he remembered there was an option that didn’t require any effort at all.

“How does delivery sound? There’s a place with my card on file in my phone.”

 He could hear Jolyne’s voice light up at the suggestion, something well deserved given how sick she was. “Really?”

“… Only something good for you. Something that won’t upset your stomach. Tell the delivery man to drop it off at the door and don’t open it until he’s gone.”

“What about Mr. Dolphy?”

What?

Jotaro felt something soft nudge his side again. That’s right, that was the name of her stuffed animal, and probably the germ-infested thing that gave him this illness, anyway. He should put his foot down, he really should— but…

“He can have soup too.”

Jolyne clambered up onto the bed to hug his limp, unmoving body. A gesture he sincerely wanted to return if his arms worked— he’d have to settle for pointing out the number on his phone and quietly listening to her place the order, only handing it back over to him to confirm it. Sinking his eyes closed into well-deserved rest, he realized there was one last thing to do. As much as he trusted her, he absolutely couldn’t leave her unattended for as long as he’d be knocked out.

“Jolyne, your gr— Jiji's phone number is in here, too. You need to call him and tell him we’re both sick. Tell him he doesn’t have to come over, but it’d help if he sent a family friend or something. Tell him that you need a babysitter.”

Though she opened her mouth to immediately protest, Jotaro’s beleaguered stare quickly silenced her as she took the phone from his side and found his number. Jotaro would begin to drift out of consciousness, brought back to reality by the feeling of something cold and metallic pressing against his forehead. Opening his eyes to stare up at his looming benefactor, he struggled a bit to place their face. He was his second cousin? No, first cousin once removed. The son of his grandfather’s brother? In any case, he was holding a can of juice to him, trying to manually cool his fever.

“Your daughter ordered five containers of egg drop soup, you know,” Jonathan laughed lightly, apparently recognizing Jotaro far easier than the other way around. “I came home and it was sitting on the counter. I put it all away, so don’t worry about it going to waste, you look like you’re going to need it.”

Closing his eyes again, warm familiarity seeped back into him. Though he didn’t always go to the family reunions, Jonathan was hard to forget. They played together as kids, and while they’d grown distant in adulthood, he was as good as they come. He was the kind of guy who went to local schools to talk about archaeology on career days and volunteered things from his studies for charity. Slowly, Jotaro started to relax.

"It’s been forever, hasn’t it? At least two years. Jolyne must have grown a foot since I last saw her… poor thing, she wouldn’t stop talking about how worried she was about you. I sent her back to bed.” An unbelievably large hand rested on his forehead, and the childish gesture was enough for force himself to sit up and wave it off. Whatever he’d felt, Jonathan wasn’t impressed with it, and he turned to root around in the pharmacy bag he’d brought along with him.

“Ibuprofen,” he began, tilting a few pills into his open hand and putting the can of juice in the other, “for the fever. I brought over my laptop, so don’t worry about me getting called away, I can finish my work from here. And I set a bin near the side of your bed, just in case.”

Squinting at him, like he was trying to find the energy to be suspicious of this and coming up dry, Jotaro could only croak one word.

“Why?” It was less ‘why the bin?’ and more ‘why are you doing this for someone you haven’t spoke to in years, who hasn’t so much as acknowledged you in that long?'

“You’re family, and you needed help. Don’t think I haven’t forgotten the time you sacrificed your science project to save my grade. Remember? Mine was completely broken to bits by… someone… and you put my name on your project and turned it in. I got an A and you failed the class. I’m just returning the favor.”

Jonathan might not have forgotten, but Jotaro certainly did. Feeling a wave of sickness as soon as he swallowed the juice, Jotaro stiffly laid back against the bed, trying to quell his stomach. His something-cousin-something-removed stood up, moving to the doorway to give him some privacy.

“Call if you need me,” was the last thing he said before shutting the door with a practiced gentleness, with the soft thuds of his footsteps following him down the hall.

Jotaro glanced to the clock one last time, showing off the numbers 10:46 in blaring, offensive red as he pulled the blankets up over his shoulders and realized he didn’t know if the clock meant AM or PM. How did kids shake this off so easily? Did he used to? Flattening himself against the mattress, even his thoughts became word salad as he closed his eyes, the last coherent one being that he should show Jonathan some of the sunken relics brought into his lab from time to time before that thought flitted out of his head too, destined to be forgotten in sleep.

Chapter Text

One of the benefits of living in a small but relatively well-off coastal city was that Jotaro Kujo was never very far from his work. Though plenty of things required travel, many others could be brought into his lab for further study. He’d recalled with some fondness (but more annoyance) the advice Joseph had given him around the time he was picking colleges: if he picked a job he liked, it would hardly feel like work at all. And true; while he did find the days where he got to observe and document a starfish regenerating one of its limbs peaceful and fulfilling, he wished the old geezer had told him about the endless grant applications he’d have to fill out over and over before he so much as got into a wet suit. Science was a stupidly expensive web of red tape, and every time someone asked him ‘but what’s stopping you from taking a trip to the ocean and doing your own research?’ was another exercise in patience.

But he was lucky. He got a job in his field and quickly, no doubt in thanks to the notoriety he gained in the after that case with Dio. Who knew being a furious activist in his younger years would lead him to such success? Some days, though, that success felt negligible.

Jotaro had respect among his peers, don’t get him wrong— but he wasn’t yet a senior staff member, only just having completed his PhD. He was still comparatively new in his field. While his research had been valuable, the aquarium was small and underfunded, and that meant either cutting staff or cutting things for the animals. Jotaro Kujo would never work for anyone who would do the latter. That meant whenever he wasn’t updating his research or holding meetings, he was expected to take on a few extra tasks.

His days were rather routine. Research in the morning, break at lunch, do some maintenance for the animals that the interns and part-timers weren’t experienced enough to handle. He was in charge of feeding the octopi during the day, who were fond of leaving hickie-like bruises all up and down his arms with their suckers, as well as a few of the nursery animals— this month, it was only sea lions that had been rescued from an oil spill off the coast of California. In addition to feeding time, he had to brush their teeth, often within the scope of people with cameras taking pictures of “Professor DILF”, whom patrons affectionately spread rumors of having a major in marine bi-hottie-gy and a minor in sexonomics.

The fact that he was more attractive to patrons than their stellar starfish touching exhibit was the bane of Jotaro’s life. In an effort to get people more interested in research and the funding thereof, there was a massive glass window looking into their laboratory, punctuated with a few plaques describing what the facility was focusing their efforts on at the moment. Instead of accomplishing what they’d hope it accomplished, Jotaro got men and women tapping on the glass and, when they got his attention, fogging it up to write their phone numbers down. With a bitter grimace, he didn’t even know why they bothered if he couldn’t even read the numbers backwards.

When the various sea creatures he was in charge of were all settled with their routine inspection, he’d take his designated half-hour break to go pick up Jolyne from school and drop her off in the staff room so she could do her homework or watch television. Everyone at the aquarium knew her, knew she was fine to let wander around on her own, but when you were there every day, a lot of the magic of seeing a moray eel sail over your head in a transparent archway lost its spark. Jolyne had more fun when she was allowed to dump flies into the rainforest frog exhibit than she had watching the beluga whale named Vivi sail majestically around in her massive tank.

Jotaro loved Vivi, as much as he’d outwardly express affection toward anything ever. She was a rescue that couldn’t be rehabilitated, and therefore was cared for as a permanent resident. Sometimes, when he was in the hallway near her tank, he’d lecture people about the conservation of belugas, how it was possible for them to be reclassified soon as threatened due to oil trade, and that noise pollution was interrupting their ecosystem and lifestyle because—

(He’d get into that entire speech, looking as gravely serious as he always had, leading more than a few patrons to think he was personally angry with them for boats being too noisy in the arctic. To be fair, sometimes he was.)

There was one more responsibility that occasionally fell on Jotaro’s shoulders, passed around between researchers who had not yet achieved senior status. It was a premium package offered to absurdly generous patrons in which a researcher would give them a complete behind-the-scenes tour of the aquarium and even access to safely feeding or touching a few of their residents, like the penguins and sting rays. This was a task that none of them particularly liked, often fostered off on one another in exchange for favors whenever someone did pony up the costly sum for the tour. They weren’t ungrateful for such large donations by any means, but they would come from both respectful enthusiasts and wealthy people throwing around their money and letting their spoiled kids do whatever they wanted. Jotaro had only ever done it once or twice, and while both times hadn’t been too bad, he’d still heard of horror stories from his coworkers.

“Professor Kujo?”

Not even deigning to look up at his intern, Jotaro continued peeking down into his microscope and jotting down things in chicken scratch next to him. “What.”

“There’s a tour scheduled for today, and you’re up for it. You need to go meet the family near the back gate.”

Adjusting the lens, his reaction was as impassive as ever.

“Hendrix can do it.”

“Hendrix is on vacation, sir.”

“Yoko?”

“She’s been on maternity leave for two weeks already…”

He wrinkled his nose, knowing there was no way he was the only researcher on staff today. “Kiedis, Shakur, Brandy. I know they’re all on schedule today.”

“They’ve all turned it down. Apparently, there’s a conference today with one of our main funders, and they’ve all been asked to attend.”

Except him, though it was understandable— Jotaro had a notoriously bad temper with seeing the people who were constantly cutting their budget face-to-face. That meant he was the only one in the lab doing busywork, and that meant he was the only one expendable enough to do the tour. Frowning and wrapping up his studies for the day, a soft mutter of ‘yare yare’ escaped his lips that didn’t quite end after the first two. He hadn’t gotten into this profession to be social. Having to read the comments on his work blog felt like enough community service for a lifetime.

Shutting down his PC and turning off the lights, Jotaro made one last pit stop at the staff room to tell Jolyne to stay still and behave for the next hour or so. The whole procedure of the tour was excessive. The outline on the website promised the patrons would be allowed to touch and feed at least one of their penguins and had a full access tour through everything but the quarantine. In its entirety it felt excessive, and Jotaro thought if they really wanted to save the environment they would leave the scientists alone while they concentrated their efforts on finding ways to make sure the ocean, you know, stayed alive.

Making his way outside and closing the gate behind him, he launched into the speech before even meeting their eyes, wanting this over with as soon as possible. In a brilliant show of method acting, his tone had all the enthusiasm of a dead fish.

“On behalf of all of us at the Bay Aquarium, allow me to thank you for your generous contribution to conservation and the protection of aquatic wildlife. Without you, it…”

When Jotaro lifted his gaze from the pamphlet he was reading off of, his eyes were immediately caught by three golden ringlets atop a child’s head, and instantly knew that today had rocketed from average to jaw-clenchingly aggravating.

“Oh, I don’t believe I heard that, Dr. Kujo. Say it again. About thanking me for my generous contribution.”

“Excuse me.”

He disappeared back inside, no doubt flagging down the same intern that had asked him to take on the task, making completely sure there wasn’t someone else who could handle it and if they could call in the pregnant woman to do it just in case. Regardless of the outcome of that conversation, Jotaro reappeared from behind the gate, reminding himself that Dio had to pony up a small fortune to do this.

“Again, thank you. That’s a large donation, considering you’ve given so much to us in the past, if indirectly. Big oil companies have to pay a lot in lost lawsuits, don’t they?”

The gloating expression on Dio’s face died down and quickly soured, but Jotaro wisely didn’t press it in front of his kid, even if he still had plenty to say. “Did your father bring you here for anything important today?”

Giorno looked up at him somewhat shyly. This entire outing was the result of months of wearing Dio down, asking to go to the aquarium over and over after his ‘cool friend from school’ bragged to him all about how she was there every day. When he’d been asked what he wanted for his birthday, he’d respond with a firm, ‘I want to go see the fish’. Any suggestion of a different present, some hot electronic or a vacation literally anywhere else was met with ‘only fish’. And when Dio suggested that perhaps Diego take him in his stead, he had nearly started bawling.

So he was here, refusing to look chickenshit over spending time with his son on his birthday. Besides, Jotaro was at his behest now, and if he acted like the animal Dio knew he was, he’d get fired for certain. The sweet, succulent opportunity to boss him around in his own territory was too good to pass up.

Jotaro quietly unfurled a map for him, pointing out where the various animals were located and describing a little bit about them and how their facility cared for them. Completely ignoring the other man there, Jotaro also failed to notice the gate opening behind him.

“Giogio!” A bright and excited voice called out from behind him. Giorno’s eyes lit up, looking past Jotaro’s impressive shoulder span to see his classmate.

“Jojo…!”

“Jolyne, I told you to stay put.” Jotaro stood up, glancing between the two of them. Their rivalry-turned-friendship had never actually bothered him— it had, in some ways, reminded him a lot of his own, and so he found it difficult to begrudge. Besides, being resentful towards his kid for having friends just felt wrong. He’d be lying to himself if he said he wasn’t at least suspicious of him, or waiting for the day he turned out just as rotten as his dad, but for now he was going to give it the benefit of the doubt.

“I saw him through the window!” She turned on him, puffing up indignantly. “I wanted to say hi!”

“You’ve said hi. They’re here for a tour today, and I can’t bring you along for that.” Keeping his words short, sweet, and firm, he hoped she would take the hint.

“She can come if Gio wants her to.”

That was among the more surprising things he’d ever hear come out of Dio Brando’s mouth, considering Jotaro’s expectations of him were below sea level. Frankly, he wasn’t even sure how to respond— but after giving it a thoughtful pause, he let it go. Maybe Dio wouldn’t be a shitheel in front of his kid. All of their little altercations had been firmly out of Giorno’s sight, and Jotaro had made sure that the magnetic draw between his fist and Dio’s face only connected when Jolyne wasn’t there to witness it. Children were impressionable and worried easily, and he didn’t want to scar Jolyne for life by suplexing someone into the otter tank.

A fun idea, though. Otters were more vicious than people gave them credit for if their emergency containment procedures were anything to go by.

Settling on letting his silence give his approval, Jotaro instead turned his attention to the younger Brando.

“What were you looking forward to seeing?”

“… The rays.”

That made enough sense. One of the few exhibits where touching was seasonally allowed. Motioning for Jolyne to stay close to him, he lead the group back into the building, wordlessly and quietly making his way up the stairs to the side.

“Dr. Kujo, I believe one of the benefits of a tour is the tour guide’s ability to communicate with their guests—”

“We’re a multi-purpose research facility that uses the aquarium as a way to fund our wildlife preservation cause. You know, because people sometimes spill an obscene amount of oil in the ocean several times over the course of a century, an entire ecosystem can pay the price. And because of how important a healthy ocean is to the entire planet, saving marine life is like saving the world.”

Giorno seemed captivated by all of this, and while Jolyne bragged about Jotaro’s job when she was sure he wasn’t listening, she was too used to all of her father’s stern lectures on the subject to be paying much attention. She was aware that Giorno always checked out books on animals from the school library and turned them in almost immediately the next day after speeding through them. Everyone in her entire grade knew how passionate he was about living things— Charlotte’s Web made him cry, and then she read it just to prove it was just a dumb story about a pig and she cried too.

That’s why she’d quietly bragged about Jotaro to him, because Giorno would definitely think he was a hero.

“… I want to help animals someday too,” he murmured quietly up at Jotaro.

“That’s a good thing to do. Plenty of animals need help.”

—

Dio didn’t think he would ever nurse quiet jealousy towards Jotaro. Resentment? Sure. Utter, vile hatred? Absolutely, but as Jotaro guided rays to glide toward their tour group in the touching tank like he was some sort of linebacker Disney princess, he was overcome with the urge to sit on the edge and stick his hand in to prove that anyone could do it. Giorno was enchanted, and rightfully so, his eyes lighting up whenever a ray would graze beneath his fingers.

“They’re bumpy and smooth at the same time,” He looked up at Dio, beaming. “Like wet sandpaper. Try it.”

Never in his life before had Dio want to acquaint himself with a gritty pancake and he wasn’t about to start. “I’m fine, Giorno. I believe you.”

Instead, Giorno took his arm and started dragging it towards the water, insisting that he had to try. Jotaro, swishing his hand on top of it, could only smirk in bitter amusement. “Keep your palm flat and just at the surface of the water. They’ll come to you.”

The air of false civility had only made this more interesting, watching Dio bend to Giorno’s whims because while he was eager to be a monster to anyone else, he was in no hurry to have his son resent him. He couldn’t tell why, but he could guess a narcissistic person like him probably viewed Giorno as some sort of future investment he didn’t wish to damage. Tentatively, Dio’s hand flitted into the water only for the biggest stingray to flounder over to him and rush up the side of the tank, flapping just above the water and making him reel back with a disgusted sneer.

“They can’t jump out of the tank.” The one that tried to make friends with Dio settled for Jotaro instead, sailing majestically over to accept his affection. “They’re completely harmless, by the way. The barbs of their stingers have been removed. There’s no need to flinch.”

In another life, Dio would kill a man for even insinuating he was afraid of something so docile, but in this one, he’d be the prime suspect and there were no stone masks to save him from prison, so he weighed his options and let it go. Besides, if he was mad about it later, there were all sorts of payback one could do to their next door neighbor. In the meantime, Dio contented himself by thinking of buying out an entire tank of feeder fish and emptying them into Jotaro’s pool.

When the rays were done hovering near them for affection, Jotaro went into lecture mode. He showed them the part of their aquarium that housed chinchillas as a part of their ‘all mammals are important to the ecosystem’ exhibit. He lead them past their giant octopus, where Jolyne whispered over Giorno’s shoulder that Jotaro would often come home ‘covered in spots’ from handling her. As Giorno was given a small silver fish to feed one of their penguin chicks, Jotaro went on somewhat boringly about oil spills and Dio took up the habit of standing just outside the room to scroll through his phone and send messages he’d been delaying. Occasionally, he’d glance over his shoulder to make sure that yes, his son was still fine, and no, that small fat flightless bird wasn’t hurting him.

“Don’t give me a reason to drag you back into the courtroom, Jotaro.”

“… Your son’s very delicate with animals. There’s no reason to worry.” He passed him another fish, and though Giorno seemed uncomfortable to hold something dead in his hands, the worry was quickly abated when the penguin giddily swallowed it down and peeped in his direction, nosing around his hand for more. “He must get it from his uncle’s side of the family.”

Such harmless, innocuous sounding words froze the air between them as Jolyne took over the the bucket of fish and the two children played a game of ‘who can win over the most penguins’. Dio didn’t turn to look over his shoulder, but his frigid stare could be felt from all the way around the world.

“… You’re familiar with him.”

“Second cousin, sort of. It’s a small world.”

“Hm.” It was the kind of self-affirming sound that said, ‘no wonder your entire lot seems to be the bane of my existence’. Jotaro did indeed look like Jonathan, but the Japanese name had thrown him off of any relation whatsoever. No wonder he’d seen his car outside Jotaro’s house. No wonder, no wonder…

“I take it you’re not friends with him either.”

“He helped with Giorno for a little while.”

“‘Helped’?“

“Mind your own business, Dr. Kujo.”

(Jotaro would later completely fail to mind his own business, sending a Facebook message to Jonathan composed of a short sentence asking what Dio’s deal was and watching the typing icon pop up for a full two hours before getting several unbroken paragraphs of the whole story.)

It was odd. Jotaro had spent the entire trip sizing up the man he’d fist-fought twice in the past six months and wondering what what was going to start round three, but Dio hadn’t done anything aside from throw insults his way that would go over a child’s head. At the very least, they were on equal footing in that regard. Their children being there was a stopper for any potential fisticuffs, else Jotaro might have quietly drowned him in the starfish tank. He was surprised to feel the tension dissipate as they reached the end of the tour and his obligation was finally cut.

Jolyne stared up at the cylinder tank in the middle of the lobby, full of sardines swimming mindlessly in a circle. Someone older than a seven year old could likely ruminate the tank’s representation of futility or herd mentality; that to these fish, it didn’t matter if the tank was as big as it was or the size of a whole ocean. Jolyne, however, mostly thought they were super dumb. Giorno stared up quietly at the tank, staying close to his new best friend and contemplating it a little harder.

“Your dad is cool,” He admitted, finally.

“— He’s a pain. He’s always telling me to clean my room when I have homework, and to do my homework when I’m cleaning my room, and he’s always quiet and he never lets me have sleepovers…”

“Neither does mine.”

“Well, yours is an even bigger pain! No freaking wonder!”

Giorno’s eyes followed the tank, picking out the fish fighting uselessly against the current brought into motion by the other fish. “I don’t think he’s a pain. I know other people do, but…”

In another life, Giorno would be at the age where his skills at reading people were bar none, where he could feel the temperature of a room more accurately than a thermometer. In this life, the need for that skill was almost completely diminished, but some things were just consistent. He may not be in constant vigilance or ever have to be, but he was clever in a way that couldn’t be overwritten. He knew Dio had enemies and deserved some of them by the cruel tone in his voice over the phone in his office, by the fact that he came home once from a parent-teacher conference with wounds. Giorno, however, had never been on the other end of his cruelty, just his sternness and occasionally questionable influence.

He’d probably change his mind in his teenage years, but for now, Giorno was happy. “Do they feed these fish to the penguins?”

“No,” Jolyne shrugged. “They’re just kinda… there. Spinning around and junk.”

He was about to respond when his father finally approached him, holding something impossibly big and soft. Greatly underestimating the discrepancy between the weight he could carry and that a child could carry, he unceremoniously dropped it into Giorno’s arms, who immediately started to buckle beneath the massive stingray plush’s weight.

“Happy birthday, Giorno.” The massive stuffed animal was a celebration in two ways— his son’s birthday and the fact that Dio would never have to return here, ever again. It wasn’t his biggest gift or even the most expensive one, but Dio was of the persuasion that ‘the more enormous and flashier the gift, the more proof I give a damn about you’. More telling about him was the fact that he never bought anyone else presents, with the exception of occasionally remembering Diego’s birthday with a passive aggressive self-help book and a ludicrously expensive gift card to a place Diego didn’t even shop at. Like a craft store.

(Joke’s on him, Diego flipped those for a profit online every year.)

“We still have to go out to dinner, Giorno. Come along.”

Dio turned to leave and immediately spun on his heel when he realized Giorno had flopped completely beneath the weight of his stingray. Picking it back up, Dio cast one last askew glance over his shoulder at Jotaro and his daughter before flipping him a backwards V sign. He figured the child wouldn’t know what it was, but Jotaro definitely would see it as a British ‘fuck off’.

「くそくらえ」

Jotaro’s response was even, perking Jolyne up to bother him what that actually meant, as she’d only ever picked up on a few Japanese words from him.

He promised to tell her when she was a bit older.

—

Jotaro Kujo: jonathan
Jonathan Joestar: Oh! Hello. How are you doing? I’ve kept meaning to check up with you since your illness, but work got in the way. Are both you and Jolyne feeling better?
Jonathan Joestar: She’s so sweet. She sent me several game requests the other day.
Jonathan Joestar: We’re playing scrabble right now!
Jonathan Joestar: Er.
Jonathan Joestar: Online, obviously.
Jonathan Joestar: How are you? Is something up?
Jotaro Kujo: dio
Jotaro Kujo: who is he to you
Jonathan Joestar: Hum…….
Jonathan Joestar: I knew you lived next to him and I knew you had a scuffle with him back in the day… can I ask the sudden interest?
Jotaro Kujo: just curious
Jotaro Kujo: he was cagey
Jotaro Kujo: want to know from the source if you’re willing
Jonathan Joestar: I’m… well, you’re going to find out anyway, aren’t you? I do suppose I’d rather you hear it from me.
Jonathan Joestar: Okay. Back in a minute, just going to get tea.
[ Jonathan Joestar is Away ]

[ Jonathan Joestar is Available ]

Jonathan Joestar: Alright, so.
Jonathan Joestar: I was supposed to adopt his son.

Chapter Text

Rohan Kishibe’s days, nights, and everything in-between fell into place almost as ritually and surely as the sun would rise. His schedule was as particular as it was ridiculous.

From 7 AM to 2 PM, he would sleep in a bedroom with the kind of light-blocking curtains that could convince you a solar eclipse was happening right outside your window, complete with eye mask.
From 2 PM to 4:30 PM, he’d sort his business emails and check in on his fanbase, read the responses to his latest chapter, and very occasionally respond to a few of them, if they were either too thoughtful or too stupid to ignore.
From 4:30 PM to 6 PM, he’d sort out anything and everything he needed to do within normal, waking hours, be they appointments, dropping off finished work, or doing some scant grocery shopping.
And after 6 PM, it was work work work until morning.

It was the kind of lifestyle that required him to be aware of the only nearby places open 24 hours, like outlet stores and greasy breakfast places. It required him to hire maids and gardeners to take care of everything not worthy of his time, and required people to schedule around him rather than vise-versa.

He’d never stop working, even when he got his chapters done weeks, sometimes months in advance. If he wasn’t doing Pink Dark Boy work, he was doing full-color illustrations. If he wasn’t illustrating, then he was scripting. If he wasn’t doing any of that, he was probably working on one of the several one shots that had to take the sidelines to his main project. Rohan never had any shortage of what he was supposed to be doing, and while most people would break under that pressure, he found it comforting. His career and popularity made it so money was never an issue— his house was full of original artworks and replications of furniture from his favorite films and franchises. He rarely wanted for anything, and he intended to keep it that way.

Today, though, Rohan found himself at the IHOP, and by today, he meant 3:03 AM.

It was usually deserted this time of night, save for a police officer taking a break from their deserted patrol hours and the occasional pajama-clothed youth who just really wanted out of the house. There was only one big difference today— that being he noticed his neighbor’s unmistakable silhouette (a strong one, too, he adds— good character design) pouring over countless papers and two thick textbooks open, ruined with highlighter marks.

“I thought you already completed your PhD,” Rohan murmured quietly, pulling out the chair in front of Jotaro and inviting himself to sit with him. An amused sneer crossed his face. “You didn’t leave your child alone at home, did you?”

“Her great-grandpa is watching her tonight. Had to get out and get work done,” then, realizing he didn’t answer Rohan’s question, “My job is paying for additional education. Paper’s due in two days, then I’ll be done.”

Pointing out something sickeningly sweet to the waitress and deliberately requesting warm syrup, Rohan relaxed in his chair, wearing clothes more expensive than the seat had probably ever touched. “Most men would settle for what they have, you know. Raising a child, having a tenured job. It’s almost as if you don’t know what to do with yourself if you’re not tackling something big.”

“A full time job and a seven year old are already big.” Wispy scratches of Jotaro’s pen quickly scrawled down all the notes he’d need to finish the last two pages of his paper. The beginnings of a professor’s messy handwriting was already starting to become apparent in his chicken scratch. “And it doesn’t surprise me that you think they aren’t.”

“You know what I mean. I feel like you miss your activist days…” Leaning over, folding his hands to rest his chin on them. In a strange sense, Jotaro still had a baby face. Not in the same way 25 year olds could get pulled over just for looking like a child, but in the way that Jotaro could have bought a case of beer without a second glance when he was seventeen and still looked the same now. Maybe he just got all of his aging out of the way in one year?

“I’m doing more in the field now than I was before. I don’t miss getting thrown in jail at protests.”

“That’s only because you fought everyone you had a problem with.”

“They deserved it. Still do.”

Satisfied with that answer, Rohan leaned back, memorizing the way the creases fell on Jotaro’s face and how he’d be good inspiration for a character in his next arc. If he could just capture the simultaneously stressed-yet-tranquil expression, he was certain he’d have a popular character within an hour of the chapter being released. Quiet ruggedness was ‘in’ right now.

“Holding back these days?” The mangaka asked, somewhat provokingly.

“Only using different methods.” The scratching of his pen slowed to a quiet stop as he took a deep swig of his coffee, flipping back over the pages to make sure they were fine to turn in. “And you’re one to to talk.”

Truthfully, Jotaro planned on typing them out, but this particular professor didn’t mind their delivery so long as they got to him— it was surprising, given Rohan had always thought of Jotaro as ‘effortlessly talented’, that he didn’t complain or buckle under the work, that he just did it. Like him. The little seams showing around the edges were somewhat endearing. One had to guess that he didn’t let people see this side of him. They caught him like this, just as Rohan had tonight.

Rolling his neck in an effort to get rid of a knot that would never go away, Rohan supposed he’d have to satisfy himself with that answer. It took a workaholic to know one— though, in Jotaro’s case, it might have just been diligence. When the plate of sugar and carbs was set in front of him, he picked around a different topic to bother his neighbor with.

“Does Jolyne read my comic?”

“There isn’t a grade schooler in our area who doesn’t. Kids accidentally leave behind stuff with your… designs… on it at the aquarium all the time.” Little things, trinkets that children like. This time, Jotaro took a swig of water, wisely leaving the coffee mug where it sat. “She made her own character for it.”

“Really?”

“Deep Blue Girl.”

“Show me.”

“Her drawings are at home, so—“

Rohan snatched up Jotaro’s phone and immediately flipped to the picture section, calling him on his bluff that he wouldn’t have his daughter’s art on there before Jotaro even tried to deny it.

“Is it this one?” He held up a picture of their refrigerator that had made it onto Jotaro’s Facebook page that had a conspicuously cerulean crayon drawing pinned to it.

Jotaro squinted slightly, utilizing the remaining brain cells he didn’t completely dry up on his paper. “Maybe.”

“I’m emailing this to myself.” Rohan Kishibe needed no permission, and Jotaro didn’t feel like arguing with him until he heard the ding of the ‘mail sent’ noise and Rohan kept browsing his phone. That was when he finally snatched it out of his hands, making sure he didn’t go in too deep, not that he had much to hide. His texts were almost entirely one word messages, sometimes even just one letter.

Hearing the call of his bed from several miles away, Jotaro sternly obeyed it by standing up and packing up his things. If he was lucky, he’d be able to get a few hours in. “I’m heading home. Don’t do anything weird with that drawing. I don’t want a picture of my kitchen on your blog.”

“Nonsense. I simply enjoy saving fanart. Children have a very sincere approach to fiction, I think.” Rohan made an extravagant gesture with his hands. “They love the world of a comic so much that they wish to be a part of it. They find the little crevices where they fit in and they spend days, months, years with their small daydreams. For some of my younger fans, it’s the pinnacle of their enjoyment. That’s why I’m fond of those characters— Deep Blue Girl, and so on. They’re the voice that calls back to my work. The beginnings of people who will one day create their own.”

But then, a brief pause.

“But some of the older fans can be twits about it, though.”

“Sure,” By then, Jotaro had already tuned out, slung his pack over his shoulder, and was on the way out. He’d only remember the conversation again when a manilla envelope addressed to Jolyne would show up in his mailbox, the only thing inside being a professional rendition of her fan character.

Dio woke up first, to the cold chill of an overly air-conditioned house, just as he usually did.

A night owl at heart but a morning person by necessity, the tousled look of him just out of bed was something very few had the privilege of seeing. Almost automatically, he rose at the sight of deep blue daylight outside of his window and reached for his phone, sorting through the important messages like a ritual. Some days he’d wake up to case updates, and some days he’d wake up to unstable clients screaming their guilt at him and damage control was an immediate necessity. Thankfully, today was not one of them. A few adverts and PDFs for paperwork were all he had to look at.

Flicking the button of his alarm off, he circled around his bed and opened the door with a soft creak, padding down the hall and giving three sharp knocks on Giorno’s bedroom door. It’d be another half hour before Giorno got himself all sorted out, but he always woke up without fail, and Dio would crack open the door just to make sure he was stirring.

Then, in the kitchen for tea. Dio usually had someone living in for this to prepare their meals and breakfast and babysit— but he was between servants at the time. His last had been something of a disappointment, and the one before had assumed their job included physical benefits. He couldn’t throw them out fast enough for daring to presume alone.

“Maybe it’s time to call Vanilla again, finally…”

An old college friend who was a little too devout, but responsible and respectful. He had several people who pledged loyalty to him in their younger years, people who still sent emails like he was a professor who changed their lives and sought his wisdom. He always had that enigmatic aura, that kind of snap of the fingers power over others that drew them close and closer still. Luckily, the same power was effective at keeping them at bay, so he’d yet to have any stalkers— which was good for their sakes, because he had a zero tolerance policy. If he were in the cult business, Dio imagined he’d have quite a following by now.

In particular, a priest would treat ‘[email protected]’ like a weekly confessional, writing thousands of words of political and philosophical inquiries to him like a ritual, and Dio would respond sincerely each time. They had a reasonable friendship, certainly as close as Dio ever got to it. On the opposite end, Dio would get emails from “[email protected]” erratically, sometimes frequently, and sometimes spaced apart. They were always the same in nature.

‘Re: Giorno’
‘Re: Elementary Grad Invites?’
‘Re: birthday party’
‘Re:Re:Re:Re: Dio…’

Sometimes Dio didn’t respond.

One draft was sitting in his phone email, half-written and ignored, and he knew he’d have to send it off before the day was over or Jonathan would hover and fuss. For as badly as Dio treated him growing up, he supposed a poor sibling relationship was nothing in the face of what he did to him seven years ago, and then did again four years ago.

And yet… the messages never ceased. For once, in spite of every rational thing, Dio understood why.

Giorno wandered into the kitchen in a blanket cloak and pulled himself up onto one of the high stools next to the counter. Breakfast was simple— exotic fruit Dio carved carefully with a knife, avocado on toast, and several eggs that hit the plate as soon as they were done frying. Simple and healthy was for the best, even if Giorno had a tendency to eat all of the fruit first and then pick over his toast and eggs.

“Eggs are dead chickens, right?” His son had been a vegetarian ever since a particularly traumatizing educational video he’d seen in school when he was four or five. Now, he wouldn’t touch a single cut of meat.

Dio smirked slightly, cracking another egg on the side of the pan for himself. “They’re byproducts of female chickens. No actual chicken-killing involved.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure. They keep the chickens alive. Ask your teacher if you don’t believe me.”

Giorno seemed suspicious, but satisfied with the answer for now. One day, he’d probably find out just how those byproducts were made and what happened to the baby male chicks and swear off this kind of breakfast forever, but for now, he was fine with the half-truth. It was hardly the most vile one that Dio ever told.

When dawn finally broke completely through the window, shedding off the cyan hue of night, Giorno set his plate in the sink and ran upstairs to go wash up. Dio would soon follow suit, slipping into his own empty bathroom to begin the morning ritual of becoming his own brand of lawyer-esque perfection. A cool shower first, drying off and getting halfway dressed second, then the dedicated styling of his hair, followed by the sharp ends and subtle tones of his makeup. Like clockwork, Giorno would knock on his door and Dio would tell him to come in, and have him sit on the counter while he pinned the rolls of his hair into place. His son tried before to do them by himself, but the rolls always looked lumpy and Dio would patiently take them out and help redo them.

It was a tradition spanning back since he had hair long enough to do this. Dio curled his bangs on a whim, and Gio had loved it.

“Do you have any homework over the summer?” One after another, Dio took one of the bobby pins pinched between his teeth out to pin a lock of his hair in place.

“Mrs. Lauper said she’ll make us write an essay about summer vacation when we get back. That’s it.”

The pins were carefully hidden in his fluffy hair, and Dio shielded Giorno’s eyes and shook the hairspray can. “Hm.”

“What?”

“… We might not have a vacation this year,” Dio finally responded, misting his hair, waiting for his inevitable sneeze, and moving back in front of the mirror to finish his own hair. “Padre has a very important case spanning July through August. We’ll probably be in session for weeks on end. Do you know the man I told you about a few weeks ago?”

Diego was babysitting again then, and he turned on FaceTime so he could read Giorno to sleep. Instead of a normal children’s book, Dio read him a very PG version of his case notes. The content wasn’t as important as the sound of his voice and how boring his reading material was, but he’d noticed Giorno would sneakily turn on the news every now and then to see the man on television.

“The suspicious guy! The guy on TV!”

“Well, he could have done a very bad thing, and you’re right, he’s terribly suspicious. That’s why I, Dio, must represent him. Because no one else is smart enough to deal with such a suspicious man.”

Fingers through his hair, fluffing it toward the back. It wasn’t the most conventional look, but lawyers were about charisma. They were about sounding like they could be on an episode of Law and Order without a script, thinking and talking on the fly. Jurors loved him, because he knew what they wanted. When he took the floor, he gave them that feeling that they were a part of something magnificent and grand, like on television. He could make weak details sound like the crack in a case, and he could put doubt in the hearts of the most steadfast witnesses. His words were always romantic and manipulative, and while he had his critics, he also had his fans.

“You’ll be gone every day…”

These cases were accompanied by endless research, a lack of sleep, reciting speeches and proofreading documents. Dio smiled thinly at him as he took his jacket off of the hanger beside him, very nearly finishing off his model look.

“Do you want to come to the office with me today, buongiorno? I won’t mind as long as you behave.”

Giorno glanced up at his nickname, dangling his legs over the counter. He could play games on his computer or watch television in his office as Dio worked, and usually there was enough time when he got out for them to go shopping or get food after. Plus, his secretaries, undergrads, and assistants always treated him so nicely— going out of their way to spoil and play with him (because it’d please Dio, and also because it’d be easier than scanning papers all day).

“Yeah!”

“Go get properly dressed and gather your things, then.”

