"I'm boooored."

"Then watch some TV."

"I don't want to watch TV." She said, hanging off his jacket, pulling on it, inching back both her father, and the chair he was sitting in a few inches back each time. "I've done nothing but watch TV!"

"Then go out and-" Jotaro began, before catching himself. If Jolyne went out, he would have to go with her. "Nevermind. Look, just read a book or something."

"There isn't anything to read here!" In response, Jotaro dropped a science magazine on her head. "This stuff doesn't count!"

Sighing, Jotaro picked up his phone. His eyes drifted over to the clock on the wall, before tapping in the number. Josuke should be back at his house by now, shouldn't he?

"Hello? Higishikata residence?" It was a woman's voice. Tomoko Higishikata, then. He considered just hanging up, he hated annoying conversations, and explaining why his crappy grandpa wasn't here himself to take care of her and his own illegitimate son surpassed the title of simply 'annoying'. But considering how long he would have to be staying here...

"This is Kujo Jotaro."

"I'm afraid I don't know anyone by that name, I'm sorry, is there something you need? I'm not interested in buying anything."

"Is Higishikata Josuke home? I need to speak with him."

"No, he's still at school. Are you one of his teachers, because if you have a problem, don't worry, I'll set him right. I know he looks like a delinquent, but really he's got a good heart."

He smiled a little. "No, I'm not a teacher. Look, this will be sudden, but I'm not going to dodge around the question. I'm Joseph Joestar's grand son. Legitimate, at least."

"Whu..."

He gave her a few seconds, and Jolyne began kicking at his ankle. He hadn't realized he cut her off to talk on the phone. He picked her up with Star, tossing her onto the bed. Using Star Platinum's voice, so Tomoko wouldn't hear, he said "Shh, be quiet. I'm trying to get Josuke or his mom to take care of you while I'm busy."

"Wait, really?!" Jolyne asked with Stone Free.

"Yeah." Star answered, before fading away. "Look, Miss Higishikata?"

"Y-Yeah? Oh! I'm sorry it's just, I've been waiting, all these years to hear back from him."

"The old man's settling his accounts, he's pretty frigging old, after all. Josuke's name came up as an inheritor."

"Oh?" Tomoko asked, interested. "How much money are we talking about here?"

"A bit. But that's not really what I want to talk to you about. Is it alright if I leave my daughter with you, or rather, with Josuke once he gets home? We've talked already, and I have other business I'm handling in Morioh at the moment."

"How old is she?"

"Six."

"It's a bit sudden... but it'll be nice to hear from Joseph again! Come on over! Wait, just let me get ready-"

"I'm heading over. It'll be about twenty minutes." He hung up the phone, sighing with relief. He hated talking to people. "Come on Jolyne."

"I'm really going over to Josuke's house?"

"Only his mom is there right now, but yeah."

"Great!"

The drive over to their house went by quickly, Jolyne nearly bursting with energy. "So, does she have a Stand?"

"No."

"Does she know about them?" Jolyne asked. "Can I make string?"

"No."

"Aw... what if I don't show her how I make it?"

"No."

Jolyne slumped down, and looked out the window. Jotaro glanced to the side, and suddenly hit the brakes. Jolyne jerked forwards, neither of them bothering to seat belt her, but was caught by her string. "What the heck Dad?!"

"I want you to look." Jotaro parked the car nearby, and immediately left to head towards the stone. "This is Angelo."

"This is a rock, Dad."

"Josuke made it by combining Angelo with a nearby rock." He motioned for Jolyne to get closer. "You can still hear him breathing."

"That's... really creepy." Jolyne whispered, holding her ear to the former serial killer, now sculpture.

"There are Stands that have done creepier." Jotaro said with a frown. "But this is what Josuke is capable of."

"Can we go?"

"You're not impressed?" Jotaro asked, a little disappointed.

"It's weird." She said stubbornly, climbing back into the car. Jotaro sighed and climbed back in himself, turning the keys and taking off down the street once more. As they got close to the address, Jolyne turned towards the haunted-looking old house on the corner. "Josuke should fix that place!" She said, pointing to it.

"Hm, it'd be a little hard to explain away."

"And a sad breathing rock isn't?" She asked sarcastically.

They stopped in front of Josuke and Tomoko's home. He walked up to the buzzer and hit it, and Tomoko left the door seconds after. She seemed to be nervous, running her fingers through her hair. When she caught sight of Jotaro she froze. "Joseph?" She asked in a daze.

"Jotaro." He said in reply. "We spoke on the phone."

"Y-Yes, of course." She turned and smiled down at Jolyne. "And this must be your child? Joseph's great-grand daughter?"

"And your son's grand-niece."

"Oh, you make him sound so old like that." She bent down, and smiled at Jolyne. "Hello there. My name is Higishikata Tomoko."

"I'm Kujo Jolyne!" She said proudly. "I've met Josuke already."

"When?" She asked, surprised. "Did your father bring you with to meet him? I'd assume this inheritance business would go over your head."

"Yeah."

Jotaro nodded. "Don't feel pressured to do anything special for her. She's pretty damn self-sufficient. I'm sorry to leave this on top of you at short notice. Just tell Josuke that I'll pay him to babysit." He reached into his wallet, pulling out quite a few bills. "Nine thousand yen a day if he'll babysit her after school. If you have a problem with it, I'll look for someone else, but at the moment, your son is the only person I know in town. And he's plenty responsible."

Tomoko blinked. "Nine thousand a day? Are you sure you want to pay him that much?"

"Consider it payment for the inconvenience." He said.

"Well, I'll take her off your hands for today, as a favor to Joseph." She said, grinning down at Jolyne. "And I'll talk to Josuke about the babysitting job. I've been hounding that boy to get a job, and he just hasn't been interested."

Jotaro nodded. "Thank you, Miss Higishikata... and about your father, you have my condolences. I was at the funeral, to pay my respects and meet up with Josuke."

