hierophany | open post

Are you allowed to go to my library?

[This is the way he gets the most information out of his companion, after all: by needling at him, pressing at him, doing unexpected things and seeing how he reacts to them. It makes him slip, and give up things that he can then piece together into more of the puzzle's image. It's what Columbo would do, probably.]

I would've thought that counted as a "private space of others".

[ Ah. This is more what he was expecting. Less concern, more testing. He sighs, pressing his lips together, then shakes his head.

It's irritating, that a prisoner has authority over where he can and cannot go. The nameless stand makes it make sense, in theory. But then he opens his mouth again and his attention is on the person and not the stand it's almost like he's having to answer to someone when they're barely any older than him and beaten to shit with their hands all full of tentacles. ]

It does. It's your library. And so I was asking permission.

So I could tell you no. And you'd listen.

[And that's really something else, isn't it? To think that he's a prisoner right now, the lowest of the low, and yet he still has this measure of power over someone else.

It sits badly with him, especially in light of the redhead's current physical weakness, and the way that he just accepts whatever was done to him with that weird captivated note in his voice. Like he's just the designated whipping boy for all of them, somehow, and wants to be, and in some fashion they've all just inducted Jotaro into the club.]

Fine. You can go in my library, for a price. A door toll. Every time you go through its door, you have to tell me one true thing. I don't care what it is. It just has to be the truth, every time.

No other restrictions? I could just tell you obvious things. You are presently in a bed. Your name is Jonathan Joestar. My hair is red.

[ It feels like pity, when it's something so easy. He could just use useless non-facts to pay the toll. It's deliberate, it has to be, to allow him to do that. The only thing stopping him is his own refusal to be useless.

The nameless stand could retrieve books once he knew where the reading room was.

He huffs, standing, then walks over to a wall. Taking a knife from his pocket and opening it, he scrapes the blade against the brick, leaving a pale mark. Then, wordlessly, he goes to the door to the library. ]

The marked brick is north.

[ And he passes through the door. ]

You heard what I said. It just has to be the truth.

[Because if there's one thing he's learned about his companion in the time that they've been together, it's that he's the one who's always fairly fixated on making sure that things between them work out equitably. So in a sense, he'll actually discover more through a "pay as you will" scheme, because if he's the one setting the price, then he'll get his information, but the redhead will learn what he thinks is important to begin with.

This way, it's the other way around. He could just give up useless information every time, but he won't. He'll give up information that's equivalent to the worth of the books. That's how he is. That's how these balances are struck.

But now he's learned something. A direction. A way of orienting himself; it's basic, but sometimes basic tools are the ones that prove the most versatile, and the most useful.

A little curiously, he sends his Stand to follow along after Kakyoin. It's not like his big purple guardian will be able to tell him anything about the trip, but maybe Kakyoin will say something about it himself when he gets back.]

[ Jonathan's reading room is, as it turns out, as overly ornate as the living quarters above it. The shelves are lined with so many books that, if he were inclined to be judgmental, the bulk of them could only really serve the purpose of decoration, because nobody could read so much in a lifetime.

And it is a lifetime, because the boy above him heals as slowly as any other useless thing.

The books exist at two extremes. The most twee sort of heroic fantasies, and the most dry sort of research texts. He's looking through the latter when he finally notices the giant floating purple man. It's almost shameful that he was able to miss seeing something that had those three adjectives attached to it.

He stares at the unnamed stand for a long, silent moment. ]

Am I required upstairs?

[Contrary to whatever gospels Kakyoin might preach, the great purple Stand that belongs to Jotaro Kujo does not know his own name. No one has ever called him by one, except perhaps "evil spirit", which is more of a definition than a name. He doesn't know a lot of things, and more often than not, the thing he doesn't know is what will make his user happy.

He wants, desperately, to do what his user wants him to do. To protect his user. And there are perhaps no greater mixed signals about anything they've yet encountered than the ones his user is sending about this small green Stand user in his midst, who hurts him but helps him but abandons him but obeys him.

It's very confusing.

But this time, at least, his direction had been clear. He'd been supposed to follow the small green Stand user, and so he is following him. And Stands like him aren't supposed to be able to leave a radius of two meters from their user, but the thing is, nobody ever told him that.

The last time he was sent here, it was to bring back a book. This time, he'll do the same. He'll just watch the small green Stand user to decide which one he brings, and that will be all the proof he needs that he followed him correctly.

And so, he just looms.]

[ No answer.

Which is odd. He wasn't expecting an answer from the unnamed stand himself, but when he sends Hierophant out and away from himself he can hear and speak through him. Surely Jotaro isn't accompanying him here just to loom over him.

But the alternative is that Jotaro's stand has moved this far away from him, but isn't acting as his eyes an ears. Which means it must be acting independently.

He gestures to a desk. ]

One knock for 'yes', two for 'no'. Am I speaking to the man my lord has named Jonathan Joestar?