He immediately pushed off the counter and dashed off to his bedroom, and Dio idly wondered that while he was in the throes of a grisly serial murder case, where the killer had taken inspiration from Tibetan sky burials in order to dispose of his victims— if there was something perhaps… inappropriate about treating the day where he’d be analyzing forensic evidence in his favor as a fun day out with his son.

No, definitely not, he thinks as he snatches his keys off the counter. And it’s a stupid question in the first place, too. After all, he wasn’t the one that left four people to the vultures in a state park. Why should Giorno have to be lonely just because someone— who may or may not be his client— did?

Jotaro called into work that morning. Between nearly falling asleep at the wheel, forgetting where his professor’s office was, and going through every single key on his keyring until he got the right one for his house, he was able to negotiate with himself into calling them and asking to come in at noon instead. His grandfather was asleep on his sofa, with the TV turned on to some channel running infomercials.

“Jiji.”

With a startled snort, Joseph jolted awake, before sighing at the sight of Jotaro and rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Jesus, Jotaro, I can’t take a sudden wake-up as well as I used to—“

“Where are the kids?”

“Josuke and Jolyne? I… put them to bed, why?”

“There’s a light on in the basement.”

Of course. Once he knocked out, he knocked out— it’d be easy for them to sneak down there to watch TV or play video games with him none the wiser. “Go get ‘em. I’ll deal with Josuke when I’m more… awake.”

That could be an hour or longer, so Jotaro took up the mantle and descended to see the two of them— his kid and Josuke, older only by a few years, clearly exhausted and fixated on morning cartoons. A few scattered board games littered the room, but most prominent was the ouija board sitting front and center on the glass coffee table.

Jotaro sighed.

“Dad!” Her voice was weakly scared as she got up off the sofa and hugged his leg. “Dad, we called a ghost!”

“No, you didn’t.”

“We did!” Josuke barked from his place on the sofa, pulling the blanket Jolyne left behind closer around him. “We asked its name and he said ‘William!’ When we asked how he died, he said ‘here’! And then the lights in the bathroom flickered!”

“The lights in the bathroom down here always flicker. Something with the wiring…”

“But it was at the exact same time!” Jolyne tugged on the side of his pants with a frightful insistence. “And we heard knocking around the house!”

There was exceedingly little Jotaro could do to settle down two scared, sleepless children, so he took the first idea that came into his head and sat down in front of the Hasbro piece of trash and put his hand on the plastic planchette. Jolyne scooted timidly back onto the old sofa and watched, literally on the edge of her seat. Josuke seemed to be listening or looking for any sign of William’s reaction.

“Get out of my house.”

And then, he slowly moved the planchette to the words ‘O. K.’

Problem solved. Jotaro folded up the board and put it back into its box, only for Jiji to cough loudly above them, setting off a chain reaction of kids screaming and bolting up the stairs and Jotaro standing up so fast and so sharply that he hit his head on one of the basement’s ceiling beams. Between the splitting pain and nails on a chalkboard sound of children panicking, Jotaro had gone from dead on his feet to sharply awake in a matter of moments.

There’d be time to interrogate them later. He dropped the box back onto the table, shrugged his heavy book bag off and dropped his coat on the sofa, picking up the remote and very nearly sitting on a lump on the sofa he didn’t know was there.

“… Okuyasu.”

The kid stirred awake, having been seemingly invisible underneath an assortment of blankets.

“Mr. Kujo, I asked Josuke’s dad if—“

“It’s fine. He’s upstairs. Go.”

Jotaro wished he had the conviction of a kid who could sleep through his friends’ noisy screaming at a ghost that didn’t exist, but he sent him off upstairs and got comfortable on the sofa, changing the channel to the news.

“This is Katie Perry, today we’ll be continuing our story on the grisly serial murder case that has shocked our entire district into—“

Luckily, Jotaro didn’t stay awake long enough to hear their pre-recorded interview with the defense team. He’d prefer hearing a ghost in his basement than the sound of Dio Brando’s overdramatic voice.

Chapter Text

DIEGO: is giorno ready. ten mins from your house
DIO: This is still a fantastically awful idea, and if I get a call in the middle of the night talking about how he wandered off a cliff because you were too busy pouring bourbon into your coffee I’ll be more than miffed
DIEGO: save the visceral imagery for that case of yours don’t use it all up on me
DIEGO: you needed a babysitter i’m going camping giorno loves bugs and you don’t trust your kid with hardly anyone else
DIEGO: this worked out for you let it go
DIO: Do not
DIO: Take
DIO: Your eyes
DIO: Off of him
DIEGO: it’s getting really old you know
DIEGO: the relentless scolding before i actually do something wrong
DIEGO: like i have ever lost my nephew
DIEGO: besides other people are there and i know one of them is good with kids so even on the off chance i need to run free with the wolves someone’s going to be keeping an eye on him
DIO: Who
DIEGO: trustworthy people. jonathans going to be there
[ Read 7 mins. Ago ]

DIEGO: ok well you can be as pissy as you want over that but now you know for sure
DIEGO: giorno will be fine
DIEGO: send him outside with his things and all the bugspray his arms can carry I’m here
DIEGO: and it better not be more than two duffel bags because I’ve been there when you paid 300 extra for your massive checked luggage
DIEGO: be practical
DIEGO: a seven year old has no need for a formal-casual outfit in the wilderness

The cluster of trees did little to prevent the overbearing warmth of the mid-August swelter, but the shade the branches provided and the occasional humid breeze played their part in relief from it. The campgrounds spoke of age— signs with chipped paint and yellowed flyers pinned to them brought to mind almost a sense of preserved abandonment. Nothing looked new, smelled new— the brick bathrooms lined with broken tiles and cracked porcelain only bore signs of life through the fact that there were still bulbs hanging from the ceiling, and presumably, someone ran through and cleaned them enough for it to be not completely unbearable. In a sense, it was almost a draw to the campsite. What people had built there, foliage had grown over and reclaimed. One actually felt like it was just them and the woods.

“Close your eyes and mouth.”

Jolyne scrunched her face up as Jotaro sprayed her down with sunblock and bugspray— knowing she’d probably come back from this covered tip to toe in bites and too-pink burns anyway. So would he, of course— the one time he shed his heavy silhouette of a coat for a shirt and pants. An askew glance over at Joseph wrestling Josuke in place so he could do the same told him they’d probably end up worse off.

“You sure you’re not too old for this, Jiji?”

“You can shut it.” Joseph, despite rapidly approaching sixty-eight years of age, looked like a weathered Hollywood star who still had some life left in him. He had Caesar to thank for that. The man had achieved his lifelong ambition of being a world-class fitness instructor, with a regimen strict and strong enough to keep him looking not a day past fifty. Joseph, of course, had slacked, but Caesar had never let him go too far off too often. That was the nature of their relationship— Joseph was all play, Caesar was all work, and they gave each other what the other lacked. Today, Joseph was certainly strong enough to wrangle Josuke, freeing him with a laugh once he was sure he was a sufficient ward against mosquitos.

“You messed up my hair!”

“I barely touched it, kiddo! And that’s nothing compared to what’ll happen to it when we go hiking!”

Nonetheless, Josuke had pulled a comb from his pocket and started smoothing over the stray strands like some sort of mini-punk. His hair was just barely long enough to pull into its tiny pompadour, but he took full advantage of doing so every single day. It was a fascination Joseph couldn’t understand, but wouldn’t exactly put his foot down on, either. Some kids were really into dinosaurs, or horses… his son was just really into Arthur Fonzarelli. Or so he thought.

“Who else are we waiting for?” Jotaro had given Jolyne his hat for the moment due to the sun’s almost petrifying glare down on him. By the shadows around him, he had to guess it was just before eleven.

“Let’s see… Jonathan said he was going to ride with his younger adopted brother here. And he— Diego— invited a few friends who know the trails. I think that’s about everyone.”

Diego had a tendency towards two-facedness, and all of them knew it, but at the very least, he didn’t start shit in the same way Dio did. He kept up his appearances in conjunction with his pride, rather than putting pride before it. He was tolerable and strange, not quite likable but not as completely unpleasant as Dio. And by now, Jotaro knew Jonathan would’ve given anything for time with Giorno.

When Diego’s teal 2003 Nissan Altima pulled into the campground parking lot, a rather rusted old pick-up truck pulled in behind it. Giorno was quick to bounce out of the car to meet his friends, and like a circus weightlifter squeezing out of a clown car, his brunette uncle was quick to follow in step.

“Giorno, don’t forget you’ll have to carry things to the campsite.”

Even his reminders felt like gentle requests than a scolding— Giorno nodded happily to him and turned around once more to topple into Jolyne and Josuke. In the more recent months, it felt like they had grown even closer than before. The summer had been kind to them, it gave them several adventures to scrape their knees with. Diego was the last to get out of the car, popping the trunk and starting to unload the camping equipment he’d played a game of real-life tetris to get inside. It’s his friends— a well-groomed-in-the-wrong-ways twenty-something and a more college-looking joe that come out next, but not before the taller one unfolds a wheelchair and helps the other into it.

“Is this everyone?” His voice is sharp as his companion wheels around to the back of the trunk and starts reaching in and pulling things out with relative ease.

“… hey, who are these two?” Joseph is the first to get curious, as always.

“Gyro’s the taller one, Johnny’s the short stack. They practically live out in these woods. I told them I was going and they begged to come along.” Diego was carefully checking through the luggage, wondering what to take with him and what to leave behind as Dio’s excess.

“You’ve never lacked the nerve to lie right in front of us, Diego,” The hearty slap Gyro gave his back doubled almost as a punishment. “He said he didn’t know shit about this place and asked us to tag along. He’s right on the first part though. We come out almost every free weekend we got.”

“Wait a minute,” Joseph watched Johnny roll over to Jonathan, tossing him some of the heavier equipment with familiarity. Cousins, or something like it. They knew each other well enough, at least. “If we’re going to be going up the trails, how—“

Jotaro scrunched his face, taking his hat back from Jolyne and forcing it down his forehead.

“How what?” It sounded like Johnny could predict what was coming next.

“… I’m just gonna say it. How are we gonna get a guy in a wheelchair, you know, around. Because—“

“Jiji, for the love of—“

“No,” Johnny lifted a hand. “I wanna hear where he’s going with this. Old people always make it funny, like he isn’t going to hurt his back walking up there himself.”

Joseph wisely shut up. Gyro whistled over at him with a wry grin.

“I know that back when you were running the Oregon Trail, there weren’t any good clear roads. But in the modern era, we’ve got these fascinating inventions known as pathways. You can run a wheel right over ‘em. Incredible.”

“He might not have had wheels back then,” Johnny offered, helpfully.

“Then pardon my rudeness, Grandpappy Joestar.” With a firm hand, Gyro closed the tailgate. “When we get to the campsite, we can introduce you to fire, too.”

True to his word, the trails wove around for miles as they made the hike, Jonathan carrying the bulk of their shared baggage like it were a light feather mattress. Giorno kept close to his legs, happily chattering with him over what he was doing in school, listening closely to his story about an excavation near Istanbul. One could easily mistake them for father and son, were it not for the question of resemblance. Josuke, however, didn’t share Giorno’s endurance, and hitched a ride with Johnny by sitting on his knees as he rolled along.

“… so we brought plenty of food. Me and Johnny like to fish, actually. D’you know in the south of the US, they eat frog legs? Like, just skewer them and put them on the grill. Hardly believed it until he made me try it, so I’m gonna try and—“

“We’re not eating frogs.” Jotaro’s orders were by no means as gentle as Jonathan’s.

“It’s not awful. It’s just like chicken. Johnny, where’d you learn to do stuff like that, anyway?”

“That’s just what taking vacations in Mississippi was. Crawfish and frog legs.”

“Yeah, but you came from a rich family. They sure as shit weren’t teaching you to catch them.”

“So? My friends did.”

“You Americans,” The tune Gyro had been whistling to keep up morale continued until they found the spot just near the end of the trail.

“This way, no one’ll drive up this far to bother us.”

It was a clear space, with the sound of running water trickling by some fair distance away. A few errant, empty cans of beer were scattered around, Gyro picking them up with the quickness of a guilty party. Pitching the tents was an ‘everyone’ effort. One for Gyro and Johnny. A rather massive one to accommodate Jonathan, Diego, and Giorno, and a fancy, multi-room one for Joseph, Josuke, Jotaro, and Jolyne. Joseph was the kind of person to own an elegant trailer for this very reason, but was talked down to a tent. Still, that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to be sleeping en vogue.

“So…” Diego began quietly as the pop-up tent unfolded to its full glory.

“So?” Jonathan’s tone was always so nice when dealing with him. He could’ve been a better lawyer than Dio, for how disarming he could be at times.

“How’s the business? Of digging up old bones and pots and arranging them nicely for museums, I guess?”

“Busy,” Jonathan shakes his head and nudges Diego out of the way so that he can do the hard part of the work, flitting his gaze over to make sure Giorno was still close by. “I’m always called out at a moment’s notice! And I’ve been treated so well that it hardly feels like work.” He popped his head out of the screen, grabbing bags and pulling them inside. “Didn’t you want to get into paleontology?”

Diego gave a vague, half-shrug. “That’s a hobby. Sooner or later, I’ve got to finish the law degree Dio’s buying me.”

“Are you sure? You shouldn’t give up a passion just because he’s so… willful.”

“Law’s a good stepping stone into politics.” Diego unlatched the cooler just to pull out a beer, already feeling parched from the walk. “Don’t you remember what I told you I really wanted to do before I moved out?”

Jonathan gave a half-hearted laugh. “Yes, but you were so young—“

“I want Manhattan, still. And Dio’s… influence convinces me that’s not so much a pipe dream anymore. Not that I’ll be climbing up on his back, of course. Just his name.”

There was something about his Brando brothers that always felt a bit delusional to Jonathan— if they didn’t possess the powers to make such ridiculous, grand things a reality. Any other person who said they wanted a town in their pocket one day were pretentious, ridiculous, possibly a little high. When either of them said it…

“… I think paleontology would be good for you.” After everything is gently set in place, the sleeping bags rolled out and the tent zipped up, Jonathan ducks to grab a cola next to him. “You’re more knowledgeable than even some of my colleagues on the topic. You always get so excited when I send a bone or piece of amber to you.”

Diego waved him off, as if he was trying to dissipate the doubts Jonathan was trying to press into him. The unspoken ‘don’t be Dio’ was clear as day, but he’d rather carve his own path than listen to either brother. Realizing he was making the outing tense, Jonathan clinked his can to Diego’s.

“To a good time, if nothing else?”

“Sure.”

Immediately, Diego’s eyes locked on to Giorno, making sure he was still within sight and he could still keep his head. Jonathan seemed to have effortlessly been keeping track of him, watching as they knelt near the firepit and Gyro started lighting it up. A few failed demonstrations with getting a stick to start smoking was all it took for him to give up and go for the lighter instead. Jotaro was sitting off on a log to the side, swiping through emails on his phone as he chewed the end of a straw. He’d done toothpicks at first when he started quitting smoking, but they’d splintered fast in his mouth. His ex made him swear to give it up. Plus, he couldn’t think of any way to make ‘do as I say, not as I do’ work with Jolyne.

Joseph was quick to snatch the phone out of his hands.

“We came up here to get away from all of this! Just this once, give yourself a break.”

“It’s easy for you to say now that you’re retired.” Still, Jotaro didn’t reach for it back, and Joseph took the opportunity to turn it off.

“Do you go on outings with Jolyne often?”

“She comes to the aquarium almost every day.”

“Ahh, that’s not the same. Even Disney World would get boring for the child of someone who worked there.”

Jotaro gave a shrug, looking up as Gyro set out an iron grill over the fire pit and Johnny moved himself to the log beside him as they futzed over what to make first.

“Make this weekend really fun for her, okay? A good story she can bring home to her classmates. Jolyne will appreciate that most of all.”

Joseph wasn’t blind to Jotaro’s struggles— he wove his affection into his actions, but a child might not see that so easily. He needed a good push in the right direction from time to time, and that’s what made him rise from his seat and go over to the fire pit to draw her away from the crackling flame and back to the safety around the circle. Taking a stick from the pile beside him, he showed her how to singe the grime off of it so anything they roasted wouldn’t also carry the refreshing taste of dirt.

And for a while, it was quiet.

The scent of cooked meat and burnt marshmallows were still wafting over the camp by the time night fell properly, with everyone still chattering around the fire contentedly. The trio of children were gabbing indecipherably about something from school, or some popular new thing no one older than thirty there knew anything about— a mention of a scary game that a kid from Giorno’s class bragged about perked Gyro’s attention, and he sat down the fire poker to look over at them.

“You kids ever hear about the Goatman?”

“Huh?”

“There’s a story in these parts… you know, we always heard it from other campers—“

Jonathan rubbed his brow. “If you insist on telling this, maybe after the children have gone to sleep?”

Johnny pulled up his knees, giving a half-hearted shrug. “Pff. Kids aren’t as fragile as you think they are. I remember liking spooky stuff when I was little.”

“I wanna hear it!” Jolyne was the first to exclaim it, with Giorno nodding after her and Josuke side-eyeing the two with an uncertain look. Joseph took note, giving him a hearty pat on the back.

“You can go to your tent, Josuke, it’s fine.”

“No way!” Joseph’s coddling brought out his defiance in full force, refocusing his attention on Gyro. “Tell us! What’s the Goatman?”

Popping the cap off another beer with his teeth and spitting it to the side, Gyro took a first swig and grinned. He definitely didn’t look like the kind of guy who should have a full grill, and the firelight made it look a little more menacing than entertaining.

“So this guy parked his RV down the road a few years back. He had a family of like… five people? Staying with him. And it’s going really great and they’re all getting along, ready to stay for the whole week, when… at first, you know, it’s just bushes rustling. That’s not weird, there’s animals everywhere. But it kept happening. Same place, same time. There was nothing there, no animal nests to worry about. They chalked it up to the wind and moved on.”

Setting down his beer bottle so he’d have the full gesture of his hands, Gyro went on. “But then came the smell. It was like burnt pennies and ozone. It smelled the way blood tastes. They thought a small animal had been killed nearby or something, but they were starting to get a little more uncomfortable. Still, one of the family members pointed out that if someone knocked over a can of trash or a skunk came by, that might be where the foul smell was coming from. They decided to wait it out. But, you know…”

Gyro gestured over the fire, to all of them. “That guy was staying with five people. Including himself, six. So near the second to last night, he starts counting down the people in the tents. Six people.”

He leaned in, quietly.

“And he made seven.”

The children stared wide eyed up at him. Even Jonathan was leaning a bit closer.

“He called for the people he knew came with him. First, he asked for his wife to check on the heater in the trailer. Then, his two kids to come clean up their toys. Then, his brother and sister-in-law to help him settle something between him and his wife. And once they were all in, he locked the door and told them to stay quiet. He said something— someone— had invaded their campsite. In the tents, he couldn’t tell who was who.”

“And then it started wailing!” Gyro’s voice got more grandiose as he went on, standing up and pacing around the fire. “It scratched at the doors, yowling like an animal trying to form human words! The stench was unbearable! The kids started screaming! And all of a sudden… it stopped. None of them went outside the trailer that evening, even with how cramped it was. He couldn’t sleep either. He just had his shotgun as he sat beside the door, smelling the copper come and go. And when morning broke… everything was fine.”

There seemed to be a collective ease exhaled around the campfire, except from Johnny, who knew the good part was coming.

“They packed up their things and decided to go home early. But you know— he was the last one out. There were piles of blankets on the floor where the family had found places to sleep. One, two, three…” Gyro was counting it out on his fingers, going slower. “Four… five… six. And the man had never slept that night. It had laid in the trailer with his family. He threw open the bathroom door to find—!!”

The children reeled back, slightly.

“… that the bathroom window was wide open. It had found another way in, slipped through his peripheral gaze. God knows what it could have done, what it wanted to do. But they packed up and left, and I haven’t heard about them camping here ever again.”

Diego didn’t seem impressed. “That’s it?”

“That’s it. What? You think I’m going to recount the Texas Chainsaw Massacre to a bunch of kids?”

Johnny snorted into his beer, coughed, then downed the rest of it. “For what it’s worth, it’s one of my favorites. The idea that you have to count out the people you go to bed with… the idea that there could be one more. It’s fucked up.”

“Johnny!”

“It’s messed up,” He corrected himself at Jonathan’s immediate scolding, which now properly sounded as such. “— Er. Forget the other word, kids.”

Jotaro didn’t have to say anything to make his dissatisfaction clear— that iron stare of his drilled it in clearly enough.  Not that he could really talk— most of the foul language Jolyne had ever learned, she’d learned from him. Speaking of, she seemed to be staring at the group around her, pointing out each one and counting them out. One, two, three, four…

“Jolyne, it’s past your bedtime. Brush your teeth and get in the tent.”

“No! No way!”

“Jolyne.”

With a slight frump, she pushed herself off of the log, not testing his sternness to go dig out her tooth brush and a bottle of water. Giorno, for the most part, seemed completely unaffected, instead rolling a harmless spider around his hand before letting it crawl off on the log.

“I think we could all stand to turn in. Gyro, Johnny, keep an eye out for any… Goatmen, would you?”

(The truth was, Jonathan was absolutely beaming at the story, and wanted to interject with what he was sure were origins of such a monster or legend and what time they would have come from. He reasoned it probably would have put a damper on the storytelling, though.)

“Will do.” Another marshmallow skewered onto a stick. As the firelight dimmed, the families settled quietly to the tune that Gyro was making up on the spot.

“Neither on a plane

or on a boat,

You can’t run away

From that mean old goat, goat, goat…”

Jolyne pulled on Josuke’s ankle when she heard Johnny and Gyro finally turn into bed, clapping her hand over his mouth before he yelled out.

“Josukeeeee… don’t say anything. I need to talk to you.”

They were zipped up in the other half of the tent, apart from their parents. She’d insisted on them having their own ‘room’, even if the only thing that separated it was bug netting. Josuke licked her palm, earning a grossed out ‘ew!’ as she rubbed it off on her pajamas.

“Don’t wake me up like that! I only just fell asleep!”

“Shhhh!!” This time, she didn’t chance it and put a finger over his lips. “I need to talk to you about Gyro’s story! I’ve heard it before!”

“What?”

“Well… something like it… but he left something out. Here, look into the other side of the tent.”

The two of them peered through the mosquito netting, Josuke trying to squint his eyes in the dark.

“It’s just the old man and Jotaro.”

“Look over them!”

It took him a moment to see what she was talking about, but after a moment, he saw it. A lump in the dark on the other side of Joseph’s sleeping form. It was conveniently person sized, and Josuke immediately backed up, messing up their sleeping bags in the process.

“Th- there’s something there!”

“A Goatman,” Jolyne confirmed, solemnly. It was but a moment as the two froze and something moved and rustled in the other half of the tent. Josuke snatched up the big lantern that sat between their sleeping bags and shined it over.

“I don’t— I don’t see anything… it’s just them.”

“It escaped!”

Wasting absolutely no time, Jolyne fought with the zipper of her side of the tent to stumble out of it, finding her sandals and trying to find a silhouette among the trees. Josuke stumbled out with her, passing her the light as she twirled around with it. So far, nothing to see— but the imagination of a child could create more than just a spooky, quiet forest. Out of the corner of her eye, something dark moved against the trees, and she charged for it.

Or she would have, if Josuke didn’t yank her back by the arm.

“Are you crazy?! Even if there was a… a Goatman in our tent, maybe we should let it freaking run away!!”

“No! The part of the story that Gyro left out is that it could imitate anyone! It could pretend to be other people to lure you to your doom… what if it comes back to try and replace dad? Or your dad? Or anyone else? We have to stop it!”

Jolyne was willful above all things, and even when her trembling hands reached for the fire poker, she held it with a resolute firmness. “If it calls for you and sounds like our parents, it’s just trying to get us.” She stuck the poker in the dying firewood, heating up the end of it like she was forging a war weapon. Josuke thought she was absolutely crazy— for both believing in a goatman and wanting to kill it. The sound of another tent unzipping had her thrusting it outward in its direction, but the only monster that came out was… Giorno.

“What are you two doing?”

“The goatman is here! I can smell it!”

“No you can’t, stupid!” Josuke barked back. “I can’t smell it!”

“Then you should try! He’s definitely here!”

Once again, the over-active imagination of a child was nothing to mess with. The scent of burnt hickory wood, intermixed with pieces of meat that fell into the flames— it was a smell, and one that was convincing enough to be what Gyro described. What blood tastes like, and ozone… whatever ozone was supposed to smell like, anyway. Jolyne wasn’t sure why anyone would know what ozone smelled like if it was in the stratosphere.

“We gotta kill it.”

“Why?” Giorno was the first to make her stop and think.

“What if you go home with a doppleganger of your uncle? Even  better— what if we catch it? We can put it in dad’s aquarium! It’ll make us so famous we’ll be in ALL of the history books.”

“Aquariums are for sea life, Jolyne.”

“Who cares! We gotta look for it. Come on— as long as we’re back before morning, it’s not going to hurt them any.”

Josuke, with folded arms, thought about all of the things he could buy with money he presumed was just given to people who made profound discoveries. Giorno, with hands rested on his hips, thought about what it would be like to befriend and bring home an animal no one had ever seen before… with magic powers. Dio would definitely let him keep it, if only to gloat over what a rare find it was. And Jolyne thought about riding its shoulders and plunging her fire poker through its skull, destroying it and becoming the most badass kid in her school— no, in the country. Seven year old defeats violent cryptid sounded like an awesome headline.

So they gathered their gear. Some bacon strips, meant for the morning, for bait. Some weapons, which were some heavy sticks from the wood pile and Jolyne’s poker. And of course, the flashlight. Jolyne hissed a whisper over her shoulders as she pointed her skewer forward, towards the clearing in the brush that had played tricks on her eyes. And so, they marched.

Diego woke up and noticed something was amiss first when he realized the air mattress wedged into their tent was missing someone. Flicking on the little lamp dangling from the top, his worst fears shot straight into the pit of his stomach. Giorno had left.

A long strain of expletives rained out of their tent as he pulled on his shoes and Jonathan roused from his slumber, noticing what was wrong the second he woke up and Diego had already launched his way out, shouting Giorno’s name into the night.

(Some distance away, Jolyne told Giorno firmly that the goatman imitated people’s voices. It’s probably trying to lure them into a deadly trap! They have to get the upper hand first!)

This, of course, alarmed everyone else out of their tent. Joseph’s strain of ‘oh my god’s intermingled with the frantic sounds of Jotaro pulling on his boots faster than an army recruit and circling the perimeter of the camp, finding where the tall grass had been broken down by footsteps, and charged into the forest like a blind buffalo. And if he didn’t seem intimidating enough, Jonathan was hot on his trail, shining a light above him and calling out into the night for Giorno to ‘stay right there, we’re coming to get you’. Diego, panicked and aggravated, followed after them, with Joseph at the tail of the group.

Gyro and Johnny watched from the pushed aside flaps of the tent.

“This is your fault, probably.”

“Don’t say shit like that, I—“

“I’ll hold down the camp. Go after them.”

Hearing them get further and further away, Gyro resigned himself to gathering up the brightest torch they had and following the broken thickets carved down by the people in front of him.

There were no goatmen out in the forest, of course. Nothing with a menacing curl of horns, ten-foot-nothing, chattering like a gleeful menace that has caught its prey. Josuke at least had that to be thankful for. He had significantly less to be glad for when Giorno and Jolyne were gently approaching a snake.

“… hey, Giorno…” She asked him, uneasily. “Isn’t that color pattern, like. Isn’t it different on different snakes? Like the poison ones are one way, and the harmless ones are another?”

He nodded, slightly. “I don’t remember how it goes, though.”

“What if we set a trap with it? It doesn’t seem to be mad, yet…”

The faint hiss in the dark said otherwise.

“Jolyne—“

Giorno was about to say that whatever this was, her grand scheme for fame, it was starting to fall flat of her earlier promises and he was beginning to get a little tired. He was sure if there were any monsters out in the woods, they would have either gotten them by now or they got bored with the chase.

“What would we even do? Dangle it from a tree?”

“That sounds awesome!”

“No. That snake didn’t do anything to anyone, we’re not gonna…”

But Jolyne was already tiptoeing near. She’d seen a show on Animal Planet that if you just grabbed the head right, it couldn’t bite you. They made it look so easy— and she was going to make it look easy too.

Or she would have if it hadn’t lunged for her, and a massive hand snatched it out of mid air and threw it overhand into the night.

“THE GOATMAN!” Jolyne shrieked, immediately picked up by her waist by someone behind her, powerful and tall, certain she was going to be eaten head first as she thrashed and thrashed and…

… thrashed…

Against her father.

Her very angry father.

Her very angry, worried father.

She froze. Just about the only thing she could see from the parade of lights pouring into the clearing was his wide-eyed glare. And then, an exhale, like he’d suddenly let go of everything in relief that she was fine.

“You’re grounded after we go home and until school starts.”

The first words out of his lips are a punishment, of course, but he holds her tightly to him as if he’s convinced she’ll writhe out of his grasp and chase more goatmen if he lets her go. Jonathan and Diego had knelt quietly next to Giorno, making sure he hadn’t been bit or hurt and making it very clear that if his father had been here, he would have lost his mind mowing down the forest just to find him.

“To be honest, I would have resorted to the same thing.” Jonathan ruffled Giorno’s hair with a heavy hand. Diego stood up, hands behind his head, basking in the relief that he’d get to keep it this time around. Giorno would probably escape punishment, if only because Diego would never tell Dio that he wandered off.

On the way back, Joseph’s well-practiced scolding voiced reached out to all of them, not just the boy on his back. That this is exactly why you shouldn’t believe scary stories, and even if you do believe them, do your best to ignore them. At that age, Joseph wasn’t sure he could take wild scares like that anymore.

“You gonna give me a heart attack, Josuke? Or are you gonna behave from now on? Do you know what your mom would do to you if I told her about this?”

“You wouldn’t tell her either!”

“Pfeh! If I go down, I’ll take you with me. Sometimes that’s worth getting a lesson through your skull.”

The camp settled back down again, people crawling back into their tents, too worked up to sleep for a while yet. Josuke and Jotaro exchanged places so he could be sure Jolyne wouldn’t run off again, and with miserable embarrassment, Josuke realized the goatman Jolyne had seen in the tent had only been their bags, lined up against the tent wall, in the perfect shape of a person.

Jotaro laid back down against the tent floor, and Jolyne sat on her knees beside him.

“… I just thought— I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. Don’t do it again.”

Branches scratched against their tent. Jolyne jolted, but Jotaro stayed put.

“There’s no goatmen. Gyro read that story on the internet.”

“What? But he said the people in camp—“

“I’ve read it too. It’s an old one.” The light of his phone dimmed, and he turned it over on its face so it wouldn’t flood their tent. “There’s nothing to be afraid of tonight.”

“How do— how do you know…”

“Because the only moment you were in any real danger, I stopped it. The same goes for any monster. I can handle it.”

The answer, while simple, was more comforting than Jolyne would have given him credit for. Pulling her sleeping bag up over her shoulders, she wiggled her way closer to his sleeping bag and got comfortable— and, remarkably, fell asleep faster than he did.

But it wasn’t too remarkable— he had been more worried than her, in the long run.

They were all up by ten the next day, the previous night left unspoken of. Diego sat on a stump nearby, grinning at the occasional text message he got and cursing whenever his phone would blink without service. Whenever Giorno asked him what he was looking at, his thumb swiped by his phone, characteristic of rapidly changing the app. Jolyne nibbled on grilled toast with bacon and butter as the rest of the kids looked sheepishly around at each other.

“So— no more ghost stories,” Gyro had ran off in an opposite direction that night, and his shins were an angry, patchy red that looked like the dedicated work of mosquitoes and poison ivy. “Not until you’re older. Or possibly never.”

“Fine by me,” Joseph muttered, warming his hands by the fire. “We’ll fish, instead.”

“Fishing is boring,” Jolyne whined.

Jotaro nudged her shoulder with the back of his fishing pole. “It isn’t. I’ll show you how to catch and release.”

While that did nothing to convince her, his words from the other night still rang true in her ears. Jolyne finished the slice of bread and got up off the log to follow him down the steep, sandy trail that lead to the river. Behind them, she could hear Jonathan telling the other kids about his most interesting find near Kathmandu, and also about the time that he got trapped in a cave due to his ridiculously thick arms. He seemed less enthused to tell that one. Jolyne’s hand tightened around her father’s grip. She was a bit surprised to feel him return it.

“Some day,” He began, quietly. “I’ll tell you about the time my friends and I went camping. Polnareff swore up and down there was a big, furry creature walking around our camp.”

“Was there?”

“With Polnareff, you can never be too sure.” He answered simply.

Jolyne understood.

Chapter Text

“Breaking news,” Diego murmured, looking up at his phone screen in the pitch dark of night. “Jean Simmons: acquitted of four counts of first-degree murder. Insufficient forensic evidence coupled with unreliable witness testimony lets the 66-year-old man walk free. The defense, Dio Brando of Brando Law, had this to say:”

Diego cleared his throat, knocking out an imitation of his brother so impressive that Jonathan could have sworn he was in the tent with him. “I understand completely the polarized public view of this case, but more than anything, we must trust in the resources the law has to offer us. Before we execute innocent men, it is the job of the judicial system to prove their culpability beyond a doubt. If faulty evidence sows seeds of doubt, we must listen to reason until the truth— and only the truth— is available to us.”

He double-tapped his home button and rolled around until he was comfortable on the air mattress. It was a king size that spanned the whole width of the tent: Diego shoved up on the far left, Giorno sleeping comfortably in the middle, and Jonathan weighing most of the mattress down on the right. His fingertips scroll through his text messages. Near the top are two left unopened, and he flicked through them.

Dio’s, of course, was cut and dry. The case is over, so bring Giorno home soon. Soon, Diego guessed, meant the next day at the very latest. The whole reason Dio gave him up to him for the week was just so Giorno wouldn’t be sitting at home like a latchkey kid as he went off to do his big case of the year. He probably wanted Giorno home so he could prepare him for the coming school year, or make sure he had his homework done…

… or because he missed him, even if Dio would never admit it in words like those. ‘His presence is a comfort’, probably. Maybe, in the hypnagogic thoughts that came to Diego as he tried to drift off in slumber, Giorno was like an external hard drive of all the goodness Dio was ever capable of squeezed into human form, and Dio was disquieted to be away from him for too long. Like a monster you could control by keeping its heart locked in a box. Silently, very silently, Diego thinks their mom would be disappointed in him for thinking of it that way. Their mom would probably know what it was. A tiny twinge of pain sounded out from the crater her loss had left. He’d been young, and the wound had mostly healed, but she left an emptiness that always had Diego thinking ‘if Mom were here, she’d set Dio straight’ or ‘if Mom were here, maybe Dio would be less ‘DIO’ and be more ‘Dio’.’

But sweet thoughts like that didn’t fit Diego either, so he forces them out with sleep.

—

The trunk of his car closed with the finality of an ending summer. It was a far more difficult Tetris game to arrange their luggage this time around, even though Diego and Jonathan were both sure they hadn’t picked up any wild souvenirs. The rest of the group were back at the campsite, content to stay a few more days before heading back home. To Diego and Giorno, two people used to living a posh lifestyle where air conditioning was always within reach, a week had been more than tiring enough.

The backseat of the car was Giorno’s kingdom, free to lay down with his tablet across the soft cushions that Diego spent a good hour vacuuming out before the trip. Jonathan once again squeezed himself into the passenger seat as Diego flipped through his keys for the right one, air conditioner giving a slight ‘swoosh’ of hot air before it steadily grew cooler.

“You know, I’m never so surprised when I hear he wins those cases anymore,” Jonathan mused thoughtfully, resting his arm near the window and watching as the greenery around them thinned out and highway signs for speed limits and fast food stops became visible over the trees. “I’m more shocked when he loses. Yo— our brother really has a gift.”

Diego wanted to tell Jonathan that he didn’t have to call Dio a brother if he didn’t want to, but veered off the topic as easily as he turned his steering wheel towards the highway. It would probably upset their nephew in the back to hear it. “He’s definitely a savant in terms of analyzing his cases. Sometimes, I wonder if he has the script right in front of him, and he’s always five steps ahead in it.”

“Or he stops the clock, looks at the prosecution’s notes, and continues…”

Diego laughed lightly, knowing that’d be all too harmless of a trick for his brother to use. “Whatever he does, he does it well.”

“And you will, too?”

“This again?” Flicking the radio on, but turning it down just enough so that Toto’s Africa didn’t disturb their conversation, Diego’s hands went firmly back to the wheel. “Of course I will.”

“I just— I grew up with you, Diego, just as readily as he did. I don’t think you want to be a lawyer, politics or not.”

The accusation was met with a shrug, neither a confirmation or denial. “Dio’s not sending me to school because he thinks a family business is a cutesy idea. He could build his law firm with the most flawless people he could get his hands on if he wanted to. The reason he gets prattish with me is because he knows I’m capable of what he can do, enough to invest in that potential. And he’s not—“ Fighting with the words, as if he knows the hypocrisy, “— he’s not so bad, he’s just my brother who tries to act like a father. We lock horns, but I would never sell myself out to please him and he’d never support me through the Ivy Leagues if he thought I was a lost cause wasting his time.”

