| “ | It's natural to cry. But I think the times when people want to cry are the times when they need to work the hardest. So I decided that I’d cry all the time while things were normal, that I’d never try to pretend I was tough. I’d take all those tears from when I really wanted to cry, and I’d cry them out now. That way, when I really need to work hard, all my tears will be dried up and gone. | ” |
–Jacuzzi to Nice Holystone, 1931 The Grand Punk Railroad: Local | ||
Jacuzzi Splot (ジャグジー・スプロット, Jagujī Supurotto) is the young leader of a delinquent gang originally based in Chicago. He and his girlfriend Nice Holystone, along with their friends, successfully rob the Flying Pussyfoot en route to New York City in December 1931.
Upon arriving in New York, Jacuzzi and his gang reestablish their bootlegging operations only to come into conflict with the Martillo Family, the Gandor Family, and Huey Laforet's Larva and Lamia in September 1933. In December 1934, Jacuzzi and his gang temporarily return home to find Chicago in chaos, and clash with Nebula and the Runorata Family.
In February 1935, Jacuzzi and his gang attend the Runoratas' casino party at Ra's Lance in order to assist Firo Prochainezo with his gambling efforts.
Appearance[]
Jacuzzi has short brown hair and brown eyes, and in the early 1930s typically wears an orange-brown checkered vest over a white shirt, dark cummerbund, and olive trousers. He infamously has a large black tattoo of a sword on the left side of his face: its right cross-guard is situated under his left eye, and its blade curves over his eyebrow and onto his forehead.
Personality[]
Jacuzzi is a young man who cries constantly, worries constantly, and apologizes constantly. He is easily terrified and easily startled, and has fainted from shock on at least one occasion.
At the same time, he is extraordinarily caring, and extraordinarily brave.
Most who come across Jacuzzi for the first time are quick to wonder how a 'crybaby' like him could possibly serve as the leader of a delinquent gang. While it is true that he does not necessarily command total respect from his friends and followers, he does inspire strong loyalty amongst those who flock around him. The care and attention he pays to his friends is acknowledged and returned in kind; he makes a point of familiarizing himself with all the members in his gang, to the point where he is able to discern a stranger's voice amongst those of his friends during an incident in January 1932.
Despite appearances, there is a method behind Jacuzzi's tears. At the age of fourteen, he decided that he would cry all the time and not bother with 'acting tough'—so when confronted with something serious, he would be able to stand strong and be ready for any kind of pain, having no more tears to shed. This is exactly what happens aboard the Flying Pussyfoot: even when enduring agonizing wounds during his fight with Goose Perkins he remains dry-eyed, filled with resolve to defeat the Lemures and return to Nice alive.
Jacuzzi experiences real terror in the face of danger, but always rises to the occasion and protects his friends in spite of it. He is terrified when he confronts the Lemures, and he is terrified when he offers up himself to Graham Specter in exchange for Chané Laforet, and it is this bravery and love that endears him to so many people. People often join his group out of a desire to protect him, won over by his genuine kindness.
Though Jacuzzi is always if not overly considerate of other people's feelings, he is not above going against basic etiquette when desperate times call for desperate measures. When Eve Genoard gifts the gang wine in 1935, he seriously considers selling her gift for money that the gang desperately needs, and stands his ground when his friends protest. When push comes to shove, Jacuzzi is not a pushover: when Ladd Russo intimidates him aboard the Flying Pussyfoot, Jacuzzi balls his fists and refuses to cower in front of him; and when Dallas Genoard threatens him in 1933, he uses his crybaby demeanor to his advantage and deliberately acts passive and timid in his presence.
One of his most distinguishing features is the large black sword tattoo located on the left side of his face. He obtained the tattoo so that his close friend and girlfriend, Nice Holystone, would always be able to recognize him despite her damaged eyesight.
Chronology[]
Pre-1931[]
Jacuzzi is born and raised in Chicago, befriending his neighbor Nice Holystone at a young age. In 1926, he is horrified when Nice is severely scarred in an explosives incident and hides away in her room during her recovery. Realizing that her vision is now very limited, Jacuzzi has an artist tattoo a large sword upon his face so that Nice will easily be able to recognize him. He refuses to cry despite the pain, and resolves to cry all the time so that he will similarly be dry-eyed for other important situations.
During his teenage years, Jacuzzi comes to hate the liquor ban and hate the mafia for abusing the ban for profit and murder. He decides to brew cheap and palatable alcohol on his own, though Nice and other local delinquents quickly join his cause. When his nascent gang sells their first batch of alcohol, the local Russo Family mafia take umbrage and kill eight members of Jacuzzi's gang in response.
Jacuzzi and his friends decide to wage all out war with the Russo Family for the sake of their fallen brethren through both their bootlegging business and highway robbery; Jacuzzi himself is so furious that he guns down and robs eighteen Russo speakeasies all by himself in one day, crying all the while. Outraged, the Russos issue a bounty upon Jacuzzi's head.
1931[]
December 29. In the middle of the night, Russo capo Sidaris and four colleagues track down Jacuzzi's hideout and confront Jacuzzi near an abandoned factory. They find it extremely hard to believe that Jacuzzi is the gang's leader, given how unabashedly he is blubbering, but his facial tattoo is too distinctive for him to be anyone else. Despite Jacuzzi's pleas, his friends murder Sidaris and company and blow up their corpses.
At 4 PM the next day, Jacuzzi, Nice, Donny, Nick, and Jack arrive at Chicago's Union Station and prepare to board the transcontinental express Flying Pussyfoot bound for New York. According to their friends Jon Panel and Fang Lin-Shan, the train's bartender and cook respectively, someone has smuggled a batch of contraband explosives onto the train; per Jon and Fang's suggestion, Jacuzzi's gang intends to carry out their first ever train robbery with the smuggled cargo as their target.
