Journey Of A Golden Spirit: Rossi Di Napoli (Mass Effect/JoJo)

This is less a step across branches, and more stepping into an entirely different tree. It's also a lot darker than my normal fare, so be warned. I just wanted to try my hand at a bit of abject horror involving aspects of one of my favourite comic book characters.

Actually, perhaps a little backstory. Way, way, way back when I was first planning this quest, I had ideas to offer a different type of crossover, with The Manhattan Projects. This could have been one of the choices, and it would have acted something like a… whatsitcalled- like Armsmaster Quest, but more… directly involved. This is just to get the idea out of the way so I can move on to more relevant stuff.

And while I'm here, tomorrow- or today if you're on GMT and feeling pedantic- will be another sidestory, the first proper... I suppose, interlude, really, giving out a little more information on a certain character. This is instead of the actual update because, eh, it's my birthday and I've earned myself a bit of self-indulgence.


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The soul of a bird flits through the air, clear through the smoke and dust of artillery shelling.

"Do they live? Do thy progenitors and kin live? Shall you add them to your cairn of souls as I if they do not?" It asks you.

"Of course we will. We love them so." A fracture of your mind asks- you believe this one is supposed to be a monk, what with the robe with the long sleeves and rope belt.

"They will add nothing! Sentimentality is not something I will stand for!" One with an eyepatch and a cap of some kind yells.

"How can we not?"

"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" You all but scream at the shards of your mind, still breeding with every stray thought, rare as they are right now, the souls of woodland animals, and the mind of Jeffrey Sanders, a boy from your class you took to the woods one night, implying an offer of sex, offering death and consumption --Completely-- as consolation.

Except you didn't. Those were the actions of another, using your body against you. They had always been there, between every blink, taking control every time you weren't quite paying attention, every time you lost time-

"Us. Always us. Always you but not you but the you you will grow to be. We will grow to be. Is there such a difference, even now?"

You scream wordlessly as a Batarian appears from seemingly nowhere and raises his gun at you.

Your arm goes numb as THE OTHER takes it over and you watch the rock that wasn't in your hand a moment ago fly towards the alien and pierce the upper left eye, sending it screaming to the ground as your legs become not your own and you but not you walk to it and drive your heel into its forehead ridge over and over again, eventually reducing its head to paste as strength not yours commands.

As soon as you feel your legs become yours again, you drop to the ground and vomit.

"We defend you when you will not."

"Why?! Why are you making me do this?!" You scream at the monk, as you stop retching, her calm, almost serene look unfazed by your outburst.

"You must live. You must grow, and consume to grow. You will understand in time that you already understand."

You're beyond scared of the red and white ghost in front of you. You are beyond terrified of the control these, these ghouls have over your body.

You don't know how much of you is you and how much of you is them and as soon as you think of that, the monk smiles and you find yourself paralysed as you realise the implications of that uncertainty.

"Fie!" Eyepatch yells. "Finding your mother and sister is better than being stuck on the ground in fear, girl!"

You look at it- her- no fuck you it's an it- and realise that it does have a point.

You get up, still feeling woozy, and continue stumbling in the direction of your house. You think.

"Ok. Ok ok ok ok o-k." You start babbling after a few minutes of relative peace, the gunfire in the distance notwithstanding. "If- if we're doing this, we've gotta, set down some ground rules."

You have to regain control, of your body, of your life, of your mind, of something, anything, just enough to give you some semblance of authority over your own headspace. You need that, or you're going to snap. More than you already have.

"Hmmmm?" Jeffrey offers, the only sound he seems capable of.

"Yeah. First- I don't, want you to take control of me like that anymore."

"Didst it not save thy life not minutes ago? Hath we not proven our ability to help you?"

"Yeah, and then you turned his head into paste." You gag a little as you think of the batarian's brains splattered on the grass, and take a moment to recover. "Fine, if you have to, do it, but just... some restraint, please?"

"'Restraint' doesn't really come into the equation.'

"Well it fucking does now! I just threw a rock through a guy's eye, then stamped his head into paste! I don't even want to think about the damage that's caused me! I don't want to kill and cannibalise people! I-"

"Will continue to. Eventually. You will feel that urge become unbearable soon enough. The absolute consumption of another is... like breathing to us."

You consider starting to argue, and then your stomach rumbles. And you realise you just vomited up everything you've eaten in the past day.

You think back to the batarian head, this time not in disgust, but in hunger, and you wonder how it would taste, that knowledge!- no, no, no no no no no, not going there not going there-

The monk smiles. It's the happiest smile you've ever seen as if she's achieved everything she's ever wanted in life, and it scares you witless.

