Seeking Resolution

[madimpossibledreamer]

No, Kakyoin, Gold Experience is what Hamon looks like as a Stand, but then, you’re also the one who said there was no such thing as a Mirror World and that no one can have more than one Stand, so you’re probably used to being wrong about this kind of thing. Still, it’s interesting to consider, because there’s still probably a slight connection.
I wasn't planning on getting here this soon, but otherwise Kakyoin's paranoia would just...keep going.

Main Points:
Jojo's Bizarre Adventure post-Eyes of Heaven (after Rewritten Encounters)
Summary: Eyes of Heaven: Explored mostly as a source of working through jojo issues ;)
Kakyoin (and Josuke) finally get some answers.
Word Count: 2838
Rating: Teen
pre-Jotaro/Kakyoin

         Kakyoin hears his visitors before he sees them. All right, part of that is that he has taken to spreading Hierophant’s tendrils even wider after being attacked, so he can clearly hear Dr. Joshi admonishing White Jotaro, Illusionary Daughter, and a cheerful if stubborn voice he’s never heard before.
         “I will not let you see my patient. He’s likely to suffer a relapse if you push him too far.”
         “If he does, I can just heal him with my Stand,” the cheerful voice insists. Ah. That must be Higashikata, Joestar-san’s illegitimate child, assuming that this is in any way real.
         “Won’t do much if you get a Stand attack,” White Jotaro rumbles. He sounds angry. Of course, the trick is that Jotaro usually sounds angry, but this time, Kakyoin is fairly certain that he is, in fact, angry. “Like you already did.”
         “So you have been visiting my patient.” She sounds vaguely disapproving. “We hadn’t just been forbidding visitors for no good reason. It’s a miracle he’s still alive.”
         Kakyoin can’t exactly see through the tendrils, and it’s not as if he’s got the web spread to feel every motion in the air, but he gets the strong feeling White Jotaro just pulled the hat lower. He can picture the moment almost perfectly. Nearly fifty days of near-constantly being around someone can do that, and it’s not as if he’s been aware of the time passing, if time had indeed passed. It’s not as if White Jotaro is unaware of how clear a miracle his existence was.
         “Is Kakyoin a damn prisoner?” He sounds actually frustrated, punctuated by the fact that he’s swearing. Not that Jotaro avoided swearing, but he’d do it for emphasis. “If not, then he should be able to make his own decisions, even if it’s disregarding doctor’s advice.”
         “I thought you were badly enough behaved when you were a patient.” She’s resigned, and Kakyoin can sympathize; Jotaro is stubborn enough about wounds at the best of times. He has fond memories of threatening, and then actually following through, on using Hierophant in the dim light of hotels to hold his new friend down for applying dressings, washing off blood, and even, on one memorable occasion, doing stitches. Jotaro was very, very lucky he’d learned just enough to mend his own clothes so as not to bother his mother. He could, of course, possess Jotaro and that’d simply be an end of it, but anything more than lightly holding the fellow teen’s wrists tended to trigger fight-or-flight responses. Star Platinum didn’t actually punch anything, but the least Kakyoin could do is try not to contribute any further stress. “All right. If Kakyoin-san wants to see you, and only then, he can come out and meet you himself. Otherwise, I’ll have to ask you to leave.”
         A minute passes and no one comes to get him, though he does hear White Jotaro protesting about making him walk, but it seems she’s not willing to let that go as a criteria. It suddenly occurs to him that she must have spotted Hierophant, and since Jotaro hadn’t questioned that, it seems likely that Jotaro—or rather, this possibly constructed facsimile of him—still retains the observational skills he’d had in youth.
         How bizarre, the idea that as far as he can recall, it was merely a few months ago.
         He is, however, determined to have answers, the second they are offered. He questions the use of the cane only briefly; he’s quickly learning that his dignity is slightly less of a consideration than the simple ability to move. Sure, he might have some fantasies of strong arms catching him (Jotaro or Star Platinum, he’s not particularly picky), but those can only take place if he’s actually in their presence when he takes a spill and in any case his libido is also less of a consideration when he’s determined not to get caught in a trap in the first place, if this is indeed a trap.
