digiorno | ic inbox ( ruby city ) Ⅰ

You did something to my head.

[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?

[He gives Jotaro a look that's somehow both sour and tearful, jerks his chin towards the rise and fall of the other's chest.]

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.]

Edited (GRIP NOT GRIN) 2015-11-04 19:32 (UTC)

...Because I didn't want to lose Giorno, from telling you how not to be Dio.

[God, do they ever look alike. Moreso now than ever, where both times he's been laid out and exhausted and it's always just the two of them, isn't it. It's always just the two of them, stopped time and restarted consequences, and he's always alone with it.

It's...something, though. Don't you think I know what that looks like? How out of place that sounds, because if Giorno were someone else that would've been exactly the point — looking dead, looking finished, the perfect cover to draw in an unsuspecting viper just close enough to smash his head in.

But Giorno cares. No one who cares has ever seen him do that.

Everybody...everybody would kill him if they saw him do that, wouldn't they? Kakyoin — christ, he wouldn't walk for a month if Kakyoin saw him do that. Jonathan would...shake him until his head rattled; Bruno, Nanna Lisa —

...His mom's not half a world away anymore. She's not dying if he doesn't push himself to his absolute limits and beyond. And he doesn't believe that Giorno would tell her (tattle on him, hadn't they joked about that once, don't be a snitch or I'll never trust you again), there's a moment where he envisions it, and shakes all over from the chill and the weight of the block of ice that drops into the pit of his stomach at the look on her face.

Jesus. Maybe Giorno is right — maybe he does need protecting, after all. Not from Dio, or his memories; from himself.

...And that makes all the difference, somehow, because if it were Dio or his memories he'd have the right to say no, that it's overstepping, that it's his to shoulder and conquer — but if he's the menace threatening himself, then Giorno has every right to stop him. Especially if he needs it.

Sometimes you can't tell when you need it; you need that person on the outside looking in, who can tell you so.

...It really does go both ways with them, doesn't it.]

...But that hurt you from trying not to hurt you.

[He closes his eyes, breathing in slowly.]

I did that once before. Not for the same reasons. He thought I was dead, but to make sure he listened for my heartbeat. Gio, he would've killed me if he'd heard one, I had to. He was going to cut my head off and I had to wait until he got close enough for Star to hit him.

[His brow furrows slightly; he frowns, shaking his head a little as he grits his teeth in the barest hint of frustration — probably with himself.]

I don't want our fight to stop like this. We're not done yet, I'm not done. I want to fight you, not ghosts. We're not done yet, if I'm a wreck and you're crying...if we stop here we'll never get out. I'll never get out.

I can't do it if it's anyone but you. So...I'm in your hands. If you say we're done — but if you say I've got another chance, I'm going to get up and keep fighting. Because I get it, now. What it means to see something and chase after it with everything you've got. Maybe I was wrong before...maybe I am fighting myself, too. But...that better me is waiting at the end of this. So please don't make me stop now.

. . . Jotaro.

[He's looking at him steadily, watching him, measuring him - clearly upset, with tears clinging to his lashes, but not distraught, not despondent. It's undeniable that he does better when he has someone to take care of, and that's part of why he's able to hang on so strongly now, but at the same time, this isn't just about Jotaro. This is about demanding for himself as well, finally, after weeks and months of allowing it to slide.]

[So he squeezes Jotaro's hand and shakes his head, and they're thinking along the same lines, almost exactly: him imagining Kakyoin's face, or Jonathan's, if that came out and they weren't expecting it. How much that would hurt them - maybe just as much, maybe more.]

I won't lie to you and say I never wanted to know the similar things because I wanted to make sure I wasn't him, or even because I was curious, but . . . you have to know I care about you, don't you? You and Kakyoin and Jonathan, and your mother . . . I'm not the only one connected to him. In a lot of ways I'm the one least connected to him, and at the same time the most capable of making stupid, accidental mistakes that leave you like this.

When you hurt, it hurts me too. It hurts me and Kakyoin and everyone. When you hurt because of something I did that could've been avoided, I feel awful, like it was me who stopped your heart. So please don't . . . hide things from me anymore. I won't put myself in your business, or ask for details or elaboration if you don't want me to. Just please help me to not hurt you.

