Chereads / sTaNdZ (JoJo’s Bizzare Adventure) / Chapter 2 - Tag! You're It!

Chapter 2 - Tag! You're It!

"Tag! Tag tag tag tag tag!"

Silver Chariot is running around the town, stealing scraps of metal and sparring with itself, and re-arranging things in a store. It hides behind the store and listens, still sparring with itself.

"Sir, why is this bag of chips thirty dollars?"

"Sir, I'll buy this couch for ninety-nine cents!"

"Sir, why is this hat labeled "poh-teh-toehs"?"

"Sir, why are the zucchinis arranged to look like helmets?"

"Sir, why are the apples in the oranges bin?

"Okay, WHAT the hell is going on?"

Silver Chariot smiles to itself and speeds off, its ethereal steel-plated boots clanking on the pavement. It rushes into the school, grabbing a piece of paper and a pen on the way. It scribbles something and folds the paper up. It floats through a few doors and finally arrives in the chemistry classroom. It picks up a whiteboard marker, scribbles out the diagram of intramolecular bonds, and writes "tag" all over the board. It also draws a little stick figure holding a sword. Then it floats just outside of the building and waits.

Josuke opens the door and walks into the room quietly. He looks around, and something catches his eye.

"Hey, teach? Why is "tag" written all over the board?"

The teacher looks almost offended, for some ridiculous reason.

"What are you talking about? "Tag" isn't written all...over the...oh..."

She turns around and sees Silver Chariot's drawings.

"What is th-AHH!"

Silver Chariot shoves a piece of paper in her face. She pulls it away and reads it. It says "Tag! You're it!" in scribbly black letters. Silver Chariot runs through the back row of desks, and then the next, and then the next, scattering everyone's pencils and paper. Josuke and the teacher turn towards the commotion, and Josuke sees a blur of sliver, visible for long enough that he could see it, but so fast that he couldn't make out what it was. He turns to the teacher. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees The Hand, followed by Okuyasu.

Of course. Typical Okuyasu. Hitting anything that moves.

"Teach? Did you see that?"

The teacher looks at him incredulously.

"See what? All I see are a bunch of troublemaking students!"

Josuke walks to his seat and rolls his eyes at his paper. He hears the teacher's voice snap behind him.

"OKUYASU NIJIMURA! DETENTION!"

Okuyasu heads back to his seat, head down, muttering "not again" under his breath. Josuke looks at him apologetically. The teacher erases all of the writing on the board and redraws all the diagrams.

"Now, back to the lesson. A bond between a metal and a nonmetal..."

Josuke stares at his blank paper, his mind somewhere else.

Silver? Fast? Was it silver? Teacher couldn't see it. Okuyasu could. Stand? Which one? Hmm...

"OI, JOSUKE!"

Josuke snaps back to reality. His paper is covered in random notes on which Stand the pranks could be done by, and little sketches of the stick figure that was on the board. The room is empty, save himself, The Hand, and Okuyasu. Okuyasu snaps his fingers in Josuke's face to get his attention.

"Okuyasu? I thought you got detention."

"I did! It's over though."

"Over? What time it it?"

"It's four-thirty. The period ended forty-five minutes ago."

Josuke shakes his head and packs up his stuff. He spares one last look at his random scribble notes, and puts his notebook in his bag.

"Come on, Okuyasu. Let's go home." Okuyasu de-summons The Hand, and the two friends walk out of the school. Silver Chariot smiles to itself.

"Tag tag tag tag tag!"

Silver Chariot laughs out loud as it runs around the town, preparing for its next prank. A bucket, paper, tape, water, a pen...it gets everything it needs in about one-fifth of a second. It writes a scribbly, messy message on the paper, fills the bucket with water, tapes the paper to the bucket, and shoots off to find its target.

Josuke and Okuyasu are walking home from school. They're talking about nothing in particular, making fun of each other, just enjoying hanging out.

"Hey, Okuyasu, you remember that time when you-" Josuke is cut off when a bucket of water is dumped on his head. He pulls it off, and immediately pulls out his phone. He looks at his reflection in the phone's screen. Obviously, his pompadour is wrecked. His thick black hair sticks to his face and neck, and it's still sopping wet. Josuke freezes and drops his phone. Shaking, he picks up the bucket and looks at the paper.

It says 'your hair sucks, Josuke!' Upon reading this, Josuke starts to lose control. His breathing is heavy and laborious, his fists are clenched, and he sees nothing but red.

"Jos-" Okuyasu starts to call, but he stops and backs away. He might be a moron, but even he knows not to talk to or be near Josuke when he's in this state. Josuke whispers something inaudible, body shaking with rage, and a familiar, silvery-gray, football-player-looking Stand pops out behind him.

"Please do this for me, okay?" Josuke growls.

Crazy Diamond nods.

"DORARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARA!!"

Crazy Diamond starts punching the bucket. The first couple blows reduce it to nothing but scraps of metal, but it keeps pounding those scraps until they're nothing but atoms blowing away in the wind.

"Good." Josuke takes a deep breath and de-summons his Stand. He stares at Okuyasu for a second.

"Let's go, Okuyasu," he says firmly. The two take a 'wrong' turn, and Okuyasu looks around, clearly confused.

"OI, JOSUKE! Where are we going?"

Josuke glares at Okuyasu, and the moron decides to shut his mouth before he gets beaten up.

"We're going to find my...we're going to find Jotaro."

The two walk into the apartment building. Josuke is muttering to himself in the elevator up.

"Silver, fast, Stand, water, pranks...floor seven, apartment twenty-two..."