Jonathan went silent at that. He’d placed Diego as a yearning type who wanted out from Dio’s claws, but maybe that was just what Jonathan would have wanted in his shoes. What Diego described wasn’t complete agreement or rebellion, just that he seemed to know how to weave through Dio’s desires to meet his own ends. Those brothers… the elder Brando and the younger… he couldn’t help but worry with a tinge what kind of influence they’d be on Giorno, even if he knew by now that neither would ever hurt him.

But that ship sailed for him a long time ago.

“… speaking of Ivy Leagues, do you still race horses?”

Now there’s something Diego could get behind talking about for the next few hours. Racing was his natural talent— and it was elegant and sophisticated enough to be seen as a worthy extracurricular at his school. Dio hadn’t even minded buying him Silver Bullet from a respectable thoroughbred line. He remembered what he said that day, as the hired movers loaded the horse inside the trailer. ‘An impressive resume and history is everything. Diego Brando, valedictorian of his class, with a hobby of racing pedigrees in his downtime. So long as you don’t do anything embarrassing at college, I don’t see why your career in politics would have much dirt.’

(But no one was as immaculate at covering up their tracks as Dio and Diego were. They got into plenty of shit— they merely swept off the evidence just as quickly.)

The sunset tapered off into desaturated purples as the only things visible from the backseat were long-standing signs with gas prices and hotel rates. Giorno had ridden along these roads enough to know that there was considerable distance between them and home. Pulling on the seatbelt, he let himself get comfortable with his stuffed ladybug as a pillow and turned on his phone. There was only a meager ten percent battery left, but he no longer cared about conserving it when home was just several hours away.

GIORNO: Padre

The ‘typing now’ icon had popped up ridiculously quickly, almost as immediately as Giorno had messaged him.

DIO: Yes? Is something wrong? You’re on your way home now, aren’t you?
GIORNO: No. Yes
[ DIO is typing ]
GIORNO: I miss you
[ DIO entered text. ]
[ DIO is typing ]
DIO: It has been long, hasn’t it?
DIO: Come to think of it… this has been the longest you’ve gone on a trip without me.
DIO: My apologies, Giogio. I do not intend to make it a habit.
GIORNO: No/, I had fun
GIORNO: I had fun but I missed you
GIORNO: That’s not bad isi t

Somewhere, a few hundred miles away, Dio felt a soft beat of warmth he’d only grown acquainted with in the past several years. The kind of warmth that makes your chair feel more comfortable, the clothes on your back feel softer, and potential stresses tamed back into mere hurdles to be sorted out like paperwork into manila folders. A mentor to his eternal student, each little lesson feeling like another step up the stairs. If all of these conversations brought him such peace of mind, he hoped Gio would never stop learning.

DIO: Never
DIO: Bitter and sweet things complement each other
DIO: Reunions would not feel so good had people never left, would they? Anticipation is uplifting in its own way.
DIO: I am looking forward to seeing you just the same.
GIORNO: you too
GIORNO: were passing the town with the big fans
GIORNO: the ones make electrisity
GIORNO: ill be home soon papa
DIO: I’ll stay up. Take care.

That was his heartwarming goodbye, because even though Dio was not accustomed to saying the succinct three words any normal person would, he was very good at crafting them out of different materials. Giorno held his phone close for a moment before rolling to his side in a tangle of seat belts to try and sleep the rest of the trip off. The sound of his uncles’ voices intermingling pleasantly was a nice backdrop, along with the sight of rushing stars through the sunroof.

Until the car stuttered once, then twice, and then with a swear, Diego pulled it over to the side of the road.

Popping the hood immediately bore out a puff of smoke, sending Diego back and Jonathan swatting it out of the way. He’d helped repair his fair share of broken down jeeps on several of his excavations when a fixed vehicle and a broken one meant the difference between getting back to camp or becoming a missing person’s case. Even still, he called back to Diego saying it’d be for the best if they got this to a mechanic, and fast. Plumes of constant smoke were never really a good sign.

“I’m going to call Dio, he’ll want to drive out and—“

Diego firmly clapped his hand over Jonathan’s cell phone. “Do not.”

“… He’ll be furious if you don’t tell him. Exponentially more so than he would if you told him your car broke down. For goodness’ sake, he can afford a taxi for his son.”

“Look— look. He gave me some money to get my car checked up a while ago. And I sort of… put it off. You know, I had places to be and—“

Jonathan shot him a look, then opened the car door to look at the engine light. Diego had covered it up with a dinosaur sticker.

“Diego!”

“Just tell him we’ll be another day. We decided to stop at your house for the night, or … something. He’ll believe you.”

“That’s because I don’t lie to him.”

“See?” Diego threw his hands up in the air, as if to say ‘problem solved.’ “Look, you’d be doing me a huge favor, and I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

“You know I’m not the best person to put on the phone with him. Just because it’d work doesn’t mean it’s the best idea. Think of Giorno, he probably wants to go home.”

At that, Diego opened the back door of the car and unbuckled Giorno, effortlessly lifting him up. “You want to spend one more night with your uncles?”

“Wh… why?”

“A little car trouble. Of course, we can call your dad and have him send a cab for you, or drive up and get you.”

The pleading look that Diego shot Jonathan was menacing in how earnest it was— and the part of Jonathan who’d spent his days growing up trying to be the best big brother, sharing his archeology books with him, staying up at night with him to wait for Santa— bent and caved. Even if Diego did deserve some scolding for this irresponsibility, he wasn’t sure it should always be Dio doling it out. Jonathan crouched near Giorno and smiled the softest smile he’d given since… well, this morning.

“Giorno. Did I ever tell you about the time I excavated a Greek island and met the most amazing little puppy?”

Giorno shook his head, shaking the sleep out along with it.

“Well— We might not get home tonight. I was thinking if we stayed over in a hotel nearby, I could finish that story for you. And it’s like Diego said, if you want to go back home to dad first, it’ll be just fine.”

“… I’ll stay another night.” The lure of something as interesting as that was hook, line, and sinker for Giorno— plus, hotels had always felt like little pockets of a vacation. Dio could get a hotel anytime, anywhere— in the most luxurious suites, at the busiest times. There was something pleasant that Giorno couldn’t describe, even at that age, about waking up in a pitch dark room, all but for the light that escaped the thick curtains toward the bottom. By now, he’d been several places in the world, grown accustomed to planes and lines and private taxis.

This would be the first time Dio wasn’t present for it. The slightest step of independence.

Jonathan took hold of the phone call while Diego called the tow truck. Giorno stayed in the car as long as he could, overhearing Jonathan say, ‘Of course, neither of us would stop you if you called a taxi… but I think you almost sound anxious, Dio’ and how that seemed to quiet the other man on the phone and puff out his dignity and pride. The excuse of it being a flat tire that they would see a mechanic about in the next town over worked as well— after all, Jonathan was trustworthy. Something so shady might not have flown had it come out of Diego’s mouth, but…

With his car parked outside of a repair shop nearby, the small town seemed like it was only populated by gas stations and all-night diners. If there was a residential area, it was well hidden and probably run down— an industry town that deflated once upon a time. The Twilight Inn, a funny little non-chain operation, was the only place left to stay.

The waiting room was lined with carpet that showed the pattern and ages of the early nineties, colorful and kitsch. A single television sat above the mantle, scrawling by sports broadcasts that had gone down earlier in the day. An aged cola machine flickered to the side of the room, with flavors long since retired still marked as ‘out of order’. Still, it was clean— no busted holes in the wall, no mildew smell, it was just… old. Nostalgic for Diego and Jonathan maybe, but for world-class traveler Giorno, a touch confusing. It was a place so old that they didn’t even get cards at the front desk, but actual keys. Diego whistled.

“What do you think are the odds we’ll find a broken crack pipe underneath the bed or something?”

“Diego!” Jonathan hissed, loud enough to cover up his words. “I’m sure it’ll be fine! And don’t say things like that around Giorno.”

“Hey, he’s at that age where he wouldn’t know what I was talking about, anyway.”

“And at that age where he’s clever enough to learn and find out. Come on.”

Their humble two-bed room looked like a cross between a bed and breakfast and the average hotel. The old carpeting had followed them up the stairs, and the comforters resting atop the bed were patterned with flowers. Between the beds was a homely tube-television that boasted free HBO on a sticker plastered to the side.

But at least it didn’t smell of smoke. Giorno was quick to lay dibs on the bed he wanted most and stared expectantly at Jonathan.
“What happened to the puppy in Greece?”

Jonathan smiled softly as he unzipped his suitcase to pull out his last clean pair of pajamas. “Well, we were on a dig, right? And there was always a fair amount of stray dogs around…”

Diego did some cursory checks around the room, made sure their bathroom wasn’t filthy with mold and that there were no needles one could haplessly step on. Perhaps he’d misjudged the place, and it was just small and a little spooky. It was so damn quiet, you see— there was no one in the downstairs lounge aside from one trucker sitting at the bar. A flip through the ‘room service’ menu boasted more home cooking than standard hotel faire. Even looking in the little refrigerator, the complimentary bottles of booze looked as if they’d been untouched long enough to become a fine vintage by now.

“I’m gonna get some ice,” Diego hollered over his shoulder, seemingly not interrupting either of them.

It was only when he made it to the ice machine that he realized he wasn’t sure what he even needed ice for. Was it just a useless errand he’d subconsciously come up with just to get out of the room with Jonathan in it? Why? Jonathan had never made him uncomfortable, but here he was, lingering in front of a machine too old and he was sure was too filthy to produce any ice worth getting. Instead, he opted for getting a bunch of bottles of soda and whatever looked fresh in the vending machine— a couple bags of funyons, some candy bars, pretzels…

“And even after all of that trouble, this one puppy would come back every day, just because I fed him the meat from my sandwich. He was too young to be away from his mother, so I figured he’d been abandoned— I asked around if anyone knew him, and they didn’t. He was just another one of the strays. So, do you know what I did then?”

Diego slipped quietly back into the room, snacks in his arms.

“What?” Giorno asked, excitedly.

“Where do you think I got Danny from?”

Giorno gasped in a way that immediately earned a soft chuckle from Jonathan. “It was hard! I had to ask a family there to take care of him for me while I filed all the paperwork. Dogs from overseas can carry illnesses, so he had to be fully vetted there and back home, and there was a lot of red tape, but I never saw him more happy than the day he got to come home with me and run around his new yard. He’s gotten so big now! When you come over to my house next time around, you’ll have to see him. I bet he’s almost as tall as you.”

Amidst their happy chatter, Diego set down the things softly and listened to his instincts. His presence here was a bit intruding, even if Jonathan might not have thought so.

“I’m going to walk back to the mechanic. See what they can do until closing. You two be good, okay?”

Giorno nodded back to him, and Jonathan pat his shoulder. “Text me if anything goes wrong, okay?”

“Gotcha.” A little half wave over his shoulder, and he was gone.

—

The mechanic had finished the job and closed only a couple hours after Diego had left them— but he still found time to roost in a bar nearby. Around two in the morning, when he was finally tired enough to start heading back, he saw that the two of them were fast asleep. Little notes and photographs Jonathan had scattered around spoke of stories he’d been telling him all night. The snacks had been thoroughly eaten, with one bottle of coke left for Diego. He hummed softly, swallowing some words he wanted to say now that would have to wait for the morning.

Instead, he tucked himself between the blankets of the unused bed and fell quick into a sleep he knew he’d be rudely awakened from.

—

“I’m sorry,” Diego began quietly, once Giorno was out of earshot getting one last drink from the vending machine. In the bright morning light, Diego was grateful for an excuse to squint his eyes and look away. “For what he did to you. I never meant to… ignore it as much as I did.“

“I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific.”

Nothing more cutting than truthful words. “When he had everything set up for you to adopt Giorno. Had the papers ready, let you spend the entire nine months getting excited to become a dad— shit, you were even renovating rooms and spending more time with the mom-to-be than him, just for him to— change his mind at the last second and take custody. Even getting Giorno’s mother on his side. And then, when he—“

Jonathan lifted a hand. It was clear this kind of conversation was one that would excavate him for once, and dig out all of his hurt over it all again. He wanted to cut off Diego before it got a little deeper.

“It’s fine, Diego.”

“See, you say that, and it’s—“

“No, Diego. Do you know why it’s fine? It’s not because I forgive him for putting me through it and what… came after. It’s because I thought there was no hope for that man. I thought that, even knowing what your father was like and why he might have become the way he was, I couldn’t feel any sympathy for him. There are many things I still can’t forgive him for. But that one thing— that one thing Dio did, it was out of love. The only time I’ve ever seen him do it in his entire life, he showed compassion for someone when it would sacrifice his time, his lifestyle. For once, he was still thinking of himself, but in a different light. He looked at Giorno and saw himself in Dario’s arms.”

He closed the trunk again, with an actual finality this time around.

“I think that’s the first time in his life he felt compassion. And he’s become better. Giorno has made him better, because Dio has one person he can never be cruel to. Can you believe that? I would have intervened long ago if I thought otherwise. He still might be a lot of the same man, but that’s only to us.”

“… I know what you mean.”

“So, just this once— I won’t pretend I don’t think of Giorno as my son, in some odd, distant way, but for all the pain it was— it made an impossible situation possible.”

Jonathan shrugged, cracked his neck, and walked around to the driver’s seat to start up the air conditioning. Diego furrowed his brow, slightly.

“You can be angry with him. You can hate him, resent him— you don’t have to be this zen saint about everything.”

“Hahaha!” The laugh was more like a jovial bark. “I don’t think you paid too much attention! Of course I’m mad. I can’t even think about it for very long without putting myself into a sour mood. I’m just mad with a bigger picture in mind. He was my brother for a long time, too, you know. It’s not like he was a complete stranger to me.”

“I guess—“ Diego started in with, but tapered off silently. He could follow Jonathan’s train of thought, even if it was hard for him to do so on the virtue that Jonathan was just… kinder than him. With his two older brothers as intense rivals growing up, maybe Jonathan had just grown up to the point where he wished Dio would be better? It wasn’t as if they could have some grand battle to settle this. This was the real world, and you couldn’t knock sense into someone without consequences. Dio would always be Dio, and Jonathan would always be Jonathan… maybe Jonathan just wished his brother would change; and he had, at great cost to himself.

Be careful what you wish for, Diego thought quietly to himself. If anyone deserved to be selfish for once in his life, it was Jonathan, but the reality was he simply wouldn’t be Jonathan if he took that offer up.

He let the complicated feeling settle for a bit before his repaired heap of a car sped off to take them both home.

—

“There you are,” Dio murmured softly as Giorno headed up the steps to their house. Well dressed and prim as ever, he crouched down to ruffle his hair, so strange-looking without its unique curls. “I almost went to go get you myself.”

Giorno had never been able to get the full width of his arms around Dio, but he tried his best to hug him before he stood back up.

“Well… I suppose you got him back in one piece, albeit late.” There was a sharpness to his tone, as if to say ‘you’re not off the hook until I’m sure he hasn’t contracted malaria in whatever forest you took him to’. Diego furrowed his brows and was about to snap back, when a smile curled his lips.

“You softie.”

“What.”

“What?” Diego parroted obnoxiously. “I’m just telling you the truth. You’ve gone from tungsten to gold.”

“And you remain as irritating as nickel. Leave.”

A sharp grin over his shoulder, Diego smiled far too smugly for Dio’s liking before sliding back into his car and driving off, until the familiar rattle of his car was no longer audible. Dio sighed, glanced to his neighbor’s yard to make sure that man still wasn’t home, and picked Giorno up with one arm beneath his legs. With his duffle bags in hand, he nudged their front door open with his foot, disappearing inside as it closed behind them.

Chapter Text

VABowieVoices has been recording chapters for this fanfiction for the past four chapters! And to be honest? That's an unbelievably high honor for me, that someone could like my fanfiction to dub it and want to share it. I'm really beside myself, so instead of posting an unfinished draft, I want to share with you this miniature audiobook so that you can listen to some Family Fic over your winter break.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3, Brando Side & Kujo Side

Chapter 4

Please extend your thanks and applause to Rei, as their take on this fanfiction has kept me so, so happy and inspired to write this past year. I wanted to give them the shoutout they deserve!

Chapter Text

The dregs of Christmas aftermath swept through Jotaro’s household. Torn paper was either carelessly thrown into garbage bags, or lay sitting aloft for the tiny kitten Jolyne received to trounce with as he pleased.

You see, Jotaro Kujo didn’t dislike his ex. His only college beau, she’d somehow managed to be stricter than him, but with a gentle hand in a way that Jotaro could not possibly emulate. It was something he’d admired in her from the moment they met, the reason he married her, and one of the many reasons he wound up divorced from her. Jolyne had spent Thanksgiving with her, and her mother was going to come back for Christmas season… If anything, Jotaro hoped they could remain friends even if they were incompatible as lovers. Jolyne linked them tightly, and above all things, the ex Mrs. Kujo was a sensible woman.

So the first thing a week before Black Friday, he said “Let’s collaborate. Let’s both get her one big thing she really wants and work down the checklist for the rest together.”

He didn't believe in being a shitty competitive ex.

The big things Jolyne wanted were a pet and a new 3DS, because her years old handheld had suffered enough loving injury from her and now could only be played by arranging it a certain way. Jotaro stayed stock-still on Black Friday, waiting in line to get her the special edition Pokemon one.

However, Jotaro knew he’d been tricked by his ex in the kindest of ways when he saw Jolyne’s reaction to the Sun/Moon giftbox and her reaction to the baby tabby nudging its way out of the box. Promptly named ‘Chou’, Jolyne would have hugged the life out of it were it not for her mother’s gentle scolding saying that wasn’t safe, and Jotaro’s gentle suggestion that Chou might want to look around first.

So Jolyne, in her new plush shark sleeping bag, would be rolling around on the floor trying to catch glimpses of the cat as it pounced in and out of the sea of wrapping paper as Jotaro and his ex-wife exchanged a few smaller gifts.

“You’ve been doing good…” She murmured. “At first, I thought you were going to… make her leave with me, you know?”

His expression remained stoic, as if in another life, Jotaro understood the truth of those words. “She has always deserved better than that.”

The ex-Kujo gave a small smile. She still liked him, despite their differences and despite the fact that they parted on unhappy terms, because Jotaro was always remarkably honest. Even if it was about upsetting things, he would never leave room for doubt with her. It appeared her desire for friendship matched his in equal measures.

Especially when he unwrapped a shark-shaped sleeping bag to match Jolyne’s in an adult size.

“Everyone deserves to feel like a kid again on Christmas,” She mused thoughtfully, bringing the mug he got her up to her lips. For a moment, he was speechless.

Then he was kicking off his slippers to try it on.

—

The Christmas at House Brando no more than several meters away had a different attitude.

Diego was home, and had been home for the past two weeks after finals. While the ex-Kujos were collaborators, father Dio and uncle Diego were competitors of the fiercest kind. They would constantly snapchat each other their hauls for what would go under the tree for Giorno, partly to brag and partly to make sure the other one wouldn’t get it first. While Dio was undefeatable by the sheer wealth he had to expend, Diego had a living conscience, and there on up had a leg up on him for thoughtful gifts.

So it wasn’t really a surprise for Giorno to wake up to his family smugly sipping coffee and inviting him to tear into the frankly Dursley-like explosion of packages beneath the tree.

Giorno got everything popular under the sun. He opened one light box to find tickets to Napoli with his father during spring break. He opened another to find several pieces of amber— a collaboration between Diego, who’d wire him money, and Jonathan, who altogether didn’t need it but didn’t want Diego to feel exempt from the gift giving. Several contained unparalleled specimens of amber-trapped dinosaur-era things, and each time Giorno held one up to the shining light of the Christmas tree, Diego slyly stirred his candy cane in his coffee.

The rule was that Giorno would always open presents first, then any others would come next. Somewhere near the middle, Giorno would tear through some blindly, let Dio stuff a sweater over his head to see if it fits or pose for a photo, giddily thank them each time, until there was a mountain of things to be sorted that couldn’t fit in his room if he tried.

Now is when Giorno got really excited, because he could give both of them their presents before the Spitening began and Dio and Diego exchanged theirs.

Lumpily wrapped with Christmas paper Giorno found by hunting through the house, Giorno had saved his allowance for both of them. A knit holiday sweater featuring a T-rex eating a deer was Diego’s present, one he accepted warmly by stepping away to peel off his sweater and pull this one on instead.

“This is beautiful. I’m going to wear it all year round— Thank you, Giogio.”

Then Dio would get his. He was the most difficult and simple person to shop for at the same time, because whatever Dio wanted, he already had. Yet he’d be easily satisfied by whatever Giorno picked out for him. When he opened it up, it was a vintage suitcase in elegant condition, which had been recently embossed with his first name. “DIO” struck out in gold letters against the alligator leather, which looked like it was sealed in a vault from the moment they made it.

“Giogio…” He murmured. “How did you get this?”

“A store…” He was worried saying pawn shop would make Dio scold him for going somewhere shady. But he had seen this in the window and saved every bit of money he got (and Dio was a generous allowance tipper) until he was just barely able to afford it. The shoprunner decided to tack on a ten percent Christmas discount, just for him.

The lettering, though… that had been the work of Giorno’s hypothetical father, who had wanted to make it the best gift Giorno could give.

He embraced him kindly, perhaps a bit too tightly knowing his strength, but released him quickly enough with the promise he’d use it every day.

Then came Dio and Diego.

As always, Diego would unwrap a card with a gift card attached.

“Pro Bass Shop,” He commented idly, turning the card around to see it was worth five hundred dollars. “Wow. I thought fishing wasn’t an extracurricular to you.”

“I just happen to think you could use the time outdoors to meditate.” Dio sipped the rest of his coffee as Diego passed him his. A light gift, wrapped inside a department store box.

“Open it.”

This was always something. One time, Diego got him a Disney princess sweatshirt. Another, he got him an clip-on cat tail that moved on its own that had immediately gone into the possession of Jonathan. Giorno found it fun and Jonathan was the one who cared the least about dignity to let Dio’s son play with it.

Instead, he rolled out three pairs of yoga pants, inoffensive but for the words tacked onto the back of the rear. “JUICY” sparkled in pink on one, “SASSY” in neon green on another, and “HEAD BITCH” in glittering gold on the last. He checked. They were all in his size.

“Thank you for the lovely gift box, Diego. I’ll be sure to reuse it.” He immediately closed the package before Giorno could ask about it.

“No, there’s something underneath the wrapping paper.” Diego insisted. “Look.”

Peeling it back just enough so that he could root around inside, Dio pulled out one thing. At first it felt like a christmas card, and then it was a simple photograph, likely from an instant camera. Diego looked like a child, Dio looked like an early student.

On the back was written “First Christmas out of the Joestar house!” Dio remembered he’d pulled his mostly-illegal strings to get Diego light-up heelies that year.

“Hm.”

“Hmmm,” Diego joined in, sipping his coffee.

“Give me that gift card.” Dio responded abruptly.

“But how else am I going to enjoy the wilderness and become a pro bass fisher?”

“Give it here.”

Dio took it, put it into his wallet, and withdrew four hundred dollar bills and five twenties as if it were nothing. Diego looked legitimately shocked.

“I’ll give the gift card to one of my underlings,” He sternly replied, holding out his money. “It can be their Christmas bonus.”

Diego was just brimming with a comeback about this unexpected sappiness when he decided to let it go, taking the cash and folding it into his pocket.

“Dio, thanks.”

“Hm?”

“Thanks for bringing me up.”

“Thank you for following your big brother to the right side of the tracks.”

Giorno looked at them, a tad confused but knowing the air had warmed between them.

“Are we going out for Christmas dinner?”

“We are.” Dio stood up casually from the sofa, sending the cue to everyone that he’d be ready after two hours of sprucing up. “I think we’ll stop to see a movie on the way back, too.”

Chapter Text

Gyro typed up his last referral on the shoddy computer that the IT department had graced the medical wing with. It still ran on Windows XP, shuddered and screeched like it was fighting a demon to process some documents, but in the end it was as faithful as Ol’ Faithful itself. Like a broken down truck that refused to quit. Or Diego’s shitty car.

Another strange donation to the medical office, there was a massage chair plugged in by the corner. Apparently, some outlet store went under and donated a ton of supplies to their wing. Some went unused, some were used too quickly, but the massage chair was, weirdly, one of the most valuable tools they’d gotten. A student having a breakdown from grades might be easily coaxed into it while a doctor talked them down and offered to help. Releasing the tension was sometimes enough to quiet the most inconsolable of broke, on-the-verge-of-finals desperates.

Johnny sat in it now, laying back with his phone as he zoned out to a podcast. Gyro looked over to him jealously, like he’d been taking it easy after he’d been focusing ‘round the clock on all of his work.

“Johnny.”

“…”

“Johnny!”

One earbud popped out with an annoyed grimace. “You don’t interrupt someone with earbuds in!”

“Massage chair ain’t physical therapy. Let’s hop to it.”

“Sure it is. It’s physical and therapeutic.”

They stared each other down like this was a song and dance of whether Gyro would let him take the day off or his indomitable will would make sure he took care of Johnny no matter what. Today, Gyro’s stare was particularly powerful, and the sight of it was endearing. Even if it got exhausting, Gyro never let it go too far, listened to his complaints, and asked him what he’d be comfortable with. He pushed him when he needed it but let him rest when he could see it was necessary.

He did it because he really cared. Enough to do it outside of his credit hours, without it as a paying job, et cetera. It wasn’t like Johnny couldn’t afford his own, but Gyro understood him inside and out and saw issues before Johnny could himself. He was undoubtedly blessed with some sort of natural talent, but as Johnny thought on it, maybe it was just when it came to him.

“Alright, sunshine. We’ll get take out from your favorite place after.” It was a place Gyro couldn’t stand, but Johnny loved. “And we’ll watch your favorite stuff on TV when we get home. So twenty minutes with me?”

Johnny slapped his hand onto Gyro’s upper arm, the sign for him to pull him up and for the two of them to get to work. “Patronize harder, Gyro. I would’ve done it for less.”

“Oh yeah?”

“You’ll find out later.”

—

The Kujo living room floor was covered with a vacuum’s nightmare worth of scraps of sparkling paper. Jolyne was cutting up page after page of glittery, hand-folded snowflakes with a pair of scissors, but her technique could use some work. Most of them looked like an abstraction of triangles and vaguely symmetrical squares. Yet, in front of the TV, she dutifully continued her work like a master of her craft as Jotaro surveyed the disaster.

“Isn’t it late for a Winter Ball?”

“They didn’t do a Christmas Ball. They said… December’s too busy. So it’s in January.” Snip snip went the scissors, another shower of shapes raining down on her legs. Apparently, she’d been assigned to decoration duty and volunteered for the snowflakes, thinking they’d be easy work she could take credit for. By now, he’s sure she’s made entirely too many while transfixed on a cartoon marathon.

“Hmm…” There were few precious years Jotaro had before she started saying she would bring dates to these kinds of things, so he’ll reluctantly treasure them while they’re still innocent. Jolyne’s taste in romance was already appearing to be dismal— she ‘dated’ boys on the school yard only for her to push them into the mud later for taking the Capri Sun out of her lunchbox. Her girlfriends lasted longer, until Trish told her butterflies were tacky this year and so was the blue jacket she wore embroidered with pink ones. She was near inconsolable that day, and though Jotaro couldn’t quite empathize with a seven year old’s fleeting romance, he was at least there to pat her back.

“Will you get me a dress?”

Jotaro rubbed his eyes, thinking yeah, this is probably what you should do for a kid— but with it closing in fast, there probably wouldn’t be any time to take her shopping. So he’d have to do it himself? Good grief, that could be a disaster. What he found tasteful and what she found tasteful were two different things; not only that, he didn’t want to be a 195cm man in the little girl’s clothing aisle without an obvious child to buy it for.

But that’s where he was later, at the mall with Joseph.

He remembered her size, and really, he was just hoping to look for generic, because, honestly, that’s the only middle ground they’d meet. But then he had to switch gears— did little girls like puffy dresses, or looking mature? If he got her one with butterflies on it, would she get insulted by her ex again? No, that’d be mortifying, so he puts that one back on the rack. Stares were drawing all around him and he hated it, wishing Jiji would come back from the boy’s department with a little tuxedo for Josuke soon.

And, ah— there he saw it.

It was purple and green with a gold puff of tulle and sparkling lining from the edges leading up to a star shape in front of the chest. The star itself reflected between gold and green shimmery colors. What’s more, there’s plenty in her size. This would be good enough.

“Jotaro, if you don’t put that down, I’m gonna slap it out of your hands.”

Ah, not as good as he hoped.

The suit Joseph picked out for Josuke was a muted purple, dignified and elegant. “Don’t you know anything about what little girls like?”

“No,” was the firm and resolute answer, as if anything but would be nonsense.

“Let’s see…” Joseph might’ve been old by then, but he raised a girl and by god, he’s sure he still knows what one likes. “Ah, here we go.”

Taking notes from what Jotaro wanted, but less… terrible, Joseph eventually pulled a blue tulle dress off the rack, adorned with a black ribbon around the waist and little fake black butterflies decorating the skirt. “This’s perfect, she’ll love it.”

“A classmate made fun of her for having butterflies on her clothes. Called them tacky.”

“Hasn’t stopped your daughter from wearing them.” Joseph shrugged. “Honestly, Jotaro, that thing in your hands… I don’t know a single person who’d dress like that in their entire lives.”

—

If it had stopped at the dress, it would have been just fine. Jotaro could leave her in Joseph’s capable, chaperoning hands and go about his evening in relative quiet. Apparently, Josuke had forged Joseph’s signature perfectly on a permission slip for what each person would be bringing to the dance. Wanting bragging rights above everyone else, he proudly stood up and declared his dad would rent a bouncy house for the gym, erupting in an explosion of cheers. Joseph, who got the call from the teacher after saying what a generous donation it was, had been forced to book one.

“He took all my hair products,” Josuke had told Jolyne as they picked out of each other’s lunch boxes, “but the joke’s on him. Mom’s hairspray holds up fine!”

(Tomoko would later lock it up in a cabinet, leaving Josuke to go to school pompless and ticked off about it.)

Rather than hunger or a need for a break, it was a buzz on Jotaro’s phone that brought him out of the trance of typing. “Hello?”

“Oi, Jotaro…” Joseph asked in that cheerful-but-lightly-uncertain voice of his.

“What.”

“You free this evening?”

“Paperwork.”

“…. aaaand can that paperwork be done later?”

“What do you want?”

“A third of the chaperones cancelled and while I could wrangle a boatload of kids on my own when I was spry, it’s harder to keep up with them these days. I called Caesar because— you know, all his siblings— but he’s out of town! Jotaro, you’re the scariest hardass I know. Please come down.”

Jotaro grunted on the other end and hung up. It was usually his sign of dismissive agreement.

Sure enough, all of Jolyne’s sparkling snowflakes were plastered any inch someone could paste them. Papery pale blue garland was woven between the bars that separated the stands from the gym. Some things had an obvious adult touch, like the welcome sign that was cut too neatly and painted too elegantly, or the copious amount of treats (mostly store-bought cupcakes) that lined the snack table. Most of the girls here were dressed as Elsa with a few mildly upset friends who lost the fight for the crown and wound up as Anna. The bouncy house was shaking with what was sure to be an overcapacity of children, some stumbling out after careening head first with another.

Erina, working as the nurse on staff, was usually cooler than a cucumber, but even she was a bit frazzled with the icepacks that were starting to run low. When he came over, she glanced up at Jotaro with a nervous smile.

“I’m terrified one of them is going to break an arm in there! I tried scolding them and everything…! Children can be absolutely unstoppable sometimes.”

“Don’t worry about it,” He’d seen her on Jonathan’s Facebook before, and saw them constantly talking… but he didn’t think about it much more than that. Pulling aside the airbrushed curtain, he deepened and loudened his voice as if Star Platinum was over his shoulder and [ B O U N C E H O U S E ] just insulted his mother.

“All of you. Out! Single file line, only three of you in at a time! Five minutes only before you go to the back of the line!”

One by one, the kids tumbled out and reluctantly followed the orders of a man who didn’t sound like he was messing around in any capacity. After Erina had given him the “O.K.” sign with her hand, he wandered off, wondering what exactly what he was supposed to be patrolling for.

A cup of punch eventually made it into his hand, because he’d been hard conditioned by movies growing up that red plastic cups had to be spiked with something. He must have been forgetting this was elementary school entirely, but at least it wasn't bad. After he lowers the cup from his face, their eyes meet.

Ah, thought Jotaro, feeling his jaw clench and his shoulders square.

Ah, thought Dio, setting down a tray of tarts too rich and fancy to be enjoyed by any of the children here.

“…”

“…”

It was as if all the Elsas had banded together and cast a super eternal winter in Jotaro and Dio’s proximity alone. There was no looking away and dusting their hands. Whatever they had… it was a powerful bond of hatred that would leave lions circling each other rather than idly passing each other by. Jotaro was naturally silent, and Dio was naturally still, but of course, it’d only be him that spoke first.

“Amazing, what a father will do for their child. Referring to me, of course, you were content to ignore this until you were called in as cavalry.”

“Playing housewife more important than running your crooked firm?”

Dio smiled tightly, only a thin sliver of his perfectly white teeth showing between the gap of his lips. “And how about the sea urchins that are more important than your daughter?”

Jotaro took a solid step forward. Dio stood still. The bare insinuation was enough for decking him in the face, but surrounded by children, his fists, tightly clenched, stay in his pockets. “You will never talk about my daughter again.”

He still remembered the threat from the beginning of the school year— that ‘that goes doubly for your daughter’ Dio had the gall to say to him. It had been enough to fight him before, it was still enough to fight him now. Dio began a soft saunter towards the gym doors and Jotaro pursued, knowing the conversation hadn’t ended and discontent to let Dio slip away.

“It’s funny,” Dio mused to himself, “that you think you can tell me anything and that’ll make me do it.”

Just outside the gym doors were rows and rows of lockers. The hallway was darkly lit with only a few fluorescent lights shining down the hall. Clearly an off-limits zone for the children, so that’s why Jotaro had no problem grabbing him by the collar and slamming him into one of the lockers, High School style.

“I was calm and patient with your son when you forced that tour on me. I don’t care that he’s friends with my daughter. But if I hear you say a goddamn word about her, anything, even her name, I will make you regret it. You can run your mouth with anyone and get off without consequences, but not with me. I beat you once, I’ll do it again.”

“It’s not about your daughter,” Dio gleefully spat in spite of Jotaro’s warning. “It’s your pathetic floundering that I find so funny. Your priorities. Everyone can tell you want to be left alone to your own devices. Sometimes I feel that extends to your own family. You cut one out already, didn’t you? I’m always wondering when you’ll consider number two.”

Jotaro flipped him from one locker and slammed him into the next, leaving a dent no less than three inches in.

“Violations of my rule will be punished.” Jotaro stated stalwartly, letting go of Dio. “And punished, and punished, and punished. Do yourself a favor and sew your lips shut for fashion. Spare the world from your crap.”

Turning his back on him might have been a mistake as Dio grappled him from behind, but thankfully the music bouncing loudly in the other room prevented all sounds of the scuffle that would ensue as long as the song went on.

—

Jotaro had the dignity to cover his face with a red kerchief when pulling Erina away from her nurse duty to take a look at his face. A busted lip and a bleeding nose was all he had to boast from the fight.

“Oh my gosh, Jotaro! What happened?”

“Dio.”

“You’re a grown man! You shouldn’t pick fights with a guy like that! They’ll just never end!” She spoke as if she knew of experience, removing the cloth and dabbing a new one on his face. “At least your nose isn’t broken. Where did he go?”

“To the bathroom. Probably to cover his black eye.”

“You need to be more responsible!” She scolded, despite its obvious sympathy. “This is a child’s dance, and you’re a grown man! Restrain yourself! Imagine how worried your daughter would be!”

At that, it finally dawned on him he hadn’t seen hide nor hair of Jolyne that night, possibly out of a purposeful obligation to not embarrass her in front of her friends. “Do I look cleaned up? I need to find her.”

“Except for your lip, you look fine…”

At that, he finally turned away from her, knowing she was right. Whatever it was about Dio, he either needed to learn to be bigger than it or book a more appropriate venue, like a boxing ring. She was entirely dwarfed by his size as he loomed behind her quietly. When one of her little friends pointed up at him, Jolyne stared up at him, half disinterested, half worried. He scooped her up, knowing it might be a source of teasing for a few weeks to come, and she tugged on his lip.

“Don’t do that,” he grimaced.

“You got hurt again! I keep telling you not to!” She reached into her little bag and pulled out some lip balm she kept for the drier winters. She scribbled it onto him in a way that’d look clownish were it not for its clear appearance, and when he was done he was quick to tuck his lower lip into his mouth for a brief moment to avoid the stinging.