[And then for a few long moments he's quiet, thinking about everything that Jotaro's said. He thinks, and he looks out over the sand at the surf beating quietly against the edge of the beach, and he tries to figure out . . . can they do this? Can he do this? It's not a matter of giving Jotaro another chance, it's a matter of ensuring that they push to their limits, not past them.]

[Please don't make me stop now.]

[He exhales slowly and closes his eyes, tilting his head up; the moon pulls the tide around and beams through his eyelids, and he thinks, yes, he's pretty sure - he's pretty sure they can do this. And if they can't, they'll pick each other up again once they've fallen down.]

. . . Nobody's called me Gio since I got here.

[With a soft laugh, he turns, opens his eyes, looks at Jotaro levelly, his gaze clear and calm.]

Trish would call me an idiot for doing this. But I think you're right. I think that we need to do this, and we can do this. And I think that you're amazing, and I wish you knew it just by knowing it like I do, but if getting through this is what you need to see it, then we'll get through this.

You have to promise, though. Promise to talk to me, for real, and don't let me cheat just because I'm ignorant of something that's going to hurt you.

[When you see something about yourself that you hate, you kill it. But Kakyoin...I can't do that. I can't stand to pull out and throw away any more of me, or there won't be anything left.

He'd said that, hadn't he? Right in the beginning, early on, when he hadn't wanted to talk about it and Kakyoin had tried to make him, and he'd gotten frustrated and bristly and upset because he didn't want to be needled about it, didn't want to have to confess anything to Kakyoin of all people, because he could barely stand to look at him even then from the guilt and the shame of knowing what he was carrying.

...Even back then, had Kakyoin seen that he — no, what a stupid thing to ask. Of course Kakyoin had seen it. Kakyoin knows him better than he knows himself, better than anyone.

And it's quiet, but a quiet epiphany is still an epiphany, and he doesn't say eureka but it's the same feeling, like a fog parting to reveal a horizon that's always been there, whether you ever knew it or not.]

...I don't care enough about myself, do I.

[What a new and mildly bewildering concept. People hurt when he does things to himself. Even when it's for their benefit. Even if it means that no one's getting hurt except him. Even if it's so clearly the better option than ever being the person having to watch someone else get hurt ever again.

...

So. He...cares about them so much...that he puts them into that position instead...?

...Jesus, he's going to have to apologize to, like. Everyone he's ever spoken to. Ever.]

...Whenever I fight Kakyoin, we use codewords. Usually my mom's name. Because I scare him, and the thought of hurting him scares me, and we need to know how to tell each other to stop —

[And for just a second, just one, something crumples in his expression, and his voice comes breathy and shaking.]

God. I scare the hell out of him...

[He sucks in a breath, dragging his hand over his eyes, and leaves his forearm lying across them for a few seconds while he pulls himself together again.]

...It's not the muda muda, so much. It's not being able to move. It's when something's coming at me and I can't move. I was on the ground and my body didn't work, that's what it was. If I hadn't already been like that, I don't think it would've gotten me the way it did. I thought if I could slow everything down, I'd be able to move, and I could get away.

I'm sorry. It doesn't change that I did it, but I don't think I would've if I could've— ...no. I'm just sorry. I fucked up, and I'm sorry.

[He lowers his arm, blinking bleary eyes up at Giorno.]

Pick something that'll make you stop, if you hear it, and tell me. My grandma's name is Suzie Q, can you say that in a hurry if you have to?

[Poor Jotaro.]

[The thought comes to him unbidden as Jotaro speaks, springing less from a place of pity and more from the deepest, most impossible groundwater stream of sympathy. He knows the truth of this, and he forgives Jotaro for it, and . . . so it's silly, isn't it, not to forgive himself. Talk about hypocrisy. Kakyoin wasn't kidding.]

[He squeezes Jotaro's fingers and smiles weakly, nodding with his head tipped slightly to one side.]

It's possible that that's a genetic trait.

[So. Me, too, in other words. And me, too to the rest of it, too, because he knows, he understands, that being stuck like that is horrifying. That's why he used it - because Jotaro told him not to hold back, with no qualifiers, and so he went as hard as he possibly could, until all of a sudden it was a thousand times too much.]