"So that's where he went off to." She said quietly.

"If Joseph were here, he'd do everything he could to protect you and your family. But he's a geezer now, and he doesn't have the strength to come out here. So, I'm here in his stead. If you ever need anything, just call." He said, determined. Looking to Jolyne, he pointed at her suddenly. "Don't make trouble, got it?"

"Got it Daddy!"

"Good." Turning abruptly, he got back in his car and left.

Tomoko put her finger to her lips. "What a strange man."

"Yeah." Jolyne agreed. "My Dad is pretty weird."

"Where is that boy?" Tomoko said, looking at the clock. "He's definitely done with school by now."

Jolyne shrugged from where she sat at the table, sniffing at the Japanese cooking. She didn't hate it, exactly, but at her core she was a six-year-old American. "Does he have any friends he hangs out with a lot?"

"Not too many," Tomoko said sadly, "our Josuke is a bit of a loner. So! While we wait up for him, tell me about yourself."

"Alright." Jolyne said, looking up and interested. "I've been all over America, cause my Dad is always moving around for his job and for other stuff."

"What does your Dad do?"

"He's a Marine Biologist. And a student. And a detective, and in a year, he might be a doctor!"

"That's a lot." Tomoko raised an eyebrow, "He's a detective?"

"Yeah! He came here because of Josuke, but he also was trying to find a serial killer!"

Tomoko frowned. "Really?"

"Yeah."

"Did... he find him?"

"Yep. He and Josuke fought him, and turned him into a sad rock."

"And your father told you this story?"

Jolyne frowned, thinking. "Yeah, he stopped by this sad-looking rock, and said that Josuke- Oh! But it was just a made up story. Josuke can't put someone into a rock."

Tomoko giggled, "Well, obviously."

"But he really is a marine biologist. He's studying at his school to get his doctorate. So he's been really busy. I've been just watching TV all day, but it's getting distracting for him."

"Ah. Well, you'll be welcome to stay here whenever you want... hey, Jolyne, what do you think of your great-grandpa?"

"Josuke's dad, right?" Jolyne asked as Tomoko blushed and nodded. "He's always fun. But he's really old, but when he was younger, he was really ripped!"

"Ripped?"

"He was even more muscly than my Dad!"

"Yeah... but... he isn't any more?"

"No. Dad says it's just because he's lazy and never does his breathing exercises, but I think it's because he's old."

"Mm. Did he ever mention me? Or Josuke?"

She shook her head. "My Dad's kinda mad about it, because Great Grandpa would brag that 'He only loves his wife'."

"Ah..." she blushed. "Is it causing... a lot of trouble at home?"

"No, but he hasn't told Great Grandma Suzy yet." Tomoko looked a little guilty, and Jolyne got up out of her seat and walked to her side, grabbing her hand. "Don't worry. They'll make it work out. They love each other. And Great grandpa loved you too. You don't have to be sad. No one blames you at least."

"Thanks, Jolyne."

Tomoko got up, gathering Jolyne's dishes as she went, when Jolyne turned her head out towards the road. Her Dad said that her hearing was a lot better than anyone else he had met, because she can hear through her strings. And she was *made* of strings. When she was younger, her Dad would find listening strings attached to him whenever he went out of the house. Mostly she just got echoes and whispers, and needed to actually move her ears closer to understand all of it, and her Dad learned to speak softly when he wanted to keep a phone conversation private.

She could have sworn she heard Crazy Diamond's scream.

And it was nearby. Jolyne walked over to the window, and cracked it open, summoning Stone Free and running her invisible string out into the air, spreading it out over the street to try and get a better fix on it.

"Tomoko, can I go outside?"

"Oh?"

"I just want to look around the neighborhood. And look for Josuke."

"We can go for a walk, if you want. There's a park nearby, too, if you want." She said, smiling.

Dorarara! Diamond's shot echoed.

"I'm more interested in that haunted-looking house."

Josuke was fuming. Koichi was injured, and there wasn't anything he could do about it with Okuyasu's the Hand in the way.

"The letters on the gate... it can't be that your Stand can remove space?" he asked.

"That's right." Okuyasu bragged, "those characters were destroyed by my right hand. Anything I erase will restore itself as if that were its original form. As for the space that gets removed, even I have no idea what happens to it." He raised his right hand menacingly. "And against people like you, always backing away, I can just do this!" Swiping downward, the air was briefly lit yellow, before vanishing. Josuke found himself suddenly closer to Okuyasu.

"Huh. I can do something like that too. But you really are an idiot." Ducking, he let the flower pots that were behind him, which had also jerked forward from the Hand's removal of space, fly past, colliding with Okuyasu. The boy was conked out immediately, knocked to the ground dazed.

Josuke briefly strangled the boy, if only to make sure that he was absolutely unconscious, and not simply shocked. Looking up, his heart went off-beat as he noticed Koichi wasn't there. Simply a trail of blood leading into the creepy house.

"Koichi!?" Josuke growled. "You Nejimura brothers..." he marched for the door, but stopped at the gate. Crazy Diamond reached down to repair the shorter gate that had been slightly erased. At first, nothing happened, like the new shape was the correct one. But after a moment it split in two, a gaping hole in the gate. "Crazy Diamond repairs things by putting them back together in the right shape... by gathering everything that the object was made of back into the spot it used to have. But if the stuff it was made of is just 'gone'..." he glanced back at Okuyasu. "Man, your Stand is definitely a scary one."

Looking back to the mansion, he marched inside. One brother down, one to go.

"No one's lived in that place for years." Tomoko explained as the two walked along the road. "It's out little neighborhood's lil' claim to fame. Some people come to check for squatters, sometimes, but otherwise-" Tomoko stopped in her tracks as she stared at Okuyasu's groaning body, lying on the sidewalk outside the open gate. "Oh my God!"