[ Because if not, this stand is acting independently in a way his lord's never has. And he doesn't know what to think of that. ]

[The unnamed Stand peers at him, almost curiously. It's only fairly recently that Jotaro started talking to him, instead of just about him, and the experience is still somewhat novel. So he cocks his head, listening intently to the question he's posed with, and it's a relatively long interval before finally he moves over to the desk, makes a fist, and regards the glossy wood of the desktop.

Thunk. Thunk.]

[ He watches the new stand's fist carefully. Jotaro's hands should have healed enough to manage the motion, but only with nerves restored and the swelling properly managed. But he managed it before, too. Wrapped his fingers around his throat despite Jotaro's own injury.

He doesn't know enough about stands other than his own to grasp what it means, but it feels significant. It feels like it must be part of the reason that the nameless stand seems so significant.

Two knocks. ]

I see. Thank you. And it's only fair that I tell you something in return, yes?

[ He was going to use the information as payment for leaving the reading room, but- he doesn't like receiving something for nothing, he doesn't like being useless, and it's more useful to the nameless stand than it is to Jotaro. He'll come up with something else for that. ]

The kitchens are two floors below us, about 46 metres to the west.

[It's odd, somehow. The actual words that Kakyoin speaks don't mean anything to the Stand he says them to; it's not that he can take the new information and form associations with it and use it to reason out anything through independent thought. But it is a little bit like a switch being flipped, moving the nameless Stand between a place of not knowing and a place of knowing. It's as though a doorway has appeared in a wall that had otherwise remained perfectly solid.

A kitchen has food in it. This is a thing he has access to by virtue of his connection to his user. This is where the kitchen is; information he now has access to by virtue of Kakyoin telling him. Now he has a pathway between wanting food and retrieving food, for which the higher-level function of "how do I find food to retrieve it" has already been satisfied for him.

The Stand blinks, then zips off abruptly. When he returns, it's with an armful of the pantry's contents, and he pauses only long enough for Kakyoin to see he's holding them before disappearing again, back up to the tower room to satisfy one of his user's most prevalent subconscious wants.]

[ And there's a question answered. The stand wasn't following him to watch him. Or, at least, that was a lower priority than finding food. He didn't mind being observed, particularly, but it's good to know. Even if it does result in more questions. If not to observe him, why did the stand follow him?

...it could just be to see how he reacted. A test. He's not certain what passing or failing would look like. Or what it would mean, for that matter.

He selects his book. ]

You are in Cairo.

[ He says it as he passes through the doorway, making no comment on the nameless stand following him down into the library. Or on the presence of everything that it's brought into the room. ]

The hell did you do? Why's he got all this stuff?

[So says Jotaro, who's sitting up in bed by the time Kakyoin returns to the room and passes through the Truth Door™, staring with bewilderment at the array of foodstuffs his desperate-to-please Stand has just laid out at his feet. He's all but positive that he didn't tell him to go get any of this stuff; he just wanted him to watch Kakyoin.

Which means the redhead must have done something to provoke this. Did he say he was going to the library, but then went further, and led his Stand to the kitchen? Sent him back with food? Why is he doing this?]

You just didn't feel like carrying it, is that it?

So he is doing this autonomously. With a surprising range, for a stand capable of what you consider him to be capable of.

[ He returns to his place on the side of the bed, setting the book down on his lap. ]

He can answer yes or no questions. He told me he was acting autonomously, so in return I told him where to find the kitchens. It seemed a fair exchange.

"Capability"? I don't know anything about that. I guess he just gets things and brings them back.

[Even as he says it, the Stand is picking up a wrapped club sandwich — marked boldly with the letters TD on the paper — and peeling it open to offer it up to Jotaro like a mother flying a spoon toward her toddler's mouth.]

...Hn.

[And yet, he's hungry enough to take a bite anyway, chewing gratefully as his hands lie useless in his lap, and his Stand carefully feeds him to take the edge off his hunger.]

Then thanks, I guess. For telling him that.

You thought he would be capable of killing Hierophant with a single strike.

[ Oh, that belongs to-

-he smiles, looking at the initials on the wrapper. In an ugly, spiteful way, a night and day contrast from the pretty, serene one he wore while talking about the offering of blood. There'll be consequences later. But probably not for him. Telence isn't meant to know about Jotaro's presence here, yet, so his sandwich will be missing for no given reason. Maybe he'll pick a fight with someone over it. ]

You're welcome. I was going to tell you when I returned, if I hadn't had the chance to speak with him.

So? Look how big he is. You don't think something that big could kill your smaller one in a single hit?

[It seems logical, at least, but what does he know, really. Anyway, he's just going to spend his time eating this sandwich.]

Anyway, go back to the part about how he "told" you stuff. You talked to him?

I'd expect that if he were restricted to the area immediately around you. But as stands grow more capable of moving apart from their user, they also grow weaker. Hierophant is an odd case. He's unusually strong for his long range.