I understand. I do, and I'm not angry anymore, I just - I don't want to be the person to hurt someone like I just hurt you. Not anymore. You know that, I know you do.

And - when, with Diavolo, it wasn't - the same, but there was that feeling of being frozen while time went on around you - things were happening and you couldn't - so. It's a fear that makes sense. I won't do it again.

[Because they're going to fight for all they're worth, but they're going to take care of each other, too. Those are the new rules.]

[He blinks slowly, not at the name suggestion but at the concept of . . . having a grandma. And then he comprehends and nods and thinks for a moment, and - there's only one answer, of course there is.]

Narancia.

[Narancia. The dead one, just like Bruno and Abbacchio. The one who didn't like going to school, who fought a lot. The one who Giorno called for in that first instant when time resumed, when in the blink of an eye the world around him had changed and yet he didn't once lash out the way someone else might've.

It's a little funny, maybe. He has a feeling Giorno picked Narancia in the same way the he'd almost picked Kakyoin, himself — and the only reason why he hadn't is because "Kakyoin" would feel too much like manipulation, and "Noriaki" is too important to gamble on this, and "Tenmei" isn't his to give.]

You said his name, the first time I stopped time.

[...Which. Raises another important point, actually.]

...Something about missing time, right? That's the same reason I just moved you, instead of hitting you.

[He slides his free arm back, pushing his elbow against the sand to help prop himself back up into a sitting position — visible proof of the way the conversation and the passage of time are both acting to help pull himself together.]

Yes. He--

[And then he hesitates - not, ironically enough, because he doesn't want to talk about Narancia, especially to Jotaro, but because what he's about to say probably says a lot about his battle strategy, and he's still very much invested in winning this fight. Still, it's an important thing to know about Narancia, he decides after a moment, and takes a deep breath, and continues.]

His Stand. Aerosmith, it was able to detect people breathing from far away. So I thought - after a certain point I always just called for him automatically, to check and see how close an enemy was. He was always watching over us.

[But I couldn't watch over him.]

[Is that what he regrets most? Sometimes it seems like it is. Sometimes it seems like choosing one worst thing is impossible, but other times he knows in the deepest part of himself that Narancia was the one out of all of them who least deserved to die, who was least prepared for it.]

[He sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose and then just - talks, lets whatever wants to come out come out.]

You could always see him learning. He acted like he hated it but he was really good at it, naturally much cleverer than he thought he was. And he was the last one to decide to come with us, to help Trish, to kill Diavolo. Maybe he shouldn't have - I don't know. I just miss him. He was in my body when he died.

So I know if you say his name I'll know to pay attention, like he always paid attention, and learn, the way he always worked hard to learn, and not do the wrong thing again.

[He takes his hands back and folds them across his knees, looking tired.]

Yeah. Yes. You were more careful than I was. I just never thought of it as time, or stopping something, it was always more adding . . . but I feel like I should have realized.

...That's really something, isn't it. When you're so in sync with someone else that you just...

[...have no problem stabbing someone in the face, because you know that even from across the entire damn town, your partner has roped the asshole's Stand in his tentacles and pulled it free, covered your back without even being there.]

Mmmm.

[He's the first to get to his feet, then, and he does, shaking loose sand off his clothes before pivoting and offering his hand to Giorno, open-palmed.]

When we're done, tell me about him, okay? But for now...I've still got to figure out how to beat your vines. And I want to see if you can work out the way I've realized, how you could break my Time Stop.

...You wanted my promise, so I'll give it to you now. I'll treat his name with the worth you gave it. I won't sacrifice myself instead of using it.

[The moment when he hooks back into the fight is visible and easy to pinpoint: it's the moment Jotaro says the way I've realized, how you could break my Time Stop. Jotaro's standing above him, towering really, and he looks up at him with eyes wide as saucers, and - really, it's shocking how unsubtle it is, how blatantly expressive, but with Jotaro it's easier, it's safer, it's better, it's fine.]

[He smiles. Grins. Smirks.]

[A challenge. He can meet a challenge.]