Jolyne frowned, summoning Stone Free and having her stand float around partially unfurled, to get a better look at the other side of the gate. It seemed to only get worse. A path of blood, leading inside the haunted house. And inside- she threw a few invisible listening threads toward the house- were the bizarre sounds of many tiny footsteps.

Tomoko walked over to Okuyasu, bending down to check his pulse. "Oh good, he's alive."

"Someone else might not be, though." Jolyne said seriously, walking through the gate, only paying a moment's attention to the cleanly-cut missing chunk in it.

"Jolyne! Get back here!" Tomoko said harshly, you can't just walk in to someone's house and- is that blood?!" Jolyne ran forward, following the path, and heading for the door. "Jolyne! Jolyne, don't you dare! Your father will-" She was already inside. "-that girl!" Tomoko said, scared and angry. She bent down to pick Okuyasu up, when with a loud groan, he got up on his own. "Oh! You're alright, thank goodness. Just wait here, I need to grab the girl before she finds even more trouble."

"Girl?" Okuyasu muttered, blurry. "My brother... damn that Josuke."

"Josuke?" Tomoko asked harshly. "What do you have to do with Josuke?"

"Eh?" Okuyasu turned to look at her, still slightly out of it. He didn't have time to react before Tomoko slammed him in the face, knocking him back down and out. "So, you've been fighting my son! That had better not be his blood." Getting up, she ran for the door as well, but before taking a step inside, she was struck dumb by the scene unfolding inside it.

An older teenager was standing on one end of the hall, holding a bow and arrow, and a child was bleeding heavily and coughing horribly at his feet. Closer to her, Josuke was standing, body tense with confusion and rage, and across from him was Jolyne.

Suddenly, Josuke and Jolyne jerked to opposite sides as holes began appearing in the floor. "What the-?!" Tomoko managed before screaming as miniscule bullets hit her side, sending her to the ground.

"MOM!" Josuke shouted, noticing her for the first time, and as he turned, noticing Jolyne as well. "Jolyne!? What the fuck are you two doing here!? Get out!"

"I can fight!" Jolyne protested. "You were in trouble!"

"No! Get the fuck out of here, and take my Mom with you!"

"Heh, how lucky. So many distractions." Keicho Nijimura said, smiling. "It's a shame Okuyasu couldn't handle you, so I'll have to take care of things."

Josuke flinched as the flashes appeared in the darkness, and with a strange sound, suddenly pinprick-like holes began appearing nearby him. The wall and nearby pot shattered as he dove for the ground, dodging the strange attack. Jolyne glared at the darkness, Stone Free rising behind her, partially unwound.

Keicho frowned as his tiny soldiers were tugged into visibility by a Stand-made net. Jolyne tugged it towards her, and had Stone Free fling the group of soldiers through the wall and outside.

"Tiny soldiers?" Josuke breathed. "Then these holes are bullet holes in miniature."

"See! I can fight!"

"No, get my mom and get her to safety! I can't risk her, got it?"

"What about him?" Jolyne asked, pointing towards Koichi, rasping for breath. He seemed to be getting worse by the second.

"Shit." Josuke growled. Keicho frowned, grabbing Koichi by the leg and backing up the stairs. At Keicho's feet, more tiny soldiers appeared. He looked back at the door. "Is my Mom alright?"

"She's bleeding." Jolyne said, "So you need to heal her! I'll go rescue the other guy!" She made to run up the stairs, when Crazy Diamond picked her up and tossed her out the door.

"No! Look, is she dying?"

"N-no, it's just her side-"

"Then she's better off than Koichi!" Josuke shouted, "I'll heal her real soon, so just watch over her! Gah! And there's another one outside too, but he should be knocked out..."

"Let me fight!"

"Protect my fucking Mom, Jolyne!" Josuke shot back, before running up the stairs. "And don't you dare leave her alone, got it! Jotaro will be hearing about this!"

"No!" Jolyne hissed, running back in and following. "You need help! I'm able to catch those guys-"

"And what if he kills you, huh? What'll happen then?"

"You can just heal me-"

"I can't bring people back to life, Jolyne! When people die, they lose everything! Now, go and protect my Mom! Trust me!"

She faltered, and Josuke simply ran ahead. She stood on the steps another few moments before turning back to go to Tomoko.

"Oh god..." Tomoko managed, pushing herself to sit up. Josuke was still in there! She needed to call the police, and get Josuke and Jolyne out of there. To her relief, after some shouting, Jolyne came running outside. "Jolyne, oh thank goodness, what happened in there, are you okay?"

"I'm fine." Jolyne said, determined. She looked at the wound and grimaced. She had always read and watched the same things Jotaro did. Blood, violence, and gore were part of a good amount of nature documentaries and pictures attached to files from the Speedwagon Foundation. She wasn't afraid of things like this. "Does it hurt?"

"I'm okay, don't worry honey. Where's Josuke?"

"He's trying to help the other guy the enemy hurt."

"...Enemy?" Jolyne concentrated, running thread into Tomoko's sides and interweaving through the tiny bullet wounds. With a pull, the wounds were squeezed shut. Tomoko was startled with the sudden yanking sensation on her side, and looked at the wounds suddenly all closed, without any explanation. "What was that?" she asked, watching how Jolyne had been staring intently right before it happened.

"I'm giving you stitches." Jolyne clarified. "Josuke can heal people better though."

"How? He's a high schooler! What's going on?!"

"A Stand Battle. My Daddy really did fight a serial killer. And Josuke put him into a rock. I make string, Josuke fixes things, Dad stops time, and the Enemy in there makes little soldiers. They shot you."

"They... shot... me?"

"Yeah."

"This is ridiculous..." Tomoko muttered, but all the same, she had hundred of tiny wounds and a little girl had just closed all those wounds painlessly. "...How?!"

"We don't know." Jolyne said, standing up and walking over to Okuyasu. "...We should tie him up."

