Chapter Text
Once, Zhuang Zhou dreamed he was a butterfly, a butterfly flitting and fluttering about, happy with himself and doing as he pleased. He didn't know that he was Zhuang Zhou.
Suddenly he woke up and there he was, solid and unmistakable Zhuang Zhou. But he didn't know if he was Zhuang Zhou who had dreamt he was a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming that he was Zhuang Zhou.
-- “The Butterfly Dream”, Zhuangzi, Chapter 2
Dan, a six year old who had no business thinking about Zhuangzi or any kind of philosophy other than what could be had for snack time, nevertheless sat contemplating the subjectiveness of reality. Over the last few years of his (current?) life, as his brain and self-awareness developed, the fog of eat-sleep-bowel movement-happy-upset slowly lifted, allowing his previous (dream?) life to filter through in fits and starts.
The smallest, most insignificant things would trigger these visions (memories?) -- the edge of a counter at eye height, where Dan would find himself recalling that his field of vision should be higher, or a flash of green or pink hair that he didn’t quite remember being natural shades– some of his family had locks a desaturated sort of pink – or the aroma of Papà’s coffee, which smelt even stronger than the tar he used to drink at work (work?).
At some point he’d also realized his other iteration had(?) lived in a different country and spoken a different language, and promptly freaked out over how long it had taken him to notice. He thought he remembered a smoggy, crowded city full of traffic and noise, a far cry from the terraced vineyards and crisp alpine air of his current home.
Dan had yet to remember how that life ended, if at all, and felt like he didn’t really want to. He enjoyed his current life, despite (or perhaps because of?) his child status, and got the feeling he hadn’t been doing so great in the other one. Why would he be here otherwise?
And then there was the matter of this small bonus, which Dan thought might be a consolation prize granted to him for reincarnation. Entering the simulation. Whatever this was.
Shifting his body so the small hands cupped in his lap would not be visible to anyone passing the balcony on which Dan had secluded himself, Dan concentrated and lit a tiny green spark on the tip of a finger. He made it dance over his fingertips one by one, from the index finger to the pinky and back to the thumb, then let it fizzle out.
He’d gotten this ‘mutant superpower’, for the lack of a better term, after miraculously surviving a lightning strike that charred the field he had been standing in, but left him without so much as a scratch. After that, Dan noticed that electronics around him would malfunction whenever he got particularly agitated, and eventually, when he wanted them to. Further empirical investigation established that he could manifest what seemed to be green sparks of electricity if he was determined enough. This ‘electricity’ had strange properties that defied the laws of physics (at least the ones Dan knew of; who knew what crazy natural laws this world abided by) — other than shorting out the lights and scrambling phone calls, it could make objects impervious to damage, which made absolutely no sense at all. Maybe it could even crystallise thin air, considering Dan had once accidentally summoned a green disk of … something … in response to being pursued by a wasp, which had then bounced off the disk and died.
Dan, of course, found this to be the most exciting thing he’d ever done in either of his lives, and wondered if it was the purpose for him being here. Not like he actually could envision himself as some legendary hero with superpowers.
At any rate, Dan desperately wanted to spend more time practicing and experimenting to find out what else he could do with it. Could he electrolyse water? Charge a battery?
Unfortunately, six-almost-seven year olds did not get a lot of private free time. He also had primary school (the greatest waste of time ever when one could do advanced calculus), in addition to the multiple extracurricular activities his family mandated (self-defense, mountain survival training, shooting, hot-wiring, lock-picking…).
All in all, Dan had a pretty rough schedule.
He could of course come clean to his new family about his neon green superpowers, but he was a bit apprehensive of how they would react. He didn’t doubt they loved him, but …
“Mamma, we found Dan!” A familiar sing-song voice, accompanied by a rumbling “Boof!” interrupted Dan’s thoughts.
Dan turned around to face the source of the sound, his current older brother, Dario, and their family St. Bernard, Bébé. The gangly, curly-headed teen was smiling, as he always did around Dan, but his eyes held a glint of concern. “What are you doing sitting by yourself on this chilly balcony, Dan?”