         Dr. Joshi sighs when she sees him join them, but overall seems resigned. “I suppose Higashikata-san can heal any injuries that occur as a result. Very well. I’m sure you remember the location of the visitor’s room, Dr. Kujo, so I will be leaving now.” Her steps are swift as she leaves. Not wanting to waste time on this? Or perhaps she’s merely trying to give off that impression.
         White Jotaro, meanwhile, has begun breathing more deeply again, as if he’d actually been worried. Though he does narrow his eyes ever-so-slightly at the cane as if it’d personally offended him. What perhaps isn’t so surprising is that he’s not the first to speak.
         “Um. Hi. I’m Josuke Higashikata. You’re Kakyoin-san, right? My baby nephew’s said a lot about you; well. Given, you know, it’s Jotaro-san.” Said ‘baby nephew’ grunts and attempts to hide further in his hat. “Anyway, my Stand, Crazy Diamond—it can heal you.”
         Kakyoin can see the resemblance to his father. He takes a measured breath. At least Hierophant has standing instructions since the baby incident to monitor his own thought patterns for sudden changes, even though he’s not sure how sensitive his own Stand would be to such matters. “That would be appreciated, thank you. I’m not sure what it might do with some of my implants, but I believe Dr. Joshi would not have been so flippant if it could kill me.”
         Obviously, his own casual reference to the concept made Josuke-kun more nervous, not less. His eyes bug out a little, he turns a little white, and if anything his hands start shaking, though like Jotaro he tries to hide that by hiding his hands in his pockets. “R-right,” he agrees, trying not to sound so insecure.
         “Yare yare daze, Kakyoin. Stop scaring the kid,” White Jotaro scolds. His tone says he doesn’t care, but Kakyoin knows better. If he didn’t care, he wouldn’t have spoken up at all.
         “I can hold his hand. That helps me when I’m scared,” the Jojo child announces, puffing out her chest and slipping her hand into Josuke’s.
         “Thanks. That makes me feel a lot better.” He’s sincere, is the interesting thing. Between his personality and the way he, too, babbles, he might resemble Joestar-san closely, but they’re also different. Joestar-san was a trickster through-and-through, capable, on the rare occasion, of blunt honesty, but prone to bluff after bluff when it came to his emotional state or saying anything that actually matters. (On analysis, perhaps it isn’t so surprising he cheated on his wife after all.) Josuke-kun, on the other hand, is the reverse. Kakyoin would hardly be surprised if he had a devious side, but his first instinct is open communication.
         Josuke pulls out his Stand with the ease Kakyoin, for instance, does. The kind of nonchalance that suggests he’s had his own Stand since he was a child and doesn’t really see the use of a Stand as a combat-only situation. Sometimes the suspicion and distrust that Jotaro had felt for his Stand still seem baffling. Kakyoin understands the concept, of course, the fact that he hadn’t realized his power and thus didn’t have the same control he did, but only in the abstract.
         Josuke holds his hand over Kakyoin’s body, frowning as he concentrates. The glow seems familiar. Is it possible Hamon can be embodied in a Stand, somehow? If so, perhaps this is what it looks like. And the aches do, in fact, ease, including a few that Kakyoin hadn’t realized were present until they were gone.
         Jotaro waited exactly long enough for them to finish before starting to stroll ahead of them. He’s not particularly good at it, but he is trying to make some effort to allow them to stay not too far behind him.
         “Thank you. I’d love to hear more about your Stand,” Kakyoin states decisively, and White Jotaro snorts.