You keep running. You have to. If you stop and think, you don't know what you'll lose in that thought.

Eventually, almost on autopilot, you reach your home. The sun rises, gunfire and shelling long dead, and you notice with a feeling of ice water in your heart that the door's been kicked in.

Oh god. Oh god no please say they weren't still home no no no no-

"Enough. Find out their fate, then panic." The songbird admonishes you.

You do not move. You don't want to.

Your legs go numb, and begin to move of their own accord. You look down with a wild fear in your eyes and begin screaming your assent.

"Ok, ok, ok! Just give me a fucking minute!" You shriek, and after a moment, you can feel those legs become your own again.

You take a few deep, calming breaths. You confront the fact that you need to find out. Eventually.

Before you can lose your resolve, you walk through the front door to the sight of your mother making the dinner your sister playing happily the sun shining the grass being green a corpse, two bullet wounds to the head, clutching her favourite teddy bear close is that a tea party they're having you wonder if the blood on her dress is hers or that of the woman holding her cooling body close and hugging her happily-

The two realities battle for dominance in your eyes, and you feel something hot against your lip. A salty, metallic liquid dribbles past your lips and you realise you have a nosebleed.

Why? You didn't hurt yourself, you just saw a perfectly normal warzone filled with happiness and death why you why now why here why at all-

"... Clara?" Your mother asks, dragging you back to a reality you'd rather ignore. She coughs, sputtering blood as she does. "Clara, come here." She commands.

You walk forward, not of your own volition, but not of the other's either.

One of your eyes is going red. You think a blood vessel's burst above your pupil. It hurts.

You hurt too much to scream at the sight. You're too tired for fear. All you feel is numb.

"Mom..." You mumble, dropping to your knees next to her, uncaring of the shock it sends through them. Then you start talking, and everything comes bubbling to the surface, bursting through any kind of mental dam you might have had in the way. "Mom, I-I see these... ghosts, around me, and they tell me that I need to eat people, and they keep taking over parts of my body, they made me kill one of the aliens, and I'm scared, and I think I'm going crazy and I just don't-" Your mother hugs you, and you stop talking. For a moment, you almost feel better, like things might not be as bad as you thought they would be.

Then she says six little words that bring it all crashing down.

"I know. I have them too."

Your brain just stops, and you find yourself at a loss of... everything.

"Honey... I don't have long enough to tell you. I'm too hurt."

"... No. No, no, no, I can't lose you too, not now, please!" You cry, tears streaming down your face at the prospect of living the last chain to a life of normalcy you have. She pulls herself close, holding her lips near your ear.

"Don't fight it." She whispers. "You can't fight being an Oppenheimer. It's like holding back a tidal wave with your bare hands, you can't. Just... let it in. Let us in."

"What? What do you mean, 'let us in?"

She doesn't reply. You feel her weight on your shoulder, unsupported as her hand slips off your shoulder and her body collapses on you. You shift, and she flops into your lap, her eyes looking up at you.

Her eyes are unfocused. Glazed over.

"... Mom?" You ask in a tiny voice.

... Oh god.

Dead. Both of them.

You sit there, just waiting for it to hit you that your mother and sister are dead, and you couldn't do a damn thing about it.

It doesn't.

You feel... hollow. Almost numb.

Almost.

Except for one, tiny, traitorous thought.

"You know what she meant by 'let us in.'"

"No."

"It doesn't have to be goodbye. It never has to be again. Is this not a blessing?"

"Why? Why are you trying to make me do this?!" You yell at the monk, tears blurring your eyes for a moment, obfuscating the true number of apparitions surrounding you. Then, in a moment of pure clarity, you realise there are hundreds around you, looking directly at you with entirely blank faces. Then, as one chorus, they explain to you the truth of them.


Of you.

Of us.

There is no difference. You begin to laugh. Eight words. Eight words, and suddenly everything makes sense. It's a revelation, your need to consume others so simply explained by the fact that you're...

You are the dark half of the world.

It doesn't have to be goodbye. Your mother all but requested you do this. How can you say no? You look down at the corpses of your mother and sister, and an alienfamiliarwelcome hunger rises within you.

As the sun rose over the ruins of a house and a family, you consumed them --completely-- so that their souls might live forever within you.

You loved them...

So how could you not?

Mild delay, courtesy of the chaos of starting a new quest, but it's here now, and I think I have the beginnings of a schedule set out, though it will require me starting yet another thing. This set of stuff is getting released in more bite-sized chunks for reasons, and the next progressive update will be up on Saturday Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday.

