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[epitaffio]

WELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE CHANNEL, PURPLEPIPER. FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION, USE 541.26.365.77 *** PURPLEPIPER has joined 541.26.365.77 <PURPLEPIPER> Am I doing this right? <PURPLEPIPER> Pretty weird to just leave a message like this is an answering machine or something <PURPLEPIPER> ME leaving a message I mean! <PURPLEPIPER> You can leave one if you want and I'll just get back to you whenever I can.

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[fateschosen]

Hm. I'd thought of Atem as someone reasonably level-headed.

[He, at the very least, is someone who tends not to pry. Has Diavolo really grown so careless?]

It certainly doesn't seem like this part is intended for us. It's an attempt to strike fear into the hearts of the human populace — but I doubt they need more of that. They're already so... helpless. That harpy just finished explaining to us how worthless their best defenses are. They already know their place. This is ... wasted effort. Pointless theatrics.

[Crunch.]

And now, a game? There is no point in playing with one's food. Eat them and be done with it. They've already lost.

[There are little things about this broadcast that unsettle him. The terms of Atem's little game, for one. Is this how he always goes about feeding? One of those types who carefully picks his meals that consist of those most "deserving" of death? If selling shoddy security systems for a profit is enough to warrant this sort of treatment, then...]

Be on your guard around him, Doppio.

[epitaffio]

[Level-headed... He can't really argue with that, can he? Or at least he couldn't, before... this. Just like with the harpy, in the best case scenario, this is purely performative; in the worst, the fog has seriously screwed with his head.

... Somehow, though, he was less sure with the harpy. When it comes to Atem... it's easier to believe that this, too, is part of some game he's playing.

Still, the Boss may be right when he calls it pointless.]

... I guess... the food might not be the point of it either. Maybe it all plays into what he's doing.

[The word felt odd on his tongue. Food. It's only natural that the Boss would put it that way, since he's affected by the hunger, but for Doppio - who is unbelievably unaffected, against all odds immune when not even the Boss is--

It all calls to mind the sensation of ants crawling under his skin.

When the game goes sideways - the humans press the buttons, the trick is revealed, the shade lashes out - Doppio is, in a sense, grateful for the distraction.]

Do you think... Atem knew they'd play dirty?

[fateschosen]

[Diavolo imagines himself in their position. A human held captive by a monster. Helpless, his life left in the hands of Atem and the humans beside him.

It isn't greed that drives them, not from the moment the three are strapped in place in front of stakes aimed to kill. At that instant, the reward at the end is meaningless. Power is wonderful, but power at risk of one's own life... What other option did they have? To sit there idly and trust that the other two wouldn't sell you out in an instant? Wait the allotted time and pray that they wouldn't kill you before you had chance to draw another breath? No, everyone stepped in to their bindings with the same goal — to live to reap their rewards.

He wouldn't have played. That's the difference between him and these humans. He'd have walked away with his life. But, if, against all logic, he did decide to play Atem's game ... he'd have pressed the button before the countdown began as well. It's the only way to ensure survival.]

...I can't imagine a scenario where they would have done otherwise. [He finally says.] That smile on Atem's face when they agreed ... the way this entire scene was arranged ... he must have known what they'd do from the very start.

[And perhaps that is why he feels so uneasy, lapsing into silence as the shade tears into them. Greed made them take the first step and play — and that was all it did. But it wasn't greed, it wasn't soullessness or rottenness that drove them to break the rules and "kill". It was the most basic instinct of all: the need to survive.]

[epitaffio]

... Yeah. I guess you're right.

[Doppio isn't privy to the Boss's logic; all he knows is that the conclusion he's arrived at makes enough sense to him. And Atem is sneaky like that, isn't he? Doppio hasn't known him to be cruel, but...

He doesn't know him all that well, he thinks, shunting fake memories of a fake reality off to the side.

A werewolf comes into frame. She's unfamiliar, but her cool and focused approach is immediately striking.]

"Butcher"? Geez, haven't they done enough to scare people?

[Then again, the collected way she's approaching this... Maybe it is meant to be instructional.