[He's on his feet in a second, bouncing backwards on his toes like he weighs nothing, a wisp on the wind, playful as a kitten. Gold Experience blooms beside him, and it's not in constant motion anymore, nor is it holding all the shy tension in its body that Giorno doesn't show like usual; instead it moves in perfect sync with him, only the opposite way, so that as Giorno hops backwards, Gold Experience slips forward, chin tipped up, a challenge in return.]

[What Narancia loved best of all - besides Bruno's approval, and the love of his family - was a fight.]

Stop talking! You talk too much! Come on.

...That might be the first time in my life anybody's ever said I talk too much.

[And — he can feel himself getting more and more exhausted from the repeated use of The World, it's settling in now in a way he hadn't precisely expected but that still makes sense, but this time it's important and effective so he uses it just long enough to accomplish two things. One is to retreat back across the sand to a proper fighting distance, a moment of journey that to the naked eye would look like he'd moved in no time at all, but the other comes before that; he scoops up a handful of sand and tosses it into the air over their heads before he vacates, leaving it where it'll shower down over Giorno and Gold Experience in the instant when time resumes.

Narancia.

He'll try to take good care of your boss for you, kid. And...

And Grandma, that boss thinks your grandson is amazing, and he should try to remember that, shouldn't he.

Time resumes.]

Let's go, Giorno!

[Time resumes - and sand falls into Giorno's hair, dusts across his shoulders, across Gold Experience's too. His Stand twitches, startled, and he shakes his head like a dog to get clean.]

That's a dirty trick, Jotaro!

[But he's laughing all the same - how could he not? - laughing even as Gold Experience shifts forward and vines twine up from the ground to twist around his ankles and lift him bodily off the ground. It'll take him more than the five seconds of Time Stop to get free, that's for sure, and in the meantime Giorno's advancing, grinning wide with his hair blown away from his face, giddy and excited.]

But you're not the only one who can play dirty.

[And of all things — implausibly, unexpectedly, impossibly — the vines ensnare him and lift him off the ground, and it's not even that it's unexpected; it's the familiarity that makes him laugh right back, quieter and far more subdued than Giorno's, but there just the same.]

Hierophant does this trick better.

[Okay. When he'd hit the vines the last time, he'd been blown back — so, attacking them at all poses a problem. He'll have to take damage in order to free himself from them, unless...

Briskly, he gauges the distance he has left between Giorno and himself — enough? He'll have to stop time at the last possible instant — and draws Star Platinum back inside him in a rush, urging his Stand to manifest around his limbs like ghostly armor, and trying to force the grip of the vines to expand in compensation, to keep their tight grip even around Star's naturally larger frame.

It's the same way, he thinks, that escape artists free themselves from bonds — by tensing up while the knots are tied and then relaxing when it's time to escape, a minuscule amount of room to wriggle is created.

The question is, will it be enough, when added to stopped time for the sake of getting loose?

There's only one way to find out, so it's worth a try.]

I'll tell Kakyoin you said so.

[And he will, too. Maybe later, when everything's less fraught and immediate, but he absolutely will.]

[In the meantime - Giorno's coming close, closer, not so quickly that he can't watch Jotaro calculate. It's really fascinating, now that he takes the time to look, because the minutiae of his expressions are so subtle, but he's beginning to know them now, and - look at him, look at him go.]

[The thing is, though, that big gestures only do so much, and Giorno knows that, so . . . this is a way to buy time, absolutely; to wear out Time Stop, for sure; to see what Jotaro can do when he has a little wiggle room, of course. And he's not disappointed, but he's also not being quite still. One of the vines, a very thin and unobtrusive one, sneaks up while Giorno's approaching and Jotaro's wiggling around with Star Platinum pushing against the main body of plant matter and peels one of the aglets off of a shoelace, then absconds with it and disappears.]

[Well. Appears to disappear.]

[By the time he's close enough to see the sharp furrow of concentration forming between Jotaro's brows, he feels prepared to make his next feint, and sends a tree-trunk-wide vine snapping forward towards Jotaro's face. Better stop time, friend, if you don't want to break your nose.]

