Jorge Joestar

Chapter 12: Rhinoceros Beetle

NOTE: I add some picture on chapter 2

When I told him Joseph Joestar had died of cancer two years ago, Cars said,

“Oh… Luck always was on his side.”

“If he was still alive, would you have sought revenge?”

I asked.

“He’d be an old man, nearly a hundred years old.”

“I would indeed. After all, the man sent me into spacethirty-seven times. I won’t feel freed from that fate until things are settledbetween us. I’ve spent nigh eternity dreaming of placing a stone mask on thatman, turning him into a vampire, having him devour other humans, and finallyeating him myself.”

“………..? Stone mask?”

“A tool that turns humans into a good source of energy andnutrition. Mere humans are hardly enough to satisfy our appetites. Turning theminto vampires makes them far more appetizing, and drinking blood makes themyoung again, and much stronger. I’m sure Joseph Joestar would make a pleasinglydelicious vampire.”

Desperately trying to look calm, I listened to Cars’terrifying story…my mind reeling. A stone mask? That turned humans intovampires? Was that even possible?

“Humans are a life form with possibilities,”

Cars said.

“You can do almost anything if you simply tweak their brainsa little. Changes to the brain change the electric currents. If the electricsignals change, the blood changes. If the blood changes the bones and organsand skin and all the rest changes. Jorge Joestar, you are quite lacking inheight compared to Joseph.”

Lacking!? I wasn’t lacking! Certainly I was shorter than mygrandfather, who was over 190 centimeters, but I was taller than the averageJapanese man. As I thought this, Cars reached his hand out to my head. I froze,and his fingers slipped into my head, as easily as an airplane slips into acloud.

“Eeeek!”

I squealed, but I was afraid I’d die if I moved so I had tostay perfectly still.

“Don’t worry, the brain has no capacity for pain,”

Cars said,

and pulled his fingers out of my head, leaving no holes orany sign he’d reached inside me. Just as I was starting to feel relieved aweird sound came from my throat and my head snapped sideways of its own accordand I thought maybe that sound wasn’t me swallowing but my neck breaking andthen snap crunnch craaack all the bones in my body started twisting in allsorts of crazy directions, one after the other. But it only looked horrible. Icould feel the vibrations running through me, but no pain. My knees and elbowsbent backwards and my wrists spun the wrong way and it seemed obvious all mybones were breaking but apparently they weren’t and I was fine. And I was abouttwenty centimeters taller.

“………..!?”

“See? I know the human brain,”

Cars said.

“I can also make wings grow from your back.”

He started to reach his hand out again but I ducked underit.

“I’m fine!”

“Heh heh heh. Humans are a fascinating species. They seemlike they are constantly striving to become something else, but they resistactual change. Most likely they simply enjoy imagining things. That is what Ilike most about the human race. They are the only ones who imagine, who create.Who make stories. When I was living underground I gathered the stories humanhad written, and read them. Humans are the only species that enjoy things that happento others of their kind. At first I had no idea how they were enjoying it. Ourbrains had no concept of emotional investment, of putting ourselves in other’sshoes. It wasn’t easy to do. My race was complete as it was, and satisfied withthat. And as a result they lacked ambition, made no progress of any kind, andlived a life of stagnation. But there’s a difference between being actuallysufficient and simply not knowing that something is insufficient. I came tounderstand that we weren’t perfect. We just hadn’t noticed that we weren’t. Welacked even the ability to realize this

fact because we had never compared ourselves to anyone else.Because we expected nothing from anyone else, and made do entirely with what wealready had. But I noticed. Reading human writings and learning to enjoy themsent new electric impulses through my mind. I knew then that we had neverstopped to think about our own potential. We were certain our species was thepinnacle of all things, and thus we had stopped progressing. This was the firsttime I ever felt dissatisfied. The first time I had ever questioned myself.That quickly let to frustration, to anger. And that frustration and angerpleased me. It was what you would call a eureka moment. I was furious withmyself, and that was cause for celebration. It was proof that I, too, hadpotential.”

“And looking back, I was baffled by how I had everlived without  doubt, withoutdissatisfaction. We could never set foot in the light of the sun, could neverknow the world above during the day. We were trapped in the world underground.I couldn’t bear it any longer. So I quickly began exploring my own potential.My own brain. Everything begins with the brain. To study our brains I begankilling my own kind like we killed humans. I killed them, spit open theirheads, and examined their brains; as I suspected, we had potential. In order toinvestigate closer, further, and with more certainty, I killed a great manymore, but murder itself did not really pose a problem among my kind. After all,none of them cared for anyone but themselves. Sometimes I even killed in frontof others of my kind, but nobody said anything. They had no emotionalinvestment, no imagination, and I slowly realized just how appalling that was.If someone attempted to attack us, to conquer us, and we reacted with suchdisinterest, that could be the end of us. We would be annihilated by our ownselfsatisfaction and arrogance. Fearing for my own safety, I continued

my studies, created the stone mask, stretched my brain, andconquered the sun. And not only that. I created a perfect body for myself, onesuperior to all other living things.”

“Hunh…so? How is not dying?”

“…there’s such a lot of time.”

The question I’d asked absently hit directly to the heart ofthings, and Cars’ whispered response had an air of such grim realism that Ialmost started laughing, but he was watching me suspiciously. Whoops. If hethought I was mocking him, he might get angry, and in such closequarters…well, it was about three times the size of the H. G. Wells, butthere was so still nowhere to run, and I had no hope of standing against him.Hokay, I thought. Was it acceptable to allow this Ultimate Cars to reach Earthsix months from now? Of course not. After all, he ate humans. He also turnedthem into vampires, but either way he was clearly the enemy of mankind. Sure,there wasn’t a rule that humans shouldn’t have any predators…yet at a humanfaced with such a threat, I felt obligated to do what I could. But thispredator was immortal, so I couldn’t just kill him. Could I somehow blow up theship? No. He was smart enough to take the Giottos apart and build them intothis ship in the blink of an eye. We didn’t have any powerful explosives athand, and even if we blew it up with Narancia’s Das Boot, Cars would just killNarancia the moment he realized what we were doing, and his Stand would vanish.As the thought crossed my mind there was a sonar ping from inside me.Narancia’s Das Boot had snuck inside my body again, without Cars noticing. 458I glanced at Narancia. The boy’s eyes were totally those of a mafia veteran. Hewas going to try something before he got eaten. With Das Boot? It could onlymove inside living tissue and Stands. Wait…part of this ship was made fromthe extra Cars. He could

move through that. That must be how he got his submarineinside me without touching me. What else could he do? But before I could thinkof anything else, Cars said,

“What’s this?”

I looked over, and Cars had his hand inserted into his ownchest. He felt around inside himself, then pulled his hand out with one ofNarancia’s submarines held in it.

“Is this…a machine? Has human technology created boatsthat can go inside the body?”