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The rain won't stop.

You can't remember how far you've both walked, but the rain doesn't seem to have let up since the start of your journey, and you're numb enough that all you can feel is your sister held against your chest, carrying her as best you can, shielding her from the worst of the rain with your body. You feel bullet-sized globs of water hit your back over and over again, drumming a rhythm into your spine that does more to numb it than the cold ever could.

Your legs hurt. Your lungs hurt. You can barely breathe normally, let alone in that special way that numbs your pain, makes it just a little easier to walk, to run, to keep going.

Your sister's heavy.

But you have to keep going. You can't stop. Or you won't start again.

For a moment you forget why you're carrying her, then you hear her wheeze and remember. She can't breathe properly either. You know she should be able to do that breathing thing that makes you glow and feel better, but there's something wrong with her lungs and you can't find anyone to help her and she can't walk and oh god she's dying she's going to die and you can't do anything about it and you're going to be next-

"Hm? Ah, little boy?" You hear a voice calling out, and turn to find an old man approaching you. He's dressed well, holding an umbrella high to protect against the rain, holding it higher to accommodate you and the girl in your arms. "What's wrong? Is she ok?"

Such genuine concern is foreign to you, and for a moment, you forget how to respond. Then everything comes back to you and you can't help but blubber and cry and choke out a few words about what's wrong before you focus and manage three full words.

"Please... help her..."

With that, and the small spark of hope that someone's finally going to be able to help Daria, you just...

Decide... to take a... a small nap...

"Eh? Boy? Are you... oh Lord-ah, uh- ah! Yes, hello, I need an ambulance at..."

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Albrecht tells you something when you say you won't fight tonight.

"You fight, or she fights."

You stare at him with nothing but contempt in your eyes, before his gaze slips off you and onto your sister.

Never an overt threat. Just... a look. An implication. Weighing up exactly how much entertainment her battered, broken body on the ground after a fight would bring his, 'clientele.'

'She fights. She doesn't win. Whatever they do to her afterwards is your fault.'

You feel your sister huddle behind you even further and it takes everything you have not to feed him what few teeth he's got left, shackles or no.

"I'll fight." You grind out, and his demeanour changes instantly.

"Wonderful! Well, follow me!" He exclaims, turning on a dime in his shiny shoes and walking off down the hall in an almost imperious manner, like some kind of ancient king or emperor.

You don't follow. When he turns and sees you still there, he raises an eyebrow.

"What? Changed your mind?"

You wordlessly jingle your wrist at him, gesturing to the shackles chaining you to the wall.

"... Ah, right." He says almost as if he forgot about it, and gestures to the armed guard outside your cell. "Unshackle him, will ya?"

The guard moves towards you, a middle-aged man with a paunch that belies some muscle underneath, leaning in as he undoes your shackles.

"You know… while you're out there fighting, your sister cries a lot. Some of the boys have been thinking she might need someone to… comfort her-" He devolves into a sort of breathy chuckling that makes your skin crawl just feeling it on your neck.

You just manage to wait until you feel the shackles fall away from your wrists, and barely a second later, you hit his jaw like an angry god. You're not entirely sure what happens next, but there's a chunk of grey flesh on the ground you think might be the tip of his tongue, a few white chunks that might be shards of teeth, and he's on the floor screaming wordlessly and covering his mouth with his hands. You can already see the blood welling between his fingers.

You stand up and follow your warden, sorry, sponsor, dragging the guard by the leg out of the cell, away from your sister. You can hear him scrabbling at the floor to get away from you, trying to kick you away, but you just ignore him.

The man who threatened to throw your sister into a cage match watches you with an uncertainty in his eyes.

"Sometimes, you just have to make a point." You say, answering the question he's not asking.

You punctuate that by lifting the man's leg further and slamming his leg into the concrete floor, shattering his kneecap. With that, you let go and walk on, leaving the pervert to squeal like a rabbit caught in a trap.

You know you shouldn't be smiling at that. But you feel your lips tug upward anyway.

"And for future reference, the deal was 'you fight, and nobody lays a hand on your sister.' Since your memory seems to be failing you, I thought you could do with a reminder." You mention smoothly as you pass him.

Somewhere in the back of your mind, subconsciously, something begins to happen. This trickles down- up?- to your conscious mind as a feeling that you just made the one man capable of ruining your life very, very angry.

... It was a calculated risk, actually naming the day this would be up on, but man I'm bad at math.

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You do the first thing that comes to mind when you need to fix a problem very quickly.

「Pearly Gates.」

Why fix what ain't broke, right?

