Il vangelo dell'infanzia
Chapter 1.
Quietly, a man sits alone in a hotel room, tip-tapping on a large personal laptop. The room was perfectly clean as if it had been recently upkeeped by the hotel room attendant for new customers, though no staff had been there in a week. That, however, was to the man's liking. He was beyond secretive, he had not even spoken nor heard his given name in years. But this was for good reason, as he was the head mafioso of the largest gang in Italy, supplying and organizing more than half of the world's illegal drug and arms trade.
Suddenly, the door to his room opened. An older woman dressed in the hotel's cleaning uniform walked in, whistling a pretty yet indistinct tune. Always the paranoid man, he had been paying attention to the cleaning schedule for the week he had been staying at the hotel. It was standard behavior for him, no more eventfull then breathing. He had developed this behavior after years of staying at hotels, as it was his preferred lodgings. While staying in a luxurious house was probably more comfortable, it provided many weaknesses. Staying in one place, having something in even a fake name or forged identity, and having potentially snooping or curious neighbors were just many ways a less cautious man could have his identity found out or questioned.
The man, after an archeological expedition to Egypt, had discovered a set of arrows. These arrows, forged from a meteorite that had landed in Greenland, contained a space virus that blessed those with a strong enough soul with a mystical ability called a Stand. Stands were reflections of their user's own souls, embodiments of what they may call their "True Self." This man, through greed and paranoia, had forged his soul and unlocked a Stand that he had named 『King Crimson』. This Stand, humanoid in shape, crimson in color, covered in ornate silver intercrossing lines, and with another smalled face directly on where its forehead ought to be had the ability to skip time. Able to see 10 seconds into the future, anything it saw was destined to happen. Though, because of 『King Crimson』, he and he alone was able to alter whatever happened in the ten seconds leading up to whatever head had seen. The paranoia of people finding out his identity had also allowed him to be the only one aware of what had happened in those 10 seconds. Effectively bypassing the causality of events, let allowing the result to stay, yet nobody besides him knowing what had led up to that event.
As the woman walked in, perfectly punctual, the man activated his stand. To him, in these few seconds, it felt as if he himself had been erased from existence and yet the only thing of reality that remained in the timeless world. Having everything and everyone in existence ignore you unless you chose to interact with them was an experience that gave this man a feeling of being on the throne of reality, despite having done this countless times. Gathering up what few possessions he had, he quickly and effortlessly slipped out the window. When the woman would come to in the next few seconds, she would never notice that it had been neglected by cleaning for the last week, or even that a living being had stepped foot in there since its last cleaning. Cooly withdrawing, the man exited the window into a back alley unnoticed. But, if anyone had noticed him exiting, they would not have seen a roughly 6-foot tall fit man exiting the window, but a boy who looked no older than 15 who stood many inches shorter than the man. This boy, Vinegar Doppio, was afflicted by what many may call Multiple Personality Disorder unbeknownst to him. So severe was his disorder than even his physical body changed forms when his secondary personality took over.
As the young man walked out into the street, he took a look around. It was a nice Italian day, sunny and beautiful. He crossed over the road to peer over the railings to look at the clear crystalline cerulean shimmer of the ocean. "What a lovely day," the boy thought to himself "I wonder what the boss is going to ask me to do next? I hope he gives me a break from that last assignment, tracking down and chasing that Frenchman was hard enough." Leaning over the rails, thinking to himself, he felt a quick but painless bump that made him lose his balance and nearly tumble into the ocean. After quicky steading himself, he looked to his side and saw a couple of young boys running and chasing after a soccer ball. "Sorry about that mister!" One shouts, no older than 11 or 12. "Watch where you're going you brats!" the boy shouts back, although they were probably out of hearing range by now, with the sound of the ocean and seagulls providing a nice song of nature that only helped to exemplify the peace and beauty of the town. "Oh well, they meant no harm by it," the boy said to himself as he got up from the railing and started walking along the sidewalk. As he started to get closer into the main part of town he walked across a group of young men, roughly 18 to 20, performing for money. They were break dancing to a song the young man did know. He stopped for a while and watched, neither particularly engrossed or disinterested in the performance.
As he listened and watched, so to did his alternate personality. The track they were dancing to sampled lines from a movie that particularly interested the man. "The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist, that was his power" "To be in power you didn't need money, or guns, or even numbers. All you needed was the will to do what the other guy won't" "How do you shoot the devil in his back, what if you miss." The man, Diavolo the name he had given himself, was intrigued and yet infuriated by these lines. They seemed to describe him perfectly, down to his need to hide himself and the power to do it, to his personal philosophy that results were what mattered in the world and any and all actions taken to get them were justifiable. But the mere idea that someone could portray any form of threat to him enraged him. To him, it was preposterous. He was the king of kings, the Emporer of time. Standing up to him would be like an ant standing up to an elephant, a human standing up to a god. But deep down he knew the possibility existed.
Suddenly the boy started to here a telephone ringing. "Du-ru-ru-ru-ru" It went. He knew that it was the boss trying to contact him, so he looked for the phone. He found the "phone" on the ground by the men dancing. "Hey, don't touch that, thats our money jar" The young man who had just been previously break-dancing accused Doppio. "What are you talking about, cant you see I have a very important phone call to take?" Replied Doppio as he tried to shoulder the "Phone" away from the man, trying to take his donations back. "Hey asshole, give me back my money!" the man shouted as he started to grab and wrestle the jar from Doppio. Doppio, losing his patience hits the man with the strength that you would never expect from a boy his size and stature and screams "Don't friggin touch me, you're pissing me off". The man flew back, hitting the brick wall with enough force to produce hairline fractures in both the bricks and the man's bones.
"Hi, this is Doppio?" The young lad says into his "phone". "Hello Doppio" Speaks a deep, intimidating voice into the phone, oozing menace and power. "I have a mission for you to complete"