//------------------------------// // Chapter 11: One Train Ride Away // Story: SuShi's Bizarre Adventure: Nugget Run Horizon // by Jojoleopard //------------------------------// Gipsy Dance woke up with the air burning around her. Smoke clogged her nose and ash stung her eyes and skin as screams filled the air. She blinked and rubbed the pain from her face, then pushed off a fallen wooden beam from on top of her body. A hole through the wall of her home gave her a view of the carnage unfolding outside. There was fire everywhere and there were other houses doing far worse than hers. The Sfera’s home was completely demolished. Gone. Reduced to rubble, and she could see half a body sticking out from underneath. A man struggled down the streets, grasping his neck as he gagged for air. He could find none and he collapsed right there in front of her, twitching twice before going still. Then there was a man, standing there behind his body. Gipsy didn’t see him appear, but there he was now, decked out in a black suit with a white flower hanging from one pocket, which matched his white hair. He had a scar running down one eye to his chin and he looked at the dead body and smirked. All of a sudden a figure standing almost twice his height appeared next to him and stomped a foot down on the man, grinding him into the ground. “At last…” the man laughed. “All these pathetic Romanis are dead. Italy has been cleansed of their filth and soon, they will be wiped off the face of the earth completely. Ah, but one of you remains…” He suddenly turned to Gipsy and she fell back a step. “Ciao, little one. So you survived. But… I am soon about to change that.” Gipsy Dance wasted no time in fleeing. She ran through the wreckage of her home, scrambling for the front door on the other end. She could hear it now, there was something that sounded like a trumpet behind her, followed by a crashing of wood. Whatever that thing was, it was coming for her. Squeezing out the front door past a pile of wreckage, Gipsy ran and ran, looking back occasionally over her shoulder as she anticipated the thing to burst through her home any moment. And there it was. Once she arrived at a curving street at the end of her path, there was a loud trumpet and her house exploded in a shower of wood and cement, flying high into the air as she caught sight of the figure’s golden apparel. The young girl rushed down the street, but she had only made it halfway before something swiped at her legs and she fell on her chin. Pain shot up through her head like vines, but she mustered enough strength to crawl ahead and turn around. The mysterious man was now standing on top of her, half bent and smiling at her with amusement. There was nothing more she could do and he knew that. “Kudos to you, girl, for getting this far. But I’m afraid the game is up.” He planted a finger on her forehead, then swiped down. Gipsy felt fresh pain blaze across her face and only after putting a hand to her forehead, she found that it was now bleeding. Looking down at the man’s hand, she realized his index fingernail of his right hand was sharpened into a spike. “What d-do you want?” she managed to get out. “Wh-Who are you…?” “My child, I do not want anything specific with you.” He chuckled. “I, Eximus Exo, a member of Weather Alternate, seek to eradicate the impurities of humanity and you, my dear, unfortunately are one of them. It is a shame of what you are. If you were born of a pure bloodline, I would have taken you under my wing, train you, teach you the ways of the world unknown to many. But you are of mud. To us, your people are nothing but the dirt of which we plant our feet when we walk.” “Why, what did we ever do to you?” Gipsy cried. Eximus’ smirk widened and he straightened himself and dusted his jacket. “You existed.” The giant figure appeared beside him again and lifted a foot over Gipsy. The girl shut her eyes and planted her hands against her ears, but the end never came. Cracking open one eye, she saw a golden frame standing in front of her, holding up the giant’s foot with its own hands. “So, you’re a Stand user too, hmm?” Those were the last words Gipsy heard from the man as the giant swiped a hand at her, knocking both her and her golden helper off the side of the road, sending her plunging down into the sea below. After that, all she remembered was the pain and the anger, and they both remained to this very day. --------JO-JO------- “And since then, I’ve trained myself and how to use my Stand, Spandau Ballet,” Gipsy Dance said, now seated at a table with Summer and the rest of her group. “I’ve longed for the day where I will meet Eximus Exo again and I will cut out his heart and feed it back to him. And then I’d do it all over again. Fifteen times over. He killed my parents, my siblings, my neighbors, my people, all because we were not like him and the rest of Weather Alternate.” “Man, these people deserve to die for what they’ve done to poor Gipsy’s people.” Prism Dash hammered a fist against the table. “Now we’ve all the more reason to take them down for good.” “It’s good to have you on the team, Gipsy.” Summer gave her a pat on the shoulder. “Once we find this Eximus Exo, we’ll leave him for you.” “I’ve been searching for him for twelve years now and I just caught wind of some information that he was heading for Germany.” Gipsy clenched her fist that was resting on the table’s surface. “Now I know why. If we are to stop him and Weather Alternate, we must head there with haste.” “Yes, welcome to the team, Gipsy.” Sweetie Belle shook her hand. “Now, I’ve found a train headed for Berlin at three o’clock. If we can successfully finish our lunch, we should be able to make it there with time to spare.” “Berlin?” Prism asked. “Then we’re getting pretty close, aren’t we?” “We should take care when we reach Germany,” Jojo advised. With his last outfit all dirty and smelly, he had purchased himself a new attire, consisting of a blue scarf, a brown coat without sleeves, and some new pale green jeans. “Who knows how many members of Weather Alternate might be lurking about.” “Let them come.” Gipsy growled. “They’ll see