Oh, shit, I thought. Neither Narancia or I had even begun tounderstand how ultimate the Ultimate Thing really was. As if proving that, Carssat down on the floor, and took Das Boot apart as we watched. His fingers movedwith such unhesitating precision it was as if he had built it himself. First heheated the tips of his fingers like a blow torch, making a line across theouter walls, and after peeling them off he divided it into engineeringsections, living quarters, control rooms, and missile storage. Tiny hands hadcome out of the tips of his fingers, and were turning and opening every nut andscrew, leaving the entire plumbing system intact. It was like he stroked it andeverything divided itself into pieces, lined up in neat rows on the floor, downto the individual spoons in the kitchen or the springs in the beds. When itcame to the monitors in the control room or the computers in engineering, henot only took them apart, he also analyzed the structure.

“Some sort of visual data,”

he muttered, putting the computer back together. He pluggedthe cord into the palm of his hand and opened his mouth. A beam of lightemerged from the back of his throat, and a thin membrane appeared between hisjaws, turning his mouth into a projector. The information flowing from his palmwas transferred to a thin cellophane-like paper, and projected onto the wallacross from him. It was a sexy photo of a naked woman.

“Eh!? Hey! Aughhh!”

Narancia shrieked, turning bright red.

“Stoooooop! Stop it! What the fuck!? God damn it!”

He was in such a tizzy he forgot all about shame and fearand threw himself at Cars, trying to cover up the projector lens, but Carseasily lifted him, spun him around in the air, placed him flat on his back onthe ceiling, and tied him there with cords and pipes. Below him, Cars kept onprojecting. Ka-chunk. Ka-chunk. With an analog sound like an old slideprojector, image after image displayed, every single one of the same nakedgirl.

“I said stop! Yo! This is morally wrong, damn it! Please,Mr. Cars! I really fucking mean it! Aiiieeeee!”

Narancia was so worked up now his nose had started bleeding,dripping down from the ceiling. I was definitely starting to feel sorry forhim.

“Cars, these might be personal memories. It’s not the bestmanners to display someone’s precious…”

and no sooner had the words left my mouth then the nextpicture showed that girl on the cover of a magazine.

“Hunh?”

Wait, these were all pin-ups?

“Auuuuughhhhhh! How dare you!? My Trish Cicciolina!”

Narancia screamed. Now I placed her. Trish Cicciolina was afamous porn star who’d become a member of the Italian Parliament. She wasfamous even in Japan. She was middle-aged now, but these were all from when shewas young. I glanced up, accidentally meeting Narancia’s eye.

“What, motherfucker? You’d better not tell anyone about thisor I swear I’ll fucking kill you! Let me down, Cars! Fucker! I get free of thisI’ll kill all of you!”

he screamed, spraying spit and nose blood.

“You can like whoever you want,”

I said, weakly. This did not appear to comfort him at all.

“Shut up!”

he roared.

“Shut the fuck up! Fuck you all!”

He then began trying to spit at me. I dodged, laughing. Whatthe hell were we even doing? Cars turned his mouth projector back into hisnormal mouth, and said,

“So this machine has come from inside your body? Have humanbodies become capable of making machines?”

“Die, Cars!”

Narancia yelled, now just spitting furiously in alldirections. Cars ignored this completely. He stood up, and reached his handtowards Narancia’s belly. Afraid he’d die if Cars dissected him looking for thefactory, I hastily yelled,

“No, Cars! It exists as a machine, but is something elseentirely.”

Cars stopped his hand, and looked at me.

“……….? What do you mean?”

“It’s called a Stand. It takes the form of a machine, butisn’t one. I only just learned about them today myself, but Stands are…something ordinary humans don’t have. A special power. Like telekinesis ortelepathy, or psychic powers. But much more varied and complex. They can looklike people, animals, plants, or machines. Only people who have Stands can seethem or touch them. I just happen to have found someone who made it so I couldsee and touch Stands, but I’m not a Stand Master myself.”

“Then I can use Stands, too?”

“Well…I’m guessing you can see and touch them becauseyou’re the ultimate lifeform…”

I trailed off as Cars held his palm up in front of hischest, and a submarine surfaced from inside him. It was a different design fromNarancia’s Das Boot.

“……….!”

I looked up at the ceiling, and Narancia appeared to beshocked speechless. Cars had just spontaneously developed a Stand.

“Hmm,”

Cars said, staring at his Stand.

“I understand now.”

Whooops. We were fucked now, I thought. Everything waspossible for the ultimate being. He could absorb anything, without limits.

“Since it’s my own power, I can easily grasp what it can do,”

Cars said, and boooooooooommm an explosive sound echoedthrough every inch of my body. It was so loud I covered my ears but since thenoise was inside me I couldn’t block the sound.

“It seems you really don’t have a Stand,”

Cars said, and I was relieved

my ear drums had survived what I suddenly realized was anextremely loud sonar. My ears were still ringing. This was nuts.

“Unh…!”

I turned towards the groan, and saw Enrico Pucci writhing onthe floor, clutching his hands to his ears, his face screwed up in pain. Hemust be getting the deafening sonar treatment, too.

“Hmm, there is something in you,”

Cars said, striding over to him. Despite his injuries, Puccitried to scramble away, but was moving too slowly, and there was nowhere to go.

“Unh…no…”

Cars ignored his hoarse pleas, bent over, and stuck his armin Pucci’s back.

“Auughhh!”

Pucci screamed, and Cars began dragging a humanoid Standabout the same size as Pucci out of his back by the neck.

“Hmm,”

Cars said, examining it.

“This looks like a man, but is no man…nor anyanimal…what is it…? Why are there letters written all over the surface ofits skin?”

“Gah…shit…shut up! Do it, White Snake!”

Pucci yelled. His Stand turned and punched Cars in the cheek.Cars’ head rolled sideways with the blow, and a disc popped out of his head,but not one or two, but a flood of them, bubbling out of his head, spillingceaselessly onto the floor. Pucci froze to the spot, horrified. Even as morediscs poured out of him, Cars turned back to Pucci, and said,

“So this…is your Stand’s power. Fascinating. I understandit.”

Hunh!? Before I even had time to be surprised, a humanoidStand emerged from Cars’ back. It looked something like Pucci’s White Snake,but it was bigger, and had three heads and six arms like a statue of Ashura.The middle arm on the right punched Pucci’s face, and two discs came out. Carslooks mildly surprised.

“……….? Only two…?”

Discs were still spilling out of his own head with no

signs of ever slowing down. They were forming quite thepile.

“Let’s see…”

Cars picked up one of Pucci’s discs, and placed it insidehis own forehead.

“…I see, White Snake. A stand that can turn memories andStand powers into discs and steal them, and control people by writing to thediscs…”

he said, once he’d finished reading Pucci’s Stand disc.

“Stop, please…”

Pucci said.

“How did you get this power,”

Cars asked.

“Were you stabbed by a special arrow? Long ago, when I wason Earth, there were occasional people with special powers, and I made a toolthat could pull those powers out of humans, a bow and arrow. I barely used itbefore I began slaughtering my own species. In theory, that bow and arrow cantrigger a reaction; to protect their own lives from the fatal wound, theirtalents would blossom, the energy would heal the wounds, and they woulddiscover special abilities previously hidden within them. Has something likethat pulled this Stand out of you?”