“I just wanted to watch the sunset, and it’s not that cold,” Dan replied hastily, petting Bébé as the dog ambled over to lick him. He peered around Dario and futilely backed away as he realized Dario’s voice had indeed summoned the force of nature that was their mother. “I wasn’t getting into trouble,” he added quickly as Mamma’s hawk-like gaze focused on him, then grinned warmly as his mother’s expression softened.
Mamma, or Madam Zheng, as the staff addressed her, was a formidable lady of stocky build allegedly descended from Chinese pirates (and Portuguese traders, and possibly a half-dozen other lineages. Dan still had no idea how a pirate lady ended up this far inland up in the mountains). She looked and acted nothing like what Dan remembered of his other (previous) maternal parent, other than sharing the same surname, but felt like that familiar brand of aggressively well-meaning tiger mom all the same. He loved her as he loved all his other family in this place: noisy, effervescent Dario, brilliant, aloof Diletta, and their distracted but affectionate Papà, whose greatest achievement was probably marrying Mamma, who ruled the household with an impeccably manicured iron fist. Sometimes he felt a little guilty about his hazily remembered other family, who he’d presumably left behind permanently to be here, but it was very difficult not to enjoy being part of the energetic, weird and wonderful Villani household, despite the family’s many failings.
Such as their various and sundry criminal activities.
“You shouldn’t sit around so much, Daniello. You should go play outside, get some exercise,” said Mamma, patting Dan on the head fondly as Dan gave her a hug. At his eye level, Dan spotted a small blood spatter on Mamma’s otherwise impeccable pantsuit. Because Mamma would want to know so she could make herself presentable, and because he wanted to change the subject, Dan pointed it out quickly.
“Mamma, were you collecting rent again? There’s a bit…” Dan gestured to his own chest.
The Villani Trading Co. did everything from protection rackets to dairy smuggling to pest control (for a given definition of ‘pest’) in their little rustic corner of northern Italy. They were small-time, regional fixtures who generally kept to themselves, doing their best to avoid the meandering tentacles of the Milanese syndicates further south and the Swiss past the border. As the boss’s wife, Mamma didn’t have to see to business herself, but Dan suspected she rather enjoyed terrorizing would-be troublemakers. With family like these, Dan had long since given up hope of living life on the straight and narrow.
It didn’t quite bother him as much as he thought it should. Was this what they called ‘desensitization’?
Mamma, having spotted the stain, clucked her tongue in annoyance. “So there is,” she sighed. “Dario, take your brother to the dining room. I will join you shortly. Papà’s home for dinner today.” She gave Dan’s hair one last ruffle and turned to leave, handing her jacket to the slim, short haired lady beside her, her bodyguard/personal assistant Haiyan, who bowed slightly and followed after her.
“Come on, let’s go.” Another hand came down on Dan’s head to steer him from the balcony.
“Rude,” complained Dan, half-heartedly elbowing Dario in the ribs. This only earned him another relentless head rub as he was maneuvered down the hallway using his head as a joystick, Bébé following placidly behind, tail wagging. Being pint-sized certainly sucked. Everyone wanted to touch his head, for some odd reason.
“You’re the rude one,” said Dario, chattering away at a mile a minute. “I’ve been looking for you all evening! Why were you really squirreled away in a corner by yourself anyway? I can never find you unless I take Bébé. Don’t tell me you were actually just watching the sunset, do you even believe that yourself?”
“I just like some space to think,” Dan replied, though he didn’t think he sounded very convincing. His poor older brother probably thought Dan was being bullied at school or something and had been secretly crying in a corner. “I promise I’m ok.” He widened his eyes and gave his brother the most innocent look he could manage.
Dario rolled his eyes. “What do six year olds even have to think about… oh fine! Don’t look at me like that… you’ll tell me if something’s wrong, yeah?” Dan nodded, gave Dario an awkward quick hug, then bolted before Dario could bear-tackle him in return for being ‘such a cute little brother!’.