They get out, and go to Jotaro's door. Josuke knocks. A tired-looking Jotaro opens the door.

"Hey Josuke...why are you here?" Jotaro asks. He rubs his eyes and blinks a couple times.

"Um...are you okay?" Josuke asks. Jotaro nods.

"Star Platinum never wants to go to bed. It was watching anime, LOUDLY, at three in the morning."

"ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA!! ORA!" Star Platinum shouts in the background. Jotaro facepalms.

"Yeah, I can tell. So anyway, I'm here because I need your help."

Jotaro glares at him.

"Is it a Stand?"

Josuke nods. Jotaro opens the door, and the two boys enter. The three sit down.

"What happened to your hair, Josuke?" Jotaro asks. Josuke can feel himself getting angry, but he focuses on figuring out which Stand this is, so he could have Crazy Diamond beat the hell out of it.

"I had...a bucket of water...dumped on me..." Josuke says, breathing heavily. He pulls out his notes, thankfully not damaged by the water. He hands them over to Jotaro. Jotaro takes one look at them, and snaps his fingers to get their attention.

"It's Silver Chariot," he states matter-of-factly. Josuke and Okuyasu look at each other.

"Who's Stand is that? I've never heard of it," Josuke asks. Jotaro sighs.

"It's...it's the Stand of an old friend of mine. He's...well...c'mon, I'll take you two to his house."

Josuke shakes his head.

"Give me thirty minutes. I can't...go anywhere...looking like...this."

Jotaro nods.

Josuke summons Crazy Diamond.

"Get my hair stuff, will you?"

"Dora rara!" Crazy Diamond states affirmatively. It rushes over, and comes back in about a second, carrying a couple bottles and a hair dryer. Josuke retreats to the bathroom to fix his hair, and Jotaro and Okuyasu stare at each other, fidgeting awkwardly. They have nothing to talk about. They hear Josuke turn on the hair dryer.

"So, what's your Stand?" Jotaro asks.

"It's called Za Hando," Okuyasu states, while summoning it. "It's a teleportation Stand."

"Oh, how far can it teleport?"

"Uh...it doesn't teleport itself. It teleports objects. And to where? I don't know. I often wonder about that, but I'm not very smart, so any time I think about it, I just get a headache."

"Oh."

They go back to awkward silence. Josuke comes out of the bathroom, his pompadour shiny and completely fixed.

"There we go. That's better. When I get my hands on this 'friend' of Jotaro's...I swear I'll-" Josuke mutters to himself. He stops when he sees them. He gives the stuff back to Crazy Diamond. It rushes off and drops it all off, then comes back in about a second. The three men nod to each other, and Jotaro leads them a couple buildings down, to a normal-looking house. Josuke fidgets, and Jotaro knocks on the door. Polnareff answers.

"Jotaro! Long time no see!" He exclaims. He looks past him, as if noticing the other two for the first time.

"Who are they?"

"They're...friends of mine. This is Josuke, and this is Okuyasu," he says, while gesturing to them. Josuke glares at Polnareff, pure rage in his eyes.

"Uh...Jotaro, why is he looking at me like that?" He whispers, clearly nervous. Jotaro sighs.

"Yare yare daze...Polnareff, I didn't come just to introduce my friends. We're here to talk about your Stand."

Polnareff nods.

"What about it?"

"IT MESSED UP MY DAMN HAIR!" Josuke snaps. Jotaro winces, and Polnareff shakes his head at the ground.

"SHIRUBĀ CHARIOTTSU!"

The Stand suddenly appears next to its user, as if it had teleported. It sees Josuke staring at it, and looks at the ground, fidgeting with its sword nervously.

"A teleporter?" Okuyasu asks. Polnareff shakes his head.

"No, it's just fast."

"KUREIJĪ DAIYAMONDO!"

The Stand appears behind Josuke.

"Beat...this...damn...thing...up..." he mutters, breathing really heavily. It nods.

"Uh, Jotaro-"

"DORARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARA!!!!!!!!"

In a few seconds, the entire front of Polnareff's house is destroyed. The two Stands emerge from a cloud of smoke, breathing heavily, but unharmed. Josuke is still staring at Polnareff, his eyes burning with rage. He closes his eyes and breathes, and when he opens them again, the rage is more tame. Polnareff surveys the damage and shakes his head.

"This is gonna cost-"

"DORARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARARA!!!!!!!!"

The entire house is fixed. Even the hedges and flowers are back to the way they were. Polnareff stares at it, clearly confused. Josuke steps forward.

"That's my Stand's ability. It can fix things, or more accurately, un-damage things. Now, why the HELL did your Stand dump a bucket of water on my head?!"

Polnareff flinches at Josuke's raised voice. He turns to his Stand.

"Why did you do that?"

"Tag! Tag tag tag tag tag! Tag tag tag...tag?" Polnareff rolls his eyes.

"Yes, you're in trouble! You're grounded! No leaving the house today or tomorrow!" The Stand shakes its head at the ground and floats away, clearly unhappy. Polnareff turns to Josuke and sighs.

"I'm sorry that my Stand did that."

Josuke closes his eyes and takes another deep breath. When he opens his eyes, the rage is nowhere to be found.

"It's okay. I don't blame you."

Polnareff smiles.

"So, now that that's done, do you guys wanna hang out?"

Okuyasu and Josuke immediately nod. Hesitantly, Jotaro does as well.

"Okay! C'mon in! Did Jotaro ever tell you about that time he..."

The four of them joke around, play video games, and just have a good time. Silver Chariot doesn't even cause any problems.