"Does Joseph know about this?"

"Yeah, Josuke inherited his Stand from him. He makes purple vines like I make string." She began creating string, tying together Okuyasu's hands behind his back. "What does he do?"

"What- you think he's one of them too?"

"Why else would Josuke fight him?"

"C-Can I get a Stand?"

"Daddy says that can be dangerous. If you don't have enough fighting spirit, when you get your Stand you get really sick."

"Sick? Is Josuke in danger?"

Jolyne looked back at the house. "Not from being sick."

Tomoko winced as she looked down at her side, it was red and sore, and there were many tiny droplets of blood forming, like from a pin-prick. "Is... is there any way you can help him?" She looked back at the house, and watched as Jolyne flinched, as if from an explosion only she could hear, as the house shook to its foundations.

"Yeah! I'm really strong!" To show it off, she lifted herself in the air with Stone Free. "But Josuke told me to make sure you were safe. And he can heal people, so he'll be able to save the other guy."

"The other boy, the child... Jolyne, how do I get a Stand?"

"I don't know! And it's really dangerous. Dad said Grandma got a horrible fever because she wasn't strong enough, that her Stand was killing her, and no doctors could fix it, since only Stand Users can see Stands."

"A... horrible fever?" Tomoko asked, chilled to the bone. "Without any explanation, that can't be cured?"

"Yeah."

"So he's had it since all the way back then. What gave him his Stand?"

"It's passed down family's."

"So it's Joseph's fault?!"

"No, it's Dio's fault. He's a guy my Dad killed when he was a teenager, with Great-Grandpa. Dio did something to one of my really-really-great grandpas body, who died a long time ago, which gave all of that his descendants a Stand all at once."

"Then I can't get one?" Joylne shrugged. Tomoko, with a huff, got to her feet and grabbed Jolyne's hand, not caring that the girl was still floating. "Come on!" She growled.

"Where are we going?"

"I'm going to call the police!"

"What are they going to do?"

"...Then I'm calling the hospital!"

"Josuke can just heal us."

"How?"

"He just waves his hand, and anything that's broken is put back together."

Tomoko blinked, and then bit down the annoyance that came with the knowledge that so much money had been lost getting things repaired over the years. She had never noticed before, but now that she thought about it, she had never once come home to find something broken, but Josuke was sometimes clumsy as hell. Dozens of dishes thrown away, that couldn't have. But she had other things to think about. "Then who could help us?"

"My Dad." Jolyne said proudly. "He's the strongest in the world!"

"What can he do?"

"He doesn't want me to talk about it." She frowned. "He's going to yell at me for talking to you about Stands at all. But Josuke's in danger!"

"Fine. We'll call him." She pulled the still-floating Jolyne alongside her as she ran for the house, and where Jotaro's phone number was inside it.

Josuke swatted aside tiny tank fire with Crazy Diamond's fists. His Stand's hands weren't torn apart by the impact, as the punch was strong enough to deflect it away before it exploded, but it was taking its toll. Josuke's hands were a bloody mess.

As it was, in the dark and creaking house, he could barely sight the Enemy Stand. Koichi, arrow removed, and body bleeding out, laid in the center of the room, the mysterious Enemy taunting him wordlessly. Josuke twitched and swatted at his back with his hand when he felt a tiny man crawling up it. For his trouble he got a tiny dagger embedded in his thumb, and one hell of a burn where a teeny grenade went off over his jacket. Tiny tanks were rolling towards him, their cannons aimed for the space between him and the door holding Koichi.

"Shit." Looking over at Koichi, and the way his coughing was getting weaker, he looked at the trail of blood.

Josuke's own dried blood could be made wet again, but it wouldn't go into his body. But maybe for Koichi... Crazy Diamond slapped the blood, and Koichi jerked forward to meet the blood Josuke sent back half-way. Grinning, Josuke backed away from the ambush room, closer to the stairs, and had Crazy Diamond restoring the blood path on the way back. With each bloodstain on the floor removed, Koichi jerked closer to Josuke. Just a little farther...

The tip of Koichi's finger was within reach of Crazy Diamond, and Josuke didn't hesitate, coating his friend with restorative energy. Koichi got up, blinking in surprise at the world around him.

"Ahh! Wh-What happened?"

"Koichi, thank God!" Josuke breathed out a sigh of relief. "Get behind me, we need to get out of here."

"What's going on, all I can remember is getting stuck in the door, and then... and then... Wait, where are we?"

"Look, we're not out of danger yet. We need to get out of this house, right now." The question being, would the other guy in the high school uniform let them? Looking around carefully, he inched towards the stairs. How had Jolyne noticed those first soldiers in the darkness?

Noticing a flash of light, he darted to the side, yanking Koichi with him out of the way of more gunfire. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a lighter, only to have it get blown away by pinprick holes destroying it and making his hand even more of a mess. "Shit!"

"Did you burn yourself?" Koichi looked confused, following Josuke's eyes, and then staring in utter confusion as tiny men began parachuting down from the rafters. The falling fighters began to fire at him, he got sprayed with tiny bullets, wincing and flinching back from the pain, flailing blindly with the full force of Crazy Diamond's punches, smashing a few of them to pieces.

The remaining part of the army touched down, before forming ranks, becoming a wall of death that filled the hall and blocked the way to the stairwell. There was only one exit, the room behind them.

"I underestimated them." Josuke said, afraid. Grabbing Koichi, he dashed into the room, ducking to the left of the door as gunfire filled the space he and Koichi had been in just a second before.

"Josuke, what is this?"

"Don't bother asking, I can't explain it right now!" Looking around the pitch-black room, he noted cracks of sunlight coming from a boarded-over window. "Lucky! We'll have to jump, but at least we can get out of here." Crazy D should be able to cushion them, and if not, an Enemy Stand is definitely deadly, while a fall from the second floor was only maybe deadly.