Honestly, this overly passionate family.
***
Over dessert, Papà announced that one of their Very Important friends down south, the Vongola, had invited the whole family to attend a Party, near the end of the year.
“Papà, they’re our only contact in southern Italy. Because you said they’re all crazy down there,” corrected Dario, who never passed up a chance to remind Papà of his general reluctance to wander any further south than Rome.
“They are all crazy down there. However, the Vongola might as well be the only ones who matter! Of course, we might not even have this connection if your great-grandfather--”
“O-kay Papà!”
Thankfully, Dario cut in again before Papà could retell that tired story about how the Vongola Seventh had pledged the eternal friendship of the Vongola to their enterprising great-grandfather in exchange for three wheels of cheese and a bottle of wine, thus giving the Villani family, then just a struggling band of smugglers, enough clout to establish a foothold for themselves etc etc. Dan had heard it a million times.
“So, what’s this party for?” asked Dario.
“It’s the 18th birthday of the youngest son of the Vongola Ninth, Federico. He’s being inducted into the business, so it’s a big deal,” said Papà, unruffled by the interruption. “We missed the celebrations for the last two sons … if we miss this one again our friendship might not stay so eternal.” Papà smiled at Dan, apologetic. “We’ll have to celebrate Daniello’s birthday earlier or later, as it’s around that time.”
Dan shrugged, not really bothered. “It’s okay.” Mamma reached over and kissed his head fondly.
“Wait, is Diletta supposed to go, too?” Dario asked suddenly.
Diletta, the eldest and most opinionated of the three siblings, currently attended boarding school in Switzerland, but would be home for winter break, just in time for her hard-earned holidays to be subsumed by this trip down south.
“She hates these things. She’ll be so pissed!” crowed Dario, who, as usual, seemed particularly excited at the prospect of his sister losing her temper, which usually resulted in bullets and mayhem.
Papà winced. “Well… it would be best if she did, since the invitation is for all of us…”
“She will come with us,” said Mamma, with frightening calm. “Sit down, Dario.”
Well, if anyone could make it happen, it would be Mamma.
***
In the intervening couple of months between that discussion and the Vongola Party, Dan had made more progress on his ‘superpower’, though it had taken some acrobatics in time management and dodging his minders. Based on pieced-together eavesdropped conversations between Papà and Dario about Vongola, he suspected that the green sparks were the ‘Lightning’ type of ‘Dying Will Flames’, a rainbow-colored, weather-themed set of phenomena that apparently manifested when the users were, well, in danger of dying. He’d heard of them briefly before, from the men around the compound, but never quite put two and two together, as he had a hard time thinking of his ability as a ‘flame’.
Near-death experience, check. Acid green ‘lightning’ with illogical hardening properties, also check. None of this made any sense to him, still.
Papà didn’t seem to know all that much about Dying Will Flames, due to the Vongola Alliance’s near monopoly on Flame users in Italy. Their own family being friendly with, but not part of the Alliance, also meant that they were not privy to detailed information on those Flames.
Once again, Dan had deliberated at length whether to tell his family about his abilities, with the added reassurance that they were probably kind of normal, or at least known of. Eventually, he settled on no. The extra scrutiny they would likely face for having a Flame user might be more problematic for their small-time organization than helpful. Perhaps they would even be pressured into giving up Dan to a more powerful syndicate! That might never happen, but still, Dan would rather wait and see until he had more information.
Uncertainties aside, what Dan did know was that he could now stun creatures (wasps again, Dan seemed to be a magnet for them), and more excitingly, could now morph his green disk into a cylinder of varying size, which could trap objects within an electric forcefield. Unfortunately any living thing trapped in there invariably ended up dead if he made the cylinder too small, as had happened to … yes, wasps, roaches, a sage plant, and on one particularly horrific occasion, a rat. Dan was fascinated, and wanted to make much bigger cylinders, to see if the..Flame’s…magnitude?...scaled with size, or if the same amount of Flame just became more thinly spread out. It was going to be difficult to find a good spot to do it. Dan thought it was a miracle someone hadn’t seen him already.