Their plan is as follows: while the train is en route, they will locate the cargo and dump it when the train passes a certain river; their retrieval team, having been on standby, will then recover the dumped cargo for themselves. Not only should they be able to sell the bombs for a hefty profit, in doing so they will protect the potential would-be victims the bombs were originally intended for.
On the platform, Jacuzzi learns that a black-suited orchestra plans to have guards watching their instruments in a freight room and immediately assumes the worst for his train robbery. His fear slightly recedes when Nice observes that their cargo appears to be stashed in a different freight hold, only to become panic instead when Donny assures him he can 'do something' about the guard anyway.
A Czeslaw Meyer boy about ten years of age bumps into Jacuzzi and apologizes, assuring Jacuzzi that he is all right before running off in the direction of the second-class compartments. Nice wistfully remarks that Jacuzzi was just like Czes when he was little, and her assurance that Jacuzzi is still 'cute' causes Jacuzzi to blush.
Jacuzzi and his friends claim a third class compartment, and the Flying Pussyfoot sets off on the evening of December 30. After a few peaceful hours pass, Jacuzzi and Nice head for the dining car to meet with fellow gang members Jon and Fang. They order dinner at the bar, and Jacuzzi is dismayed when Jon refuses to discuss the robbery within earshot of the passengers—and dismayed further when Jon doubts he will be able to talk with Jacuzzi in private anytime soon.
Nice encourages Jacuzzi to talk to the strange couple at the end of the counter, suggesting that they might be movie stars due to their Wild West-themed attire. They ask if he is a movie star on account of his tattoo, and he accidentally admits to bootlegging, tries to pass that off as a lie, and introduces himself as a delinquent. Then he apologizes.
The couple invite him to partake in Chinese food with them, and introduce themselves as Isaac Dian and Miria Harvent. Jacuzzi obliges, and relaxes into conversation to the point where he is able to speak with them frankly and fearlessly—something that normally never happens with strangers.
An impact against Jacuzzi's back causes him to choke on his beef, and he turns around to find the boy who had bumped into him on the platform. The boy apologizes while his companion, a girl of similar age, shrinks back at Jacuzzi and Nice's appearances.
The girl's mother chastises her for being rude before introducing herself as Natalie Beriam, disclosing that she and her daughter Mary are travelling to visit her husband; meanwhile, the boy stiffly introduces himself as Czeslaw Meyer and claims he is on his way to visit family.
In the dining car.
When Jacuzzi assures Czes that he did nothing wrong, Isaac seizes the opportunity to relate the legend of the Rail Tracer, a monster which preys upon trains. Jacuzzi is scared witless by the story, and further horrified when Isaac cannot remember the sole method of escaping the Rail Tracer's wrath. Jon interjects that the Young Conductor ought to know, as he once told Jon the same story, and Jacuzzi bolts out of the dining car in the direction of the caboose.
He bumps into into Donny, Nick, and Jack just as they are about to enter the dining car, but does not bother to stop and explain his distress. Upon reaching the conductors' compartment, he is met with the grisly sight of two brutally mutilated corpses dressed in conductor uniforms. Jacuzzi assumes that the Young Conductor is dead, murdered alongside his colleague by the Rail Tracer.
Nice and Donny join him a minute or two later, bearing bad news: the 'Black Suits' (the Lemures) have captured Nick and Jack along with two White Suits. Jacuzzi exclaims that the Rail Tracer has arrived, and that they had better save Nick and Jack and make a run for it. Machine gun fire sounds off in the distance, and although Jacuzzi's first instinct is to flee, he swallows his fear and decides to do everything he can to force the Black Suits and the Rail Tracer off the train.
The trio burst into the freight hold intending to rescue their friends, only to find that Nick and Jack are alone—the former rope-bound but unhurt and the latter unbound but bloody and in pain. Nick explains that a White Suit (Ladd Russo) had freed his captured comrades, and then assaulted Jack before leaving them alone.
Jacuzzi clenches his fists, furious and upset over his friend's injuries. One his way out of the freight hold, he notices that the room's width is too narrow to match the car's length, and that the color of the back wall is slightly different from the floor and ceiling. He realizes that this must be the smuggled cargo's hiding place, but keeps his realization to himself; for now, he considers defeating the Lemures and the Rail Tracer his first priority.
Upon exiting into the corridor, Nick spots Ladd dancing in front of one of the other rooms and points him out to Jacuzzi. Jacuzzi advances towards him, intending to ask him why he hurt Jack, but stops in his tracks when Ladd identifies him by name; Ladd then introduces himself as Ladd Russo, announcing that he and his plan to take over the train and potentially kill half the passengers. Upon noticing the blood oozing under the door behind him, Jacuzzi ignores Ladd's provocations and swears he will make the White Suits pay for what they have done.
Ladd and his companions are startled when Jacuzzi accuses them of murdering both the conductors, and decide to investigate the conductors' compartment for themselves. As the White Suits exit the car, Ladd shouts that they not responsible for the 'mess' in the freight hold they just left.
Jacuzzi's group enters the hold to find its interior and ceiling coated with blood, and a Lemur's corpse lacking its entire lower half crumpled in the center of the room. Bloody footprints lead to the opposite wall's sliding door, left half-open and thus exposing the passing-by landscape.
Where Jacuzzi weeps openly at the gruesome sight, Nick is overcome by nausea and leaves to vomit through a window in the corridor. Doing so leads him to spy something strange on the coupling, and Jacuzzi and the others look over to see a red thing scuttling around the train's exterior. The gang exit onto the coupling, find it gone, and guess that it might have crawled onto the roof. Jacuzzi, Nice, and Nick clamber up onto the roof of the train, leaving Donny to carry Jack through the car.
