Killer Queen: A Clockwork Pink
Chapter 5: Tears of Rage
"You want me to do what?" Kira asked Shinobu, who actually heard the request she gave him.
It has been a full 3 weeks since their dinner at Trattoria Trussardi, and a full week since Kira learned about the existence of other stand users in Morioh. In that week, Shinobu's and Kira's friendship seemed to grow, or bloom in some people's eyes, due to, in part by Tonio Trussardi using Pearl Jam to give Shinobu a boost in Hormones, which may be the reason why she has been complimenting Kira with flirtatious intent. However, Kira was not one to receive compliments often, if ever, so the kind words he has been receiving might just go over his head or cause him to flush in embarrassment.
At times he finds himself unconsciously cursing Tonio for this, but he would be one massive liar if he said that he didn't enjoy the compliments.
Today he found himself inside Shinobu's apartment, more specifically, sitting by her dinner table, drinking a nice cu of tea that she specifically made just for him.
"I enrolled Hayato to the closest Elementary School to the apartment complex, but I need someone to walk him on the first day of school. Since I start work at 5:15, which means I won't be able to take him to school, which starts at 8:45." Shinobu said as she poured herself a cup of tea. "So, I want you to walk with him to school tomorrow. His school is only a 5-minute way from where you work… The… The Game-"
"Kame Yu Department stores?"
"Yeah that! It's only 5 minutes away, so that means you'll make it to work on time!" She said with a smile…
Kira sighed, contemplating the request fully. He believes that Hayato himself was a good kid, but his silent hostility towards Kira might turn him off from the idea. Regardless, Shinobu is his friend, and he would need to endure to not disappoint her.
"It's only a one-day request. I trust Hayato, I am only asking you to go with him so he won't get lost just this once. He'll memorize the route instantly. I trust him, he hadn't gotten lost at all when walking to school and back by himself where we still use to live wi-"
"Wait, wait, wait." Kira interrupted her, sitting up straighter so he can lean closer to her. "You're going to let Hayato, an 11-year-old kid to walk alone, even though that Jotaro guy told us to 'watch where we tread,' because there is a fucking serial killer that just got done slaughtering a group of teenagers?" Kira said that last part with a lot more force than he intended to, noticing because there was suddenly dagger like glares being sensed in his spine.
Shinobu stayed silent for a moment, pursing her lips, and lowering her eyes for a moment, digesting the words- no, truth that Kira just spoke to her. Finally, she looked up at the blonde man, who was still just sitting there with a face that screamed "indifference."
"I know my Hayato, Kira… He will never stray away from the path that he chooses for himself, he will not speak to anyone he doesn't recognize. He would always come home on time, every day. Even in the situation we are in, I highly doubt that will change." Shinobu stared at Kira with ever so slightly squinting eyes, psychoanalyzing Kira's unmoving face.
Suddenly she perks up a bit before flashing a quick but quiet smile. "Uh, be right back… I need to use the restroom…"
Shinobu runs to the restroom leaving Kira alone at the dinner table. Or rather, not alone, because when he turned to where the piercing eyes are coming from, he sees Hayato looking through the rack of the door, only a single hazel eyes looking at him while the rest of his body was obscured by a shadow. Kira looked at him for a second before turning forward, realizing what he needs to do tomorrow.
"Fuck…" He sighed.
The next day…
Kira was outside Hayato's and Shinobu's apartment, checking his watch. He was wearing his lavender purple suit with a green shirt and black tie with a cat design on it. He tapped his foot impatiently as he looked at the door, gritting his teeth in mild annoyance. It was currently 8:15, and Hayato wasn't outside, ready to go to school. Kira is a man of perfect patterns, and it has been almost 2 years since he was last late to work, even for a second. At the rate that Hayato was dragging on, both he and Hayato will be late to be at the places they're supposed to be. Kira knocked on the door again.
"Hayato, I know you really don't like me, but don't make me resort to kicking this door down to get you out. I'm going to need to explain to your mom and the landlord why the front door is busted." Kira said as he knocked.
Suddenly the door handle discreetly clicked and turned, cracking open a bit. In the crack between the door itself and the doorframe stood Hayato wearing a pale shirt, orange vest, blue jean shorts and a pair of red shoes. His face was plastered with furrowed eyebrows as he looked up to see the blonde man.
"A Lavender Suit, really?" Hayato remarked, looking at up and down at the suit.
"It's Gianfranco Ferre. I wear it because it looks very nice" Kira responded to this criticism with an apathetic tone.
"Your taste in fashion is, ugh." Hayato stuck his tongue out to better exemplify his pretend disgust at Kira's fashion sense despite not having one himself.
"I am not taking this from a kid who still wears a rainhat for school, c'mon let's go…" Kira said as he took the rain hat from off the coat hanger and placed it on Hayato's head.
Kira is starting to get annoyed at Hayato's pestering, he is internally grateful that this was only a one-day thing, he didn't want to have grey hairs or wrinkles like his parents at age 33.
Even as he walked down the stairs, he still took a brutal belittlement from Hayato who is trailing behind him. "And what's with the way you speak? You sound like the Hamburgler took your emotions as well as your sense of fashion."
Kira said nothing to this, gritting his teeth with his lips still together. Hayato is only a kid, he does need to know about my childhood, he doesn't need to know what I went through with my mom, he doesn't need to know why I keep this demeanor. I don't want to burden him with the weight of my trauma. He's only a kid.
They crossed a few streets, getting closer to the Elementary School that Shinobu enrolled Hayato in, looking at the architecture kept Hayato distracted from chewing a primarily annoyed and indifferent Kira out. Kira stayed silent paying attention to the streets that he was walking in, looking at each person who walks by with a squint of mistrust, ever since that Kira learned that there was a body-mutilating serial murderer on the loose, he was sure to look at each individual person in the eye, to see if they themselves are monsters in human clothes. But there was also something nagging at him, a question that he needed desperately answered because the truth alludes him, and the only way to reach that truth was to ask someone who is unwilling to talk to him in a normal manner.
