JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure:
Steel Shadows
Chapter 31 -> 40
Story By; Sakusha Rei
Art By; Lukama (if he does more stands)
Poster Image: Captain Jack
Additional Art by: N/A
Contents Table;
- CHAPTER 31: Dream Theater
- CHAPTER 32: Fueled By Anger (1)
CHAPTER 31: Dream Theater
Joachim struggled in his bindings. He pulled as hard as he possibly could without displacing his own joints, but it proved futile.
‘Don’t worry, Joachim Jovi, you are in good hands now. But first… you’ll give me some… inspiration’, Solon said in a slow enchanting tone. Whatever she may say, Joachim knew he was in the opposite of good hands.
She readied her paint brush, holding it high up in the air. What followed were a few swift strokes of paint and the stinging pain of his skin being flayed open. Joachim screamed out in pain as dozens of shallow but painful cuts appeared all over his arms.
‘Oh! Such beautiful red!’, she exclaimed, bringing her free hand to rest on her cheek. Solon tilted her head and Joachim could swear he could see her blushing. ‘You just can’t get this exquisite color with boring normal paint!’
It was only then he noticed all the paintings decorating the walls of Solon’s workspace shared the distinct color of blood-red. Somehow, Solon was bleeding her victims to death only to use them for paint.
Joachim turned back to Solon and saw a crazy shine to her eyes. “Do they all have to be freaks?”, he thought to himself. He had to get out of here, but he was alone with a freak and a brainwashed kid in the other room.
‘Fistful Steel!’, Joachim shouted, balling his hands to fists. His stand moved forwards, approaching Solon quickly, but fell short only a few centimeters before being able to touch her easel. Something appeared to stand between it and his stand.
Joachim figured her stand had something to do with the canvas she was painting on. If he destroyed that, maybe Solon’s stand would de-activate and Joachim would be free. Fistful Steel was still reaching out to the easel, stuck in place, when Solon’s stand appeared behind her. ‘Behold, Dream Theater!’
A dark green bodied stand appeared beside her, it looked to have several paint stains all over its body. It held a brush in one hand and a paint-board in the other, and instead of legs, its lower body ended in a giant brush.
The stand swept its brush across the canvas and immediately Joachim felt the stinging pain again on his face. It was a shallow cut, but a precise one, like the others. The cut leaked so much blood, Joachim could already taste it in his mouth.
Just when he was about to lose hope, something caught his eye. From the door, outside of Solon’s vision, a purple papercraft stand had stealthily slipped itself halfway through the tight space between the door and its frame. Blink-182 pointed its thin but deadly blade arm at the keyhole. When Joachim’s eyes hit the keyhole after following the stands indication, he saw someone staring through it from the other side. Before Joachim could fully grasp the situation, or question the particular stand’s user’s intentions, he had already blinked in astonishment.
Within the fraction of a second, Joachim felt the weight clamping his arms and legs in place be lifted. Sukiba had jumped into the room and released him from his restraints, cutting through the soft sofa with ease.
‘Sukiba?!’, exclaimed Joachim.
‘Gomen’, she replied simply. Sukiba was holding him by the arm, pulling him upright.
‘What! You little wretch!’, screamed Solon, her once stern face distorting into one of boiling anger. ‘You dare defy your own mother?!’
With furious strokes, Solon and Dream Theater prepared an attack of sorts. By now Joachim was able to figure out the basics of her ability. Whatever she drew became a reality, but only visible on the painting.
Before the attacks were unleashed however, Blink-182 had teleported behind Solon. Joachim could barely follow as Sukiba started deflecting invisible projectiles with her two kunai. Skillful swipes and blocks protected Joachim, but a few struck Sukiba anyway, it was too much for her.
Solon laughed as she kept painting new threats. Even though the trained assassin’s stand loomed right over her shoulder, Solon seemed to be completely ignoring its presence as she executed her own attacks.
‘I knew you wouldn’t have the resolve to even injure me slightly, child! This is going to be my finest work yet! My name will go down in history thanks to these priceless pieces of art! Thanks to the blood you shed for me!’, mused Solon.
‘Joachim, the couch’, Sukiba said.
As soon as she mentioned it, Joachim could feel the heat emanating from the cut up, but otherwise unharmed seats.