Take the handkerchiefs, get rid of them, now.

The alien figure of your Stand materialises directly behind you, and you shift ever so slightly closer to Cesare, pressing the side of your hips against his, obscuring both signs of your gang membership and letting Pearly Gates snatch them so fast that you're pretty sure you have rugburn. The sound of space-time being torn a new one is music to your ears, and soon you're left with the self-assured satisfaction that you're not going to be taken in for wearing gang colours.

If you had to judge how long that took, you would probably say about three seconds. In reality, it took less than one.

Adrenaline, man. Helluva drug.

You move back, and the Carabinieri blinks. She seems confused for a second, staring at the point where your colours were.

"Ma'am? Is something wrong?" You ask her innocently.

You see the uniformed cyclops begin to mouth something, before she closes her eye and shakes her head.

"N-nothing. Just... been up way too long." She says after a moment, sounding as tired as she looks and no doubt feels.

You affect a sympathetic look in her direction.

"Must be hard." You say, almost believing the sympathy in your voice. An idea occurs, and you take hold of one end of your Mostaccioli, breaking off a handful for her. The chocolate inside is still melted, the almonds still hot, the smell divine. You restrain yourself well enough to ask her if she wants a piece.

"... Sure, I could do with a sugar rush right now." She says, taking the offered piece from your hand, the slight skin on skin contact sending streamers of electricity through your fingertips. She takes a small bite of the pastry and closes her eyes as the taste hits.

"Mmph." She hums a little, immediately looking better.

Sugar, man. Helluva drug.

"So," she says around her mouthful of cookie, "you said you knew this, 'Fireball Bruno?'"

Cesare, who up until that point was looking quite relaxed, was trying his best not to look like a deer in headlights.

"Uh-"

"Yes dear, why don't you tell the nice Carabinieri woman everything you know about Fireball Bruno?" You ask casually; as if you aren't asking him to turn snitch.

"Wh- I- do I not get a say in this?!"

""No."" You and the Carabinieri say almost simultaneously.

Cesare is the deer now.

Realising he has no choice in the matter, he starts breathing again, taking one deep, barely Hamon-toned breath to calm himself.

"... I talk, you heard none of this from me, ok?" He says after a moment.

"This conversation never happened." The Carabinieri says with the ghost of a smile on her face, taking another bite of her chunk of cookie.

"... Alright. Fireball Bruno works for the Verdura as, something like a loan shark..."

Oh, yeah, you should actually try this stuff.

"I dunno his turf exactly, but I know it's somewhere down by the river..."

You take a bite of the cookie stick, wincing slightly as your teeth struggle to make their way through, but they eventually do, and oh god you're in heaven this is what heaven is like nothing is going to beat this ever-

"... Or he visits with a bottle of grain alcohol..."

The dough! Dense and chewy, still warm in your hands and in your mouth, the slight taste of honey coating your palate, laying the foundations for something more!

"... See, he uses Hamon to enhance the flames, directing it into something more like a thermal lance than a fire-breathing trick..."

The filling! The chocolate, dark, almost bitter on your tongue, complementing the creaminess of the almonds, fresh, barely toasted from the baking, tasting so slightly of cherries... such a three-dimensional flavour!

"... And last I heard, he hangs out at..."

This is the best thing you've ever tasted! It's not just a conversation, it's like a whole damn nightclub in your mouth!

"... He hangs out where?" The Carabinieri asks.

Wait, what? Why's Cesare stopped talking?

"... What's the plan?" He asks after a moment of thought.

"Excuse me?"

"What. Is. The plan? I tell you where he hangs out, what happens?" He asks again without a hint of fear in his voice.

"Why do you want to know?"

"Because Bruno is a psychopath who doesn't give a shit about hurting people, on top of being a fucking human dragon, and I want to know that giving you this information isn't going to get people hurt!" He half-yells, immediately wincing as he realises his mistake. People hear things.

The Carabinieri starts a little at the sudden yelling, before growing silent.

"... I... I understand your fears." She ventures quietly after a moment. "I understand why you're so hesitant. But we need this information. We don't want blood on the streets any more than you do, and the information you've given so far is invaluable in making sure we can keep it that way." She says gently, walking closer and placing a hand on his shoulder.

It would almost be comforting if she wasn't three inches shorter than Cesare. Suddenly the whole act becomes a little funnier to you. You watch her head just slowly pan up to Cesare. You hear him snort a little, leaving the Carabinieri blushing a little harder.

"A-anyway-" She says, taking her hand off his shoulder. "- I promise that nobody will get hurt when we go to take him in. That's a promise."

