After explaining her long story as to how she'd ended up with a Stand, and was sitting above a secondhand bookshop with two weird men, Roberta exhaled sharply.
"So that's how I ended up here. But what about you, Kylie? Why are you here?" She asked. "Did you cut your hand on the Arrow too?"
"I assumed that the museum would be the best place for safekeeping. I thought wrong." Avdol sighed.
"Aw no, I was born with my stand! Come out, LUCKY/LUCKY/LUCKY!" Kylie called. From behind her burst her stand, and Roberta was shocked as to how perfectly it represented her friend. It looked like a tiny humanoid figure, and it was a vivid shade of neon pink. It wore a pale pink flouncy skirt and a violet heart-shaped bodice, and had a long violet ponytail. Although it had no eyes, it had plump pink lips. The stand had magenta butterfly wings, and constantly left a trail of pearlescent, floating pink glitter as it flew around Kylie in a circle.
"She makes me lucky! Only problem is, she can only affect me." Kylie said. "Say, what does your stand do, Bobbi?"
"She's great at restoring artefacts. I mean, unless I'm fighting someone in a military museum, I don't see how that'll help me."
Avdol picked up his mug, and dropped it on the floor.
"This isn't old. Try mending it." He said. Roberta called out her now- familiar stand, and it mended the mug with a touch of it's bandage.
"You could mend a jammed gun, or a broken car to escape in. Think of a stand as a muscle- the more you train it, the stronger it gets." He said.
"I've had Lucky since I was a baby, and she just rubs off on me!" Kylie added. "Mr Avdol and Mr Polnareff help me train her to get stronger."
"Kakyoin told me that you get back to work tomorrow, so see if you can use it on some decaying artefacts. And remember- the pillar men are not your friends!" Polnareff said in a dramatic manner, before laughing.
"Anyway, Kylie, let's see you try to predict tomorrow's lottery numbers."
When she got home from the bookshop, Roberta headed upstairs to the penthouse. She activated LDG, and got the ghoulish stand to hover just out of sight, behind the corner, as the stand's limit was five metres. In order to test a theory, she was going to set up a test with her stand, as she was still skeptic if all the stuff about stands and pillar men was rel, or if she had gone insane. She rang the bell, and Kakyoin answered it.
"Roberta, hi! Why'd you come around?" He asked.
"I came to borrow a cup of sugar." Roberta said, her voice plain and flat as wonder bread. She made Living Dead Girl spring out from behind the corner, and Kakyoin almost jumped a mile.
"ROBERTA, GET DOWN! JOTARO, IT'S AN ENEMY STAND!" He screamed. A green, snakey stand emerged from Kakyoin as Jotaro summoned his spirit, which was some kind of purple barbarian.
"Relax, she's mine." Roberta grinned, calling LDG over to her. Kakyoin sighed with relief, relaxed his stand, and glared at Roberta.
"What the hell was that for?"
"Avdol told me about stands, about Pillar Men, about the arrow- everything. Why didn't you tell me?!"
"I thought you'd hurt yourself on a normal arrow, not the Stand Arrow. And even if we had told you, you'd never have believed us, you stupid bitch!" Jotaro grunted, slipping back into his irritable teenage mindset. Star Platinum shook his head at Jotaro using such language on a lady, but Roberta just laughed.
"Oh yes, let's hide the LIFE-CHANGING arrow and the MAN-EATING AZTEC VAMPIRE STATUE from our new curator! You could've just made excuses!"
"Hey, we keep Joseph around for a reason. Everything he says is true. So you could've listened to him, but you didn't, so you've just got yourself to blame." Jotaro grunted.
"JoJo, please. I'll talk this over with Roberta, you go and make some coffee."
Jotaro sighed, then affectionately shook his head.
"C'mon, Star, let's go get Nori some caffeine."
As they sat down over hot cups of coffee, Kakyoin explained the situation to Roberta.
"If we told you, you'd think we were mad. But everything that Avdol and Joseph said is true, which is why we keep up the UV lights and keep down any stories of the Warrior's origin." He said, stirring cream and sugar into his coffee.
"That I can understand, but what about all the historical evidence for Pillar Men?" Roberta asked.
"Joseph had it either hidden away in the archives or sealed away." Kakyoin said. "He said he destroyed it, but his grandpa was a archaeologist, so he can't being himself to. It's all in the archives, take a look tomorrow.
"I told Noriaki to have the pillar man in storage destroyed, but there were no hamon users strong enough to do so. Anyway, Star sulked about it until I told him to keep it in one piece." Jotaro explained. "Just don't be stupid and get any blood on the statues, and you'll be fine."