Without waiting for Pucci to answer, Cars pulled the memorydisc out of him, knocking him out, and placed it in his own head.

“…hmm…it seems my bow and arrow was not involved, butthe theory is not wrong. ‘The Devil’s Palm’…while the body hangs between lifeand death only those with a Stand lurking within them will be saved.”

I had heard the legends of ‘The Devil’s Palm’. A holy spotsomewhere in America, that moved itself from place to place, and those thatwandered into it were either chosen, or died. Cars sighed.

“But everything else is quite dull. There is nothing to belearned from human memories. They lack attention to detail, their thoughtpatterns are shallow, and their recall is shockingly poor…”

He reached up to pull the disc out.

“Mm?”

he said, pausing.

“What…?”

Then he took the disc out, slammed it back in Pucci’s head,glanced at me, and laughed.

“Thanks to him, six months will take four hours. Aren’tyou lucky?”

Hunh? We both gaped at him, but he turned his attention backto Pucci, who had woken up again.

“You there. I did not write a message on the outside ofGiotto, and did not throw it down to Earth. Think on that. Who prepared themetal plate that killed your family?”

Hunh? Huuunhh? ………what!? We’d all assumed the notesabout the way to heaven had led us to the back of Mars, where we found theGiottos and Cars, and all of us, myself included, had assumed that was key tofinding this ‘Heaven’, so this revelation threw me for a loop. But who elsecould have prepared that metal sheet with a message on it? Who had dropped thatfrom the sky onto Pucci’s house, and how? They hadn’t just dropped it on hishouse, they’d wiped it from the face of the Earth. Pucci’s home had vanished,replaced by a crater seventeen meters in diameter. Who else could do that?

“Think about it,”

Cars said.

“If I could throw a metal plate down to Earth, I’d haveflown there myself. This is impossible. Even if the metal is treated to be heatresistant, there’s no possible way a single metal plate could survive all theway from space to the surface without burning up. I know everything about theGiotto’s heat shields. No matter what angle it entered the atmosphere, it wouldmelt in the stratosphere. To begin with, they’ve obviously only applied theheat resistant treatment to the outside. The back of the plate is ordinary metal,and would melt away first. And they’ve even carved letters into the front ofit. That would ruin whatever effect the treatment had. Why is it humans chooseto blind themselves the moment things cease to make sense? Why

can’t you stop yourselves from being so stupid you ignoredthe facts that don’t fit with your desire to believe this was a message fromspace?”

But the strangest part was, nobody had noticed the meteorfalling. The meteor had evaded both the Space Center and the Air Force radar.Funnier Valentine had mentioned that. That should have caught my attention. Itwas more than just ‘strange’. But looking things over again, how could throwingan iron plate leave a seventeen meter crater? That seemed unlikely if it hadn’tbeen traveling as fast as it would have if it was coming from outer space. Butthat’s only if it was thrown normally. What if it wasn’t thrown normally?Thrown by someone not normal using a not normal throwing technique.

“Come, now! Remember the sky!”

Cars said, annoyed by Pucci’s silence.

“Even with your pathetically low recall, you should be ableto managed that much! Remember him!”

“…………?”

When Pucci just gaped at him, Cars spat,

“Look,”

and turned his mouth into a projector again, beaming animage onto the wall. Ka-chunk. The evening sky, orange and purple mingled. Asingle dot against it. Ka-chunk. That dot enlarged, clearly human shaped.Ka-chunk. The humanoid form enlarged, but with the sun at his back his face andfigure were in shadow, impossible to make out. Ka-chunk. The contrast adjusted,illuminating everything. The man floating in the air was muscular, with longlimbs and a barrel chest, even features twisted in a wicked grin.

I knew that man.

No, I didn’t. I don’t know why I thought I did. He waswhite, and looked like no one I’d ever seen. Long, narrow eyes, a strong jaw,full lips, and three moles on his left ear. He was handsome, but there wassomething inherently evil about his face. His smile let us catch a glimpse oftwo long, sharp fangs. He didn’t seem like a Stand Master…he didn’t even seemlike a human.

The image on the wall vanished, and Cars laughed.

“He’s a vampire. What could my food source be plotting,sending me a spaceship and Joseph Joestar’s grandson?”

“Eh? I’m adopted. Not actually related to Joseph at all.”

And it wasn’t this mysterious vampire who put me on the H.G. Wells, but Tsukumojuku. When I said so, Cars’ White Snake appeared in frontof me, fist clenched. Oh. He’s going to hit me, I thought. But I didn’t evenhave time to brace myself. Wham! Not only did my face turn, but my whole bodyfollowed it, and I went spinning through the air. He hit me so hard it’s awonder my neck didn’t break. It was probably a good thing I didn’t bracemyself; going limp probably saved me.

“I’d better check your memories, too…”

Cars said. White Snake pulled the disc out of my head, andslotted it into Cars’. His relaxed tone belied the sheer force he’d used, but Ilacked the energy to argue that point. My cheekbone appeared to be broken, andI couldn’t touch it, and it was already super swollen. Both my shoulders werestill injured, so I was pretty much hurting all over. I tried to squeeze thethrobbing pain out of my mind and

wonder why Tsukumojuku had sent me to Mars in the firstplace. Hey! I am your instrument. A person needs your help. I’ll take you tothem. That’s all he’d said, but I still hadn’t done anything here. All I’d donewas meet Cars, and it sounds like he and Joseph Joestar had a history, but Carscouldn’t be the person who needed my help. He wasn’t a person… I thought thatfar, then I shook my head. Actually, my cheek hurt too much to shake, so I justdid it in my mind. The reason I’d done nothing wasn’t because the person whoneeded me wasn’t here. I hadn’t done anything because I hadn’t tried to doanything. If I actually accomplished something then that would be useful towhoever it was who needed me. The journey Tsukumojuku had given wasn’t overyet. And it seemed like this space trip might actually finish within the fourhours we’d been given. I had no idea why.

“Uh, Cars-sempai,”

I said. The blood in my mouth made a gross sound and Inearly started coughing on it but managed to stop myself and say again,

“Cars-sempai, sorry, um…can you heal me up? My body andhead hurt so much I can’t think straight.”

Cars didn’t respond at all, so for a moment, just a moment,I managed to trick myself into turning to look at him. Even that slightmovement felt like someone took a long harpoon and jammed it into my cheek andthrough my brain with such force it wound up sticking two meters out the otherside and the pain of it left my vision blurry but I managed to recover and seeCars enjoying my memories. He was just staring at empty space, but I think hewas enjoying my colorful life.

“Yo, Carsy, don’t ignore me!”

Cars’ eyes suddenly focused on me, and he grinned.

“You sure waste a lot of time on stupid puzzles.”

Nah, they might looks simple from the results and solutionsbut that was just the Egg of Columbus and actually getting there

was pretty dang hard. I would have argued that point all daybut simply couldn’t right now.