Neither Jacuzzi nor his friends see any sign of the red shadow, and say as much to Donny when they reunite with him at the coupling of the next two cars. They move back to the front of the train, stopping just short of entering the dining car. After peeking through a window, Nice reports that two armed men are on guard, and all the bar patrons she and Jacuzzi dined with are nowhere to be seen.
Over Donny's shoulder, Jack groans that he and Donny encountered Isaac and Miria en route to he conductors' compartment, apparently determined to save their friends from the Rail Tracer. Jacuzzi pales at the thought that Isaac and Miria are endangering themselves to save him, and orders Nice and Nick to crawl over the dining car's roof to First Class. In the meantime, he and Donny will leave Jack somewhere safe and then search for Isaac and Miria. He kisses Nice on the mouth—the first time they have kissed in their ten years of being a couple—and heads for the rear cars with Donny in tow, dropping Jack off in the third Second Class cabin along the way.
Jacuzzi and Donny have a happy reunion with Isaac and Miria in the conductors' compartment, and the four of them move to a freight hold to chat. There, Jacuzzi briefs Isaac and Miria on the situation and his plan to defeat the Lemures and the Rail Tracer. Isaac and Miria are thrilled at the idea of Jacuzzi acting the hero, and give him an invigorating pep talk after he insists that he is not a 'good person'.
Eventually Isaac and Miria make to leave, intending to find the Rail Tracer and ask it to go home. They assure Jacuzzi that they will run away if the situation requires it, and urge him to rescue Natalie Beriam while they distract the Rail Tracer. Both parties promise each other that they all have to come back alive, and Isaac and Miria depart for the conductors' compartment. Jacuzzi and Donny exit in the other direction, and Jacuzzi vows to become the "biggest bad guy" on the train in order to see his plans through. Donny notes that this is the first time he has ever seen Jacuzzi enjoying himself.
Donny and Jacuzzi head back to the dining car, and on the way capture and interrogate a rogue Lemur on the Lemures' plans. Once they reach the dining car, Donny promptly knocks out two White Suits at the door while Jacuzzi brandishes a tommy gun and announces that the dining car is now under his control. Soon after, an explosion sounds off a couple cars away. Jacuzzi asks Jon and Fang to take care of the dining car and act according to their original plan, thus leaving Jacuzzi free to search for Nice. Jon asks if Jacuzzi is not scared, observing his lack of tears, and Jacuzzi replies that he is absolutely terrified. However, he has made a promise to come out of this alive, and he has to ensure that Nice survives as well.
He takes off for First Class, bursting into a cabin to find Goose Perkins aiming a gun at Nick's head. Jacuzzi immediately opens fire on Goose while Nick and Nice escape out into the hallway, and joins them a minute later. When they reach the dining car, Jacuzzi orders Nice and Nick to help Donny unload the rest of the explosives. Nice gives Jacuzzi her last cherry bomb, and Jacuzzi climbs onto the dining car's roof.
Goose follows after, armed with a portable flamethrower. Jacuzzi sprints across the rooftops and attempts to open fire on Goose at a safe distance away, tosses the gun aside upon finding it ammoless, and runs until he reaches the penultimate car. Just as he realizes that he has no means of lighting his cherry bomb, Isaac, Miria, and Czes soar overhead via a long rope; while Jacuzzi neatly avoids being swept off his feet, Goose is not so lucky.
Upon standing, Goose tries and fails to use his flamethrower—it quickly becomes clear that the flamethrower was damaged in the fall. Jacuzzi charges forward and headbutts Goose's face over and over, making some headway until Goose shoots him three times with his hand-firing mechanism. One shot grazes Jacuzzi's side, and the other two lodge themselves in his thigh. Jacuzzi refuses to cry, and headbutts Goose again.
As Goose prepares to fire up the flamethrower once more, Jacuzzi prepares to sacrifice himself by way of the cherry bomb. However, both are distracted when a mass of red meat swirls past their feet; in disgust and fear, Goose attempts to repel the bloody flesh by shooting jets of fire at it. Thinking that the bloodflesh is the Rail Tracer, Jacuzzi flings the cherry bomb in the direction of the flames. The ensuing explosion sends Goose flying to the end of the car, injuring him but not rendering him immobile. Jacuzzi blocks his way; he stabs a knife into Jacuzzi's arm, but Jacuzzi kicks him in the stomach and sends him tumbling off the rooftop.
The tanks on Goose's back explode upon contact with the ground, and Jacuzzi remains in a state of collapse until he is joined by Nice. They embrace, but Jacuzzi pulls away when he spies a red silhouette toward the front of the train—believing it to be the Rail Tracer in human form. Quietly, he asks that Nice to never cry no matter how "painful things might be," snags two of her new grenades, and charges forward. He collides with the figure, determined to take it out at the cost of his own life, and the two roll off the side of the train.
The Rail Tracer—in fact the conductor Claire Stanfield—flings the grenades away, saving both of their lives. He returns Jacuzzi to the rooftops, where Jacuzzi tearfully reunites with his friends sans Jack asks Donny to take him to Doctor Fred in Second Class. Then, upon finally noticing his own blood, he screams and falls into a dead faint.
Donny and the others take him to Cabin #3, where Fred dresses Jacuzzi's wounds. The Flying Pussyfoot eventually limps into New York's Pennsylvania Station on December 31 at 2:00 PM, two hours late due to a two-hour long police investigation and a switch-out of its cars and engine. Jacuzzi and Jack are taken to Fred's Clinic for proper treatment.
Some time after he and Jack are settled in adjacent beds, with Nick and Nice present, Jon and Fang arrive with a pot containing twenty-five gallons of stew—a 'gift' courtesy of the Flying Pussyfoot's former head chef Gregoire. The smell attracts the rest of Jacuzzi's gang, who stream into the room and immediately gorge themselves on the proffered food. Members of the retrieval team inform Jacuzzi that an elderly miner owner and Hollywood movie tech bought the stolen explosives for a hundred thousand dollars and grenade clay shells for two hundred apiece, much to Jacuzzi's delight.
