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madimpossibledreamerMain Points:
Jojo's Bizarre Adventure/Buffy the Vampire Slayer AU
Chapter Summary: The path gets more hazardous.
Word Count: 1122
Rating: Teen
Note: HERE THERE PROBABLY BE BUFFY/JJBA SPOILERS
It’s not that they get tenser. That would be obvious. If anything, they loosen up, but purposefully. Readying themselves for a fight. Mr. Brown leaving his bow strung to be able to nock one at any second, and the Captain’s never put away the throwing dagger, but her grip on it changes. It happens after they cross the first ‘river’, the ‘river of scorpions’, because if they were taking the traditional path, they’d swim in through the cenote and then through the river of scorpions and that’d be the point of no turning back normally. Once you get that far, you’re in the grip of the Lords of Death, and your life is slightly conditional on keeping them amused. Of course, they’re also amused by suffering and death, but death is kind of final and puts an end to the entertainment.
Their reactions are fair enough. From what Whisper is telling her, that feeling of being watched isn’t just their imagination. Of course, these trials are mostly meant to humiliate and trick them, but she wouldn’t bet they’ll stay out of it, especially once they’re doing well. Like the Moon-Spider demon, they delight in the pain of others, but other people doing well or avoiding their traps is considered humiliating for them, and they kind of tend to throw tantrums about that sort of thing. The kind of tantrums that end in beheadings, and she really likes her head and where it currently is.
Right now, though, they’re not technically even in the dead realm, so they’re probably just being watched so far. It’s not until they make it into the actual court that any of the Lords of Death will actually step in themselves.
Probably. It’s not a sure thing, but none of this is. Which sucks, but she also appreciates that it’s not trying to lie to her and tell her she’s absolutely safe when that would be a lie.
She can tell because of the smell. She’s smelled all kinds of places—fancy hotels, like where she’d found Jojo and Mr. Speedwagon, not-so-fancy hotels, restaurants, trains, buses, parks, flats, empty houses and not-so-empty houses, and this place smells like none of them. Oh, of course underneath there’s still that smell of blood she’s surprised she grew used to, and some sense of decay, and the ruins of an old stone building, with the few plants that don’t need light and the immense amounts of dust and that scent that just screams ‘old’. But there’s also something in there she can’t place, something that doesn’t smell natural or like it has anything to do with humans or even should. She doesn’t let herself dwell, though. It’s going to bug her unless she figures it out, true, but she also doesn’t have the time to be spending on this.
So she doesn’t think about the fact that she thinks she could see movement from the ground behind her in the flickering torchlight. Or the fact that it feels and looks like there’s a ripple as she takes step after step in the blood river and the pus river, like the stones aren’t just colored but are metaphor come to life. Because there’s no splash, nothing on her shoes. Her socks feel uncomfortably wet, but the instant she lifts her foot the feeling goes away. She’s just exchanging the feeling of which foot feels nasty.
Her best guess is that it’s both at the same time, metaphor and real, blood and not-blood. The further down the corridor they walk, the more real it becomes, but a part of it will always only be metaphor. It’s just that two of the things became linked, like when Whisper makes someone hurt physically based on an emotional wound or vice versa. Well, maybe not just like, but it’s easier to understand that way.
And then they come to a four-way crossroads. The previous ones have only counted if you assume that back is a direction, which would be rather silly. This one includes a way to the left, and the right, and stairs that go up and down.
Logically, the one that goes down would seem to make sense, but Whisper thinks that’s too easy for a place trying to trick them, and he’s probably right.
“Do you need help?” a rough voice asks to the left, and Mr. Brown instantly has an arrow ready to loose, accompanied by a dagger. But they don’t shoot, because nothing is visible.
“Ignore Left. He’s just showing off,” a higher, quieter-spoken voice advises, and the weapons instantly and smoothly change position.
“Take your time,” an extremely deep voice suggests from the stairs leading down into the darkness, and this time the Captain decides to throw the dagger, probably to test for invisible enemies. She hits nothing, but palms another quickly, glaring at the excited laughter from the stairs leading up.
“Trying to kill Down? I don’t blame you. He’s a downer. Get it?” The laughter suits the excitable voice, Darling decides.
“It’s worse than Jojo,” the Captain grumbles, though this time it’s pretty obvious it’s affectionate, even without the tone. “Miss Violetta, what do we do now?”
That’s…really respectful, actually. Is it a change, or…no, actually, now that she thinks about it, she’s pretty sure the Captain’s never addressed her directly, not by name anyway. Maybe she’s gained more respect by being useful, but that’s not the only reason, and Darling needs to remember that. Just because Captain Von Stroheim isn’t the most open doesn’t mean she doesn’t care.
“It’s the paths themselves talking to us. We’re probably better off ignoring them; they’re just trying to confuse us.” Whisper’s having issues telling her where to go next, too, so they’re staying put until Whisper figures it out or one of the others has an idea.
“Now that’s just rude!” the stairs moving up exclaim, and Darling doesn’t miss the Captain rolling her eyes even as she tries to work this out.
Jojo's Bizarre Adventure/Buffy the Vampire Slayer AU
Chapter Summary: The path gets more hazardous.
