It was a normal day for Jotaro. He woke up in his bed at home, got ready for another day of school or skipping- he hadn't decided yet- and then went downstairs to eat breakfast prepared by his mother. Salmon, vegetables and rice, as was a normal breakfast food in his household, and then she handed him his usual lunchbox and his glasses- giving him a stern glare.
"Don't forget your glasses again, sweetie!"
"Shut up, bitch." He said gruffly, taking the offered items and putting them pointedly in his bag. He went to step out, and paused. Ah, there it was. The usual goodbye kiss to his cheek. No matter how sharply he talked to her, or how tall he got, she refused to let him go without it. He smiled a little, not that it showed much with his features.
And then he was on his way, skulking in the general direction of his school with a backpack full of food and his mother's love. To skip, or not to skip… He looked around, trying to see if there was anyone who'd notice him going off his usual path and down to the beach today. Damn, some cops were skulking around the main entrance. Guess he'd made too much of a scene last time he'd gone down there.
He sighed, turning onto the side street and making his way up those tall steps that led to his school. Some girls gossiping at the bottom gave him a fearful look and scattered to the sides as he approached. Just a usual day. But then, quite suddenly, it wasn't a normal day. He wasn't sure what happened, but there was a gash in his leg and he was falling backwards, quite forcefully- no one was near him to have pushed him so how-?
Jotaro didn't have much time to ponder that as he crashed through several branches. Lying flat on his back on the ground for a long moment, he let out a long sigh. Great, what a lucky start to the day. He pushed himself up, ignoring the dark whispers from the girls he'd nearly landed atop, and began dusting off his jacket and patting himself down for more scrapes. That… Could have gone a lot worse. Looks like it was just his leg.
From the top of the stairs, an unfamiliar voice called out, "Are you alright?". Was he alright? Was he alright? He'd just fallen like 20 steps! He squinted up, seeing a vague green blur. That wasn't the colour of their uniform- a teacher? Or maybe a transfer student who hadn't got the uniform changed yet?
"I'm fine." He replied, short and quick, mind still occupied with the strangeness of the coat colour. "Who are you?", he added, just to be a bit courteous. The guy had shown him some courtesy so he may as well give them some back.
Rather than replying immediately, the person made their way down the stairs, and soon the greenish blur resolved itself into something distinctly person shaped, and then yet clearer into a person. Dark, reddish hair with one oversized bang curling around the side of their face, a small smirk on a wide mouth, the emerald uniform studded with gold year pins at the top (a second year, like himself). This was someone he'd think he'd remember, the uniform and hair were pretty unique.
"My name is Noriaki Kakyoin," His voice was gentle, yet very deep. Definitely a guy then, despite what the waist shape said. "You should really clean up that cut on your leg, it might get infected."
Kakyoin held something out to him, and he blinked, looking down at it. A… Handkerchief. He looked at the cut on his leg, that was at least a few inches long, and shook his head. "Thanks, but no thanks. The nurse will do a better job than your handkerchief."
The smile became a little forced. "Let me escort you there, then."
"Do you even know where it is?"
"It's the least I can do, after- watching you fall."
Why did his voice catch there? Was the guy trying to avoid saying he tripped him up? He wasn't even near him. What a weird person. "Good freaking grief. Fine."
Walking into the nurses office, a familiar sight to him but probably new to Kakyoin, he saw two delinquents waiting on beds to be seen. Huh, Nurse must be doing something in her office. Whatever. He sat down in a chair, rocking it slightly as he waited, half closing his eyes to ignore everyone else. He was here to get some disinfectant or whatever and then go… Somewhere. The guy who'd insisted on escorting him here would probably go to his class instead of following him back to town or wherever. Hopefully.
"What, did Jotaro get in a fight?" One of the delinquents whispered to the other, and he cracked one eye open, looking in their direction.
"No way! He never gets hurt from fights. Maybe-"
"Shut up! You're too loud." He growled across the room, not interested in hearing them gossip about him. It worked, they went deadly quiet in an instant. The redhead almost seemed to want to ask a question, a curious expression on his face as he parted his lips, but then the nurse came out of her office and the expression turned more neutral as he stepped aside.
"Did you get into a fight again, Jotaro?" She tutted, examining the gash for a moment before grabbing some fabric scissors from a table, "I'll just cut your trousers and-"
"No." He snapped, pushing the scissors firmly away from his leg, "I'll just take them off!"
She laughed a little, familiar with his antics, before turning to the delinquents and walking away. "Alright, alright. I'll just take these two's temperatures, then, hmm?"
