Venom's Prisoner | ||
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Summary: WARNING: LEWD LANGUAGE! Josuke is officially so hot even the guys want him! Zombie'd and sent by Dio to kill him, Venom Prisoner decides he wants to keep Josuke for himself instead! After the battle, Ponset comes by to talk about Hamon with Zeppeli. Who: Josuke, Venom Prisoner, Baron Zeppeli (emitted by Dio), Ponset When: May 9, 2016 Where: Mijikai Street |
But Josuke is not completely unaware, even though he's relaxing. It's for this reason he happens to see the glint at the window. He pauses, shifts forward to look up at the high window... One broken window and a loud shriek later, and a half-dressed Josuke is running down the hall, having grabbed the clothes he'd laid out on his way out of the apartment. He pauses just long enough to hop into his pants (oh geez, somebody is so totally gonna report him for streaking... but HEY he had a towel wrapped around him!). Instead of aiming for the stairs, though, Josuke aims right for the far wall. It looks like he's going to run right into it... but then the blue-armored pink figure appears... "DORARARARARARA!" The wall explodes, and Josuke leaps out the hole in the wall, pulling a tank top on. The wall fixes itself behind him. Hopefully that'll buy him some time. He lands in a roll, dust sticking to his still-wet arms, panting slightly. "Geeeez, that was scary," he mutters. "Weirdos aren't supposed to break into guys' apartments, are they?"
"Waaaaiiiit! Come back, cutie, I escaped from prison just to see you~ <3" the hulking monster of a man calls after the teen, his feet leaving deep imprints in the floor with every step. And if Josuke turns to look, sure enough, this thing -- it's too huge to be an ordinary man! -- is definitely wearing prisoner garb, including an iron ball chained to his ankle that isn't slowing him down in the slightest! "That beautiful star-shaped birthmark on the back of your neck... it's just like Dio-sama said! But I don't want to kill you, I just want to keep you forever and ever~"
'Dio'. Weird situation forgotten, Josuke hedges, "D-did you say 'Dio'?" Dio. Josuke remembered that name. Dio had been the reason for Josuke's fever, when he was four. Dio's developing a Stand... it made him sick. Almost killed him...
"Yes! Dio-sama, the loveliest man in all the world, brought me back to life after I received the death sentence! But no matter how beautiful, one man is never enough to satisfy me!" the... yeah, it's definitely a zombie, explains. And then... BAM! He takes a flying leap, crushing a crater into the floor with the force of it, quickly crossing the distance between himself and Josuke at impossible speeds! "And that's why I, Venom Prisoner, have chosen yooooouuuuu to be my next lover~!" <3
"DORARARARA!" Those fists really hurt -- Jotaro's Star Platinum can (eventually) break through diamond-hard substances, and even HE was impressed at the power of Josuke's Stand. So it's not likely to feel great if Venom Prisoner does get hit while he's falling. Hit or miss, Josuke is getting the hell out of the way! He jumps back, just staying out of arm's reach. He knows that V.P.'s leaping is going to make anywhere in the immediate area 'in range', technically, but he just wants to stay out of immediate grabbing range. "Sorry, that's gotta be two-sided, and I don't swing that way," Josuke replies. But, his tone's actually not mean at all. Despite the barrage of punches from Crazy Diamond -- could Venom Prisoner even see them? -- Josuke's actually... still trying to be nice?! Yes, he is. Maybe he can dissuade this guy...
BAM! POW! KABOOM! Those, however, are the sounds of steely-hard fists crashing into the zombie's body, dozens of times in an instant! Hard enough to break solid stone, they make short work of the giant's bones as well, pulverizing them into paste and sending Venom Prisoner flying! CRASH! That was the sound of Venom Prisoner's body hitting a nearby wall, breaking through the bricks and leaving him buried in rubble! They say that Diamond is Unbreakable, and this Crazy Diamond is making an ironclad case! "Waaauuuugh... t-that's what they all say..." Venom Prisoner grunts as he pulls himself back up to his feet, his twisted limbs setting themselves back in place, his nose and jaw straightening out again despite the blood spurting from them... but it's not Crazy Diamond's power. This... is a zombie's regeneration! "That's what they all say, but when I get my hands on them, their objections turn to squeals of delight! It's like music to my ears~" the monster declares, his mouth opening wide... too wide! Josuke may notice that the iron ball from around Venom Prisoner's leg is missing... just before it fires from his mouth like a cannon, the chain aiming to wrap around Josuke's legs!