Kira glanced and eyed Hayato for a few moments. The brown-haired boy didn't take notice that Kira was looking at him, he was too busy memorizing the street names and landmarks of the route, so he can walk by himself tomorrow.
"Hayato…" Kira said as he looked forward once again to pay attention to where he's going. "What's your problem with me?"
Kira realized his words had an effect because he can no longer hear the small patters that are Hayato's footsteps. Kira paused to turn around, Hayato was a bit further away because he paused as Kira continued walking. Kira quirked an eyebrow at his reaction but decided to keep going.
"I tried to treat you with nothing but respect, however you look at me as if I am a murderer, this has been going on ever since you and you mom moved in…" Kira said.
A beat.
"You charmed my mom the first day we moved in, it was really quick I mind you. Don't think I didn't see you get kissed by her that one time. You like her, but only for her body, you only want to have sex!"
"Woah, woah, woah, Jesus Christ kid, calm down. I don't- your mom and I are only friends." Kira said, raising his hand as his face is turning red.
"HORSESHIT!" Hayato screamed out, it was a good thing that the street they stood on was empty, otherwise onlookers would be staring at them. "On the weekends mom would sit on the couch and stare off into space with a smile, and she would always compliment you. Are you a murderer, trying to swing her into a vulnerable state so you can strangle her in the middle of the night? Or are you a subject of MK Ultra?"
"Murderer? MK Ultra? Hayato… What the fuck are you talking about, kid? Holy shit kids and they're wild ass imagination, I-" suddenly Kira felt the strange urge that something, or someone is staring at him. He looked behind him and realized he was standing in front of a creepy looking house. It kind of looked like an old vampire's castle, like some kind of old black and white movie he watched as a kid. But here there was rotting, modern plywood covering the winds and some boards messily nailed on to coverup the shattered windows. "Woah, what a creepy as house…"
"Who gives a crap about a creepy ass house? You talk to yourself constantly. Who the hell is 'Killer Queen' anyways?"
Kira's eyes grew wide before snapping his head to Hayato, a small shadow covering his eyes which were laden with an unreadable emotion. "How do you know that?" Kira knows full well how Hayato knew about Killer Queen, but he wanted to toy with Hayato for a moment in revenge from the verbal walloping he received from the 11-year-old.
Hayato's face grew pale for a moment, sputtering as he realized he had said too much. "I- Uh- You… I heard you through the wall of my room."
Kira looked at Hayato for a second, before raising his suitcase to his chest, clicking open the latches on it, he reached in an pulled out a small digital camcorder. "Oh, okay, explain this then… I found it on top of my refrigerator connected to a modem. I swiped it before I picked you up."
Hayato's eyes seemed like they were about to pop out of their sockets, and his face began to burn up with utter embarrassment.
"I- That's- that's not mine!" He said, trying to save face, but his sporadic body langue along with his beat red face made Kira see right through the lie.
"Uh huh... Look what the side of the camera says, 'Kawajiri…'" Kira deadpanned as he pointed to the paper tape plastered on the camera's side, which did indeed have "Kawajiri" written on it with black permanent marker. "I don't think your old man would bust into my apartment just to spy on me-"
"HE DOESN'T EXIST TO ME. DON'T EVER MENTION HIM!" Hayato roared at Kira.
Kira felt a pang of guilt in his heart, he actually felt like he offended the Kid. I forgot how they got into this situation to begin with. His dad really must be a real piece of work… Before Kira could open his mouth to offer an apology, Hayato's yellow rainhat abruptly flew off his head, passing Kira before landing behind the brick wall that laid in front of the creepy house. There was a gate that said "No Trespassing" on it, and right behind it there was the yellow sunhat.
"That's weird… There was no wind…" Kira eyed up the condemned house, signing. "I'll get you your hat- hey!"
Hayato already passed him, walking up to the gate intending to reach the hat.
"I can do things myself…" He turned to face Kira with the angriest face he could muster. "AND STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM MY MOM!"
Kira could only sigh. Man, this kid is a piece of work, just like his dad. I wonder where he learned all those curse words- Kira's train of thought was cut off when he heard the sound of someone kicking metal. He turned to see Hayato with his head stuck in between both doors of the small gate, he was flailing about and yelped with a strained voice. Behind the fence, he can see a tall, dark-skinned teen, with a blue school uniform on, modified to have a golden dollar and yen symbols on his collar and on his chest with the word "Billion" written in English on his left sleeve and in kanji on shoulder portion on his right sleeve.
"Hey kid, what'cha doing snooping around our yard. It clearly says, 'no trespassing' on the door." The boy said in a hoarse, smoker like voice.
"H- Hey! Let go of the kid-" Before Kira finish, he noticed a second person looking at them, through a partially boarded window. The person, or man had broad shoulders, and he was pointing something out of the window… An arrow. The arrow reminded Kira about the same arrow that gave him Killer Queen…
.
.
.
WAIT A FUCKING SECOND, THAT'S ALSO A STAND ARROW! Kira internally screamed.
The arrow was released, zipping straight past the dark-skinned boy and into the area where Hayato was stuck in. Hayato's body tensed up before going limp. The door opened and Hayato landed on the dirt floor, face up with a massive arrow stuck in his throat blood gushing out, the arrow must have hit a choroidal artery… His eyes were open, but his eyeballs were rolling to the back of his head…
"Haya… to…" Kira couldn't believe what he is seeing.
He wanted to scream, he wanted to blow up the entire house with Killer Queen in a vengence, but something was stopping him from doing so.
"How unfortunate. I thought he'd have a better fighting spirit when I heard him yelling at that man over there…" The man in the window chuckled to himself, only abruptly stopping when he actually turned his head to look at Kira. "Huh?"