“Accidents happen.”

Unsatisfied with the answer, Jolyne waited as some gentle-sounding song had started playing, and as he set her down she refused to let go of his hands.

“Dance.”

“…”

“I’ll stand on your shoes. Let’s dance, okay?”

It would be a very simple dance, with Jotaro more swaying and taking small steps than actually putting some moves in, but Jolyne seemed to be happy either way— and it wasn’t until later that Jotaro realized it was her way of taking care of him. She hadn’t asked for it because she wanted to, because her classmates would tease her for it all the same. She asked for it because she thought it would cheer up Jotaro after he got hurt at her party. Whenever they drove home later, Jotaro chewed a straw and thought about it, thought about what Dio said to him, thought about Jolyne in the passenger’s seat, playing with the black butterflies on her dress and balancing a saran-wrapped plate of cupcakes on her lap.

He’d only give her up if her life was in danger, he thought. If there was a deep reason to tear the two of them apart, he’d leave her in the care of her mother, but otherwise…

… Jotaro… wouldn’t have these fleeting, painfully happy moments in his life. The ones that couldn’t make him smile because he was thinking and turning them around too hard in his head. Jolyne remained his magnificent daughter. No matter how bad he was at conveying it, he hoped it’d reach her one day.

—

Giorno found Dio in the bathroom outside of the gymnasium and watched him clean up quietly.

“I wish you wouldn’t get hurt.”

It’s not like it was an especially common occasion in the household, but it upset Giorno all the same to see Dio come out of what was obviously a fight. Regardless of whether or not he was learning a bad lesson on how to take on his opponents in the future, it was his dad. No matter how enjoying of violence Dio could be out of his sight, it was no comfort to see him blot on concealer around a red-looking eye. He pulled himself up on the counter next to him, and reached into his pocket to pull out something borrowed from the nurse’s station. Without any hesitation, he stuck one of the bandages over Dio’s chin, where a small blot of red had formed.

“I know, Giogio.” Giorno was too smart to pull any wool over his eyes or give him some sort of excuse. Sometimes, his son’s genius, proud of it that he was, got in the way of complicated adult matters. He figured out the words and meanings of things quickly, understood what Dio talked about in his crime reports, understood some of the things said around TV, and understood… the negative things said about him in newspapers. Yet Giorno was confidently on his side, because he had never particularly cared what Dio did as a lawyer. As he understood it, it was jokingly shady at best and miserable at worst, like the courtroom was more of a coliseum and whoever was the lion or the gladiator was decided by who fought the hardest.

“I know you don’t like him.” His words were obviously about Jotaro. “Why not ignore him? You ignore pretty much everyone else.”

“It’s like an itch you can’t go without scratching. When you got chicken pox, remember? No matter how much we told you not to scratch, you acted like you didn’t have enough hands to.” Dio sighed, putting on his winning smile for the mirror. “That man and I go a long way back. I know he’s the father of your best friend.”

“But?”

“That was the end of it, my son. I wish I could say ‘you’ll understand when you’re older’, but frankly, I hope you don’t. Let’s go home.”

—

“You see,” Joseph said after most of the party guests had left, and his poor, tired back lay flat against the bottom of the bouncy house, “this is why I wasn’t going to sign that permission slip. Your old man was one jump away from a dislocated hip.”

Josuke was still showing off on the other side, doing flips with relative ease, his hair a limp mess now that he no longer had any product to put in. “Liar. You wouldn’t have gotten in if you didn’t want to show off!”

“In my day? I’d lay this thing flat. I’d do all those tricks you’re doing one handed. Caesar can probably still do them now.”

Josuke landed across Joseph’s chest with a thunk and a sputtering gasp from his old man. “See? You’re not dead yet. I bet you could still do it.”

“Not after that!” He barked exasperated and somewhat happily. If he pulled a stunt like Josuke did with the permission slip when he was a kid, he’d catch hell for it. But he’d still probably do it. He probably inherited too much from him, the tiring son of a gun. Eventually, with aching shoulders and a back that begged for Tylenol, Joseph sat up and pushed Josuke upward too. He cracked his neck deliberately in the way Josuke thought was gross and fought to stand up.

“We gotta call the rental guys and have them pick this up. C’mon, Josuke. I know you got to stay later than everyone else, but the party’s over.”

“I know.”

Only a few kids remained outside waiting for their parents with the poor teacher who was designated to wait with them. Joseph pat her shoulder and said the rental place would come in and clean up, giving her something to be relieved about in the chilly air. With a fancy car key that had a thumbprint reader for his remaining hand, his car beeped and Joseph and made sure Josuke had everything he needed before the two sped off into the night.

“Next time, I want to wear a Ferraro suit.”

“You’ll get whatever JC Penney’s has until you’re sixteen, kiddo.”

—

“This guy sucks,” Gyro hissed at the television as Johnny took up most of the space on the couch, legs crossed across his lap. “He’s got the most annoying, nasally voice ever and he screams for the dumbest reasons. Change it to another channel.”

“I thought you wanted to see this video game.”

“Not with this shitty dude’s voice ruining it! Let’s watch something else.”

Their apartment was an eclectic disaster of things hanging off of other things contrasted with an immaculate kitchen and a filthy bedroom. Their living room was the one place that maintained harmony between perfect and disaster, and while there was laundry to be folded hanging off of a lounger, they were doing pretty good for themselves, all things considered. Johnny had snatched the Playstation controller from Gyro and started flipping through his subscriptions until he settled on a channel that made Gyro fight for the controller.

“No.”

“You said I get to pick today!”

“Not this deep web shit! Wh— do you have a playlist for ‘whales exploding’?!”

“You’ve never seen it? It’s really interesting. They’re the only mammals big enough so that when they die, the gases inside them basically make them a pressure bo—“

Gyro hit the triangle key and batted at the control stick from his vantage point. “No whales. I dissect enough stuff at school, let’s keep whales off the list of what I have to see the insides of.”

“Then what do you want to do?”

With his arm outstretched and his body leaning, Gyro pondered the question before settling in against Johnny, bringing his legs up against the sofa with his and resting his head against his chest. “I’ll nap. You watch whatever you want.”

With that simple gesture, Johnny turned on something simple, a podcast-like channel, and turned the volume down low enough to become background noise. Glancing down at Gyro rather than the TV, he muttered quietly.

“Sure.”

Chapter Text

Schools were almost haunting in the evening, bereft of children screaming left and right as they filled the halls more densely than a New York sidewalk. A few office workers remained filing paperwork, even though they would have to return same time, same place the next day to do it again. Managing a large school population was hard enough even though this was a rather exquisite place of learning and therefore, had a smaller student body than most. Parents usually demanded more bang for their buck for such an entrance fee, and therefore reports on each child had to be filed regularly around the clock…

Mrs. Turner was one of those people who clocked in late hours like this was nothing more than a business office, faxing spreadsheets and putting long hours into graduating into a better promotion. It was to her surprise that Mr. Buccellati, one of the teachers who took on more extracurricular leadership roles than any one person ever should, began ushering people in after him. Of course, he was head of the PTA, too… but the meetings had become so infrequent that one had to wonder what merited one this evening.

The people following in step being him, even stranger— There was Mr. Brando, hometown celebrity, there was a man who didn’t remove his hat or absurd coat upon entering. An older gentleman that looked more like a grandparent than a parent looked both jovial and a bit too tired to be here, and behind him…

A man with sharp, pink hair pulled into a thin ponytail, escorted by two thugs who looked scarier than Mrs. Turner had ever seen in her entire life. She’d been warned about one of the parents here. If you see a man with pink hair— face down, papers out, do whatever he says. Integrity out the window and be damned. The rest that filed in looked more normal, more ordinary… and the campus head of security, Mr. Abbacchio (who rarely went by his first name) closed the door behind him.

It was almost tempting to peek in to see how it'd turn out, but she had three more reports to finish. If Tina wanted to get seven hours of sleep, she couldn’t allow herself a single nanosecond of distraction.

—

“How pleasant that you all join me today. I know you all have very busy schedules…”

“We do.” Diavolo’s reply was firm.

Bruno had a few clipboards laying in his lap, sorting through one after another for each children they planned to discuss today. Jotaro naturally gravitated to the opposite end of the room from Dio after he got a cup of indistinguishable orange juice. Not just because he didn’t want to sit next to him (he absolutely didn’t), but that provided a good point to glower at him from should he get up to shit like the last several meetings. Diavolo and Dio exchanged glances that only the mafia and a lawyer who might have probably taken on a few favors for him before could. Joseph was thankful for the break from Caesar’s nightly workouts, as today was yoga and god damn it, after sixty he deserved to let his bones rest in peace.

Abbacchio, the adoptive father of a particularly excitable child named Narancia, was more than just security at this meeting.

“… which is why I won’t waste anyone’s time,” Bruno flipped through a few pages. “Do you know that your daughter teases other girls for not wearing name brands?”

“If this is what you brought me out for, and I damn well hope it isn’t—“

“We take bullying very seriously in our school,” Bruno had an impenetrable glare, and as a practiced mafia don, Diavolo could icepick a man in the skull just by looking at him. “… and because of that, we must urge you to talk to her at home or let her enroll in an extracurricular to help her make friends. We understand that Trish often hides her feelings by being abrasive, and we have professionals who could help her with that—“

“Idiota, are you insinuating there’s something wrong with my daughter? Did you drag me out here to tell me I’ve raised her wrongfully?”

“I’m insinuating,” The response through his teeth was anything but mellow. “That children develop different ways to deal with social anxiety and our school has the resources to help her make friends.”

There was an electric fire between their stares, two men who wouldn’t back down before the other no matter what the cost— the price of their lives, their dignity, their honor. For once, Dio and Jotaro couldn’t help but feel the tiniest sliver of relief that it wasn’t them, this time.

“There’s nothing wrong with Trish,” Diavolo finally snapped back. “If a parent can afford to send their kid here and doesn’t dress them properly, that’s on them. I refuse to tell her it's wrong to speak her mind so young.”

Plus, there was also the side of Diavolo that liked seeing his daughter start to show ruthlessness at this age… a certain pride-- one that might befit her mafia heritage someday. He also very much embraced the idea of being in hiding. His name as the parent on her school certificate was a fake. He could vanish with her without a trace any time. … but at the same time, her assertiveness, learning who she was among her peers… that was important too.

Bruno didn’t seem to expect a different answer from him, despite his pressing. Even if it didn’t amount to much, he’d merely have to talk to Trish more often after class and see if she would have more to say to him than her apparently tacky classmates. He set that clipboard aside and turned to Joseph, now speaking far more frankly than he’d reserved for Diavolo.

“Your son has a fighting problem.”

“He has a what.”

“A fighting problem. His hairstyle is rather eccentric and whenever someone says something bad about it, he… doesn’t hold back. He’s gotten into several fights, and he’s on his last strike for expulsion.”

“Goddamn! You couldn’t have told me sooner?”

“They happened within a span of a week. I’m sorry, Mr. Joestar. This was literally at my earliest convenience.”

Josuke had spent his time getting into fights with a small gang of punks, who knew that any comment on his hair would receive swift retribution. Because their only offense was name-calling, it seemed like a surefire way to get Josuke booted from the school while being able to fight back as self defense. Of course, the little Joestar had always won, leaving a trail of bloody noses on their way to the nurse’s office. It had gotten so bad that every altercation wound up the same way.

It was an interesting point of contention for Joseph, who was glad his son took no shit, but also… didn’t seem to pick his battles very wisely? A sort of soft-proud, largely confused and concerned moment that had him folding his arms and figuring out how to deal with this. If he told Josuke no pomp until he learned to control himself, that’d be letting his bullies have a win over him? At the same time, knowing the best time to run away was invaluable…

“I got it, I got it. Kid has a temper problem. Would you mind us taking a few days off with him while I have a talk with him? Kind of a suspension type deal.”

“I’ll arrange for his homework to be sent home with him.” Bruno scrawled down the rest of his notes on the clipboard. He liked it when this was easy and a parent would actually deem to listen to him. With these kinds of people— particularly types like Diavolo and Dio— it was a crapshoot whether anything would get done at all. He turned his attention to the school chief of security he knew so well.

“Narancia has been playing pranks.”

“I know,” Leone seemed embarrassed to bring this up in front of other parents instead of discussing it privately. “Who do you think has to clean up most of them? He thinks he’s above the law because I am the law. And I’ve been strict.”

“Check his backpack before he goes to school. Also, make sure he doesn’t have access to any empty lockers to store things in… it might be a trouble to review security footage but I’m sure you can handle it as his father?”

Leone sneered. “And you?”

“I have a lot on my plate. Just get it settled, per favore.”

An innate knowledge spread across the room as if these two knew each other in a way that wasn’t necessarily professional. Only Joseph both cared enough and didn’t care enough for another person’s privacy to ask.

“Who’s Narancia’s mother?”

“He’s an adopted child.” Bruno responded simply as he sorted to the next child. The supermarket cookies laid out for guests had so far gone untouched, except for one that had mysteriously disappeared with no culprit in sight.

“Ah, ah, so Abbacha is a single parent! Must be hard, working with kids all day and then taking care of one all on your own in the evening.”

“He doesn’t take care of him all alone. He has my help.”

That gave Joseph pause, not in the typical elderly way, but in a bit of embarrassment that he hadn’t caught on sooner than everyone else in the room. He was always quick on his feet when thinking, but perhaps when it came to matters like this, his mouth was faster than his brain. Jotaro huffed somewhat indignantly, facing away so that his cap cast a shadow over his expression.

“Doctor Kujo?”

“Yes?”

“You’ve done exceptionally well since your last discussion with Ms. Lauper. We’ve appreciated your attendance in chaperoning, as well… at some point, we’d like to discuss a class field trip to the aquarium with you.”

Oh god, Jotaro managed to mutter internally, bracing himself for being a tour guide for a mass of screaming children who couldn’t be corralled and inevitably one of them would get lost because they wouldn’t leave one of the tanks alone— field trips were important and essential for raising a new era of marine biologists, but god did he hate that very fact. Even ones where he didn’t have to do anything, just sit in his lab and study rocks that contained some early vertebrae were filled with noise. Jotaro Kujo only wanted a quiet life.

“Get in contact with the director… here’s his number.”

The look on Jotaro’s face was still stoic, but pleading as if to say ‘don’t. Forget I ever gave you that number’. Despite all of his internal qualms being fired out of his eyes like he was trying to empath his feelings onto Bruno, the teacher still folded up the paper and put it into his front pocket, as if to invite Jotaro to his special hell for fighting a grown man in one of his classrooms. That grown man in particular was sitting to his left… waiting for his turn to speak so he could finally leave.

“Your contributions to the school have been generous.”

“Of course—“

But it was cut off by Diavolo. “You’re going to compliment him on donating but not me? Disrespectful.”

“— As have yours, sir.” Sometimes it was easier to settle down his homeroom than it was to corral adults. “But I bring it up as a point to Dio because I feel his intentions with them have been less than noble toward the pursuit of education.”

“Go on,” Dio said, crossing one leg over the other and wearing a stern, daring expression for him to press forward.

To be honest, or discreet in front of the parents? He knew going toe to toe with Dio would make this last hours of petty wordplay. “You can’t bribe the school into giving your son good grades.”

“…”

“You cannot bribe us into giving him vacation days where his homework is ignored.”

“…”

“You cannot bribe us into hiding the fact that he’s stolen from faculty wallets to get drinks from the vending machine.”

“Surely not yours?”

“Not mine.” Bruno’s pursed lips were a betrayal— he loved having Giorno in his class, but he felt like the boy had the run of the house at home, and anything he said, went. Therefore, things like money were trivial and stealing was no big deal if he was already handed everything already. And of course, having an encouraging father in that environment was nothing to be ignored either. “But he did generously donate twenty of Ms. Lauper’s dollars to a vending machine to buy juice for his friends. Please talk to your son about playing Robin Hood. He is not exactly stealing from the rich—”

“This is an Ivy-league elementary school. Guarantees you into the best high schools which throw you into the best colleges. My son is definitely stealing from the rich and giving to the needy.”

“The point is that he should unlearn such unethical behavior. Give him that money yourself or teach him the meaning of right and wrong.”

Diavolo scoffed at him with a crooked smile before Dio could respond. “You don’t even give your kid money when you drop them off? Povero.”

Dio bristled like fire kindling at that— the bare insinuation that he didn’t make sure Giorno had his basic needs was just the kind of thing to start a forest fire. “Giorno is always taken care of before school. He’s at that age where he simply does it to show off.”

“My principessa goes to school with fifty dollars in her pocket every day. Doesn’t make a big deal out of stealing, does she? Sounds like you’re having some trouble…”

“I’m not the one the teacher went to first about their troublesome child.”

“Call my Trish troublesome again, Dio,” Mocking him as if it was a butcher of the Italian language to name someone God, despite his own name.

“Settle down.” Abbacchio’s tone was firm. “You both have shit to work out with your kids. Next clipboard.”

A man who had been rather quiet this entire time was sitting with his hands folded on his knee. His stare was entirely passive, his lips pursed into a tight frown.

“Kosaku Kawajiri?”

“Yes?” Replied a man who was not Kosaku Kawajiri.

“Hayato can’t bring his camcorder to school anymore, it’s getting disruptive. Please make sure he leaves it at home from now on.”

“Of course. With that settled, may I—?”

Bruno gestured to the door, where that impeccably invisible man had gone through, far too quiet compared to the rest of their heavy footsteps.

Something was off about that man in a way not even the mob boss could guess. His wife usually showed up to these functions instead, but whenever he came in, he gave off a serious, no-nonsense Dexter vibe. He sounded like a man imitating a robot imitating a man, like everything was filtered through some sort of wavelength before he spoke it. No one envied Hayato, particularly, who was convinced that his dad had been body snatched and he wanted his friends to go along with him to find proof. Some of the other children humored him, but never enough for Kosaku to break his poker face. Not that he was exactly in steep contrast to any 'former' Kosaku’s— a man always too tired to talk and too dull to listen to. But his mom seemed to like this version better, anyway…

“So, with February underway, the children have a school project they need to be doing for the science faire.” Bruno broke Kosaku’s permeating silence with his calm demeanor. “I don’t need to remind anyone that something beyond a seven year old’s construction abilities will be looked at with some scrutiny. However, I trust you'll assist them only when absolutely necessary…?”

Jotaro would leave it to Jolyne, only to help her glue on finishing touches and helping her hammer things in place. Dio would absolutely be fostering this responsibility onto Diego. Diavolo didn’t give a shit, Diavolo would make one of his lackeys do it. Joseph would leave it entirely to Josuke, lest he catch Tomoko’s wrath— but he’d give him clever hints (read: cheats) to make the project easier. Aside from the murmuring from some more normal parents in the back, this was pretty much all he anticipated.

“Our last order of business— our head coach and director of arts would like to speak to you about sign ups for extracurriculars. I could go on and on about it, but… nothing wrong with nurturing your children’s gifts and building an impressive resumé. Now then—“

The man who practically broke through the door the moment he knew it was his time to shine definitely lived up to the fitness aspect. A cheery grin, muscles that looked like greek marble carved from an impressive exercise regimen, and of course a loud, booming voice that unfortunately did not announce his presence, but—

“JOTARO!”

There was no holding back in the hug that ensued, lifting the marine biologist out of his chair and almost embarrassingly high. Jean Pierre Polnareff did not mess around when it came to reunions, and while the redhead that followed him in was also enthused, he didn’t get quite so up and personal.

“Didn’t know you… worked here…” Jotaro sputtered before Polnareff released him back into the safe confines of his metal folding chair.

“Just got hired! Last guy quit ‘cause of age. Or frustration? Grouchy old people stuff. Anyway, out of all the applications and interviews, they picked me?”

“Can’t imagine why,” Muttered Kakyoin, with his Master of Arts and teaching degrees being the primary reason he was accepted so easily. “Jojo. Yo.”

This time, Jotaro gave a steadier wave… these two were his best friends back in his college days. It wasn’t like he fell out of contact with him, just his workload made it so he could only drop by an errant comment on their social media pages every now and then. Polnareff always wanted to see pictures of Jotaro and Jolyne, Kakyoin would write him long, long messages that felt like excerpts from a particularly elegant diary (that Jotaro admittedly only responded to with what he could manage). Even in the face of the people staring him in the back for being so informal, there was nothing he could ever begrudge of these two. Once, they had been the only people brave enough to get close to him, even though he would shove off most.

Beneath the shadow of his hat is a warm up-tick of his lips.

“Yare yare, do what you came here to do. Your job.”

Ordinarily callous words, but Kakyoin and Polnareff knew when Jotaro was punctuating them with affection. Eager to impress, Polnareff gave his speech first.

“I’m head of the Athletics Department, and one of the primary coaches on campus! I promise you, if your kid has a dream in sports, I’ll do my best to help them with individual training regimens and practice in their field! Pardon my French, but I’ll raise them to kick ass on their team! Up until now, I’ve been working on my degree and I graduated with honors! Full cords, baby! Right now, we have sign ups for basketball, baseball, lacrosse, and tennis! So if any of you want to sign your kid up—“

“Pass,” Dio said.

“Pass,” Diavolo said.

An immediate two rejections. A little disheartening…

“… Narancia could channel his energy into something productive for once,” Abbacchio spoke up. “Put his name on your list and speak to him after regular gym.”

“Josuke pretty much goes with the flow… I don’t know if he’ll think he’s too cool for this or all for it if his friends sign up. I’ll ask him.” Joseph responded gently.

Polnareff glanced around the room, some of the parents in the background raising their hands and agreeing before his eyes eventually fell on Jotaro.

“… Jolyne would do it, but only the most competitive one. Sign her up.” The fact that it’d be Polnareff teaching it would undoubtedly put it in her favor, too. He was like an uncle— both him and Kakyoin were.

“Now then—“ Kakyoin raised his hand, smiling elegantly for the crowd. The scars across his eyes were a little alarming to say the least, but he otherwise had a cool and professional vibe about him. “As I’ll be teaching higher-level art classes, I’m going to offer a multitude of forms and programs for children to invest themselves in. We will be reviewing art history as we build, craft, and create. We’ll be painting with as many mediums as we can get our hands on, with as many different art styles. We will have sculpture, both clay and abstract. We will have ways to mix up our curriculum, such as creating print blocks or learning the very basics of animation. However, my goal for each and every student is to find them a preferred path within the arts and to help them pursue it so that their skills will reach a point that will prepare them for future learning opportunities.”

Polnareff interjected. “What if they want to draw anime?”

Kakyoin pulled his wide lips into a stifled thin line. “It’s form of art that’s popular right now… and of course, they are children, but I will do my best to encourage all forms of art with our students.”

Far more hands raised at the prospect of the arts than sports, though whether it was Kakyoin’s presentation or Polnareff’s lack thereof was to be debated. With everything seemingly settled, it was finally time for all of them to be free of each other, and as Polnareff snagged three cookies between his fingers that would’ve gone uneaten, Bruno let the parents file out one by one, including Diavolo’s body guard, albeit stiffly when it came to them. Trish was a kind, if bratty girl— given her upbringing, that wasn’t surprising. He just didn’t feel right with the school letting a literal mobster into their building. Money spoke though, and it spoke well and as he and Abbacchio were the only ones left in the room, he finally slacked and gave him a tired look.

“Let’s go get Narancia and lock up. Hope he wasn’t too bored.”

“He’ll be fine… that kid knows how to entertain himself and we should both know.”

Leone gave Bruno an affirming pat on the shoulder and walked out alongside him.

—

“You seriously gave up smoking?”

“I gave it up years ago.” Jotaro leaned against the brick wall of the school with his two close companions on either side of him. “Cold turkey. Didn’t want Jolyne growing up around cigarette smoke.”

“Ha! That’s just like you… even though that must have been insanely hard, you’d still do it.”

“… Jojo,” Kakyoin began. “Why did you never ask about our jobs?”

“Thought you two were still in school.” For the moment, the chilly night air substituted his cigarette smoke, a familiar and old sensation to see again this past winter.

“… We missed you plenty.”

“We were always talking about it!” Polnareff interjected. “ ‘Where’d ya think Jotaro is right now? Should we stop by the aquarium? He’s full time at work and at home, so he’s probably really stressed out…’ “

“Never stopped thinking about you guys. It just got busier and busier. Figured you could use the break. Figured…” That they’d be moving on with their lives without him. Always a smooth current with a torrential force beneath it, Jotaro was often the opposite of what people thought of him. He felt too much, too strongly, and it wasn’t the first time he isolated himself because of it. He thought he deserved their scolding now— truly and seriously, but instead they just sighed and shook their heads like knowing friends who understood him more than he understood himself.

“Well, now that Kakyoin and I are living closer—“

“— You’re going to deal with us more often. And of course, there will be absolutely no unprofessional favoritism…”

“— If Jolyne can’t kick ass, she can’t pass my class.” Polnareff snorted. “Keheh! As if, she was pulling on my earrings since she was a baby! That girl lives to tackle other people into the dirt!”

“I want to see her again soon.” This back and forth conversation between Polnareff and Kakyoin sunk a lead weight of guilt into Jotaro’s stomach, because they truly didn’t mind he was the way he was, and they were suddenly talking again like nothing had ever happened… with each of his arms, he pulled them tightly into a close, three way hug. As best as they could manage with two men built like trucks and one built like a slightly smaller truck.

“You two need to stop forgiving me so easily.”

“Sorry, nope. The only amends we’ll accept is getting to see you and the tot more.”

“Polnareff’s right.”

“— then come over to my place tonight. Jolyne's missed the two of you.”

—

The Kujo house was warmer tonight than its usual, with Jolyne excitedly bounding into hugs with both visitors, showing Polnareff the gross thing she could do with her shoulder before Kakyoin gently but firmly encouraging her not to get into the habit, else she might have to see a doctor to put it back in place. They talked for hours— how they were sharing a house as three roommates with the addition of Polnareff’s younger sister, because this area was too goddamn expensive and they had to make it work somehow. It wasn’t like they planned to work for the same school. Polnareff openly admitted he was expecting a public school to look him over and deem him worthy. Apparently, enthusiasm and street smarts were invaluable, as well as a knack for working with kids. Bruno was happy to put in a vote to help appoint him.

Jotaro listened quietly, responded every now and then when they asked him a question, about his life, about what he was doing with work, how’s his ex, how’s everything… and a little hook snagged into him and started to lift that guilt just a little bit. Jesus, was this why he felt so subdued lately? They were like coursing energy, reinvigorating him by the moment. On the outside, he might have appeared to be the same old Jotaro, but memories were flooding his head of defacing an oil refinery sign and volunteering overnight to help returning beached things back into the ocean, with their help. Things he always assumed nobody cared about but him, they cared about because it was him. And while he never understood their interests quite the same, he had always tried to return that favor…

When it was finally time for them to leave, late into the night and well past Jolyne’s strictly enforced bedtime, they shared one last hug again and a promise to text each other more often, or for Jotaro to hang around after school so they could catch up. Pol suggested one night, they should all go out for drinks and really get into it— talking about their shared history, how long it’s been, how they should really, really laugh about Jotaro basically curbstomping Dio in court when it was impossible and unheard of. They patted each other’s backs as Kakyoin’s car made that familiar beep-beep of unlocking, and Jotaro and Jolyne stood in the doorway, watching them go.

“… you seem really happy today.”

A strange observation, because Jotaro wasn’t smiling or looking any different than usual. Jolyne could always tell, though. A certain gentleness replaced his stoicism, he seemed more quiet than just determinedly not speaking. He was relaxed for the first time since Christmas and nothing, not even Dio rolling up in his car and comparing him to the sickly-smelling water at the bottom of a trash can, could spoil his mood.

“I guess. Go inside and get ready for bed.”

She whined, because it was the weekend, gosh.

“I’ll check your toothbrush this time to make sure you brushed, too.” He was… he was smiling. “Go in, Jol. It’s late.”

It was a nickname he hadn’t used in a while, which took her by surprise. Nodding slightly, she bounded upstairs to grab a change of pajamas and head into her bathroom, while Jotaro looked at the remains of the night he and his friends and family shared. A box of pizza without a single slice left, but two breadsticks that would be inedible by morning. He went around, picking up mismatched glasses of coffee and juice and stuffed the entire pizza box into the trash compactor. Very quietly, he washed those dishes on his own, not overrun with thoughts or completely blank, just resting in the moment.

He signed Jolyne up for sports didn’t he?

He did. He also realized just now that he’d done it without asking her, because he felt bad for Polnareff in the moment. The glasses were left overturned on a large dishrag to dry for the morning. Well… it’ll be good for her. She can stay longer after school instead of being bored in the aquarium, she can get to see Kakyoin and Polnareff more… and of course, like his friend said, she’d have more opportunities and thicker boots to kick people in the shins with. No matter how that turned out, she’d probably be happy with it, especially if her friends signed up…

He washed his hands just one last time and started trudging up the stairs. Days like these would be natural from now on… his friends rolled back into his life like they always did, understood him too well to let him go without a little scolding but with all the understanding in the world. He didn’t realize that it had made him feel alone until he felt their absence in his chest fill up again.

“… what did we call ourselves? The Stardust Crusaders.”

The name of their little environmental protection gang. Saying it out loud sounded like a childish thing, but he still had a leather jacket in his closet that had the words painted on, along with a dastardly looking logo that they all shared.

When it finally came time for bed, Jotaro checked his phone one last time, seeing he’d already been added to #crusaderchat and messages were scrolling by about him finally showing up. A small laugh escaped him before he messaged ‘Hey’ once and rolled over to get comfortable for sleep.

Chapter Text

“Holy hell, is that a dog?”

Breakfast in the dining room attached to the kitchen overlooked the joint Kakyoin-Polnareff household’s backyard. It was a modest, single-floor home that had three bedrooms and not nearly enough bathrooms for two men who were very particular about their hair. The blinds had been drawn on morning light, and Jean Pierre squinted outside, putting down his coffee to go nose-to-glass with the mirror. Kakyoin, who would rather remind him to get ready for work, couldn’t help but wander over curiously. Sherry was still in her room, getting ready for school.

The dog was chewing its own leg like a bone and went into the throes of yapping every time a bird landed near it. It was a scraggly, thin, angry looking thing that limped as it walked back to its patch of grass. It kicked dust up with its good leg before settling down again into the haggard mess it called comfortable.

“That’s… strange. That’s a Boston Terrier. It doesn’t look like a mix, either…” Kakyoin leered out the window, though not as close as Polnareff. “Designer dogs like that aren’t usually strays.” A pause. “Either way, we’ve got to call animal control.”

“No way,” Polnareff replied firmly. “If it’s sick or something, they’ll just put it down. We should take it to the vet.”

“Well, there’s no guarantee they won’t, either—“

“Don’t be heartless! You can’t just stare down an injured dog and think ‘better kill it’! Come on, we’ve got to give it a try.”

—

The first attempt didn’t work so well. The lure of food was greedily accepted by the mutt, but any attempt at getting his hands on it was rebuked by the loudest snarl Polnareff had ever heard out of an animal. The next night, torn up sandwich meat and tuna and a dish of water served as an offering to be ravenously devoured before the small dog hobbled back. It looked a little bit young, and the ‘gaining its trust’ method was starting to wear Polnareff out with the worry of whatever infection the dog might have might kill it in the meantime.

“Okay, Saturday we’re taking it to the vet. I have a plan.”

Those plans were always slipshod and hastily thrown together, though. Polnareff would do the hardest part, donning elbow length cooking gloves to chase it to the side of the yard. There, Jotaro would wait with a laundry hamper to get him into, and Kakyoin would hold the lid like a shield to divert it if it tried to run around.

“Are we ready, guys?”

“You should have bought a carrier.” Jotaro boomed across the yard apathetically. When he raised his voice, all octaves went along with it, but the tone managed to remain the same. It was like he had been born with a magic spell that gave him a built-in megaphone.

“Excuse moi, Jotaro, some of us need to pay rent and not squander our savings on something we’ll never need again. Anyway three, two, two and a half, one…. go!”

The grand chase across their backyard began, with the mutt dashing and turning to snap at Pol every few seconds. Jotaro and Kakyoin had set up a barrier at the very end of the yard, trusting in Polnareff’s ability to guide an animal to safety… except it wound up much easier. After the dog outwitted him and sunk his fangs into the oven mitt, Polnareff held onto the territorial terrier by his rear and walked him over to the laundry basket, where Kakyoin and Jotaro looked severely unimpressed.

“The trick is to ball your hands into fists, so when they bite down, they don’t get your fingers,” He said, as if this was and had always been genius as they slipped the dog into the laundry basket and put a lid over it. “Jotaro, thank you for helping us with this!”

“It was probably abandoned… got roughed up by real street dogs and couldn’t fend for itself,” Jotaro frowned slightly. An abandonee or a lost dog? Either was possible. “Don’t get attached.”

The scraggly dog snarled within his confines as Polnareff lifted up the makeshift carrier with his oven mitts. “Me? No— Never. That’ll be someone else’s job in the shelter.”

—

“Well, he doesn’t have rabies…” Dr. Goulding clicked her pen and jotted a few notes down on her clipboard. “But I have never seen a boston terrier in this bad of shape. No microchip, no collar…” The dog was sedated and breathing quietly on the table, having had several X-rays done. “He’s got mange, a break in two parts his ankle, and gum in his intestines, creating a blockage. Since he’s officially a stray, we’re grateful you brought him in… but with his temperament, without an owner, we’re probably going to put him down. There isn’t much else—“

“You’re gonna kill him? Over him being itchy and eating gum off the streets? Look—“ Polnareff gestured to the limp but breathing dog on the table. “That’s a perfectly good dog. Someone would want that dog.”

“You brought him in in a laundry basket. And without someone to foot the bill for his stay here, removing the blockage, and saving his ankle, we have no real choice. No one will want to sponsor that dog.”

And in the back of Polnareff’s brain was this ticking instinct, this ‘I’m not going to feel right going to bed tonight knowing I let a dog die’ running through his mind. Kakyoin shook his head at him, trying to convey that enough was enough and it’s time to let the poor, miserable thing go.

“How old is he?”

“No older than two or three.”

“Can I take him home if I pay for his bills?”

Ellie shrugged and sighed in a noncommittal way. “Of course? At this point, we have no other owner to consider, especially in his state. He’s been out on the streets for a long, long time.”

Kakyoin stared like he didn’t want to pay a pet deposit. Jotaro gently looked at Polnareff knowing what he’d choose to do before he did.

“Let me see that bill.”

Scanning the list of treatments, Jean’s lips grew tighter as the balance grew bigger. Of course, with his new job, he could make this just outside of rent, but he’d be eating Spaghetti-o’s for dinner and ramen for every other meal. And nothing fresher than old fashioned tap water.

“… can he make a full recovery?”

“Physically, yes. Personality wise…”

“I’ll work on it. My little sis has always asked me for a dog… alright, go ahead. Treat him! This is good karma for the next whole year! Maybe he’ll make it to the news!”

Dr. Goulding smiled with furrowed brows. “Then meet the nurse at the front counter with your credit card.”

—

Over the weeks of mild exhaustion as he ran the track and coached (“Well, if I’m not getting anything from a bowl of cheap ramen, vitamins will work in their place, right?”), Polnareff would visit the vet every now and then some. A tag had been placed on the dog’s cage in his absence, reading ‘Iggy’ as nicknamed by the vets. His leg was fully wrapped in a cast, and the mange had begun to subside with bristles of black and white fur beginning to grow in. And, of course, with each visit he had to authorize another payment, and if the nurses thought this dog was bitchy, what if Sherry wouldn’t want him?

The first time they let him pet Iggy, he didn’t growl. It was more of a half-hearted bark muffled by its lips, a proclamation of irritation at being awake than a warning. He itched behind his ears and the dog stretched out his legs, staring down the enormous man like they were on the same level in this cage.

“He’s usually not so calm…” Dr. Duran commented idly, chewing the end of her pen. “Maybe he knows you brought him in? He wasn’t going to live much longer. Maybe a couple of days.”

“Why’d you call him Iggy?”

“Well, removing the gum from his digestive tract made him fairly… er, flatulent after the surgery. So we started calling him ‘icky’, because he was ugly, smelled bad, and was mean as hell. Then we realized we needed a name on file for him, so Iggy worked.”

“Who’s a gross dog?” Polnareff grinned as he rubbed Iggy’s cheek. “Who’s so gross that even vets think you’re gross? It’s you! It’s you.”

His attention was met with a growly murmur.

“So, will you be taking him home today?”

“What?”

“We’ve treated his mange here, but you can do the rest. So long as you make sure he stays off his leg, he’s fully recovered from his surgery and ready to go.” The nurse rose her eyebrows. “Unless… you want this dog to go up for adoption?”

“No no! No. I— uh, I didn’t… know this would be happening so soon. Can you give me a minute? Just one. Thanks.”

He hit the speed dial for Kakyoin’s cell phone, who had spent the better half of the evening grading watercolors at school. Then, when he didn’t pick up, he hit it again four more times.

“What.”

“The— the dog comes home today. Noriaki, I need your help.”

“With what?”

