The Ludicrous Escapade Pt.3

Enlighten Him

Valentine took note of your new position. He wasn't particularly surprised, having already guessed the nature of the ability your Stand was using. Across the many universes, he had seen a few Dios here and there with a similar power.

Perhaps he was more annoyed, than anything else. You had decided to take the time to place yourself at Gyro's side as he gave his dying breath. Were you mocking him now? Saying you'd rather be with a dead man than himself?

Clearly, Valentine was unaware that you had succeeded in saving Gyro Zeppeli.

Valentine decided to continue with the monologue he had started before you had stopped time, this time addressing it to you. "You see, since the steel ball had been scraped away, it was no longer a true sphere, but an ellipse! It was not a perfect rotation anymore! It was the rotation of an elliptical sphere when it collided! It was imperfect!"

He looked down at you, now deciding to place blame on you for Gyro's supposed death. "You chose to take Lucy with you, (Y/N). Did you want save her? But it's because she was with you that he was so completely defeated. If you had just left her on the train and stayed with me, I would have let him go. It's because you have suddenly become so insistent on defying me that I needed to ensure his demise."

He extended a hand toward you. "I won. If he had thrown a perfect sphere, then perhaps he would've shattered D4C's dimensional walls. But he wasn't so lucky, was he? I am the one is who is victorious."

"What...?" Johnny's voice was shaky. "What the hell is going on?" Gyro had attacked the President... and now he was unmoving in your arms. Had he... was he dead? As all the time the three of you had spent together flashed through his mind, his breathing bordered on erratic.

You looked over at Johnny. The President was still focused on you, so you couldn't really inform Johnny without Valentine knowing as well. Not that it really seemed you'd be able to alert him at the moment, anyhow. Johnny's mind appeared to have drifted elsewhere. So for now, at least, you thought it might be better if the the President believed Gyro was dead.

"And next is you, Johnny Joestar. But first..." Valentine reached into his jacket and pulled out a revolver, firing all six bullets at Gyro.

Time froze again, right before the bullets made contact with Gyro's torso.

"Oh. Hey. You did it." You started plucking the bullets out of the air.

Dio gave you another offended look. "Why are you surprised?"

"Are you really asking me that after what just happened a minute ago? I gave you one job and you can barely manage to do that." You let the wound in your hand bleed some more, decorating the water with it. Just to sell the idea of the Zeppeli being dead even more. Hopefully that would prevent Valentine from attacking him again. "Though I guess I don't really expect much from you nowadays."

"(Y/N)..." Dio put a hand on your shoulder. "I'm not going to let your little friends or whatever die. I know that would just make you despise me even more. Believe it or not, I would actually prefer if you didn't hate me. So..." He turned away from you, no longer entirely sure where he was going with this. "You can at least expect a little from me."

"Okay?" It was clear you did not believe in him.

His mouth set in a small pout as he allowed time to continue once more.

You made sure you were in roughly the same position you had been when time had frozen. The ocean began to pool around you, so you lifted Gyro's body slightly to keep his head out of the water. His breathing was faint. The last thing you needed was him drowning.

Valentine let out a short huff. "Very well. Hold onto his body if you want. We can bury him later."

You wondered if Valentine realized that his whole body had now been aged up by Gyro's Stand with the Zeppeli's last attack. He looked well into his seventies and the skin of his face was beginning to sag. He only had a few tufts of hair left on his head.