Kira was enveloped in a bleeding purplish-pink aura, his usually slicked back hair was now spiking up and freely flowing, as if he were falling vertically and the faint outline of a pink humanoid figure with cat like ears and striking pink eyes began to form behind him.
"Okuyasu…" The Man in the Window spoke in a deep voice, the boy with the dark skin turned to the window looking surprised.
"What is it bro?" Okuyasu asked.
"That man right there is a stand user… Get rid of him…" The Man in the Window said before his silhouette retreated deeper into the shadows.
Kira tried to carefully approach Hayato's body, but Okuyasu had already stepped over the kid's body, sticking out his hand ordering Kira to stop.
"Where do'ya think you're going?" He said, cocking a smug smirk on his face.
"I'm trying to get to Hayato… Now get out of the way, Kid. Because if I have to kill you I will…" Kira spoke softly, but each word is invigorated with a sense of fury no man would be able to achieve.
"Kill, me?" Okuyasu scoffed at the notion, before his cocky smile faded into a more dense, serious face. "Nah, I'll just erase ya…"
Suddenly a large white hand with what seemed like 2 buttons on it appeared from his chest, fully manifesting into what seemed to be a humanoid figure, with a white cylindrical head, bright blue chest, and shoulder pads with spiked trailing the tire like shoulders of the stand. Standing behind Okuyasu, the Stand also had Yen and Dollar symbols on connection of the neck and the collar bone, just like the uniform of its user.
"The name's Okuyasu Nijimura, and this is my Stand, The Hand! It can erase anything, and I mean anything with a swipe of its right hand, and it fuses the non-erase parts of objects together like nothing happened. Just like… so" Suddenly The Hand lunged forward with its right hand extended out, illuminating in an ugly combination of green and black.
Kira didn't want to know what Okuyasu meant by "erasing anything," so, instead of taking the stand head on, he dodged to the side, evading what could have been a matter vaporizing swipe. "KILLER QUEEN." The Pink, Humanoid Cat stand finally materialized after years of dormancy, and punched The Hand on the bottom of its cylindrical chin. Okuyasu physically jumped from the impact, and blood spewed out of his tongue. He fell to his knees but immediately got up, wiping away the bit of blood laced dibble rolling down his chin.
"Phew! Ya caught me by surprise there, but y'ain't gonna get me that easily again!" He snickered as The Hand jumped to land behind its master, swiping the air in front of it with its right hand, pointed at the direction of Kira.
He didn't know what happened, but he flinched from the swipe itself, although it was out of range for it to erase him, he still did from the adrenaline, but when he opened his eyes the next moment, Okuyasu was standing much closer to him, or rather, he was standing much closer to Okuyasu, because the teen and his stand were standing in the exact same place. Suddenly the teen socked Kira across the face, definitely not hard enough to draw blood, but hard enough to surprise him. He staggered back out of range, but The Hand swiped again, causing Kira to find himself right in front of Okuyasu again, found himself getting punched in the face, again. (But this time on the nose drawing a bit of blood.)
If The Hand can erase anything. Does that mean...? Holy shit he's erasing the space between us, causing me to teleport? He was punched a 4th, 5th, and 6th time before he finally understood. On the seventh space erasing swipe, instead of Kira trying to protect himself he sent out Killer Queen in all its violent glory to give the teenager a wallop of biblical proportions.
"SHIBO!" Killer Queen screamed, face, mouth unmoving.
Killer Queen's gloved fist struck the side of The Hand's head with such force it actually cracked the side of the stand's face, the side of Okuyasu's face. Okuyasu seemed to have had an imprint of Killer Queen's knuckles before the side of his head seem to explode with blood. Okuyasu flopped over, crashing violently into the brick wall that it caved in on him, causing clay bricks to land right on top of him, down of the count. Kira huffed and puffed a few times, looking out the knocked out teenage boy before turning his attention back to the front gate- he's gone.
Kira looked in disbelief as the body of Hayato seemed to have disappeared, but Kira knows where he went, a blood trail led to the old, moldy wooden stairs of the house, leading inside the front door which laid inconspicuously cracked open, almost imploring him to enter. So that's what he does, with Killer Queen trailing behind him, Kira entered the doorway. The mixture of heat and the smell- Oh fucking god it's rank- made him gag a bit. Kira looked around at the dimly, correction: no even lit interior of the house, the paint seemed to be peeling off the rotting walls. Dust and Cobwebs layered the scattered furniture around, the furniture itself seemed to be rotting like the floorboards. A horrific place to live in, but it is the place where Okuyasu and his brother lived in.
Kira had a particular tendency of knowing exactly when people were staring at him, and what emotions they exude when staring at him. And the moment he entered the ancient house, he felt an avalanche of eyes on him, the suddenness of the eyes almost knocked Kira off his feet, he felt like a series of razor blades were being jammed not each vertebrate of his spinal column; the emotions of all the eyes were almost empty, emotionless but flaring with murderous intent. Kira, with the assistance of Killer Queen watching his blind spots, looked around in the small room, standing absolutely still, stifling his own breath to make less noise. Not for stealth purposes, but to hear every single individual sound coming from the house.
He heard, what sounded like extremely light and incredibly footsteps that tapped wildly above, then he heard multiple loud, audible clicks. The clicks themselves all seemed to occur at once, but Kira stood still to listen.
"Fire!" A small but deep voice yelled out, like an order.
Kira shoots his eyes wide open; he and Killer Queen looks up to see on the roof, hiding behind some support beams, there were a multitude of white flashes of lights, small, almost like white laser pointers. He impulsively sprung himself out of the area where the lights were, but as he did, he heard many loud bangsgo off, and pain suddenly exploded in his right leg. The pain threw him off balance, causing him to crash into an old table, causing it to explode into splinters.