He decided the problem could wait until they got back from their trip. He had all the time in the world, after all.
***
The day of this universe’s Dan’s birthday (he didn’t quite remember his other one), they took a short flight to Palermo.
Dan had requested cake for breakfast in lieu of an actual celebration, which he got and consumed shortly before being herded onto the eight-seater private jet that Papà had borrowed (or appropriated), together with his family, plus Haiyan and two of Papà’s bodyguards.
Their seventeen year old big sister Diletta had deigned to come along, but made sure everyone knew how unhappy she was about it. Dan felt so exhausted on his parents’ behalf that he took it upon himself to plop down next to her and pester his sister with questions about school so she would stop sulking.
Diletta was one of those prodigies who did well in everything she applied herself to, won all kinds of scholarships (hence the fancy school in Switzerland), spoke multiple languages, played sports, and was beautiful to boot. Really, her only flaw seemed to be her attitude problem, but Dan thought that might be just a teenage thing. Unwittingly, her brilliance provided a convenient smokescreen for Dan’s precociousness and age-inappropriate actions, as their parents just assumed more of the same.
Unfortunately this left poor Dario with the worst combination of an inferiority complex and middle child syndrome. Dan privately thought Dario was quite capable in his own right, though, and knew his sister felt the same, despite disparaging Dario’s ‘slowness’ sometimes. Dario, like Papà, had a silver tongue and could talk circles around almost anyone, a rather underrated skill, in Dan’s opinion. If Dan read Papà right, Dario would likely be next in line to lead their family business, which Dan wholeheartedly agreed with, since Diletta would probably offend everyone within half a day. It helped that Dario resembled their father and late grandfather the most both in appearance and character, which pleased those more traditionally-minded in the Family.
Dario was listening in on Diletta’s stories as well, curly head bobbing in agreement and offering a witty remark now and again. Diletta’s bristliness steadily broke down in the face of both brothers shamelessly buttering her up, and she even smiled! Dan considered that a mission success.
“You’re a good little brother, Dan,” Papà whispered, giving Dan a pat on the head.
Dan ducked his head, a little embarrassed. Well, he was pretty sure this was his first time being a sibling, so he appreciated the positive feedback.
***
They were greeted at the Vongola private airstrip by a tall man in a black leather coat, who Dan immediately recognised from the posters that had been going around back home. Like in the posters, it wasn’t immediately obvious that one of his gloved hands was a prosthetic.
“It’s Tyr the Sword Emperor,” hissed Dario, his voice going up almost an octave as he clutched at a bemused Dan. “I didn’t think we’d meet him! I thought he’d be like, busy assassinating and stuff.”
Tyr (who Dan privately called “He-Man”, due to the aggressively manly blond pageboy cut, pronounced jawline, and sword toting) had held the Sword Emperor title since his early twenties, and had headed Vongola’s assassination division for almost as long. He had a very active fanbase all over Italy’s underground, even up north where their family lived. As far as he knew some were even sticking his posters up on doors to ward off evil. Thankfully, Dario managed to refrain from running up to him to ask for an autograph.
“He’s probably here for something more important,” said Dan, attempting to peel Dario’s fingers from his arm and ignoring his stifled squealing.
True enough, after greeting them very politely but distantly and having a minion direct them to a pair of waiting cars, Tyr excused himself, evidently having other matters to attend to as Dan had guessed. As they passed, Tyr casually glanced in their direction, and their eyes briefly met. Dan offered a respectful nod, which was returned with a slight incline of Tyr’s head before their gazes fell away. Dan thought he could see why Tyr was a ‘Sky’; his grey eyes made him think of the sky just before a snowfall in the mountains, solemn and still, with clouds so low you could scarcely tell where the sky ended and the land began.