"What?!" But before he could make a move, helicopters began appearing. "Josuke! At your side!" Koichi warned, looking at more tanks appearing from thin air as well.

"It's a whole fucking military." He growled, before blinking in surprise. "You saw them? You're a Stand User?"

"What's a Stand?"

"We'll talk about it later!"

"Oh?" The two turned towards the third voice, their Enemy suddenly making himself known, standing near the other door out of the room. "So he's a Stand User now?"

Josuke reached behind him, pulling nails from the wall, and throwing them with Crazy Diamond as hard as he could at the high-schooler. The army on the floor, as one, fired at the nails, turning them to dust before it could hit him. "My name is Nijimura Keicho. And this, is my Stand. Bad Company."

"Like I care, shithead."

"The reason I've chosen to reveal myself is because of your little friend."

"M-me?" Koichi asked.

"Yes, you. I'm looking for a Stand User with a certain ability... I didn't think you really had it in you. So, bring it out, and I might allow you to live." he glared at Josuke. "You, and that brat you were with earlier, have useless powers, so I'm afraid I'll have to kill you both."

"What?!" Koichi asked, panicking. "What does he mean, Josuke?"

Keicho grinned evilly, "Bring out your Stand, right now. Or I'll kill you both!"

"How do I-"

"Listen up Koichi. It's actually super simple, really. You just have to think, deep to yourself, 'I have to protect myself' and 'I really want to kick this guy's ass', and that's it."

"Th-That's it?!"

"Yeah, the rest is all instinct."

The shorter teen was sweating in fear now. All of this was crazy! All of it! "Even if you say that, how am I supposed to just-" both teens froze as a tiny grappling hook shot into Koichi's collar, one of the Bad Company soldiers scaling up Koichi's chest like a man climbing up a wall.

"I'll help you. Stealth squad! Attack!" Keicho barked like a general. The soldier began stabbing Koichi in the chin and in the neck. Before Josuke could help him, a glowing egg appeared in the air, before suddenly dropping.

All three of them stared at it. Emotions mixing in a general mess of disappointment and plain befuddlement.

"Can you move it?" Josuke asked quietly.

"How am I supposed to move it?" Koichi asked, a little irritated, and exhausted from summoning his Stand for the first time.

"It just... moves!" Josuke tried to explain. "It just does! When you want it."

The three stared a little longer.

Keicho sighed. "Well, it's an interesting experiment, at least." he pointed at them, and the soldiers were suddenly at attention, getting back into formation, helicopters and tanks in their midst. "What happens when someone clearly unsuited for a Stand is healed from the injury before they die? An utterly useless dud of a Stand!" All of them open fired at once. Crazy Diamond punched like crazy, deflecting as much as he could away from them, and kicking the egg to the side to get Koichi out of the line of fire. Both of Josuke's hands were ragged now, and Keicho didn't let up. Soldiers split off from the main group, for now, ignoring Koichi to scale the walls of the room to get above Josuke. The attack helicopters fired their missiles, and Josuke backed up, step by step, beginning to fail now and again to deflect it. Tiny holes riddled his chest as he missed a burst of gunfire.

Koichi bit his lip, urging his Stand to do something, anything.

"Huh, is this all it'll take?" Keicho taunted. He began walking forward, and Josuke spit some blood from his mouth, getting up and walking forward to meet him. He collapsed a second later once more, when his first step was onto a mine the size of a coin.

"Fuck!" He shouted, dropping down. The army shifted once more, surrounding him in a circle. Ripping the button from his jacket, he had Crazy Diamond launch it past Keicho. The man didn't bother having it shot down, the piece of metal missing him completely and embedding itself in the wall.

"Hah! Can't even throw right? And even if you had any aim, my army could have shot it down like nothing."

Josuke looked over at Koichi. "Koichi, I need you to run."

"And leave you here?!"

Josuke smirked, touched, "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine." He pointed at the door, the army's movement to surround Josuke leaving it unprotected.

"Wh-What about the Bow and Arrow?"

Keicho's attention turned back to Koichi, glaring. "What do you want with it?" He snarled.

"L-look, if we don't get him now, he'll just keep on killing people with it!" Koichi declared.

"What do you expect to do? You can't even defeat me, let alone think of stopping me."

Josuke looked Koichi in the eyes, before darting his eyes towards the door. "Now. Don't worry. I'm great. And I've got a plan."

Koichi hesitated another moment, before turning and running.

"Oh no you don't!" Keicho growled. The soldiers closest to Koichi turned, raising their guns and cannons, as Josuke forced himself to jump to the side, before having Crazy Diamond repair his jacket.

Two things happened at once.

The pointed metal button shot from the wall, and headed for Josuke.

Josuke, pulled by his jacket, that he held to him with all the power in his bloody hands, to keep it from flying off, was headed for the button.

Between the two objects rushing for each other was Keicho, focused entirely on Koichi. Josuke's entire frame impacted against Keicho's in a tackle, as the button cut a long slice along Keicho's stomach before affixing itself to Josuke's now fixed and spotless uniform.

"Dammit!" Keicho growled, all units, attac-" he caught himself at the last moment, his entire army turning and raising his weapons towards Josuke, and thus him as well. He shuddered as he felt the hand of Crazy Diamond wrap around his head.

"Hey~" Josuke said, casually, "you know, having such a close-range Stand like mine sure is a problem, sometimes." The ghostly hand held Keicho's head in place as the other hand reared back, Crazy Diamond smiling wildly. "But it does have it's advantages. If someone gets right-up and personal with me, I can defend against anything. You though, with your Stand spread all through the room..."

"Damn." Keicho said, before a high-speed fist collided with his face, over and over, making his nose a bloody mess, and quickly knocking him out.

Koichi, leaned back inside the door. "Is... is it over?"

"Yeah." Josuke said, grinning as Bad Company faded. "It's over."

