He almost couldn’t keep himself together.
Jet black hair with streaks of grey caused not by old age but by stress, aquamarine eyes like the bright blue ocean glistening green in the sun, and a neatly trimd beard that outlined his jaw. Skin the color of hazel, the strong and tall build of a warrior, and the gait of a leader.
These were all phrases that could be used to describe the man standing before Gio.
He looked down at the child in front of him with so surprise in his eyes that he couldn’t hide.
"Oh, you’ve co? I thought they would alert to your arrival so I could greet you at the door, but it’s good that you’ve found your way here."
He spoke with a calm smile and an unchanging expression, but Gio could see today what he could not before.
In his eyes, there was an unmistakable swirl of emotions that he tried his best to contain.
Fear, excitent, anticipation, pain, sorrow, lancholy, warmth, love, and so much more. His father never wanted to leave him in the Wasteland. Seeing him now fifteen years later...
Sufficed to say, Gio wasn’t the only one having trouble holding himself together.
"What am I doing, holding you at the door?" Kyrian finally said after a mont of staring blankly.
"Co in, co in. Make yourself comfortable. I’m sure there’s a lot you want to talk about."
He made room for Gio to walk into the room and followed behind him. As Gio sat down, Kyrian went to a small cubby on the side of the office where he found a small kitchen.
"Do you want any snacks or drinks? I have a lot of stuff here, and anything I don’t have can be brought by the servants in no ti."
"There’s no need," Gio responded, shaking his head.
"Just so tea or water would be fine. Anything that’s good to drink during conversation. I don’t have much of a preference."
"I see, I see..."
Kyrian nodded his head and went over to a cupboard, choosing his own favorite brand of tea to boil.
"You go by Gio, I heard."
"I do. My first mory is only a fragnt, and that’s the only na I rember."
Kyrian froze for a mont, his heart dropping.
He wasn’t stranger to Gio’s Original Gene. "First mory," he said. His "first mory" should have been the very first mont after birth, but that wasn’t the case.
A great sadness coursed through his body, but he tried his best to let it pass and focus on making the tea.
"The na you were given at birth was Yves Giovani Atmos. Your late mother and I couldn’t choose between the two nas, so we gave you both and decided to let you choose when you grew up which one you would go by," he said.
"But due to your circumstances, you were never properly registered at birth, so if you wish to change it to Gio only, I can arrange it. I just hope you keep my surna...but I can also understand if you don’t wish to do so just yet."
"It’s fine."
Gio’s response ca instantly.
"Really? I thought..."
Gio shook his head as Kyrian’s words trailed off.
"It’s uncomfortable and I’m still going to go by Gio, but it’s better to have a proper na for public circles, right? I wouldn’t want to cause any annoying problems."
Kyrian raised a brow questioningly.
"Have you dealt with upper-class people before?"
"Well, the upper-class people in the Wasteland would just be ordinary middle-class citizens here, but the ntality is the sa since they don’t know there’s a higher level," Gio responded with a shrug.
"I see...then, you’re fine with registering you in the system under your birth na?"
"I am. Gio was fine when it was on its own, but if I have a last na now, it sounds a little off."
Kyrian didn’t entirely know how to respond. He expected a lot more pushback than he was receiving. From Gio’s perspective, even the question should have been offensive.
But he was thinking about it so practically?
’The life he lived in the 6th Stratum...’
Kyrian sighed.
Gio watched that sigh roll out of his mouth, but didn’t say anything about it. These things would change with ti.
Plus, he wasn’t lying about his reason. He may not have told the whole truth, but there genuinely was only a single reason for him to keep the na.
It wasn’t out of love or anything like that. "Yves" was the part of his na that his mother chose. He would gladly spit on it and throw it in the trash. Keeping his na as "Giovani Atmos" alone was ideal emotionally.
’But it’s good for to have multiple identities to go by.’
Yves was a unique enough na that ca from a class where nobody would na their child "Gio." He could completely differentiate himself in certain places through his true identity and the na his father gave him.
On the other hand, when he was acting outside of such circles, he could use "Gio" freely.
’Those people make a big deal about reputation. Anything I do under the na they know will be used against . It’s better if I can move as Gio outside of their reach.’
The only way for them to find out about his activities under his "real" na was to put a tail on him.
After all, as aforentioned, even if they did a background check and found his middle na to be Giovani, they would never associate him with the nickna, "Gio." It was simply beyond their scope of thought.
’And just like in the past, he’s going to make sure that nobody knows I grew up in the Wasteland.’
"Gio...can I call you Gio?"
"You’re my father. There’s no reason not to."
"Gio, I know all of this might feel like too much change too fast, but there’s no reason to take it all in at once. You can ask anything you want to know. If you want to ask questions later, you can do that too. Take everything in at your own pace. I don’t plan to rush you into anything."
The tea he’d been making was finally finished. He brought it over with two cups, sitting across from Gio and pouring for both of them.
"I want you to study at so point. I want you to interact with the world, but before that, I want to make sure you know what this world is like. Before anything else, just take a year or two to calmly adapt. After that, we can talk about any plans for the future."
He handed Gio his cup and stood up, correcting his posture.
"To start, it has been one of my life’s greatest dreams to et you, and it has finally co true. My na is Kyrian Atmos, and though it may take so ti for you to truly view that way, Gio, I am your father."
Gio’s mind flickered to an old docuntary he saw about a movie file that had been recovered from the ancient era as he responded.
"I’ve only ever gone by Gio for my entire life. I lived a little strangely, but I sohow ended up here," he said, standing up as well.
"I know it’ll take so ti for us to form a proper relationship, but I’m not against trying for it. At the end of the day, I accepted the invitation because I was curious about the "family" that was ntioned. I’m not going to turn around and resent you now that I’m here."
Awkward introductions ca from both sides, but it was just a start. For a start, both of them were more than happy for it to be this friendly.
They sat down just as awkwardly and picked up their cups. Kyrian coughed loudly as he sipped his tea and changed the subject.
"Was it hard to find your way here? The mansion can be confusing."
"I almost got lost, yeah, but it wasn’t too hard. Mainly, it seems pretty empty. It’s strange to have this much space and everyone I see is just a servant."
"Ah, about that..."
Kyrian shifted in his seat. Evidently, Gio accidentally ntioned sothing he’d been wanting to avoid until a bit later.
Well, it wasn’t an accident at all.
Gio brought up the mansion’s emptiness to hasten this introduction in the first place. Kyrian couldn’t hide from it.
"...Haa..."
He sighed and looked at Gio.
"What I want to say isn’t anything serious. In fact, I could say it without context and everything would be fine. However, I feel I owe you several explanations, and this is one of them."
He put down his cup and brought his hands together, a gesture to calm his own nerves.
Gio listened carefully as a story he knew well spilled from his father’s mouth.
"It all started when your mother passed..."
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