“I’d like to think faster so if you could just heal me…”

“In the end, you’re just another human,”

Cars said, ignoring me again.

“You see a mystery and think, ‘How odd!’ and put it on ashelf somewhere.”

Shuddup.

“Even if I put things together after the fact, as long as Iget there in the end, what does it matter? If I stopped to ponder every mysteryI saw before collecting all the information I needed, I’d never solveanything…”

I managed to spit out, but was there any point in arguingadvanced detecting with the ultimate thing? But to my surprise, Cars just said,

“Hmm…makes sense,”

and then noticed my condition.

“Mm? You can still think like that even without your memorydisc? This isn’t something learned through experience, but a creation of yourinnate intelligence? I see why they call you the ‘deduction machine.’“

I had a lot of ideas about where he’d pulled that from mymemories but that was an insult critics of the detective novel genre used todismiss the presence of the detective character…but that didn’t god damnmatter so I summoned the last bit of energy I had and spit out,

“Heal…me…”

and at last Cars heard me.

“Heal you? Human healing is far too weak, and takes far toomuch time,”

he said, coming over and crouching down next to me, leavingmy disc stuck in his head.

“Remember this! The heal button is right here,”

he said, and stuck his fingers just to the left of the crownof my head but I couldn’t actually see him doing this and I couldn’t stick myfingers in my own brain anyway. Then my brain went bam and suddenly inflated,then squeezed itself tight like it was pumping something downwards and firstthe swelling on my cheek got way larger and the bones started making scrapingsounds like they were rubbing against each other and the skin on

my cheek came back and the swelling was gone and my bonesmoved back to normal and everything was slim again. My cheek was healed in aninstant and then the swelling went down to my shoulders. Bam! Both shoulderswent giant and round and the wounds yawned open but didn’t hurt and didn’tbleed. Pfffft a sort of wind came out of my body and when that stopped thewounds were closed and the swelling went down and my flesh and muscles andbones were all connected right like they’d always been. After healing myshoulders the swelling went all the way down the rest of my body like it waslooking for other wounds and injuries to heal and finally ended up at my asswhere it came out like a fart, pbbbt. I yelped, embarrassed, and jumped to myfeet but my body was entirely back to normal, and I felt better than I had inyears except that I was still too tall.

“Cars, sorry, but can you put me back at my old height?”

“? …..isn’t the view better?”

Tch!

“It wasn’t bad to begin with, and my clothes don’t fit anymore, so I look like shit!”

“You can always change your clothes.”

Says the half-naked man. But I didn’t say that, and Carsreached out and stuck his hand in my brain again, and a moment later snapcrunnch craaack my bones all broke the opposite direction from before and thenI was my old height again. Mm, good. I felt like my head was a little largerthan normal but it had always been on the big side.

“OK,”

I said. Time to think.

“Cars, can I have the disc back?”

“It’s more effective if I look at it.”

Gah.

“But they’re my memories,”

I said, and since a third of the disc was sticking out ofCars head I grabbed it and yanked it out. I was getting pretty bold. If he wasgonna kill me it’d be over in an instant and that instant was always hoveringover me and I had no way of predicting what would cause that instant to arriveso I

just didn’t give a shit any more. Even after he healed mywounds I couldn’t exactly relax, here. But as I was putting the disc back in myhead Cars said,

“I already found him.”

“? Who?”

“That vampire.”

“….eh? Where? In my memories?”

“Yes.”

Really!?

“So I’ve met that vampire before?”

“No. You simply saw a photo of him.”

“Hunh…?”

“When you were seven, you were looking at an album of oldphotographs in the Joestar home, and it momentarily entered your field ofvision.”

How the fuck was I supposed to remember that? I didn’t evenremember the album! Cars laughed at my dumbfounded expression.

“Heh heh, like I said, your memories are more useful when Iview them.”

Then Cars turned his mouth into a projector again anddisplayed my memory on the wall. Ka-chunk. A page of an album filled with blackand white photographs. Ka-chunk. A close up of the largest photo on the page.It was apparently a picture from when the Joestars were living in America. Itwas a big house, with what looked like a large farmland outside. Three welldressed men were lined up outside the house. The middle-aged man in the centerwas sitting on a chair, and two boys stood behind him. All three were smiling.Ka-chunk. A close up of the boy on the left. Light colored hair, that lookssoft to the touch. Long, narrow eyes, a sturdy chin, and full lips.

Him. He had a pleasant expression, and he was still young,not fully grown, of a much slighter build, but it was clearly the same personwho we’d seen floating in the air looking evil as shit. Ka-chunk. The wholephotograph displayed again. This time it also showed the note written under thephotograph. A caption, written in English, that read,

“1881, Joestar Estate.”

And three named, arranged in an upside-down triangle tomatch the positions of the three men. The middle-aged man in the chair wasGeorge Joestar. The boy standing on his right was Jonathan Joestar. And the boyin question was labeled Dio Brando. Dio Brando. When I saw that name it feltlike a bolt of lightning ran down my back.

1881? That was 131 years ago. Jonathan was my great-greatgrandfather, Joseph’s grandfather. Joseph had apparently not got on well withhis own father, Jodoh Joestar. (Who was, apparently, a gloomy man of few words;it was hard to tell what he was thinking; the exact opposite of Joseph, who,for better or for worse, was always bullshit free.) But he often mentioned hisgrandfather with something approaching reverence. A gentleman, kind-hearted,handsome, and so athletic he played rugby with the young men until quite latein life. If he was with Jonathan as a boy, this bearded man in the chair,George Joestar, was most likely his father, the Jojo of six generations beforeme (albeit, of no blood relation.) Another George Joestar, I thought, andremembered what Tsukumojuku had said. In my world there is another JorgeJoestar.

Had Tsukumojuku’s friend been this middle-aged George? No,that didn’t fit. Tsukumoku had claimed to be from a world where it was July23rd, 1904, twenty-three years after this picture was taken…or even more. Theworld he’d come from had a completely different map. A hundred years was notenough time for all the continents to fuse together. …or was it? Look at whatwas happening to Morioh and Nero Nero Island. Sprouting six legs likethat…would hardly be enough, I guess, but was it really out of the questionthat all the continents had moved that quickly, and made the world we lived in?And that world history had chosen to keep that fact a secret? Wait, wait, Ithought. I already knew that I didn’t need to think in terms of the history Iwas living in. I looked at Cars. This Cars was the original Cars. Because hewas the ultimate thing, he’d failed to die as the universe ended, and had gonethrough the beginning and end of the universe thirty-six times, collectinganother thirty-six extra Cars and thirty-seven Giotto space probes. So theworld was repeating history in a very similar fashion. Was this what thephilosopher Nietzsche had named the Eternal Recurrence? The concept of historyrepeating itself occurring in actual fact over a substantially larger timespan. Then it made far more sense to assume that Tsukumojuku had come from aworld in one of the previous thirty-six universes, and the discrepancies in theworld map had been caused by the accumulated effects of minor differences inthe way history unfolded. OK. So the Jorge Joestar Tsukumojuku had been friendswith was a Jorge Joestar from one of those previous universes. And ifTsukumokuju was right and that Jorge had spelled his name Jorge thandifferences in my own time line had led to that name being

applied six generations later…to the Japanese boy adoptedinto the Joestar family. Me. Although my name was still officially spelledJoji. That seemed a bit forced. I mean, I was adopted, I thought. Similaritiesor differences might arise within history, but that was always within theJoestar bloodline. None of that had anything to do with an adopted son. Butanyway, Dio Brando. I knew nothing about him at all.