[...Of course. He'd outright asked for this, hadn't he — work out the way to break my Time Stop, and it sure as hell didn't take him very long to hit on a solution, had it? If he could use it the way he'd be able to if he had a vampire's body supporting him and mitigating the taxing effect it has, then he'd have employed it long before now. That he hasn't might be a consideration of honor, sure, but more likely than not —

So. That's what he's going to do, then. Pressure him with situations that will force him to stop time or get hurt, and break it from overuse when he can't anymore.

This time, there's no escaping it. Accepting a hit like that — no, even if he lashed out, it'd hurt him anyway, wouldn't it. Shit.

He'll just have to be fast, then.

He doesn't bother to waste breath on a verbal command; he simply wills it, and Star Platinum stops time in the same instant that he immediately withdraws, and Jotaro starts wriggling in an attempt to scramble his way free.

Although — ]

Hey, Giorno.

[He's not usually one to speak, while time is stopped. He dislikes the silence, but deep down maybe it's just that he's always a little afraid that he'll open his mouth and Dio's voice will come out. This kingdom outside the flow of time isn't something that belongs to him; he's the invader in it, the conqueror who stormed the gates and threw out the old master, and wasn't sure what to do with what was left when he was done.

But if his hunch is true, and Giorno's going to force him to use it to his limit...

Well.

Well, indeed.]

[And this is how it goes. This is how they fight, or maybe play, testing each other's limits until they know exactly how to keep going without giving any ground. There's really no combating Time Stop, but there's no combating Reset, either - two undefeatable techniques, two great minds, battling in the sand like children on the playground.]

[Jotaro had a normal childhood once, more or less; Giorno never did. But it's been a long time for both of them since they had the opportunity to do something just because they could, to match up against someone who was their equal but didn't want to hurt them.]

[So they're not hurting, but they are exhausted quickly, because both powers are relatively untested for roughly the same reason: they're frightening, dangerous, too much, a reminder of awful things. And it's not long before Giorno's breathing a little heavy, his expression focused but obviously tired, Gold Experience retreating across the sand to stand just in front of him.]

. . . Jotaro.

[He wonders if he'll have to say the rest.]

[He won't.

Even now, with Star Platinum still faithfully at his side, Jotaro can feel himself hovering on the verge of a significant crossroads. Through and through, he knows he's not done yet. He can't possibly be, because he's still standing, and his body is aching and his breath is coming short and shallow but it's still holding him up, and his heart is still beating. He's never used Time Stop this much before, in a single sitting or even as a cumulative sum; in one night he's pushed himself farther and farther than he's ever gone with it, farther than Cairo, farther than mistakes, farther than Kakyoin's fear of it.

He wonders if the universe itself is growing weary of it, these two god-children that they are, stopping and starting the flow of time itself like siblings fighting over a remote control.

He's not done yet; he's still standing, he still has a few more left in him, but the strength that's keeping him up is artificial and as fleeting as the adrenaline coursing through his veins, and as soon as that wears off, well. Once he would've said that's just a sign he'll have to finish his fight before it does.

Except —

Except that all of a sudden he can see the difference between done and able, and what he's been thinking was the former has actually been the latter, because there's more to being finished than fighting to incapacity.]

...Yeah.

[He reaches up with an arm whose muscles feel heavy from use, finding the brim of his hat to tug it slightly down.]

You're about to say, "We've still got to walk back to the city after this"...right?

[Maybe he's not; it's not as though he can make that sort of infallible prediction, unlike some people. But it's a pretty good guess, anyway.]

. . . Oh.

[He smiles. Smirks, maybe.]

Am I?

[He was going to. Now, in a fit of obstinacy, he doesn't want to. But it comes all the same.]

We've still got to walk back to the city after this, Jotaro.

[But that isn't all. He's tempted to cross his arms over his chest, but they're too weary to lift that far, so . . . he just tucks them into his pockets, a gentler mimic of Jotaro. Behind him, Gold Experience pads backward through the sand to fetch the cloth bag.]

Can I come over there?

...Yeah.

[His hand half-sinks down of its own volition, and he tries to play it off by swiping at his nose with his fingers, but it's halfhearted at best and soon it's back at his side, anyway.

And what happens next is — well. It's that he tips his eyes down toward the sand, and then back up at Giorno, and then they drift on their own to Star Platinum, whose guardian stance abruptly melts away in favor of drawing over and wrapping supportive arms around his user.]

