Chapter 3: A Spark Ignited

Angel and Jacob walked into the city and start looking at all the traffic. Although walking wasn't ideal, it beat sitting in traffic just to travel 20 feet. The classic Hollywood sign hung out in the distance as the lights and bustle played all around them. They loved the city. While it was expensive to live there the sights were totally worth it. As they passed the busy streets they visited some game stores and some higher end restaurants for lunch. As the night progressed they found some parties and hopped from place to place enjoying a wild night out. At the end of the night they caught a cab and the drive was painfully slow back.

Angel fell asleep in the back of the cab and Jacob rested his chin on the door where the window was rolled down at looked at the cars and streets passing by. One by one the different buildings glowed at them, in fact, it seemed brighter at night now. How did celebrities live like this? Jacob sighed. As they passed another set of buildings, he looked into the alleyway and saw a boy struggling against an older man before he heard someone cry out. Jacob's eyes went wide for a moment and he shook Angel awake.

"Wha…do you…want?" Angel said drearily.

"Dude! I think I just saw Mr. Deriks's son get dragged into the alley!"

Angel sat up now, "What? What are you talking about??"

"I can't be sure but the way he sounded and how he looked in the light, I think it was really him."

"What's he doing out so late?"

"I don't know, but it didn't sound so good, we better go."

Angel shook his head and paid the driver for his time and they got out. Luckily traffic wasn't too bad so they were able to make their way to the alleyway easily. As they approached closer to it they came to a stop.

"So, if we find this guy and he actually was kidnapped, what are we exactly supposed to do?" Angel looked at Jacob with a quizzical look.

"I will be right beside you…" A voice whispered into Jacob's ear causing him to flip around in fear. He looked into the darkness and expected to see something. The steely, clear voice had been so close, almost as if it was standing where he was.

"Dude," Angel slapped his shoulder, "I'm serious, what are we going to do??"

Jacob turned around, "Sorry, I thought I heard something."

"So what's the plan then!" Angel began to nervously tap his foot.

"Umm…. well, I mean, if we get him out and there's just one guy then it'll be three on one, but I guess if it came to it, we just run." Jacob scratched the back of his head,

"We're going to die tonight, aren't we…" Angel sighed and began to walk into the dark alleyway. Jacob followed not far behind.

"We should be ok as long as- "A loud thump was heard behind as Jacob stopped talking.

"You ok?" Angel turned around and saw Jacob on the floor, unconscious. "What happ- "And within seconds he too was knocked out and everything faded to black.

Some time later, Angel woke up and as he looked to his left he saw Jacob laying on the floor right next to him. They had both been bound by the arms. He looked to his right and saw Mr. Deriks's son laying there. A familiar pair of shoes walked by, a pair of black dress shoes with red laces. As Angel looked up, he saw the strange man from "Taste of Vacation," except now he could see his face. It was a fairly younger face but it had distinct features that made him stand out. He had a scruffle around his face and some shaggy hair kept under his hat. His eyes were a slight tint of red and he constantly gazed from place to place. As Angel looked down the line both ways, he saw a bunch of other boys about their age tied up and laying on the ground.

Jacob woke up a few moments later and looked around, "What's going on?" He whispered to Angel. The whispering didn't do him any good as the well-dressed man responded to his question.

"I'll make it clear for all of you. You are all here on different circumstances, but for the same reason. Some of you come to rescue a friend," he'd look at Angel and Jacob, "Some of you are here because of a debt," he'd look at some other people, "And some of you are here out of rage and vengeance for some actions that took place today." The man looked hard at Mr. Deriks's son.

"What is he talking about?" Jacob looked over at the boy next to Angel.

"But no matter," the man continued, "You will now either die, or serve the boss." From his cloak the man retrieved something from his pocket, a short staff of wood with a golden looking arrow head crowing the top. He spun it around in his hand and chuckled. His intense glare profiling every single person there, "If you are so fortunate to pass the test, one of these will be attached to you," he raised a sort of circular object into the light, "Don't worry, you won't remember anything. If you don't pass, you will die. The device is to keep you in control, it is necessary to make sure you don't have any outbursts. So, who wants to go first?" His eyes scrolled up and down the line of boys, "Thank you for volunteering!" He took the arrow and stabbed it into one of the boys before pulling it out. The boy began to convulse and a light began to shoot out from him before he shuddered and his body cracked all over and shriveled up and died.

