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ic inbox ( ruby city ) Ⅰ
buongiorno! sorry i missed you; i'll happily get back to you as soon as i'm done with whatever business i'm on. leave a message!
( text | voice | video )
⇦ ● ⇨
buongiorno! sorry i missed you; i'll happily get back to you as soon as i'm done with whatever business i'm on. leave a message!
( text | voice | video )
⇦ ● ⇨
no subject
[As usual, he thought ahead, even in crisis. He chose half an hour for a specific reason, because there are three things he needs to do before he meets Jotaro on the beach.]
[The first one is the easiest: he goes into the bathroom and packs two things into a small cloth bag. One is a button, small and square and green, one of the many he keeps in his pockets just in case he has to make something and there's nothing convenient to hand. The other, which takes a little more thought, is a light blue washcloth, slightly frayed at the edges. Another just in case.]
[The second one is easy, too. Once he's back in his room, it's a matter of a few minutes to unpin his bangs, take out the braid, run his fingers through his hair until what's left is a messy halo. He'll go back to normal tomorrow, but this one time, this one night, he wants to be wild and angry - to allow himself that, because if he battens it down any more it'll just fester. So for now, for this, he creates a new ritual, lets himself be less than perfect, and studies himself in the mirror for a moment in the dark. What he sees doesn't entirely satisfy him, but he turns to go anyway.]
[The third one . . .]
[The third one is pushing Mista's door open with his hip, as silent as if he's floating, crossing his arms and leaning against the doorframe with a tight frown; listening to his breathing, watching his slight movements in his sleep. It would be so easy to take advantage of him, and maybe he has been, maybe a little bit. Everything else has been cresting over him in a never-ending wave, and through it all, as always, Mista's been there, always just there, trusting him without fail, believing in his ability to pull through no matter what. There are negatives to that kind of loyalty, plenty of them, but he doesn't--]
[Unconditional loyalty, unconditional love, those are new to him. So he has to do better here, too. Make Mista's life as good as it can be, because even though he would be happy with very little, he deserves everything.]
[He'll start tomorrow. For now, he doesn't leave a note, just vanishes into the night. By the time he gets to the beach, his hair is wind-whipped and Gold Experience is trailing at his heels, close enough to kick them, but he doesn't, because for all that Giorno is deliberately choosing not to be perfect right now, there's still a predatory elegance to him that never dies.]
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What he's doing, frankly, is crazy. He's well aware of that. But for Jotaro, actions will always speak louder than words, and though he's not technically the one who created this mess, he is the one who dragged it out and into the light of day, so on some level that makes it his to accept and contend with. That's how things are. And Giorno is a special case anyway, because Giorno is always a special case. He has been since the beginning.
And this is what they do, the niche he somehow fills in Giorno's existence by providing something he doesn't have from his other sources. Someone beyond the inherent power structure and struggles that dominate his life. Someone who grabs him from the middle of it and drags him elsewhere.
Sometimes there's chocolate pudding. Tonight there'll probably be blood.
As he's leaving, with Star Platinum at his side and a backpack slung over his shoulders, he pauses outside Kakyoin's door and takes a moment to just stand there, head lowered, thinking. Before he quite realizes it, he can feel the wood of the door beneath his fingertips; he won't open it, knows better than that, but there's a familiarity and closeness in reaching for it anyway.
I'm sorry for making you wait, he thinks. Just hang on a little longer?
And then — they go.
Giorno beats him to the beach, which is expected. Giorno — at first glance in the twilight, that isn't who he sees, which isn't expected at all. The saving grace is that he's far too short to be Dio, and the clothes are wrong, and the Stand looks nothing like The World, but from a distance there's still that moment, just like the first night they met all over again.
The noise he makes to give himself and his presence away comes in the form of unshouldering his bag and tossing it onto the sand with a thump; whatever's in there, it's soft enough not to risk being damaged by being dropped, but heavy enough to make a sound when it lands. Star is at his side, at always, and his face is the one hairline crack in an otherwise stoic situation, because he's grinning in a way that can only be called loud as a contrast to the quiet twilight silence.]
