melt your silver down / kiss your lover's face / the sirens start to sound

[herotypical]

Who: [Bad username or site: lists_to_port title= @ livejournal.com] & [Bad username or site: slaying title= @ livejournal.com]
What: a battle dome date
When: july 9th
Where: the battle dome
Summary: one part training exercise, two parts tourism
Rating: r -- for violence. and then who knows what. better to be safe than sorry idek?

Buffy Summers asked Jack Sparrow to meet her at the battle dome. It was a plan that had been discussed before the pirate had disappeared and now that he was back? Well -- she cared very little for dawdling. They had dawdled before but now was the time for seizing. She had yet to overcome the horror of waking up alone for yet another morning when she had expected to be the furthest thing from it.

People change. And Buffy mused quietly upon the changes to be found in Jack as she waited just outside the dome's entrance. She had a bag-o-weapons at her feet and a plastic bottle filled with some sort of over-sugared juice in her hand.

Comments

[herotypical]

"...Right on the nose. The streets? That's one thing. But not many people were ever inside this house. I need to know how they know it. How they know all the things they know."

Because what if it wasn't just some sort of mind-reading? What if it involved some genuine link to the other worlds? A link the scientists were trying to exploit to find their own way home but simply hadn't, yet.

As she spoke, she lead him into a bedroom.

[all7seas]

"Yours," he breathed, not ready to touch any of those speculations yet. Instead he was touching things. Her things. They weren't real, but he picked them up and held them and sniffed her perfume bottles and touched the odds and ends on her bureau and pressed a palm down on her mattress.

[herotypical]

"Mine. Circa 2001, from the looks of it."

She tugged a scarf free from where it was wound about the side of her vanity mirror. It felt real enough, even if she knew it couldn't be.

[all7seas]

A Polaroid photo of Buffy smiling at the beach made its way into the pirate's pocket, joining the one of her laughing that he had stolen earlier.

"You've lovely taste, sweetheart."

[herotypical]

"I saw that."

She opened the bedroom window and yet again pulled aside a set of curtains. Buffy aimed to have as much visibility as possible. "Good luck not having anything you've picked up vanish once we leave this place."

[all7seas]

"...Here." He pulled it from his pocket and held it out to her.

[herotypical]

Buffy shook her head. She didn't want it; it wasn't real.

"What am I gonna do with a picture of me, huh?"

[all7seas]

"I happen to be wanting one. You could give it to me? A gift, like?"

[herotypical]

"I can't give you that one. It won't leave the simulation. But..."

She remembered talking to that Minato kid about cameras and photography. "But let me see what I can do on the outside, okay?"

Of course -- a photo had recently bled through and she had found it in the shops. And it had come with a little homemade frame; however, this was earmarked for Dawn's birthday. The same gift she had given Buffy on her twentieth, soon to be returned.

[all7seas]

Jack tucked it back in his pocket anyway. It was becoming a habit of his to try to take away images that would fade and vanish in the end.

Then? Then he dove onto the bed, burying himself under the pillows. There was a muffled sigh of contentment as he breathed in the Buffy-scented sheets.

"This simulator......highly accurate." He wondered then that since the both of them were taking part in this simulation, perhaps some of his own thoughts and feelings were seeping into it as well. It was an interesting thought and it occupied him for several moments.

[herotypical]

"Too accurate, just like I sa--"

Had that been the sound of a door shutting? Buffy's attention snapped to the window but there was nothing to be seen.

[all7seas]

"What is it?" he whispered, sitting up immediately. It wasn't a sound that had alerted the pirate; it was her sudden cut-off statement.

[herotypical]

"This party of two is about to turn into a full-on shindig. You still got some stakes?"

[all7seas]

In answer, Jack produced two more stakes from his belt. "Aye, General; they shall be at our mercy." It was a pity to have to get out of her comfy bed, but any mention of vampires made the man more than glad to pick up a stake or two.

[herotypical]

She pointed at the low vanity. "There's holy water in the top drawer. Good to have, if it'll work." There might also be a little silver claddagh ring; however, Buffy didn't remember its existence. She's been years without it since Sunnydale fell. It didn't cross her mind often.

[all7seas]

"Right!" It took but a moment to acquire the holy water and---

Oh. Ring. Jack plucked it from the drawer.

"Annie? You never told me you were Irish."

[herotypical]

"That'd be because I'm not."

She unhooked a little wooden cross from where it hung on the wall. There was a muffled thump and crash from the lower floor -- it held her attention much more than this conversation.

[all7seas]

"Oh. Well. You've this ring, eh? It's an old Irish sign. I only know it because me dad's Irish a ways back, even though he was raised in England. Claddagh. Eternity, savvy? Means for always."

[herotypical]

Buffy didn't look back from the doorway.

"The hands represent friendship, the crown represents loyalty... and the heart..." She belatedly realized that she was quoting the explanation verbatim from when she had received it. "It's not real, Jack. Put it away."

[all7seas]

"Love. Means love. Why would I put it back? You should wear it, Annie; silver suits you, you know."

[herotypical]

"...I'm not gonna wear it."

She strained to listen for more noises, but they had died down. She wondered if she had heard anything at all. Maybe it had been something from outside the simulation. For a moment, she had almost forgotten that there was the rest of the village waiting for them, just beyond a door.

[all7seas]

"Buffy, you're not----" He stopped, and shrugged. Sometimes she was sensitive about odd things. Out of force of habit more than anything, Jack slipped the ring into his pocket.

[herotypical]

"...Maybe we should go. Shut the whole thing down before another fight breaks out. There's nothing that says we have to fight. Not real."

[all7seas]

This date had been her idea, but leaving now would feel somehow...incomplete. Still, Jack didn't need to stay. He certainly didn't feel the need to see more vampires. Horrid things. So he nodded slowly, trying to get a read on her. She didn't seem troubled, but...

"It's...it's up to you, sweetheart. Whatever you like."

[herotypical]

Footsteps on the staircase. Buffy waffled; stay or go?

"Shut it down." She slammed the bedroom door. It should buy them enough time to get the hell out of dodge. The Slayer tried to imagine the layout of the simulation room itself and edged along this fake one until the high-tech console resolved itself out of the wall.

She toggled a few switches and pressed a wonderfully threatening-looking red button just as a light and maternal woman's voice filtered through the closed door: "Buffy? Honey?"

And it was gone. All gone. And she was convinced she had made it up. Wishful thinking.