Kira looked at his pant leg, seeing as a perfuse amount of blood began to soak into his lavender suit, many tiny holes pepper the back of his lower leg, trypophobes beware! God fucking damn it. My favorite suit… but what did this? The pain occurred before I hit the table. He checked the rest of his suit, the lavender jacket was torn and tattered, but his abdomen remained relatively unscathed. He heard something say "FIRE!" and knowing what comes afterwards he decided to run into another room, busting down the door with his weight. He crashed onto the hardwood floor, feeling some blood from his leg squirt out from the pressure.
He groaned and tilted his head up; through the blurry vision he could spot a box-like object approaching him. His vision cleared and saw that there was a green, toy like M1 Abrams sitting in front of him, lowly humming and vibrating a bit, almost like a functioning tank. As Kira weakly got up from the floor the cannon muzzle seemed to move with him, pointing square at Kira's chest. Kira tilted his head slightly as he examined the miniature American Tank before it fired an artillery shell abruptly. Kira gasped and summoned Killer Queen to protect him by punching the shell with his left hand, but as it made contact it exploded on his knuckles.
Kira let out an agonizing scream, gripping his left hand with his right one. He inspected it and realized that his hand and fingers were all still intact, but his fingers seemed mangles, bending in way that are unnatural to human anatomy. He kicked the miniature tank, which was made out of pure metal which broke Kira's big toe, but the pain wasn't as great because all the pain receptors were flaring up in Kira's left hand.
Kira then felt something stinging the side of his neck, near the jugular, quickly using his right hand he swatted the area which stung, grabbing something that began flailing about. He looked at what he caught and noticed a small toy soldier with a mechanical face and wearing a Red Barret trying to break free of the hold by stabbing Kira's hand with a tiny but razor-sharp bowie knife. Agitated Kira slammed the Red Barret Toy Soldier on the floor before stomping on it, and when his foot did crush the Red Barret a volley of gun shots suddenly ripped through the wall.
"OH, GIVE ME A FUCKING BREAK!" Kira screamed as 2, 3, 4, 10 tiny shots hit him in the shoulder, arm, and chest.
The shots themselves weren't deep but they bled, and they bled hard, permanently staining his classic lavender suit. He looked at the tiny holes in the walls which cumulated into a few big holes and sees tiny toy soldiers with the same robotic face as the Red Barret which he just finished crushing under his foot. Each one of the were dressed like Soldiers from the Vietnam era each holding an M4A1, pointing at Kira.
"Just like my dipshit little brother I have a stand of my own. I, Keicho Nijimura call them Bad Company!" The voice of the Man in the Window boomed as all of the Soldiers say this in unison.
Kira had no time to think because another explosion knocked him off his feet, crashing right in front of a stairway. Kira looked up and realized there were smears of blood leading up the staircase. Kira glanced back to see that none of Bad Company's Infantry Drones are looking at him as he dragged himself up the stairs, a trail of blood spawning as his leg smeared crimson blood onto the staircase similar to, presumably, Hayato's blood trail coming from his jugular.
He made it to the top of the stairs and heard the low whirring of… A Helicopter? A single Apache Helicopter with a similar paintjob as the Bad Company Infantry and Tank hovered idly in front of a big door, swaying side to side like a sentry. He stayed out of its sight, taking off his suit jacket and laying it to his side to make him lighter, and tearing a dry piece of his green shirt wrapping around his leg wound and cracking his finger back into place, his knuckles exploding in pain as he did, despite that he is relieves to still articulate his finger.
He takes off his tie, balling it up and throwing the tie to the backend of the hallway, causing the Apache to snap around and began firing its minigun, shredding the tie. But while it was busy shooting the tie, Kira got closer to it, summoning Killer Queen, who upper cuts the Helicopter, so hard in fact that it shattered on contact, the debris exploding into glitter of in pieces of scrap metal.
Hayato's trail of blood seemed to lead into the last door, the same one that the Apache Helicopter was guarding before getting decked by Killer Queen. Despite Killer Queen itself also being wounded in the leg, it kicked down the door, causing it to burst open and fall over with a loud crash. Kira stood at the doorway as Killer Queen dissipated.
Kira is now face to face with The Man in the Window, Keicho Nijimura. He looked a bit older than Okuyasu, with a brighter complexion, his hair was blond, and it was almost like in the form of a pillar, with a few stands swooping downward onto his forehead. His shoulders were broad, and he stood with a sense of confidence, wearing a black school uniform, maybe he's still in high school…
Despite his posture, his face showed genuine surprise at the fact that Kira was still alive, let alone standing. Kira was bleeding from what seemed like every part of his body, his mouth, a bit on his neck, his leg, his hand, and his arms and torso. Being able to stand was a chore in it of itself because the heat plus the blood loss was making him very tired. Darkness at around his eyes like microscopic piranhas, but he knew if he passed out know, both him and Hayato would die. Suddenly the wall behind them disappears without a trace, and through the newly formed hole in the wall crawled Okuyasu, bruised blood, still dusty from the entire brick wall caving on him. He brought forth his stand, The Hand and taking a fighting stance.
"I am here for round 2… Motherfucker…" Okuyasu growled out.
"No, you already fucked up, and got your ass kicked by him…" Keicho said, putting his arm out to block The Hand and, in extension, Okuyasu.
"Aw… c'mon bro!" Okuyasu whined and The Hand's metallic face formed into one of sadness and resignation.
"I said no… Besides, even though the rest of Bad Company is downstairs… Look at him, he is about 4 seconds away from passing out." That was true, Kira felt his eyebags begin to droop much heavier than before… "The kid is going to die too, he didn't have enough resolve and the arrow didn't accept him, so we won't have to worry about him."
Kira's entire body went numb, but not from the blood loss, but from his fury. That last sentence echoed in his head like a roaring plane, looking at the two teenagers who step back a bit in shock. Kira tilted his head up so they could get a better look at his face, but they didn't see any human face, instead, it appeared as a shadowy skull.
"I was going to let you both off the hook before…" He felt Killer Queen's drive to kill everyone and anything creep up on him, and he wasn't denying it's entry, he was going to release his pent up fury on the two younger stand users. "BUT YOU HAVE GENUINLY ANGERED ME…"
He had something in his hand and user his entirety of what's left in his body strength to chuck it at the two stand users. Keicho nearly jumped out of his shoes in shock.