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[There's an arrogance, a cockiness rising in him now, and he doesn't try to hide it away. He stands ramrod-straight on the beach with his shoes sinking into the soft cold sand, and all he can remember is Diavolo and the bodies he left behind. Abbacchio with a hole in his gut, Narancia bleeding from the mouth, and Bruno, his spirit watching and then fading away.]
[Not everything is Diavolo's fault. But that man should carry a lot of what's currently on Giorno's shoulders.]
[Gold Experience turns to look before its user does. It skims light fingers along Giorno's shoulder, grabs his attention, then watches Star Platinum only. Its movements are more graceful even than usual, somehow, or maybe it's just that it's moving more; in contrast with its typical efficiency of movement, it seems in constant motion now, its hand shifting from Giorno's shoulder to the small of his back, pushing his hair out of his face as he turns against the wind. There's a shyness that's been eliminated, a wall that's come down. This is raw honesty, maybe, for a few minutes.]
[Giorno cocks his head at the sound of the backpack falling to the sand, as if he can discern what's in there just by listening. It's tempting to try. Instead, he just turns to Jotaro and considers him, his expression not just neutral but blank. Wrung out.]
[Eventually:]
I sent him to hell, you know. Diavolo.
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[And this is tonight's episode of Ultra Edgy Teens, with your host, Jotaro Kujo.
He remembers a little about the things Giorno's said about Diavolo prior to this. Things about the Stand he used, erasing time. Things about the way Giorno beat him, how he punished him for his transgressions. Their discussions about power, about how wielding it feels like a test instead of a gift, how it makes you wonder who decided that you could be trusted with something of that magnitude.
Maybe hell isn't a place so much as it is a state of being. Hell is ten thousand knives suspended in the air with their points all facing toward you, and waiting.
And hell, sometimes, is wanting to stop feeling like this when this saturates everything you do, clings to it, seeps in under your skin and won't get out, screams at you with words like failure and fault and they're dead because of you.
Star Platinum doesn't touch him, which makes for an odd contrast. Where Gold Experience is in constant motion, Star Platinum is a silent guardian, poised and waiting at the opposite end of this moment that isn't a showdown, but has all the elements of one anyway.]
You're not going to hold back, are you.
[It's not a question, just a confirmation. Everything about it is quiet and declarative, making sure everyone is on the same page before they start putting their fists through it.]
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Not tonight. Not with you.
[Which means I trust you and I'm so angry and I hate this and I want to be as alive as I can be.]
[He will not allow himself to live the same hell over and over again. He will not be condemned to that. He isn't the one who's done the evil deeds here. He's not a hero, but he's not the villain, either. He won't be treated like one, not even by himself.]
[It's a little funny, actually. If someone came upon this scene, the two of them . . . he knows the image he presents and the one Jotaro does, and someone looking without thinking or analyzing would almost certainly assume Jotaro the aggressor and him the victim. People are so damn simple-minded sometimes. It's not bad. It's just lazy.]
[Right here, right now, there aren't any heroes or villains. Just two very angry, very tired children.]
I want to know who's going to win.
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...Yeah. Me too.
[Because of course, he'd be lying if he said he'd never thought about it. He has. At length, across tedious mornings filled with the repetitive hammering of shingles, in sleepless nights of staring at the ceiling, in metal strings blunted against callouses on his fingers and in the cold air that hits the back of his throat before it descends and bites frigid at his lungs from the inside out.
Yeah, he's thought about it.]
I want two things, then, first. Because you know I won't go all-out unless you know what that means.
[Because this is how he chooses to use the power he's been given. This is what he needs, to satisfy his conscience and his honor. Maybe someday that will change, but for right now — ]
So tell me that's what you want. If I'm going to throw Star Platinum at you with everything he's got...then I want to hear you accept those terms first. That's the first thing.
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[No. He doesn't. And that's strange, because his life is all about negotiating terms, about politics, about using words to determine the lengths of violence one is willing to go before it becomes too much for either party. Here and now, though - he trusts Jotaro implicitly in that he is sure this would never become a fight to the death, but other than that . . .]
[He has Gold Experience. He can stand to lose a limb or two. It doesn't much matter at the moment.]