The news that the mafia back in Chicago are aware of Jacuzzi's hideouts—meaning that Jacuzzi cannot go back home—is less welcome, and his friends attempt to cheer him up with a piece of surprising information: they fished an injured woman out of the river along with the stolen cargo and brought her to the clinic for treatment. They summon her when Jacuzzi says he would like to meet her, and Nick and Nice, upon recognizing the woman as Chané Laforet, drop their bowls of stew in shock.
Nick finds himself unwilling to explain who Chané is to Jacuzzi when he is in such a good mood, and the afternoon passes with everyone in good cheer. He and Nice eventually recount what they had witnessed of Chané on the train to Jacuzzi and the retrieval squad that night; with the retrieval squad protesting Nick's suggestion that they send Chané away, the gang resolves to wait and see how the situation plays out.
1932[]
On January 3, Jacuzzi and Nice learn from the newspapers that the terrorist Huey Laforet is due to be transported out of New York. Wondering if Huey is related to Chané, and worried that she might try to rescue him on her own, he and Nice hurry to the transport location and find Chané as predicted. He immediately hobble-dashes to her side, relieved, but shrieks out a protest when she presses her knife to his throat at his mention of Huey's name.
Nice urges calm as she joins them, and Chané begrudgingly lowers her weapon after several seconds of internal conflict. Aware of Chané's confusion, and in lieu of a weepy Jacuzzi, Nice explains the newspaper connection and seeks affirmation from Chané as to whether she was actually planning to rescue Huey. Upon receiving confirmation that Chané was, Nice smiles and assures her that the gang will help her with whatever she needs; wiping away his tears, Jacuzzi grins in turn and advises that Chané try to not take on everything by herself.
At Nice's reminder that Doctor Fred did not give him permission to leave his bed, Jacuzzi belatedly notices that his bandages are bloody and that his injuries hurt. Once he is done panicking, he correctly interprets Chané's questioning look as a desire to know why Jacuzzi and Nice came after her at all. His answer is simple: he and Nice were worried on her behalf, and came to assist her in her rescue. Earnest, he adds that he thinks Chané is amazing for trying to fight the police for someone else's sake all on her own.
Nice remarks that he is strong in his own right, having turned the Chicago mafia against him, but he insists that he could not have done any of it without her.
That afternoon, Chané sits at Jacuzzi's hospital bedside and takes advantage of their solitude to engage in a serious one-on-one conversation. Through a series of pre-written notes, she unleashes a flurry of questions as to why he did not turn a Lemur like her into the police, why did he accept her if he knew she was a Lemur, and why he was prepared to help her rescue Huey despite the risk to himself.
Reading the notes as fast as he can, Jacuzzi tries to answer them all; he did not turn her into the police because he wants to avoid them, and because he believes that—unlike the other Lemures—Chané was only participating in the hijacking in order to rescue her family. Furthermore, he can only judge whether or not she is good or bad by spending time with her, and while he has not known her long enough to know whether she is a good person or bad person (and that he may never know), he is sure that they can be friends regardless. As for her last question, he does not know the answer.
Now timid, he warns her that his gang does not know the city well enough to hide her from the police, and that he has heard of local delinquents who might pose a problem. The street gossip on a dangerous wrench-wielding man who goes after delinquents terrifies him to the point where he bursts into tears, and he continues weeping even after he realizes that Chané has left the room, overwhelmed with worries ranging from the reasonable (such as how he will pay for the hospital bed) and the less reasonable.
Shortly thereafter, Fred's assistant Who enters the room and changes Jacuzzi's bandages, chastising him for acting recklessly during his convalescence. He casually admits to being one of the White Suits and a childhood friend of Ladd's when Jacuzzi asks, leading Jacuzzi to ask why he is not turning him over to the Russos. Who looks at Chané's note ("Why are you not turning me in") and teasingly accuses Jacuzzi of practicing, though he admits to having eavesdropped on the lopsided conversation.
After Who finishes changing the bandages, he explains that while he and Ladd are childhood friends, he is not and never was a part of the Russo Family. Further, he would feel awful about turning in someone as nice as Jacuzzi to the mafia, even with the promise of reward money. Jacuzzi blanches, but thanks him for turning a blind eye. When he wonders how someone like Who could ever be friends with someone like Ladd, Who launches into an explanation of Ladd's personality and childhood, including how Ladd turned homicidal 'out of the blue' and how their mutual friend Leila impacted him irrevocably.
Concluding that he and Ladd are the 'lowest of the low', Who makes a hasty exit and leaves Jacuzzi alone.
Once Jacuzzi is released from the clinic several days later, he continues his recovery in the Genoard Family manor on Millionaires' Row. By this time, Chané and around twenty delinquents have already moved in as 'housekeepers'—an arrangement made possible by Jon and Fang, who have been recently hired as Eve Genoard's bartender and cook. During the period he is still bandaged and reliant on crutches, Jacuzzi hobbles to the Daily Days and sells information on the Flying Pussyfoot incident to Henry the information broker.
A package for Chané arrives in the mail about two weeks after the incident. When Jacuzzi and Nice check on her, they find her frozen at the package's contents: an elegant white dress which they both compliment. However, when Jacuzzi checks for the sender's name, he freezes alongside Chané upon reading it as the Rail Tracer.
Various delinquents file into the room and promptly beg Chané to try the dress on. Unable to refuse, Chané does so and steps outside for some fresh air with a few delinquents following from a distance. Several minutes later, one of the delinquents returns to the manor, grabs Jacuzzi's collar, and yelps that Chané has been kidnapped by local delinquent leader Graham Specter. He hands Jacuzzi a ransom letter with instructions: if Jacuzzi wants Eve Genoard back, he alone must bring all his money to the abandoned factory in the harbor's thirteenth district.
