"The environment is hardly ideal, I know. I apologize. But… " Click, clack, Dio's heels tap against the hard stone floor. Click. Clack. Click clack. "I'm sure you'll forgive it, in time. If I had the time, I would have brought you elsewhere - to a more familiar landscape. Something more comfortable, perhaps, but… well. You'll understand soon enough." DioxJonathon, 10k words.

"How long has it been, JoJo? What do you think?" Dio's fingers stretch through the empty air, twisting lightly inside those dark curls. At least… he assumes they're still dark. Here, there is no light, no air. Here, there is barely any space, come to that, only. . . "Us," he says, softly, and his voice is like a predator's whisper. "Only us." [dioxjonathon, 3000words, bit creepy]

Dio sits at his favorite chair by the window, a polished wood table at his side, a crystal glass (wine, red and rich) held delicately between the fingers of one hand. In the other, he holds the skull. A souvenir? A treasure? Who can even tell the difference, sometimes. (DioxJonathon, kind of. Well, he's talking to a skull so. 650 words)

That one spirit isn't hard to find after the war. You follow the thin "roads" (if you can call them roads) through the terrains of Hell (and Heaven and Earth, because in the end it's all the same) - past the rotting corpses of trees and the luminous, still-lingering, spirits of long-dead forests, to the deepest pits of the Abyss. (GriffithxGuts, kind of. 800 words.)

How much is "too much?" How deep can a blade go, how many nerves can it sever, how many inches of flesh can it rend? Can it hit bone? Cut through? Perhaps it depends on the person — body mass, blood loss. Then again, maybe not. Breaks are sometimes enough, even without a drop of blood. (Griffith-centric, Griffith/Charlotte. GriffithxGuts implications. Canon divergent AU, 4k)

In which Enrico Pucci returns to Dio's mansion in Egypt two weeks after the close of Stardust Crusaders. (DioxPucci, 2,400words)

He can still remember that man standing atop the steps with the night wind stirring his hair. Strange, and distant and... different. (Griffith/Guts. Casca's in there too.)

The wall is cold against Griffith's back tonight, and he feels it, that chill, seeping into his bones. Creaky bones, he thinks. He may as well be getting old before his time. It seems appropriate for one in his position. (Griffith/Guts, beware the darkness)