"OKUYASU! ERASE IT, YOU DUMBAS-" Keicho screamed out at Okuyasu, but he was ignored as the tanner teenager simply grabbed the flying object with his hand. (His physical body, not his stand.)
He opened his hand and looked at him palm, only to find a rigid piece of debris, presumably from the chaos that unfolded downstairs with Kira and Bad Company. Okuyasu looked at the rock with confusion before showing it to his brother. "It's just a rock bro…"
Keicho grabbed the rock and looked at in, in utter disbelief. "J- just a rock? It's just a rock? WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU JUST THROW A SMALL ROCK AT US? ARE YOU LOOKING DOWN ON US? IS THAT IT JACKASS?"Keicho sounded like he was going to tear his vocal cords out as he extended his hand to show Kira the rock.
"No, because…" Kira started. "Killer Queen's main ability is to make anything it touches into a bomb. Anything… Including a tiny rock…" He squeezed his unbroken, right hand, putting his thumb up.
Silence filled the room as the Nijimura brother try to piece together that that meant, ironically (or should I say 'tragically' in this situation…) Okuyasu was quicker at the puzzle solving draw as he gasped loudly and screamed out, "BRO! LET GO AT THE ROC-"
Click
BOOM
The volatility of the explosion due to the lack of Killer Queen's use for the past decade caused the usually silent and disintegrating explosion to make a loud boom and cause a massive smokescreen. Kira used the opportunity to lunge and get Hayato's body out of the reach of the Nijimura brothers. The Hand can erase the space between Hayato and them, but it is also slow, so Killer Queen will need to knock Okuyasu out to prevent that from happening. Kira thought to himself as he carried Hayato towards the door despite his own injuries. He heard a groan coming from the area of the explosion, turning to see the smoke dissipate.
In the aftermath, Kira saw Okuyasu passed out on the floor and Keicho was hunched over, writhing in pain, but only able to dry heave as blood pours out of the multiple wounds on his chest.
"You're lucky… Killer Queen only grazed his finger over the rock. Unfortunately, I haven't detonated anything in decades, the explosion was a lot more powerful than even I bargained for…" Kira said to the downed Keicho.
Keicho didn't say anything, only loudly groaning. Kira looked down and frowned at Hayato, his eyes were still rolled to the back of his head as more blood pooled in his mouth and trickled down his throat. He wanted to pull the arrow out, but he doesn't know how much more damage it will cause to the poor boy. I'm going to need to drain the blood out his mouth first… I'm sorry Shinobu… I was supposed to protect him. I fucked up in that regard... As Kira went to flip Hayato's body over to drain the blood out of his mouth, he heard Hayato say something.
"Momma…" He choked out. "Momma…"
Suddenly a green light began to glow out of the wound that was caused by the arrow. Kira and Keicho looked in absolute awe as the arrow slithered out of his throat, down to around his neck before exiting out of his spine. The wound seemed to stich itself together, and Hayato coughed a few times, fluttering his eyes open trying to adjust to the darkness of the abandoned house. He stared at Kira for a second before diverting his attention to something else.
"AH! WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?" The little boy screamed out, pointing a finger past Kira.
Kira looked behind him and noticed Killer Queen staring down on the two of them with his piercing pink eyes. Kira took a moment to realize what that meant, because he slowly looked back down on the shaking and confused Hayato. He can see Killer Queen? T- That means…
"Why'd it take so long for the arrow to affect him, hrk!" Keicho groaned out as he got up. "How did he not die from suffocating on his own blood? He must be one incredibly lucky bast-"
"Woah!" A fourth, unknown voice squeaked out after a series of loud footsteps.
The three conscious people in the room turned to the big doorway to see 2 people standing there, both with a school uniform on. One was a short statured boy with a round face and silver hair standing behind a taller, much stockier built teenager with a… pompadour? Keicho's eyes shot wide open and he staggered backwards despite bleeding from every pore…
"J- Josuke… Higashikata…." He wheezed out.
"We saw an explosion outside; we just came to see what was wrong but uh… You guys are stand users, aren't you?" He sounded exasperated at the end while he pointed at, presumably Killer Queen, with his smaller, silver haired friend looking up at him in confusion.
"Yes… Yes, we are…" Suddenly the severely wounded boy grabbed the arrow without giving Kira any time to think, before pulling it on his wooden bow and firing it at the direction of the shorter boy.
"NO!" Kira screamed out trying to catch it in midair, but the arrow was far too fast, even for him, even for Killer Queen as it passed through a gap in the stand's fingers.
The arrow passed Kira and nailed the silver haired boy, who's mouth suddenly erupts with blood before flopping over backwards.
"Koichi?" The kid with the pompadour casually said, looking down at his friend, who had the arrow now stuck in his Adam's apple.
W- What? How can he be so calm with this? Kira thought, looking at the nonchalant mannerisms of the taller kid, who just knelt down. Kira then watched as he pulled the arrow out with his bare hands without any regard to the vital parts of Koichi's throat. He then saw as another hand manifested out of the taller boy, its blue armored fingertip touching the open wound, and when the finger lifted off of it, the wound was gone. The power of his stand. Josuke stood up gripping the arrow as Koichi got up, confused...
"This must be the arrow which gave Angelo his powers…" His face became darker as he glared at Keicho, who was still holding the bow with his right hand.
Keicho face went from a stern scowl into a mournful one as a few seconds went by. Suddenly there was sounds of shifting in the corner. Kira held Hayato close as Josuke cautiously approached the area where the sounds of what seemed like small (but not Bad Company levels of Small) footsteps were coming from. He opened a dusty, smaller door and immediately jumped backwards in fright.
"HOLY SHIT! THE FUCK IS THAT?" He cried out as he pressed his back against the wall, losing his coolness at the drop of a hat.