“I gotta take it to a pet store and get things for it. And inevitably I’m gonna bring home the wrong stuff and you’ll call me out on it so just meet me at PetCo, okay?”

“Did you pay the deposit to our landlord yet?”

“Not yet! Soon. I’ll wire him the money tonight. I already talked to him about Iggy.”

“Iggy.”

“Yeah, Iggy. That’s the dog.”

“It’s not exactly refined…”

The banter went on long enough for Dr. Duran to gently place Iggy in a towel and then into a cardboard carrier, bringing him up to the front. A collar and leash were set in a small bag, along with some treats for tooth decay and a bag of food he’d been weaned onto. Polnareff took the box gingerly and took the chained desk pen to sign his signature wherever they pointed it out— goodbye, using his credit card anytime soon.

His car was simple, silver as his hair and a bit old, but not by much. After running the air conditioning for a bit, he buckled in the carrier next to him and then his own, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel.

“This is good karma for three whole years. And if he turns out to be a little asshole, I can always bring him back…” But his brain echoed that this was an investment— no, a bond. A bond between man and animal! A snotty, wheezy animal in the box next to him. He popped open the box to see him, almost as if he was going to be surprised with some other dog.

“Come— come here. Over here.” Delicate, large hands scooped him up beneath the elbows and gently under his cast. He snickered, seeing they put a cone on him so the incorrigible need to itch couldn’t be fulfilled. Now on his lap, laying quietly with the interruption of the occasional rude noise, Jean Pierre pulled out of the vet’s parking lot.

—

Jean Pierre Polnareff had never owned a dog.

There were cats in the neighborhood he grew up in as a boy that had served as his childhood pet, though they all belonged to different neighbors. Dogs were high maintenance things, and as he gently placed him in a towel bundle in the kid’s seat of his cart, he wandered into the store not sure what to expect, up to and including this dog losing its mind and biting the shit out of his hand. True to his word, Kakyoin was there, waiting with a notepad several pages long and surveying the odd bundle like it was a very poor recreation of Baby Jesus at a nativity scene.

“At least he’s calm— not… tearing up the place.” Kakyoin was bold in reaching out to pet his forehead, scratching softly behind his ears only to get a rumble in return that was more an acknowledgment of his presence. “Joseph would probably know more about dogs. Jotaro… wouldn’t, he got a kitten for Christmas…”

“Have you seen the pictures? I remember him saying he’d never get a cat in his life and then—“

“Jolyne’s picture of him was very cute.” A long, thin smile. “Anyway, shall we? We have a lot to get. If it’s going to live with me, I’m going to make sure it at least lives well if you forget animals are a responsibility.”

“Come on… I’ve never messed up with that!”

“You’ve never had the opportunity. Come on.”

—

Weeks passed. Iggy finally got over his mange completely.

A month or so passed. The cast on his leg was finally able to be cut off.

When he was at his healthiest, finally removing the cone of shame and no-biting felt like unveiling someone who had just had face surgery completed and seeing how they would react. The dog scuttled around the house, sniffing both of their shoes but ultimately winding up in front of Sherry, who was showing the most enthusiasm and preening over him— it was as if the dog knew who would give it the most respect. And as she slid open the sliding glass door to go play fetch with him, the two roommates watched outside the door to make sure they were playing nicely.

“… Well, if he’s going to repay me like this—“

“Hm?”

“I’m glad he’ll be nice to Sherry. That’s all. It’s formative to have a pet growing up! I wish he’d treat me with the same respect, though.”

“You got what you wanted out of it, isn’t that enough?”

“What I wanted? Well yeah, but—“

“You got to play superhero at great cost to yourself. I’m sure the dog knows.”

“Oh…” Polnareff puffed out his chest a little. “Does he?”

“Of course not. He’s a dog, not a free thinker. Anyway, we’re meeting Jotaro at Abdul’s place.” He called out into the back yard. “Sherry, stay safe. Call us if he gets out of control, and feel free to put him in his crate!”

The gushing he got back about how playful the dog was acting was enough to convince him Sherry was in relatively safe hands. Satisfied, the two turned and left through the sliding glass patio doors to play at who would be quickest to grab their car keys.

—

The very feeling of Abdul’s tea house was like dropping off into a world of serenity, like the stillness of water or the smell of fresh rain. It had a tendency of being very quietly busy— routine customers wanted to keep knowledge of this place to themselves, but word of mouth leaked through with guests. He’d bought an old fashioned bar and converted it into a business where he could practice as he wanted and do what he liked, and for it, his customers always thought he could predict the kind of tea you wanted the most, even for the most difficult patron. A beautiful red parrot had a home away from home here in a luxurious and fancy cage towards the back of the room, which patrons were forbidden from touching, though they were free to talk to Magician’s Red. Sometimes, when he wasn’t preparing orders, he let him ride on his shoulder.

Jotaro was already there, chatting with his old friend and quietly enjoying the black tea that reminded him of the kind Holly used to make when he was little.

“Polnareff.” Abdul grabbed his hand and pulled him into a hug, patting his back. “How did your gamble pay off?”

“I’m not sure it paid much, but… the dog’s happy and alive. Sherry’s happy. I’m happy.”

“Then you got what you needed from it. Please, sit.”

A brisk oolong tea for Kakyoin, and something with a hint of fruit in it for Polnareff. “Needed?”

“You don’t remember pouring out your worries of being a good guardian to your sister to me? This isn’t a bar any longer, you were by no means drunk.”

“Yeah, but that’s so many things at once! It’s being there for her, making sure she’s safe but not being suffocating.” The table they sat at was the most comfortable one, the one Abdul saved for his favored guests. Polnareff turned the teacup in his hands. “She’s a teenager now. I’m terrified she’s gonna grow up and hate me.”

Jotaro ‘hmm’ed. “She’s not your kid, Pol. It’s different between a sister and a kid.”

“Think more about what a big brother should do.” Kakyoin sipped his tea quietly. “I’ve never had such privilege, but I know there’s quite a marked difference and Jotaro would know all about it.”

Abdul quietly doubted that. Jotaro doubted it just a little more.

“You want to protect her, take care of her, make sure she gets a worldly experience growing up?” Abdul asked.

“Yeah, of course! I want to take her camping and on vacations and I want to make sure she gets good grades but promise her it’s not the end of the world if she doesn’t and needs help— I want her to chase her dreams. I can’t imagine what it’d have been like if I lost her along with mom and dad, so I’ve got to make it up for the both of them.”

“She’ll be fine, then. Plenty of men come here and resent their responsibilities. You want to be better than that. So long as you are, no worries, right?”

“No worries…” Polnareff murmured.

“Well, he’s got me.” Kakyoin shrugged. “And I’m smarter than him, so I’ll be there with about… seventy articles about raising a teen memorized to back him up.”

“And me. I’m the only one out of all of you with a kid.”

(Many of them were well aware of the irony.)

“And me. You know I love talking to you two as a family. I could read the cards for you, if you like?”

“No, no!” Polnareff responded hastily, chuckling a little. “If I know my fortune, I’ll feel weird about it. I’ll fixate too much on it being the future. Right now, I just want to prove I can do it without the suggestion of cards.”

Abdul sipped his tea with a small smirk. “Then you’re more ready than you know.”

Chapter Text

Giorno was awake for hours before they even remotely had to be at the airport.

He was a curiosity; born in Italy to a Japanese mother and a British father. It was almost as if it was the neutral ground he could stand on with the two. He knew very little of his mother, other than Dio’s insistence that she was not a fit parent. What he didn’t know was that assumption was correct— Miss Shiobana intended to put him up for adoption, then schemed when Jonathan had asked her for the baby, thinking she could get a lot of money from him as an adoption fee. Instead, rather karmically, Dio had tripped the wire of protectiveness at first sight and immediately used all of the power at his hands to cut her out and become Giorno’s legal guardian. She was a woman who wanted nothing more than to spend her youth partying, and in the end, she got off scot free to do so (albeit with less money than she wanted).

So going back to Italy was a mystery for Giorno to try and solve. Would he finally meet his mother? He’d tugged on Dio’s sleeve the entire time after he bought the tickets for the flight, begging that he’d be able to meet her. Dio never gave him a single answer one way or the other, because really, how do you explain to a seven year old, in a school with whole families or at very least a mother present in their lives, that their own mother was a deadbeat? In some ways, it was his fault. He’d taken Giorno to his own mother’s grave several times, speaking softly about how proud she would be of her grandson. It had probably left a strong impression on him about family.

But Giorno’s mother barely merited a word. It was as if he didn’t care to know her, preferring to forget and gently reminding Giorno that he probably should too.

The sky was still dark blue outside when Dio finally got up, and Giorno met him tiredly but with no less excitement.

“Ready, papa?”

“Be patient. We have to get ready, first.”

They would be flying first-class for nearly a day on a nonstop flight to Italy. Giorno would see the skies change faster than he’d ever seen it before. He was impatient, dangling his legs as Dio fixed his hair, checking and re-checking his bags to make sure he’d brought along everything he wanted, even sitting atop his luggage by the door while Dio took his time as if he had all of it in the world. He quietly admitted to himself that seeing Giorno, usually a quiet child, so excited, was heartwarming.

“My mother was from Italy,” Dio crooned to Giorno as he lifted his heavy suitcase like it was light as a feather. “She really wanted to return there someday. And— okay, Giorno, get in the car real quick. I’ll finish this later.”

Giorno obediently clambered in the passenger side and shut the door. Dio shouted out to the man who was dutifully watering his plants, pajamas and all.

“I have cameras everywhere. Don’t even think about going on my property while I’m away!”

“No need to worry. After all, it’ll be like living next to an empty landfill once you’re gone. Completely refreshing.” Jotaro responded.

“Please, hurry and die.”

“After you.”

Deciding not to waste his time or rack up Jotaro’s anger to maximum and risk the hose again, he piled into the car next to his son and quickly sped off.

“Your grandmother taught me a lot of things. Everything I remember is a guideline for how I carry myself today. She would never lower herself before someone, she never took your grandfather’s anger. She gave us these—“ He tugged at his ear, showing off the three birthmarks that Giorno shared. “She told me they were the devil’s luck, and I had better not pierce over them. She would have loved you.”

Getting comfortable in his seat on the plane, Giorno wondered why Dio was so roundabout when he asked about his mother, not his grandmother. He already knew Grandma Brando was a nice lady. “And what about my mom?”

“Your mom.” He paused quietly, giving Giorno the impression he might not speak again after that. “I will tell you honestly, my Giorno. We will not be seeing your mother while we’re there.”

“What?! Why not?”

Instead of shh’ing him, Dio only chose to answer. “Your mother… how do I explain. Your mother gave you to me. She’s not a parent to you anymore beside your blood.”

And she was a neglectful, uncaring, scam artist of a —

“There are some people in this world that should be parents and shouldn’t, and they come in all shapes and sizes. They may look like ordinary people, but they’re either fit for the task or not. Your mother was not fit for the task.” She wasn’t fit for anything. Dio didn’t even keep a picture of her in his house.

“She doesn’t love me.”

There it was, the rocket-arrow that pierced straight through all of his defenses and stabbed him right where his one singular feeling was. A small grunt escaped his lips accompanied with a light snarl, before his expression returned to unreadable.

“Your mother grew up with different priorities in life. She… was not a good woman. Giorno, there is a reason I kept her out of your life. It’s because the only way I’d be able to give you a decent one was if she didn’t see you.”

“My mom isn’t good…” His tone carried wistfulness that was older than his years combined with a crushing feeling of a young, broken dream.

“Your father is good. Your friends are good. I chose you the moment I saw you. My biggest regret is that my own mother isn’t still with us, so you could see for yourself what a good mother looks like and acts like.”

This topic… it didn’t appease Giorno at all, and when he leaned his head against Dio’s shoulder, he silently stained his shirt with warm tears.

When the plane got up to its penultimate height, Dio took Giorno into his lap and simply held him. He could not lie about that woman, but he wished he could spare Giorno those feelings. As the boy started to sob and hiccup as quietly as he could, Dio used the small television embedded into the seat in front of him to change to a nature documentary that would last the full ten hours. He took out his earbuds, and placed one into his own ear and one into Giorno’s. The sound of a gentle narrator speaking about the life of birds began to quiet him..

“Everything will be okay. I will make sure of that.”

Italy was warm and breezy the moment they stepped out of the airport. Giorno was immediately fascinated by the rushing sound of another language being spoken all around him. He could just scarcely remember memories of not being able to read, and this brought about the same feeling. Dio was semi-fluent, having done business here and being a perfectionist about it. It was one of his clients that’d be loaning him their summer home here, and as he took his son’s hand and lead him to the taxi, he grinned down at him.

“This is the place you were born. How do you feel about it?”

“It’s…” So much at once? Confusing and enthralling? “I like it.”

“Just wait until you see the rest of Napoli.”

Of course, Dio’s driver was a man from the mafia.

Working with Diavolo was more often than not a chore. He was an aggressive man constantly paranoid about who could have information on him. Dio was one of the few contacts he didn’t seem to care about, because they both had verbal weapons of mass destruction against each other and neither cared to set off the Cold War between them. Dio got his men released in court, Diavolo owed him favors in return. Even if they lived in the same town for now, outside of Italy— it’d be temporary for the Boss, who would return and scare his men shitless with his presence.

In that way, Dio supposed he could respect him. At the very least, their venom when meeting casually were on par with the others.

Giorno stayed close, reaching out and grasping Dio’s hand until they got to the villa on the sea. The men sizing them up looked on curiously— this had to be a man held in absolute respect if Diavolo would let him borrow one of his many properties. And true, it weighed on Dio’s mind that this could be some terrible trap, but he knew the don too well. He didn’t have a single man as smart as Dio on his staff, nor one he got along with as well.

In an odd way, despite their aggression at the meeting, they had a commendable amount of solidarity between them. One of the henchmen offered Dio a phone.

“You arrived safe and well?”

“As always. Your people took good care of me.”

“Don’t mess it up beyond what my men can repair. I know your college days are behind you but I still remember how well you could throw your weight around… through glass doors and with brass knuckles.”

“Ah, nine years ago. That was an interesting vacation.”

“And I can still take you in a fight.” The sound of a cigarette drag and an exhale of smoke. “We’re even for Timbalo.”

“Yes, but I have two more of your men I need to finish appeals for.”

“Yeah, yeah. Enjoy your vacation, because I’m putting you on that the second you get home.”

“I miss you, too.” Dio teased through the phone.

The phone call ended with a cross between a laugh and a ‘hmph’ as Diavolo noisily hung up.

The sunny private beach that the pathway around the back lead to was a treasure in and of itself. Of course, the sun was merciless on Dio's skin, but not as much on his son. As soon as their things were unpacked, Giorno had already escaped down the path before Dio had any time at all to put on sunscreen. It was wide and lined with trees, the breeze neither too cold or the sun too hot. Giorno had been overwhelmed with a sensation of belonging. He kicked his flip flops off and made a sprint for the ocean that would leave any parent zooming after them.

But Dio followed casually, rubbing lotion into his neck with a basket and his book in the other hand.

“Don’t go very far,” His command boomed across the beach, still loud enough to be held afloat above the crashing waves. “Where you are now is fine.”

Giorno nodded, crouching down to see each new thing brought up by the tide, catching shells in his hand before throwing them out to the ocean. Every now and then, he’d run back up to Dio’s umbrella and lounge chair and show him the little things he caught. Shells, clams, hermit crabs (that Dio nearly flung out of his hands) and every kind of wonder one would find at the beach. Truth be told, his eyes were more on his son than the book he brought to check ‘seaside relaxation’ off his vacation bucket list. After several moments of deliberation, he set it aside and went to join him.

“Did you know,” Giorno began, flinging sea shells back into the sea. “You can’t keep sea shells?”

“Hm? What’s stopping you.”

“The ocean is becoming more acidic without shells to break down. It’s healthier to put them back in the sea.”

“… and you learned this from…”

“Jolyne’s dad.”

“Hm. When?”

“At the tour.”

“Well let’s just say that Mr. Kujo isn’t always right, and you can keep whatever shell you find here.”

Giorno threw an enormous empty clam shell back into the sea. “He works at an aquarium though.”

“He must have been over-exaggerating.” Deliberating for just a second, Dio picked up one of the shells from Giorno’s pile and threw it as far as he could— making a satisfying splash in the sea far, far away.

“You don’t over exaggerate at your job, though.”

Dio pursed his lips, stared down at Giorno, and couldn’t repress the full-bodied bark of a laugh that threatened to shake him to his core. He sat down in the tide, letting that boisterous laughter shake his bones.

“O…” He wheezed, “Oh, of course I don’t, hahaha!”

Giorno merely stared as he tossed a few more shells. He didn’t think it was that funny.

“And you’re sure your brother will be cool with this?”

Diego grinned back at Gyro and Johnny, who were carrying a bunch of plastic bags and at least two cases of beer. “It’ll be fine. What Dio doesn’t know can’t hurt him. Besides, you guys wanted a place to crash while your apartment is getting fumigated, This’ll work out just fine.”

Not a second into the foyer, Johnny whispered to Gyro. “I want to trash this place.”

Gyro only grinned back, bearing those shiny metal teeth of his.

It was mid-morning when Giorno wandered out of the villa, Dio still asleep and Giorno too impatient to sit by himself in a new country. Sliding on sandals, he made his way down to the boardwalk just a few blocks away, some euros in his pocket in case he wanted to buy breakfast. It was so… vivid here, so bright and colorful, grey-blue buildings decorated with red hanging flowers. Soon enough, he’d managed to express without Italian that he wanted a crepe from the local bakery, paid for it, and sat outside to eat and watch cars go by. He might’ve paid attention to his phone buzzing were it not for the noise and bustle.

(A phone for a seven year old. Dio truly spared no expense.)

Just as he was about to finish the last bite, he saw a man turn the corner before he noticed red drops dripping onto the pavement. Checking around before looking, this man— no no, this had been one of their greeters at the villa— had collapsed behind the tall grass. Soon enough, two men ran up to Giorno, speaking impatient Italian.

“Huh? I don’t understand.”

One elbowed the other, encouraging him to put his English classes to use.

“A man ran this way. Where did he go?”

This was a dangerous situation, and Giorno knew it. If he took too long, these guys might get angry.

“That way.” He pointed to an opposite direction, far away from the mound in the grass.

The two men nodded at each other and sped off, while Giorno looked down at the unconscious man, wondering if he should try and wake him… until he was scooped up into someone’s arms from behind, leaving him yelling and kicking.

“Giorno!” Dio persisted, turning his son to face him. “Why did you leave without me? It’s not safe to wander on your own in a place like this!”

Sweat clung to his forehead, betraying that he’d been sprinting to find him. The bakery had pointed him the right way.

“I… was hungry…”

“Wake me up, then.” Too frazzled to scold him, Dio wondered if he was being lenient. “Do not ever, ever wander off on your own again, understood?”

“Papa, there’s a man—“

Edging over to where Giorno pointed, there was indeed a gangster bleeding out into the tall grass.

“Oh, for—“ Dio pursed his lips and scowled. Part of this was his fault for not telling Giorno not to go out on his own. He pulled a cellphone from his pocket. “At least he’ll owe me another favor after this.”

“Are you still mad at me?”

The church they sat in was a work of art as much as it was a place of worship, but it was long after service hours and right now, they were resting in it after a long day of walking. Giorno stared up at the paintings in a mystified wonder, like he didn’t know how the walls could be painted so majestically without any help from the modern day. Dio had told him earlier that desperation lead to ingenuity, and also lead to lead poisoning.

“I’m not mad,” He quietly reassured him as he looked at his phone, clearly not here for the gospel. “But no more sticking your neck out for gangsters.”

Giorno got up off the pew, drawing the attention of other visitors with his unusual victory curls and hairstyle. Dio watched on warily.

“But he was going to die.”

“That was probably his job.”

“You can’t have a job where you just die,” Giorno responded, firmly. “Otherwise it isn’t a job. You can’t get paid when you’re dead.”

“There is a lot you have to learn about the world. Some of it I’d like to stop you from learning.”

“You won’t.” Giorno’s response was matter-of-fact.

“I know. But still… tread with caution, mio figlio.”

Giorno turned to face him with a stone expression that didn’t sit well with any child. “Tell me about my mother.”

“We went over this—“

“I’ll keep asking. I won’t stop. Even if the story is too bad to hear, I want to know about my mom.”

Dio sighed, putting his phone in his pocket. “I really want to save this story for when you’re older.”

“I need to know! No one else at my school knows nothing about their mom!”

His voice was too loud for the church, and Dio rested his hand on his head as if to quietly shush him.

“Very well.”

“I met her when I was in my twenties. There was no formal dating… she passed my time, I passed hers. She wasn’t the type to be tied down to any one person. When she became pregnant, she thought she could get a lot of money out of this whole thing. Rich father and all.” Dio spared no detail, no gaps where Giorno could ask questions. “Some people are like that, Giogio. And just because she was going to have a baby, it didn’t change the way she thought.”

“So she really didn’t…” Giorno trailed off, staring at the pew in front of him.

“But it just so happened I was your father. One who understood the importance of his consequences. Who could provide and take care of you.” He dodged mentioning Jonathan like a speeding bullet— He wasn’t going to let him know it was Jonathan she intended to con into parenthood. “The moment I saw you, you were a part of my family, not hers.”

“But what did she look like? What did she act like? What did she say that made you like her?”

“I certainly don’t like her. Back then, your father was a bit reckless. She… had short brown hair, brown eyes… she was a Japanese woman doing her studies here. She snorted when she laughed and she had a mean streak to her. Back then I found it charming. Less so now. She knew all the right places to go by heart, but she was capricious and I knew it. So when she told me she was pregnant, I thought I’d finally fallen into her pile of people she thought she could freely manipulate,” He sighed. “she really shouldn’t have tried to play legal games with a lawyer.”

Dio was tempted to laugh, but seeing Giorno stare at him so solemnly, all he did was continue.

“What I’m saying is… unconventional isn’t always terrible. You have me and your uncles. You have your friends at school. You can make a proper family out of that. For a while, Diego only had me. Now he has you, too.”

This was too saccharine to be coming out of Dio Brando’s mouth, but he felt if he didn’t buffer those inconvenient truths with a soft follow-up, he’d have to console his child for the rest of the trip.

“…”

Giorno didn’t cry, though it wasn’t surprising. He listened to Dio’s truthful words and slowly began to accept them.

“You won’t go away either, right?”

“Ahh, someday you’ll be telling me to go away,” he smirked. “Not anytime soon, Giogio.”

[“Is that who I think it is?”]

[“He looks just like the picture and everything…”]

[“It is him! I remember his neck scar!”]

Dio was unaware of the conversation happening a few tables over from where he and Giorno were eating. The restaurant was luxurious, draped in red and cream colored decor with a man playing piano softly in the background. Giorno was being picky with his food, curiously and warily taking bites out of Italian pizza. He’d never seen anything quite like it back home. Dio chided him softly as he enjoyed his wine along with his last day in Italy.

A woman tapped Dio’s shoulder, with a big, showy smile.

[“Oh, it’s been years, Dio! What’s dragged you back to town? You don’t look like you were studying abroad— and your little entourage is gone, too! And that’s…”]

She fixed her gaze on Giorno, squinting lightly as she realized who this kid was.

[“Is this my little bambino? Oh, I wonder if he’s going to grow up as handsome as—”]

Dio stood up to his full height, looming over her with an anger Giorno rarely saw nor cared to. “Esci di qua.”

[“Don’t be like that, I’m just saying hello—“]

“Get out.” He repeated, his tone cold and booming all at once. [“This is not your son. He will never be your son. Get out, before I call in a favor from him.”]

At that she balked, nervously stepped away back to her table, before gathering her purse and shawl up shakily and making a beeline for the exit without paying. All at once, Dio’s calm demeanor had both broken and been reinforced as he slid back into his seat, Giorno’s knowing stare digging into him.

“That was mom, wasn’t it?”

“…”

His silence spoke for his mood the entire evening, and as they eventually left the restaurant, they would walk along cobblestone streets in the yellowed light of lamp posts as they passed them by, stopping at the occasional shop to get something they’d never find at home. Giorno had promised to get his friends souvenirs, Dio merely watched to see if there were any stores open that had a nice suit he could take home and get fitted.

He held Giorno closer, as if the idea of running into that woman again was too repugnant to allow to happen again. Dio might not have been the world’s best father, but at the same time, he refused to let Giorno see her even one more time.

—

Diego stretched languidly across the sofa, fixated on the television while Gyro and Johnny were draped across the other. This had been one of the wildest summer breaks they had, and dishevelment was everywhere. Red cups all over the house betrayed a party, a garbage can overstuffed betrayed that the chores hadn't been done or cared about, and the absolute litter of empty food wrappers and half-cleaned stains showed one clear thing: Diego didn't know his brother would be coming back today.

"Yo, Diego..." Johnny mumbled. "I think we'd better head home. Your dad scares the shit out of me."

"He's not my dad. He's my older brother. Thanks for the unknowing compliment and the diss on him.”

"Go fuck yourself."

"I'll go fuck myself when I'm done with Star Trek. Then we can clean up."

Episode 67, The Empath, would have to wait for another day. The sound of tires rolling up the driveway made Diego look out the window and practically scream.

“Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit, shit shit shit shit. Here, start picking things up—.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Dio’s home.”

Gyro, with such immediacy that it could make more than balls spin, flung open one of the windows on the side of the house and put his leg through it.”

“You asshole, you better not leave me here!” Johnny yelled after him, pulling himself into his wheelchair and wheeling as fast as his arms could carry him out to the back deck. The poolside was absolutely trashed, but it wouldn’t be his or Gyro’s problem so long as they could get away from this shady-ass lawyer and his ability to stop time long enough to sue you.

Diego merely stood in shock as his friends frankly Olympic ability to make it look like he was the sole culprit. He would get them back later, oh, he would—

The door opened, and Dio, carrying his son, stood and surveyed the area. His grip tightened only slightly, but he walked forward and ignored Diego as he made his way up the stairs. Giorno was put to bed quietly, tired from the flight and barely able to walk on his own. Dio pat his head softly, sat up, and closed the door behind him.

Then, his thunderous run down the stairs erupted into a big, booming voice, with Diego running for his life around kitchen counters and Dio’s sofas to try to fend off the elbow lock that was sure to follow.

Chapter Text

“What are you going to do when Giorno’s in high school?”

Diego swept up the floor as his punishment, as Dio refused to forgive his wild party-of-three several weeks ago. He’d be in charge of maid duty until Dio found another, or he’d vowed to abruptly cut him off. Deep down, Diego knew that was a bluff, but he knew Dio was excellent at thinking up different cruel and unusual punishments to replace his usual threat, so cleaning was really like getting off scot free.

Judging by the scowl on his face, Dio didn’t like the idea. Of course, he wanted his son to grow up independent and self-sufficient, but his birthday had already passed far too quickly, and he only had a precious few years left of his childish youth.

“I don’t know,” Dio snapped, dunking his croissant into his tea. “Let it happen? It’s an unstoppable force of fate.”

“Gio’s always been a quiet kid who does what you ask him to. I bet he’s going to have the worst rebellion to offset that. Like full up disavow you. I bet he’ll go to nature protests and write tell-all articles about living with a demon lawyer.”

“He will not.”

“You thought I was bad?”

“You were terrible. You stole everything you could get your hands on, you practically organized a gambling ring in high school, you were obsessed with climbing to the top while doing absolutely inane illegal things. If I ever told you no, you got it through someone else. No one could be as bad as raising you.”

“I learned most of that from you, you know…”

“So you’re a monkey who copies others. Not much of an improvement.”

“Just so you know, he’ll like me more. Uncles always get the best treatment while parents get the worst.”

This was taking on more of Dio’s temper than he wanted to allow. Diego had the method of digging into someone perfected, and like a chaotic beast, didn’t care if it benefited him or not. He’d do it solely to get under Dio’s skin. Would Giorno grow up to hate him? Dio… hated his father plenty when he was his age, but he had a damn good reason. With a scowl, he realized that Diego’s ploy had worked and now this was all he could think about. The tighter you pull the leash, the more one struggles to get free… if he continued raising his son with a stern yet giving hand, would he grow up spoiled or resentful? At times like this, he was really useless at parenting. Dio was great at crafting followers, not… children. Giorno could grow up in his footsteps but turn for the worse if he spoiled him, or he could break free of his image if he felt neglect. How did you balance the act? It wasn’t like Diego was a great frame of reference.

“You look so serious.”

“Your own damn fault.” Dio’s face twisted into a sneer that Diego had been all-too-familiar-with his entire life.

“Oh my god… you’re upset. You’re honest to god upset. You’re having a feeling.” It happened more often than Diego implied, but he loved teasing about it all the same because Dio simply hated it.

“Don’t be ridiculous, you’re simply trying to get a rise out of me. I’m not worried about where Giorno will go from here because I’m the one raising him. If all I do is make sure he has a comfortable life, then my job is done.”

“Oh?” Diego quirked an eyebrow, entertained with Dio’s lenience. “No forcing him into the family business?”

Dio hummed thoughtfully. “Knowing Giogio, he might be destined for even greater things. But I wouldn’t mind changing my firm’s name to ‘Brando & Son.’”

Diego frowned, tying up a bag of garbage to go into the pile. “I thought you were going to rename it when I joined?”

“You’re low priority.”

“Tch…” The mess surrounding them was still plenty daunting. Even weeks later, there was still trash poking out of corners from their wild party. Times like this, Diego wished he could call up Jonathan and take him up on his desire for an apprentice. However, he knew he wouldn’t get anywhere dusting bones for a living, no matter how passionate he was about it. “You really play favorites.”

“If you ever become a father, you’ll understand.”

Some people would positively kill for Rohan Kishibe's house. It was kind of a shame that nobody ever saw it too often -- there was his maid, two best friends, the occasional editor, and that was it -- since it was truly a sight to behold. It was an elegant mixture of modern and classic, decorated with original art pieces and things squirreled away from silent auctions. The sleek glass marble counters looked like they were built to entertain, but really only ever saw any action when Rohan was carving up vegetable more often for reference than to actually cook. There was also an immaculate pool in the backyard, kept only for the rare occasions he wanted to sun atop a floatie, in the few designated hours not dedicated to his work schedule.

This pool had a frequent visitor. By which, he means a bratty kid and his grubby little friend. They would sneak in whenever he was sleeping, leaving Rohan with the problem of always chasing them out. But that wouldn’t be his problem today, he decided, keeping the gate firmly locked behind him. Today he’d be going to a haunted art show curated by one of his friends. His ex-babysitter, Reimi, was something of a local legend regarding the paranormal. She had a TV show during the September-October months leading up to Halloween where she’d explore local haunts and communicated with the dead, and people ate it up.

“I’m saving the best haunted portrait for you,” She said cheerfully over the phone. “They say the artist died pouring all of his inspiration into it. It might be good for you!”

Yes, Rohan thought, because what I really want is some other artist tainting my process. Still, he obliged, because there wasn’t much choice when it came to Reimi. Just like in his other solitary friendship, Koichi didn’t have much choice when it came to Rohan. It was rather karmic, really.

The shorter young man would be joining him, taking off a valuable day of study for one of the rare ones Rohan got out of the house. Pushing his bike behind a bush, he met Rohan at his car, slinging his backpack off his shoulder.

“I’m surprised you wanted to go…”

“There might be some good inspiration for a paranormal arc. You never know.” There would be no admission whatsoever that he wanted to hang out with them on one of his rare days off— people came to Rohan, not the other way around. Fortunately, those two were very good at reading his intentions regardless of if they wanted him to or not. Koichi gave a lopsided smile, figuring this was one of those times.

His futuristic-looking car’s doors popped open, and they both piled in, heading to city central.

“Welcome!” The cheery ginger-haired girl greeted to everyone arriving at the closed-off street near the middle of town. This small street was host to several stalls of paranormal curios, one with dolls piled up from the bottom to the top all listed as haunted, good spirit within, good luck to keep in your home. Another held pendulums and dowsing rods, others with scrying mirrors, necklaces with sigils, a whole storefront cleared to host haunted paintings. Several experts gathered to discuss them, while some patrons were clearly here only to snicker at it while teenage girls gushed to each other about how they got weird vibes from one object or another.

Reimi was not alone. When Rohan and Koichi approached her, they were surprised to find a little boy on his phone behind her.

“You’re just in time! Rohan, I have the biggest favor to ask of you—“

“If it has anything to do with that thing, I refuse.”

“Don’t call him a thing! I just need someone to look after him for a little bit.”

Josuke, from behind Reimi, stuck out his tongue at Rohan. Oh my god, of course she had that kid with her. That kid. This was precisely his kind of luck. This brat’s rap sheet went as far as setting a small fire near his home! Why should he look after him in any capacity? “Make Koichi do it.”

“You can both do it. Come on, please?”

“Rohan, it’d be bad manners to refuse…” Koichi, who had only met Josuke on a few occasions before, waved kindly at him. Josuke grinned over, apparently having a better track record with him too.

The begrudging sensation of acceptance hits him, knowing there would be no way to turn Reimi down without incurring her cold shoulder and some stern disappointment he was in no mood for. “… For how long?”

Reimi clapped her hands together, pleased to get him bending to her will. “I’m running a silent auction and a charity meet up in the main building. Can you look after him until three? I promised Mr. Joestar I’d keep my eye on him, so you better keep everything under control!”

Just earlier, Reimi had introduced Josuke to the concept of haunted dolls and dowsing rods, buying a pair from the nearby booth and reading all of the spooky descriptions for each doll, asking questions and watching the rods cross along with him. By now, Josuke was tired (afraid) of the whole meet up, and wanted to get the hell out of there. Reimi could kill two birds with one stone if she just let her friends take him for a walk elsewhere.

“Come on, brat,” Rohan waved over his shoulder, as Koichi immediately admonished him.

“You can’t call a kid you just met a brat!”

“Just met?”

“How’s the pool this summer?” Josuke asked, slyly.

“Nice and empty. Just how I like it. Come on, I want to look around and head out.”

The downtown streets were bustling with life, little shops and big ones alike. Koichi practically had to drag Josuke along as Rohan idled, taking his time looking at whatever caught his eye. The smaller teen was better with kids, but even he couldn’t stop Josuke’s vitriol.

“Why do you wear that stupid crown?”

“Because it’s worth more than you.” Rohan responded idly, sketching some quick pictures of handbags in a high-end store. These would make a great reference back home.

“You look like the king of the idiots.”

“I couldn’t possibly dethrone your father. I suppose that makes you the prince of idiots?”

All this time, Koichi was filled with regret that he hadn’t reconsidered staying home. He tugged back on Josuke’s hand, who was clambering to punch Rohan in the back of the knee. How on earth did Rohan not restrain himself when it came to a child? Was it too much to ask he didn’t pick fights with people less than half his age? More importantly, people who were young enough to be his readership? Various instances flitted through his mind about how Rohan’s panel at a nearby convention nearly ended with him starting a fight with a fan. And he’d been cheered on by the audience, too… the Pink Dark Boy fandom was lead by a vicious leader and its fans had taken their cues from him. The online wars were something to behold.

“Hey, hey… why don’t we go to a bookstore and get something to eat?” Koichi tried to intervene. “Rohan, you haven’t gone shopping for reference material in a while…”

The suggestion rolled around in his head for a moment, before he gave a noncommittal shrug. “Kiyokuniya would be fine.”

“Josuke, doesn’t that sound fun? I’ll buy you whatever you want to eat, so don’t worry…”

Koichi glanced around. Josuke had somehow managed to slip his grip.

“Josuke—?!”

But it was too late. Never doubt the wrath of an elementary schooler. Koichi could only lift his hand in shock as Josuke rushed forward and punched Rohan right in the ass.

The second level of Kinokuniya had a bakery and a little cafeteria of Japanese food, nice and quiet and far away from the rest of the bookstore, where Rohan had left them so he could brood far, far away from the ‘bratty little monster’ he was supposed to be watching. As much as he shouldn’t encourage it, when they were finally alone, Koichi began tittering. It was so rare for Rohan to get a taste of his own medicine that he couldn’t help nearly choking on his bread in laughter. Josuke looked proud of himself, especially for Koichi’s reaction.

“Don’t-- don’t do that again, okay?” He tried to chide, albeit helplessly and ineffectively. “I won’t tell your dad or anything, but Rohan-sensei is really wicked when it comes to revenge!”

“What’s he going to do? Draw me as a villain in his comic book?” At least Josuke would be popular at school for a day if his likeness showed up there. Koichi stuffed his laughter down, knowing that Rohan wasn’t above that from experience. Still, he probably wouldn’t even dignify Josuke with even that.

“Koichi…?”

A sweet and alluring voice popped up behind them as a chair was scooted next to the table. Yukako smiled ever so gently down at him. Here he was, taking care of a child! It made her flash forward to the future… would Koichi be good with kids? Ah, nothing was more romantic than--

“Oh, hey.” He chewed nervously on his straw. She must have followed him in, because no encounter with Yukako was an accidental one. She considered him her childhood sweetheart. Koichi considered a restraining order. They were friends, mostly because Koichi was too kind and Yukako had learned from her high school obsession over the years. Courtship was a more effective way to fish for a boyfriend, even if Koichi only tentatively nibbled at the line.

