Shadow Defeating Hobby

[madimpossibledreamer]

Main Points:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Persona AU
Summary: Written before the Power to Protect, and less well setup.  It does contain an original Persona, though (Xander gets Coyote, who's probably Magician Arcana, given the whole Trickster thing.  There are other reasons why Xander would fit as Magician.  Junpei had a less than ideal home life, and neither he nor Yosuke were the best friend--both would say stupid things, partially because they were young and stupid). 
Includes a quote, which you have to be better at writing than I was at the time to pull off.  The group dynamics are weird, and Spike ends up dust on the wind.  I do like Coyote.
At some point, he'd faced his Shadow, supposedly in his dreams, which is how he wound up with a Persona.  That's referenced but not shown.  It was supposed to happen shortly after Jesse.
Word Count: 728
Rating: Teen (parental physical abuse briefly shown)

 

“My hobby is defeating Shadows.” –Amagi Yukiko

         Xander was doodling in class.  He wasn’t sure where this sketching ability had come from, but hey, he wasn’t complaining.  Drawing was cool, right?  Or…was it not cool yet?  Sometimes it was so hard to pick out the latest fashions.  Guy had to be good at everything, just in case, so he’d know something useful when the time for romance came.
         A kind-looking Coyote guy.  Earrings, feathered headdress, bipedal.  Fur and Indian style wear.  Just the hint of mischief in the eyes.
         He sat back to look at his work, and then began on the tail.
         “What is that?” Willow asked, giggling.
         “My Persona,” he answered quietly, hoping she’d ask.  But then the new girl—Buffy—walked into class, and he was ignored.  In favor of…girl stuff.  The slightest hint of resentment came out, but he pushed it back.  He was okay.  After all, he was a kind of superhero, right?  Superheroes didn’t let things like that get to them, and anyway he’d worked out a fair amount of his issues a while ago.  Relatively speaking, anyway.

-Three Weeks Ago-
         Xander curled up in his bed, sobbing.  That had been Jesse, only now he was just a big pile of dust courtesy of some supernatural uglies that he hadn’t even believed in…three days ago, however long.  He didn’t even bother to move when his dad came in and slapped him around a little.  Luckily Dad didn’t seem in the mood for anything heavier, because he wasn’t even defending himself.
         Eventually he turned on the TV for some white noise and fell to sleep, trying to escape the pain.
         In his dream, he was somewhere he’d never been before.

         His pack wouldn’t accept him.  He whined, backed off, and headed for the cemetery.  It was because of Coyote, wasn’t it?  They could smell it on him, could smell that he wasn’t quite like them, that he was a little more prey and predator than they were.
         One push, and a bar of a metal fence and a broken wooden slat were in either hand.  He prowled, a smooth, graceful gait.  He was so powerful like this.  Maybe if he brought his pack a few carcasses as an offering, they’d welcome him again.
         Or maybe, the reasonable part of his mind reminded him, they’ll just fear your place in the pack and the alpha will fight you rather than let a threat like you pad after them.
         He ignored that part of his mind quite often.  It wasn’t that difficult now.  He was on the hunt, sniffing at the air, and yelping excitedly when he realized he wasn’t on his own.
         Two ugly things with fangs appeared out of the shadows, looking at him with the look of the predator.  He didn’t remember what they were called, only that it was okay to kill them.
         “Well, well, what’s the Slayer’s whelp doing here?”  He didn’t understand what the words meant, only that they were mean.  He bared his teeth and brought up the wood.
         “Looks like we got lucky tonight.  I enjoy it when it struggles.”
         Honestly, he thought vaguely coherently after, breathing swiftly, pleased, they might have revised that opinion.  He kicked at the pile of dust and giggled when the wind caught it and whisked it away.
         Somewhere behind him, he heard a faint voice asking someone, “Please tell me that this is just a nightmare.”

         By this point, Xander was pretty sure he could fight Shadows in his sleep.  …In fact, he had been.  For months.
         So when the big, hulking gigantic slimeball with tentacles dived at him, he reacted instinctively.  He didn’t dive out of the way, like Buffy and Willow were yelling at him to do.
         Instead, he stood up taller and yelled out one word: “Persona!”
         For one, terrible moment, he remembered that this was the real world, that this wouldn’t work…
         And then he felt the wind and the reassuring blue glow, crushing the card in his hand absentmindedly, and Coyote laughed at him.  ‘You realize you have a Japanese accent now.’
         ‘Shut up,’ he thought back, getting a smile in return.  Meanwhile, the baddie was moving back, confused.
         ‘Are you repressing-’ his Persona asked, sounding jokingly threatening, and he interrupted.
         ‘Yes.’
         ‘Help, help, I’m being repressed!’ Coyote laughed, readying his spear.
         Only in my mind.