"That… thing… That's my father…" Keicho explained.
A small organism with ugly, bubbly, green skin, and small patches of hair on, what is presumably its head sheepishly walked out, holding some small pieces of paper that was messily stitched together using tape. It seemed to shake as it approached Keicho and Okuyasu, the latter of which was barely regaining consciousness. The creature was shorter than Hayato, as it looked up to the looming Okuyasu and Keicho, both of whom gave the ugly creature a sharp kick. The creature flopped over messily before putting its stubbly little arms up in an attempt to defend itself.
"But now, he is less of a monster than he was many years ago. Ever since mom died, and the Economic Bubble caused us to lose everything… He became a drunkard and beat me and Okuyasu daily, sack of shit." Keicho gave his father a hard stomp, just for good measure.
Jesus Christ. That thing gave birth to these 2 jackasses? Gross. Also, what is it with Morioh and having shitty dads? Is that prerequisite? I have a shitty dad, Hayato has a shitty dad, these morons have a shitty dad.
"Until one day a bunch of money and jewels came in, giving us the financial help we needed. He stopped beating us. But one day he broke down crying in the kitchen… Mumbling something about 'Lord-' fucking 'DIO' or some shit, and he suddenly transformed into this thing…" Keicho said, trying his best to not start crying by repeatedly kicking his downed father, even after all these years he's never forgiven him for how he treated him and his brother.
Koichi and Josuke looked at each other after he said that, as if they know something Kira and Hayato didn't, but the latter two never noticed as their full attention was on the older Nijimura brother.
"We don't need to hear your sob story…" Kira spoke to the teen who abruptly stopped abusing his previously abusive father. "Why'd you shoot Hayato and the other kid with the arrow?"
"Because…" Keicho huffed a bit before continuing. "We are trying to find a stand to fix… him…"
"Even though you treat him with the same lack of dignity he treated you with as a child, you still want to fix him. So, you can be a merry, fucking, family again?" Kira questioned the elder Nijimura.
"Family? Again? ARE YOU FUCKING STUPID? OF COURSE NOT! FIX HIM SO I CAN KILL HIM!" The room was flushed with silence after what Keicho said, taking a second to calm down before continuing with his trauma induced tirade. "DIO or whatever his fucking name put his own cell in his brain, and now since they went berserk, he is functionally immortal. Everything we did to kill him was always reversed after a few minutes… But now." He turned to Hayato. "We might actually have a stand that can actually do the job."
"No…" Kira said as he dragged himself and Hayato backwards, dragging blood on the old wooden floorboards from the wound in his leg. "He barely got it, he doesn't even know what stands are, let alone the power of his stand. And even if he did… Why do you deserve it?" Hayato looked at him in confusion. What the fuck are 'stands?'
Keicho stayed quiet as Okuyasu shifted uncomfortably, knowing what was coming.
"Fine… Have it your way then… I don't need you… or you." Keicho stated with frost in his breath.
Kira and Hayato heard multiple clicks behind them, both turned hesitantly to see Josuke and Koichi looking at their feet, and at their feet were many small, robotic toy soldiers 2 army green painted tanks and a slightly damaged Apache Helicopter, all pointing their guns at them. Hayato blinked and rubbed his eyes, expecting them to disappear, but they didn't.
"Kira? What are those?" Hayato asked him.
"Trouble-" he said putting his full upper body weight on Hayato as he spun backwards. Theres no way I can dodge all those bullets, which means I need to use my body to protect, Hayato. I am not going to fail a second time! I-am-not-going-to-fail-a-second-time.
As all of Bad Company fired at Kira all at once, the blond man didn't feel pain, not even a single bullet. He thought he went completely numb because he was shot to death, or from the adrenaline needed to push himself for self-sacrifice. But he only opened his eyes to see Hayato still cowering in his arms, he looked up to see Keicho and Okuyasu only looking on in utter shock, eyes wide mouth gaped. Kira heard the sound of multiple tiny pieces hitting the floor, unceremoniously. He looked down to see at least 500 tiny, still smoking hot bullets fired from Bad Company on the floor, piled neatly, he looked up to see something else entirely.
Above the bullets he saw a dark blue figure, very small in size (maybe the size of Kira's palm) in the shape of a bat, with a short snout, tiny mouth and what looked like a silver visor over where his eyes should be. It had big, plaster white ears and it's long (about 4 inches) wings extended, but interestingly it was not fluttering like a normal bat, but instead floating in midair
"Gentlemen of the room, bow down to the Fortunate Son…" It emitted its voice without opening it short snout to speak, and everyone in the room could hear it, no doubt a stand.
Suddenly it flipped around and threw the bomb at the Nijimuras.
"HOLY SHIT THT'S FROM BAD COMPANY'S HELECOPTER-"
Another BOOM.
But this time, Okuyasu was ready for it, he sent out The Hand and erased at least 90% of the explosion, gaining only a few scratched on his pant legs from flying debris. Everyone looked at the Bat Stand, and watched as it floated down to Hayato, who tried to pull his head backwards in fear of it.
"Be not afraid, Master, for I am your stand." It said to Hayato.
"M- My stand?" Hayato asked, obviously, and not surprisingly, scared and confused.
"I have the ability to see every possible timeline in a sequence of events and I choose the best one to go through, all in the name to defend you, Hayato Hakura-Kawajiri…"
Hearing his last name being said made Hayato sick to his stomach, as it reminded him of his father, and how much of a piece of shit he was. However, his train of thought was stopped when he saw a shadow of a figure appeared in the glass window on the roof. Kira, Koichi and Josuke noticed it too, but it was the taller pompadour wearing teen who spoke about it first.
"Uh… Do you guys have another family member other than your old man?" He said, pointing up at the window.