“Did I hear you right? Did this boy do something to Rohan?”

“I punched him in the ass!” Josuke piped up, proudly.

“Josuke, don’t cuss--”

“Ass,” He said defiantly, as if Koichi was next in the ass-punching line if he didn’t let him say it.

“Did he yell?” Yukako asked curiously, reaching over and cutting up Josuke’s food for him, wanting to show off how sweet and motherly she could be. She was casting her line far, far too forward into the future. “Show pain?”

“He did! His face got really red and he clenched his knees!”

“You must have quite a strong arm!” It was clear that Yukako wasn’t fond of Rohan either-- a rival for Koichi’s friendship, to be sure. “Still, that’s very bad manners for dealing with someone you don’t like. You know what I’d do?”

“What?”

“If that man ever made me angry, I’d take a meat tenderizer and--”

“Hey,” Koichi weakly piped up. “Please don’t give him any ideas, Yukako!”

“I’m only teasing. What’s this child doing with you?”

“Babysitting…” He frowns, poking at his salad. “We should actually start heading back soon. It’s nice seeing you?”

She pursed her lips as if this were expected, as if the moment she finally got Koichi to sit down with her, he’d be making excuses to leave. “Oh,” She commented idly, dabbing a napkin on Josuke’s face as he tried to lean away. “I’ll go with you. As a mediator.”

“A- are you sure?”

“I’m sure. Come on. I saw your friend at the checkout. I think he was planning to leave you two behind.”

“Koichi…” Rohan murmured, distinctly walking behind Josuke now. “It’s as if you weren’t satisfied with just bringing along the brat. Now your stalker?”

“Sh-shhh!” He hushed him in response, quietly. “Yukako just wanted to make sure Josuke got home safely!”

Rohan and Yukako’s relationship was tense at best. At one point, she’d modeled for him, as her appearance was perfect for an upcoming villain in Pink Dark Boy. Curly Noir, a villain based on characters like Ringu’s protagonist, would commit supernatural murders. What Rohan didn’t tell her at the time was that her character’s sole motivation would be to viciously stalk Koichi’s stand-in in the comic, and he passionately demonized her character so much that she was at the bottom of every popularity poll to this date. It seemed he channeled all of his real feelings pettily into a monster of the week, and Yukako hadn’t taken it as flattery. However, he’d generously given her royalties for the use of her image. Rohan saw it as a petty victory, Yukako saw him as an obstacle.

But to avoid upsetting Koichi, they would gently play at thinly-veiled hostility between one another.

“Ah, it’s been a while since you called me that…” She murmured, having taken hold of Josuke’s hand as they made it back to the plaza. “Is your divide between fiction and reality really so poor?”

“Is yours?”

“I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

Josuke was learning plenty in this little exchange. The first was that Rohan had almost no friends, which was just a delight. The second was that Rohan was positively grinch-like with his scorn of others, and the punch from earlier felt more and more justified. He always knew he had a stick up his ass, but how far did it go up? He acted like branches should be growing out of his ears.

“Come on, we’ve got to set a good example for Josuke,” She said sweetly, squeezing his hand. “If he grows up around hostile people, who knows what could happen?”

“I already know what fucking happens.”

Yukako mocked a gasp, covering Josuke’s ears and stopping dead in her tracks. “You can’t say that around a child!”

“Fuck.” Josuke blurted out, proudly.

“Oh my god, no.” Koichi whimpered. The image of Reimi cracking her knuckles was too easy to picture.

“Koichi, fuck!” Josuke clearly knew the word before this instance. Children would rapidly spread any new bad word on the playground the moment they heard it at home, but he was loving rubbing salt into any potential wounds Rohan could have.

“What was that…?”

They hadn’t realized they’d arrived at their destination so soon. They turned to see Reimi, looking between Yukako, Koichi, and Rohan, shock and anger creeping into her face.

Well, Rohan could deal with this one way or another. “We brought him back, so our job is done. Later.”

A moment later, his nib-shaped earing was snatched out of thin air, pulling so hard he was damn well sure she was about to rip it out.

“I gave you a child for only a few hours.”

“A mistake on your part.”

“You bring him back and he’s swearing up and down right after I hear you say it--”

Rohan’s face remained deadpan despite the pain and Reimi’s aggressive chastising. “He punched me, you know, somewhere unrefined. Him swearing is probably the best condition I could have delivered him back to you.”

Another yank, and Reimi bore an eerie smile. “We’re going to have a talk, right after you tell Josuke why it’s bad to say those kinds of words.”

“I have nothing to say to that--”

Reimi’s fingers pinched both earrings, pulling them away from his head, and he winced. “Oh, you will. Get talking.”

“Reimi… is there a problem, here?”

Joseph parked his car on the corner of the street, casually ignoring the ‘do not park’ sign. Seeing his son and a gaggle of people, including Reimi threatening some man had piqued his curiosity. He walked over and as he did so, Reimi relented, albeit holding Rohan’s arm very roughly as to not let him get away.

“Rohan was about to teach Josuke a very valuable lesson. It’s especially important now that his father’s here, isn’t it?” Her cheerful voice set off the mood entirely.

“-- Reimi…” At this point, Rohan realised just how unbecoming the situation was. He could rip himself out of his grip, or catch hell from this old geezer. Father? What a joke. This guy was old enough to be his grandfather!

“Just do it.” She uttered, letting him go and making it clear there’d be no escape.

Rohan scowled at the boy, who stared innocently up at him, edging closer to his father. “Don’t say bad words. I can’t believe you have to be told.”

“Bad words?” Joseph looked at him suspiciously.

“Fuck,” Even if Josuke was pressing his luck with Joseph, the look on Rohan’s mortified face was well worth it. To add insult to injury, he continued. “I don’t know what it means, dad… is it really so bad? It sounds like ‘heck’.”

A long silence stretched between them, as Joseph looked down at Josuke, and Josuke looked at Rohan, and Koichi and Yukako looked at each other, wondering if they should split now.

“... Don’t repeat things random strangers tell you. I don’t want that word in my house and you’ll catch hel-- heck if you say it in front of your mom. As for you--” Josuke pointed in Rohan’s direction. “What’s the matter with you? Don’t you ever talk to me or my son again. Jesus Christ! If I were a little bit younger, I’d kick your ass.”

Ah, so that’s where the terrible kid got it from. As Reimi let Rohan go, she apologized profusely for putting Josuke in Rohan’s care. Joseph waved her off with a short chuckle, saying he knew what it was like when he was younger, that it’s only a matter of time, but yeah, keep that weirdo away from Josuke. Reimi didn’t look like she was done with Rohan yet, but Joseph nonetheless bid goodbye to her, picking up Josuke and walking towards the car.

“Want to go get our fortunes read?” Yukako had taken hold of Koichi’s arm much in the same way Reimi had grabbed Rohan’s. He sighed.

“Sure…”

As Joseph buckled his seatbelt, he looked over to his son. “... you really never heard that before, did you?” Various instances where Joseph had smacked his own hand with a hammer popped up in his mind, as well as all the swears that followed.

“Nuh-uh. Not even once.” Josuke was playing the part of an angel, and Joseph knew him well-- he could be telling the truth or lying through his teeth just to twist the guy’s arm. At this age, he was a bit of a trickster… not nearly so bad as Jolyne, but he’d clearly been learning from her.

“Hmm… you know why it’s a bad word, right? It’s something only adults can use. And even then, some adults shouldn’t. I didn’t grow up in a house where I was allowed to say things like that, and neither will you.”

Josuke smiled and nodded, recalling various ‘SON OF A BITCH’es and ‘GOD DAMN’s that had sprinkled his early life that Joseph didn’t know he’d overheard. What was fun about those words was how loaded they could be, the sudden surprise of springing it on someone who’d gasp and threaten to tell on him. What was the fun in cussing if adults just let you do it? The nine year old buckled his seatbelt, grinning to himself. It might have caused a lot of trouble, but at least he ruined Rohan’s day, and wasn’t that what life was all about?

“I just don’t understand…” Polnareff wove his hands through the top of his hair, sighing and sinking his weight onto his forearms. Teaching was better than he thought it’d be, but something had just been nagging at him this entire time-- he didn’t know anything that children talked about these days. Not a thing. He thought he was a cool adult for understanding what pokémon was! But children were a hivemind of changing interests, and whenever kids brought up something new, he’d be googling it in half a minute and not understanding what it even meant.

Group: Teacher Room
JPPOL: kakyoiiin
JPPOL: help me
JPPOL: i cant be a good teacher if i dont understand kids and the verdicts out that i DONT understand anything going on in my class right now
JPPOL: i thought i did!!! I can name all 151 pokemon and ive seen every disney and pixar movie to DATE but
JPPOL: you gotta help me
JPPOL: what’s a thot?
NORIKAK: first of all, there are 802 pokemon
JPPOL: shut the hell up no there aren’t
NORIKAK: how many pokemon games do you think there are?
NORIKAK: second, you teach eleven year olds, how much is that word coming up?
JPPOL: too much! they just call each other that but i have no idea what it MEANS you know? Is it a swear word?
NORIKAK: thot, definition:
NORIKAK: you
JPPOL: STOP IT
JPPOL: tell me what it means or else i’m gonna catch heat for letting it spread around the school!
BRUBUC Is Typing…
BRUBUC: Oh dear.
BRUBUC: The internet is rather infectious these days.
JPPOL: BRUNO!!!
JPPOL: tell me what it is
BRUBUC: I don’t know, this purity is rather endearing.
BRUBUC: But you should scold your students for saying it.
BRUBUC: I definitely don’t hear it in my classroom. Are you a lenient type?
JPPOL: no… yes? i don’t know? all i know is i’ve never heard that word before
LEOBUC: it means ‘that ho over there’.
JPPOL: WHAT
JPPOL: THEY’RE JUST KIDS
JPPOL: HOW
LEOBUC: because you let them say it. Irresponsible
JPPOL: also kakyoin how can you call me that?? i thought we were friends
NORIKAK: you ‘thot’ we were friends
JPPOL: NO
BRUBUC: Does Narancia ever say this, Leone?
LEOBUC: Hell no.
LEOBUC: Though I wouldn’t be surprised with some of his classmates.
BRUBUC: Hmmm… Polnareff, tell your class not to use that word anymore and say there’ll be detention for not following the rules. Don’t be too personal about it, though. If a child knows something bothers you, several might get wise ideas.
NORIKAK: they’ll write mr. thotnareff on the chalkboard is what he means
JPPOL: kids these days!!
JPPOL: and yes i’ll tell them
JPPOL: jesus christ… how do they even learn this?

Polnareff looked up at Jolyne from the spot on his sofa.

“Hey, Jojol, wanna help out your uncle Pol?” He scooted closer to her while she was pouring over her homework. “How many bad words do you know?”

Jotaro fixed him with a rigid stare, because that sure as hell was a strange question to ask his child. Jolyne knew better than to answer honestly in front of her father. As she scribbled in the lines for her art assignment, she responded earnestly. “I don’t know any.”

“Really? None?”

“I know heck.”

“Ah, that’s not really…”

Jotaro knew better. A long time ago, Jolyne had a robotic parrot that would repeat things one would say to it with a push of a button in a nasally robotic voice. Her idea of a good time was to press the ‘record’ button and say as many bad things as she heard on TV and call their house, leaving it to squawk into their answering machine for Jotaro or his wife to pick up. The parrot was disposed of and Jolyne was grounded. Safe to say, she’d learned a lot from staying up late watching television and a few things here and there from Jotaro. His wife had been the most stern about it.

“Why do you need to know.”

“My students have been, ah, chatty…”

“Don’t worry about it. You remember when you were a kid, weren’t you?”

Polnareff looked up.

“I bet you got up to all sorts of things. Forbidden stuff just makes it more fun to try and say. Just tell them off for it.”

"Yeah, but--"

“I’m saying don’t worry about it. You worry a lot. It shows you care about the kids, but don’t stress so hard you have an aneurysm.”

Polnareff slid off of the sofa, wringing his hands and tilting his head back. Sherry was such a great girl, so he hadn’t anticipated a whole class being so difficult. It was like having a temporary gaggle of children that you had to keep from influencing each other poorly long enough for them to get home. Or rather, it wasn’t just ‘like’ that, it was that. Sometimes that responsibility got to him… running around like a headless chicken, trying to keep on top of things…

A knock at the door interrupted their conversation, and Jotaro stood and answered it.

Immediately, he was greeted by a hug around his waist and a girl nearly tackling him to his floor. Just old enough to be entering college, she giddily looked up and gave him a wide grin. An old friend. A child who tagged along with the Crusaders when they were younger because she thought they were so cool, doing things to save the planet. Though she got into trouble more often than not, it was like having a little sidekick, before they sent her back home when they all went their seperate ways.

“Anne.”

“What’s up, Jotaro! I’m sorry it’s been a while since I visited-- oh, Pol’s here too! Hi! And hi, Baby Jojo!” She slung her backpack off her shoulder, eager to invite herself in. Jotaro neatly stepped aside. “I’m in the neighborhood today so I got away from my family to come say hi. What’s happening?”

“Polnareff is having a crisis about swearing.”

“Anne--” He sniffed, slightly. “Did you have a foul mouth when you were Jolyne’s age?”

“Oh, absolutely. Everything got around on the playground. You can’t hide anything from little kids who want to be cool. Why?”

“Nothing, nothing…” The feeling of disconnect was now more apparent than ever. “I guess that’s a relief…”

Anne sighed, smiling up at Jotaro. “What’d I miss while I was gone?

Jotaro closed the door after her. “Aside from being neighbors with… you called him an ‘asshole clown’, nothing much.”

“Ehhh?! You live next to Dio?!” She immediately peeked out the window, though Jotaro gestured her to look out the other side of the house. “Why? Of all people?”

“An accident. Tell me more about what’s going on with you.”

“So I got into my favorite university!” She exclaimed. “I’m going into marine studies!”

“Ah, ah,” Polnareff smiled, looking back at her. “You’re chasing after Jotaro’s heels?”

“I told you when I was little I was gonna do that! I loved wrecking shit for the environment with you guys!” Immediately, her hand darted to her mouth. “-- oops.”

Moving over to where Jolyne was seated to look over her homework, Jotaro gave a noncommittal shrug. “It's fine. Don’t worry about it, or Polnareff will just work himself up again.”

Chapter Text

Rain pelted the windows in wave after wave as Jolyne watched in a fascinated stare. The sound was intrusively loud, constant smacks of the weather trying to throw itself in or break itself apart trying. The inside of their house was plenty comfortable, free of the ozone and humidity and cold rain, but as rain filled up the gutters, the more she wanted to throw on a raincoat and play in it. Even though the winds could knock her flat against the ground and the storm’s sheer force would prevent her from standing up again, to her the world felt alive, messy, and screaming. Jolyne had plenty to enjoy from a summer day, but there was an undeniable pull to rumbling skies.

Jotaro had been keeping an eye on her, though, so there’d be none of that.

With the power and television out, only an old-fashioned radio was providing updates on Tropical Storm Victoria. Promising to last well into the evening with the eye of the storm passing over a meager half hour sometime in the middle of the night before continuing its tirade, it would only safely move on by noon the next day. Shutters not latched together banged against the house in furious applause. A few of his coworkers were trapped at the aquarium, as well— good, he thought. At least the sealife would be fed.

It hit in a flash of changing air currents over the sea, leaving people in their town virtually unprepared. It had been long since Jotaro remembered one this bad. Jolyne was two, and she had been crying in his arms as he tried without avail to quiet her… this would be the worst storm in her memory.

“I want to go outside.”

“No,” Jotaro murmured, opening their front door, still barricaded by the screen, to survey the damages so far. A blast of ozone hit his face so strongly he nearly reeled, and before the raindrops could dampen the floor, the door was shut and locked once more.

“Why not?”

“Because.”

She was always unsatisfied with that type of answer, and her pout proved it. He rolled his eyes, but only slightly. “Because we’ll have to head to the basement soon. This is a dangerous storm, Jolyne. It could damage our house, to say nothing of what it could do to you.”

A flood flashlight stood up on the coffee table, illuminating the room from the dark overcast that hung outside. The radio crackled with life, for the second update breaking through the muzak broadcast.

“… high flood warnings… winds at … per hour… high chance of trees falling, unanchored objects being turned over or going … lying… this is the storm of the century, folks! Keep yourself safe by staying indoors in the lowest floor of your house. Take cover in a basement if you have one. Do not, I repea… do not drive or leave the house. Wherever you are, stay indoors until 12 to 1 PM tomorrow evening. It’s … only going to get worse!”

“Hmm… Jolyne, grab your things and head downstairs.”

There was a shift in her demeanor when he insisted upon it— if her father was being serious, then… this really was dangerous? Jolyne had never lived through a storm that didn’t simply be noisy and passed over relatively quickly. She scooted off the couch with a bit of panic, as if something could go flying through the window right now, and gathered up a blanket, some books, and her father’s tablet before scooting off downstairs.

Jotaro sorted through his work papers to join her when there was a knock at the door. A sinking and both suspicious feeling ran through him before he opened it.

It was Diego. Completely soaked, with matted hair clinging to the side of his face, he’d been chosen as sacrifice for this task, as Dio wouldn’t deem talking to Jotaro face to face and Giorno was out of the question.

“Listen, we need your basement.”

“You’re telling me that tacky oversized mansion next door fails to have a basement?”

“Right?” Diego shrugged, a bit pathetically out in the rain. The wind was doing its best to knock him flat on his ass. “That’s what I said. It just has a filthy crawlspace. that’s not big enough for anyone. Dio thinks he can sit it out in his house but a few of our windows already broke. It’s supposed to—“

“Get worse,” Jotaro was tense, on the verge of closing the door.

“Do it for the kid.” Diego’s demand suddenly lacked the tone of a plea, as if he were putting his foot in the door and insisting. Furthermore, like a Brando, he went straight for the one thing that Jotaro didn’t have the kind of cruelty to refuse. Even since he was a teenager, he had an odd weakness in protecting children. It was why Anne tagged along with the Crusaders on their vaguely illegal missions.

Jotaro tried to summon up the anger necessary to turn Diego down, really dug deep and thought of all the reasons why he hated Dio Brando and why letting him in his home would be a disaster. But he couldn’t deny Giorno safety and he knew his father won’t sit alone in his damaged house without keeping an eye on his son. Package deal. With the rain lulling his spite, he nodded.

“You are in charge of your brother, got that? I’ll throw him out if he’s his usual ridiculous self. Keep him on a leash.”

Oh boy. Easier said than done, but with only one choice, Diego had no time to refuse before the storm really started to bear down.

“I’ll go get them now.”

—

Jotaro’s basement was old.

Not old in a decrepit way. Old in an old way. Carpeted with brown carpet that climbed up partway on the walls, a U-shaped well-used sofa with a tacky pattern, a large tube television suited to 2004 that was probably the hottest model back in its day, a mini refrigerator, a yellowed bathroom with grime around the faucet and mirror left untouched, wooden paneling, outdated. It was a step back into the past, down to the Super Nintendo hooked up to the television. It smelled faintly like dust and age, and the only lights peering in were from the window wells.

It was eerie and quiet, but simultaneously soothing and safe. At least, some people thought that.

Dio didn’t even look at Jotaro when he carried Giorno in, hidden by his coat as a shield. He didn’t dignify him with a thank you, or a smart remark, or anything that would pop the bubble of his pride. Jotaro was fine with it, thought the less he interacted with him, the better. His jaws were wired shut like a freshly-sprung bear trap.

Jolyne and Giorno were talking quietly to each other on one of the sofas, about school and their friends and the overlaying worry about the storm. Jolyne had grown more and more scared as she let on, feeling like the upstairs was a minefield and if she dared went to get a stuffed animal, she could get sucked up in the same winds that caught Dorothy and sent her to the oompa-loompas (she was never very good at telling old films apart). Giorno pat her head softly, having a lot less of the bullying streak that he once did in their rivalry. Carefully, he overturned his hand and showed her a ladybug that he’d been feeding on his window sill. Jolyne squealed happily, and they watched it crawl over the sofa together as Giorno gathered her cat, Chou, in his arms. He really wanted one… but had yet to convince Dio he’d be the one taking care of it.

Diego laid back against the sofa in Jotaro’s old clothes while the laundry room a short distance away rumbled with his wet belongings. Even with a single bar of a signal, he could still watch the Facebook video his friends posted. Gyro and Johnny, completely shirtless, were riding their horses down the street in the rain. Both of them even sported American flags tied around their necks— clear viral bait. A female voice from behind the camera told them to stop messing around and put the horses back in the stables.

Two hundred likes already… must have been well before the storm got this bad, he thought to himself. The idea that they were trapped at a horse farm overnight was enough to keep Diego going.

Dio sat in absolute silence on the opposite sofa, immovable as he was uncommunicative. He was merely rotating between apps on a phone that struggled to maintain a connection. There wasn’t any method to his actions, he merely wanted to look busy and unavailable. Jotaro leered at him as a vicious thundercrack roared from above. Jotaro had the potential to be crucially self aware and a bit distrait at the same time, depending on the topic. This time, no matter how negative, irresponsible, not-taking-the-higher-ground it was, Jotaro couldn’t keep any cool around Dio. He could act like it, hell, he was mostly stone faced through his own divorce proceedings. But beneath that, there was no desire for peace, forgiveness, or even temporary truces. To him, Dio Brando was evil incarnate only humbled by his child. And he was in his house, on his sofa, for an entire night.

If it weren’t for Jolyne and Giorno, Jotaro would be planning on getting into the third brawl in the near-hurricane outside. His ex-wife’s voice echoed in his ears, though, and surprisingly it made him rethink spilling a drink on Dio’s outfit. Childhood is a whole series of near-unavoidable butterfly effects, and a few Mothra effects. Children are sensitive to hostility, whether it’s directed at them or not, and change based on how they react to it. And that change has the potential to shape them for the rest of their lives.

No wonder she studied Child Psychology on the side. It did remind him that whatever hostility he acted on, Jolyne and her best friend would bear witness to it. In a place no one could leave for hours. With one shitty college student as a mediator. Jotaro loved Jolyne more than he hated Dio, which was expected but still impressive. It made all the difference in his behavior.

He gathered drinks from the mini-fridge. Two cans of sprite for the children, a coke for Diego, and very warily, he set a bottle of sparkling water that had been in that fridge for two years next to Dio. This was all the in-flight amenities he was going to get, even if he had a strong urge to slam that glass upside his head.

Dio looked at the glass, then to Jotaro, locking eyes with him for the very first time in his stay.

So much could be conveyed with that stare. Somehow ‘this is a poor person’s drink’ intermingled with ‘oh, I bet that just killed you, didn’t it’ and ‘how many chips did they give you at anger management for you to get this far’? The prime definition of looking down at someone while still seated, the perfect amount of furrow in his brow and curve in his lips. Jotaro’s stare was more boulder-like and oppressive. It signaled that the only reason his basic courtesy remained by a single thread was because the idea knocking his teeth out in a place he couldn’t get him to a hospital delighted him, but would probably upset his daughter.

A stalemate of vitriol. Blood pumping, heart racing anger, and they know they’d give each other a gift by rolling up their sleeves and taking it out on each other.

“Daddy, did you get Chou’s bowl?”

Feeling an injection of pure relief, Jotaro breaks eye contact. “No, I’ll get it now.”

Up the stairs and away. Jotaro went to the kitchen, and before he picked up the food and water bowls, he pulled out an overly crowded drawer that Jolyne couldn’t reach, feeling around it with splayed fingers. Victory was found along with a pack of cigarettes, and snatching a lighter, he quickly lit one up and took a deep drag as his house shook around him.

“Just for today,” He murmured, his deep breathing burning down the cigarette faster than an ordinary man could. “Can’t stand that sack of shit, driving me to this…”

—

“Bridges closed. State of emergency declared. A few people dead.” Diego idly read off his phone screen.

“Must you…?” He didn’t care, but he cast a glance Giorno’s way, who was plenty preoccupied rubbing Chou’s ears.

Diego’s star-struck sweater was warm, but a little itchy, so he scratched at his belly. “It’s nice knowing what’s going on outside a vacuum of pure hate.”

“Hmph.”

“Don’t do anything.”

Dio smirked, and tutted. “I’m completely comfortable. This is unavoidable, and seeing him under such duress is entertaining.”

Diego, for his occasionally reckless behavior, was sharper than Dio usually gave him credit for. He knew Dio’s tells when angry— first, his eyebrows would never unfurrow, and while it looked like concentration to some, Diego could tell the difference between resting bitch face and molten lava dripping down his soul. Dio was not a man with a typical temper, either. Control of your anger was another form of power, and Dio held it loftily above intense prosecutors and emotionally charged defense attorneys alike. Little rustled him, aside from Diego (who honestly got more of a familiar, familial anger) and deeply seeded weak points that Diego theorized forced Satan to possess him. Jotaro was once a whelp, inexperienced, stone cold, and defeated him in the most humiliating upset of his life. Dio bore that grudge as proudly as he would a degree on his wall. “Most Qualified Man To Hate Jotaro Kujo.”

“Listen,” Diego whispered, looking up at him upside down from his position laying on the couch. “I know you don’t take advice from anyone, but don’t start shit. Not this time. Let it go or take it outside.”

“Are you scolding me?”

“You pride yourself on crushing people? Like literally, you told me that when you started out as a lawyer. ‘I pride myself on crushing people’ in a text message. I remember because I submitted it to Texts From Last Night. You’re like a shaken bottle of soda right now. Calm down. Hug Giorno until you absorb some of his chill, I don’t know.”

Dio wanted to protest that Giorno was not some stress ball he kept around, but with a little self awareness, he did quietly agree that Giorno was someone who could relax him. The point of the hour though was that he didn’t want to be relaxed. Aggression was an addictive beast at times, especially when he rarely felt it in such absurd quantities. Even Jotaro could relate to that on some level.

A few heavy footsteps signaled Jotaro’s arrival back downstairs, setting a food and water dish down for the cat. He glanced over to Giorno and Jolyne.

“Are you hungry?”

He noticeably didn’t extend the offer to Dio or Diego, who thought with a bitter expression that that’s what happens when you’re Dio’s brother. Even as Dio watched him like a hawk, it wasn’t like he was going to let kids go hungry. Having a beef with Giorno would be going too far.

They shook their heads, anxiety making it hard to stomach the idea of eating. Jotaro shelved the idea for now, knowing he’d have to make sure they had something later, even if it was just sandwiches hurriedly gathered from upstairs. When Jotaro’s wife left, she’d hand-printed a practical bible for taking care of Jolyne when she wasn’t having custody or visiting, not because Jotaro was clueless, but because she wanted Jolyne to follow a strict and healthy schedule. No skipped meals, no staying up late, several little rules that stressed there’d be hell to pay if he broke them. It’d be a lie if he wasn’t a little disappointed she lacked some faith, given their ongoing friendship, but he recognized it was well-earned with the distance he had at the end of his marriage.

Suddenly, even though the storm was raging as hard as it had gotten, the power flickered on in the basement. Mumbling a brief ‘yare yare’ to himself, he realized their old backup generator had probably finally kicked in, even if he wasn’t sure how long it’d last. Jolyne tugged on Giorno’s hand and turned on the television, changing the channel and starting up the old Super Nintendo. The rules were simple— rotating the controller with each game over. Diego lifted his head with a bit of interest, but decided not to interrupt the game.

“Jotaro, what’s your wifi?”

“Good question.” He said sternly, refusing to say any more.

Once he settled back on the sofa, Dio audibly sniffed. “What’s that—?”

Jotaro only looked his way.

“Smoke…” He murmured, looking over Jotaro with a smug expression. “Did you burn anything while you were upstairs?”

Dio was being coy, with Jotaro knowing the only smoke he could smell was the scent of tobacco lingering around Jotaro. Of course this pompous bastard wouldn’t announce it like that without a follow up— he always had a reason for every word he carefully chose.

“No matter, as long as the house isn’t on fire,” He turned his attention back to the television. “I was working on a case before the storm took out my power. Not usually my area of expertise, but it was a slow work day. A parent was suing another over custody because she believed second hand smoke was hurting their asthmatic child.”

He was lying, straight through his teeth. Dio wouldn’t be caught dead or alive in domestic court, and Jotaro knew that.

“On one hand, you think that’s such a simple thing. Why doesn’t the father go outside? Why doesn’t he simply quit or use a non-smoking method of obtaining nicotine? But the trial was going so poorly in his corner. Significant data about irreversible lung damage and a history of committing to quit only to fail to. Most damning was when the Judge walked out and saw the defendant taking a drag from a cigarette. It’s still ongoing, of course, but he definitely won’t win. Men like that are weak. Addiction makes or breaks so many court cases, because people lose their own accountability when they prioritize drugs, or at least treat them on the same level as a permanent fixture. Relapse shows significant data in the habit starting again.”

Jotaro listened very quietly, face as solid as stone.

“I could never do that to Giorno. Not after what I’ve seen in my job.” Dio was so good at playing the role of pious, or would be if this conversation were directed at anyone but Jotaro. “After all, if you can’t control your own cravings… can you control your tongue? Your language? Your anger? A little stick being the difference between calm and furious, imagine that kind of person being in charge of a child. Too many already are.”

Here he was waxing poetic about anger when the only thing he was doing was baiting Jotaro into a rise or challenging him into humbly lowering his head quietly. The raw insinuation that he could ever take out his anger on Jolyne because of a past addiction broke Jotaro’s façade. His arm swung in a quarter circle, palms splayed, reaching for Dio’s throat, but just before any impact was made, the lights went out again.

“No!!” Jolyne shouted, throwing her controller down. “We almost had it!”

Dio leered at Jotaro with a heinous smirk as Jotaro retracted his arm. Almost, so close to ‘proving’ him right, when Jotaro’s anger had less to do with a smoke and more to do with Dio’s everything. Jotaro let out a ‘tch’, then leaned back against the sofa. Diego, who had watched and listened to it all, looked between them. Dio could really effortlessly get under a man’s skin, he didn’t fault Jotaro for not holding his hand back. What a mess…

The storm picked up in another howl as the creaks and groans of the house almost threatened to tear it off its foundation. It was so loud that being below ground didn’t do much of anything to stifle the noise. Giorno moved over to Dio, pulled himself up on the sofa, and sat on his legs, leaning against his chest to try to bury the noise there. Gently, Dio cupped his ears to further drown out the sound, as lightning cracks grew closer and closer together, with rolling thunder serving as its backdrop. Jolyne took a cue to sit next to Jotaro, who took her small hand and rubbed it over with his thumb.

“We’ll be fine.”

“It’s so loud…” She protested.

“That’s its job.”

The room was quiet after that, Diego draining his phone’s battery precariously as he wrung as much entertainment as he could out of it. By now, night had fallen, and the simple clock on the wall read as near bedtime. Jotaro briefly returned up the stairs to get food for the kids, and opened the basement closet for some old blankets. He only pulled out two. Jolyne’s was wrapped around her, Giorno’s was only gently offered because he was sure if he was more considerate than that, Dio would bite his head off for laying a finger on his son. The two bunkered down for sleep, eventually letting it take them when the eye of the storm passed through. Diego, who had no problem with rain at all, had been asleep for a while, sprawled out on an entire sofa.

Jotaro and Dio were seated on the same one.

Minutes ticked by like hours as they made themselves look busy in complete silence, but fatigue took one after the other and they fell asleep, sitting perfectly upright.

—

Jotaro woke up with a soft blink. The clock read 7 AM, or so he thought squinting at it.

His legs felt heavy, his eyes still tired. Stress had probably cut his sleep short… nothing much he could do about it now. He stretched his legs a bit to try and push out the numbness, but he realized slowly that his legs really felt heavier than usual. He glanced down, expecting Jolyne.

Not Dio’s head.

With a sharp intake of breath, the scene played out before his eyes. They fell asleep there, and in the middle of the night, Dio must have fallen to his side. Repulsion drenched him in a thick sheet, wondering what he should do. If he pushed Dio off, Dio would realize what happened and potentially blame him for it— not a discussion he wanted to have. If he stayed seated while perfectly awake until Dio woke up, that would be even worse. Why did he have to be so big, what the hell? Moving him was going to be tricky.

Sliding one leg over the armrest of the sofa, Jotaro pulled one of the pillows out and slowly, carefully replaced it as he withdrew his other leg. When his head finally dropped to the pillow, there was a brief, startled grunt that had him waiting tensely… before Dio snored off back to sleep. As quiet as air, Jotaro went back to the first floor of his house, surveying the damage.

Some pots and picture frames had tipped over in the night, other things looking disheveled by the house’s constant quaking. The rain was still beating down, but at this point he’d rather get sucked up into a whirlwind than spend another minute downstairs. He immediately walked to the drawer with the cigarettes, pulled them out, and tried to flick at the lighter.

Dio’s words from the other night were irritatedly festering under his skin though, despite the fact that he took them for a ruse. While he was lying about the circumstance, he wasn’t wrong about relapse… and that bothered him most of all. As tetchy as he was, and as much as he really deserved it right now, Jotaro spat out the cigarette and threw it and the box in the garbage can. Fuck Dio for getting him like this.

—

He spent the (relative) quiet of the morning reading his day-old newspaper, finishing his work in peace, and listening to the radio. The damages were so thorough that it’d affect the town for weeks to come. Checking in with his coworkers as soon as his bars came back, the sealife at the aquarium had suffered no injury, so he had one thing to be grateful over. Slowly, like a peak heading towards its decline, Jotaro’s stress tapered off into calm. Even the cat, who’d grown tired of the basement, came up to flop herself against his legs.

There were faint noises downstairs of chatter. It seemed like Diego and Dio didn’t plan on coming up until the rain didn’t beat so harshly against the house. It came in small waves of a gradual lessening— first, the winds died down, then the thunder and lightning started spacing itself out, and then, it was only them and the raindrops.

The moment Dio had waited for had come, and with Giorno in tow, he made a beeline straight for the door.

“Thanks,” Diego mentioned offhandedly, figuring as awkward as it was, someone should say it. Jotaro, of course, said nothing in response.

As they emerged, Jotaro followed after them outside to see the damage. A tall, entirely split tree was leaning into Rohan’s roof, with shingles sent to the ground and a noticeable broken hole where it had fallen. Squinting, he could see a light on in the room he guessed was his workplace. He was still there, hunched over his desk. It was as if the tree had never fallen at all, or having a giant hole in your house was an ignorable problem. What a mystery that guy was.

“Dio, wait.” Before Dio made it into his home, but after Giorno had run inside, the man turned to him ever so slightly with a curious look. There was a meaningful pause between them, as if Jotaro had either a one liner he wanted to spit or a speech he wanted to give to remove the weight Dio tried to put on him.

“…”

“…”

Instead, Jotaro simply raised both of his middle fingers, far outward, way way up as he walked backwards back into his own house. Dio deserved no poetry, no words, just an entirely bitter ’fuck you’. Dio watched as his door closed, waited for a minute, and kneeled over the decorative rocks to pick a hefty one out of them. With a strong power walk, He charged at a window and aimed before Diego snatched his arm with both of his own, practically weighing it down with his entire body weight.

“Come on, you prissy asshole! Just for once, let it go!”

“The wind—“ Dio strained against him, “—will have done it.”

“You call me immature at times when you’re a grown man throwing rocks in people’s houses? Get— a— fucking— grip!”

Chapter Text

While Rohan was by no means a people pleaser, nor good with children despite his profession, there was one thing he couldn’t deny: children had a wellspring of imagination that was simply endless.

Even as a young child, Rohan had planned out his story for so long, through his elementary, middle, and high school years. What had been the inspiration for his manga had once been the subject of his childhood daydreams, and Pink Dark Boy had gone through various transformations over the years. At one point, he’d been a stealthy noir cop, another, he’d been a crime-solving pixie. There were so many ways he wanted to interpret his story that time after time, he just reinvented his subject over and over and pressed forward. He still kept those notebooks somewhere in the attic. What might make other artists cringe filled him with fascination. He could watch the very stepping stones of his progress unfold with each page of an old sketchbook.

When he scrolled Jolyne’s post about Deep Blue Girl, he analyzed her with quiet amazement.

She was not overflowingly beautiful, as some girls were prone to make their fictional avatars. Rather, this character was bald and sported visor sunglasses, (or… perhaps was wearing some sort of Kamen Rider suit? He couldn’t tell between the pencil and crayon drawings). Listed in an unbroken paragraph beneath her picture, Jolyne went on to describe her magnum opus.

“Deep blue girl is really strong and a great detective and she catches culprits by using thin string to trip them up during the chase also she is rivals with Pink Dark Boy but they are friends also they just enjoy fighting sometimes it’s like my friend giorno and me. deepp blue girl also sometimes helps on his cases but shell disappear right before the crime gets solved because shes really mysterious because she comes from a family of secret detectives and her dad was named star platinum and he was the best but he disapperd in a tragic accident so deep blue girl is always looking for his wear a bouts. thats why she stays so close to pink dark boy because he is a good magic detective and maybe he can solve the case. when shes not solving crime shes a bounty hunter who chases down bad guys on the run from the laws. she seems distant but secretly really loves her friends but cant show it or bad guys might come and hurt them. leave a comment please shes really cool!!!!!!!!!”

