conceptofzero:

Seperation

He wakes up in the remains of the Cairo mansion. There’s sunlight coming through the walls, bright and vivid. He raises a hand and watches the light pour through him. DIO leaves no shadow.

Dead, then. Dead a second time. From one half life to another. His body must be dust. They likely burned him, rather than risk his return, no matter how unlikely. They were not Jonathan.

There are other ghosts here. He finds Vanilla Ice pacing in row upon row, following a death spiral on the second floor. His eyes are full of fury, but he doesn’t respond to a word from DIO. The same scene plays out in the basement as Telence agonizes over a game that’s long been lost. His servants can’t see him, even though they are all dead. They carry on, and DIO is left mute, disrespected and disregarded.

If this is Hell, it’s been very well tailored for him.

The living pay him just as little mind. He watches his home combed over and picked apart by men wearing the Speedwagon Foundation uniforms. Jotaro Kujo comes with them. He finds DIO’s diary and burns it, failing to comprehend the secrets that lie within. Jotaro, ignorant and boorish, throws aways the secret of Heaven, out of nothing but spite.

DIO watches. He is condemned to watch.

When he can stand it no longer, he faces West and walks. He crosses sands and rough terrain. He never tires. And when he hits the sea, he hesitates only briefly before he takes a step forward. His feet rest lightly on the surface of the water, and he treads above his prison, walking over the waves as he heads to the only place he has left to go.

There were many followers he left scattered over the world. But there’s only one he wants to see. Enrico. Enrico. Enrico.

Time is meaningless. He does not hunger. He does not tire. Boredom is all that remains. DIO marks the first seven days and then no more. He merely treads forward, as the blue of the ocean turns to black.

When he reaches the shore, he climbs a distinctly American beach and walks towards the nearest lights, orientes himself, and walks to a home he knows. To the boy he loves. Here, he finds more ghosts, all the same as before. They lie in ditches, screaming. They sit on highways, weeping. They stand in graveyards and in restaurants and hospital parking lots and every since one sees no one else around them. All of them, trapped in a personal hell made of their last moments, or greatest failure.

DIO carries his hell with him.

The house remains, just as he last saw it. There’s no need to wait for someone to open the door for him this time. DIO walks through it, and he winds his way to the room he lay in with Enrico.

Enrico is there. He sleeps. He’s lost weight since DIO last saw him. The little things that Enrico treasured look neglected, or forgotten, or perhaps thrown away entirely.

In Enrico’s hand, DIO sees it: his bone.

He’s a ghost. Nothing he says is heard. Nothing he does can be felt. DIO has no power to change his world anymore. He no longer than The World.

And yet, as he lies on the bed behind Enrico and wraps an arm around him, he swears he feels Enrico relax in his sleep.

This is Hell. But if it is to be Hell, then DIO will choose who he spends it with.