Despite that, and despite the fact that Doppio is sufficiently familiar with arterial spray, the sight that follows makes him gasp. A man with his eyes still open; his throat, sliced; his reaction, absent. It's somehow more eerie than it would have been if the man were either fully alive or fully unconscious.]

declaring myself free of cringe and anxiety and fear. let's go

[fateschosen]

[There have been times that Diavolo thought learning the art of butchery could be useful. For Cervo, fierce as he is with his kills, indiscriminate as he is with his gorging — there are finer ways to approach a meal, and he's toyed with being the one to introduce Cervo to them.

For Cervo ... and for Doppio.

So when the demonstration begins, when the werewolf walks onscreen, his attention is fully on the television. He is no stranger to the gorier details of the human body. How many times has he seen King Crimson's fist plunged into the chest of another? How many has he cut down without a second thought? No, there is nothing here that should bother him.

The werewolf slices the man's throat in one swift movement, and he falls limp. Next, his clothes are torn away. And then, with cold precision, she narrates as his arms are cleanly removed, one by one, followed by his legs.

It isn't the same, not remotely. There is no need for memories of the distant past to dredge themselves up here and now. This is what he tells himself as he continues to watch, unblinking and silent. He is no coward. He won't allow himself to be held back by fear.

Her knife presses against the man's abdomen, and, for the first time in minutes, Diavolo makes a sound: a shuddering gasp.

(11:20 AM. File number 68...)

It isn't the same, it isn't. Nothing... nothing like him. Nothing like him at all, and so he must watch on.]

WE CAN DO IT. WE ARE FREE

[epitaffio]

[Doppio was absolutely ready to pay attention to the rest of the broadcast, despite the distastefulness of the imagery. Not unlike what he did back home, when the Boss places his trust in him, the very least Doppio can do was steel himself and do what's asked of him. Hell, if the Boss wanted him to, he'd start taking notes on how to butcher a person.

But the sound the Boss makes is concerning enough to shove the broadcast into the background of Doppio's priorities. His eyes are no longer on the TV.]

Boss?

<Zigazigah>

[figlia_morbida]

[She's had many, many thoughts since last month's revelation. Sifting through memories and filtering the most tumultuous thoughts back and forth until something clearer is unearthed.

Diavolo and Doppio are the same person.

It's nearly winter again, and she's brought out the photo Doppio gave her many months ago now. Donatella beams up at her, the only person who could've possibly guessed from the start when the man she was so fond of was split in twain. She would've known right away, Trish thinks.

But the memories are enough to tell her that Doppio fits the bill for every descriptor of the man Donatella called her "fairweather papà". Diavolo claimed it was him in the most direct sense, and maybe it was, but that doesn't erase Doppio's involvement.

What does she do with this? Doppio has been more amenable to speaking with her than Diavolo has ever been, but what about now? Where is their truce at? Doppio hasn't reached out at all, so maybe Diavolo has forbid it.

But...she'd rather know for sure than assume.]

Doppio?

Are you able to respond? It's not urgent, but it is important. I need to know where we stand.

[Silence is an answer too.

It's what she expects, really.]

<purplepiper>

[epitaffio]

[... Oh, right. Trish. The last time they spoke...

So much happened last month that it's overwhelming to even think about. The time he ran into her was easily among the worst, so much so that he could only assume it couldn't get any worse and frankly, war aside, he was mostly proven right. The buildup to the split had been torturous, the revelation had shaken him, but the aftermath had been... almost simple.

And he's lucky, so lucky that he was in no state to be on duty when that concert happened, that he only heard of what happened to Trish afterwards, because that aside--

Now that they're all back in Ryslig, it doesn't have to be complicated. Yes, it's still as surreal to think about as it is (he has to admit) strangely logical, and he's sure Trish must have been shocked too... but when you get down to it, in the end, not that much has changed, has it?]

Yeah, sure.
The Boss hasn't told me NOT to talk to you, if that's what you mean.

<Zigazigah>

[figlia_morbida]

[It's true. What changes, really, when everything has already been shattered beyond repair? When the men involved are dead and removed from the context where any of this mattered?

Knowing Doppio is the other, hidden persona of her biological father does nothing for her except offer some final closure on the discrepancy between the boy her mother once fancied and the man who would kill her dead if death meant anything here. It solved the puzzle of why they looked like twins as little boys, and answered the questions Beatrice taunted her with.