Jotaro screeched past another car, Star Platinum acting as a second set of eyes as he drove like a madman, heading back the way he had come.

"Less than an hour." He muttered. "Less than an hour, and already there are two Enemy Stand Users! I can't let that girl go unwatched for a second!"

His car skidded into place next to the haunted mansion, Jolyne and a boy Jotaro didn't recognize waiting for him at the entrance.

"What's going on?!" He demanded. Jolyne flinched at the tone of his voice, and started to tear up a bit. "Well?!"

"Hey!" Koichi said, stepping in front of Jolyne. "Calm down! We're all fine now."

Jotaro looked at the determined look in the boy's eyes, and forced himself to calm down. His glare didn't cool though. "I told you not to get into any trouble."

"I'm sorry." she said softly.

"It's not her fault!" Koichi said. "It was me who poked my head through the door... all this fighting, Josuke's wounds, it's because of me."

Jotaro frowned, and simply walked past them. Star appeared, and placed a hand on top of both of their heads. "Fine." He grunted. "If that's how it is, there's no helping it. Explain the situation."

"O-okay." Jolyne began. "I heard with my strings that Josuke was fighting someone, so I wanted to check on him. So I told Miss Tomoko I wanted to see the haunted house, where Josuke was fighting."

"Why did you involve Tomoko? If you called me and told me what was happening, I would have come-"

"I needed to help him! What if he had gotten hurt? Josuke can't heal himself!"

Josuke sighed. "Good grief... Do you think Josuke would prefer you putting yourself in danger?"

"No. He yelled at me too."

"Good. What happened?"

"Me and Miss Tomoko went over to the gate, and she knocked out the first Enemy Stand User, who Josuke had beater earlier, but who was getting up. And then I went in, and showed Josuke the army guys the second Enemy Stand User had, but they shot at Miss Tomoko. So Josuke told me to stop helping him, and help Miss Tomoko instead."

"Josuke healed her?"

"First he went to fight the second Enemy. I gave her stitches, and then we called you." Jotaro nodded, a silent 'good job' for at least calling him rather then trying to handle it herself.

Koichi shuddered. "The second Stand User, the one who shot me with an arrow-" Jotaro's interest shot up, "-wanted to see if I would develop a Stand. But it didn't work, and I started dying. Josuke saved me, but got really messed up. He managed to beat the guy though. He was absolutely amazing."

"So, do you have a Stand now?"

"Kind of." Koichi said, embarrassed. An egg appeared at their side, before dropping to the ground. Jotaro notably didn't look unimpressed.

"What does it do?"

"We don't know yet."

Jotaro nodded. "No matter what ability is has, all Stands can be utilized to be devastatingly effective, if the User is strong enough, and smart enough."

Jolyne grinned, grabbing Koichi's hand. "Come on, we need to talk to the others."

"Anything else I should know?"

"We caught them both alive." Koichi said. "But we lost the Bow and Arrow, oh, and one other thing-"

"How?" Jotaro interrupted. "Where are they?"

"We don't know! After we beat them, and made sure Josuke wasn't about to die, we began to search the house for the Bow and Arrow. The Nijimura's- the Stand User brothers, were shooting people because they were trying to find someone with a specific ability. One of the people they gave a Stand to, his Stand came and stole the Bow and Arrow."

"It travels through electrical cables." Jolyne announced. "They told me. And it's name is Red Hot Chili Peppers."

"Well shit." Jotaro growled. "Looks like we'll have to stay here even longer Jolyne." The little girl smiled at that. "I'll have to look for a new babysitter, if Tomoko knows about all of this, she'll want to stay as far away as possible-"

"Um, Mister Jotaro?" Koichi interrupted.

"Yeah?"

"Josuke's mom, Tomoko? She's definitely involved. She and Jolyne came back, and helped us tie up the second Stand user. When we found the Arrow, she, uh, well-" by now they had entered the house and made their way up into the room where the group was staying, for now.

In the center were the Nijimura brothers, both healed from their injuries, but still very much unconscious and tied up. In the corner, sitting next to a bizarre creature that looked eerily similar to the stuff he pulled from Kakyoin and Polnareff's head, once upon a time, was Josuke. His clothes had been repaired, and an open first-aid kit had clearly been used, but he still looked pretty messed up.

And standing across from the three entering the room, leaning against the now open window, was Higishikata Tomoko, grinning at a feminine figure made up entirely of floating red stone cubes.

"Ah! Jotaro!" Tomoko said, noticing the man walk in. The figure behind her quickly vanishing. "I'm so sorry!"

Caught off guard, Jotaro blinked "What for?"

"I agreed to take care of Jolyne, and Josuke got her wrapped up into all this!" She bowed. "I would like to apologize!"

"N-No, there's no need. You didn't do anything wrong." Jotaro glared at the two teenagers tied up in the center of the room. "It's them who started this. The rest is just you trying to protect yourselves and a civilian." he looked at Tomoko, raising an eyebrow. "Did they shoot you with the Bow and Arrow too?"

"No, I did it on purpose." Tomoko said casually.

"What?! You could have died!"

"Josuke could have just healed me." She looked annoyed at her son, before noticing his injuries again, and softening her expression and tone. "Honestly, Josuke~! It could have saved us so much money! Think of those times I had to skip work because I was sick, or when we had to replace our broken appliances, or the car!"

"Sorry, Mom."

"Yeah, well, no more. From now on, we're not wasting anything that you can fix!" She looked thoughtful for a second, before smiling. "Can you return the charges to batteries? Or refill a car's tank?"

"I... don't see why I couldn't?"

"You haven't even tried?"

"I didn't think of it."

She smiled. "What a useful skill Josuke has."

Jotaro frowned. "That's still dangerous. My own mother almost died, because of her Stand."

"Josuke healed Koichi fine from the same thing, right? I don't understand why he can't fix himself. We'll have to take him to the hospital later."