Keicho and Okuyasu also looked up, confused, seeing a figure of a long-haired person with what looked like an outline of a guitar next to it. Suddenly the room lit up with light as electricity trickled from the broken ceiling lamp, quickly traveling down a wire, inching closer and closer to a wall socket that Okuyasu was standing in front of. Okuyasu looked back and realized the predicament he is in, but his decision making was extremely slow and froze.
"GET OUT OF THE WAY YOU FUCKING MORON!" Keicho said as he jumped and slapped Okuyasu out of the way before a massive surge of electricity enveloped his body, causing to spaz out and foam at the mouth, screaming hysterically, unconsciously.
Then, from out of the wall socket, a yellow humanoid figure with a alien like dome and a chicken's beak manifested through the electricity behind Keicho, before sticking his entire arm through Keicho's gut.
"Did you miss me?" The Electrical figure squawked out with an unnaturally high pitched yet gruff voice. "Oh, did you think you can just shoot me and get away with it?"
Suddenly, the figure turned and snatched the arrow out of Josuke's hands, flinching and backing away to not get struck by electricity. "I'll be taking that." It said before turning back to Keicho. "I must thank you though, without you shooting me, I wouldn't have unlocked my Stand, Red Hot Chili Pepper…"
It flashed a sharp, toothy smile before laughing manically and going back into the socket with Keicho in tow. Kira covered Hayato's eyes so he wouldn't have to see the carnage as Keicho's body distorted and smoked, his hair partially on fire from the electricity going through his entire body, screaming in agony.
"B- BRO!" Okuyasu cried out, reaching for his brother. "GRAB MY HA-"
"DON'T TOUCH ME, RETARD!" He screamed out, causing his brother to flinch. "YOU'LL BE SUCKED IN TOO! OK… UYA… SU… YOU WERE ALWAYS HOLDING ME BACK…" He growled out before screaming once again, before getting dragged fully into the wall socket, with massive amounts of blood flowing out of the 3 holes in the socket.
Kira wanted to do something, but he wasn't in Killer Queen's range, and his left hand itched like crazy, but it was drowned out by the pain of getting his hand broken by Keicho.
"Crazy Diamond!" Josuke yelled out, jumping up higher than any normal human being, breaking the window overhead and crawling onto the roof.
Kira set down Hayato before standing up himself. "Killer Queen!"
Kira also jumped up to the roof himself, boosting himself up with Killer Queen's added leg strength. But he overestimated how much weight he'll be putting on his injured leg, as he landed, he heard an audible crack and another explosion of pain in his leg caused him to scream out and fall to the floor of the hard roof. He had broken his leg as well… Still ignoring the pain as best as he could, he looked around for the stand user of RHCP, only to find the roof abandoned, save for Josuke who jumped before Kira and Okuyasu, who had just crawled up onto the roof, following Kira.
Kira and Josuke saw nothing, but Okuyasu… He did.
"Guys… Look…" He said in a low voice, pointing at something in the distance.
And in the distance, Kira saw the charred, smoking body of one Keicho Nijimura entangled in an electrical wire. His hair was completely burnt off, his clothes decaying from the heat, his eyeballs… His eyeballs looked like they were merely hanging by a single nerve cell. It had to be the most repulsive thing Kira had ever seen, his face turning green and bile filling his throat, but he swallowed it back down.
"He deserved it. He deserved what he got, it… it was karma for all that he'd done. He was a sack of shit… But still-" Okuyasu said as he turned to face Kira and Josuke, tears flowing down his face. "He was my brother… He kept me safe by keeping me away… You guys saw… Right?" Kira and Josuke only looked at him with solemn resignation.
He turned back to look at the mutilated corpse of his older brother…
.
.
.
"WHY?" Okuyasu screamed out, letting one last roar rip through the Morioh skies.
An Ambulance came by to pick up Keicho's body from the telephone pole. Kira and Hayato sat on the curb, a few feet away from Okuyasu who was crying to himself, face buried deep into his knees with Koichi and Josuke talking to each other not too far away from them. Kira and Hayato stayed quiet as they replay the events of the morning. Hayato himself is still comprehending the existence of Stands, and the fact that he himself has one now… But suddenly he tried to think about something else, separate from everything, from the fact that a death happened right in front of him, so he tried to think of his mother, Shinobu. How happy she has been in the past month; how happy she has been with Kira…
Kira… He thought as he glanced at Kira as he ripped another piece of his green shirt to put wrap over his now broken leg, grunting a bit as he tightened it. He put his body on the line for who… Me? Or mom? But whoever he did it for… He did it.
"Kira…" Hayato started swallowing hard.
"Yeah?" He is looking somberly onto his blood-stained leather shoes, his entire suit ruined.
"I'm sorry…" He said weakly, almost embarrassed about everything he had said an hour earlier. "I am sorry for everything I said…"
Kira didn't look surprised, even though he was, although it was hard to tell when his face is as unmoving as an Olmec Boulder.
"I was so scared of your proximity to my mom that tried my hardest to find the worst parts about you that I overlooked the fact that you are a living, breathing, human." Hayato explained, looking at the morning sky. "But you almost died… for me… If it wasn't for… uh... Fortunate Son, you would've, right?"
Kira remained silent, only moving his eyes multiple times, deep in thought, digesting each word that Hayato said. "I guess I would have…"
A beat.
"Welp, in any case, I still need to go to the hospital…" Kira groaned as he propped himself up, weakly trying to stand up, putting all of his weight on his relatively undamaged leg. "God… this hurts like a bitch…"
"Oi! WOAH- You know I can heal you!" Josuke exclaimed, trying to get Kira to sot back down to not inflict more pain on himself.
"W-What? You can?" Kira was astounded.
"Yeah! That's the ability of my stand, Crazy Diamond…" H explained as he put his hand over Kira's broken leg, which snapped back into its original place and the tiny bullet wounds closed by themselves with minimal pain. "It can restore objects to a previous form, so I can reverse the wounds. The name's Josuke Higashikata."