Still, she expected something to feel...different. It does, but it's just so small. Like everything has shifted an inch to the side, enough that she bumps into the new context every so often with mild surprise. It's not unlike rearranging furniture in a home long unchanged and bumping your knee into the end table that had always been there, but is more obtrusive for its new placement on the living room floor.

In fact, it's almost nice he still calls Diavolo his "Boss". A familiar thing in a very strange dynamic that she nevertheless has become accustomed to.]

I'll admit I'm surprised by that. I'm sure he trusts me as much as I trust him.

[So, not at all.]

Was he upset to know we'd been talking behind his back?

<purplepiper>

[epitaffio]

[... Haha. About that.]

I think he thinks you forced me into it or something.

<Zigazigah>

[figlia_morbida]

And yet you didn't do anything you didn't want to, Doppio.

I have as much power over you as you do over me.

I know you were scared when you ran into me that night, but beyond that, the decision to keep seeing me was your own.

[An oblique way of saying...well, they made a routine, didn't they? And Doppio could have stopped obliging her at any time, once he'd realized she was toothless, especially after what happened when Bruno found her out. And yet...

She has no love for this man, but it is strange to think that she'd been commiserating with her own father in some form all along. A part of her father that didn't care much if she lived or died, maybe, but who wasn't openly antagonistic either.

It's a big contrast when laid next to the looming, deadly shadow Diavolo cast for months until he was eliminated.]

<purplepiper>

[epitaffio]

Yeah, I know that.

[That night, even if it was only for a moment, Doppio genuinely feared she might eat him.

But she didn't. She just... talked. Made a good point. Swayed him. She swayed him, but in the end, the decision was his, wasn't it? The decision to give her that photograph, even the decision to keep talking to her...

He's still not sure how he feels about that. But that's nothing new. For months on end now, he's wondered if he's been doing the right thing. It's because she's sensible; that's the conclusion he tends to arrive at, or at the very least the conclusion he usually settles on. In a world where Passione is dead and any satisfaction gained from killing Giorno Giovanna would be met with inevitable retribution, there is no safer solution than a careful truce. And isn't that what the Boss wants? Safety?

It's sensible. It's practical. It's what's best for everyone involved, that's all.]

<Zigazigah>

[figlia_morbida]

[They're of one mind on this matter, but there are some things that still escape her understanding.

How can Doppio live as his own shadow? She hasn't forgotten how he talked about that photo. Like any stranger would when presented with the topic, but it's surreal to know that...Mana knew? Or the magic of this world recognized him for what he was, and presented him with a photo integral to his ultimate fate.

Once again, she expects no reply, but she doesn't hesitate to dig a little deeper now that they're talking.]

Tell me something, Doppio.

Does knowing what you do change anything for you?

<purplepiper>

[epitaffio]

Huh?

[He needs to think about it a little. Surely, he already has. It still feels like it's the first time.]

I don't know about "changing"...
It explains some stuff, I guess. Like why the Boss trusts me so much, or why he made me underboss.

<Zigazigah>

[figlia_morbida]

[...Huh.]

Well, I'm sure it would be horrible to be stuck in a body with someone you don't trust. You spared him a fate like that by being just the person he needed.

However, that wasn't the only thing I was referring to.

<purplepiper>

[epitaffio]

So what do you mean?

[Ah... She must be really weirded out by the whole thing. Which makes sense, right? It's not every day you figure out there's two guys in one body, and when one of them's your father...]

If you think it's strange I'm taking it so well...
I think I get it?
But it really DOESN'T change that much. Especially now that we're here, in different bodies again.
Though when I think about it, I really wish I could help the Boss the way I used to...
No wonder he's so skittish around other people if I was the one who handled that stuff all along, you know?

<Zigazigah>

[figlia_morbida]

[...

She honestly can't tell if he's being deliberate. Trish taps her nails on the rim of her keyboard.]

No, I don't think it's particularly strange. You've had time to get used to your new dynamic, and our lives before don't often mean too much here.

But again, that's not what I was asking.