Hey. Who d'you think'll get it worse? You from Mista or me from Kakyoin?

[Gold Experience deposits the bag in his hand just as the smirk softens to something less, something shyer. He cocks his head at Jotaro in a curious kind of way before crossing the space between them, which suddenly seems much further than it was before, when they were fighting.]

[When he finds himself at Jotaro's side, he lays his hand briefly on Star Platinum's arm, just to let them know he's there, then lets it fall again.]

It's not really the same thing, is it? And Kakyoin's meaner than Mista.

[Even though Mista is legitimately an actual real-life criminal, Kakyoin is the mean one.]

[He huffs out a short breath and elegantly collapses in the sand, legs crossing neatly as he folds himself up like a telescope.]

...Yeah. Did anybody tell you about...Tower of Gray?

[Oh. Oh, Giorno's down. Good, his knees were just about arriving at the same idea, and Giorno's always been one good for leading by example...

Fortunately, Star's there to catch him when he stops supporting himself outright, and eases him down onto his back in the sand, muttering soft oras as his capable purple hands get all of his user's limbs arranged so he won't end up with godawful cramps in them after five minutes of holding still.

...It's nice. He can see the sky and hear the ocean, and the sand is cool to the touch but weirdly warm when you lay on it for a while, and it's sort of like when he was exhausted and laid out before except infinitely better.]

That was...probably one of the best things I've seen in my life.

[Hello there. Giorno watches out of the corner of his eye as he goes down, scoots a little closer once he's settled, even though he stays sitting up himself, arms wrapped around his knees. He can taste the salt in the air for the first time since he got down here, now that he's tired enough and the anger's worn off.]

Tower of Gray?

[He's curious. Tired, but curious.]

. . . Kakyoin did something scary, I bet.

Sure did.

[And because he's just sort of lazing and drifting as the adrenaline wears off and the tired catches up, that state ends up reflected in his voice; it's raised up slightly out of its usual gruff pitch, quieter, with a little something like genuine fascination in it.

Which is usually what happens, when people talk about their favorite Stands.]

We fought Tower of Gray on a plane. That's what took us so long getting to Egypt, in the beginning, it made the plane crash. It was a...

[He lifts his hand, palm down and fingers spread wide, and waves a vague circle with the flat of it — a rocking sort of motion that, without realizing it, Star lifts his own hand and copies.]

...beetle. Flying stag beetle. It was fast, faster than Star Platinum. None of us could hit it, and Kakyoin wouldn't let us try because we might miss and blow up the plane.

It'd use its stinger to grab a target's tongue and rip it out. It hit Hierophant in the mouth once, he started bleeding. But he kept after it, persistent. Kept using Emerald Splash, the beetle kept dodging. He just wasn't fast enough.

So it's coming in — we're all just standing there watching, it's coming in, and it goes, "Once this rips your tongue out, you'll go mad from the pain."

[He laughs, softly, and it rasps a little from being breathless but it's there.]

And Kakyoin, he sits up and just smiles, and goes, "My Hierophant Green?"

Turns out the Emerald Splash was never about hitting it, just about keeping it in the same lane of air space — so it couldn't move around. Distracting it while he got Hierophant surrounding it, and then speared it from every direction at once.

So then there it is, trapped, impaled a dozen times over on Hierophant, and he goes, "When he rips you apart, he'll go mad, all right — from joy."

...It was the first time I saw him fight as Kakyoin, and not a puppet. I think it's still probably one of the best things I've ever seen.

[Giorno listens to this. It's pretty scary. He isn't sure how Kakyoin could ever think himself a coward, doing things like this, being brave like that - clever and strong and brilliant in every sense of the word, not just smart but effervescent and faceted. Too bad he doesn't have a camera. If he could take a picture of Jotaro's face right now . . .]

It sounds like you've thought about that a lot.

[There's an undercurrent of "you are such a fucking idiot, son" in there somewhere, overlaid firmly with fondness.]

He's really a scary guy.

[Funny how he manages to make it sound like there's a "mine" thrown in there somewhere, regardless of grammatical correctness and sentence structure and the fact that none of those words sound like it in the slightest.]

...Your turn. Mista story, come on. Let's hear it.

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