Kira watched as his hand also reset itself completely, regaining full articulation. "Higashikata? As in Ryohei Higashikata? I am sorry for your loss…"
"It's… Alright…" Josuke's face darkened, but Kira didn't notice.
He turned to Koichi who was standing leisurely nearby. "Hey, Koichi, was it? What does your stand do? Weren't you shot with the arrow? What does you stand do?"
"I- I- Actually have no idea, it's just an egg right now…" He said awkwardly, manifesting his stand, which was, in fact, a white egg with green spots covering it.
"Wait! I never showed you my stand…" Kira said.
But as those three talked about their stands, Hayato looks over at the silently sobbing Okuyasu.
"You really cared about your brother…" Hayato said, maintaining the distance with the dark-skinned teen.
Okuyasu sniffed and nodded, face still tucked into his arms.
"He… Sounded pretty mean to you from the interactions I heard between you two… Was he always?" Hayato knew this was a conversation that Okuyasu might not be ready for, but better to understand and befriend the stand users around him now that he got one.
Okuyasu pried his face away from his arms, his tan face was now very red, after crying for so long, he no longer had tears to cry. But only snot to flow. He wiped his face with his stained sleeve.
"Uh… Um. He… wasn't." Okuyasu explained. "He did his best to protect me when we were kids, he'd take the worst from our old man… But he was still kind…" His face scrunched up into anger. "Until he got that fucking arrow…"
"Then what happened?"
"He went all crazy when he got Bad Company… But I didn't understand so he shot me in my mouth… Even though I survived it changed my voice, now it sounds like I'm a fucking smoker or some shit…"
"You don't smoke?" Hayato said, genuinely surprised.
"Now I do… He became so mean to me after I got The Hand. Calling me names like 'Dumbass,' or 'Retard…' Because I wasn't always smart."
His face darkened as Hayato watched on, silent, in contemplation.
"I wish I was… So'I can figure out what he meant by 'You're always holding me back.'"
"You want to know what I think? By what he meant." Hayato shifted his position to sit crisscross. "I think what he meant to say… Was 'You were always holding me back from truly turning into a monster…' Because he could've killed so many people with his stand for the hell of it. But he only used it in his house, presumably to protect you…" Hayato knew he was speaking out of his ass, but Okuyasu didn't need to know, because he presumably wouldn't understand still.
Okuyasu stayed quiet, closing his eyes before sheepishly smile. "Yer really smart… huh kid…"
"What's that? You want me to restore the photo?" Josuke said, causing Hayato and Okuyasu to turn their head to see what was going on.
Josuke used Crazy Diamond to fix the photo that was previously just scrap paper messily taped together. "Here you go!" Josuke handed Mr. Nijimura the newly fixed photo.
The Gloop Monster looked at it for a second, before it started to break down crying… He shuffled over to Okuyasu holding it, pointing at it with his stubs for hands. Okuyasu and Hayato looked at it, it was a full family photo of himself, Okuyasu, Keicho, and his late mother.
"Even though he was a sack of shit, even after all that… He still cared for you, just like your brother." Hayato explained to Okuyasu who was at a loss for words, only breaking down crying along with his father, embracing him even though he was a mutated shell of himself.
"Now what?" Hayato asked Kira.
"I don't know, we definitely can't take you to school now, now that the Police and EMTs are showing up…" Kira said, placing his chin on his fist.
"How are we going to explain to my mom that I never showed up for scho-"
"It was a Gas Leak explosion…" Kira said, speaking the lie as if it were a fact.
"It was a Gas Leak Explosion!" Hayato repeated putting his thumbs up, smiling.
As all was almost well and good with the group, there was a man who was standing amongst the crowd was a man with aviators and a Chicago White Sox hat one, obviously not Japanese and he was chewing loudly at the wad of gum in his mouth, but now one noticed he was there.
He grunted a bit, pushing the brim of his hat up. "Nice to see you making friends… Kira…"
The man looked up to see on the roof, a man with long flowing purple hair and a bandana holding onto an arrow and a guitar looking down at the same group.
The man with the aviators sighed before walking away. The destination? No one knows. No one will know.
Night fell on Morioh, and Kira was lying in bed, thinking about the events that transpired, the existence of Fortunate Son, and the abilities it was hiding from the people around it, abilities even Hayato doesn't recognize yet. When suddenly the itchiness in his left hand returned, this time on the side of his index finger. Now, normally Kira would use his right hand to scratch it, but this time he used his thumb instead. However, when he did, he heard something thump on the floor. Looking down he saw a baby blue shaped dome, with what seemed like tire tracks at the bottom, a brown orb on top and a skeleton like face.
"Look at me!" It growled as it began to loudly wander around the room, with not goal in mind.
"Killer Queen? What is that? Is that another stand?" Kira said, surprised and startled.
"On the contrary. It's not any stand, it's my sub-stand, unlocked by pressing your left hand. It's called Sheer Heart Attack, and it pursues and blows up the hottest object in the room… Unbreakable… Unstoppable…" Killer Queen explained.
Kira had a sense of dread loom over him, weighing on him like a neutron star. He felt it itch when Keicho was killed by Red Hot Chili Pepper, but he never acted on it. He simply never knew of its existence or the fact that it could… could have…
"I could've saved Keicho Nijimura?" He said, with a low voice.
Guilt exploded inside him...
End of Episode 5
Stand Name: Fortunate Son
Stats:
Power – E
Speed – A
Range – D
Stamina – A
Percision – A
Potential – B
Abilities: To be discovered…
Music References:
Tears of Rage, A "The Band" Song featuring Bob Dylan
Fortunate Son, a Creedence Clearwater Revival Song
Jesus Christ, this has to be the most I have ever written for a chapter before in any fanfiction. Sorry if it dragged on but I needed to make this chapter, it is probabaly the most important one... So far. Thank you for reading and have a nice rest of your day!
Next Time on A Clockwork Pink: Hayato tried to figure out everything he needs to learn about his new stand, all the while an undeground Secret Society of Killers forms in Morioh...