One of the great failings of the manga industry, Rohan thought, was that they didn’t seem to be aware that there were just as many girls who wanted to be as cool and relevant as the male characters. The magical girl genre got close, but it was often hyper feminine, super powers weren’t depicted as ‘menacingly strong’, and even had the gall to be marketed towards older men half the time. No more apparent was this than in Jolyne’s letter, where her character filled a role usually taken up by a shounen rival. Not that it was bad to be feminine— oh no, not at all— but rather, there was an absence that little Jolyne felt and one Rohan could even reflect upon in his own work.

And he did. Long and hard, sketching Deep Blue Girl over and over in the margins of his sketchbook. She had poses reminiscent of waves to reflect her name, and every so often he flirted with a spider motif for her. Eventually, the urge for drawing her became unstoppable. He was taken in by this creation a child had made and he had built upon— like a half-finished canvas, he was filling in details that Jolyne had missed, rounding out her flaws and strengths, even daring to imagine how well she’d be accepted in his work. Inspiration came from the most unusual of places, but Rohan never dared to stop it because of that.

A few weeks of this, and Rohan was knocking at Jotaro’s door.

“Hello…?” Jotaro looked at him inquisitively, wondering what he could possibly need from him that’d drag him out of his working office.

“Hello. May I speak to your daughter?”

That earned an odd stare. “Why?”

“Believe it or not, I have business to discuss with her.” His pompous air showed no trace of deception. “If you would get her?”

Inviting himself in after Jotaro held the door open, it was only a few minutes before Jolyne bounded down the stairs. Rohan’s portfolio was an open display on his coffee table, and she gasped immediately when she saw it.

“Deep Blue Girl!” She screamed, pointing out several drawings. “It’s her! It’s her! She looks so cool!”

“Jolyne…” Rohan wasn’t speaking down to her, rather, he was holding her in respect as a fellow artist. Not to mention, he wouldn’t get anywhere if he was rude to a child right in front of her father. “This character has been an inspiration to me. I’d like to purchase her from you.”

“Pur… chase?”

“The rights to her character, to put it simply. I wish to include her within my work, but as she’s not my intellectual property, I have to request you sell her to me. I have put a lot of time and investment into developing her character. Of course, you’ll be credited as a concept artist in upcoming issues and volumes—“

“DADDY, MY CHARACTER IS GOING TO BE IN A COMIC BOOK!”

Jotaro let out a soft grunt of mild confusion, but eyed Rohan suspiciously for wanting to buy a cartoon character off his daughter. Really…?

Jolyne pat at the table in excitement. “You’ll really draw her in your comic book and my name will be in there and I don’t have to pay you anything?! You’ll just do it?”

“The opposite. I’m here to offer a contract and pay you. You might be young, but never deal with your property lightly.”

Rohan procured a contract from his bag, and as he was about to hand it to Jolyne, Jotaro took it first and read it over. As his daughter hopped around him, demanding that it was hers and she deserved to read it first, he made sure everything was clear before looking at Rohan.

“Are you serious about this number?”

“Is it not enough?”

“…”

“Am I getting money?” Jolyne piped up.

For a moment, Jotaro took Rohan aside in the kitchen, but it was only that. Rohan laid out the contract in front of her, and Jolyne eagerly signed, followed by Jotaro’s signature.

“Money.” She demanded, sticking her palm outright.

Rohan didn’t deny her her dues. Reaching into his wallet, he pulled out a crisp hundred dollar bill and handed it to her.

“Oh my god!!” She peeped, having never held that much in her hands in her entire life! “Oh my god!! It’s mine, right? All mine?” She looked up at Jotaro, suspiciously wondering if he was going to tell her to put this in the bank. He nodded instead, and she let out a delighted squeal, hugging Rohan (who looked quite a bit uncomfortable) and dashing up to her room to shove it in her bank.

While she was gone, Rohan pulled out his checkbook and wrote the full sum out for Jotaro. “And she’ll get 10% royalties on all character merchandise and related matter. I’ll send you a check each month after the character’s debut. You really don’t want her to know…? As the artist, I think she should.”

“This is better kept in her college fund.” The check was torn out with a deft rip and handed to Jotaro, looking it over and counting the zeroes. “If you don’t keep to your word, I have the lawyer on the contract to call?”

“You do. But don’t worry about it. I am… grateful to Jolyne for her inspiration. Tell her that if she wishes to attend any fan conventions and panels as a special guest, she is welcome to.”

“This is unlike you.” Jotaro grumbled warily. “Why didn’t you just steal her drawing?”

“Because—“ And his response was said with a terse tone. “Artists are already treated with very little respect,  and while I typically deal with children rather harshly, it is beneath me to mistreat an artist. I paid her the rate that’s acceptable for rights and royalties.”

“Why not just make your own, or buy from someone else?”

“Because.” Rohan folded up his things and slung his portfolio over his shoulder. “Sometimes things hold more value when they come from the right source. Jolyne created something for her audience. Now it’ll become part of my audience, and I’m looking forward to it.”

Mikitaka opened the store every day, two minutes late, like clockwork.

It wasn’t intentional, rather, he didn’t make the conscious choice to be late. The clock upstairs above his shared pawn, antique, and oddities shop was two minutes off. The clock in his bathroom, two minutes off, and the clock hanging over the stairwell for himself and customers alike, two minutes off. This had been the result several years ago of his batteries running out at the exact same time— and the delay to replace all three had taken exactly two minutes. This was the kind of alien he was, concerning himself with the fact that the clocks were ticking, rather than having to be running at the right time.

His co-owner, a self-professed entity of plankton, shot him a lazy grin across the table. They were unique and funny, charming as well— and the two of them never failed to take each other one hundred percent seriously. When Foo insisted that they needed constant hydration to live, it was Mikitaka’s idea to install a coca-cola machine downstairs that would be scrupulously paid through the change in the cash register. When Mikitaka took a piece of jewelry and said it bore a resemblance to a stone in the planet Kepler 186f’s deep mines, except far less sharp and odious, Foo would enthusiastically ask questions and go on to try to sell the jewelry as an ‘Interplanetary Replica.’ In all of their unique strangeness, they had found someone who had equally professed and admired such things.

When Josuke, all nine years of him, push through the door with a box of— let’s face it, junk— the two looked up curiously at their first customer of the day.

“Is this enough?!”

“Enough?” Mikitaka tilted his head curiously. “Enough for what, exactly…?”

“That comb! That 1980’s authentic Pompadour comb! Last time you guys said it wasn’t enough!”

Foo, sipping their drink, shrugged at Mikitaka’s stare. “He had two stale gumballs he bought from the machine outside.”

“Well, then—“ While they didn’t run a charity, their shop was definitely geared toward the acquiring and parting with of the strange. This especially applied to kids, who could find just about anything. “What have you brought us?”

Josuke ran up to the counter and spilled the shoebox full of goods onto the table, where Foo and Mikitaka picked them over.

“Some old roller skates…”

“They still work!”

“A granite rock…”

“Yeah, but it sparkles.”

“Is this an… omelette pan?”

“We have two!”

Waving Mikitaka over, Foo immediately cried out “Ooh, ooh, look at this!”

The pendant they picked up was a handmade wire-wrapped doll in the center of a wire loop, meant to be worn around the neck like a necklace. Josuke shuddered at that particular object.

“That’s junk.”

“What kind of junk?”

“I… Reimi got it for me at her ghost faire… you’re supposed to wrap a thread of hair around it, and if the person who puts their hair in it dies, they’ll be bound to that necklace. B- but it’s just cheap wire and that can’t possibly be true!”

Josuke’s fear of that little trinket was more than his desire to sell it.

“Ooh!” Foo looked it over cheerfully… “But since I’m plankton, there’ll always be several kinds of me. If I wrap my hair around it, it might not work— Miki?”

“My lifespan is far too long for it to be a worry…”

This didn’t diminish Foo’s excitement in the slightest. “Why don’t we both wrap our hair around it and see where it takes us?!”

“You’re sure you wish to trade your antique comb for this?”

“Uh, duh. I got a regular comb. I don’t have a magic ghost necklace.”

The ancient register Mikitaka used to process the transaction produced an equally old receipt for an exchange of goods. “Comb 060” was exchanged for “Spooky Necklace 023”. Josuke, despite his wariness, felt it melt away as the antique comb was placed in his hands. They just didn’t MAKE them like this anymore…! He’d seen it here completely on accident a week ago, and had endeavored to find something worth trading ever since. He really thought it’d be the roller skates, though.

“Don’t be a stranger, Josuke,” Mikitaka hummed, putting the necklace around a velvet jewelry display.

“I won’t!”

With the hustle of his feet out the door, and the brief return to get the box of things he left on the counter, Foo looked at Mikitaka with a daring smirk.

“You’re so soft for human kids. I could tell you would’ve taken the rock if that’s all he brought in.”

“Charity…” He began, dusting the shelves, “Is the most important facet of sentient culture. It leaves a deep impression to give something up for someone to receive something out of kindness.”

“Huh…” Foo popped a few quarters into the Coke machine, retrieving a Sprite from the vendor. “Is that why your race didn’t blow up Earth?”

“Heavens, no. Earth is a protected habitat. All sentient things must first make the scientific leap to intergalactic space travel on their own before we interfere with their culture.”

“So you like it here? Isn’t it like living out in the boonies for a guy like you?”

“I would not have your companionship on any other planet, therefore this is the only place for me.”

“Awww!” They playfully punched at his upper arm, without too much strength. “Well, my entire hivemind agrees you’re just the best.”

“Let each and every part of you know I’m grateful for that sentiment.”

Chapter Text

Kosaku Kawajiri was not unopposed to his new name, or his new life, all things considered.

It was normal enough. His skin had healed over expertly, but that’s what you do when you get the best underground surgeon to fix you in the shape of a missing man. But for a scar beneath his ear, he was perfect. It had been eleven months since he seamlessly folded himself into this life. The only drastic measure he had to take was never letting DNA come into the mix, but he had prepared for all of that until he had a daughter.

It’s cold in his regular pajamas as he rolls over to kiss Shinobu behind the shell of her ear— who giggles in response. She waits for this every morning when he did it on a whim, and now he has to pay the dues and do the wake-up test every morning. He slides out of bed and lets her stay in rest. Complications from the pregnancy had left her a little bit out of commission, though she seemed to handle Yoriko from her room just fine when he was out at work.

He made his way down the cold hallway with slippers too tight (a gift from Hayato, unrefused). He was paranoid about shoes when Kira had bought and replaced all of his old ones instantly with the same brand and make, scoured across auction sites. Shinobu would nudge him and say he was always watching TV about who built the pyramids and if aliens were real… this was just a phase. It was by the original Kosaku’s good graces that he managed to be boring enough that Kira didn’t have to put in much effort— being “kidnapped and suffering from acute memory loss” made up for the rest of the change in his personality, after all.

Their daughter was quiet. Kira’s parents often told him he was a quiet child, too. He gathered her up in his arms and walked down the steps to the kitchen, which was just a bit warmer before she started to cry— as he hushed her repeatedly and softly, he took her formula and microwaved it, stroking her temple quietly. Blonde hair was strange on her, but he said he was only black haired as a recessive gene… somehow, they bought it. He tests the heat of the bottle on his wrist and lets her drink herself to contentment.

After that, the chores are easy to deal with and simple to prepare. He sets up Yoriko in their bedroom and brings snacks and drinks for his wife, he waits for Hayato to get in the car, he drives him to school and then himself to work.

He wants to sever the hand off of one of Hayato’s female teacher’s, but other than that, his life is quiet and peaceful.

—

He doesn’t deal with the most savory of clients at times.

He owed a man a favor for his little face job. So far, he’s been delivering on a timely schedule like paying off a credit card, and felt as though he had nothing to worry about from the ruffian. He was lucky not to be loan sharked by a gang leader, so when he delivers schematics through his pitifully untraceable work computer, he gets messages back from Don Diavolo asking if the break-in point is secure, and he has to reply, dutifully, yes, it’s secure, there’s no cameras covering that part of the building and once you get in you’ll have everything on lockdown. Just remember the entry point.

(One might have thought he stole hands without knowing how to break into a building. Especially with his expensive tastes.)

There would be news reports of a robbery later that week and Diavolo would send him a number anonymously, lowered from the last one he sent, quietly taking his debt down little by little. It was the simple things in life, like keeping up with company, that made it a little bit easier to bear.

—

“Ah,” He said, combing back his hair in the mirror.

“What’s up?” Shinobu replied with a hair curler in her ponytail. She was recovering slowly but surely— it was a rough pregnancy but one that was thankfully also typically common— bedrest for a few months while her body recovered had been all she needed, and she was starting to get back on her feet.

“Sh… Shinobu.” He said, very seriously. “Can you keep a secret?”

Her face lit up with concern that very moment, resting her hand on his arm. “What is it?”

“I…” His tone was absolutely dramatic, as if this was the most embarrassing secret he’d ever kept. “I’ve dyed my hair ever since we met.”

Cheeks puffed in laughter and disbelief. “You’re kidding me. Whenever you made hair appointments, I thought you were going for a cut! You’re telling me we’ve been married since Hayato was born and you’ve been dyeing it ever since?! That’s so—“ She punched him in the shoulder, mirthfully. “That’s so ridiculous, Kosaku!”

He pulled his hand through his hair for proof. Blonde streaks, bright at the roots, were showing, and she made him lean down so she could look with fascination. “I’ll be damned… why?”

“When I was younger, it made me look like—“ He coughs into his hand. “With the way my hair curls, it made me look like a celebrity. I just wanted the rumors to stop. The habit stuck.”

“Something really did happen to you a year ago…” She smiles and shakes her head, like this was just another ridiculous part of their life. “If you told me that then, I’d have sworn you’d take it to your grave.”

“I’m getting too old for keeping up lies.” He lied.

Later, Yoriko would be in his arms, listening to his heartbeat as Hayato would occasionally glance up from his homework to glower at him, writing ‘blonde’?? in the margins of his notebook. There were no living Kawajiris to confirm or deny… long before his lucky body double appeared on the scene to be bodysnatched.

“Hayato, I need your help…” Kira’s words slithered from his mouth and up to Hayato’s mind, setting off alarm bells as a chill rode up his spine. “… I feel like I’ve changed.”

“You’re asking me?” Whatever it was, Hayato had been bitter about the change from the get go.

“Suddenly, I like foods I hated and hate foods I like. They said I have a specific kind of amnesia where bits of my personality changed. My parents both had black hair, so I always felt like a freak with having blonde hair… but I asked myself that question today and remembered they were tense with each other because they were high school lovers and my mother was pregnant by his best friend. Still, my adoptive father committed to raise me.” He rubs his chin, as if he’s more confused about the mystery than Hayato is. “Things I blocked out are coming back to me… do you know anything about that?”

Hayato did, but refused to answer. “Maybe you just hit your head really hard.”

“Oh, I did for sure. One would expect the opposite effect.”

“I guess.”

Planting little seeds of confusion did him well. If he could mix Hayato up on his notes, he might confuse him enough into believing he was wrong all along. And that would be the end of Kira Yoshikage as a mystery.

Hayato picked up his backpack and stuffed his homework in, muttering an ‘I’m going out’ to his would-be father, who nodded with the little girl in his arms.

“Be safe out there.”

It really was safer out there.

—

Giorno was hungry.

It’s not that their pantry wasn’t a well stocked buffet of delicacies, but children are particular and Giorno was spoiled. Dio was at work, no one else was home, and he really wanted a cheeseburger. Easy enough would it be to open up the freezer and cook one himself— it wasn’t that he had to get used to this, Dio usually took him to his office. He was just determined to do things on his own. One day, Dio came home to him cooking pasta perfectly, with his small laptop open to a cooking video on youtube. He could do that again, of course, but… no. He has 32 dollars in his little bank, because Dio doesn’t know the partials of giving allowance, and he wants something to eat that someone else made.

He went upstairs to the guest room, where the window faced Jolyne’s across the fence. He had a little tray of decorative glass pebbles he used to throw against the glass. It always took him a few tries before she opened the window.

“What’s up?” Jolyne, predictably for her age, was stapling pictures from Rohan’s new chapter to her wall of her character’s introduction. Jotaro would find his stapler missing later and the culprit’s artwork at the scene of the crime.

“I want to go to McDonald’s. Come with me.”

“Like, with your dad? ‘Cause no.”

“No, I’ll drive.”

Dio had two cars, a svelte black one for showing off and an expensive white one for sheer comfort, and the white one had been left at home. Jolyne looked at him like he was crazy.

“It’s like… ten miles from here. My dad doesn’t even go unless it’s to get coffee.” Still, the siren song of a cheeseburger had piqued her interest. Jotaro was strict about food in the house and making sure she ate well. “I don’t have money either.”

“Cavolfiore,” Giorno had hit his phase where he was fascinated with his Italian heritage, even though he wasn’t technically Italian. The language lessons helped, though. He slicked back his hair. “It’s on me.”

Jolyne started laughing, stomping her shoes on the ground at what a dork he sounded like. Giorno had a thing where he didn’t have a crush on her, but he liked pretending he did to make her snort. “Don’t call me a cauliflower!”

(They took the same class so they could have a ‘code language’. Josuke did, too.)

“I can do it though. I watched all the DMV videos on youtube.”

“How can your short legs reach the pedals?”

“They can reach!”

“Pfff…fff… fine. I’m hungry. But you have to pick me up to prove it.”

Jolyne slammed her window shut, presumably to go wait outside. Giorno knew just what to do.

They would pick up Josuke, too, he thought, diving into the drawer that Dio thought Giorno “was too good” to go rifling through and picked out the keys by the little keychain of his office logo, imprinted with a big ‘D’. Then it was locking the doors and running off to the garage, seeing the prize on the other side of the garage. Dio’s car.

He slammed the garage door button with a smile, having to reach only slightly.

He made extra sure there was nothing behind the car before getting in (running over even a worm would devastate him). The ignition was easy, putting the car in drive was easy, and he was tall enough just to reach the pedals if he sat on the edge. It was all just buttons and levers, no more complicated than a racing game at an arcade— that was a good idea, they could go there too… but he easily pulled out of the driveway first, backing up and effortlessly curving the car towards Jotaro’s house.

The side window rolled down, and Jolyne walked up to lean in. She’d have to be quick, dad was home. “You were not kidding.”

She quickly hopped in the side of the car and buckled her seatbelt. “Punch it!”

The car skidded away from Jotaro’s house, too engrossed in his work to notice Jolyne’s tiptoes down the stairs. Along the way, Hayato was moodily walking down the street.

“Hey, let’s ask him.”

“Isn’t he that weird conspiracy theory kid? He thinks his dad is a serial killer?”

“He’s actually kind of cool. Hayato!”

Hayato… was not prepared to see two kids beneath his grade driving a car.

“Want to get McDonald’s? Giorno’s paying.”

“You’re going to get yourselves killed…”

“Yeah? Well, you never want to be at home. C’mon, get in the back.”

He couldn’t argue with that. An adventure away from home was better than sitting at a park bench waiting for the time he’d have to go home and deal with the static between him and Kosaku. He threw his bag in the middle seat and buckled up. Giorno let out an Italian swear, remembering something.

“Josuke’s grandpa is a cop. We can’t stop at his house.”

“Nooo!” Jolyne punched him in the arm. “We gotta. Just park down the street and call him.”

“I don’t have a phone…”

Jolyne punched his arm again. “Everyone knows you do and everyone is mad you get to have one!”

Sighing, he pulled the gold-plated iPhone out of his pocket and dialed Josuke’s home phone. When his mom picked up, a cold sweat shook him, but nothing more.

“Can I speak to Josuke, bellissima?”

Tomoko laughed, putting her hand over the receiver. This was not the first time Giorno had done this. “Josuke, it’s for you!”

As Josuke took the phone, Giorno’s tone lowered to a quiet whisper. “Meet us at the end of your block,” and immediately hung up.

Soon, it was Hayato, Josuke, Okuyasu (inseparable), Giorno, and Jolyne in the car. Giorno largely ignored their chatting to rev up the car and pull onto the highway, earning concerned stares from nearby drivers but trying to puff out his chest and look vaguely sixteen. It wasn’t as if the cops could do anything until he got into McDonalds, slammed his thirty-two dollars in change on the counter, and said “Give us all the burgers this buys.”

—

“So where’d you learn how to drive?” Josuke had hoarded a lot of the burgers for Okuyasu and himself in their corner, knowing that Okuyasu was only well fed during times like this and when he was over at his place or at school. It was kind of embarrassing for his bro, but Josuke was always overprotective of him, even to the point of scrapping with his older brother for being mean to him.

“The internet.”

“And you just took your dad’s car?”

“Yeah.”

“Isn’t he going to be royally pissed?”

“He should hide his keys better.”

Jolyne giggled. She still wasn’t Dio’s biggest fan, so whenever Giorno made his life harder, she took a heaping dose of mirth in it. Hayato stared around the group, like this was… strange. If Kosaku knew about this, he’d catch hell. But here they were, laughing about grand theft auto and eating their burgers and fries like it was nothing. Maybe he needed to be more confident about it. Something— about making Kosaku’s life hell was starting to appeal to him, if these guys could pull it off so easily. Maybe he’d wake his little sister in the middle of the night— nah, that’s his problem too. Maybe he’d send him links to ancestry websites and over-eagerly press him to get a test on his sister for one of those DNA things. Something that would bother WHOEVER Kosaku really was.

Then Josuke’s grandpa showed up, mouth open in a sigh, hands on his hips, furrowed brow. The kind of ‘I’m not mad, just disappointed and flabbergasted’ look.

Hayato booked it. He didn’t even say thanks behind him, he just knew he couldn’t get caught. He was dumb to think he should be brave, he was—

No, even as he hid around the corner, Josuke’s grandfather was only shaking his head and massaging his forehead as his partner started to write something up.

He didn’t turn around and stick his guns, but he did push his way out of the door with a renewed confidence.

—

Jotaro didn’t really have the ‘I’m not mad, just disappointed’ approach. He could be mad. He could be really mad. The only thing was, Jolyne wasn’t scared of him when he lowered his tone at the police station and said she was in for a very big punishment, definitely grounded, and never to do this again. She leaned back a bit, but only nodded. Today, she had defeated him in a game of wits and independence— she’d gone out and done her own thing without his permission, and that makes a kid feel powerful.

Dio, on the other hand, was very bad at getting angry at Giorno.

He was trying his best, but— he’d done this exact same thing when Dario was alive. He stole the car to feed Diego with the change in the cup holder, because Dario was too drunk off his ass to buy food. He was only disappointed Giorno hadn’t done it discreetly enough like he did to get away with it. There was talk of grounding, of hiding his keys and how it was such a shame that he has to even resort to that, but that little bubble swell in his heart seemed to grow with pride the more and more Giorno turned out like him. Taking what he wanted, not asking, being clever enough to learn how without hurting himself.

“You have it easy these days,” He muttered severely, as a brackish grin crossed his face. “I didn’t have the internet. I had a little pamphlet from school and guesswork.”

“I could’ve done it with that too.”

“Well, you won’t be. Ever again.”

Tomoko was going off in Josuke’s direction, and vaguely in Okuyasu’s. There was, of course, the unspoken agreement that she would never tell his father or brother about any trouble he got into, and her father, so corruptly, left Okuyasu’s name off the police report in agreement. He didn’t need the extra trouble, but Josuke sure did.

As they began to part ways, Jotaro’s hand firmly on Jolyne’s, Dio walking Giorno out, Tomoko with her hands behind the heads of both boys, another kid was running his way home, halfway there before dark, enjoying the freedom of tracing paths he knew by car but now on foot, too.

Catch him if you can, Kosaku.

—

Gyro and Johnny’s mess of a living room was overcome with moans, lusty and sweet.

“God, Diego, you suck at this game!”

Diego’s eyes flitted around the Hunie Pop screen as he searched for three pieces to match.

“Dude, this is like the easiest part in the game. Move over.”

“No!” Diego insisted, finally hitting a combo and letting the pieces fall down as the pleasure meter built. This cheap, raunchy game was stupidly addictive, but no one ever said Diego was good at it.

“She doesn’t even have her clothes off yet. You have to swap pieces really fast.”

“You heard the man,” Johnny crammed some chips into his mouth. “Show him some tits.”

Diego was aggravated, trying to get the clothes off the redhead he didn’t even want to date because she was a royal bitch, but was required for beating the game. His cellphone started to vibrate, but he dutifully ignored it in the quest for bare anime nips.

DIO: DIEGO
DIO: WHERE WERE YOU BABYSITTING GIORNO
DIO: HE STOLE MY CAR
DIO: He’s fine
DIO: BUT HE STOLE MY FUCKING CAR
DIO: YOU ABSOLUTE SHITWHISTLE
DIO: I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOU’RE DOING AND I’M GOING TO MAKE YOU REGRET EVERY SECOND OF IT
DIO: I KNOW YOU WON’T READ MY TEXTS SO HERE’S WHAT I HAVE DONE
DIO: I HAVE HACKED INTO YOUR GOOGLE DRIVE AND SWAPPED YOUR POWERPOINT SLIDES WITH IMAGES OF THAT DISGUSTING GAME YOU BRING INTO MY HOUSE
DIO: ENJOY CLASS
DIO: NEVER FORGET I DON’T MISS AN OPPORTUNITY TO DESTROY THOSE WHO DISAPPOINT ME

—

DIO: Has your child ever stolen a car?
DIAVOLO: She wouldn’t need to steal one. Just to ask.

—

“Sweet,” Gyro said simply once Diego had progressed far enough in the game to reach the promised land of a nude image one could find with a quick google.

“Nice,” Johnny replied. Neither of them were very straight, but sometimes you just had to.

“Shit…” Diego finally reached for his phone after the CG popped up on his computer screen. “Dio hacked my fuckin’ account. I was supposed to watch Giogio and he stole a car.”

“You… you suck at doing your job.”

“If you two hadn’t insisted on getting me drunk I could’ve driven over there!”

“Are you saying your nephew is a more responsible driver than you?”

“I think he is.”

Diego stood up from his seat on the sofa. These two were impossible to snap back to. Johnny was this invincible wall of sarcasm and insults rolled off Gyro like water off of a duck. At the same time, they were the most ambivalent people he knew, invincible together in their repertoire of wit. Even if it felt like the three of them weren’t friends at times, Diego was remarkably jealous of that charisma. He could smooth talk his way through anything from a business deal to a drug deal but that was nothing in the face of being verbally untouchable.

“Well, I’m skipping class to fix whatever Dio did to my drive. Guess I’m running to the corner shop.”

“Convenience store,” Johnny corrected.

“You’ve lived here since you were like, twelve,” Gyro popped open a beer. “Why are you still British?”

“Yeah, Diego, where’s your cowboy hat like this tool has?”

“It’s not a cowboy hat.”

“It totally is,” Johnny quipped back.

“Jesus, get married already.” Diego rolled his eyes. “Do you want anything? Sass me again and I won’t get it.”

“Apparently, a marriage certificate.”

“Bye,” Diego said, opening the door and shutting it a little too loud for an apartment complex behind him.

Chapter Text

Autumn fell with its gentle frosting of the grass outside and with its leaves peppering the ground. At last, Jotaro could say goodbye to having to water ‘Jolyne’s’ flowers—they were dead and withered and nothing would bring them back. He felt a bit of relief for having the duty stripped from him.

But children during Halloween season were hard to deal with. First, she had spent her early October secretly watching scary movies in the basement, and he’d wake up to her asleep on the chair across from his bed, with the closets open and the lights switched on inside. For the rest of the month, Jolyne wouldn’t go near a flood drain for fear of being dismembered. It finally reminded him to put parental locks on their cable. And her tablet. And everything else.

Halloween had just been a kitsch holiday in Japan, but here it was a lifestyle. Stores changed overnight into costume outlets and drones with wraiths on them were suddenly something you could buy. He knew, because Polnareff bought one, and sent videos of him letting his dog play with it. Its inevitable destruction would later be recalled in a lengthy text message pinning Kakyoin as a possible suspect in its demise.

Truth be told, Jotaro didn’t get it. He understood the other holidays, but everyone else’s edgy month was his teenage years long past, so when Jolyne brought home a pumpkin too heavy for her and pushed it up on the kitchen island, he wasn’t quite sure what to do about it, aside from close the knife drawer when she tried to open it.

“No.”

“You can’t carve a pumpkin without a knife!”

“…” Right, Jack-o-lanterns. “Doesn’t mean you’re going to play with knives. Aren’t there tools to carve this with?”

“We don’t have any.” She pouted. “Can we go get some? Please?”

“Where did you get this pumpkin from?”

“School. They gave them away.”

He didn’t have to know she took it from one of the school’s displays for Halloween. They were just sitting outside, anyway.

He felt himself suddenly itch for a cigarette, then stuffed the urge down until hopefully, when she was gone for college. “After work.” He replied eventually.

“That long?!”

“Unless you want to wait longer.”

--

Giorno’s grand theft auto had been taken very seriously back home. Despite Dio’s apparent pride, he’d been grounded and made to focus completely on his homework. A few B’s turned into A’s during that time. Dio had grown stricter and had hidden his keys on his person. Perhaps he’d been too lenient with his son—such niceties didn’t suit him, and so bedtime was strictly at nine, there were no games, and learning was its own reward.

It reminded him a bit of how he raised Diego. Almost. Diego turned out to be a bit more carefree than he intended. He was still as nosy and dedicated as a snake and would probably make a good partner in his firm, but the company he kept rubbed off on him. Dio prided himself on having tight control of those around him, and perhaps he’d overlooked Giorno because he saw so much of himself in that boy that he wanted to see him get away with it. But stealing his car got under his skin. It was one thing to see him try to play Dio’s own mind games against himself, it was another to potentially wreck his property.

It brought him back to a long time ago, back when he was studying through the first semesters of college.

Had Diego been eleven? Twelve? Either way, he’d been a pain. They were just enough alike that they butted heads at every possibly opportunity. He’d thought miserably that he squandered his opportunity to leave him with the Joestars and vanish to build himself, but he was too selfish to let Diego have that cushy life. His mother had entrusted him with his care, not anyone else no matter how qualified they were. So they moved into an apartment that Dio paid for with the Joestar’s money, while simultaneously forbidding them from seeing either young man. They were too kind. Far too kind for their own good.

Dio didn’t cook. Diego didn’t either, having spent most of his childhood in the rich manor of his adoptive brother. Of the two, Diego was the first to learn self-sufficiency. Pride wouldn’t allow him to rely on just his older brother; he would do the grocery shopping and spend time cutting vegetables to make a simple stew that would last them a few days before it was time for the next grocery run. He squandered his time at a local stable, learning everything there was to know about horses.

Filthy creatures, in Dio’s eyes. Fascinating, in Diego’s. If there were ever a prodigy who dreamed more about getting an actual Mustang instead of the car brand, it was him. A Kentucky purebred with a lineage stretching through every single one of the greats. Diego saved every single penny he could working at the ranch and it was still only an eighth of the amount that would get him anywhere.

Money needed to come easier. This sickened him like it sickened Dio to be tied down to several burdens instead of climbing his way to the top. Both were ambitious, as Giorno would soon inherit.

When Diego turned eighteen, just a year prior, he’d gotten cozy with an older woman who lived in Kentucky and boasted a proud stable. Flattered by his charm and his attention, one day, out of the kindness of her heart, she asked that he pick any horse in the stable, and it’d be his. All the pedigree documents and everything. She had too many, and she couldn’t ride any longer.

And Diego knew all of this. So Silver Bullet came home with him to the Bay.

“If there’s anything I wish to impart on you, my child, it’s the delicate art of understanding others. What weaknesses they have, what they want to hear.” Dio was rearranging books in his library, where Giorno was permitted to sit and read during his grounding. “You’re going to work for me one day, just like my brother. Understanding people is an art you can’t simply forget.”

Dio knew, on some level, Giorno already knew this and was picking out Dio’s own weaknesses to get away with certain things. That’s where his pride was, and also his irritation. And Giorno could sense pride in a room as well as he could sense anger.

“You want me in your law firm…?”

“It’s the family trade.” He responded finally, putting Goethe back into place.

It’s the family trade, but Giorno had seen enough of what had gone on inside of it. Dio was constantly taking phone calls from sobbing, angry people who wanted justice and had seen him on TV defending some seriously scary people. It wasn’t exactly ideal to an eight-year-old who didn’t fully understand what it was—just that it was shady.

Shadiness ran in the family. Giorno felt his own tinges of it tinting his character, an emotion he couldn’t quite convey yet. He’d learn much more about it down the family line.

“Can I go trick-or-treating?”

Dio wanted to ban that too—but there was discipline and there was fostering resentment. “Ask your uncle.” Was all he said to that. Neither his permission or his denial.

Giorno nestled his head back into his book, reading about plant life cycles and pondering what he could use to make a costume.

Dio sighed through his teeth, wondering what Giorno’s uncle was even doing now. Spending the allowance that Dio gave him monthly? Doing illegal horse racing scams to make up for it? Or hanging out with those two cretins who wrecked his house? It wasn’t like him to care all that much about it, so he didn’t.

Diavolo, however, probably required his attention. There was a case on his desk to release a mobster for a suspected dismemberment. Two words that normal attorneys didn’t like to be sent, but Dio relished a challenge. Silently excusing himself from the library, he made his way down his hall to the office.

Giorno immediately cast aside the book and wandered back to his room. There was a secret there that few people knew about. Lifting the skirt of his bed, he was greeted with the sight of a medium-sized aquarium, housing one little gift from Diego. Inside was something Dio would never allow—a pet lizard. Smiling, he lifted it to his shoulder where it usually perched and climbed into bed with one of his school books.

(Amazing, really, how Dio never noticed the lamp light on under his bed.)

A pebble hit his bedroom window. Followed by another. They were glass aquarium beads that Jolyne kept in a little jar by the windowsill. He set his lizard down and rushed over.

“ARE YOU STILL GROUNDED?” Jolyne yelled, prying open her window all the way.

Giorno mimed for her to stay quiet—yes, indeed, he was, and he wasn’t supposed to be talking to her most of all.

“Sorry—are you still grounded?”

“Yeah.”

“You gotta sneak out for Halloween!”

“I might not have to…” He leaned on the windowsill. “He says it’s fine if my uncle agrees.”

“You have to go with me! We’re going to the really rich neighborhood. Full bars and everything.”

Giorno wasn’t too impressed, considering he could usually get anything he wanted with the right look or the subtle manipulation of the right person, but going with Jolyne would make up for that. He could count on her to know the most haunted places to sneak into, or to secretly carry some eggs and TP for someone’s unlucky house. But he’d have to be chaperoned. He was eight, wasn’t that old enough?

No, everyone would agree, it wasn’t. Mature for his age or not.

“I’ll ask my uncle if we can all go with him. Josuke and Oku too. I hear footsteps, see you--”

He hastily closed the window and returned to his bed, reaching for his lizard and and going back to his studies, or he would have, if the lizard was there.

Oh no.

Don’t panic. He probably just went under the pillows. No, not there. Under the bed? Nope. On the dresser, in the closet, on the walls? No, no, and no. Every nook and cranny of his room overturned, there was no sign of Gold Experience. He turned toward the light coming in from his closed door. He couldn’t have—he must’ve. The thing was loose in the house and until he found it, it was at the risk of meeting Dio’s heel as a pest that snuck inside. And he couldn’t admit it was a pet, either…

The next few days before Halloween were going to be stressful.

--

Diego had a habit of not answering his phone when it rang, checking the picture on the screen first before he’d consider it or yell at them to message next time. He was out riding, and Silver Bullet had just slowed to a stop as he took it out of his pocket to see. An almost comically terrifying depiction of Satan was on the screen with ‘DIO’ right above it. He even had a custom ringtone that had startled the other riders around him. YES YOU ARE FUCKED, SHIT OUT OF LUCK--

He quickly swiped the screen. “Dio.”

“What are you doing for Halloween?”

Soaking an oversized gummy bear in two bottles of vodka until it absorbed all of it and feasting on it with his friends until someone needed a doctor. “Nothing special. Just a party, why.”

“You heard about Giorno.”

“Right, he stole your car,” Diego laughed. “That’s like a rite of initiation in this family. You stole Dad’s all the time when he was passed out, didn’t you? And there was that one time a couple years ago I took your—”

“Enough.”

“Anyway, what about him.” Silver Bullet began to trot down the trail with the rest of the group. Answering a phone call on a horse felt like an archaic version of texting and driving.

“I’m considering allowing him to go trick or treating. If he does, you’re taking him.”

“Why are you always so embarrassed to do shit like this?” Diego quipped back. “If there’s ever something too childish for you, you completely want to side-step it even though you have a kid. Man up.”

“I’ve gone to plenty of events with him. I even chaperoned at a party.”

“You got into a fight at that party. Jesus, you call me a mess…”

“Just do it.” There was a firm finality on the other end. “If you don’t, then Giorno doesn’t get to go.”