         “Taxonomy is fun, but it can wait.” He’s not being ironic, at all. He actually finds the concept fun. Jotaro, it seems, is many things, a nerd being among them. (He’d been there, when Jotaro would recite marine and ship and plane facts from memory to stave off boredom. He should have already known this.) “You saw Red Hot Chili Pepper.” They stroll into the visitor’s lounge and almost immediately find places to sit. Josuke-kun absent-mindedly allows the illusionary daughter to sit on his lap with no hesitation. He’s fairly certain Jotaro is actually pouting, simply based off of something about his eyes, maybe, or the fact that the air he’s giving off is even more standoffish than normal. Probably that, actually. He’s avoiding meeting anyone’s eyes as much or even really looking in anyone’s direction. It’s adorable, whether or not it’s actually real.
         Kakyoin takes a deep breath. Perhaps this isn’t the time, a premature desire for answers. But he’s tired of this long game, if that’s even really what’s going on. “Before that, Jotaro, I’d appreciate an explanation.” Hierophant curls around Jotaro’s wrist, checking his pulse. White Jotaro allows this; even seems to take some comfort from the gesture. “Why do I remember dying?” he asks, because of everything he can ask this one question nagging at him seems to get to the heart of the matter.
         “Well, being electrocuted can—” Josuke-kun begins, before cluing in when the young Kujo tugs at his sleeve impatiently, stretching the fabric out a little with fingers unused to the concept of restraint.
         White Jotaro, meanwhile…
         White Jotaro looks devastated. His eyes are wide, he hastily places the hand in Hierophant’s grasp on the table, as if the support will hide any trembling, and Kakyoin gets the feeling that he absolutely is speechless for once.
         This, however, isn’t the reaction of an enemy upon being discovered. This isn’t fear, anger, or anything of the sort. This—
         This is grief. The kind of pain he’d displayed however minutely upon his mother’s gaining the Stand. This is reality, the beat of Jotaro’s blood in his wrist says. Kakyoin has the uncomfortable feeling that Jotaro Kujo had attended his funeral. “You remember,” he repeats after a minute, sounding vaguely breathless. Which, actually, probably means that he isn’t, in fact, breathing.
         “Deep breaths, Jojo,” he reminds his friend, hoping that his unfamiliar use of the nickname would be enough to spur him to action—and, in fact, that appears to be the case, as the corner of Jotaro’s mouth twitches and he complies. “I think I deserve to know,” he suggests.
         Jotaro stares at his hands, at where Hierophant has wriggled further and is practically caressing his wrist and palm in an attempt to impart comfort—damn his lack of self control, though perhaps in this instance it’s welcomed? “I hate writing the abstract,” he confesses, and the only reason Kakyoin has any idea what that means is because he, in fact, had gotten bored enough to attempt to read through Jotaro’s thesis and had seen some sort of ‘yare yare’ style note written in the margin. “Alternate universes are real,” he decides is an adequate starting position. It is, sort of, although Kakyoin and, from the look of it, Josuke-kun only accept the premise because it’s Jotaro asserting such things.
         “In one of them, DIO won, but being the bastard he is, that wasn’t enough for him. He went looking for the ultimate Stand, one that would let him rewrite reality itself.”
         And the vampire had been terrifying enough when he could only—only, hah!—stop time. “You beat him.” Otherwise none of them would still be alive.
         “Barely.” That, too, is no exaggeration, not from the way Jotaro’s fist involuntarily clenches. “And not without help. We met Jiji when he was young. Jonathan Joestar. This brat, all grown up.” He points a finger at Jolyne, who giggles and sticks her tongue out at him. “But I ended up with the same power—just like I had before.” That had to be a never-ending source of existential angst for Jotaro, Kakyoin suspected, the idea that his soul could be the twin of something so evil. Of course, he’s missing aspects, like Star’s childlike nature, its utterly kind demeanor. Star Platinum is what Jotaro Kujo would be if he stopped worrying. If he stopped overthinking things and merely let himself act, free of expectation, worry, or doubt. Of course, that analytical mind had allowed him to triumph on more than one occasion, but he’s failed to see any of this because it’s not something that would occur to him. Kakyoin will simply have to tell him, at some point.