‘Fistful Steel!’, Joachim called, and straight away, his stand put a gear on the sofa. His punch was fast enough to not get burned by whatever was happening to it. Joachim willed the gear to spin, and Fistful Steel started moving it in Solon’s direction.
‘Get down!’, shouted Joachim, to which Sukiba followed his lead towards the ground.
The sofa smashed into an invisible wall that stood between them and the artist.
‘There’s a wall’, Sukiba said, as monotone as ever.
‘You don’t say’, gasped Joachim. But that explained why his stand wasn’t able to reach Solon earlier.
‘The painting moves’, she also mentioned.
‘What do you mean?’, asked Joachim before being interrupted.
Unfazed by the crushed, burning sofa, Solon kept painting. ‘Okay, hold that pose for me sweetheart’, she said, trying to sound endearing. Which came over as immensely threatening, considering she was laughing like a maniac all the while.
‘Joachim, dodge to the right’, warned Sukiba.
Joachim wasn’t sure what he was dodging, but he was glad he did follow Sukiba’s call, because not even a second later, something smashed into the floor where he had originally stood. The only thing visible about the attack was the impression of a line on the floor, like an axe had fallen, aimed to dismember Joachim from his limbs. He felt a shiver rolling over his spine, as he pressed himself against the wall.
‘You god damn snitch! This is not how I raised you!’, exclaimed Solon furiously.
Joachim needed a plan, and quick. Invisible attacks were thrown at them left, right and center, but Sukiba could see through them. Blink-182 was still around Solon’s neck with Dream Theater behind, but neither stands made moves to eliminate one another. This must be how Sukiba was seeing the attacks, even though Joachim had never been able to perceive what Fistful Steel did, other than damage.
‘Sukiba, can you…’, Joachim started, but he hesitated to finish that sentence. Joachim thought for a second having Blink-182 harm Solon was the easiest option. But he realised that would mean asking Sukiba to hurt her adoptive mother. Even though Solon would classify as a bad person in every sense of the word, they still had a familial bond. And those were not to be underestimated.
Sukiba stared at him, waiting for Joachim to finish his sentence.
‘Can you tell me what the wall is made of?’, asked Joachim, to save himself from a very awkward situation amidst the chaos.
‘Glass, bullet-proof maybe’, Sukiba answered.
Of course, for Solon to make it possible to paint new things to attack Joachim with, she had to be able to see them on the canvas. If what Sukiba meant is that Solon’s canvas is a real time picture, a wall of bullet-proof glass would indeed be the strongest barrier to allow that. If it had been normal glass, it would have shattered easily when Fistful Steel rammed the couch into it. If it had been concrete or steel, Solon simply wouldn’t see a thing on her canvas. But how to break bullet proof glass?
‘I can take that’, Joachim stated, confidently summoning Fistful Steel at his side.
Joachim cried out loud as his stand unleashed a barrage of bullet-speed punches. The glass must have been slowly giving way, because small cuts appeared on his knuckles and Solon’s swarm of projectiles had stopped.
‘Stop! Whatever you are thinking about doing!’, Solon screeched, while clutching her canvas.
She must not be able to see much right now, except for cracked glass, and the haze of punches. Joachim kept going until he felt he could finish off the barrier with one last punch. On his command, Fistful Steel charged up its arm and crashed it through the bullet proof glass, and straight through Solon’s canvas.
Sukiba gasped in shock at what Joachim had done. Joachim didn’t really think beforehand about what a hole in a canvas that brings everything on it to life really meant.
‘What have you done…’, said Solon, awfully quiet, her fury smothered by disbelief. Even she didn’t seem to expect what would happen next.
There was a certain delay to it, just long enough for Sukiba to jump on Joachim and throw him aside. Both fell on the ground in the middle of the room as a huge hole was brought into existence that ran through the entire building, annihilating everything on the canvas where Fistful Steel had punched a hole through it. There was no blast, no loud bang, only silence. And a hole.
Joachim tried to get up, but his body felt heavy and his head hurt from smashing into the floor. He groaned and when he came to, he saw Sukiba’s face hanging closely above his. He felt his face go red and looked away as fast as he could.
When Sukiba got off of him and both got up on their feet again, Joachim noticed she had only narrowly avoided the creation of the hole, since it seemed to have claimed most of her long pony-tail and red scarf.