Unfortunately, his statement gets cut off when that iron ball ends up playing the part of cannonball! He realizes a second too late that it's not aimed to hit him... a second too late to avoid getting his legs wrapped up by the chain. "...Agh!" He falls back, legs tangled in the chain. "L-let go!" he demands, fingers clawing at the ground, trying to pull himself free. Josuke, however, has an idea. And if he can't get loose, if he can get close....
"There, now you can't run away from my love anymore~" he says, his voice filled with menace! Even the air seems to be resounding with the terrifying aura he gives off! Surely, any ordinary person would be paralyzed with fear in such a situation! But Josuke is no ordinary person, he is a Joestar! Even though his name is different, that very same blood courses through his veins! The blood of courage! The blood of determination! The blood of a family who stares Death in the eye and says 'Hit me with your best shot!' So, as Venom Prisoner closes in on the downed teen, what will his would-be victim do!? Josuke, just what are you planning!? "Heheheh... I'm gonna have lots of fun with you, sweetie~ <3" the zombie says, his words filled with triumph! This is the chance Josuke is waiting for, as those clawed hands reach for him once more!
Things never go well for those who oppose a Joestar when that expression appears. And sure enough, this time it's going to be another bad time. It starts simply enough. Josuke calls forth Crazy Diamond again, for a barrage of punches. "DORARARARARARARARA!" But something is different this time. Crazy Diamond doesn't stop. At all. It just keeps pummelling at Venom Prisoner. Josuke is hoping that the damage will just utterly break the zombie. Why? So he can fix it, of course. Fix it wrong! "CRAZY DIAMOND!" Josuke is in no shape mentally to concentrate on fixing the zombie's broken body properly. He is angry, more than a little freaked out, Hopefully the zombie won't be able to regeneration parts that aren't actually 'broken' anymore, even if they're 'fixed' in the wrong places...
This is the moment! The moment... that Josuke's Joestar legacy shines through! "W-what!? I thought you couldn't fight back anymore!" Venom Prisoner cries out in shock, even as his body is battered and broken in a million places by the barrage of punches Crazy Diamond throws at him! "B-but... I'll just heal up again, your attack was useless! Useless! Useless!" However! This is the moment Venom Prisoner realizes his folly! His body... has already healed! "How can this beeeeeeee!?" he squeals not in delight, but in terror, realizing the tables have turned! His body... a twisted mess! Hands sticking from his face! Eyes on his chest! Feet poking from his back! Nothing is in the right place! "W-what did you do!? I can't fix myself! Uwaaaaauuuuugh!"
But he has an answer for Venom Prisoner. "You can't regenerate what's not damaged," he replies flatly. It's that tone he took with Angelo. "After my Crazy Diamond broke you, he fixed you again." And here he smirks. With a falsely innocent tone, he adds, "But see, when someone gets me all upset like that, I just can't concentrate on fixing things right. I never know where things are gonna reattach themselves..." Yes, that was totally his plan all along.
...Or does it? "Aaaaargh! You were so cute, too! All I wanted to do was take you home and cuddle you like a teddy bear and violate your tight little bottom!" the zombie rants, but it is his next words that will truly decide his fate! "And now you're putting your hair back in that stupid pompadour? Ugh! That's so outdated! Uncool! Uuuuugly!" Meanwhile, another mysterious observer watches from the shadows! Friend or foe, he is about to see something extraordinary... and terrifying! More horrible than even zombies or vampires!
But then... Josuke freezes. Believe it or not, it's not the talk of what the Prisoner had planned. The insults aimed at his hair. That. That really ignites anger deep down inside Josuke, a near-primal, existential fury. Silly, maybe. But still... The comb goes back into his pocket. "Hey. You." He turns. Slowly. "...What did you say about my hair?" A violet aura springs to life around him, and Crazy Diamond appears again. But this time his colors are different. Where he had the silvery-blue armor, that armor is now a deep, dark burgundy color. Himself, Josuke is suddenly enraged. "I won't let you get away with that!" he declares. Crazy Diamond looms over the Twisted Prisoner, rearing back a fist. "DOOOORRRA!" The pavement beneath the Prisoner is broken. Once. Twice. Again and again. Only then does the Stand turn its attention to Venom Prisoner, pummeling the broken zombie with all the fury Josuke can muster. The punching continues, until a final strike sends pieces of the pavement -- and of the Prisoner! -- into the air with an explosion. But something 'catches' them. An orange-gold aura catches the pieces of everything, holding them floating in the air. Josuke, with the Joestar's determined expression, stands nearby. "So you wanted to walk all over what I wanted, did you? Well, now people are gonna walk all over you. For good." The pieces start to come together again, Venom Prisoner and the roadway, merging into a single entity. Just as he'd done with Angelo. It's fitting, Josuke thinks. Let someone who liked to trample on others be part of the road.