Dario kept up the excited chatter about all things Tyr all through their journey to the Vongola-owned hotel they were staying at. Alarmingly, even Diletta seemed a bit dreamy-eyed about the encounter. The only saving grace was that they were all speaking their hometown’s dialect, which the driver probably (hopefully!) didn’t understand, saving Dan from crippling second hand embarrassment.
Heaven help him if it was going to be like this the whole of this trip.
***
A day later, Dan stood by himself in a corner of the expansive, lavishly decorated ballroom of the Vongola main estate, quite content to nibble on some dainty desserts and people-watch. He was alone, as everyone else seemed otherwise occupied. Diletta had caught the eyes of a few young men (including the birthday boy) and was dealing with (punishing) the attention accordingly. Dario had made a few new friends and was recounting their encounter with Tyr accompanied by exaggerated hand gestures (as their regional variations in language were not entirely mutually intelligible). Mamma had been trapped in conversation with some of the other mafia women for a while and still couldn’t get out, and Papà was nervously hobnobbing with a few Alliance Dons, looking like his soul would leave his body at any minute.
The party itself was … interesting. Dan could see why Papà made so much of the ‘crazy’ in this part of Italy. So far, not less than five separate fist fights had broken out and three of the buffet dishes had turned out poisoned (there were doctors with stomach pumps on hand so no one died). And then there had been that whole ridiculous song and dance that made up a traditional Vongola Birthday. At least Papà had brought an entire crate of contraband absinthe smuggled from Switzerland, and so managed a respectable 60 points. The loser was actually shot, but again, no one died.
Dan’s thoughts were rudely interrupted as something barrelled into his chest, almost knocking him over.
“Hey! I could’ve dropped my plate on you,” he told the offending object, which turned out to be a small blond toddler. Said toddler blinked up at him, tears welling up in his eyes. Oh, oh no no no… Dan had no idea how to deal with small children.
“Okay, okay, don’t cry,” Panicking a bit, Dan hastily shoved the kid a brightly-colored marzipan fruit to distract him. “Here, I’ll give you this.”
Biting into the bribe, the toddler broke into a grin. Unable to resist, Dan reached out and pinched a chubby cheek. He didn’t like kids all that much, but this boy with big brown eyes and angelic blond curls was adorable.
“What’s your name? Did you get lost? Do you need to find your mamma?”
Toddler child babbled something in quick Sicilian or related dialect while waving his arms, nearly falling over. Dan had to grab him by his jacket before he faceplanted into the carpet, noting with some amusement that the kid still had a death grip on his piece of marzipan.
He was talking so fast in his little toddler lisp that Dan could barely understand a word of what he said (did he say his name was ‘Dino’?). The kid quickly finished his sweet and started despondently licking his fingers, looking hopefully up at Dan (more specifically, his dessert-laden plate).
“I’m Dan, by the way,” he told maybe-Dino slowly. “Are you hungry? Do you want the rest of this?” He offered the toddler the rest of his plate, and seeing him nod eagerly, he gave the plate to him, making sure he had a steady hold on it. Thankfully, it was one of those dainty dessert plates.
“-ank you,” beamed the kid, apparently starving and already chowing down. Where even were this kid’s minders?
“I’ll go get some more food for you?” Dan asked slowly, pointing to the food on the tables that were probably too high for the kid to reach, considering he’d had some difficulty himself. Well, since he had nothing to do at the moment, he supposed he could entertain the kid and make sure he didn’t get into anything poisonous.
Dino seemed okay with that, so Dan sat him down somewhere out of the way of general traffic and returned to the buffet table to pick out what he hoped were a few toddler-friendly options.
Dan was contemplating if meatballs were a choking hazard when a commotion kicked up on the other side of the room, apparently serious enough that some muscle had appeared from the edges of the ballroom and were making their way there. Regretfully not actually tall enough to see what was going on, Dan decided to turn back and check on the toddler.
Who had, of course, disappeared, the plate of half-eaten sweets upended on the floor. Dan really hoped Dino hadn’t gotten involved in whatever was happening in the ballroom. He looked around quickly and just caught sight of the child disappearing out of the ballroom, led by an adult woman.