He wanted to ask her if she was okay, but the corner of his eye caught Solon scrambling for a new canvas. Sukiba had noticed it too, but didn’t dare make another move.
Joachim stepped it, once again summoning his stand, which now could perfectly fit through the hole in the enforced glass barrier created by his punch. Before she could get a stroke of paint on her new canvas, Fistful Steel grabbed her by the neck with a single hand, readying the other to attack. But before he did, he glanced over to Sukiba, who nodded, granting him permission to end the fight.
A strong and precise punch knocked Solon out cold for a good twenty seconds. Joachim used this time to assess the gravity of his new wounds.
When Solon came to, her eyes widened in wonder.
‘Is that…?’, she gurgled, a broken jaw was probably to blame for that. ‘Is that my own blood?’
‘Seriously?’, asked Joachim rhetorically.
‘It’s an even more wonderful red than others! I need more!’, exclaimed Solon, now frantically fingerpainting on the canvas with her own blood that was seeping from her mouth.
No longer deeming Solon an immediate threat, Joachim turned to Sukiba.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes, but… if it weren’t for my weakness…’
Joachim saw her facade starting to fall apart at the sight of her adoptive mother in this pitiful state.
‘You aren’t to blame for anything, you saved my life there!’
‘Even after confirming… the truth’, Sukiba stuttered, ‘I still couldn’t stand up to her.’
Joachim could see tears slowly bubbling up in Sukiba’s big eyes, she was trying her hardest to fight it.
‘It’s okay, let’s get out of here’, suggested Joachim. Though Joachim was curious to see what’s behind Sukiba’s facade, this was not the way he wanted to see her.
They exited the art gallery through the hole that had been made during the fight. Only now did Joachim realise the destruction it had caused, for as far as he knew, the hole continued through the entirety of Patras. Through cars, through family homes, through stores, through… Joachim tried to force his thoughts to a stop. The streets were in a state of complete panic. He couldn’t bear to imagine if it had taken people who were in the exact wrong place at the exact wrong time.
‘Joachim?’ Sukiba’s voice snapped him back.
‘Yes? Oh… I’m okay.’ It didn’t sound convincing. At all.
‘Where to?’, asked Sukiba.
‘I would say, “where my friends are”, if I knew where that was…’, admitted Joachim.
‘As promised, I’ll help you find them. But after that, I’m coming back for her’, she pointed back at the destroyed art gallery.
‘Why would y-’, Joachim stopped himself once again. ‘Deal’, he finally said. But something still didn’t feel right about it. He tried to imagine himself in her shoes. Would he protect his mother even when she turns out to be a cold-blood killer? He concluded he wasn’t able to give an answer to that. Maybe that was keeping Sukiba’s mind busy the whole time as well, torn between protecting a mother figure and destroying a murderer.
Sukiba figured they couldn’t all have stranded too far apart, so their best bet would be to return to the beaches of west-Greece and search for traces.
CHAPTER 32: Fueled By Anger (1)
Isaac woke up from the cryo-stasis. He felt water washing against his legs, and a pulling force from behind. He tilted his head backwards to see Max pulling him out of the ocean’s waves.
‘Max? Where are we, where are the others?’, asked Isaac, recovering from Snow Patrol’s effects.
‘Don’t know’, Max replied.
Isaac remembered what happened on the ship. The distraction he made allowed his friends to slip past the guard. When he heard a loud bang resonate through the ship, the guard was immediately on high alert. He pulled out his gun and wanted to go down to check where the noise came from. Isaac couldn’t have that, so he knocked the guard out. That’s when Nathan appeared behind him. He had reassured Isaac that he wasn’t an enemy and that he knew a short-cut to pull off a pincer attack on the real enemy. Isaac hadn’t questioned anything he said after he witnessed Nathan freeze several guards alive, all while the mysterious fellow explained his plan…
‘We got saved thanks to Nathan, but it seems we’re split up now…’, said Isaac, getting up on one knee.
‘What now?’, asked Max.
‘We gotta find the others, they can’t be far.’
‘Can we call them?’, suggested Max.
‘No, our phones are probably dead now, the salty water damaged them’, Isaac took out his phone, tapped away on it and indeed it did not respond. ‘Not even Darwin will be able to fix this either. We’ll have to find a different way.’