"How unfortunate, he just wasn't good enough for the boss. Oh well, next." One by one he moved down the line. Some died in similar fashions but some survived and passed out from some external force and one of those disks was placed on their necks.

"What am I going to do?? I'm going to die!" Jacob thought to himself in pure fear and agony.

"I shall protect you, do not fear, I sense a presence to him but we can handle him…" The steely voice spoke again to Jacob making him even more panicked but also soothed him for an odd reason. Now that he looked up at the man he could see a red aura around him flickering like a fire. No one else seemed to notice however. The boy by Angel was stabbed and survived and a chip was promptly put on his neck. The man raised the arrow high above Angel and plunged it into his back before retrieving it. Angel began to convulse,

"Guess this one's a doozie." However, Angel fell silent and still and he seemed to be breathing. "Well I'll be damned, he's one tough sucker to have survived," the man bent down to put a chip on his neck and Jacob stared horrified.

"Please, not Angel too!"

"Do not worry," the steely voice replied sternly, "It's already too late, he's within my range."

"Your range…?" Just then, a humanoid figure appeared from Jacob. As Jacob took in the ghastly sight he looked the figure up and down. It was about his height but with definitely more muscle. The outside of its body was perfectly reflective like a mirror but in a darker chrome color. Its face had two completely silver eyes with a mouth that was made of glass shards. Its knuckles had glass shards sticking out of them and on the side of its head it had six glass spikes, three on each side, that pointed directly backwards and out at an angle, the biggest of them being near more the front of the head.

"Upside Down & Inside Out!" The figure spoke with the steely voice again. A fist moved with super human speed and precision towards the man's hand and device.

"The hell!?" A flurry of cards flew up and around the man and he vanished reappearing behind Jacob with some distance in between. "I see you already had one, thank goodness I didn't stab you with this or we'd have some bigger problems, although I will say, your stand looks mighty fierce already."

"S-stand?" Jacob was baffled at what he just witnessed.

"Yes, that's what that is. This arrow gives gifts like those to ordinary people, except unlike most, some of us are born with it. Looks like you were, and seeing your reaction means this is the first you've ever seen it." He chuckled.

"You're damn straight!" The began untying Jacob's ropes and that of Angel's, "Listen, I don't know what this is but me and my friend just came to get that guy and be on our way."

The man chuckled again, a little darker this time, "Now that I've seen your power, I can't just let you leave. The boss will definitely want you."

"I'm not asking, we're leaving, now!"

"Do not humor me. You're stand may be strong, but you're a beginner, and your close range is no match for my Ace of Spades." The flurry of cards flew up around him and hovered in the air. From a signal, five or six cards flew towards Jacob with high speed and accuracy. Upside Down & Inside Out deflected the cards quickly and they fell to the floor and stuck into the ground. One of them was an Ace of Diamonds and as the man snapped an explosion of fire erupted from the card. UDIO shielded Jacob from the fire as it was mostly acting on its own. While the fire caused heavy damage to nearby objects, the cards remained unharmed.

"Not bad kid," he walked over to the fallen cards and they automatically went into his suit pocket where a card box resided for them, "But I'm just getting warmed up." Another series of cards flew at Jacob but some vanished into various shadows around the area and reappeared right behind Jacob, aiming for the back with their razor-sharp edges. While UDIO was busy deflecting the cards, Jacob noticed the ones that had appeared behind him and realized it was too late to stop them. He closed his eyes and expected them to hit but heard an odd static/glitching noise emitted from somewhere in the general area. As he opened his eyes he saw the cards fly through him and past him as they glitched in and out of existence. After a few seconds they became solid again and flew back into the card deck. The man grabbed a card and began looking at it frantically.

"What the hell happened?" The cards looked ordinary but he was still worried. Behind Jacob he heard a grunt and saw Angel staggering to get up, another one of the humanoid beings standing by him. However, this one looked completely different. The figure stood about Angel's height, but it had a pattern of dark green with green zigzag stripes going diagonally all across its body. On its chest there was a timer of sorts with the number five on it. Its mouth was in the shape of a rectangle that looked like various wavelengths were moving across. It had to two solid black eyes that didn't seem to focus on anything. On the right side of its head, there was a silver tv antenna that went up and bent down a bit. On its knuckles there were raised crimson bumps with the infinity symbol on them. It never stood still and was slightly hunched over constantly shifting and twitching. On its back from the waist down was a cloak that was split into two down the middle, each part solid dark green with the crimson red infinity symbols going all down the side.