She picked up a pen, shaking it out, and approached one of the delinquents. Nervously, they spoke up, "Hey, uh, that's not a thermometer, Nurse…"
Was Jotaros vision getting worse or was she actually swaying around? "Of course it's a thermometer- maybe you should take a closer look!" And then, without hesitation, she stabbed it into the kids eye.
Jotaro flinched, the strong smells of ink and blood mingling as the blood sprayed out, fast and heavy, from the punctured eye. "What the hell, Nurse!" The other delinquent cried out, fear dripping from their tone as they scrambled backwards away from her.
Unbothered by the shout of surprise, the nurse turned towards Jotaro and started staggering towards him too, shaking the bloodied pen. "Hey now, don't tell me you think this is a pen too…?!"
He stood up quickly, looking to Kakyoin to see if he needed to move him out of the way of the inevitable fight. Rather than fear on his face, there was something like a smirk. The nurse shook the pen out one final time, and then lunged for his face. He grabbed her arm before it finished the arc, holding her back from impaling his face. "You should- get out of here." He managed, addressing Kakyoin. "I'll handle her."
Instead of running out of the room with his tail between his legs, or giving some snarky comment about his luck, Kakyoin only smiled broadly- no, that was definitely a full on smirk. "No, I don't think you will." He walked to the centre of the room, easily sidestepping the feral nurse, probably to smirk at him from afar. Jokes on him, he couldn't even see his face from that distance.
"Tell me, Jotaro Kujo, have you met any other Stand users yet?"
"... What." He was sure the moment was supposed to be dramatic, poignant, villainous, but that sentence didn't make any sense. "What the hell is a Stand user, and how did you get my whole name?!"
Kakyoin's pose slackened, dramatic poise deflating out of him like a sad balloon. "Wait- you don't even know what a stand is?"
"No, and if you're just going to stand there monologuing could you leave?" He grit his teeth, "This nurse is pretty persistent, apparently."
"Oh." Kakyoin was silent for a moment, trying to find words, before puffing himself back up, undeterred, "That's because I'm using her to kill you, Joestar! My stand-"
"Why?" Jotaro was, at this point, quite thoroughly distracted from the pen inches away from giving him a free face piercing. He pushed the nurse to arms length away from him, scowling with confusion. "I don't know why you're using my grandpa's name, but like… why."
"Well-" Kakyoin paused again. Did this guy even have his murder motives sorted out? Good grief. "It's just the right thing to do! Killing a Joestar in the name of lord DIO is the most honorable act you can do in this world!"
"One, I don't know who DIO is and I don't care. Sounds like a boring guy if he wants someone else to kill his prey. Two, my surname is Kujo- Joestar's my damn grandpa's name. Three- can you at least fucking try to tell me what a stand is?"
"I-" The redhead stuttered, absolutely thrown off his villainous rhythm.
Jotaro bared his teeth, a broad smile showing off one of the reasons so much of the school avoided him. A mouth full of shark teeth, glinting and dangerously sharp. "Don't try to lie to me, either."
"Dio is the most wonderful man alive, it's an honor to serve him-"
"Stands."
Kakyoin was silent for a moment, and then, quite suddenly, the Nurse stopped flailing on his outstretched arm and passed out. Jotaro shot her a worried look, and lowered her down, not taking his eyes far off the redheads form.
"Can you not see him?" Kakyoin said, quieter. Muted with some feeling he couldn't name. Hesitantly, Jotaro looked around, trying to notice anyone new. No, no one he could notice. Nurse, Kakyoin, Delinquent crying, Delinquent bleeding and crying, and himself.
"There's no one else here, dipshit."
"Ah." Kakyoin laughed nervously, "I think there's been a misunderstanding-"
"A misunderstanding." Jotaro repeated. He stalked over to Kakyoin, only stopping when he was stood over him, holding the smaller person fully in his shadow and his view. "A misunderstanding led you to try and kill me?"
"... Yes?"
"Well, I'm sure you'll agree to this misunderstanding then." He hissed, and swung his fist into Kakyoin's stomach, tossing him against one of the beds, ignoring the crack of impact. He stepped closer, or he would have if it wasn't for- something in the way. It was like he was caught in a net, thick invisible rope holding him immobile.
Pulling his arms and moving his torso did nothing to loosen the 'rope', whatever it was. "What the hell did you do?" He snarled, staring down at Kakyoin.
"Well, you did ask what a stand was." They smiled, clearly confident now that they were in the clear for punches. "Do you not like practical demonstrations?" The smooth purr of the voice made Jotaro just want to punch him more, even as he struggled to escape the invisible netting. This guy had no clue how annoying he was being.