Isaac turned around to take in his surroundings, but could see nothing more than an empty rocky beach and a coastal road where he saw the occasional car drive by.
‘What are the chances of finding some sort of telephone along that road?’, Isaac formed a sunshield with his hands, hoping to get a better view.
‘Let’s find out?’, Max said.
The road laid a few meters above sea-level, elevated by a stone slope. It was not fully vertical, but steep enough to make climbing it a decent effort. Together they climbed the wall to reach the road.
‘Well, let’s start searching’, said Isaac. He started down the road in the direction the most traffic was going, figuring if they followed them, they’d reach a town or settlement at least.
Not even ten minutes of walking later, they found themselves on what looked like the edge of a town. A bit further still, Isaac noticed a signboard which read “Kaminia”.
‘Kaminia, huh? Is that close to Patras by any chance? Although the ship never made it to the Patras harbor, maybe the others are working their way there too’, thought Isaac out loud. Max silently agreed as they continued walking.
‘As long as the Order doesn’t show up, I’m actually quite enjoying this little stroll. Though the sun could do with a little less burning’, said Isaac. ‘Oh well, at least my clothes are almost dry already.’
‘Isaac…’, started Max.
‘What’s up?’
‘We’re getting closer to…’
‘I know Max. I know’, said Isaac, reassuring Max. ‘I know you are worried, we all saw what we saw in Owl City’s vision, and I know this is where it all began. But for now, we just gotta keep going, I’m confident we can put an end to everything.’
‘Thanks.’
About fifteen minutes further down the road, Isaac saw a small bus stop. He immediately headed straight towards it, hoping there would be a map.
‘Look, Max, apparently this is the last bus stop in a line that goes directly to Patras!’
‘When is the next bus?’
‘Hold on…’, Isaac dragged his finger down a list of arrival hours.
‘The clock up there says it’s two in the afternoon’, mentioned Max.
‘Great! Looks like the next one will be here in about five minutes! Lucky!’
While waiting on the bus to arrive, a distant rumbling sound caught Isaac’s attention. It was the signature sound of a heavy motorbike approaching. A little down the street, Isaac could see said motorcycle. The man was speeding down the street and wasn’t even wearing a helmet. Isaac’s eyes and the driver’s met as the motorcycle dashed by them. It made him uneasy, yet he couldn’t say why. Like an underlying feeling he should know who this man was.
Whatever the case, Isaac decided not to dwell on it, as their bus arrived right on time. They both stepped inside the pretty much empty bus, and tried to communicate with the driver to buy a ticket. They found themselves two seats near the front of the bus, behind the driver. Other than them, there were only an old couple, a businessman, and a teenage girl in the vehicle.
‘Do you think we’ll find everyone in Patras?’, asked Max.
‘I’m certain of it.’
The bus ride went quite smoothly, despite more traffic showing up on the streets as they neared Patras. But still Isaac couldn’t help but feel something was off. He looked behind and saw an empty street, as if the traffic only existed in front of them, and disappeared behind them. As the bus passed another car, Isaac saw what was going on. The man on the motorcycle was right behind them, and beside him, on the car’s hood, appeared to stand a red robotic stand, shaped somewhat reminiscent of a depiction of a virus. A tripod with, in between its legs, a drill sucking up the car’s fuel until it stopped running.
‘Shit!’, said Isaac.
Out of curiosity, Max peered over the seats to where Isaac was looking too. The man on the motorcycle waved to them as if he knew they had finally noticed him.
‘We got company’, concluded Isaac. ‘He must be an Order official then.’
‘Didn’t the boss warn us about a stand user that made taking the road unsafe?’, mentioned Max.
‘Now that you say it, yeah. This must be him. Get ready to fight.’
Isaac stood up and shouted to the driver to keep driving, to not stop at any moment. But it wasn’t enough, the Order official was multitudes faster than the bus and crept up to the window besides Max and Isaac. Now that he was up close, Isaac recognized the man. The long messy brown hair, the perfectly kempt beard, the leather jacket he always used to wear, even the scar on his forehead… There was no mistaking it.
‘Impossible…’, gasped Isaac.
Almost playfully, the man pointed to the backside of the bus, as to divert Isaac’s attention. Isaac did as instructed and saw a smaller version of the stand he saw earlier drilling into the neck of the businessman, who was seated behind him, instead of another car.