Angel finally stood up, leaning against the wall of the alleyway, slowly regaining his strength. "I guess this one is my stand, as you call it. He calls himself Glitch Mob."

The man gritted his teeth, "You're supposed to be unconscious, there's no way you can be awake!"

"Guess I am," Angel coughed a little bit. Upside Down & Inside Out and Glitch Mob turned to face him. UDIO pounded its fists together and bellowed a roar and Glitch Mob growled in a sense, the waves on its mouth shifting from tall and high pitched to low and menacing. The man stepped back, anxiety in his eye before regaining his cool composure.

"No matter, this is a minor setback. You've been marked against the boss. I hope you're ready. We'll find you, no matter what." He flashed a smooth grin and the cards flew around him and again they vanished with him. They stood there and the stands looked at each other and communicated in an odd form that only pertained to them and then retreated into their hosts. Jacob saw a dark green aura around Angel like he had saw around the other man, and Angel saw a bright white aura surrounding Jacob. They went around and untied the rope holding the men together, the ones who had avoided being stabbed ran away in a panic. As for those who were unconscious, Jacob and Angel sat them up against one of the walls and left them, hoping they'd wake up soon. Together, they hoisted up Mr. Deriks's son onto their shoulders, which their stands came in handy helping with the work load, and began to walk back to their apartment.

On the way back, they remained silent as they were still shaken up about what had just happened. By the time they reached near their apartment the sun had begun to rise and they heard sirens in the distance and a large crowd had gathered near "Taste of Vacation". As they approached they saw what had happened. The café had gone up in flames, or something like that. Most of the building had been torn apart like it was hit with a series of explosions. As they moved closer as fast of they could they saw Mr. Deriks being taken away on a stretcher. He was dead. They set Mr. Deriks's son down on the ground and rushed over to where an officer stopped them behind some yellow tape.

"What happened!?" Angel looked around at the scene with anxiety in his voice; he couldn't believe what he was seeing.

"It seems like an explosion of sorts, but there are no signs of where it came from. The victim presumably died from the explosion but we also found cut marks along the body in various parts. Interesting thing is, the cuts are too clean and nice to be from a knife. We are still investigating it, but it seems to be an accident."

Jacob shuddered at a thought. I was no coincidence that they had seen that man in the cafe earlier and now it had been ripped to shreds. Could that have happened to them? Could stands really be this terrifying. All these bizarre things were happening left and right with no logical explanation, and so suddenly. A figure walked behind them and spoke,

"This is why I pursued the man, I…I didn't know he was capable of something like this." It was Mr. Deriks's son, a couple tears fell from his eyes down his bony and pale face. His dark hair had been all rustled from the commotion earlier in the night and his skinny jeans had been covered with dirt.

"Thank you, for pulling me out of there. I know I was out for most of it, but I was able to hold on to see some strange stuff." He had a scar where Angel had used his odd ability to glitch out the device on his neck and it had fallen off. "I'm Mark by the way, and I guess you were familiar with my father…" he fell silent and turned away from the scene and began to shamble a bit away as still weak from just waking up. Angel and Jacob followed him and Jacob stepped on an odd piece of paper. He picked it up and sketched on the back was the symbol for a Spade, he turned it over and a message read to him,

"I told you so," Just then a little off into the distance, a boom was heard and the trio looked up. They saw an apartment building with one of its windows pouring out fire from it. Angel and Jacob both realized in that moment that it was their apartment. They stared in hateful awe, now knowing what Mr. Deriks had experienced before his death. A card flew out from the window with the same red aura around it and they traced to where it flew and saw a man standing some distance away in the shadow of a tree. Before they had a moment to react, the man stepped into full cover and had disappeared.

The boys saw as the police scrambled to get into their cars and radio for backup to control the situation. Jacob looked down again and finished the note and crumpled it in anger and shoved it into his pocket, "Like you said, shouldn't have left your window open…"

Stand Name: Upside Down & Inside Out

User: Jacob Jost'R

Ability: ???

Stats:

Power: A

Speed: A

Range: D

Durability: B

Precision: A

Potential: C