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When the pain fades away and he can feel his body once more, he doesn't move. He's stopped bothering to even open his eyes a good while ago now. He's stopped counting, too, twenty-one deaths in, and he’s given up on trying to find an escape half a dozen ago . He completely lacked any sort of will when he was alive - out of there , at least, he's not particularly interested in considering the specificities of his situation in regard to life and death - and it's not like there's a point in changing now.
Someone crouches next to his head.
It happens sometimes. Someone comes, and they may even talk to him. He never answers. Surely there are some beautiful sceneries and intricate scenarios created just for him, and he's ignoring them. He could tell himself that this makes him win , in the end, that he's making the punishment lose its purpose by accepting it so passively - but there's no one left to impress. No one left to lie to. For a moment, before settling on the "lie down and wait for death" approach, he looked, each time, for the thing that would kill him. Trying to die as fast as possible, over and over and over again. As if hoping, still hoping that there was an end to the nightmare, that he simply had to reach it. He was wrong, obviously. Forever, he's there forever, and there's nothing else to do than lie there and wait for the pain to come, once again.
"Hello? Can you hear me?"
The shock knocks the air out of Diavolo's lungs and when his eyes snap open, they meet large, golden brown ones, looking at him upside down. He reflexively rolls on the side and kneels up, heaving. Face to face with - an image he's seen so many times in the mirror, pink hair and pink sweater and freckles -
"Are you, uh, afraid of me?" Doppio asks.
This is too much. It's… it's cruel, already way more cruel than any of the deaths have been, and Diavolo knows he'd better leave immediately and go jump off something on his own because - because whatever scenario is in store for him, it'll destroy him for sure.
"Don't be afraid! You're fine! Except, hm, you're dead. So maybe you're not that fine. But I won't hurt you!!"
Doppio looks… Diavolo thinks he looks off, for a second, without being able to pinpoint why. Sitting on his knees, he has his hands open before him, waving, and an uneasy but encouraging smile. No, it’s not that he looks off. Diavolo, after all, has only ever seen him in the mirror - reversed features, neutral expression. Doppio doesn’t look off at all. He looks like what everyone that’s ever crossed his path has seen him as. Everyone but Diavolo. They may never have been apart, but they’ve never - really, they've never seen each other.
"I felt like I had to come here, because someone was about to arrive and I should greet them and tell them about, you know, them being in the afterlife and everything. I just felt it, you know? It was a little weird. Ah. Ah, yeah! So you're in the afterlife! I hope you'll like it here. It's nice, I think. I find it nice."
What will it be? What will it be? Is Doppio - is he the one who's going to kill him? Diavolo can imagine it, oh, so perfectly. Doppio's thin fingers closing around his throat, squeezing and squeezing the air out, his eyes glowing a dull light and his lips distorted in a smile too wide for his round mouth. Or maybe Doppio's presence is simply a bonus. A nice little bonus! Maybe he'll get killed too, killed again, before Diavolo's eyes this time. Maybe he'll simply disappear - as soon as Diavolo will touch him, say his name, or maybe… Maybe...
"Why did I have to greet you, though? I've heard that when someone arrives here they're usually greeted by someone they knew. There wasn't anyone waiting for me, when I died. Do we know each other? I, uh, I feel like I know you, somehow. But I can't tell who you are? So that's weird too. Uh, actually, it's also weird that you're just staring at me without saying anything. Are you alright?"
He knows it's not -
There's no way that -
Diavolo knows this isn't real , only a lie, an illusion, and he keeps telling himself that as he tremblingly - reaches out, touches Doppio's shoulder for the very first time, feels it, really feels it, under his fingers, and pulls him against himself. Doppio doesn't get away and he doesn't vanish either. He tentatively pats his back a few times, stutters "I-it's okay, it's okay!", and all this - all this, Doppio's slender frame between his arms, the cotton of his sweater soft against his chest, his hands awkwardly hitting his back - it all feels real. God, it feels…
It feels…
Is it going to end? When is it going to end?
Diavolo clutches him tighter.
"Doppio…" he breathes out, voice hoarse, and Doppio shudders against him.
"B… Boss?"
He sounds small. Scared. No, maybe not scared, rather…
"Boss… It's you, right? It's you… I… I…"
Hopeful . Hopeful?
"Boss, I missed you… I missed you so much! I didn't know… I didn't know if I'd hear your voice again…"
Doppio's body suddenly comes closer and the impact almost makes him fall backwards and something tightens itself around him and Diavolo's mind goes blank. That's it. That's it. That's when the illusion ends. He's going to die again, because he's left his guard down, because he's forgotten that there is - no escape, only death, and - then - he hears a sob.