“Cars, do you know what connection this Dio Brando has withthe Joestar family?”

I was a detective, yet here I was asking someone else aboutmy own memories. Oh well. Maybe I wasn’t a great detective. Given the currentcourse of events it seemed unlikely I would ever end up gathering everyoneconnected to the place in one location and explaining my solution to them.Oblivious to my internal shame, Cars simply answered the question.

“He was adopted by the Joestar family. As Dio Joestar, hedied in a train accident in 1889.”

Adopted!? Just like me…!? Cars mouth turned into aprojector again, showing us. Kachunk. This time the picture moved, and Car’sear turned into a speaker so we could hear. I hadn’t heard Grandpa Joseph’svoice in a while. I was a fidgety child, and the image rarely focused on himfor long. I wasn’t interested in his story. It was his bedroom, and I wassetting on Joseph Joestar’s bed. He said,

“My grandfather Jonathan was a hero. He died trying to stophis adopted brother from robbing a train. D was an even bigger piece of shitthan my father. If they hadn’t taken each other out, I’m sure Jonathan wouldhave raised my father properly, and he’d have made this family even greaterthan we are.”

D must be Dio Brando, so detested Joseph refused to even sayhis name aloud. But a train robbery? The Joestars were titled aristocrats,wealthy even by the standards of English citizens. What

the hell happened? I can see why the Joestars would want tokeep this history secret. But if he’d really died then, he couldn’t have beenthere in the sky over Cape Canaveral in July, 1999, throwing a metal plate fromthe Giotto space probe at Pucci’s house. When had Dio Brando become a vampire?Once you’d become a vampire you could hardly live in polite society. Thenagain, the kind of man who’d plan a train robbery probably didn’t give a shitabout polite society.

“Cars, you conquered sunlight, using the stone mask with theAja Red Stone slotted into it, right? Are vampires also weak to sunlight?”

Shifting his mouth back to normal, Cars replied,

“Of course. Vampires can’t last a second in sunlight.We…the species I once belonged to could operate for a brief period of time insunlight, and could turn our bodies to soil or metal or burrow into rock andsurvive partial exposer to sunlight. I assume you’re thinking about Dio Brando?”

“…….!? Yes, but…”

“Vampires have power humans can only dream of. They can healvery quickly, have heightened senses and physical strength, but they don’t havewings. They can’t fly. But in the photo, he was hovering in the air withoutwings. In 1999, this Pucci fellow had not yet discovered his Stand, and thuscould not see it, but this vampire almost certainly has a Stand. Or somesimilar power.”

Yeah. And a vampire with that kind of power had waited ahundred years to put some massive scheme in motion. Making a fake Way to Heavento get Pucci moving, sending him to Mars, all to lead Cars, the ultimate thing,back to Earth. Hmm? Wait, I thought, and glanced at Cars, who was grinning atme.

“Heh heh heh, it seems this lowly vampire has the nerve totake a run at me. He must be very confident in his Stand’s ability. I

supposed it was a stroke of luck that the astronauts whocame to Mars were Stand Masters. That allowed me to learn about Stands beforereturning to Earth. It appears Stand powers can ignore the laws of physics, sohe might have been able to drop me in a trap I could never have expected…hecould perhaps have sent me out into space again without even touching me. Butnow I’m ready for him. When we reach Earth, I’ll begin by conquering all StandMasters,”

Cars said, clearly enjoying himself. I remembered whatKishibe Rohan had said.

Stand Masters find themselves drawn to one another, like amagnetic attraction.

I already knew of one place with a great number of StandMasters. It was floating in the middle of The Ocean. Morioh and Nero NeroIsland. The two of them were currently overlapping, and the two islands weresurrounded by the American army.

He said if nothing changes, the American army will flip the

island!

The message given to Hirose Kouji. Why was America trying toeliminate Morioh? Did America somehow know that the ship with Cars on itwouldn’t be landing there in six months, but in four hours? The commander inchief of the American army was the President, The Funniest Valentine. His father,Funnier, had just tried to kill all the other astronauts on the dark side ofMars. That

was clearly part of a strategy to grab Cars for their owndevices. Had the H. G. Wells blowing up been scripted, and the plan been forFunnier to be like we were now, on a ship with Cars, quietly returned to Earthwithout the other nations knowing? If Funny Valentine had given Hirose thatmessage because either he was in on his son and grandson’s plan, or because hedisagreed with it, that made a lot more sense. Mm, I was sure of it. Americaknew Cars was coming. They might not yet know that Funnier had been blown up byNarancia on Mars, and might believe it was him on board this ship with Cars,but the army was waiting for this ship to land on Earth. And since he was theultimate thing, it was safe to assume they would be well prepared; a StandMaster like Funnier might survive it, but an ordinary citizen like me couldeasily die in the chaos. Crap. I ran over to Narancia, who was still bound tothe ceiling, and grabbed the pebble phone out of his back pocket. I hit redial.Tomemememem. Tomemem. At last Shiobana Haruno answered,

“Yes?”

“Hello,”

I said, in Japanese.

“This is Jorge Joestar.”

“Oh. What is it?”

“I was wondering what’s going on down there.”

“I see. Good timing. I needed to call you myself.”

“Did you find Diavolo?”

“No. About the state of affairs here…an hour ago theAmerican army ordered us to leave these waters. Thirty minutes ago they gave usa final warning. And a moment ago an American air force scout planeinexplicably broke apart in the sky over Morioh, and crashed. Villagers wentout to rescue them, clashed with Naval forces, and are now fighting. We expectthey’ll start bombing Morioh and Nero Nero Island any moment, so we’ve orderedall civilians from both islands to hide underneath Nero Nero Island. But westill haven’t figured out how to control Nero Nero Island, so if it startsmoving across Morioh again, everyone

will have to move along with it. Not ideal, but our bestavailable option. We are continuing the hunt for this serial killer, KiraYoshikage, but no likely suspects have been found, and once America attacks thechaos will make continued investigation nigh impossible.”

He rattled this all off calmly, but whaaat? Fighting?Villagers and the navy!? Only Stand Masters stood any chance of fighting thenavy, but even then people without Stands the world over would see the Americansoldiers aiming their guns at unarmed Japanese citizens. How was theinternational community allowing this? Bombing? The American attack? How wasany of this insane crap happening? I could only assume all of this was beingkept secret from the world at large. As if he’d guessed my reaction, Shiobanaadded,

“They’ve told everyone that terrorists have taken over Moriohand Nero Nero Island, and that the villagers have been driven mad with aweaponized virus, and the terrorists made them attack the Japanese and Americansoldiers who came to rescue them.