[All that said--]
That's what I want. I accept.
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It's about confronting themselves, not each other. Seeing who wins. So in a way, it really does have to be everything, because to hold something back — maybe it's like Giorno said earlier. It would feel like lying.
The point is to be honest. With themselves, with what they've done. With what they carry on their backs, and what they shouldn't have to.]
The other is: am I the only one you're fighting?
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[He almost tells Jotaro, I bet you can guess. But this isn't Izabel; they don't play guessing games. And besides - one of the things Jotaro does is pose questions so that you have to come up with solutions all on your own. Even difficult solutions. It's an exercise he presents, a way of looking at yourself from the outside.]
[He really doesn't know how smart he is, does he? How well he understands people, when he doesn't overthink it.]
[Giorno shakes his head, and his voice comes out a little bittersweet after the unavoidable pause.]
No. I'm fighting myself, too.
[Someone has to. Mista won't; no one else, except Kakyoin, seems willing to admit that there are dangerous things in him. So he will do it himself, he supposes, and he'll feel better afterwards, not for punishing himself - this isn't that - but for fighting his demons and winning.]
Am I the only one you're fighting?
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[And that's exactly why he wants to say I understand, but what he does say is a little bit different, and a little less kind, and a little more open.]
I'm going to fight to earn the right to use the power of my Stand as I see fit. One more fight. No more doubts.
I'm going to use it to its fullest, and take it for myself once and for all.
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[That's more than enough to bring a bloom of warmth to his chest, a sincere, incongruously soft smile to his face. He places a hand over his heart to feel it beating and thinks, yes, I am alive; I am alive here on this beach, and here is my friend who is also alive, brave and fragile and strong.]
. . . I'm honored, then. To be able to help you fight for what's yours, so you don't have to fight for it ever again.
[Underneath his words are everything he's ever said to Jotaro, affirmations that he's wiser and better and more giving than he thinks, that Giorno understands not believing it but will believe it for him until he can, that it's an honor to be his friend, his family. His opponent, in this situation, because--]
[He squares his shoulders.]
This might be arrogant, too. But I don't think there's anyone here who can begin to match us, except the other.
[Which is only right. Start a chapter with a fight, end it with a fight. Another thing that blood is: cleansing, the body's way of purifying itself, and they will never be pure or clean but if they shed a little blood tonight at least they can prove to themselves that they're still human.]
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...And maybe that's one more thing they'll both be fighting tonight, the enemy they both share and perceive, and will hopefully leave behind on the sand when they're done in some sense, some shape, some form.
Good. Let them carry the legacies of their forefathers in with them, and see what follows them back out again.]
Arrogant but true isn't really all that arrogant.
[And then, with his eyes darting from Giorno to Gold Experience and then back again, watching the way he naturally shifts because they can both taste on the wind that the fight is nearing its ignition with every passing moment: ]
Don't worry too much about fighting yourself. I'll gladly beat the shit out of him for you.
[Posturing. Idle, meaningless, senseless posturing, because it's important to acknowledge that there are fights without grudges and opponents that aren't enemies, and he could've just said it's my honor too, but in the end, he thinks it's probably more apt to do it this way, somehow.]
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There's a saying . . . you wouldn't know it, but I'll teach you something easy before we get to the more difficult lessons.
[Gold Experience shifts, arms draped over Giorno's shoulders, pulls itself closer - disappears.]
Il serpe tra' fiori e l'erba giace.
[And there it is again, appearing all staccato, before him rather than behind him, still as Star Platinum now, posture relaxed and loose. Giorno tips his head slightly to one side.]
Snakes among sweet flowers do creep.
[So look before you leap.]
[This might actually be fun.]
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Or at least, if you don't see the way the moving pieces work to make it happen.]
How about you brush up on your Japanese. Let's start with kakatte koi.
[But as he finishes the words, the easy vowels that come in Kakyoin's inflection instead of his own, his mouth keeps moving over the subsequent syllables of a familiar command, and Star Platinum stops the world.
