Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Shadowed Suspicion Chapter 227

[madimpossibledreamer]

Main Points:
Jojo's Bizarre Adventure/Buffy the Vampire Slayer AU
Chapter Summary: Johan's crew investigates the town they've stopped in.
Word Count: 1377
Rating: Teen
Note: HERE THERE PROBABLY BE BUFFY/JJBA SPOILERS

        It turns out Jojo knows some rudimentary Spanish (“Cali kid,” he explains cheerfully, which would probably mean more if Beefheart had any knowledge of the various American states or a related map), and he stops to talk to the few civilians wandering the streets.  When it becomes clear he’s struggling a little, Fitz steps up to help, pulling out a waterlogged notebook from his pockets.  (That leads to teasing about Doctor Who, apparently, which is more Robin’s thing than hers, and he quickly joins in.  She’d say the blond is flustered by it, but he’s usually flustered by almost everything, so it’d be a little redundant at that point.)  Apparently, while the man can’t speak most languages, he’s fluent in the written form of many simply by reading, so between the two of them, they almost form a coherent interpreter.
        The results aren’t any more encouraging than the findings from Whisper’s return.
        “So, we could be mistranslating something…” Jojo reports, rubbing the back of his head.  “…But they keep telling us different names for the city.  None of them have told us the same thing twice.”
        “But…shouldn’t they know where they live?” Darling asks, hesitant, and Jojo’s voice softens as he talks to her.
        “Yeah, you’d think, which makes this weird.”  Jojo doesn’t sound weirded out, though.  He reacts easily enough to Beefheart’s quizzical look, though.  “Plus side—or downside—of living in a supernatural equivalent to Arkham, I guess.  I can think of a dozen different possible explanations—they’ve been kidnapped, somehow, from their own villages and still think they’re there.  They’ve all been born here but all see or experience a different city.  This place isn’t actually in reality.  A few other, more worrying ones.  I mean, the most realistic is just that Fitz and I are making some sort of mistake when asking around, but…”
        “But you don’t think that’s the most likely,” Robin finishes brightly, and Jojo shakes his head.
        “I mean, yeah, sure, it could totally be, but we’ve already run into oddities—the completely rural, empty road we drove along to get here, for instance.  When the weird has started, in my experience, it kinda doesn’t stop.  Not until you can figure out why it’s started.”
        The blond exclaims loudly, and quickly follows it up by looking up at them all, eyes wide.  “I finally remembered the translation of the state—they all gave the same answer there, but it wasn’t one of the ones I remembered from my studies of maps.  Mictlān—that’s the Aztec underworld.”
        “Why couldn’t they have just gone with a good old-fashioned infierno?  I would’ve recognized that one immediately, given that I grew up on a boca del.”  Jojo, the Captain confirms, is definitely strange.  “I don’t remember us crossing any rivers of blood or encountering any flaying wind.”
        Fitz beams proudly.  He's not much better.  "You really do know your supernatural texts."
        Jojo shrugs, uncomfortable at the praise.  “It’s easy to memorize stuff you’re living through.  The more pressing issue is, if this is one of the various underworlds, we have to get out.  From what I remember, Mictlān isn’t one of the safer Hell Dimensions, even if you’re not alive.  And it being an afterlife with no demons that I remember, it might be hard to find an exit.”
        Beefheart tenses, preparing for the incoming attack as something cuts through the air toward them, only to relax when it becomes clear it’s only Violent Whispers.
        Darling seems less stressed to see her Stand for only a moment or two before she gasps, eyes wide.  “Whisper can’t make it to his full range,” she explains, voice hushed.  It doesn’t exactly need to be, as there’s no one close enough to overhear, but von Stroheim doen’t correct her.  “There’s a wall in the way, but Whisper couldn’t even see it.”
        “I hate those invisible walls,” Beefheart mutters.
        She blinks as Jojo exclaims, “…those are the worst!” and holds up a hand for a high-five.  She meets his gesture, bemused.
        “So, our first order of business is to see what happens if we try to walk out.”  Robin, as usual, is focused on the practical.  Okay, yes, zombies, scary, don’t want to deal with them, can an arrow to the head work?
        Darling’s definitely feeling the fear, since she huddles in close to Robin and Jojo.  The Captain doesn’t outright unholster her gun but she keeps a hand on it, ready at any time, because this probably means there’s something dangerous nearby.  Fitz does the same, only with his water pistol, and she’d laugh at the visual if she hadn’t seen what he’s capable of doing with just a little water.  Even just seeing the aftermath was an enlightening, and slightly unsettling, experience.  She’d be more worried if it didn’t seem as if he was likewise disturbed, even if he’d tried to hide the reaction.  People with that kind of power who don’t treat it with the respect it deserves shouldn’t be wielding that power.
        Which reminds her.  “Jojo, you are absolutely not trying to copy this.  At all.  Ever.”
        “Would I do that?” he asks, all faux-innocent.
        “Yes,” she responds immediately, and is amused to note Robin and Fitz have likewise responded to the affirmative at the exact same time.  The man in question pouts, and Darling pats him on the arm.
        She’s distracted by the thought and doesn’t realize the truth immediately.  It’s easy, to begin with, to think she’d just walked into something without looking. It isn’t until she sees Jojo start a bad mime routine that she realizes that yes, they have confirmed that they can’t just walk out, either.  Now she wishes she’d paid more attention, seen if the man who’d brought them here had been able to drive away unscathed, whether he was human or a demon, as Jojo might assert, and whether, from the start, this had been a trap.
        And then he stiffens, eyes narrowing, all playfulness gone from his gestures, as he glances over to the top of one of the buildings looming ominously to either side of the road they can no longer follow.
        “What’s wrong, Jojo?” Robin asks first, and Jojo’s response is uncharacteristic, terse, with a lower voice than he usually speaks in.
        “Thought I saw something.”  He sticks one hand in a pocket, lifting one hand briefly before letting it listlessly fall to his side.
        “Jotaro?” the blond clarifies, and the Captain is confused.  Surely their reinforcements couldn’t have arrived yet?
        Jojo nods, not saying anything else, and Fitz sighs.
        “I’m going to need more than that, Johan,” he emphasizes, and Jojo blinks, and then the moment’s gone.
        “It’s either the déjà vu or the fact he’s an animal nerd,” Jojo explains, looking a little pale against the street light, retrieving the hand from his pocket and waving it toward the roof.  “There was what looked like a dead animal by the side of the road, only this one happened to be the skeleton of a bird.  Might’ve been a Cathartes burrovianus, judging by the size, but it flew off over that building.  With no feathers.”  He smirks slightly at the stares.  “The tiniest vulture,” he elaborates.
        “Was that the ‘something weird’ you were looking for?” Darling asks, and he shrugs.
        “I can’t know for sure, but…yeah.  Very possibly.”  He looks at her, then.  “I can try to copy Mom.  Not sure if connecting to a doorway outside this place is possible or even safe, if Pretender can even manage, but it might be worth a try.  Or we could go chasing Bonesy the Vulture.”
        It takes her a moment to even realize—he’s looking for her to make the decision, rather than charging ahead himself.  He might be learning some teamwork yet.
        “The vulture,” she decides after a moment.  Perhaps it’s silly to be relying on her knowledge of horror games, but they’re all she has with regard to this, and trying to escape without dealing with the reason they’re there easily has the potential to go horribly wrong.
        “All right.  Keep an eye out for skeletons, and hope we’re inland enough there are no fog pirates.”  Well, whatever that was, he’s back to normal and Fitz isn’t panicking, so presumably everything’s fine.