“………….!?”

“There are actual reports of patients in Sardinia and theTouhoku region of Japan going berserk and attacking people. Their symptoms arecontagious, and the number of victims is rising. It’s like a zombie movie. Thedead bite people, and those bit or who come in contact with their saliva turnand attack other humans. I suppose the key difference from the movies is thatthere are rumors of flying zombies. At any rate, the world is in a state ofpanic, and everyone believes that Morioh and Nero Nero Island are the source ofthe epidemic. They’ve been told the islands set out into The Ocean so they cancarry the zombie disease to other lands, and an international emergency safetycouncil meeting is

being held to decide the fate of these two islands.Satellite weapons are already arranged above us, and we believe they’ll be usedto blow these islands away. We have to figure out a way to control theseislands before that happens.”

I don’t even…zombies? Flying zombies? Since when didthings like that exist!? When I said nothing, Shiobana asked,

“By the way, where are you and Narancia?”

“Eh? Uh…outer space.”

“……….? Could you put Narancia on?”

“Oh, sure,”

I said, and handed the pebble phone up to Narancia, whoimmediately wailed,

“Giornooooooo, it’s me! God damn it, listen!”

And with tears running down his cheeks he began explainingeverything that had happened. I staggered a few steps away, and saw Carsgrinning at me.

“It’s possible the Stand Masters you want to conquer areabout to be wiped out?”

I said. Although that might well not happen. Stand powerswere pretty amazing, after all. They might well be able to withstand theAmerican army’s attack. But I was worried. Cars chuckled,

“If you’re worried, then you’d better save them.”

Could he read my mind, too?

“If I could do that this would all be easy.”

“Have you actually thought to see if there’s anything youcan do? Human minds moves so slowly, and you lack perseverance. Always givingup so easily.”

What…!? I wasn’t a Stand Master, I was an ordinary human!I opened my mouth to say as much, but thought better of it. Cars wouldn’t saysomething like that unless he already had an answer in mind. In other words,Cars knew there was something I could

do. There was something I could do, I just hadn’t noticedyet. I would if I thought about it. If my reason for being helpless was that Iwas an ordinary human then I needed to do something about that. I had justmeant I wasn’t the ultimate thing or a Stand Master, but I just had to changethat. I could change that. Behind Cars, Enrico Pucci was lying on the floor, stillbadly hurt, and breathing ragged. He was glowering at outer space, deep inthought. His Stand. White Snake. Two Discs. It could take out a Stand power.The same as reading the memory discs, if you stuck a Stand disc in your head,then would that make me able to use the Stand just like we’d been readingmemories?

“Cars,”

I said,

“Can I borrow the disc of your Stand power?”

Cars laughed out loud.

“Ha ha ha, bold move, Jorge Joestar. I thought you weregoing to ask for my help, but you’d prefer to do something yourself.”

Eh? Oh, was that all? If he was willing to do it for me thenby all means, but Cars’ Ashura White Snake was already out, and pulling twodiscs out of Cars’ head. White Snake and Das Boot. But White Snake was stillstanding behind Cars. Hunh? I thought.

“It’s a copy,”

Cars said. He really could do anything, I thought, and tookthe discs from him. I shoved one of them into my head. As I did, Cars said,

“But can a mere human use my power?”

Oh shit, I thought, and everything went black. I’d exploded.

I had literally exploded, and there were still bits of goredripping off the ship walls, and Narancia on the ceiling and Pucci on the floorwere both gaping at me, covered in blood. But my body was back to normal,totally uninjured. Cars was still laughing.

“You really don’t think things through,”

he said. The discs were in

his hand, so he must have taken them out of my head. But heput my body back together before I died. I guess the ultimate thing viewed meas sort of a flesh doll made of bits of bone and blood that he could easily putback together again if anything happened. I was rather grateful he’d let mesurvive my careless death.

“Thanks, Cars. …can I ask how? I’m pretty sure I wastotally dead there.”

“Flesh is a vessel, and the soul is like ice cream madeinside. If the vessel breaks, the soul momentarily retains its form. I merelyreassembled the vessel before the soul melted away.”

“Ha ha…I think we just casually answered the question,

“What is life?”“

“That was never a question.”

“…okay…but was my ice cream ok? Didn’t spill any?”

“I do not fail. And I’ve already removed the thirty-sixsouls from the extra mes, so I have experience. But my experience also tells methat you’ve already died a number of times.”

“Hunh?”

“If we extend the ice cream analogy, if you melt ice creamand refreeze it, it doesn’t quite taste the same as it did. The texturechanges. Understood?”

“Yeah…”

“It’s exactly like that.”

“So I felt like I was dying? Several different times?”

“Hmm. And your emotional reaction to that damages your soul.I suppose it’s possible.”

“When you turned the extra Cars into fuel and ship parts,did their feelings damage their souls?”

“I sensed nothing like that. The extra mes gave me theirlives, and I simply took them.”

“Oh…ok. There’s no point in arguing amongst yourselves?”

“We are the ultimate thing, and there is no discord among

us. We all understand everything. And I did not throw outthe souls I removed. They now form a part of me.”

“…did you lick them like ice cream, eating them?”

“The ice cream is a metaphor, fool. Are you really human?What happened to your ability to make sense of things?”

“Ha ha, you sure are smart, Boss Cars.”

“You are merely far too stupid. I can’t believe you’redescended from that crafty Joseph Joestar.”

Well, I am adopted. But I let that be. Grandpa Joseph haddefinitely taught me a lot. I’d grown up in the Joestar household. So this waspathetic. I was supposed to be a detective, but he kept saying I wasn’tthinking enough and was being far too stupid and he was absolutely right aboutit. My mind was starting to clear.

“I have to do better,”

I said, mostly to myself. Blood was pumping through mybrain.

“I’m Jorge Joestar. The Detective Jojo.”

So I had to think, damn it! The situation was so oppressivemy brain was withering and not working properly. Do your job, brain! Everythingabout this mess was beyond anything I’d previously experienced. But I’d beensurprised by all kinds of things before, but I’d always overcome surprise andnew experiences by thinking really hard. If I was really a detective, then I’doutwit this case, too! Even if I couldn’t believe in myself, I had faith in mywits!

“You’re right, Cars,”

I said.

“I remember who I am.”

Cars was watching me intently.

“I think deeper and broader than anyone else around.”

“That’s right,”

Cars said.

“But do you really understand the true nature of whatTsukumojuku called the Beyond?”

I truly believe that there is meaning in my meeting you likethis.

Tsukumojuku had smiled. Everything has meaning. Of coursethere was meaning in the fact that I’d met Cars here. Even someone asoverwhelming as him was an necessary element for me to perform my role asdetective.

I nodded.

“You’re cool with that?”

Cars smiled.