He knows, already, that he'll have to use this sparingly. Maybe tonight is about finding his own limits for The World, too — limits he desperately needs to know, to use it with any real tactical effect. How many, for what duration. If he needs to recharge afterward, how long is that delay. He needs to know; it needs to become his. It needs to become second nature, inside and out, or it's nothing.
For now, he has five seconds, and he's not tired. So he uses them wisely, dispatching Star Platinum to follow him and sweep over his tracks in the sand as he runs at Giorno, catching him easily up and moving him back a few feet from where he'd previously stood. Not far; just enough to make a statement, to change his view enough that he'll notice, and have perhaps a moment of hesitation from trying to re-orient himself.
With his remaining time, he veers off to one side, just barely out of Giorno's peripheral vision in his new position, and brings Star Platinum to guard against a hair-trigger attack that he suspects will be coming the instant that —]
Soshite toki wa ugokidasu.
[— Time resumes.]
no subject
[Many of the reasons are deliberately crafted. He chooses to look, speak, move a certain way; these happen to be the ways that come most naturally to him, for the most part, and he knows how to utilize his skills to best effect. But the fact is that things would likely be much easier for him, at least in the world he's chosen to inhabit, if he were more like his father: physically imposing, strong, visibly dangerous.]
[He's not. He chooses not to fight that particular reality by clumsily mimicking machismo, a concept which he finds ridiculous; rather, he embodies grace and delicacy because he is graceful and he is delicate, but so is a spider's web, and they are designed to bend and flex and stretch but never break.]
[He's young. He's a boy. He knows this - now better than ever, after what happened in the mirrors, after what he's just learned about himself and his tendency to take on too much. He isn't always good at balance, and sometimes his judgment isn't the best. But if there's one thing, one thing that separates him from Dio Brando--]
[It's the way he chooses to react to the world.]
[The hair-trigger attack doesn't come. Instead, when time resumes, he reaches out for Gold Experience, who is there immediately to support him in the half-second of disorientation before he is able to stand on his own. And as he does--]
[(The other thing people forget about Giorno Giovanna: he is strong, but he is not only strong. He has the power of life at his fingertips, but he has the mind of a tactician, a general, an emperor. His goal is the preservation of civilization, not its destruction. Life and rebirth, not death, not suffering, not pain. Peace.)]
[--what comes is calm, defensive, well-planned (because what is his Requiem if not the ultimate defense? what is his calling if not a defense against man's worst nature? what would he spend his free time on if not coming up with solutions to worst-case scenarios?), a wall of braided vines sprouting in a circle around him, reaching for the sky. If Izabel were here, she would start at how similar they are to the vines that threatened them in Wonderland.]
[But she's not. It's just them.]
Naranc--
[Gold Experience Requiem looks at him, and he remembers: Narancia isn't here. Aerosmith isn't here. He's fighting alone, so he has to win alone. And that means . . .]
[The wall of vines moves forward, all in a rush, to swallow Jotaro up.]
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(A third is that time is moving. He is the only one here who can control time. Time Stop is his, and he'll prove it again and again until he believes it.)
It's reasonable to assume that this is Giorno's answer; he's built himself a wall to act as a shield (while he recovers? probably, he assumes; it'd be disorienting to anyone) and now that wall is advancing like an offensive, but they're vines. He's buying himself time to move.
That's fine. And frankly, Jotaro's a little relieved. Giorno has every reason to be unnerved by his use of The World, maybe even almost as much as Kakyoin, but he hasn't turned pale and screamed. He doubts he could've continued the fight, honestly, if he had.
But the fight has continued, and that means the next step is to show this wall why it's not going to be that easy.]
Star Platinum!
[His Stand surges forward with a mighty roar, fists winding back for a brutal, lightning-fast attack rush —]
...!!
[— that blows him back thirty feet and lands him on his back in the sand, blood beginning to pour from his nose as not-inconsequential explosions of pain begin to go off beneath the flesh of his torso and face.]
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[He doesn't waste time imagining who it'll be, either. They'll know soon enough.]
[What he does do is push through the vines like they're nothing, coming to stop in front of Star Platinum in the sand. It's not a move of bravado, since Gold Experience is absolutely still standing between them and just to one side, but he does look up at Jotaro's Stand a little apologetically.]