I realize you think of yourselves as separate people, and you are, but physically...you were once a single man. And if you handled the social part of your lives in the past, then it follows that you were the charming young man my mother fell in love with.

[Do you catch her drift, Doppio? Do you?]

here we fuckin go

[epitaffio]

What

[The way Doppio's responses noticeably slow down may shed some light on how deliberate his evasiveness was.]

That doesn't make any sense.

[It's not so much deliberate as it is a somehow habitual blindness. He doesn't do it on purpose, never goes so far as to stare the truth in the eye and shut it down; instead, he manages to walk right through it without looking back.]

That makes no sense!

[There is one thing he has to actively steer his mind away from - his life in that other world, where Trish was present despite not even being in Ryslig at the time - but that isn't difficult for him to do, either.

It was a fake life, and that wasn't really him. Why should it matter? It doesn't matter. He's told himself that so many times, it didn't factor into this until exactly now, when Trish has brought it up, and now he finds himself having to turn away from it.]

Just... think about it!
How old would I have been then??
Your mom wouldn't fall in love with a kid!
I mean... an even YOUNGER kid

HEHEHEHEHEHE

[figlia_morbida]

[It does, but regardless she doesn't understand it.

Maybe it's a reflex too well-trained into Doppio that he doesn't realize it, but in her mind, he said it himself, didn't he?

Nothing's changed.

Which begs the question of how he can comfortably engage with the idea that he and his Boss were once the same man, but the significance it holds regarding his relationship to her is too hard for him to acknowledge? He certainly can't be feeling anything like remorse or guilt with this information being held up for him to examine. Indeed, neither iterations of her father are capable of that.

Maybe she's being uncharitable. Waking up and realizing you are a duo and you have a daughter is a weird, destabilizing fact to someone who's lived a lie for so long, but at that point how can anyone draw a line in the sand over what is or isn't too much? None of it is normal!

Still, she tries to explain it. She hasn't got the patience for denial, but it does occur to her Diavolo probably did not engage the topic like she is right now.]

Doppio, listen to me.

You cohabited a body with your boss, something you yourself have stated and discussed not even minutes ago. That makes you the same age as him regardless of what you may or may not remember for yourself.

It makes us family by blood.

You haven't got any reason to panic and hide from this fact. We both know it. Diavolo knows it. It's a simple truth.

[epitaffio]

[Is there a line? Is it a matter of it being "too much"? The fact of the matter, as Doppio sees it, is that all he knows is the following:

"The Boss and I once shared a body."

It's surreal, but simple. It explains a number of things - not only what he admitted to Trish, but what he doesn't dare to share, such as the ever-persistent inkling that his connection to the Boss truly was something special, something that nobody else had ever had.

But that's all. Why would it mean they're the same age? Why would it mean he has anything to do with Trish?

It's not so much of a line as it is a wall, one that she's forcing him to collide against rather walk through.]

You don't know that. You don't know if we've ALWAYS shared a body.
Do I LOOK old enough to be your dad?

Hell, don't you have that family connection thing?
Where you look at the Boss and you KNOW he's your dad?
If I was your dad you'd have known way before this!

And I'm NOT panicking!

[figlia_morbida]

[This is making Trish wonder if Diavolo swept it under the rug. Or obfuscated some of the truth, but she's dug deep enough to know now.

It makes too much sense for Doppio to have ever been a separate person.

Indeed, he may be a wholly distinct entity from Diavolo, but he's nonetheless a symbiotic one. How else could Diavolo hide so perfectly in plain sight, ruling over Passione without every being identified? With meek Doppio as a front, he could skirt by detection, eyes passing over the unremarkable silhouette Doppio cut.

It also helps her to not lose her nerve or second-guess herself because she's seen exactly how this sort of relationship functions for herself. Without Cervo, maybe Doppio could have said these things and been right. But here he is, a man who denies the reality, not realizing he's made another entity to stand in for him in this world. Almost like it's a survival mechanism of his, to let another personality subsume him wholesale until it's time for them to relinquish control and let him deal with the problems he's meant to handle.

Still...this is troubling. He believes, and yet he doesn't. Where's the divide? Can it be crossed? She can lead a deer to port, so to speak, but she can't make him take the ferry.]

