Gary was puzzled. It wasn't just that his five-star golems had suddenly fallen to pieces - a damn shame, but not entirely unexpected. No, what puzzled him was, when he tried to brush the golems' pieces off of Limelight, one piece had stubbornly clung to the table. "Come on, you're not even stuck to anything," he muttered as he pinched the small piece between two fingers, trying to yank it off. "Why won't you move?"

A buzzing sound momentarily distracted him, and he looked over to see his phone vibrating on the side of the table. That's strange, he thought as he picked up the phone and held it to his ear. I thought I turned the vibration function off.

"PATTON!" Woods roared through the phone. Ah, Gary thought to himself, that's it. It wasn't the vibration function; it was Wilson. Out loud, he asked, "What is it, Woods?"

"Stop whatever you're doing right now!" Woods shouted in a panicked voice. "Stop trying to pull the pieces of the golems off of Limelight!" "Oh yeah, I wanted to ask you about that," Gary said nonchalantly, continuing to try to pull the battery piece off of Limelight. "One of the pieces won't move, even though it isn't stuck to anything. Do you have any idea why that is?"

"I told you to stop pulling it!" Woods shouted, even more terrified than before. "One of their Stands hooked itself to that piece. They're using it to discover your location! Listen, Gary, they know that they're fighting more than one Stand user!"

"We're fighting more than one Stand user?" Daniel asked.

"That's right," Stan answered. He turned back to Birdhouse in Your Soul, which continued to pull tightly on the piece of the giant. "I had my suspicions when the first golems disappeared, but now I'm sure." He pointed toward the direction the group had come from. "See, the enemy Stand user inside their house is in that direction. But that's not where the enemy Stand user who's behind these golems is. That person is," he moved his finger until he was pointing in the same direction as the piece of the giant was trying to move, "this way."

"So what you're saying is, we should be going after that goon instead!" Daniel exclaimed. "Maybe," Stan replied. "We definitely need to deal with them, yes. But we shouldn't let the Stand user inside the house get away either." So we split up, then," Joshua said. "Daniel and Stan go back to the house and try to find some way around those invisible walls, and the rest of us will-"

SNAP! Joshua was interrupted by the sound of the tendons attached to Birdhouse in Your Soul's claws snapping like rubber bands, sending the piece of the giant rocketing away from the group. "Follow that piece!" he finished, chasing after it.

"What am I gonna do?" Gary moaned over the phone. "If they know where I am, then that's it. It's over for me!" "Calm down, Gary," Woods said, even as he was feeling very far from calm himself. "Can't you just put more barriers around yourself?"

"You've got the information Stand," Gary groaned, sounding as if he was almost in tears. "Why don't you tell me if I can put more barriers around myself." Before Subdivisions could even put pen to paper, Gary continued, "Limelight works by turning the world around it into a game, where the object is for the players - the enemies - to reach me without dying. That objective has to be possible for the game to work, so if I surround myself with barriers, the game will shut down. Until now, I've had no problem with that rule, since none of the previous players even realized what the goal was, but now that they're after me…" An edge of panic crept into his voice. "I need to get out of here - need to pack up and run before they reach me!"

"You can't!" Woods shouted before Gary could hang up. "I'm still one of their targets, remember? If you run, then I'm gonna get captured!" I should've fled the house earlier, but now... "You have to defeat them! At least kill the two going after me before you run!" "Are you kidding me?" Gary said incredulously. "I've barely got time to escape as it is, much less wait for a golem to defeat two-" He cut himself off suddenly, lost in thought. "Did you say there are two Stand users going after you?"

"Yes," Woods slowly responded, confused. "Then there only three enemies coming toward me?" "Yes," Woods responded again. Gary's laugh - a short, brutish laugh that started off slow but quickly got faster and louder until he was cackling - rang through the phone. "Perfect. Absolutely perfect!" Gary exclaimed. "Three of them. If there were four, it might get overwhelmed, and if there were two, the requirement cost would be too high, but if there's three-" He laughed again. "Where are they, Woods?" Gary asked, his panic now completely replaced by a maniacal fervor. "I'll deal with the Stand users targeting you in time. But first, I need to introduce the fools who are trying to approach me to the prize jewel of my collection - my six-star…"

"Hey, Joshua?" Hiram panted. "How much further away do you think this Stand user is?" "They can't be too much further away," Joshua said, slowing down, "if what you said about the range of Stands is right. Are you alright?" Joshua, Hiram, and Alexa had followed the piece of the giant as it flew away, and even though it had quickly outsped them and disappeared from their sight, they had continued to run in that direction it flew. Currently that path had led them into a small patch of woods in the suburbs; Joshua could see a row of backyards not too far away from him.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Hiram said, leaning against a tree. "Just...having so many shields active, and all the running we've been doing, I think I just need a little break." "A little break?" Alexa said. "You can take a break if you want, but Joshua and I need to keep moving, before another golem attacks us."

