Kraven walked down the halls of the Baccarat Hotel back toward the elevators. He was in an awful mood.
What did that girl do? he thought angrily to himself. It's impossible for the elevator to have just randomly malfunctioned. She must have used her Stand. But what did it do?! What did it do?!
"What did it do, goddammit?!" he shouted out loud, punching the wall and shattering a random piece of glass modern art that happened to be hanging there.
"Hey!" someone yelled.
Kraven turned to see a member of the hotel's security staff running towards him.
"What seems to be the problem?" Kraven asked, quickly calming down.
The security guard stopped, confused by his response. He stood there for a couple seconds, then continued moving towards Kraven, albeit much more slowly.
"Sir," he said. "I'm not sure if you realize this, but that was a very expensive art piece you just broke. I'm sure it was probably an accident, so we can get this all sorted out, but-"
"Don't get near that guy!" another voice from further down the hall shouted.
A second security guard came running down the hall from the direction of the elevators. She was clipping a walkie-talkie onto her belt as she ran.
"Don't you ever listen to your radio?" the newcomer chastised the other guard. "Apparently, a man with black hair and tattooed eyes was involved in some kind of fight near the elevators a few minutes ago! That guy matches the description!"
"What, really?!" the first guard asked.
He pointed at Kraven, his hand reaching for the baton on his belt.
"Stay where you are!" he said. "And put your hands where I can see them!"
"Jumping to conclusions, are we?" Kraven said, a bemused expression on his face.
"I said put your-" the guard started to say.
Before he could finish, a knife came flying out of the other guard's badge, burying itself in his left shoulder. He dropped to his knees and screamed in pain, clutching his shoulder with both hands.
"What the hell?!" the other guard shouted.
She also reached for her baton, but before her hand could reach it, the muzzle of a silenced pistol emerged from the window behind her, angled downward. It fired, sending a bullet tearing through her right calf, and she also fell to the ground in pain.
Kraven continued walking down the hall, stepping over the first guard carefully as he whimpered and clutched his wound. Then he stopped, tilting his head and looking back at the two security guards.
"Hm," he said. "It occurs to me that I can't very well just leave the two of you lying out in the middle of the floor with injuries like that. People are going to notice."
He walked up to the guard with the bullet wound in her leg, crouching down next to her. Then he grabbed her by the wrist and jerked his arms to the side, dragging her across the floor and letting go. She flew towards the window, but as soon as she hit it, instead of smashing through it, she seemed to be sucked into its surface, disappearing.
"That's one," Kraven said, standing up. "And now to make it two."
He walked over to the other guard, grabbing his leg and dragging him toward the window as well. Then he swung him forcefully, throwing him as well. Unlike his coworker, though, the guard smashed through the window, falling toward the ground below.
"Dammit!" Kraven shouted. "Dammit, dammit, dammit, I got the angle wrong! Of all the stupid-"
He breathed in, then out.
"No, this is fine," he said to himself. "I'd rather have kept both of those guards alive, but one is fine."
Then he punched the wall again, shattering another unfortunate modern art piece.
"No it's not fine!" he yelled. "Everyone outside probably saw the guy fall to his death! They're gonna call the police, and then I'll have to deal with five whole Stand users and a bunch of guys with guns!"
He clenched his fists and turned back to walk toward the elevators.
"No, I've got this," he growled. "I just need to change the plan up again. I was already in a time crunch since I've got to get to Giorno before the kid does, so this actually doesn't affect anything at all! I'll take the elevator up and just casually walk to his room!"
He stopped and turned to face the elevators, pressing the button to call one. As he waited for it to descend, he tapped his foot impatiently. After several seconds had gone by, the doors finally opened, and he stepped in, pressing the button to take him up to the floor he knew Giorno was staying on. As the elevator doors slid shut, he grinned.
"Of course, what was I even worried about?" he asked himself. "Nero Forte is the perfect assassination tool!"
Joanne walked toward Trish, Scorpion Queen by her side.
"Alright," she said. "Let's hear it. Time to get on in there and see what this Giorno guy has to say for-"
Trish opened the door to the suite, stepping in and then quickly moving to the side to allow Joanne and Scorpion Queen to pass. 10 or 20 meters away, sitting on a large couch and facing away from the door, was a man with a long braid of blonde hair, in addition to two shorter braids, one on either side of the long one.
"-himself," Joanne finished in a notably quieter tone of voice.
As soon as she saw the man, she felt a sudden jolt.
What… was that? she wondered. It's almost like I know this guy… but how?
She cautiously entered the room, slowly walking towards the white couch.
"Is that you, Trish?" the man asked, not turning to look at the door.
"Yeah," Trish replied. "And you'll never guess who I found wandering around in the hotel."
The man stood up, allowing Joanne to see some of his outfit. He wore a black two-piece suit with a golden trim that looked somewhat like a twisting vine. The trim continued down the back of his suit, meeting up just above his coattails, and as he turned around, Joanne saw that he also had golden wings on his collar and shoulders, in addition to a heart-shaped opening in the suit's chest and four green emblems shaped like ladybugs also on the front of the suit, two on the left side and two on the right. His hair had three noticeable ringlets just above his face, and his expression changed from a relatively neutral one to a mixture of shock, relief, and several other things that Joanne couldn't quite place as soon as he saw her.
"Joanne?" he said, walking around the couch and approaching her.
"Yeah, that's me," Joanne confirmed, looking at him. "What, is my name just fucking public knowledge now or something?"
"No," the man said. "You should come take a seat. There are a lot of things I need to explain to you."
He turned and walked back toward the couch, sitting down where he'd been before. Joanne hesitantly walked over to the window, sitting in a chair near the glass table. She looked down at the table and saw all the papers, and the photo of her.
"What the hell is this?!" she asked angrily. "My criminal records, my old school papers, a photo of me? None of this shit is any of your business!"
"Joanne, calm down," Scorpion Queen said, resting a hand on its user's shoulder. "We already knew that this man was looking for us. It's not too much of a surprise that he'd use these kinds of things to do so."
It turned to the man, who was patiently waiting for this exchange to play out.
"You are Giorno Giovanna, correct?" it asked.
"Yes," the man said. "My name is indeed Giorno Giovanna."
"Alright then," Joanne said. "You've got a hell of a lot of explaining to do, jackass!"
"That's true," Giorno replied. "I'll start from the beginning. Your name is Joanne Jonas. You were born in New York City in the year 2004, and your mother was Erin Jonas. You never knew your father- all you knew about him is that he was a man from another country, who your mother fell in love with after he saved her from a gangster who assaulted her. You were born with a distinct star-shaped birthmark on your left shoulder. Ever since you were in primary school, you always broke the rules and got into trouble, but you always managed to avoid getting seriously injured somehow. Your mother passed away two years ago due to a combination of COVID-19, her already poor condition, and other complications, and when that happened, you dropped out of school and ran away, choosing to live on the streets. Is all of this correct?"
"How the hell do you know all that shit?!" Joanne asked angrily. "Who the hell do you think you are that gives you the right to just-"
Giorno reached up and pulled the left side of his suit down, uncovering his skin down to just below the shoulder.
"Do you remember how I mentioned your star-shaped birthmark?" he asked. "Well, I've got one as well."
He turned to show Joanne that he was telling the truth.
"Because, Joanne," he continued, "I'm your father."