Mi dispiace, Star. [And to Jotaro:] I tried to warn you. You should know better than to make me repeat myself.
[But that's it. Monologuing's for amateurs (Padre), and he's got work to do.]
[Gold Experience moves without a word, a sound, a look, just moves. Not as fast as The World, of course, because The World moves outside time, but fast all the same - for Star, not Jotaro, which was another reason for the pardon begged, because - well.]
[The blow doesn't actually need to connect, really; it's more a movement through the air, an effect on the outside versus the inside. He can't stop time, no, but he can accelerate life just for a little while, and life is all in the mind.]
[Time moves forward. The mind rushes. Everything that is felt is felt more.]
[He stands framed against the surf, and watches, and waits.]
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oingwhatishedoingithurtsgetupgetupgetuphe'scominggetupgetupithurtsStargethimStargethimithurtsithurtswhydoesithurtthevinesithadtobethevineshehitthevinesandithithimselfithurtsithurtssothat'swhathisattackrushfeelslikeithurtshelpStargethimStargethimgethimgethimgethimgethimgetupgetupgetupnonononononononohurtsithurtsithurtsgetupgetupJotarogetupgetupgetupyou'renotdoneyetgetupgetupgetupgetup
He claws weakly at the sand, but his fingers...don't...
nononononononogethimgethimgethimgethimStarhelpmeStarhelpmeStarhelpmeStarhelpmeStarHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARSTARSTARSTARSTARHELPMESTAR
The sight he makes is, quite possibly, nothing short of horrifying to watch. His mind is racing, synapses firing, impulses being directed to all of his limbs, and they're too fast, his body can't keep up and he jerks and convulses, scrabbling at grains of sand that he can't hold on to, that slide through his fingers like the control he's trying to keep over his limbs and he can't —
HELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTARHELPMESTAR
— He can't.
But he can't stop a bullet, either.
There is, in the end, no command. There is no order, no strategy, no direction. Jotaro does nothing but suffers.
Star Platinum, on the other hand, lunges and swings of his own volition, his face twisted with violence and all signs of recognizing his former pudding friend forgotten as he strikes back at Gold Experience, motivated by nothing except self-preservation and that of his user, understanding nothing save that Gold Experience did this, and therefore it has to pay.]
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[Very few things horrify Giorno anymore. He sees Jotaro writhing on the sand and he thinks, He's hurting, and another part of him thinks, He asked to be hurt, and another part thinks, Is that a good reason to give it to him?]
[Yes, but also no. Yes, because he made a promise. No, because Jotaro is not his enemy.]
[. . . But he made a promise. And he believes - he really does believe - that Jotaro would not allow himself to use Giorno as a tool for his own martyrdom. That was not the goal of this evening. The goal of this evening was a fight.]
[So he'll fight to win.]
[Star Platinum attacks, pure animalistic violence, and Giorno - beams, because that's him, that's his friend, that's his family, that's Jotaro and his beautiful soul hurting on the ground and fighting to the end with everything he's got. They really aren't so different, are they? They both suffer, and they both fight. They endure.]
[Giorno beams, and Gold Experience Requiem smiles, too, a soft and secret smile like it's just heard an inside joke, and it looks human and, yes, horrifying, and catches a blow on the jaw that skids and impacts, jolts through into Giorno and makes his teeth clack together, and he spits out a tooth onto the sand, still beaming, and this time, this time, they're both ready.]
[The next blow is thrown, and--]
[Reset.]
[Reset.]
[Reset.]
[As for where the next part comes from, in all the chaos, it's hard to say. But it does come, angry and joyful all at once, because if there's an animal in Giorno, there are a few moments when he wears it on his sleeve.]
[Mudamudamuda!]
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And yet there it is.
And this — this is too close. This is more than enough to bring it all rushing back in an instant, only made worse by the pain still exploding under his skin, only amplified by the effects of Life Shot still working. It's dark he's on the ground something's going to happen someone's right there Star is throwing punches that do nothing there's nothing it's useless it's useless it's mudamudamudamuda —
Even the memory comes too fast.
Too fast.
Star.