Cesare goes quiet again. He's very obviously weighing things up in his head.

You... kinda feel bad for causing him this much conflict, honestly.

"... Piazza Roffredo. It's not too far from here. He's usually there in the late afternoon." Cesare admits after a moment.

The Carabinieri works her Omni-tool over for a moment and you see through the back- ah, the wonders of transparent screens- that she's looking up a map of the local area.

"... Got it. Thank you for your cooperation, sir." She says, closing down the holographic interface and finishing off her third of the cookie stick.

"I'd say 'anytime,' but I'd be lying."

That gets a genuine chuckle from her.

"That's fair. Anyway, I should get back to patrolling. You two stay safe now, ok?" She says as she starts to walk away.

"You too."

She waves, before turning to walk away, only to immediately turn back on the next step.

"Oh, one more thing- you two haven't seen a stray dog around here, have you? Kind of large, floppy ears, red coat?"

You blink, unsure if she's joking or not.

"Uh... no, no we haven't. Why?" You say, finally contributing to the conversation in a way.

"Just some reports of one in Chiaia, is all. Right, well, take care now!" She says cheerily as she walks on. You wave, she waves, you say your goodbyes, she says hers, she walks around the corner and Cesare grabs you by the hoodie and pulls you in close.

Not in a nice way.

"What. The hell. Was that." He grinds out between his teeth.

"She saw our colours! I had to do something to get her off our back, and you're the one that said you knew something about him in the first place!" You hiss, keeping your voice down in case the Carabinieri's still in earshot.

"You made me snitch someone out! Screw what happens if they actually try to arrest the madman, if this gets out I am a dead man!" He hisses back, genuine fear in his eyes.

"Hey, I made you do jack shit, dude, that was all you, and it won't get out! Why would she say anything about you?!" You very specifically don't yell, pushing him away as you do. He finally lets go of the front of your hoodie and turns away from you, bringing his hands to his head as if to nurse an oncoming migraine.

Still, he seems... genuinely scared of what could happen.

"... Ok. Ok, at best, she's not involved at all in the trying to arrest him. It doesn't get out who told her, Bruno gets arrested and shanked in jail, the Verdura go nuts trying to find the mole." He stops moving, staring off to the side for a second. Eventually, he starts nodding slowly. "... Ok. Ok! Yeah! That could be worse!"

You grab onto the opportunity.

"Yeah, see? Things are gonna go fine," you try to placate him, "and besides, you have a Stand that's basically your own personal death squad."

The nodding quickens.

"Yeah. Yeah, you're right."

You get the feeling he's currently working on the logic of 'if I believe it hard enough it'll come true,' but it's a start.

It's a start.

"Uh..."

"Hm? What is it?"

"Gioia," Cesare begins to ask, "do you recognise this place?"

You frown, then look around to realise that you...

Don't, recognise this street.

Um.

You don't have the words to explain how bad a thing that is.

As if to compound the bad-thingness of the situation, you hear the sound of laughter and merrymaking around the corner, and as soon as you hear it, the source rounds it and oh for FUCK'S SAKE-

"... You again?" Wallet Douche asks casually. "We have got to stop meeting like this."

"What? Is that the same girl from yesterday?" One of his cronies speaks up.

As they speak, you get the impression that Wallet Douche and his companions- all seven of them- never actually went to sleep. Beyond that, you realise that, at this point, you're probably gonna have to beat the shit out of this guy to get out of here unscathed.

He begins to walk forward, his boys following, and you specifically choose not to move. Cesare looks at you, most likely wondering why you're not moving.

"Looks like it. And she's not running, for once."

"What can I say? Third time's the charm."

By this point, they're starting to surround you. All eight of them are obviously thinking this is gonna be an easy fight, two on eight, but you've had a good night's sleep, you've got Cesare at your back, and... well.

"Oh? For what? Getting beat half to death in an alley?" He points out with a smile on his face.

You most definitely do not wince at all, but you do tense up a little at the implication.

"No," Cesare says, "third time's the charm for kicking Verdura ass."

And that's the smile gone.

"God, I can't wait to see you on the ground." One of his cronies mutters. "Maybe we'll be nice and give you something to remember us by in hosp-"

Barely a second later, Cesare hits his jaw like an Old Testament God. You're not entirely sure what happens next, but there's a chunk of grey flesh on the ground you think might be the tip of the Verdura's tongue, a few white chunks that might be shards of teeth, and he's slammed into the wall, sliding down it and screaming wordlessly while he covers his mouth with his hands. You can already see the blood welling between his fingers.

Well then.

Guess you're fighting.