Monday came along as it always does, and Roberta headed off to the museum. She'd be staying late again, restoring an ancient greek vase, which got her curious about the Sandstone Warrior. She was bleeding everywhere when she ran out the museum a week ago- what if some had gotten on him? She could investigate that later, as right now her primary concern was the archives. There was nothing under "Pillar" or "Aztec", yet Roberta did find a large file marked "BIG DUMB STONE STRIPPERS."
"Jackpot!" She grinned. Roberta opened it up, and her jaw almost dropped at everything inside of it. It was full of photos and photocopies of artefacts and records, which included:
A series of cave paintings in Lascaux, sealed away from the public.
An ancient Greek fresco depicting four giants
A set of engravings from Mongolia, showing "The Great Powerful Queen of Death and Ice."
Remains of a prehistoric temple built over 40,000 years before Gobekli Tepi, now covered by the jungle and a housing estate.
A tattered scroll written in Hebrew, talking about "The Nephilim who fought in our people's place."
An Ancient Egyptian tomb painting.
A tiny sculpture of the "God of Metamorphosis and the God of Fire" in copulation.
An earring said to belong to "An ugly red-headed beast."
Roberta was in absolute awe of these funds, but nothing could've prepared her for what was in the vault. Using her pass to open the door, she saw that the only thing in it was a white chest, shaped like a coffin. There was a viewing window, and she nearly screamed at what she saw inside of it. It was a statue of a man, surrounded by UV lights. She quickly closed the vault and locked it, but she could never forget the sight of the Pillar Man's horned head and long, petrified locks.
"If these two in the museum are just the sons... What are the fathers like?!" She muttered to herself.
Night came, and the museum closed. As the punters headed home and Kakyoin went back to his penthouse, Roberta hunched over the vase. Work that would've once taken hours was now just a simple case of letting LDG tap the broken vase, and watching it regrow like a time lapse video of a plant. Roberta quickly mended the vase, then went to get herself a cup of tea. She always kept a packet of Tim Tams in her drawer, but as she reached for one, Mark's voice rang in her ears. It wasn't just that time at the restaurant, he'd always berated her about her body.
You're gonna look like Lizzo if you keep pigging out like that. Maybe you should try keto?
Jesus, can't get it down fast enough, can you?
You know, Roberta, I like petite girls the best. Maybe cut the carbs?
She grimaced, staring at the biscuit as if it was a rotting corpse. It was filthy, full of carbs and chemicals and seed oils, gonna make her fat, fat fat, nobody would love her, Mark was right, MARK WAS RIGHT, MARK WAS RIGHT...
She flinched, and hurled the offending biscuit away from her. It sailed through the air, as Living Dead Girl emerged by herself.
"Shit, chill out, boss! He was just saying that shit to hurt you!" The stand said.
"What if he's right, LDG? What if I am unlovable? What if he only dated me because he knew that he could hurt me with it? Bastard!" Although Roberta could accept that her ex was a bad person, she was still under the delusion that she was to blame, and that it was her fault for being unlovable. Wrapped up in self pity, she was only snapped out of it by the sound of crunching. Roberta walked out of her office, peered down the balconies that ringed the museum- to see her Tim Tam being absorbed by the Sandstone Warrior!
It had been millennia since he'd had a good sacrifice. Humans used to offer him the hearts of their enemies, the finest jewels and gold, even free usage of their various orifices- but nothing compared to the best sacrifice of all, and that was Xoxolatl. Kars had brewed it up years ago, and it was a hot liquor made of cocoa beans, human blood, vanilla and honey. He hadn't eaten it since the prehistoric times, but just today, a human had lobbed an offering into his compound- a lump of sweet, solid xoxolatl.
"Many thanks, human. May the earth be stained red with the blood of those who have wronged you." He said, as although the UV lights froze him, he could still talk and think due to Roberta's blood, and that idiotic human who tried to turn the lights off. Roberta peeked from behind the balcony, to see Wamuu staring at her, still encased in stone.
Did she just give a sacrifice to an Aztec God?!
The curator crept downstairs, but the only exit was directly in the statue's line of vision.
"You, human! Did you leave the sacrifice?" Wamuu demanded. It was that peculiar woman with the lip ring, and Roberta gasped as she recognised his voice.
"You're that caretaker who told me to dump Mark!" She gasped. "I mean, yeah, he was a stinker- but how are you alive?!"
"Your blood and his stupidity invigorated me." Wamuu replied. "Is there anything I can do in return for another sacrifice?"
A million and one thoughts flashed through Roberta's mine, most of them involving the full force of Hierophant Green and Star Platinum beating her up for releasing an Aztec monster, and the end of humanity ensuring because of this.
"Just stay still and pretend to be a statue. I'll get you more chocolate if you do that." She squeaked, imposed by Wamuu's buff, stone form.
"That is easily done." Wamuu replied, freezing back into lifeless stone. As Roberta left the museum, one thought ran through her mind.
"FUCK! HOW AM I GOING TO HIDE THIS FROM KAKYOIN?!"