"Do you know what your Stand does?" Jotaro asked.

"I think so." Her Stand appeared once more, "I wanted to protect my son, and Jolyne, from this kind of danger. To keep them from getting hurt." The Stand, which was mimicking Tomoko's movements, then split up, losing its humanoid form and reforming behind her as a solid square stone wall. "This is my Stand, the Wall."

Keicho blinked awake, and suddenly Star Platinum, Stone Free, the Wall, and Crazy Diamond appeared, all staring down at him, arms crossed. He winced, glaring at them all. "So you didn't kill me?" He muttered. Looking at his father sitting in the corner, mourning over a piece of paper, he was filled with rage. "Damn it all! I've come to far to give up now! Why would you crush my goals like this!?"

"Stands are dangerous. Most people, when given power like that, abuse it to their own ends," Jotaro muttered "making Stand Users willy-nilly is irresponsible and dangerous, who knows how many monsters you've unleashed on this town."

Tomoko growled, "Doing this to my poor son- why!? What did he do to you?"

"Shooting Koichi, when you didn't even think he could make a Stand..." Josuke hissed out, furious. "...you straight-up tried to murder him!"

"You're an asshole!" Jolyne added.

He looked to his side, where Okuyasu was completely transfixed on their father. Useless. If he was thinking, he'd realize they all had their Stands so close to them. One well-aimed swipe with the Hand would be enough to put all their enemies out of commission at once! The fury began to build up in him. It would be risky... but he could still salvage the situation. A single soldier of Bad Company appeared, squeezed between Okuyasu's and Keicho's sides, as they were tied together, hidden from their enemies.

The small soldier had a bag with it, filled to the brim with tiny coin-sized landmines. At this range, both he and Okuyasu would take a hard hit, but it might be enough of a distraction to give them a moment to back away, and it would definitely destroy the knot, placed behind their backs, that held them together. Okuyasu had to notice the soldier's sudden mass pressing against his side, but his brother barely gave a reaction, carefully not looking at the side. Keicho was impressed, for a moment.

The soldier punched the first bomb, and the chain-reaction explosion of a dozen tiny mines blew them apart. The blocks of the Wall immediately split up, forming a shield in front of the Stands, catching the worst of the explosion. Okuyasu had caught the worst of the explosion, most of his left arm gone, and a good deal of his side a mess. Keicho, luckier, had only lost a hand and given himself a horrible burn on his side. With a bit of free room, he summoned more and more of Bad Company, his soldiers pouring out of his aura and opening fire. The blocks shot here and there, catching every tiny bullet and tiny explosion. Groups of four or five blocks each caught every missile his helicopters launched.

Before he could swear, or begin to strategize, strings shot out from the cracks in the floorboards, forming loops and snaking around his arms and legs, before yanking him down to the floor, trapped and bound to the ground. A group of his soldiers broke off to try and cut the strings, but Jotaro and Josuke stepped forward, walking without fear through the confused mess of soldiers, stamping everything around them with their Stand's legs.

"Dammit Okuyasu!" he screamed, "HELP ME!" Okuyasu wasn't moving, he realized. He had truly been hit hard by the mini-mines. "Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! You stupid brother!" he groaned, close to tears, beginning to feel the pain of his hand, and knowing it was only a fraction of what he had dealt to Okuyasu. "Why did you stay with me, you stupid brother? You should have told them. They would have stopped the explosion... Why would you stay loyal to me?"

Josuke walked over to Okuyasu, and to Keicho's amazement, Crazy Diamond reached over and with a single movement, Okuyasu was fine. His brother picked himself up, staring at Josuke in utter bewilderment.

"You... saved me?" he looked surprised and angry, then, "Why did you heal me?! I'm your enemy! I tried to kill you, you know!"

"No particular reason." Josuke answered. "I just don't think that just being evil is a reason to let someone die painfully like that."

"But... you're not healed yourself. Why can't you just-"

"I can't heal myself with my Stand. Only other people. Besides, I don't believe in killing my enemies. If they're dead, they lose everything. No one deserves that."

He stared dumbly, before looking over to his father. "What is my father lookin' at?" he said quietly.

"Those scraps of paper that were in that chest he was digging through, they belonged to a family photo." Josuke shrugged. "I figured it wouldn't do any harm, he was so upset before."

Okuyasu looked at Josuke, then at his father, and then his brother, before sitting down and sighing. "I just... don't get it."

Tomoko grinned. "My boy's a saint, isn't he?"

"Mom!" Josuke blushed. "I just do what I feel like. There's nothing deeper than that."

Jotaro nodded, looking over at Keicho, who observed the exchange with a growing look of resentment. He rubbed Jolyne's head. "Good thinking with the limbs."

Bursting with pride, she did a twirl, and more string was sent up, around a support column, and then down to Keicho, mixing with the string already there, Keicho was lifted into the air, limbs held wide as he was suspended in the middle of the room in a mess of string, looking like he was trapped in some massive spider web "Give up, Enemy Stand User!" She demanded dramatically.

Jotaro had Star continuously stamping more soldiers, and Tomoko's the Wall automatically blocked the attacks of soldiers, and pushed them around whenever they got close to any of the other people there. Koichi watched in wonder, amazed at what the combination of Stands could do.

As the soldiers and their vehicles were crushed, Keicho got wearier and wearier, and less and less new ones popped into existence to replace old ones. After a few minutes, the blond teenager was breathing heavily, and the Wall disappeared, its protection no longer needed. Okuyasu, under the watchful eye of Josuke, retreated to the corner of the room to sit with his father and look at the photo together with him, crying silently.

"So..." Jotaro began, his glare turned to Keicho, suspended in Stone Free's webs. "Talk."

"...I will only do so... if you find a Stand User that can make my father turn back to normal, and kill him!"

Jotaro turned towards Josuke. "Did you try healing him?"