“I have no desire to be the leading man.”

Cars was completely down with the theme Tsukumojuku hadbrought us. His intelligence was blinding. And thanks to Cars, I was finallyemotionally ready to step into the gears of the world. With a healthy clank. Ihad Cars prepare a reduced power version of the Stand discs for me, and placedone in my head. I first inserted a small sized version of Das Boot: Carsedition, and found the second disc wouldn’t go in. Rohan had mentioned thatthere was a rule, only one Stand per person. Obviously, Cars was the exception.But that was fine. Das Boot was more useful to me than White Snake at themoment.

“Cars, how long till we reach Earth?”

“Another fifteen minutes.”

“Hunh? We’re that close already?”

“And it seems I’ve run out of time to eat you all.”

“………..”

“But I wasn’t bored. Don’t worry; there’ll be plenty of foodback on Earth.”

I really wasn’t worried.

“How did our six month journey turn into four hours?”

“I don’t completely understand it myself. But it seems thisastronaut’s Stand has some effect on the flow of time.”

White Snake did? It didn’t just take Stand and memory

discs? Whatever.

“Cars, how much fuel do we have left?”

“As calculated. Just enough.”

“We’ll slow down before entry, right? Can we let some of itoutside the ship for a moment when that happens?”

“For a moment, yes. Do as you please.”

But that fuel was extra Cars, wasn’t it? As I thought that,Cars said,

“One always rules all. The other mes know that.”

That’s why the other thirty-six didn’t hesitate to letoriginal Cars turn them into fuel and spaceship parts. I looked up at Narancia,who was still gaping at me, the pebble phone forgotten in his hand.

“He hang up already?”

“Hunh……? Ahhh!”

He quickly put it to his ear again.

“Tch, he hung up! You had to go and blow up all of a sudden.Scared the shit out of me! You OK, dude?”

“Ah ha ha, sorry, I’m fine, I’m fine.”

“You’re fine, you’re fine, my ass. Jesus.”

“Narancia, the American army is about to attack Morioh andNero Nero Island. I’d like to prevent that.”

“Yeah, Das Boot, right? Run out on the Cars fuel and boomboom boom? Let’s do this shit!”

As out of it has he’d seemed he was clearly following alongperfectly well. He wasn’t a ranking gangster for nothing.

“We’re almost at Earth.”

“Heh heh. We’re still alive!”

“The tough part’s still ahead.”

I turned to Cars.

“Can you let Narancia down?”

Cars waved a hand and Narancia was released.

“Woo-hoo! Freeeeeedom!”

“Ha ha.”

I turned to the only actual astronaut on the ship.

“Pucci, we’re almost at Earth.”

“….yeah.”

He staggered to his feet, and moved to the pilot’s seat. Hepicked up the comm device made from bits of the Giottos,

glanced back at Cars a minute, and opened a channel.

“Houston, this is Lt. Enrico Pucci. Houston, do you read me?”

There was a crackle over the radio, and an answer.

“This is Houston. This is…Pucci, you said? Why are youtransmitting on Giotto’s frequency?”

“Because I’m on the Giotto.”

“…who’s with you? Where’s Funnier?”

“Funnier’s dead.”

“…………”

“Soundman and Pocoloco, too. Funnier killed them. Tell thePresident. There will be an accounting for this crime.”

“Calm down, Pucci.”

“I have never been more calm in my life.”

“…where’s Cars?”

“He’s here.”

“OK. We’ve just pinpointed your location. That…isn’t justone Giotto you’re on. We’ve got the size of it on our monitors. It’s big, andfast. Like something out of Star Wars. Are you controlling that alone?”

“I don’t need to control anything. This thing is made fromCars’ own flesh.”

“………….”

“Tell us the plan to get back to you.”

“….ok, ready to hear it?”

The only reason they had a plan that fast is if they’dalready prepared it a long time ago. They were ready for anything. The onlydifference was the passengers involved. As Pucci and the NASA director hashedout the details, we got closer to Earth. It was growing visibly larger outsideour window.

“Wahhhhhhh! Earth!”

Narancia yelled, slapping me on the shoulder.

“We’re home, buddy!”

We’re home. I was relieved, as well. But now we had to

fight.

Cars was looking at Earth, surprised by the vast expanse ofblue.

“This is the Earth? Why is there less land?”

I wonder what the Earth looked like before the universe diedthirty-six times? Then it occurred to me that maybe I already knew, and Ishowed Cars the world maps Tsukumojuku and I had exchanged.

“This is the world I knew,”

Cars said. Tsukumojuku had come from the same universe asoriginal Cars. It all connected.

“What you’re seeing now is The Ocean. Panlandia just happensto be on the other side of the planet at the moment.”

“It’s like a water vessel,”

Cars said. There was thunk behind us, and I turned to findPucci staring at Cars. Was he stunned, or exalted? He looked as if he’d been sosurprised he was about to start laughing. What was he thinking?

The spaceship slowed down, and Cars moved over to the pilotseat, stole Pucci’s headset, and said,

“Lord Cars is ready to return. Is the party ready?”

The fact that Cars appeared to be excited made him extrafrightening, and Narancia and I both got very quiet. He tossed the headset backto Pucci, and turned to us.

“Apparently we can see our landing site from the windowright now. There are two islands stacked on top of each other crossing theocean, and they’re in our way, so they’re going to get rid of them.”

“………..!”

Narancia and I both went to the window, and stared down

at the round ball of water. The Ocean was vast, and Moriohand Nero Nero Island were too small and too far for our human eyes to make out.

“I can’t see, I can’t see!”

Narancia yelped, so Cars came up behind him, pushed hisfingers into the back of his head, pressed a switch somewhere in his head, andadjusted his vision. Narancia immediately said,

“Oh, there it is! I can see it! Shit, shit, shit, there’ssmoke and fire everywhere! What the fuck!? It’s like a god damn war zone.”

“Cars,”

I said.

“The fuel, please.”

Cars pulled his hand out of Narancia’s head, and nodded.Black liquid began bubbling out of the ship outside the window. Living fuel,heading towards Earth.

“Narancia, let’s do this. Support fire for Morioh and NeroNero Island.”

“Ohhhhh, yeah! C’mon, Jorge! Kill the fuck out of anyonethreatening my gang!”

I grabbed the pebble phone and called Shiobana.

“Hello?”

“It’s Jorge Joestar. We’re in orbit. We’re going to firesome missiles down at the Americans, so make sure the villagers and islandersare out of the way. And the Stand Masters.”

“Ordinary citizens are already evacuated. All Stand Masterswill be under Nero Nero Island in the next few minutes. Fire away.”

“Roger. But please, try to save as many American wounded aspossible.”

“…naturally. Fortunately, there are no injured partiesfrom either island yet, so the people are still amenable.”

“Good. Commencing attack.”

“Roger. Thanks.”

I hung up, and turned to Narancia.

“Heard that? We aren’t killing them. We’re disabling theirweaponry. Your boss agrees.”