[ He doesn't take any of the food. It's not particularly unusual, since he presumably hasn't had his last meal poisoned. But he does shuffle up the bed, after a moment, leaning his back against the headboard so he can sit in the bed proper instead of on the edge of it.

Nobody ordered him not to be comfortable, after all. ]

I did. Like I said, he's able to answer yes or no questions if you give him a way to do so.

I'm just surprised he talks to you. He doesn't talk to me; he just looks at me.

[It has not yet occurred to him that there might possibly be a reason for that, one that he has yet to consider. One that involves his own subconscious, and his previous fears about his own "evil spirit".

Regardless, he shuffles his own positioning when Kakyoin moves, getting into a place where he can look at the redhead while they talk, even as the Stand continues to feed him his pilfered sandwich.]

So. We're in Cairo, huh. Whatever happened to your plan of just giving me boring truths I already knew?

Have you talked to him? [ He gestures to the nightstand, then looks at the unnamed stand. ] Like before. One knock for yes, two for no.

[ It's been a long time since he's been able to talk with someone. His lord talks to him when he earns it. Enrico asks for his input on his work, sometimes. Telence talks at him the same way he talks at his collection. It's rare that anyone just- talks to him, without him needing to earn it. It's nice. Even if it's just because Jotaro has only incredibly dry collections of essays on landscape erosion for other entertainment. ]

It wasn't a plan. I don't particularly want to avoid paying your door toll. It was just irritating that I could, so I told you what was wrong with it.

If you could, but you didn't, then it still worked, didn't it? So you've really got nothing to criticize.

[He chews another bite of his sandwich, thoughtfully. It bothers him a little, that the redhead had gone ahead and discovered something new about his Stand that he hadn't known before. It's not like it's the first time that's happened, of course, and it certainly won't be the last. But this time it bothers him just slightly more than it might've otherwise, and eventually he realizes it's because he didn't find it out through superior knowledge or resources or the help of the golden bastard. He found it out because he just...tried.

Irritating. But it's nice to know that his evil spirit — formerly evil spirit — can communicate, even if it's just a little.]

So. Uh. I guess...do you like being my..."Stand", or whatever?

[The singular knock that resounds off of the nightstand is instantaneous.]

It doesn't make it any less irritating, that I had to choose not to be useless.

[ But his door criticisms come second to his interest in the nameless stand. He goes quiet, observing. As Jotaro asks a question and it answers without a breath of hesitation.

His interest in the nameless stand, he catches himself considering. He wants to know about it because he wants to know, not because he wants treasures to bring back to his master. That's a new, uncomfortable sensation, wanting things that are so unconnected from his Lord.

A pair of yellow lights set into something green slides up from behind the headboard of the bed, observing quietly. Not anything so complete as a face. Just eyes, and enough body to hold them. ]

You should be glad to have him here with you. [ He says after a moment, once he's sure he won't be interrupting. His voice has the same wistful quality it did when he talked about Dio. ] He's very beautiful.

This is the most he's been...well. Out of me, I guess. I think since I first saw him.

[And the truth is, he's not really sure what to think about that. To think that he'd spent so long vehemently keeping this creature of his under wraps, locked away within the security of his body, because he was trying to protect everyone else from its evil — but then in a matter of minutes, this eerily amicable redhead had all but convinced him that his evil spirit really wasn't so evil at all. That he has a name. That he's something identifiable, something special but not unique.

Now, he's done it again. Shown him that his Stand can talk. That it thinks, on some level. That it likes him.

He spent a long time being afraid of it, and even after all of that, it still didn't hesitate a second before telling him that it liked him.]

...I wouldn't be here without him, though, would I?

[He glances at the redhead, skeptical but not overtly suspicious.]

He's the reason you grabbed me to begin with. He's the thing everybody wants, isn't he?

[ It takes him a long moment to answer. He looks over the nameless stand almost cautiously, then looks away. ]

I know that you dislike it, here. [ It's soft. Careful. Like he has to run some kind of complicated calculation with each word to figure out how to manage that much of an understatement. Finding no balance between this being wrong and Lord Dio being able to do no wrong, and having to make one. ]

I'm not forbidden from telling you what my instructions would have been, if you did not possess a stand.

[Silently, he lifts his hands, still with the thread of Hierophant Green trailing out from each, as if in unspoken reply to the question of how he likes it here. Still, there's something in the way the redhead navigates the thought so carefully, so specifically, that keeps Jotaro from pushing harder for the moment. They're moving in a direction, now, that could be helpful. The last thing he wants to do is shatter it in its infancy.]

Pretty sure I can guess what you would've done. You would've killed me, right?

[One of a few things will happen, here, on a spectrum between two possible endpoints. At one end, the redhead will be astonished and horrified. At the other, he'll simply say, "Yes."]

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