Just as Alexa said that, a very large black figure came crashing through the trees, breaking off branches and even felling one before landing on the ground with a heavy thump. Joshua stared at the black figure as it rose; this giant was larger and taller than any other giant before it, towering at least twenty feet tall. Its arms, legs, and for some reason its head were long and spindly, and its limbs seemed to be incredibly flexible as they moved about, knocking down nearby trees. It was completely black and featureless, and at first Joshua couldn't even tell if it was facing forward or backward. As he considered this, the giant suddenly lurched forward, whipping on of its long arms down upon Alexa. "[Off the Wall]!" Hiram called, and a silver sheen appeared over Alexa just before the arm crashed into her. Absorbing the force of the giant, the silver screen around Alexa faded as she leapt backward out of the giant's reach. "Great," she muttered. "I just had to say something."

Joshua wasted no time making a counterattack. In a flash, Imagine Dragons was out and at his side, and he raced forward, his Stand slashing into the black giant's arm. Or through it, as Imagine Dragons' claws did through the suddenly translucent arm, without seeming to damage the giant at all. Just as Imagine Dragons finished passing through it, the arm turned solid black again and slammed itself into Joshua.

Joshua flew backward, slamming into a tree; his head pounded in pain, and he could feel a warm trickle of blood running down the back of his neck. Off to his side, he could see Hiram leaning against a tree, looking as though he was about to vomit. In front of him, he saw Alexa barely dodge another lash of the giant's arm. YMCA attempted to land a chop on the giant, but its arm went through the giant's body just as Imagine Dragons' attack did. Right before the giant's long leg could kick the stumbling Stand, Off the Wall's silver shield flew over it; Hiram nearly fell over when the leg hit the shield, and the shield itself flickered and faded. As Joshua watched this scene unfold, a though crossed his mind:

How can this thing be solid one moment and intangible the next?

The first giants had been made out of clay. The second pair of giants were batteries; they could use the electricity within them, but couldn't generate electricity on their own. All the giants so far had been physical objects, just giant and with some sort of sentience. In other words, there had to be some physical reason why this giant could turn intangible. Joshua watched the giant's long head slump as it moved forward, turning translucent as it brushed against the treetops. Then, for a single moment, he could see something. It wasn't much - and maybe he had imagined it - but for a moment, an explanation appeared to him.

He knew how he could draw it out, prove it was the correct explanation. And then he knew how to exploit it as a weakness.

"Hiram," Joshua called as he got to his feet. "I can't protect you anymore, Joshua," Hiram responded feebly, lying against the tree while Alexa and YMCA stood in front of him defensively. "If I use my shield anymore I'll collapse."

"That's fine, Hiram," Joshua said, as Imagine Dragons emerged to his side. "Actually, I was going to tell you not to use your shield on me." "What?" Hiram asked, too tired to truly be confused. "Alexa, if this works I'll need YMCA's help," Joshua continued unwaveringly. "You'll know what to do when you see it. Just be prepared." Okay, he thought, this is probably going to hurt. I just hope I don't die. And he charged at the giant.

Despite lacking eyes (or any features at all, really), the black giant responded immediately to Joshua's charge by whipping one of its arms out toward his Imagine Dragons' side. Yeah, this is really going to suck, Joshua thought. Just as the arm crashed into Imagine Dragons, the green Stand tensed, slightly lifting the tough scales across its body.

Joshua was lifted off his feet by the giant's swipe, flying several feet before crashing to the ground. But despite a mouth full of dirt and an arm bloody with fresh scrapes, Joshua had to smile as he got to his feet. I was right. It worked. He raised an arm in victory, and Imagine Dragons mimicked his movements. The arm Imagine Dragons raised - the same arm that the black giant had struck directly - now had several taut black cords snagged onto its scales.

"These giants are made by a Stand user," Joshua said, "but they're not Stands. They're made of actual, physical objects - in this case, tightly wrapped thin plastic cord. That's how it becomes intangible: all it has to do is adjust the density of those cords, and it will seem like the attacks just go through it. When you're made up thousands upon thousands of wires, it doesn't matter if one or two get cut. But that we've taken hold of some of those cords - cords it can't turn intangible - we can defeat it."