In a flash, Star Platinum disappears, leaving Jotaro alone and still writhing on the sand. But gradually, the jerkiness of his movements slows — and oddly, so does the rise and fall of his chest, rendering him almost perfectly still for a brief span of time.
He's a sitting duck, but he doesn't move a muscle — until at last his hands slide, just a fraction, and his muscles shift one deliberate twitch.
In the next instant, Star Platinum is back to guard him again, this time with his fists at the ready on the defense instead of attacking outright, and Jotaro's chest is back to rising and falling as he resumes his jerky, uncontrolled spasms on the sand.]
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[And so he is paying attention to things. The movements of Jotaro's limbs, because he knows what's normal in the middle of this chaos and what's not. The way his eyes move, whether or not they roll back in his head. His own breathing, so that he will know before his body does when he's about to panic.]
[To Jotaro's breathing. Because he remembers when someone else important to him stopped breathing, when his chest went still, when he ceased. And began. And ceased again.]
[Jotaro stops breathing, and he - doesn't scream, because he never does. But the cry in his throat dies instantly, and what comes out instead is a thin whine, I didn't mean to not again not again I didn't--]
[But he didn't. He didn't. And he realizes, as Jotaro's heart starts again, that this wasn't his fault at all. Whatever just happened, whatever stupid accidental common thread was just plucked, whatever note of horror played in Jotaro's mind, he didn't do it, and that means.]
[That means.]
[That means that Gold Experience disappears as he stalks forward across the sand, murder in his eyes and his trembling hands, that he is not Giorno Giovanna right now, not a frightened little boy with a dream and a fear of losing everything, but someone capable of taking not only what he needs but what is owed to him, and the world owes him a great deal. Right now, the world owes him Jotaro Kujo's life, and so it's Don Giovanna who pushes past Jotaro Kujo's fighting spirit like it's nothing, looks at Star Platinum like he's a disobedient subordinate who ought to know better, and kneels at the side of this stupid, broken idiot who's broken his promise.]
[Gold Experience's hand hovers translucently over his, like a thick golden glove; then the two of them, boy and Stand, rest their palms over Jotaro's heart, and pull back Life Shot, and heal him.]
[And it fucking hurts.]
[And when it's done, Giorno jerks Jotaro by the chin to face him, holds him steady for a moment, and slaps him with all the force of himself and his Stand combined.]
How dare you.
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One instant the world is spinning, racing too fast, the entire universe rushing toward its endpoint to start over again, and then suddenly it's gone. The explosions of pain are gone, but they're back quickly enough and he's too disoriented at first to explain why. His nose was bleeding and now it's not, but his face feels like it's on fire anyway and Dio is looking at him, low to the ground and holding his chin and accompanied by a flash of gold —
This is familiar, too, and what registers is: he's close enough, I can hit him, and so he does.
The lucky thing is, it's only Jotaro who's swinging. Star Platinum's crushing blows are absent as his Stand lingers behind, confused and disoriented himself because with no orders forthcoming his duty is to protect, but in a situation like this he can't be certain what protection is. So in the end, they end up trading blows, one for one save that one of them doesn't come with the force of a Stand behind it, and it's barely even connected when he orders Star Platinum to stop time for the second time tonight, and feels it burn as everything once again stills to a halt.
This time, though, he simply eases himself back down into the sand, and stares up at the sky overhead where it's beginning to dot with stars.
He can think again.
What the hell did Dio do...that left him so he couldn't think?
It's so quiet in the world of stopped time. It used to bother him, the quiet; on some level it still does, but — no one's talking. That's nice. It's just quiet, and the waves ought to be lapping at the shore but they're not but they will be soon, and that's fine.
...No one's talking? But Dio's right th—
...
Oh.
He reaches up, absently, and catches hold of one of his opponent's forelocks, gently twisting it into a coil and setting it back against his forehead. That's better. That's the way it's supposed to be, isn't it...
Time's going to run out, but that's...okay, too. Five seconds to breathe was enough. He should move, probably, but he won't. Not yet, at least, because there's still no telling if this is the end of their duel or just a temporary suspension of their maneuvers, and Giorno had something to say to him so he should probably...let him do that.