“…tch, fuck it then,”

Narancia grumbled. He pulled out his headset periscope, so Ipulled my own out, too.

Since it’s my own power, I can easily grasp what it can do.It was just as Cars said. I didn’t know the specifics of the full range ofabilities, but I instinctively knew how to control Das Boot.

“Let’s fuuuuuuuuuuucking goooo, Jorge!”

Narancia yelled.

“Fuck yeaaah!”

I shouted back.

“C’mon, Narancia!”

“Rock and Roll! Dive Dive Diiiiiiiiiiive!”

Our Das Boots surfaced outside the ship, running across thesurface of the ejected fuel. Leaving one or two ships inside ourselves, just incase, we both gathered our fleets into one giant submarine each, firing verybig missiles.

“All gates open!”

Narancia ordered. I opened the hatches on every torpedo andcruise missile I had.

“I’m going for the units on the East! You go for the West,Jorge!”

I checked my targets in the periscope. All locked on.

“All missiles ready,”

I said.

“FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRREEEE!”

Narancia screamed. I did. Pnt pnt pnt pnt pnt pnt pnt pnt!Pssh pssh pssh pssh pssh pssh pssh pssh pssh Twenty-four torpedoes sped acrossthe fuel, and thirty-two cruise missiles were hurled up into space, and everysingle one of them headed straight for the Earth. They entered the atmosphere.Real missiles would have burned up on reentry, just like meteors, but Standsdidn’t care about physics. They shot towards the two islands at almost exactlythe same speed as they’d moved through outer space. Thud thud thud thud thudthud thud! We hit every helicopter and battleship the navy had posted aroundMorioh all at once. We hadn’t armed the detonators, so none of them exploded.We just needed to defang them.

“Tch… Fucking boooooring,”

Narancia moaned. We fired a second wave. This one hit thelanding craft as

they approached the shore, and the ships stationed in theharbor. Thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud! Once again, noexplosions, just robbing the ships of their military capabilities.

“Oh, shit, one’s about to sink ♡!”

Narancia chuckled.

“Knock that off. Shiobana promised Passione people wouldhelp the rescue efforts.”

“Eh, eh…? Don’t let Giorno know, Jorge!”

“We’re about to start our descent,”

Pucci said, interrupting our celebration.

“Pull your Stands back.”

The ship had been moving towards reentry this whole time, sowhile we’d been looking through the periscopes we’d moved quite far away fromMorioh and Nero Nero Island, and the two islands had vanished over the crest ofthe planet.

“One more!”

Narancia yelled, and as his Das Boot retreated, it fired ahail of missiles at the satellite weapons. Boooooooom. These exploded. When Ilooked shocked, Narancia shrugged.

“What? They’re unmanned. And having that shit up in space isscary.”

But now they were space debris, and would cause problemslater…but for now, fuck it. Our Das Boots rejoined the ship, and we continuedorbiting the Earth, gradually descending.

“Brace yourselves!,”

Pucci said.

“We’re going in.”

Not that he was controlling the ship or anything.

“Let’s go!”

I said. Narancia joined in.

“Go! Back to Earth!”

Just before we hit the atmosphere the pebble phone rang. Plupon pin para para pon plu pon pin para para pon! Narancia answered.

“Hunh? What, Buccellati? Now’s not a great time.”

The ship was starting to shake, but over the racket I couldjust make out the voice on the other end of the line.

“We’ve found the bodies of Diavolo and Morioh’s serialkiller, Kira Yoshikage! Together! Someone took both of them out!

We don’t know any more yet!”

Hunh? Kira Yoshikage? They’d been taken out!? So Diavolo andKira Yoshikage were both dead? Already? Both of them? A mafia boss and a serialkiller. Wasn’t that good news? I thought, but no, it wasn’t. Diavolo and Kirawere, in theory, the ones moving the two islands. If they were both dead thenneither one of them could move, and the ship with us and Cars on it wasfalling, and Stand Masters are drawn together…! Hunh!? Stand Masters aredrawn together? I shouted at the pebble phone in Narancia’s hand,

“Tell everyone on the island to run for it! A spaceship’sabout to crash on top of them!”

But the phone hung up, and I wasn’t sure if he’d heard me ornot. Narancia and I looked at each other. We might survive landing in the water,but we’d almost certainly die if we crashed into land. The ship was wrapped infire, and the extra Cars were burning up, vanishing without so much as ascream. To slow our descent, we spread our wings, and by the time we werethrough the clouds the fire had vanished and we could see Nero Nero Island andMorioh out the front window.  Nero NeroIsland was standing on six legs on top of Morioh. This was where we died. ButCars would probably survive.

“Sorry, Narancia,”

I said.

“You would never have gone to Mars if you weren’t with me.”

Whoops. Brought an anomaly along, but…it all meanssomething, I’m sure. Bye! Tsukumojuku had brought both of us. And it did havemeaning.

“Thanks,”

I said.

“If you hadn’t been there, I’d never have seen the Earthagain.”

Tears in his eyes, Narancia said,

“Tch…you gotta make a big

deal about it? I hate sappy shit!”

I laughed, closed my eyes, and wondered who I should bethinking of in my last moments, but inside my brain just started jumping fromTsukumojuku’s arrival to entering Morioh to going to Mars, leaping randomlyaround different scenes from this adventure, and I found myself mildlyimpressed by how amazing it had all been. I opened my eyes long enough toconfirm that the ship was definitely headed directly at Morioh. Pucci waswatching the same scene through the other window.

“So this is the rhinoceros beetle!”

he said. Our ship was headed right for the Arrow CrossHouse, and when he saw the ship of the roof, Pucci cried out happily,

“And that’s the Via Dolorosa!”

Rhinoceros beetle. Via Dolorosa. Those were two of thefourteen words carved into the back of the Giotto plate.

Via Dolorosa = The Way of Suffering. The last road JesusChrist walked, dragged past the townsfolk, carrying his cross on his back. Itwas also called the Via Crucis, the Way of the Cross. As we were fallingupside-down, the Arrow Cross below us was at our backs. And the spaceship withus and Cars on it crashed directly into the Arrow Cross, and the shock of theimpact knocked Nero Nero Island off Morioh, and flipped Morioh upside-down. Andas if there had always been another upside-down island underneath Morioh, whenMorioh flipped another island rose from the sea. A massive island, 900 timesthe size of Morioh, that forced the water out away from it, but the Americanbattleships and aircraft carriers were just rocked a little, the wave passingwithout further incident. The 219,850 km² island that appeared out of nowherewas one no one in our world had ever

heard of – Great Britain. The mythical England.

When I’d stepped off the train in Morioh, and looked at themap of the town it had seemed familiar. Just before we hit, I’d seen it fromthe sky, and remembered that feeling. Had I been here before? That was all inmy head. I had just been remembering the map of the world Tsukumojuku had drawnfor me, and recognized the shape of England. But since it had been backwards, Ihadn’t recognized it. I hate saying that only human, but I clearly had to workon my observation skills. If I’d worked harder, maybe I’d have survived!