Dan followed after him before he knew what he was doing -- perhaps it was because even from that one glimpse, Dino seemed reluctant and even fearful, but something was clearly wrong.
One step into the corridor, and Dan was already semi-regretting his decision to be a busybody. Despite clearly being in the line of sight earlier, Dino and whoever had taken him had straight up vanished the moment Dan had tried to follow. Dan was also pretty sure this had been a well lit, straight hallway when they’d first arrived, not this...winding, dark...wherever.
Also, where was everyone? There was no way a mansion this big would be so deserted, especially with a big party full of criminals going on. Dan figured it must be one of those magic weather flames things-- there was one, Mist, that was supposed to be about illusions. Again, illogical, unscientific, headache-inducing...
Straight ahead, he told himself, and strangely enough whatever alternate dimension or illusion was overlaying reality flickered enough for Dan to spot the duo and hurry to follow.
Two minutes into the chase, if it could be called that, Dan was convinced this was the worst idea he’d ever had. It felt like one of those dreams where you kept running and running but never got anywhere, with every movement slow and syrupy. He kept getting mental nudges to turn around, or impressions that there were walls or locked doors in his way, as if a maze was being built around him. Only by firmly ignoring all of that nonsense and focusing intensely on Dino and the woman who was dragging him by the hand, constantly mentally visualizing their position, could he even keep track of them.
Eventually they came to a stop at the end of a corridor, the woman evidently feeling she needed to get rid of their tail once and for all.
“Dan!” Dino shrieked when he saw Dan and tried to run towards him, but the woman roughly yanked him back by the arm. The woman smiled a bit stiffly, and said something in a placating tone.
“My apologies, I didn’t catch that,” said Dan, who had a headache and insufficient processing power to parse the accent.
The woman looked at the end of her patience but repeated, “Were you looking for Dino? It is past his bedtime, so I will put him to bed now. You should get back to your parents before they worry.”
As the woman was speaking, Dan had been watching Dino frantically shake his head, crying with so much distress that he was hiccuping. The tiny hope that this was all an elaborate misunderstanding died completely, replaced by grim determination to get the kid away.
“Oh, yes, it’s pretty late,” agreed Dan, and zapped the woman as hard as he dared.
Their surroundings rippled as the woman staggered and dropped her hold on the kid, who stumbled away. Dan dashed forward and hit her again, flooring her, before scooping Dino up and hauling him away as fast as he could, hoping he hadn’t done too much collateral damage to the toddler.
“Come on Dino, we gotta go,” he hissed, trying to hurry him forward while the woman was down. Dino, probably shocked and disorientated, kept falling over himself and Dan wasn’t strong enough to carry him properly, so he ended up half-dragging him along. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that the woman was already getting up, and yep, warping reality again because a wide crevasse opening to what looked like depths of Hell abruptly split the path in front of them. Logically, Dan knew this was another trick, a lie, but his head hurt, and he couldn’t focus enough to see the way out, or make his brain tell his foot to take a step forward.
Stepping cautiously towards them, the woman looked ready this time to counter whatever Dan had previously thrown at her, and Dan figured he’d better do something immediately before she decided to pull out a gun or something, but he was drawing a blank.
Out of panic, frustration, and sheer lack of options, Dan threw up as big of a lightning cylinder as he could around the woman, boxing her in, and pulled it tight. He’d never done one so big but it would hold, or Dan would die trying.
Almost as if responding to his will, the fiery hellscape wavered and reverted to the plain wallpapered corridors, ceiling lights flickering in and out.
The effort made Dan’s head feel like it was going to explode, like a tension headache and the world’s worst hangover all at once. He was hyperaware of Dino’s presence, but everything else seemed oddly muted. His palms were cold and sweaty, and black spots were starting to swim in his vision.
Then, he heard footsteps? Voices?
“We’ll take it from here,” said a voice, rich and deep and reassuring.
By the power of Greyskull, thought Dan, and passed out.