He's got something to say too, doesn't he...?
And time resumes.]
I don't want to beat it.
[He forces the words out in a hurry, determined to get them out in the first place before he loses his opportunity, because he has a feeling he might if he's not fast enough.]
I can beat it but don't use it again. I don't want to. I don't want to.
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[Well, because a lot of things. Because when Giorno goes on a tear, it's hard as hell to stop him once he's started. Because the blows exchanged have made him think (inevitably) of his stepfather, and that's made him feel helpless even though he isn't, and that's made him angrier. Because he can tell, once time resumes, that it's stopped, and he hates that, that Jotaro feels the need to take a break from him, as though he's a real enemy.]
[So he opens his mouth to yell more, and then - just that quiet voice, getting quieter.]
[Uncertain, he glances up at Star Platinum as if for confirmation (of what? he doesn't even know that), and then presses his lips together and tucks his hair behind his ear, leans in to brush Jotaro's hair away from his forehead, anger not gone but combined with something else, something softer and infinitely more vulnerable.]
I don't want to watch you kill yourself.
[There's been too much of that. Too much. He presses his lips together, and then - takes Jotaro's hand in both of his, clasps it tightly, rests his forehead against their joined fingers.]
Tell me what, exactly. Tell me, and - tell me what I did that scared you. If I don't know, I can't keep from doing it again.
You don't have to do anything you don't want to, Jotaro, this - this isn't that kind of fight.
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[Even now, he can't really put into words what "something" had been; a power of Gold Experience's, obviously, but working out what had been done had been nearly impossible by definition because everything was going too fast to try to keep up with it, and all of a sudden everything was too much. No strategy. No real capacity to act against it. If Star wasn't capable of acting on his own, would he even be here right now?
...
Wait. What?
Of course he'd be here right now —]
Wasn't gonna kill myself. I just had to be able to think long enough to tell Star what to do.
[And he almost could, hadn't he? There'd been that one second when everything had slowed back down again. One second is all he would've needed to get Time Stop off, and then he could've gotten away from the golden monster coming at him with a street sign in his hands —
...
Wait. Giorno?]
. . .
[His brow furrows slightly and his mouth comes open in preparation; there was another question in there, too, what did I do that scared you, and he's almost ready to answer it with a question of his own: who told you about mudamudamuda, was it...Jonathan?
But he doesn't, because in the second after he thinks it, he knows — no, he's got that wrong, too. Saying something like that, believing that as a possibility — now that really would warrant what Giorno had spit at him earlier, I can't believe you'd think so little of me. There's going all-out, but deliberately using even something like that against him, as a battle strategy?
It's not that kind of fight.
So he lets the notion die on his tongue, and after a minute he ventures what feels like a more vague, less likely possibility, but one that puts his faith in Giorno instead of withdrawing it over something as patently stupid as two idiot boys bending the universe around them in the sand.]
Muda. Muda muda, he'd yell it when he was about to kill someone. Mostly me. Is...that when I freaked out?
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I saw you. You did something. You stopped. Don't you think I know what that looks like? Don't you think I know?
[Him of all people, so afraid to let those he loves slip away into death that he nails them back to the world of the living, holds them to him with an iron grip - he knows.]
[Just like he knows, somehow, right before Jotaro asks him a question in return. Is that when I freaked out? And the thought of it, this unlikely and absurd similarity, it's almost enough to make him laugh, not a laugh laugh but a desperate whine of a noise, for lack of anything better to do.]
[When he was about to kill someone. Mostly me.]
[Mutely, he nods. And it takes him a little while longer to come up with words in response, so he presses his forehead to their clasped hands, then his lips, eyes squeezed tight shut, trying so hard not to start trembling.]
I didn't know.
[He shakes his head, blinking rapidly, then squeezing his eyes shut again. Freaked out, like it was nothing.]
I didn't know. Jotaro, if I don't know, how am I supposed to protect you?
[From himself, from the echoes of Dio, from bad memories, from being so scared that he feels he has to stop his heart to survive. From everyday bad things, which Jotaro is too good for - from everything. That's all he wants: to protect him from everything.]
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