Nice anxiously asks Jacuzzi what he plans to do. Though he is trembling from fear, and though he is white as a sheet, he replies at once that he must do as bid. He then swoons with fright, but collects himself and departs for the harbor two minutes later.
When Jacuzzi arrives at the factory, he finds Chané and Graham in the middle of a duel, knives against wrench. He cries out for them to stop, hopping forward on his crutches at a slow but clearly determined pace, as he has brought the money Graham requested. Graham observes that Jacuzzi looks rather penniless, and Jacuzzi clarifies that Chicago's Russo Family has a bounty on his head.
Graham is genuinely moved by Jacuzzi's self-sacrificing offer, and decides to let Chané—whom he has long since realized is not Eve—to go free. However, Chané's obvious bloodlust makes it clear she will not let Graham do as he pleases, and Jacuzzi protests her intention to fight to no avail.
Jacuzzi's friends arrive on the scene with a literal bang, courtesy of Nice blowing up a wall despite there being a perfectly good door in existence. Graham reminds Jacuzzi of his note's condition that Jacuzzi come alone, but his friends all retort that they each individually came of their own accords. While Graham concedes to their logic, he is at a lost how to proceed; meanwhile, Jacuzzi remarks that he heard an unfamiliar voice in the crowd.
The delinquents' attention turns to a redhead by the wall, whom Jacuzzi senses something terrifying about and whom Chané immediately attacks. However, her knife stops before it can bite into the man's neck. Blushing, the redhead declares his love for her and asks for her hand in marriage. He assures her that he will expand and protect her world, not destroy it, and that his abnormality means that she can trust him.
Graham impatiently asks that they return to the matter at hand, and asks who the redhead is. The redhead says that he can call him Felix Walken for now, and Graham's followers pale upon hearing the name of such a legendary assassin. Graham reminds them that they have the legendary killer Ladd on their side, only to tense when Felix—Claire—asks if this is the same Ladd who 'fell off the train'. Coldly, he asks how Claire came by such classified information, and Claire responds that he is the one who dropped him.
Graham immediately hurls his wrench at Claire, who proceeds to dodge all of Graham's attacks for the next several minutes. Eventually conceding the match, Graham concludes that Claire is Ladd's prey alone and ushers his gang off the premises. Before he leaves, he says he likes Jacuzzi and that the factory is Jacuzzi's to use however and whenever he pleases.
Jacuzzi wonders whether Graham is a good or bad person before falling to his knees, overwhelmingly relieved that everyone is safe. Nice asks him if he knows who Claire is; while Jacuzzi thinks Claire looks familiar, he decides not to pry for Chané's sake.
1933[]
On a certain day in September, Jacuzzi breaks a vase while cleaning and bursts into tears. His friends scold him for bawling, with only Donny and Nice making any effort to comfort him, and he dives under the nearest table when the doorbell rings. Nice opens the door to find a strangely dressed Isaac and Miria on their doorstep, and she calls Jacuzzi out from his hiding place so that he can greet some old friends. While Isaac and Miria are pleased to see him, they appear to be preoccupied with plotting revenge on someone named Firo Prochainezo.
The doorbell rings for a second time, and Jacuzzi is greeted by Tim, Adele, and other members of Huey's Larva alongside Dallas Genoard. Like Isaac and Miria many of them are bizarrely dressed, but their objective proves to be even more bizarre: they want Jacuzzi's gang to join up with them, and offer Jacuzzi and his gang the chance to become immortals as an incentive.
Adele spears Dallas' throat as a demonstration, only for Jacuzzi to drop into a dead faint before Dallas regenerates. His friends witness Dallas regenerate in his stead, but Tim had been counting on Jacuzzi personally witnessing the deed and is forced to recalculate.
Several minutes later, Jacuzzi wakes up at Nice's prodding and finds that more people have arrived—Maria Barcelito, Tick Jefferson, Ronny Schiatto, Ennis, and Chané. Surprised by the increase in numbers, he looks to Nice for an explanation. Ronny, the Martillo Family's chiamatore, asks Jacuzzi whether his people are the enemies of the Martillos or if they will join them; before Jacuzzi is able to answer, events unfold and Dallas suffers multiple injuries from Maria after he threatens Tick.
Tim orders Adele to stop Maria, and the two women duel. As the fight unfolds, Ronny repeats his question; Jacuzzi answers that while his gang does not consider the Martillos enemies, they have no plans to join the Martillo Family.
In response, Ronny stops the battle between the two women by teleporting their weapons into his hands. Everyone present is thrown into confusion, but Jacuzzi becomes panicked when Ronny advances towards him once more. Nice's solution is to ignite a smoke bomb, and as smoke fills the room, Jacuzzi apologizes to Ronny and says that he will answer him when the situation is less frightening.
He and his gang scatter into the depths of the large mansion, and all other factions flee the premises. The gang soon does the same, wanting to go into hiding for a short while, and reconvene in the abandoned factory by the Hudson River. Jacuzzi explains the situation to his friends and, after opining that they cannot continue running away without angering the mafiosi, requests that the delinquents refrain from discussing bloodshood.
Nick confidently declares that their side will not have any bloodshed, as Jack has gone to fetch Vino (Claire). Chané flushes at her fiancé's name, but Jacuzzi murmurs that the situation might just become more complicated with Vino involved. Still, as one of his friends points out, they cannot deal with Ronny on their own.
One of their patrollers rushes inside with news that "one of the guys from earlier" has arrived on the premises. Jacuzzi manages to stay calm and inquire as to which group and what sort of person this 'guy' is, to which his friend responds, "the weird group who showed up first," and "the guy who got skewered by that spear."