"It didn't have any affect." Josuke said sadly "Restoring him as much as possible, it basically just rearranged the particular placement of the bumps and slime. I can't make him into a human again... whatever happened to him, it happened so long ago he probably doesn't have enough regular human flesh left to make anything."

"Sorry. We can keep looking." Jotaro said. "I have contacts at the Speedwagon Foundation, they've been looking into Vampire Cells for... well, for longer than I've been alive, by a long shot."

Koichi, Tomoko, Josuke, and Okuyasu all stared at him, and all at the same time silently mouthed the simple question: Vampires?

Jotaro rolled his eyes, "Everyone in this room has a psychic ghost-thing under their control. Nothing in this world is impossible." Turning back to Keicho, he glared, "How many people have you killed?"

"Are you sending me to prison? With my power-"

"You could escape any prison you wanted." Jotaro finished. "I know."

Jolyne nodded "A Stand User could never get stuck in a prison."

"Then... what are you considering?"

"I'm going to make you 'Retire'." Jotaro growled. "Unless you convince me you're more useful as a functioning person."

Keicho felt a chill go down his spine. "My father... sold his soul to a man named Dio, for money. The bastard abused us ever since the economy went bad and our mother died, but as his children... we at least owe him a normal death. He was loyal to Dio, but to make sure, he put something in him. His cells. When Dio died, the cells went out of control, and my father turned into that thing. He can't die, can't do anything, can't even recognize us-" he stopped, thinking of the picture. "I... I thought..." he sighed. "I don't know what to think."

Okuyasu let out a sad laugh. "You can't say that brother, that's my job. You're the plan guy."

Keicho closed his eyes. "I've been trying to find, or make, a Stand User who can kill my father."

"I'd recommend sunlight, but that apparently hasn't had any effect." Jotaro said.

"We're not helping him kill him!" Josuke protested.

Jotaro looked over at the Nijimura brothers' father. That could have been Kakyoin. That could have been Polnareff. "I think it'd be the kindest thing we can do for him-"

Tomoko frowned, before walking over to stand with Josuke by Okuyasu, Jolyne rushing to join her. "We won't be doing anything so hasty-" Tomoko protested.

"You can't just kill him, Daddy-"

"-If the Speedwagon foundation can't heal him." Jotaro finished, expecting them to agree, but they all simply were just as stubborn, Koichi joining Josuke on the other side, and even putting a supporting hand on Okuyasu's shoulder.

"No." Okuyasu said, determined. "If... if he can remember us... that means Dad's still in there, probably." hope was beginning to shine in his eyes, and he teared up as he looked between Josuke and Koichi. "I can't believe all of this... we... we were determined to follow this through, for Dad's sake. Even if we had to kill people..."

Keicho sighed. He had lost.

"...Let me down." He said. "Okuyasu, is Dad really still in there?"

"Yeah bro. He is."

"Then I've got no reason to do this shit any more." He said quietly. "We can finally start our own lives."

"Do you think you can get off scott-free?" Tomoko asked harshly. "Okuyasu here might be a minor, but you're an adult, and you've been shooting people with that arrow, where Josuke wasn't there to help them survive it!"

Jotaro looked at Tomoko. "I know it'll sound unfair... but there really is no prison that will hold him, if he tries hard enough. And I don't like killing unarmed men. Not that a Stand User is ever really unarmed. The best we can do, is watch him ourselves.

She narrowed her eyes at Keicho, before sighing. "I guess you're the most experienced with this stuff, Jotaro."

He nodded, and turned to Jolyne. "Let him down kid."

"Okay Daddy." The strings snaked back into her body in a flash, dropping her prisoner to his feet.

"Well... if that's all done for. I need to talk to some people from the Speedwagon Foundation. We need to track down that Arrow."

"Wait," Keicho said, shocked. "You lost it?!"

"Something calling itself Red Hot Chili Peppers took it." Koichi explained. "After we knocked you out and Tomoko used the Arrow, it popped out of the electrical socket."

"...Then I know who you're looking for."

The Wall

User- Higishikata Tomoko

Destructive Power- D

Speed- D

Range- C

Durability- B

Precision- B

Developmental Potential- D

Abilities- Controls a large number of cubes that can take a variety of shapes. An automatic Stand, the Wall will either exactly mimic Tomoko's actions in humanoid form, or form barriers to protect Tomoko or things she cares for.

When she brings it out, she can choose its placement and orientation anywhere in a twenty meter diameter around herself. She can bring her Stand out in two shapes; humanoid, at which point it will mimic any and all movements Tomoko makes, or as a 'default' wall. Both shapes however, will break apart randomly in order to shield anything Tomoko wants to protect. Once it breaks off, Tomoko loses all direct control of those blocks, and they will move to protect things Tomko cares about without any control or input from Tomoko. They will continue doing this until those blocks are destroyed, or Tomoko chooses to call off her Stand, but even if she calls back her Stand, if the blocks are actively protecting something, they will not disappear until Tomoko feels whatever they were protecting is safe.

She cannot choose to make it stop protecting things she cares about, or make it protect someone she doesn't want to. The only way would be for her to honestly not care about those things. Cannot attack, except when in human form mimicking Tomoko.

A destroyed block stops floating, and will fade away. The Wall doesn't transfer damage taken to its User, however it takes several minutes for destroyed blocks to regenerate, and she can only produce a set amount of blocks, and blocks regenerate one-at-a-time. Meaning, if the Wall was completely destroyed, it would take several hours before Tomoko could use it in its entirety again.

Tomoko's Stand "the Wall" is named after the song "Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd, the same band that made the song that inspired the name of Crazy Diamond (Shine on you crazy diamond). It felt appropriate. Sorry for such a long wait, by the way! I was dealing with other non-fanfic related stuff, but I'll be focusing back on this one. There won't be nearly as long a wait as there was for this one.