         “Can you still use this power?” Kakyoin asks softly, and blue-green eyes finally meet his own, burning with the same determination Noriaki has seen on plenty of occasions before now.
         “I don’t know, but I’m not going to find out,” he states, as if that’s the end of discussion. “I already made enough mistakes. Don’t need to add more.”
         Kakyoin frowns, utterly lost. “What kind of mistakes?”
         Jotaro actually snarls, tugging a little on Hierophant’s tendril as his fists and teeth clench tight enough it looks like it hurts. “You were stuck in a coma for ten years!” He only raises his voice a little, but from Jotaro that’s akin to shouting. “And I can’t—I tried to save everyone, but—!”
         Kakyoin in response raises his voice, putting more pressure on Hierophant Green to tug that fist open, to stop Jotaro from hurting himself. He’s firm but gentle. “You did not fail. You did not make a mistake. You saved my life, Jotaro, and you will not beat yourself up for saving my life.”
         Star Platinum bursts forth and smashes a nearby chair with an anguished ‘ora!’, disappearing just as quickly. Josuke-kun flinches. Kakyoin, carefully, does not.
         “No,” he repeats, reassured slightly, because while it’s obvious some things have changed, it’s not as if he suddenly doesn’t know his best friend and crush.
         “If I had been stronger, better—I could have—” He’s trying, but he can’t even explain coherently what he had done wrong. He’s shutting down; his brain is overwhelmed, really, and why not? It’s not as if an old friend suddenly coming back into his life is any less stressful than traveling around the world, even if it’s supposed to be a joyous occasion.
         “Jolyne-chan.” Saying that name out loud sounds weird. It’ll just take some getting used to. “Your dad needs some water. Do you think you can get him some?” It’s not much, but doing something mindless like drinking can help.
         Her chest puffs out. “Right away!” Her Japanese...is passable. At least it’s understandable, unlike Joestar-san’s attempts.
         And then she unravels her arm and sends it across the room to the water cooler, making a concentrating frowning face that seems very familiar.
         “Jolyne-chan, wait, remember what we talked about!” Josuke-kun panics, but the sudden jostle makes the cup spill as she accidentally pulls it back too fast. She stares at the cup of water with only a few drops remaining, nearly in tears.
         “Don’t worry, kid, I’ve got this,” Josuke-kun reassures her, and summons his own Stand, punching the cup—which refills with water. What a fascinating ability.
         Somehow, this has all been lost on Jotaro, who has since continued mumbling to himself. Dissociating, by the look of it. He does, however, start drinking mindlessly the second the cup is placed in his hands.
         “You’re strong enough, Jotaro.” If he’s not hearing, then Kakyoin will simply have to repeat himself later. Noriaki thinks about it, really thinks about it, and suddenly everything makes a whole lot more sense. “Other than my own, you saved Avdol’s and Iggy’s lives. Caesar, too. You gave your mother more agency in her own fate.”
         “Why didn’t you change anything...with Joestar-san and my mom?” Josuke-kun asks quietly, and that cuts through the panic at least slightly. Or rather, it redirects it.
         “You deserved to exist,” he insists. Josuke-kun looks like he’s going to cry.
         “I love you too, dear nephew,” he responds, getting up and hugging Jotaro, who looks very uncomfortable. He doesn’t, however, look ungrateful. As a matter of fact, he looks more present than he had this whole visit.
         “The other Joestars have had a sense of déjà vu, but no one else so far. I didn’t think…” He didn’t think that would happen with anyone else. He wasn’t prepared for any of this.
         “Thank you for saving my life, Jotaro,” Kakyoin states with sincerity; he absolutely will do so every day if he has to in order to get it through Jotaro’s stubborn skull. “If you wanted to know about Red Hot Chili Pepper now…” He’s taking pity on him. This is hardly the last time they’re going to talk about this, but right now Jotaro is too overwhelmed for further conversation, and now that he’s sure this is real, he’s ready to help out in any way he can. Jotaro nods decisively, so Kakyoin begins to retell his own latest Stand encounter.