Word Count: 1122
Rating: Teen
Note: HERE THERE PROBABLY BE BUFFY/JJBA SPOILERS
Darling can tell when they cross the threshold into Xibalba, when the spell starts merging the real world and the underworld. She feels it too, but she’d ignore her instincts normally, pretty sure it’d just be her nerves, if not for the fact that she’s not the only one who reacts. Now that she thinks about it, though, it’d make sense if an underworld has mental effects like making people who enter uneasy. She’d fought with Mr. Brown and the Captain before, on that roof. She can’t boast the kind of knowledge the two had from so much practice, or the ease with which Jojo and Mr. Speedwagon had taken to working with each other because pretty much everyone had more experience fighting than she ever wanted.
It’s not that they get tenser. That would be obvious. If anything, they loosen up, but purposefully. Readying themselves for a fight. Mr. Brown leaving his bow strung to be able to nock one at any second, and the Captain’s never put away the throwing dagger, but her grip on it changes. It happens after they cross the first ‘river’, the ‘river of scorpions’, because if they were taking the traditional path, they’d swim in through the cenote and then through the river of scorpions and that’d be the point of no turning back normally. Once you get that far, you’re in the grip of the Lords of Death, and your life is slightly conditional on keeping them amused. Of course, they’re also amused by suffering and death, but death is kind of final and puts an end to the entertainment.
Their reactions are fair enough. From what Whisper is telling her, that feeling of being watched isn’t just their imagination. Of course, these trials are mostly meant to humiliate and trick them, but she wouldn’t bet they’ll stay out of it, especially once they’re doing well. Like the Moon-Spider demon, they delight in the pain of others, but other people doing well or avoiding their traps is considered humiliating for them, and they kind of tend to throw tantrums about that sort of thing. The kind of tantrums that end in beheadings, and she really likes her head and where it currently is.
Right now, though, they’re not technically even in the dead realm, so they’re probably just being watched so far. It’s not until they make it into the actual court that any of the Lords of Death will actually step in themselves.
Probably. It’s not a sure thing, but none of this is. Which sucks, but she also appreciates that it’s not trying to lie to her and tell her she’s absolutely safe when that would be a lie.
She can tell because of the smell. She’s smelled all kinds of places—fancy hotels, like where she’d found Jojo and Mr. Speedwagon, not-so-fancy hotels, restaurants, trains, buses, parks, flats, empty houses and not-so-empty houses, and this place smells like none of them. Oh, of course underneath there’s still that smell of blood she’s surprised she grew used to, and some sense of decay, and the ruins of an old stone building, with the few plants that don’t need light and the immense amounts of dust and that scent that just screams ‘old’. But there’s also something in there she can’t place, something that doesn’t smell natural or like it has anything to do with humans or even should. She doesn’t let herself dwell, though. It’s going to bug her unless she figures it out, true, but she also doesn’t have the time to be spending on this.
So she doesn’t think about the fact that she thinks she could see movement from the ground behind her in the flickering torchlight. Or the fact that it feels and looks like there’s a ripple as she takes step after step in the blood river and the pus river, like the stones aren’t just colored but are metaphor come to life. Because there’s no splash, nothing on her shoes. Her socks feel uncomfortably wet, but the instant she lifts her foot the feeling goes away. She’s just exchanging the feeling of which foot feels nasty.
Her best guess is that it’s both at the same time, metaphor and real, blood and not-blood. The further down the corridor they walk, the more real it becomes, but a part of it will always only be metaphor. It’s just that two of the things became linked, like when Whisper makes someone hurt physically based on an emotional wound or vice versa. Well, maybe not just like, but it’s easier to understand that way.
And then they come to a four-way crossroads. The previous ones have only counted if you assume that back is a direction, which would be rather silly. This one includes a way to the left, and the right, and stairs that go up and down.
Logically, the one that goes down would seem to make sense, but Whisper thinks that’s too easy for a place trying to trick them, and he’s probably right.
“Do you need help?” a rough voice asks to the left, and Mr. Brown instantly has an arrow ready to loose, accompanied by a dagger. But they don’t shoot, because nothing is visible.
“Ignore Left. He’s just showing off,” a higher, quieter-spoken voice advises, and the weapons instantly and smoothly change position.
“Take your time,” an extremely deep voice suggests from the stairs leading down into the darkness, and this time the Captain decides to throw the dagger, probably to test for invisible enemies. She hits nothing, but palms another quickly, glaring at the excited laughter from the stairs leading up.
“Trying to kill Down? I don’t blame you. He’s a downer. Get it?” The laughter suits the excitable voice, Darling decides.
“It’s worse than Jojo,” the Captain grumbles, though this time it’s pretty obvious it’s affectionate, even without the tone. “Miss Violetta, what do we do now?”
That’s…really respectful, actually. Is it a change, or…no, actually, now that she thinks about it, she’s pretty sure the Captain’s never addressed her directly, not by name anyway. Maybe she’s gained more respect by being useful, but that’s not the only reason, and Darling needs to remember that. Just because Captain Von Stroheim isn’t the most open doesn’t mean she doesn’t care.
“It’s the paths themselves talking to us. We’re probably better off ignoring them; they’re just trying to confuse us.” Whisper’s having issues telling her where to go next, too, so they’re staying put until Whisper figures it out or one of the others has an idea.
“Now that’s just rude!” the stairs moving up exclaim, and Darling doesn’t miss the Captain rolling her eyes even as she tries to work this out.