"N-nooooo! Anything but that! Pleeeeeaaaaase!" the zombie begs for his life as his body is thrown up into the air, but comes back down with the pieces of pavement to seal him within the road! Even when the sun comes out, it will not be enough to kill him, left forever trapped as part of the roadway! This is the true horror of Josuke Higashikata! "Oh, bravo, bravissimo!" comes another voice from the shadows, but the origin soon becomes clear as a white-suited man in a checkered hat steps forth, applauding! "I was about to step in, but I thought you might have a plan. That birthmark of yours... you really are of the Joestar bloodline, aren't you?"
However, he pauses as he hears the voice. As luck would have it, Josuke's left shoulderblade had been facing the direction that the man in white had been in, and Josuke turns to face the voice. "What?" Pause, blink. The man mentions the birthmark, and Josuke turns his head to the left a bit, as if he could see it. He can't, of course. And then the mention of the Joestar line. his eyes go a bit wide. "Uh... yeah, I guess. My old man is a Joestar." No sense hiding it, right? The birthmark is a identifying trait, and he's just in a tank top and pants, so it's not hard to see it.
Then, with a flourishing bow, the man introduces himself properly. "Baron William Antonio Zeppeli, at your service. I have been fighting Dio and his underlings for quite some time, and finding more and more allies in my struggle. Another Joestar would be an invaluable ally." As he straightens up, Zeppeli pulls a sandwich out of his pocket along with a salt shaker, sprinkling some salt on his lunch before taking a bite out of one corner.
The confidence fades, and there is a sad, nervous teen there. Josuke raises a hand to his face, scratching t his cheek nervously. "I don't want to cause them any trouble, you see. Because... well, my father... I was the result of an affair, so..." He doesn't care who knows he's illegitimate. But that should definitely tell Zeppeli that Jonathan was not this boy's father. Though at the mention of Dio, a little of that confidence comes back. Josuke frowns. "...Dio... I almost died when I was four, because of him. I don't know much about him. Just that my father and some of his friends had to go kill him to save my half-sister. We both got sick when he got a Stand..."
Taking another bite of his sandwich, the salt shaker having since returned to his pocket, the eccentric Italian glances down at the patch of pavement where Venom Prisoner now lays, unable to break free. "By the way, I was meaning to ask... just how did you do that? Even in all my years using Hamon, I've never seen such a strange feat. You didn't even touch that zombie once..."
Josuke blinks, though, at the question. "Huh? You didn't see it?" There's a pause, his aura reappears, and Crazy Diamond reappears at his side. The Stand is back to bubblegum pink and silvery-blue armor now; perhaps his mood influences the look of the Stand? "I used my Stand, Crazy Diamond." Oh, speaking of which... there's some damage that needs fixed. Josuke steps over to the wall that was destroyed -- yes, Venom Prisoner, take that bare foot right over your nose! -- with the Stand following. Crazy Diamond places a hand on the wall, and the pieces start to knit back together. Now that he's calmer, he can concentrate on not botching the job. He's unaware that even users of Hamon can't see Stands. Then again, he has no idea what 'Hamon' is, anyway. Once the wall's repaired, he looks at Zeppeli again. "You said, Ha...mon?" he asks, making sure he's got the pronounciation correct.
Stepping over to join Josuke's side, and making sure to stamp right down on Venom Prisoner's nose on the way, the Italian man closely inspects the wall, feeling it with one hand as he looks for any cracks. "Spectacular... whatever your 'Stand' is, it truly has an amazing ability. Very different from Hamon, however..." Glancing aside at Josuke, he then explains, "Yes, Hamon, or the Ripple. In the ancient Tibetan art of Sendou, they teach practitioners how to use the power of their own vital essence for many purposes. Primarily healing, but as it turns out, it's also quite effective at destroying the undead. Zombies, like the one you just fought, and vampires like Dio."
Zeppeli's mention of the Stand's abilities gets a half-smile. "Crazy Diamond can fix things, too. He kept regenerating, so I had Crazy Diamond 'fix' him again. I figured he couldn't regenerate the damage if there technically was nothing broken." Joestar ingenuity -- crazy, but it seems to have worked! Zeppeli explains Hamon/Ripple then, and Josuke blinks. "Life force? You mean like ki?" Yes, Josuke has played Street Fighter. Or some equivalent thereof. Besides, that's like a fallback explanation for every weird anime ability that isn't handwaved as magic! But the mention of healing? He's reminded of one problem with Crazy Diamond. "...Can a user of Hamon heal himself?" Since that's a major problem...