"We certainly can, can't we, mistress?" YMCA exclaimed as Alexa moved to Joshua side. "Absolutely, we can," Alexa responded. "Cutting one or two strings doesn't matter. But if the forces of tension in the golem are disrupted first…" YMCA pounded its golden fist into one of the cords, and a sort of shockwave traveled up the cord into the black giant. The cords that made up the giant loosened, and the giant's limbs seemed to sag and flop on the ground. "Well, I'll let you deal the final blow," Alexa said to Joshua.

Imagine Dragons pressed its claws into the cords in its scales, cutting them one by one. As it pressed against the final cord, Joshua asked the now rather pathetic-looking giant, "Any last words?" The giant made no sound in response. "Didn't think so."

Snip. The giant collapsed into a loose pile of black cords.

"We did it," Hiram said exhaustedly. "We beat it." "Almost," Joshua said, staring at the pile. "There's still one more thing I wanna do."

"Damn it. Damn it. Damn it!" Gary swore, pounding his fist against the table. "How could my six-star lose! It was made to be impossible to touch, much less destroy!"

"Gary, are you still there?!" Woods yelled through the phone. "Don't you dare shut off Limelight right now! The enemy is outside my house, and I need those barriers to stay up!" "Don't worry, don't worry," Gary said as he regretfully picked up the pile of plastic lacing that had once been his strongest golem. Though those brats had once again destroyed a powerful and difficult to recreate golem, he wasn't planning to accept defeat so soon. "I've got a backup plan - Yeowch!" he cried as he threw aside the suddenly burning hot cords. "Those damn brats! One of them must have set fire to the golem's remains!"

"Don't you dare panic!" a panicking Woods bellowed. "Don't abandon your station. I need those barriers around my house!" "Calm down, Woods," Gary said, clutching his hand in pain. "Fuck, this is going to blister. Anyway, like I said, I have a backup plan. They're tracking me because of how I move the golems off of Limelight, right? Well, this time I'm ahead of them. I moved the remains of my lacing golem off in a different direction!

"Really? That will work?" Woods asked. "Of course it will!" Gary exclaimed. "I'll have them running around lost, with golem after golem sent out at them until they're beaten, and all the while they'll never get any closer to me!" "Are you sure, Gary?" Woods asked. "Are you really sure you moved the pieces off in a different direction?" "Of course I'm sure!" Gary said, wiping his brow. Was it his imagination, or was the air around him suddenly getting hotter? There was a strange smell in the air too. "Why?"

"Because the enemy is still heading straight toward you."

"What?! How?!" Gary cried, leaping up from the table. "I'm sure I threw the cords away from me. How could they still-" His eyes drifted to the ground. "Shit!" A small fire burned on the lawn where the cords had fallen. The strange smell, Gary realized, was the dark smoke that rose from the fire into the sky. "They can see the smoke from the fire they started next to me! They know exactly where I am!"

"Put it out then, quickly!" Woods yelled. "Summon more golems! Just don't give up, whatever you do!" But it was too late. Woods was yelling at nothing; Gary had already fled, leaving Limelight, his figures, and even his phone behind.

Shit! Shit! Gary thought, running as fast as his portly legs could carry him. Screw Woods! Screw my Stand! It doesn't matter if I don't get the Fragment back anymore; as long as I can escape, I still win. I'm Gary fucking Patton, strategic mastermind of the Cobalt Order, and nothing is going to bring me down-

His thoughts were interrupted as something small and brown suddenly appeared underneath his feet, sending him crashing to the ground. "Oww...what the fuck was that?" Gary said, as he looked up to see the same dog he had kicked out of the lawn growling at him. Behind that mutt, several much larger dogs also faced him, growling. "Err…" Gary said meekly. "Nice doggies?"

Gary Patton - Retired!

-To Be Continued- Where Do We Go? (Act 1)

Stand User: Alexa Hamilton

Stand Name: [YMCA]

Power: A

Speed: B

Range: C

Durability: C

Precision: C

Developmental Potential: B

Force Cancel: YMCA can reduce, or even completely negate, the forces of or impacting anything it touches, including itself. If it is a constant force (such as gravity) this negation lasts until YMCA chooses to release the force onto the object. However, YMCA can only cancel the force of one thing at a time, and cannot attack or defend while it is negating a force.