their end to a girl of lowly blood. Especially Eximus Exo. He’ll be there. I know it.” “I wonder about the leader of Weather Alternate. For sure he’s going to give us trouble,” Summer mused. “What did they say his name was, Dolfy something?” Everyone shrugged and mumbled to themselves. “Even I do not know that. I am sorry.” Gipsy toyed with the bangles on her left arm. “But know this, he’ll pay just as much as Eximus Exo will.” With a new member and newer resolve, the group quickly finished up their lunch, constantly looking over their shoulders as they expected another enemy Stand to appear. Thankfully, by the time their plates were empty and they had put their utensils down, no enemy Stands had showed up and they were free to leave for the train station within Sweetie Belle’s time frame. Summer Shine got to know her new companion a little better on the way. Apparently, her people had originated from Asia and they’ve spread across most of Europe since. Her family roots were Italian, and she had grown up in a place called Gaeta, near the southern shores, and that was where her quest for revenge had begun. The train station wasn’t far from the cafe and they made their way there in a little over ten minutes. Summer found herself constantly rotating her head around, taking in the details of everyone that passed them by. Weather Alternate had proven resourceful in their last few encounters and they could’ve been any one of these people around them. They had no way of knowing, so it was better to keep a good lookout. It was here that they also discovered that Sweetie Belle was quite loaded. Ever since meeting her from the plane crash, she’d been paying for everything, even the train tickets to Berlin. “We set up some startups to see what we could be good at in our time,” she explained. “Some of them didn’t work out, but some of them have been pretty resourceful. I guess our biggest one is the Crusaders Foundation. Would you believe it, we have a huge oil company out in the Middle East, somewhere near Saddle Arabia. It also doubles as an organization used to help people who have fled their countries and need some help getting started elsewhere.” “Wow. That’s… two completely different things.” Jojo beamed. “But awfully nice of you, Sweetie.” “Me and the girls,” she corrected him. “I would’ve asked them on this journey with us, but I felt I had to do this on my own for once.” “Do what on your own exactly?” Sweetie looked at her friends and smiled. “I wanted to do this for my sister. Perhaps if she was looking down at me this moment, perhaps she could be proud of me. We haven’t always seen eye to eye, but I hope I’m living up to the generosity she always showed others.” Summer put a hand on Sweetie’s arm and held it firmly. “You already have. You didn’t need to help us. You didn’t even need to follow us all the way across the ocean, but you chose to. All on your own. Your sister would be proud.” The others, with the exception of Fuchsia, nodded their heads in agreement. “Thank you. Thank you all.” Sweetie’s eyes glistened and she couldn’t help but smile wider. “Come on, we better get a move on. The train will depart in forty minutes.” “About time.” Fuchsia rolled her eyes. “You were all getting too soppy for me.” “Time to grab another snack?” Prism asked and licked her lips. “Did you not already eat enough at the cafe?” Summer raised one eyebrow. “You had two whole burgers and sides.” “Yeah, well…” Prism sniffed and slapped her belly. “Girl’s gotta eat, Sushi.” -------JO-JO------ Ripple Fancy watched as Sushi and her group walked onto the platform from the train’s window and smirked. She had foreseen their arrival on time. They entered the train at least four cars down. Not too close by, but to Ripple, it didn’t matter. Once they caught wind of them arriving in Europe, Weather Alternate had guessed that they would be on their way to Mount Fegel, where the Nugget Run and their nefarious plot were taking place. It would only make sense for them to take a train to Germany now, and that train would be the three o’clock train to Berlin. She had purchased her tickets earlier and she had already been here, looking out the window and waiting for them to show up. She had a hunch they would be taking this very specific train, and she was glad her hunch had been right, otherwise she had wasted a lot of her time, especially with how long her Stand took to work. She crossed one leg over the other and looked down at it, partially tucked under the seat next to her. Right now, it was but a pulsating pinkish egg, but soon, once the time was right, she would let it go, and as the train made its way out into the countryside, there would be nowhere for anyone to go. They would be trapped on this train with her, and Gloriosa would have her revenge. Ripple had been one of the members roped in to help Gloriosa take this group down. This Sushi group had already taken out her brother, her brother’s girlfriend, and her precious dog. She had never seen this dog before, but everyone seemed extremely worked up about it dying. Gloriosa had been absolutely livid when she was briefing them on the task, and only from the soothing of her husband did she cool down and explain it properly. In her opinion, Ripple thought this would be a simple task. It was only a matter of eliminating a few souls, plus, they were basically children with one adult. It didn’t seem all that hard, though they did manage to take out Timber, Blueblood, and even Gobble Gab, a member of Master Dolfy’s inner circle. That last one, at least, gained them a little respect from her, though it wasn’t going to matter much once things got started. “Try as you might, Sushi…” Ripple looked at her pink painted fingernails. “You won’t get much sleep tonight. Once I set my sights on you, it’s the end of the line. You’ll never get to Berlin, or perhaps… maybe just a portion of you will…” She kicked one foot against the egg and there was a squelching sound, followed by something that sounded like metal being dragged against metal. A lid at the top of it popped open and something slithered around inside it. People were going to die here.