"No shit I don't like this-!" abruptly, he was cut off by some part of the net being shoved into his mouth like a gag. Well, more fool Kakyoin. These teeth weren't just for show. He bit down hard on the invisible rope, and it quickly retracted, blood spurting from Kakyoin's fingers at the same moment.
"What the fuck-" Kakyoin hissed- "You bit him!"
"You stuck some rope in my mouth, what was I supposed to do-!"
"Go quiet?!" He cradled his hand, "You bit my fucking stand-"
"That's what this rope is?" He tried to move his arm, and, upon seeing that it was still restrained, he got a terrible idea. He moved his head to his arm, and then, made as if he were going to bite the air in front of it. Then he tried moving it again. Hell yeah, free arm. Take that, weird invisible rope stand.
He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, as he ground out a sentence since he apparently had the bastard's attention now. "Listen, I don't give a shit about DIO or whatever but you seriously just tried to kill me. You deserved that."
"Alright, Alright... I guess I did." Kakyoin held his hands up despite his bitter tone, the universal signal for chill out showing. "That was my Stand, Hierophant Green." He sighed dramatically, "I thought I'd finally found another stand user, especially with those strange teeth of yours. Dio must have sent me after the wrong person."
"Another- stand user?" He let himself relax a little bit. Not enough that he wasn't ready to trade fists at a moment's notice, but a bit. "You looking for something supernatural?"
"Well- yes, it could be called that."
"... I have lots of books on that sort of thing." He had gathered them over several years, but nothing really fixed him so he'd just let them gather dust.
"Is that an- invitation?" Kakyoin seemed genuinely perplexed.
Rather than reply and say yes, like a normal person might, he walked over to the window and jumped out. "I know a good way off campus." Redhead could follow on his own initiative. He was gonna skip whether or not that guy followed him.
Stepping under the entrance to his house, and slipping his shoes off, Jotaro blinked in surprise. There in the living room was his Grandpa- the one his wannabe murderer had the surname of memorised- and some foreign guy he didn't recognise at all. Before he could slip through to his room, the old man turned and looked at him and Kakyoin. "Oh? Jotaro, what's this! You never bring friends over!"
"... Fuck off jiji. I'm just showing him some books." Why did jiji have to be visiting- why today. He just wanted to give the guy the books, and toss him straight back out into the street. This was a stupid decision. Looking back to Kakyoin, he could see the redhead's wide mouth was drawn tight with tension. It'd be just his luck if the guy tried to kill his whole family, if he was actually after the bloodline. But no one had any freaky powers- technically. So it should be fine. He grabbed the others arm roughly, and dragged him to his room, closing the door forcefully behind them.
"What sort of supernatural is it." While it should have been phrased like a question, the dead tone delivery made it alot more blunt than intended. Kakyoin looked visibly uncomfortable, hovering near the door. Shit. "I've got… lots of books." He elaborated, gesturing to the well stocked book shelf.
Kakyoin nodded, still looking quite unsettled, and moved to look closer at the book titles. "It's something like a companion spirit."
Jotaro sighed. A companion spirit. Lots of folklore about that. He ran his hand atop the spines of a row of books, pulling out a few and putting them into Kakyoin's arms. "This covers familiars in celtic mythos, this is a general summary of european folklore that mentions it in chapter 23..." Next row, asian myths, "Here's some about tutelars, and these ones cover yokai lore in general."
He paused, assessing the stack in Kakyoin's arms. That was getting quite sizable. "Do you want to come back for the tribal myths another time? They're good reading, and they actually get a lot right."
Kakyoin opened his mouth to say something, eyebrows furrowed with confusion, before a loud crash cut him off for the second time that day. The two teens paused, looking in the direction of the noise. It was swiftly followed by a muffled, shocked, 'oh my god!' from jiji. damn it. What the hell happened?
Without a word, he stepped out of the room and half sprinted to the source of the noise. Books could wait, that crash sounded dangerous. In the entrance to the kitchen, his grandpa and the foreigner were standing there. "What happened." He growled, pushing his way between them, only to stop still the cold floor of the kitchen, lay his mother, passed out and looking very ill. He froze, mouth half open in surprise. She hadn't been ill just a few hours ago- had she?
Authors Notes
A fanfic Idea I came up with quite suddenly, and then couldn't let go. It's going to be quite rough, as it is mostly a serious crack fic, but I'm writing it for my enjoyment mostly so that's okay. I will be cross posting on AO3 as well under the same name. Updates will probably be infrequent or inconsistent. Please leave a review or favourite if you liked this or have any questions or suggestions! It helps with the motivation alot.