Several delinquents exit the building to greet Dallas with Jacuzzi among them, fending off the rain with umbrellas, and Dallas testily asks if they have business with him. Jacuzzi asks if he is a friend of Larva, and Dallas pauses for a long moment before demanding one of the delinquents' umbrellas. Jacuzzi hands over his, waving off his friends' protests; Dallas tells him to lead the way to his hideout before magnanimously inviting Jacuzzi under his just-relinquest umbrella, and says that Jacuzzi now owes him three favors.
Jacuzzi assumes that the first two favors are for the umbrella and Dallas' cooperation, but is at a loss for the third. Dallas sneers that the third is obvious: Jacuzzi's gang is freeloading in his second residence.
Once they return to the shelter of the abandoned factory, Dallas divulges information as promised. He starts his narrative from when he first became immortal, relating a tale of involving an immortality elixir, the secret society of someone named Szilard Quates, and Szilard's crony ENnis. He embellishes the narrative as he sees fit, describing Ennis as a murderous monster and insisting that Larva was planning on "getting rid of" Jacuzzi's gang from the beginning.
Jacuzzi and his friends find Dallas' outlandish story hard to believe, but interrogate it nonetheless. Jacuzzi asks if Ennis really did murder all those people for Szilard's sake, given that she seemed to know Isaac and Miria, and asks if Dallas is really related to the Genoards. Dallas snaps that he has said as much multiple times, but Jon interjects that he finds the idea that Dallas is Eve's brother most unbelievable of all.
Dallas is somewhat discombobulated when Jon says that Eve loaned the manor to their group, but recovers and insists that he has returned to reclaim his position as head of the Genoards. He soon fills them in on Larva, though half of his explanation consists of guesses and fabrications: according to Dallas, Larva intends to retrieve one of the immortality elixirs while they have Jacuzzi's gang attack the premises; afterwards, Larva will likely 'get rid' of the gang or feed them to complete immortals—Dallas's personal opinion is that Jacuzzi's gang will be 'offed'.
Jacuzzi broods for a little while before asking another question: Tim is likely the leader of Larva, but to whom does Larva answer? Dallas searches his memories, murmuring the name 'Huey Laforet' without thinking, and all the delinquents fall oddly quiet before turning to look at Chané. Jacuzzi asks if Dallas is sure, vaguely explaining that they have a loose connection to Huey.
The tense atmosphere changes when Claire arrives, with Claire embracing CHané from behind and assuring her that she does not need to worry any more. He ensures that the scratch on Chané's cheek is her only injury before striking up a 'conversation' with her, though Chané never speaks a word throughout it. Jacuzzi asks if Claire can "tell what Chané wants to say," and Claire affirms that he can.
Claire turns his attention to Dallas and reveals that he was listening to Dallas' story, nonchalantly asserting that Dallas is trying to use Jacuzzi's gang as his pawns in taking out Larva on his behalf. Jacuzzi, Nice, and Jon, who had caught on to Dallas quite a while back, are surprised that he would so bluntly point this out. He permits Dallas to use him and the gang after all, with the tacit implication being that they will use Dallas back. Then, he correctly deduces that Dallas is hiding something else.
Claire and Chané stay behind in the factory while Dallas leads the delinquents to the Larva's SoHo hideout, with most of the delinquents loitering outside and the 'main' members—Jacuzzi, Nice, Jon, Donny, and Nick—enter the building. Tim grudgingly acknowledges Dallas' actions before inquiring into Jacuzzi's interest in the Larva job. Jacuzzi cautiously says that he is, asking if Tim meant his promise, and Tim reaffirms that he will make the delinquents 'like Dallas' once the job is done.
When Tim asks if Jacuzzi does not doubt him, Jacuzzi responds that they have no time; with the mafia breathing down their necks, they will cling to all the power that they can. He asks what Tim wants his gang to do; Tim explains that they need the 'failed' liquor of immortality in order to make the gang immortal, and that they initially lost track of the liquor after the alchemist responsible for it 'went missing'. However, they have recently learned that a certain corporation – Nebula—stole the elixir and has since been stockpiling it. The Larva simply want to return the liquor to its rightful place.
Jacuzzi gulps at Nebula's name and then, sure that whatever method Tim has in mind is illegal, asks with narrowed eyes if Tim is asking they help him steal. Shaking his head, Tim says that he wants them to commit armed robbery.
When Jacuzzi flat out refuses to participate in murder, Tim assures him that all his gang needs to do is infiltrate Mist Wall in janitorial disguises and spread gas in the locations Tim had indicated to him. He hands Jacuzzi a hand grenade that Jacuzzi reluctantly accepts, claiming that the knockout grenade is like Nice's smoke bomb from earlier that afternoon—his boss (Huey) designs such things as a hobby.
Adele rings the hideout just as Tim finishes relating the plan's basic outline; a Larva member takes the call and hands Tim the receiver shortly thereafter, explaining that the twins told her Christopher Shaldred's location and that she is making tracks for him now.
As Tim speaks with Adele via telephone, Jacuzzi anxiously whispers to his friends that this job seems like a "much bigger deal" than any of them thought. When he asks why Jon is frowning, Jon shares his realization that they forgot about Fang, who had gone shopping a little while before.
Sometime after the meeting at the SoHo hideout, Jacuzzi finds that the idea of cooperating with Tim and the Larva still does not sit right with him. As such, he proposes that they steal the immortality liquor again once the Larva steal it from Nebula. If they pull the heist off, they might just be able to use the liquor as a bargaining chip with the mafia. When Claire learns of Jacuzzi's idea after rejoining them later on, his encouraging support of their plan prompts them to put Jacuzzi's plan into action.
At 10 AM the next day, the gang gathers in Mist Wall's parking lot with everyone save for Jacuzzi, Nice, and Donny dressed in white work uniforms. Recalling Tim's words to him the day before, Jacuzzi emphatically refuses to acknowledge those who would take hostages in order to forces others to act and reaffirms their plan to steal the elixir from the Larva. At his assertion that they will pull off this robbery just as they did that of the Flying Pussyfoot, his friends cheer so loudly that they almost drown out the sound of the rain.
