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Weary.
It is the only word to describe the pervasive feeling inside of Jotaro, inside his mind for certain and inside his body with much less certainty. As if his neurons cannot decide whether or not to carry signals, sometimes he cannot get out of his hotel bed because his numbness has paralyzed him; sometimes he itches for a fight, fast and quick and dirty. Sometimes, when he is trying to read, his mind blinks off as if it were a light switch which Jotaro does not have control over.
Perhaps it would be wise to share these things with someone. But Jotaro has never thought that sharing has much wisdom to it at all, and, in the end, he knows no one would quite care.
What were they to do, Joseph might ask, about something in his head? And he would ruffle his hair and leave it for Jotaro to sort out on his own. He did this when Jotaro asked him anything, like it's all the same to him.
It twists his heart, just a little.
And makes him angry.
Anger seems to be the only thing that fills this overwhelming emptiness. Happiness is fleeting, and sadness is buried too deep to be felt anymore; anger is thrilling and captivating, anger fills him with a bristling energy that does not leave until he hits something good and solid.
He is lucky for the turn of his life towards Egypt; not because it is good or enjoyable, but because it gave him plenty of acceptable ways to release this emotion. He's unsure of whether his mind will be able to distinguish appropriate displays of violence when they return home — if they return home — but he cannot seem to provoke his mind into thinking that far ahead.
No, his mind stays within the next few days at most. Two-thirds of his headspace is occupied with the looming threat of death which, he has come to find, leaves little room for much else. The other third is residence to the numbness, to the total absence of anything which has such a presence that it demands to be named regardless of its lack of identity or content. Jotaro has yet to find this name, and knows only that weary describes how it makes him feel and that he hates it very much.
The void eats whatever he tries to fill it with, relentless with its hunger and unquenchable with its thirst; not a cigarette nor a knife in the world can satisfy it, and it comes and goes as it pleases.
It has pleased to stay, recently.
Beforehand, it was as though one side of Jotaro was able to feel, while the other had been submerged in freezing water.
Now, as the days mount on his shoulders and weigh on his heart, he enters a fugue state in which the Weariness prevails and overtakes him. He is conscious, but it does not matter; after all, what is consciousness without a thought? Where does human being stop and machinery begin?
If it is at the base of intelligent thought, of abstract idea or compassion, Jotaro is no longer sure which one he is.
His body moves with its human grace — although such a word hardly describes his gait — but beneath the surface there is surely, most surely, a metal interior. He believes that Asimov got it right; Jotaro is to save a human life, and he has gone farther into self-destruct than ever before in order to do so.
It plagues him when he wakes today, as it has for the past few days. His legs are immovable, and no matter how hard he tries he cannot summon the motivation to nudge them even an inch to the left, or to the right — and somehow he knows, without even thinking it, that it is the Weariness, as if it is an illness that started with a head cold and ended with full body symptoms.
Jotaro sighs, and turns his face, and tries with all his might to keep his eyes open. There is little more waking him, when the morning comes, than his circadian rhythm. Holly's sweet face is long gone to his memory, and no longer provides the inspiration it once did.
No, now Jotaro runs on necessity and spite, and it is an awful existence.