Next to his ear.
Doppio… is sobbing, face buried in his shoulder, and his arms are wrapped around him. He's - he's hugging him, isn't he? He's not…
"You're not going to kill me?" Diavolo blurts out.
Doppio sniffles. "Uh?"
They're hugging. They're… hugging. That's what they're doing. It's a lot. There's a body close, so close to him, pressing against him, and a special warmth to it. There are arms enveloping him, trapping him, and he has to trust that they're not a threat. It's a lot, but it feels…
It feels…
It feels right.
Diavolo hasn't hugged anyone in - he can't remember how long, can't remember if he's ever even hugged anyone - in years, at least, years when he was alive and then however much time he's spent dying. It's the same for Doppio, he realises with a start. There were some nights where he'd watched Doppio hug himself, wrap his own arms around himself in a tight embrace. Diavolo could feel what he felt, faintly, like hearing a voice talking through a heavy blanket. Doppio was lonely. Doppio found the pressure of his own arms comforting. Doppio wished that those arms were someone else's. Doppio wished that someone would at least call him, keep him company.
On these nights, Diavolo never called.
It wasn't safe. Doppio was his underboss, and it had to stay this way, they had to maintain this distance. Because if they got closer, too close, Doppio would eventually figure out who his boss really was, and - and one more person knowing about his identity would multiply the risks of his enemies finding it out and coming after him, coming after him through Doppio . Doppio's ignorance was a safety net, one of the many he had weaved around himself and around them both, and they were fragile, thin like a spider's thread and keeping together a perpetually collapsing structure, but they had to stay in place. No matter the circumstances. Even when they felt like a cage. He never called, but he tried, once, just once, to wrap his own arms around himself in the dead of night. He tried to imagine the arms were someone else's. It did feel comforting, for a few seconds. Then... it felt vulnerable. The fear, the terror he could never really get rid of rose in his chest, suffocating. He couldn't allow himself to feel vulnerable. Each weakness was an opening for their enemies to strike. He had to be strong, for his own and Doppio's sake. He had to be… He noticed a tightening in his throat, an itch in his eyes, and he ceded control of their body back to Doppio before he could start…
Crying.
Is he…
Is he… crying?
His eyes and his lungs are burning hot and tears are rolling down his cheeks, landing on Doppio's sweater. He gasps for air. This isn't right, he shouldn't be so exposed, so fragile, he should be stronger than that, he should… The frantic thoughts racing through his mind come to an halt. They're not… They should be accompanied by a violent, drowning panic, but… they're not. They're reflexes, driven by a phantom of fear, but the fear… it's not there anymore. He doesn't… he doesn't… he doesn't feel afraid, he feels…
The word forms in his mind, makes his body shudder in disbelief. Here, crouching on the ground in an unknown place, uncontrollably crying in someone's arms, at his most vulnerable - he feels safe.
"I'm sorry you're dead, boss," Doppio mutters against his shoulder.
Diavolo emits a strangled wheeze. His head is spinning. He feels safe. He feels safe . For the first time, the very first time, no paralyzing fear, no gripping worries, no despair, no pain. Like waking up from a lifelong nightmare - a nightmare longer than life. Sorry? If he's dead, really, finally dead, finally in the afterlife, finally allowed to rest - then it's the best thing that's ever happened to him.
He can't say this to Doppio. There's a lot, there's so much to explain, to make up for. All he's done, all the atrocities and the deaths - nothing he could ever say or do would erase them, but…
But maybe he can still have some sort of second chance. A chance, now that the horrifying fear of being known has left him, a chance to do right by Doppio. To atone for all the lies. To explain everything. To say that he's sorry, that he was wrong, all this time, and that he, Doppio, should have been the only thing that mattered. That he had known this, once upon a time, and that he had forgotten, had used him, had told him so many lies , had watched him suffer without doing a thing. Had left him to die. That he had gotten lost, somewhere along the way, but that he's there now, and maybe… if Doppio wants it, they can finally get to know each other, and eventually… now that they're face to face, separate, maybe they can finally get close. Get to be friends, brothers.
Is that why he's there? Was he freed for this second chance? He doesn't know, he may never know. That's what he wants to do. He feels a twinge of fear grip his chest once again - can all this still disappear? Will Doppio accept him, when he learns the truth? But he won't be controlled by this fear. He wants to make it right. He's going to make it right.
"My Doppio… I missed you, too."