Dallas accompanies Jacuzzi, Nice, and Donny up to the Babel Restaurant on Mist Wall's top floor, leaving the rest of the delinquents to distribute the knockout gas throughout the building. The quartet claim a big table by one of the windows overlooking the cityscape, and where Nice blithely eats a sandwich, Jacuzzi shivers and does his utmost to avoid looking the window's way, though Nice is of the opinion that a skyscraper restaurant is far better than the rooftop of a moving train.
Jacuzzi declines to eat while their friends are "walking a tightrope," while Dallas ignores them both and scowls at a menu two tables away. A waiter approaches them and asks if they would not mind sharing their table with three newly arrived patrons, and Jacuzzi says that he does not so as not to attract attention. He attempts to greet the patrons with a smile, only to nearly pass out when Ronny Schiatto claims the seat opposite him.
Ronny cites 'magic' when Jacuzzi asks how he found them, and Jacuzzi refrains from shouting "that's nuts" due to Isaac and Miria greeting him from Ronny's side. Ronny does not get very far before a newly arrived Firo exclaims in shock upon seeing Ronny, Isaac, and Miria in the Babel Restaurant. Dallas yowls Firo's name and stalks over, only for Firo to demand from him Ennis' location.
Dallas stops in his tracks, genuinely confused, but Isaac hastily reassures Firo that he and Miria have already 'rescued' Ennis. Firo relaxes, relieved, and proceeds to pin Dallas to the floor with insulting ease. Meanwhile, Ronny taps his temple and murmurs that he "didn't think they'd go this far." Firo and Jacuzzi simultaneously ask what he means, and Ronny replies that he heard gunshots from the first floor—the building has become a killing field.
Adele and a red-eyed man—Christopher—enter the restaurant by way of the elevator, and Jacuzzi and his friends stare while Isaac and Miria are enthused to recognize Adele as the 'magician' from the day before. Firo asks Christopher why he came to New York with far less enthusiasm, but Christopher ignores the question and asks the staff which one of them is the manager. A middle-aged man with a Nebula employee ID raises his hand, and Christopher promptly shoots him in the head.
Where the other patrons scream, Donny immediately lobs his group's table at Christopher. Christopher dodges the table and shakes his hand out of Donny's fist; before he can shoot Donny as he did the manager, Nice blinds him with a flash bomb. Jacuzzi scrambles off the floor with the intention of snatching CHristopher's knife-gun away, but Adele blocks him and apologizes that Christopher is an ally.
Jacuzzi, furious, reminds Adele of Larva's promise not to murder anyone; with a conflicted smile, she replies that she was not the one who made that promise. Jacuzzi freezes at her 'creepy' expression and, upon feeling something cold and sharp against his temple, glances over to find Christopher holding the knife-gun to his head.
FIro objects, and Christopher admits that he does not have a reason to kill "this inked kid"; he simply thought that taking a hostage might make everyone calm down. Firo knocks Dallas out and offers himself as a hostage, and Christopher laughs before refusing on the grounds that they are friends. Firo threatens to punch him, but Christopher points out that someone who cannot die makes for a terrible hostage.
The elevator bell dings, its doors opening to reveal no one behind them. Christopher saunters forward to check its interior, only for Ennis to kick him in the face and send him flying backward. With Christopher temporarily kicked off his feet, all the patrons make a mad dash for the emergency stairwell. Firo and Ennis reunite as the patrons filter out, leaving only the key players behind.
Christopher stands and, upon addressing Ennis as a 'little sister', introduces himself and his companions as homunculi who were failed creations based off Szilard's research. The elevator bell rings again; annoyed, Christopher flings a few knives at the doors just as they are beginning to open. The knives disappear inside without a sound; a moment later, Claire exits the elevator juggling the knives, followed by Chané, Tick, and Maria.
Firo greets Claire with boyish joy, and Claire greets him before remarking to Jacuzzi that something "dicey" appears to be taking place. Jacuzzi attempts to say that he has no idea what is going on, but Claire cuts him off and asks if he can at least assume the knockout gas worked, given "the crowd napping in the first-floor hall."
With a laugh, Christopher asks how Claire could have thought 'asleep' after seeing "all that blood." His and everyone's attention is drawn to the kitchen at the sound of Isaac and Miria's cheering over a 'magic trick'. Then, with everyone as witness, the manager's corpse between them sits upright. From the emergency stairwell, Hong Chi-Mei shouts for Christopher to flee: all twelve-hundred Nebula staff are immortals.
Jacuzzi's eyes fill with tears at this revelation. Christopher does not see why they have to run, given that they have two immortals—indicating Firo and Ennis—who could devour said immortals for them. Firo tells Ennis that they should leave, but Christopher has other plans; he signals Adele to keep Firo busy so that he can continue entreating with Ennis.
Claire intervenes before Adele can stab Firo, and uses her spear's head to deflect the bullets Chris shoots at him. Tim joins Chi by way of the emergency stairwell and orders Christopher to retreat as the leader of Larva; Christopher agrees to abandon the mission, and immediately engages in attacking Claire in his 'free time'. The pair depart through a window to take their duel to the outside pyramid rooftop and Chi and Chané follow in their wake, the latter of whom ignores Jacuzzi's protest.
Adele breaks the subsequent silence by admitting to Jacuzzi that she was frightened when Claire grabbed her spear with his bare hands; she had never thought she would lose to a bare-handed opponent before. Tim requests that she retrieve Christopher and company, only for her to ask if it is "all right to dispose of the throwaway pawns" now that their mission has failed. Convinced that killing just one person will alleviate her shivering, she thrusts her spear at Jacuzzi's face.
