Ozon Baby's Pressure (story arc)
Poor Tom and Ozon Baby (プアー・トムとオゾン・ベイビ, Puā Tomu to Ozon Beibī) is the seventeenth story arc of JoJolion. This arc narrates the attack on the Higashikata house by Poor Tom and his Stand Ozon Baby which manipulates the atmospheric pression around the house.
Summary
It is morning at the Higashikata household. After witnessing a scene during breakfast, Jobin disables the camera and reminisces the first time he met the Rokakaka Smuggling Organization. During an argument with his father at the local baseball stadium, Jobin, wanting to rise in the social ladder, proposed to expand the family business, but Norisuke refused to his frustration. It was at this moment that Yotsuyu Yagiyama first contacted him.
In the present, Jobin buries Ozon Baby in the orchard. At the same time, Josuke and Rai sneak into the orchard through secret underground tunnels. Rai spots the Rokakaka branch and plants several moth larvae inside it to have a fruit produced in two days.
Meanwhile, Jobin is confronted by Tsurugi in the garage, the latter asking about Jobin's actions. Before the conversation is concluded, Ozon Baby begins to attack the household, and gravely injures Tsurugi and Iwasuke. Jobin realizes that Ozon Baby is an automatic Stand which will indiscriminately attack anyone in its range. Managing to bring Tsurugi back to safety, he also roughly grasps the enemy's ability: Ozon Baby can decrease the air pressure in a zone, but any closed space will dampen its effects. Cornered, Jobin revives Tsurugi and formulates his own plan, planning to use Josuke and Rai whom he is sure are in the garden. For their part, the two begin to feel the enemy's power in the tunnel, but decide to go out in the open.
The whole Higashikata Family has fallen unconscious because of Ozon Baby's depressurizing the house when Hato opens the door to the garage to check what is happening. Trapped in the shed, Jobin and Tsurugi also see that the pressure inside their room is increasing, surely reaching lethal levels in several minutes. The father and son thus decide to boldly set the orchard on fire in order to push Josuke and his appraiser in the open, as well as call Poor Tom to draw him to the orchard. The Rock Human indeed rushes to the Higashikata's.
Pushed into action by the fire, Josuke and Rai open the hatch, surrounded by great protective bubbles. Rai alone goes to extract the branch but he unexpectedly meets Poor Tom. Taking a split second decision, Rai both tries to cut off the branch and take it, but also strangles Tom with his other arm, planning to break his neck.
A brief flashback narrates the youth of Rai Mamezuku. Rai's parent had managed to grow prized pears but their growing techniques were leaked. Thus a competitor stole the pears and ravaged their orchard, forcing the parents to part with their land. Furious and blaming his parents for their mistakes, Rai lived in his mountain slope and grew his own fruits here despite the climate. He eventually met Norisuke, who hired him in secret.
In the now, Rai tries to kill of Poor Tom, but touching the Rock Human is revealed to be a grave mistake. The pressure inside the bubble dramatically increases because of that, and Rai begins to be gruesomely crushed by the air. Josuke intervenes, shooting several poisonous yew seeds from afar with bubbles. Rai and Josuke manage to make Tom swallow one seed. Unfortunately, Tom uses a knife sheath to encase part of Rai's wire inside it, causing the pressure to skyrocket again. Rai dies from his injuries and crumbles into a pile of wires.
Poor Tom seizes the branch, but the poison begins to take effect. Crawling away from Josuke, who pursues him despite the pressure in his own bubble increasing as he approaches the Rock Human, Tom hears the sirens of an ambulance and fire truck, and guesses that his allies are probably here to pick him up. Motivated by Holy's sake and Rai's sacrifice, Josuke launches a multi-layered bubble containing another yew seed. The structure allows the bubble to pursue Poor Tom and catch up to him, exploiting the pressure to pop one layer at a time. Unable to run, Tom is finally cornered by the bubbles as the ambulances appear into view.
The multilayered bubble inexorably approaches Poor Tom despite his attempts to flee or pop the bubble and his pleas. At it flies into his face, Poor Tom finally relents and cancels his Ozon Baby to avoid the bubble popping the poisonous seed into his mouth. However, it is revealed that there was nothing inside and that Josuke bluffed Poor Tom into cancelling his ability. Desperate, Poor Tom flees toward the ambulance supposedly hiding his allies, and cries out that he has the branch. Suddenly someone shoots Tom twice in the head, killing him, and a mysterious unseen figures emerges from the ambulance to take the branch. Josuke is unable to catch up to the ambulance.
Meanwhile, Jobin and Tsurugi declare their victory, as Paper Moon King tricked Tom into taking the wrong branch, leaving it ripe for the taking. Grafting the Rokakaka branch into a ferocactus, Jobin plans to cultivate it and tells Tsurugi to keep the branch a secret. For their part, Tom's mysterious companions see that he has been tricked and deduce that whoever started the fire in the orchard must have somehos stolen the Rokakaka. Finally, Josuke returns to Rai, revealed to be alive and slowly reconstituting himself. Desperate, Josuke can only observe his total loss.
Appearances
Characters
Stands
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Chapters
- 72 (919). Poor Tom and Ozon Baby, Part 1
- 73 (920). Poor Tom and Ozon Baby, Part 2
- 74 (921). Poor Tom and Ozon Baby, Part 3
- 75 (922). Poor Tom and Ozon Baby, Part 4
- 76 (923). Poor Tom and Ozon Baby, Part 5