As a demonstration, he takes a deeeeeeep breath through his nose, golden energy crackling like lightning down his arm and around his hand as he kneels and reaches for Josuke's leg, gently touching it. "That iron ball and chain must have hurt, even if you put on a brave face. It almost certainly bruised your legs, if nothing else. However!" As Zeppeli's fingers make contact with Josuke's leg, a gentle tingling spreads through the teenager's body! If there was indeed any pain, it's gone now, like the ripples in a pond bringing a sense of peace and calm as they break against the shore, before becoming still once again. Standing again, Zeppeli exhales, giving Josuke another small smile. "Go ahead, check if you like. You feel good as new, don't you?"
As she gets close to walking past the two, however, she suddenly looks like she perhaps just remembered something and looks straight on at Zeppeli, recognition in her eyes before she even really looks at him. "Huh," she says a little quietly. "Haven't seen you in a while." She glances as Josuke and then back at the ground, apparently ready to just continue her walk onward.
He trails off as the pain just... fades away. "Wow..." he marvels, lifting one leg. And yes, he kneels to pull up one leg, to check where he was sure there were going to be bruises tomorrow. Nothing. "Yeah, it's... totally gone." He seems utterly flabbergasted at this, and stands up. And then he blinks, as someone speaks up. He still a little jumpy, and tenses, but he soon relaxes when it doesn't look like the woman's going to attack. So he offers a nod in her direction. "Hello." Then he suddenly gets a bit embarrassed, realizing he's just wearing pants and a tank top. "Eesh... I should get dressed." A mean look at the weird patch of road. "That idiot broke in while I was taking a bath."
Pulling a knife from his other pocket, he suddenly slices the palm of his own hand open! As the blood streams down to the ground, he simply takes another few breaths, that same energy from before crackling around his hand, the wound closing up, seeming to stitch itself back together and barely even leaving a scar! "As you can see, this same 'supercharging' effect can be applied to your own wounds as well. However! You must be able to breathe unrestricted in order to harness this power! I assume you wish for me to teach you, and it's true that your family are genetically predisposed toward using Hamon, but you must understand that there are weaknesses and limitations." But then, a familiar face appears! Brightening up a bit as he notices Ponset, Zeppeli gives the girl a friendly wave in return. "Ah, good evening! True, I haven't seen you since the incident at your school! How have you been, young lady?"
Teach him? Josuke blinks. "...Can you?" he asks. "If it works better against those zombies, it might be a good idea." Though, he does wonder if it will replace his Stand, or make him not able to use it. Ponset's words get a confused look. Anime? Dinosaurs? But yes. Let's not be half-dressed in front of a lady! "Um. I'll, uh, be right back," he notes, and heads into the apartment building again. And as he does, broken and destroyed walls are fixed in his wake!
But as Ponset explains what's been going on in her life, he turns to her again and nods. "I see, I see. I discovered much the same, though it has had little impact on my life here. Even in the 'real world' there are still plenty of things to do, plenty of people to protect! And there's also the matter of Dio, who has come here as well..."
He catches the tail end of Ponset's words, and nods. "You're telling me. I mean, I don't mind the attention, but nobody calls me 'Jojo' unless they don't know me." A big switch from the previous Joestars, to whom 'Jojo' was an affectionate nickname that his closest friends would use. In fact, he doesn't really seem to like the nickname at all! And then he looks to Zeppeli. "You said my father's side were predisposed to being able to do this Hamon? Have any of them shown Stands, that you know of? I'm not sure how it'll interact with Crazy Diamond. I'm not backing out, just wondering if you know."
After Josuke asks about Stands and Hamon, the eccentric scratches his chin, thinking about it for a while. Finally, however, he nods and says, "Hmm, yes. I seem to recall the first time I ever heard about these 'Stands' was when someone mentioned Joseph Joestar. It's not a name I'm familiar with, so I'm assuming he is one of Jonathan's descendants, but I seem to recall he was able to combine his Hamon with his Stand. Unfortunately, I don't know any further details."
Zeppeli's comment about his hair gets a pleased grin. "Thanks!" he says. "It's called a 'regent'." In Japan, anyway. Other countries would call it a 'pompadour'. Maybe an old style, but yes. Josuke's chin is kind of narrow, and his nose is kind of flat. The hairstyle brings the attention up, to accent his eyes. Though then that name -- Joseph Joestar. Josuke seems a bit shocked, just a moment. "Joseph is... my father, yeah," he admits. "Jotaro said he had a Stand... he didn't tell me about the Hamon." He brightens a little then. "But that means it shouldn't do anything weird with Crazy Diamond, so that's good." | |
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