Maria intercepts the spear with her katana, and proceeds to duel Adele with the others as witness. Their fight is briefly interrupted when several Nebula security guards exit the elevator, whom Adele takes care of single-handedly while Maria takes a breather. Ennis and Firo take Adele on in the meantime, and Jacuzzi demands to know why Maria is standing around talking when the security guards are being—or, have already been—slashed down.
Maria challenges Adele once more and, in a deft, skilled maneuver, manages to stab Adele through her right shoulder. Adele crumples, and Tim rushes to her side. He stops her bleeding and helps her toward the exit, but Dallas blocks their way and sets off the explosives hidden under his jacket.
Donny shields Jacuzzi and Nice from the blast, but his sizable weight squashes them somewhat and renders them temporarily down for the count – albeit still conscious. Tick thwarts Dallas' attempt to throw Tim and Adele out of the shattered window, and defenestrates Dallas in their stead.
Chi enters the restaurant moments later with Christopher slung over his shoulder and, when he shouts if either Sham or Hilton is here, the waiter who sat Ronny at Jacuzzi's table emerges from the shadows of the kitchen. Jacuzzi is startled that the waiter evidently did not run; identifying the waiter as Sham, Chi asks him to carry Adele. The four of them and Tim descend via the elevator.
Chané and Claire enter the restaurant not a second later, and everyone takes the elevator down in groups. Jacuzzi's crew is the third to leave; as they enter the elevator, Jacuzzi hopes that Nick and the rest are safe and remarks that he feels as if he is forgetting something. Nice asks if he is sure it is not Fang, only for Ronny behind them—having followed them into the elevator—to announce that their 'real business' begins now.
In the aftermath, Jacuzzi and Ronny work out an arrangement in which the Martillos will allow Jacuzzi's gang to operate on their turf in exchange for a fixed monthly tribute. Both Ronny and Claire telephone the Gandors and ask them to treat the delinquents well.
1934–1935[]
(To be added)
Relationships[]
Nice Holystone: Nice is Jacuzzi's confidant, best friend, romantic partner, and right-hand woman from childhood, having been in a relationship with him for ten years prior to their first kiss in 1931. That it is their first kiss speaks to the strength of their commitment to each other: they understand their relationship for what it is, without needing outward romantic expression to 'affirm' its nature. Both respect and care for each other far too much to rush anything so personal.
That respect extends into business, where Nice trusts Jacuzzi as a leader and usually follows his instructions without question, and he trusts her to co-lead the gang when he is absent or incapacitated. Jacuzzi's tattoo, meanwhile, is one of the most significant examples of how deeply he cares for her; not only did he realize what she was afraid of without her telling him, he permanently altered his body without hesitation so that he could banish her fear. On the train, he and Nice both have moments where they drop everything to come to each other's rescue—and when Jacuzzi seemingly sacrifices his life for her sake, Nice openly sobs over his 'death.' See Trivia for alternate paths their Flying Pussyfoot journey might have travelled down.
While Nice normally speaks formally to most people, she speaks in a casual manner to Jacuzzi at his request.
Isaac & Miria: After they meet Jacuzzi on the Flying Pussyfoot, they give him the courage to take over the train and protect the passengers from the Lemures and the Rail Tracer. Their friendship is rekindled once they re-establish contact in the months that follow. Jacuzzi deeply cares for the two of them, and he and his gang are the ones who take in Miria during Isaac's incarceration; he even goes so far as to escort Miria to Chicago, despite the risk it poses to him and his gang, all for the sake of making sure she is safe. While Isaac and Miria are remarkably good at cheering him up, their bravery and selflessness are qualities that he admires and even tries to emulate.
Chane Laforet: finding her by the river after the train and saving her life in the process, this reaction causing having a nice press against his throat into mistaking as a hostile gang member, Jacuzzi offered her advice not to taking on anything by herself when the situation demands it. Sooner or later she sits by his hospital bed as a form reconciliation as the two start to warm up. Jacuzzi and Chane ‘s bond rekindle as the two become close to knowing when to accept partnerships as Jacuzzi accepted Chane as a part of his gang.
Adele: having to be contacted by his gang and nearly almost killing him on the spot, Jacuzzi and Adele’s relationship seemed awkward at first but long enough afterwards of reconnecting on friendly terms.
Trivia[]
- Jacuzzi's reason for obtaining his tattoo is different in the 2007 anime adaptation. In the anime, he obtains the tattoo so that he will visually stand out just as much as Nice.
- In one of the NDS game's false endings, it is 'revealed' that Jacuzzi has a brother called Bress (alt. 'Blaise') Splot who leads the secret elite organization Money Dragon in 1931. This is not considered canon, and is generally regarded as an amusing 'twist' should one discover the ending during one's playthrough.
- At least two of the game's alternate endings to the Flying Pussyfoot involve Nice and Jacuzzi committing suicide over the other's death. In Ending 37, Nice accidentally kills Jacuzzi after using an explosive to take out Goose. Upon realizing what has happened, she sets off the rest of her bombs and kills herself. In Ending 38, Nice is tortured by Goose for information. Jacuzzi bursts into the room with a machine gun, as he does in the novel, and accidentally shoots a stick of dynamite on the floor. The explosion kills Goose and fatally wounds Nice, who dies in Jacuzzi's arms. He shoots himself in the head.
- In the first preview and main visual for the anime, Jacuzzi's eyes are teal colored. However, his eyes are brown in the final cut, as per his light novel design.
- Jacuzzi's age fluctuates in the light novels. In the second light novel, he is nineteen years old (Nice recalls an incident five years prior, when he was fourteen). However, in the dramatis personae section of the eighth light novel, it is written that he is "almost twenty"—which would place him around sixteen to seventeen years of age when he robbed the Flying Pussyfoot.
- It is unknown whether this was a deliberate retcon on Ryohgo Narita's part, whether he was being deliberately vague, or whether he simply forgot.
- In the anime, his wanted poster displays his age as sixteen.