‘What the hell are you doing to that man, Franky!’, shouted Isaac to the window keeping him separated from the Order official.
‘Franky? Do you know him, Isaac?’, asked Max, who held onto his seat, his knuckles turning white.
‘That’s my aunt’s fiancee…’, admitted Isaac, ‘and I’ll put an end to him myself’, he continued as a terrible shadow moved over his face.
Taking that as some sort of cue, the man named Franky sped up and moved in front of the bus now. Lingering there, Isaac tried to think of a plan to take him down.
‘Max, we must figure out how his stand functions’, said Isaac.
‘I… I have no idea…’
By now the stand had disappeared from the businessman’s neck, who had subsequently sank down from his seat. The other passengers had huddled together in the back of the bus in a panic.
‘Where has the stand gone?’, asked Isaac rhetorically.
‘Is that man… dead?’, something shivered in Max’s voice.
‘I don’t know’, replied Isaac.
‘Ack!’, yelped Max. The virus-like stand had gripped onto Max’ neck now.
‘This little thing… Vengeful One!’, called Isaac, and with a swift punch, Vengeful One flung the little droid to the other side of the bus. It had landed all the way at the back of the vehicle and disappeared.
‘Thanks’
‘I have a feeling this won’t have taken care of him…’ said Isaac.
A crash alerted Isaac to turn his gaze to the front of the bus again. Another red robot had jumped through the bus’ windshield. This one looked different from the one they saw earlier. It had a more crab-like appearance, with a tough looking upper body, crawling on four long appendages, wielding bloody chainsaws instead of pincers.
‘What even is that!’, shouted Isaac.
It seemed to look dead ahead to where Isaac had launched its tinier version, and readied an attack.
‘Max, get down!’
In an instant the whole backside of the bus was cut open. It was still moving down the street, except there was a gaping hole in the back of the vehicle now too.
‘The passengers and everything?!’, shouted Isaac in disbelief. A strong air current now moved from the front of the bus down the middle, courtesy of the broken windshield and missing back.
Franky once again appeared beside them, still on his motorcycle. In a rage, Isaac had Vengeful One punch out the window.
‘FRANKY!’, yelled Isaac.
‘That’s Alexander for ya! Come to look for yer parents, kiddo? They ain’t here no more, hahaha!’, shouted Franky over the sound of his own massive motorcycle.
‘Come face me head on, coward!’
‘I’ll pass, Black Fuel works best on the road!’
Isaac balled his fists until he could feel his nails digging into his palms. He turned away from the man taunting him and faced Max.
‘Max, get your stand ready, just in case’, Isaac said, doing his best to sound calm.
‘What are you-’, started Max, but Isaac stopped him.
Isaac stepped into the aisle to face Franky’s, or Alexander’s stand, Black Fuel. The thing immediately took notice of him and attacked, chainsaws pointed at its prey.
Isaac dodged the dangerous weaponry and Vengeful One attacked it with ferocious punches. Vengeful One’s innate strength crushed the stand as if it was a tin can.
‘Looks like this thing is not very defensive, huh?’ said Isaac.
Searching for his adversary, Isaac looked around the street. He saw Franky driving next to them still, having his grin wiped off his face. He sped up and overtook a car driving in front of them. As soon as he did, Black Fuel’s drill half appeared on said car, sucked it dry of all fuel in a matter of seconds.
‘What is he doing?’, asked Max.
‘I think I get how his stand works now’, answered Isaac. ‘His stand can only be active when his target is moving. As soon as he overtakes a target, he can summon either part of his stand. A drill to suck up anything he can use as fuel, be it gas, or even blood it seems. With that, the other part can move and attack’, explained Isaac.
‘Another Twin stand’, noticed Max.
‘As long as there is fuel to be harvested, you won’t get rid of me that easily, kiddo!’, Franky appeared next to them again, that nasty grin back on his bearded face.
‘What happened to my parents! You know, don’t you!’, yelled Isaac.
‘Hah! I’m sure you have other things to worry about. You always were such a rude, stubborn, misbehaving kid. It seems nothing has changed.’
‘Tch! You haven’t changed either, asshole!’
‘Isaac behind you!’, shouted Max.
CHAPTER 33: Fueled By Anger (2)
Coming soon…