Diego rolled his eyes. He knew that the main reason Dio called was that he wouldn’t be caught dead surrounded by children dressed as pumpkins and witches. Something about his ego. “You’re lucky I’m a better uncle than you’re a father.”

“You’re lucky I’m putting you through college instead of letting you rot on the streets.”

“Love you too,” Diego spat pettily before hanging up.

Jonathan would never do this, he thought to himself as he rode back towards the stable.

--

“What do you want to be? A butterfly?”

Jolyne scoffed. “I was a butterfly last year, and the year before that, and as long as I can remember! I want to be something cool.”

Jotaro looked across the aisle of Halloween costumes with an apparent lack of understanding. He’d never grown up with this, and before now, Jolyne’s mother had done all of this by hand. What was cool to kids these days…

Jolyne didn’t give him very long to process that before she started tugging on a child-size knockoff of a Jason Voorhees costume, complete with real blood splatter and a decapitated plastic head to use as a bucket for candy. He immediately put his hand on her head and brought her back from it.

“When you’re older.”

“I watched Friday the 13^th! I’ll be fine!”

“You weren’t fine when you watched it. You sat through the whole thing and then came upstairs crying.”

Jolyne shook her head, scoffing. “I’m over it now! I can appreciate how scary he is. And I want to scare other people, too!”

“Why not a ghost or a werewolf?”

Jolyne glanced over at those two costumes, essentially a sheet and a girly wolf based off some cartoon. She frowned. “I wanna be Jason.”

“You’ll just run around all night hitting people with the plastic machete.”

“I won’t! Pleeeeeeease, let me have this!”

Good grief. She wasn’t going to let this go, he could tell that straight from her puppy eyes. He took the costume off the rack and handed it to her. Immediately, she put on the hockey mask and grinned. If she’d already been exposed to the source material, there was no helping it.

“You have to promise me something.”

“What?”

“You’re never getting into a car with your friend, ever again.”

“… okay.”

“Okay, what?”

“Okay, I promise I won’t get into Giorno’s car again.”

“Good.” He pulled his hat down slightly and started walking to the cashier. Little did he know, Jolyne would start to wear that outfit constantly before Halloween. She’d do her homework in it, leer creepily out the window to startle Giorno whenever he passed by. It became easy to menace Josuke and Okuyasu in the worst game of hide and seek known to man, with the seeker smacking the person hiding with her trusty machete upon leaping into their hiding place.

They eventually chose Freddy and Chucky costumes just to contest her.

--

Giorno hadn’t found Gold Experience by Halloween, which was making him increasingly worried for the lizard’s life. He could barely muster the excitement for the holiday itself, even when Diego was leaning into his doorframe, twirling his keys on one finger. “You ready to go, kid?”

The vampire costume he’d worn last year fit just fine, complete with the moldable fangs he could stick on his canines. Diego was the only one he shared this secret with—Diego had gotten it for him, after all.

“I lost my lizard.”

“Oh…” Diego trailed off. “How’d he die?”

“No, I mean he was on my bed one minute and ran off the next. He’s loose in the house,” He pushed himself off the bed and took the pumpkin-shaped bucket in hand. “I’ve looked everywhere. He couldn’t have gotten outside…”

“He’ll turn up. I’m sure.” Whether the lizard was dead behind a book case or alive just before Dio flushed it down a toilet after finding it. “If not, we can get you a new one.”

“It’s near his feeding time…”

Diego gave a hearty pat on the back. “Don’t think about it for now. C’mon, let’s go.”

Giorno had been determined to go with his friends to some schmaltzy neighborhood, but Diego insisted theirs was rich enough—Dio wouldn’t live here unless there was some prestige.

As they left, all lights turned off in the house. Dio wasn’t going to entertain trick-or-treaters, just as Diego predicted.

“There’s Jolyne!”

As Diego strode across the lawn with his nephew, he was met with the sight of three children and one man in a hat and a coat that could almost pass as a costume. Something so 90’s that it was flat-out bizarre. Dio’s nemesis, the break in his win streak, Jotaro Kujo, hosting a bunch of little kids on his lawn, fighting with their fake weapons. Diego gave a small wave. The enemy of his nuisance was his… friend? Maybe acquaintance. Jotaro took one look at him and could smell Eau du Brando coming from him. The same long blond hair, the smirk basically tattooed on his face. He kept his guard up.

“Mind if I tag along? He wants to go with his friends.”

Unlike the Brando household, they had a bucket out front with candy that simply said, ‘take one’. Diego knew it would be empty within minutes of their leaving.

“Sure.”

“Sure, you mind? Or sure, go ahead?”

“Sure.” Jotaro repeated, taking Jolyne by the hand.

It was uneventful. Stop at a house, wait down the steps for the kids to get their candy, go to the next house, repeat and rinse. Diego remembered doing this with a pillowcase and a makeshift costume, and Dio stealing bits of his candy because he refused to be seen ‘begging’ at houses but had a startling weakness for peanut butter cups. Of course, Diego ran it alone. That meant he had the glorious luxury of sneaking into abandoned old houses with his haul and eating it in the spooky atmosphere.

Ghosts were for people who wore quartz necklaces or pentacles and talked about their sixth sense all the time. He’d never been afraid of creaking old houses after he grew up in several.

He wondered if…

“Hey, kids. Want to see a haunted house?”

There was a rejoice of cheers from the little crowd, along with Jotaro staring him down in a disapproving manner.

“And where would this be?”

“Not far. I grew up around here, you know.”

True to his words, the street lights started to grow dimmer and look older as he lead them down the street on their candy-grabbing escapade, stopping for each house with a light on. Fewer and fewer trick or treaters were down this path. The sky was growing dark early, and curfew for Halloween would soon be up. It was a thrill retracing his old footsteps from long ago. He only hoped that 1172 Jackson Drive still existed. It was full of rot, last time he was there. But what a glorious, frightening rot it was.

“Here we are.”

The wood paneling on the sides of the house were dim and dark with water soaking into them. Several boards were nailed along the windows and a for-sale sign had been knocked over by the wind. In a weird way, Jotaro’s interest was piqued. He had no belief in the supernatural either, but the house had a draw to it. A sort of ‘how are you still here?’ mystique.

Diego easily walked up to the door and knocked. There was naturally no response. It was locked tight too, likely to keep out junkies and whoever was brave enough to squat there.

“Looks like we’re out of luck.” Diego sighed, dramatically. “Unless…”

One of the windows had the boards pulled off it. Testing it, he lifted the glass panel until it gave way, easing up with a slow, torturous creak. He got one leg inside, then looked over his shoulder.

“I’ll scope it out before I let you in. Just in case.”

Jotaro nodded.

It was musty inside, and Diego found himself covering his face the moment his head passed through the sill. Hardly any light, he pulled out his cell phone and turned on the flashlight.

Just as he remembered. The winding staircase leading to the second floor looked too weak to carry a person, but the temptation was there to try. Old furniture with plastic covering sat in the parlor just where he entered. It hardly mattered, because he could see the fabric molding just underneath. Footsteps making dull taps against the wooden floor, he snapped the occasional picture of the dining room set, of the outdated kitchen, of the hallway leading down to the basement.

There was something funny about the kitchen. A knife stood straight up in the sink, surrounded by old dishes. At first, he thought it was just how it fell, but as he grabbed it, he felt something snap as it came free, the dishes held apart colliding with one another, making a noisy, messy sound.

“Huh,” He whistled lowly, tossing the knife by the handle in his hand. “Hot Pants will get a kick out of this.”

Diego took it with him as he scoped out the rest of the house. A little room with a bed and some toys in across the way from the basement stairs. You couldn’t get creepier than that. Snap, snap. More pictures.

Something creaked from upstairs. Diego thought nothing of it, this house was probably constantly settling.

Something creaked again.

“Jotaro? Did you come in already? It’s moldy, so the kids probably shouldn’t…”

The nursery’s little mobile gave a turn, jingling as it did so. There was no wind in the house.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Diego glowered, ripping it easily off the ceiling and down over the crib. Something bothers you? Take care of it. He’d hardly noticed the mess he made trailing dust into the room.

Actually, it didn’t quite look like dust. It was in too neat of a line across the doorway, except for the part where his foot had dragged. Tapping it with his shoe, it gave a grainy, sand-like crunch.

“Salt,” He murmured. “Okay, okay. Someone was here before me. Set up a prank. Did a really good job, but now it’s time to go.”

He headed back through the kitchen, when the lights struggled to turn on. Beneath him, he could feel the sound of a generator whirring to life. And something stupid stuck in his head then—if he left the house now, he’d let it win. He’d let it scare the shit out of him, and all his pride would be gone. Stubborn until the end, he pulled open the door to the basement.

“Alright, alright. Did a fucking raccoon get wedged between some cogs or what?”

His footsteps were noisy coming down, and all he could see were a scant few lightbulbs on and a little bit of light pouring in from the well windows outside. The generator was clearly visible, down the hallway and past some shelves. He didn’t want to leave it on and see this place burn down the next morning, so he resolved to shut it off.

The knife in his hand was gripped a little too tightly. His stride was unbroken as he made his way over, noting that the thing was newer, almost too new. Only a thin coat of dust settled on it. The switch was hovering between on and off, and he sighed. His footsteps above probably triggered it to go ‘on’. He firmly and quickly shut it off.

And he was immersed in darkness.

All that was left to do was walk back to the stairs, turning on his phone flashlight again and guiding himself home free. But on the last shelf…

Something reached from the corner and grabbed his shoulder. Or grazed it. All he knew is that when he turned his flashlight up, a grotesque, pale face was staring down at him, looming so far down that it must have been stooped against the ceiling, easily nine feet tall. Its face was frozen in a permanent droop, almost sorrowful, were it not for the grin that tightened its features from ear to ear. Diego didn’t stop to keep looking.

At the same time, his phone rang, with that same tone, screaming about how fucked he was.

He ran like hell. He ran like heaven, he ran like the Dickens, Poe, and whoever the hell else.

 Stumbling up the basement steps and tripping, he knocked his head on one of them, swore and began running up. Haunting laughter followed him through the house, and on a glance around him, the eyes of the portraits were blinking as their mouths moved unnaturally. He fought with the lock on the door, feeling something terrible encroach. The lock gave way, and something stuck to his foot as he stumbled down the stairs, breathless and shamefully afraid. He collided with Jotaro’s form, dropping the knife as he held onto his coat.

“Don’t… don’t go in there. Don’t.” He suddenly felt like he was in desperate need of those crystals or whatever warded off ghosts. Some salt. Shower him in some salt.

“… Diego.”

Jotaro pushed him by the shoulders away from his own body, frowning like he disapproved. Giorno tugged at the thing stuck to Diego’s foot.

“… Haunted escape room,” He read out loud from the flyer. “2017. Bring your friends and escape the haunted manor. Whatever you do, don’t disturb the spirits.”

Diego wheezed, still out of breath. “It’s an escape room? A fucking escape room?”

“Sorry…”

“Dad, dad! Look what I have!”

Jotaro turned to see the miniature Jason wielding the very real knife.

“Put it DOWN.”

“I like it! Can we keep it?”

“No, Diego, go put it back where you found it.”

“Hell no!”

Jotaro took the knife from Jolyne’s hands and looked it over. It was rusty and old, but dull, like a prop. “Why were you carrying a knife?”

“I don’t know—look, I just found it somewhere and I didn’t want to let go! And apparently I was right not to! Do you know what was in the basement?!”

Jotaro smirked, much to Diego’s bemusement.

“Scared?”

“You go in there and not shit your pants. I dare you.”

“Language around the kids,” Jotaro muttered, setting the knife on the porch. “Let’s just finish up.”

It was a little while before Diego even realized he missed a call. He hit redial.

“Get home,” Dio’s voice was a menacing accompaniment to the house. “Now.”

So much for his detour. The group headed back down the street, Diego resolutely not looking over his shoulder. He began to flip through his phone and look at the pictures he took. Funny thing, a lot of them were blurry even though he was sure his camera wasn’t shaking. The picture in the baby’s room had a lens flare that didn’t seem to line up quite right.

Ghosts weren’t real, he told himself.

Absolutely.

--

“It’s really a mystery.”

Dio watched Giorno go over his candy carefully on the table before telling him to wash up and head for bed. He plucked an orange-wrapped treat and started unwrapping it for himself, gold eyes never leaving Diego’s still shaken form. Slowly, he backed up and lifted a bowl overturned on the table. A fancy lizard stood there, proudly, as if he was on an adventure. Diego recognized it right away.

“I don’t think Giorno can get that terrarium into this house on his own. Do you?”

“…”

“I don’t think he can set it up either. He’s just a child. These things require delicate climates. Which leads me to believe he had a conspirator. Would you know who that is?”

“Oh, fuck me, I’ve had enough of a night that I don’t need more of this—”

“Imagine how mine was, reading a book in my study when I feel something crawl up my arm. Imagine the fortitude I had to muster not to kill it on sight.”

Diego… turned his head to the side and bit back a laugh at the imagined scene.

“I assure you, it isn’t funny. It especially isn’t funny for you.”

Diego fell silent again, because he wasn’t about to say ‘sorry’.

“Get out,” Dio snapped. “The only reason you’re getting off free tonight is that you did me a favor. That’s all.”

He should have just stuck with the vodka gummy bear. Diego pulled on his jacket and headed for the door just as Giorno came down the steps, freezing when he saw Gold Experience on the counter. He was done for, wasn’t he? First, he was grounded and then Dio found out about his secret pet—even Giorno, who was on Dio’s best side, knew not to mess with his wrath.

“Just take it. We’ll discuss what to do about your pet tomorrow.”

Giorno obediently took the lizard between his palms and hurried upstairs. Dio looked between his glass of wine and another chocolate, sitting on the table. He unwrapped it and took a bite, washing it down with a fine, old wine.

Might as well have both.

Chapter Text

Jotaro Kujo was at his best when left to work peacefully.

Jolyne was with her mother for spring break. She spent a good deal of her time with her when school holidays came up, because the distance between their homes was now cross-country, and his daughter could only travel so much between them. He thought at first, secretly, that she must enjoy her trips with her more than she liked living with him, because she was always so excited to go, and sometimes spent nights crying when she got back home. It was less about him and more about the unhappy situation of divorce. Jolyne had felt abandoned when they decided to split, but neither of them thought it’d be good to stay together for the sake of the kid. Jolyne’s mother Whitney had it particularly harsh. She’d spent the first six years basically raising their child alone as Jotaro busied himself with his PhD and work. It was understandable she wanted to be with her family after.

Needless to say, his in-laws weren’t fans.

But Whitney was more forgiving than Jotaro anticipated. After some soul searching, she’d married him thinking she could change him, or that the baby would change him. It turned out that was easier said than done. Accepting him for who he was, was the most frustrating and heart-breaking thing she had to do. Without complaint, they had signed divorce papers together, with the agreement that Jolyne would eventually one day live with her mother permanently once elementary school was done with.

All the way in Florida.

As he double checked paperwork on his desk and relaxed to the sound of white noise coming from the television static in the other room, Jotaro was busily pressing that thought into the back of his head. If Dio, opposite of his godly namesake, had been compelled to keep his own offspring, what did it say about Jotaro to agree to something like that? They had been talking about moving Jolyne out there sooner. He could concentrate on his work, enjoy the silence, and have the house all to himself. He would send all the alimony and child support they needed and more—he wasn’t spendy and had never been. But as that date approached, Jotaro realized he’d grown accustomed to his role.

He always put out two dishes in the morning for cereal, even while she was away, eventually putting away the other bowl as he realized his error. He’d knock on her door to remind her that bed time was encroaching only to realize no one was there.

He wasn’t frustrated by this weakness, like Dio might have been if he’d given Giorno to Jonathan as intended, but it did leave him confused. He thought of himself as a better man when he was out of the picture. What made him think like this was obvious; it was in how all his coworkers treated him. He was strict and no-funny-business. While he enjoyed her antics at times, he didn’t show that he did very often. She was a witty, tough kid who reminded him of himself when he was younger. She deserved better than his half-smiles when he mustered them. He thought of his own mom, who’d indulged him even when he hit the age he wished she didn’t.

He was raising her into rebellion, most likely. The kid next door probably wasn’t a very good influence. Sure, he was a nice kid, but how long was that supposed to last? Jotaro stood up and pulled down a picture album. The first pages were spaced between months of photos, and as time went on, the book became fuller as the days between pictures spanned only weeks, and then maybe once a week. All of them were candid shots. He wasn’t the type to ask permission for photos, so there were plenty where Jolyne was licking ice cream off her arm or chasing and getting chased by geese. He’d never forget the day he punched a goose.

(It had it coming.)

He was… complacent with how things were.

He hadn’t earned the right to raise his daughter, with how badly he’d been acting in the first years of her life, but now the thought of her suddenly exiting his own life left him feeling uneasy.

Nostalgia didn’t suit him, so he closed the photo album and got back to work.

--

Dio didn’t have many things he absolutely despised doing. He was mature enough to take on the most unwanted of tasks or at the very least delegate them to someone else, but when it came to being forced to do something he absolutely didn’t want to do, none was so dreaded than the yearly trip to the cemetery.

Diego made him do it, else he would never go himself. There was a time where he’d bring Giorno, and they’d gather and tell stories about the woman, but that time had since passed. They had a ritual. First would be stopping at the flower store, lined with both wedding bouquets and funeral arrangements for beginnings and endings alike. They would pick out pink roses, like always, spaced apart with Queen Anne’s lace and tied neatly with a ribbon. Diego would know better than to talk about Mom then and there. He knew better than to talk about her in general. That was Dio’s touchiest subject. It made him revisit the worst time in his life—the period in which their mother died, and following closely, Dario’s accident with poison.

Diego couldn’t remember their mother as clearly as Dio did. For a while, he’d pictured her as a sweet woman who could do no wrong, but that was actually far from the truth. Dio’s mother was a survivor, and sometimes that meant doing whatever it took to survive. Dio and his mother had endured under Dario’s drunken rages, but his mother always got him back. She’d taught Dio the art of revenge from an early age, around the same age as his son now. For every time Dario had hit her, he’d meet with his own unfortunate circumstances. He put a roof over their heads but did precious else. It was Mom would come to his aide whenever he was hungry or whenever he overheard his little brother cry in the night. She took no bullshit and gave none in turn. She was a woman who had her throat cut once and lived. He still remembered the rosy tattoo that covered the scar as if he’d seen her yesterday.

“Whatever happened with that?” Diego asked, driving down the country road to the iron wrought gates that stood tall a good distance out of town.

“It was one of her friends who told me after she died,” Dio mused, trying not to think of the graveyard. “An ex of hers had problems with a drug dealer, who threatened her life in exchange for money. When he didn’t hand it over, the dealer made good on his word. Apparently, she was in the ICU for four weeks.”

Mother didn’t have any taste when it came to men, but that’s all Dio would ever fault her for.

Today was one of the rare days Dio would answer Diego’s questions about her. He pried for information from as many people as he could find, but answers were rarely cohesive about who their mother really was. Some said she was ex-mafia. Some said she was just an innocent woman who took several wrong turns in her life. Some said they couldn’t believe she survived everything she went through only to die after falling down the stairwell.

They pulled into the entrance of the cemetery, where a green tent still stood from an earlier service in the day. A fresh mound of dirt marked a fresh grave. Neither Dio or Diego paid it any mind.

It always took some searching to find her. Dario had paid for the minimum in terms of a grave, so she only had a plate in the ground to mark her final resting place. The plate had two names on it, as Dario was originally meant to be buried there as well, but Dio made sure he never got close to his mother again, even in death. He was at the other end of the cemetery in a plot that was almost nameless. Unscrewing the vase from the top of the grave, Diego put the flowers inside and sat down next to the grave.

“… Hi, mom.”

This was where it got truly awkward, as Diego liked to speak to her and Dio didn’t. Inevitably, as Diego began to talk, Dio went to wander. The interesting thing about this graveyard is that one of the people Dio put on death row was buried here. The good old days.

He didn’t pay attention to the masses as he went about his walk, careless to the idea that he was stepping over bodies to make his way to his father’s grave. Every year, he’d have a little tradition. He’d spit on his grave and bask in his own achievements as his father rotted beneath him. It was better than standing by his mother’s grave and thinking about her cold bones. Sure enough, there he was with a stone marker that listed his name and birthday and death dates, with no such mention of ‘loving father’. The only kindness engraved on the stone was a set of wings, a promise of heaven that wouldn’t be attained.

Dio spat on the grave, as promised.

Deadly nightshade tasted sweet and looked like blueberries. A woman from his mother’s old church had brought over a bag of completely innocent blueberries for the family to enjoy sometime after his mother’s death. Now, a patch of blueberry-looking things had grown in their backyard, and Dio knew personally that after the neighbor’s dog ate it, it turned up dead the next morning. Dio wouldn’t tell you what had killed his father, and would adamantly say the woman was a fool who’d picked from a bush far back on the farm that had contained those deadly berries mixed in. But the truth of the matter was that a pair of gloves was in their dryer the next day, stained with slightly purple hues, and the garden shears had been used. Who, now Dio didn’t know who, had used the shears and the gloves, of course. He was a child who lost his parents in quick succession. You’d have to be an idiot to suspect him of anything to do with that harmless accident.

But let’s say Dio had picked the plants in his backyard, mixed them in with the berries in the bag, and waited for Dario to come home drunkenly one night and eat a handful. What would even motivate a child to do something like that? Exactly. Nonsense.

But let’s say he had thoughts at his mother’s funeral as he sat on the couch next to the casket and held his crying baby brother. As he watched Dario open the collection box of donations and pocketed the money for himself. Thoughts that were out of place among any child, but having been raised by Ms. Brando, who preached revenge as a lifestyle, had taken root. Thoughts that grew and grew each time he opened the refrigerator and saw he only had enough to feed Diego and not himself. It’s still very silly to believe a child could murder their father and get away with it.

That poor woman who gave them the blueberries probably still stayed awake at night thinking of what she’d done.

“My son is eight years old now,” He announced to no one. “He’s too smart and he has terrible taste in friends, which must skip a generation.” He thought, remembering his mother.

“Actually, come to think of it, Diego has terrible companions, so maybe it only strikes once per generation. The point is, I have found nothing of yours in him.” He boasted it proudly, thinking of the shitty old bastard burning in Hell, having no one to listen to but this voice deriding him once a year. “I can already tell he’ll grow up too clever and too headstrong for his own good. I will be sure to raise him with everything you lacked in life.”

Deciding he was being just a bit too formal, he also added, “I hope you poisoned the maggots you fed, you shitty, contemptuous bastard.”

Glancing over the long stretch of land, he could see Diego standing up from where he sat. Ignoring the grave beside him, he stuck his hands in the long black coat he wore out here and found his way back to his mother’s graveside.

“Everything out of your system?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” Dio glanced at his watch because he didn’t want to think about standing over the very spot where his mother rested. “Let’s get going.”

“Hey, isn’t that…?”

Diego stopped at a grave as they walked back, with a marker that said ‘loving husband, father’ on top of it. Dio took one look at the grave and sneered.

“He was wanted for seven counts of first-degree murder,” He thought out loud. “Maybe being a loving husband and father was all he was ever good at.”

“Doesn’t it bother you, knowing you basically killed him?” Diego put his hands in his pocket and moved some dirt away from the grave with the tip of his shoe. Even he remembered how big this case was. The execution had happened abnormally fast, no doubt because of Dio’s influence at the trial. The date of death was only last year, and the grass on the ground was tellingly thin.

Dio looked mock offended. “I don’t know, maybe it should have bothered him more.”

While Diego was ultimately the kinder of the two brothers, it didn’t mean he was by any means soft. They were two apples from the same tree, and like his mother, Diego also believed in an eye for an eye. Just because he didn’t know how far Dio had once taken that philosophy didn’t change anything. He was too young back then to suspect Dio of anything, either.

“How did we get stuck with the Joestars after Da…rio died?” Rule number one, don’t call him father, dad, or anything like it.

“Jonathan’s father didn’t like the idea of either of us in the foster system.” Which had been a blessing. Dio had been brought up proper and received a college education befitting a rich son. He was all too happy to reap the benefits before jettisoning off on his own. “He owed dad a favor, and when he saw us at the funeral, he made up his mind about taking us in.”

Unlike Dio, Diego was fond of Jonathan. He was fun, rowdy, and cultured. He had taken him to dinosaur exhibits and for one birthday, even got him a necklace of a fossilized tooth. He was the one secretly encouraging him to switch his major without Dio knowing, simply because he wanted Diego to pursue his dreams. That wasn’t in the book for Diego, but he appreciated the encouragement and the remarkably tame memes Jonathan sent over Facebook that he absolutely wasn’t used to.

(One had to simply know Gyro and Johnny to be sent some of the most disgusting, fascinating things on the planet. It’s because of them Diego knew whales could explode after death.)

“Sounds like him.” Diego unlocked the car, and the two piled in.

“I swear I’ve explained this to you before.”

“Poor, forgetful me.” The truth was, Diego was digging for questions before this forbidden day ended and he’d lose his chance until next year. Ultimately, he couldn’t think of anything worth Dio’s time, and had pulled out of the cemetery to speed home.

--

Jolyne wasn’t used to flying on her own. This had been her first year doing so.

Her mother went with her as far as security would let her, gave her a hug and a kiss and sent her on her way. From then on, the nicest airline assistant had followed her through the gates and lead her to the one she was flying home from, and sat with her as she talked about her mom and how excited she was to go home, how she missed her dad but nobody tell him. The ratty old dolphin plush had been her constant companion, her comfort object away from home, and was stuffed in the top bag of her carry-on luggage. She’d miss her mom, but she missed her friends a lot, too.

Long had she since given up on parent trap type schemes. It didn’t quite work out the way it did in that movie—her family were experts in avoiding each other. It made her sad to hear her maternal grandmother ask her if she wanted to stay here, forever, prepping her for that conversation in the future—but Jolyne shook her head, saying it’d be best if mom came back. With a pursed frown, her grandmother let go of the conversation. And now she was finally returning home.

She was allowed to board first, proudly presenting her ticket at the front of the line. Quickly taking a seat by the window, Jolyne forgot the reason her parents didn’t usually let her sit there. Staring out the window at the airport outside, she forgot that she got terrified during takeoff and landing. She could be absolutely okay up in the air, but the tilt of the plane and the descent towards busy express ways always made her feel like the plane was going to crash. She was seriously about to freak out.

A young gentleman took the seat next to her after putting his suitcase up in the storage compartment. He took a look around, wondering if he’d taken the spot of a parent.

Oh no.

As the plane began to move and Jolyne hurriedly clasped her seatbelt shut, she took her dolphin plush into her arms and buried her face into it. Now, if this man had been anything other than a good Samaritan, he would have awkwardly regretted his choice of middle seat and tried to not pay attention to the crying child or flagged down a flight attendant to deal with it. But in terms of dealing with the fearful and lonely, this man was an expert.

He could thank the Lord for that, after all.

“What’s wrong?” Pucci asked, gently.

“We’re gonna crash…” Jolyne muttered from against her stuffed animal.

“Planes crash so rarely, they—” Deciding not to say ‘cars crash at a much higher frequency’, he opted for something else. “-‘re among the safest way to travel.” He was still dressed as a priest, having taken this flight at the last minute and out of his latest sermon. “Where is your mother?”

“She’s not here anymore…” She was back at the airport, probably waiting for takeoff.

“Oh.”

Taking that for the worst, he cleared his throat. “God watches everything, you know.”

Jolyne didn’t know what the hell that had to do with anything, but it was taking her attention away from the moving plane and the flight attendant talking about ‘in the event of a crash’. “So?”

“So He’s watching this flight as well. He’ll make sure we arrive safely.”

“What about the plane crashes on TV?”

That caught him off guard. He cleared his throat in his closed fist. “Sometimes… things happen for a reason. But you must understand, there are thousands of flights every day for the very occasional ones that happen on TV. We’ll be safe. This is a very average flight.”

“And God’s watching it?”

“Yes.”

“Does God sometimes not watch?”

“God sees everything.”

“So he sees plane crashes too.” Jolyne decided, frustratedly. Her head went back against the dolphin.

Lord save him from his poor seating choices, Pucci thought with a hint of unease. There was a reason he passed most days to volunteer for Sunday School. Determinedly, he reached over and closed the window screen for their row. “There. Now you won’t see anything. Better?”

Ignorance was bliss. With the window closed, the girl seemed to calm down even as the plane was still moving. He decided to open his laptop once they were at the right altitude and began composing an email. She was noisily playing a video game on a 3DS next to him. Very occasionally, his gaze would flit over from the elegant composition of his very wordy letter to his cross-country pen-pal to see her character hitting little animals with nets. Against his better judgment at leaving well enough alone, he spoke.

“Feeling better?”

“Yeah.”

“I told you that it would be safe.”

She pried open the window to look at the clouds they were now sailing over. “Is that supposed to be heaven?”

He took a sharp inhale. “Heaven’s less… tangible… than that.”

“But it’s supposed to be in the clouds.”

“It’s wherever you feel it is, in your heart.” Please, God, let that be enough.

“Then it’s in the clouds, probably.”

Pucci let that answer itself, before turning his attention back to his laptop. Every letter he wrote Dio had been a long-winded dialogue about the state of things and seeking his opinion more than Pucci had sought from the head of his church. Dio always had plenty to say in more succinct terms, about life, about gravity, about the world and about what he thought of Heaven and Earth. It was purely by chance that Dio took on the case that exonerated him from a false murder accusation and ever since, Pucci had been a fan and disciple. He’d practically missed the fact that Dio was a demon by a long shot, failing to see him as anything but in a holy light.

The hours-long flight came to an end with precious else going wrong. Even Jolyne had fallen asleep and had to be roused awake by the rumble of the plane landing, which she thankfully didn’t mistake for a crash. Her companion next to her was all too glad to get up and get his luggage, departing on his holy pilgrimage to the west coast. Jolyne gathered her things and waited for a flight attendant to show her out. When none came, she decided she was on her own.

She knew her way out of the airport like it was the back of her hand, though without any adult to guide her. A short distance behind her, one flight attendant was panicking at the loss of the young girl as she’d just taken her eyes off her for a moment, but Jolyne didn’t listen to the intercom—it was too loud around them, for one thing. And Dad was waiting. As she wheeled her luggage behind her, she paid no mind to the rushing bustle of the airport and headed straight to the baggage claim.

She’d demanded her father make her a sign for coming home from the airport. It didn’t matter that he was supposed to be met by her flight attendant with her in tow, she just knew that really important people were welcomed with big glittering signs after a long journey home. It made her feel special. Jotaro didn’t know his way around a hot glue gun, but he did actually have a sign with sparkling blue letters spelling out her name with little pom poms glued on it. He looked rather silly holding it.

She practically dropped her little carry-on on sight. She ran up to hug him.

“You remembered!”

Her father was more concerned with the lack of accompaniment. For the rest of the night, neither of them would be any the wiser to the fact that the airport had lost a child. He’d get a call later that night from the airport innocently questioning whether he’d found his daughter or not, much to his stern disapproval. But for now, standing next to him was the artist in question who had made her sign with supplies left over at his university.

“Uncle Jona!”

“Jolyne!”

Her imposing uncle was anything but as he leaned over to lift her up. He lived in the city proper in an expansive estate and had volunteered to drive them. He wasted no time setting her on his shoulders even though she should be way too big for that by now—but his linebacker physique made her look small, not the other way around. He took her suitcase like it was nothing as it made its way down the luggage claim and made sure to duck as they left through the big, sliding glass doors so she wouldn’t hit her head. He’d made that mistake a few times, once on camera.

“How was your trip?”

“It was great! We got to see a gator in our backyard.”

“Really? Right in your back yard?”

“Uh-huh, and I got to eat oranges right from the tree in the backyard too—”

“Is that when you found the gator?”

“No, mom found it, and—”

As uncle and niece (more like cousins a few times removed) continued to speak, Jotaro tucked the sign under his arm, unconsciously getting blue sparkles plastered to his white jacket. He noted with quiet surprise what a relief it was to have her back. He’d found himself worrying what trouble she’d get up to on the other side of the country when she got into so much just when she was staying with him. Her mother never learned of the carjacking incident, as much as she would’ve loved to know. He didn’t want to one day get a phone call that she’d been out in the Florida wilds and stumbled across a foolishly released pet boa or something like that…

As much as he thought he was better an isolated parent, his life was better if he knew where she was, safely.

“You hear that, Jotaro?” Jonathan nudged him, quietly. “She went to a space museum.”

“It was a lot cooler than an aquarium.” She said, proudly.

“Is that so…”

They piled into Jonathan’s comically small Prius, which was driven for environmental reasons and not for comfort reasons. Jotaro and Jonathan were practically shoulder to shoulder in the front.

“… good to have you home, Jolyne.” He said just loud enough for them both to hear. Jonathan smiled gently. It was a rare admission and deserved to be acknowledged.

“You’d be lost without me!” She proclaimed, leaning between the two seats, squeezing past their shoulders to turn on the radio.

At that, Jotaro simply lowered the brim of his hat.

--

“You’re sure it’s not a problem? I can get a hotel.”

Dio waited for Pucci to take his suitcase from the airport shuttle and lead him up the steps of his house. Any visit from the priest was destined to be a good week—it was rare they had time to speak and for once, their schedules had aligned for a visit. Diego stood somewhat awkwardly in the driveway as he hadn’t left yet, glancing between Pucci and Dio somewhat questioningly.

“What are you looking at?” Dio looked Diego over, curtly. “Don’t you have… I don’t know, homework to be doing—”

“Right. I’ll get going.”

Dio’s disciples were a curious bunch and Diego didn’t care to know much about them, particularly the priest. Pucci leaned to Dio with a slight look of amusement. “He looks like you when you were younger.”

“Please,” He demanded. “Don’t suggest anything like that again.”

But it seemed as if this person could get away with such assertations. As Dio clapped his hand over his shoulder and lead him into the house, Diego couldn’t help but wonder if he’d seen him somewhere before. Dio’s friends were precious few and far between, (and he never wanted to see the pink haired man again). Maybe when they were younger, he’d met this man?

“How is your son?”

“He’s fine. Still in trouble.”

“After all this time?”

“I’ve been keeping an eye on his grades. Wouldn’t want him to lose his car-stealing privileges.”

Pucci laughed to himself. The foyer of the house was warm, but stark. This part of the house never looked lived in no matter how many times he entered, and the stiff guest bedroom he’d be offered would be more or less the same. “Whatever happened to Vanilla?”

“Him? Long story.” Dio took two wine glasses down from the wall. “But you’re here, and I’m fit to tell it.”

Pucci could feel himself recharge in Dio’s presence. He looked forward to every email, every letter in return in the same way—like a jolt to his battery, a hit of inspiration that would have him leading a new sermon with renewed vigor. There was an energy in Dio’s presence that rubbed off on him and many others. He was jealous of it, coveting, even—and he’d said as much in one of his responses. He was fortunate now to have the money to fly across the country and see him when things were stressful, and Dio was ever a gracious host.

“But enough about him, how have you been, Father?”

“Overworked… it took about everything I could muster to pick up the next flight over.”

“We can’t have that…” Dio took a sip of wine, deep crimson and quite vintage. Pucci hadn’t touched his yet.

“By the way, how did you handle today?”

“?”

“It’s her anniversary…”

“Ah.” The amicable conversation now felt a bit stiff. “We visited. Had our traditions.”

“I know you admire your mother.”

Did he? Or was it just that his mother was the only frame of reference he had growing up, and emulating her had been a choice between her and Dario? Dio didn’t want to base himself off of anyone, and he didn’t quite hold himself as respectful of the dead, either. In the end, she was a personal weakness to have mentioned. A secret Achilles heel. Someone he’d kill for.

“She had her flaws.” He concluded. One of them was not living nearly long enough.

The two would talk into the night as Giorno, upstairs, listened quietly to their conversation as he let Gold Experience run between his fingers. The light in Jolyne’s window had turned on again, but before he could take a pebble from beside his window and throw it, they had gone out again, presumably so she could go to sleep.

He hung a small sign in his window. “Wake me up when you’re up.” Hopefully she wouldn’t shatter the glass this time as he let his lizard crawl back into the tank and cozied up for bed.

--

“You sure you can’t stay?”

Jonathan smiled, but it was unconvincing in a way Jotaro wouldn’t notice. He didn’t like how Dio lived right next door, and so did Giorno, which meant it’d be so easy to pop over and say hi. Read him a bedtime story. Jonathan never forgot how little ago it was that he was helping Dio raise him, and how it made him feel like Giorno’s father—even though those four short years hadn’t lasted and Dio quickly kicked him out. He knew his way here not by memorizing Jotaro’s house, but by Dio’s.

That man’s cruelty knew no bounds.

“I can’t. I have to see Erina before the night is over. See you, Jotaro.”

Try as he might, Jonathan never had the right accent to pronounce his name properly. Sticking his hands in his jacket, he took one look at Dio’s house before steeling his gaze back to his car, trying to ignore the urge to knock on his door and ask to see Giorno.