That "family connection thing" is almost certainly a result of my Stand awakening.

I have neither her nor that ability here, so I can't say that's a fair argument to put forth when the first time I ever saw you for myself was on this very peninsula. There's simply no comparison that can be made.

Similarly, I can't prove that you were always the same person, but there are reasons for me to believe that to be true. To imply otherwise would mean that somehow, you two were completely separate people that got put into one body, but that's much harder to pull off than to be two souls in one body, especially when you could seamlessly share King Crimson in a way unheard of among Stand users.

I brought this up not because I want to hold it over you, either. It's more that when I thought about the stories I was told about my father, you fit the description more than your Boss ever has.

Do I want it to be true? No. I wish my father could've been as sweet and kind as the person my mother remembered. Ignoring those supposed traits, you've shown yourself to be a cowardly sycophant, while your other half is heartless and colder than the deepest parts of Hell.

Neither of us gets anything good out of the truth other than some closure on my part.

That being said, if you're not interested, I'm not going to push the issue. Ignoring the biology of it, if you really weren't present enough to remember, then calling you anything resembling "father" must be laughable to you.

[epitaffio]

[He's not sure how he feels.

That is not a statement of indecision, but a complete, vast Unknown. It's as if there were a haze over him - he reads her words and they seemingly achieve the impossible: they fail to penetrate him while also seeping into him and tying a knot in his throat.

What she says makes no sense. He feels no connection to her, Stand-related or otherwise. For some reason, when she calls him a "cowardly sycophant," it stings. It stings when she says those words about the Boss, too, but he can't bring himself to correct her - whenever he tries to write in his defense, something screams at him not to do that. Not to do that to her.

He doesn't know what this IS.]

Didn't you have closure already?
In Rome?
Or... are you saying it's different now?

[figlia_morbida]

[The thing he doesn't seem to get is that she doesn't feel a connection either, not in the way he might think. They're similar, actually, in that he lived never knowing he had technically fathered a child, and she lived knowing what fathers were as a concept while not once caring that hers was absent, not when he had never been there to miss in the first place.

But they do have one tenuous connection, in that he is...maybe the only person besides Diavolo who personally knew Donatella Una, although he doesn't remember her, so what does it matter? What does she get if she somehow conjures the barest memory? Diavolo never spoke of her, and Trish is sure she would spit fire over anything he could possibly say, and she's sure Doppio's opinion would inspire similar rancor.

What happened that summer only carried weight because she exists, after all.

Otherwise, it would have been just a distant memory. But now she's got the lonely position as the only living proof either of her parents ever existed, a forgotten woman and a forgotten man erased from the world just months apart. She supposes Doppio can happily not care about any of it as he always has, which is irritating, but unsurprising.

His question is easy to answer, at least.]

The whole point of going to Rome for me was twofold. Specifically, to find out who exactly my father was, and then to kill him. What I learned in Rome went against what precious little I did know about him, and was secondary to making sure he couldn't ever hurt anyone again; so in a way, it was different the moment we faced each other on the battlefield.

And then I was left with questions no one could answer. The dead can't speak, and the living can speculate until they're dead too, without ever reaching the truth.

However, I'll admit I know nothing about your boss other than what he was able to show in Rome. Maybe he really is just like you when he isn't faced with someone he can only see as an enemy. Maybe he does stop to chat with insects and frogs as amiably as you have in the past. Maybe he's clumsy and awkward too.

Regardless, I think I know the truth.

[epitaffio]

[The next message only comes several minutes later, despite being quite short:]

I've never seen the Boss do anything like that.

["Even though he's not as bad as you think," he wants to tell her. Once again, some part of him vehemently forbids it.]

[textually comes at Doppio w a chair]

[figlia_morbida]

Is that all you've got to say, Doppio?

[Hmph.]

Fine.

The truth persists no matter how much you turn away from it. Actions don't stop having consequences even if they go unseen. Unseen in this case is a double meaning, because I do mean whatever you tried to hide, and the things that happened when you stopped caring to look.

Everything you two tried to bury in the past was able to sprout anew because of your shortsightedness. And I'll be here to remind you every day of that which you failed to erase despite your combined efforts, and I hope it haunts you both for as long as we all live.