divine utterances, or the wisdom of time

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/32951761.

Rating: Mature
Archive Warning: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Categories: F/F, F/M, Multi
Fandoms: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar), Aang/Azula (Avatar), Sokka/OC Slayer (don't
judge me), Minor Xander Harris/Dawn Summers, mentions of mai/ty lee,
mentions of past Mai/Zuko - Relationship, minor Willow
Rosenberg/Kennedy, brief Katara/Aang
Characters: Sokka (Avatar), Katara (Avatar), Zuko (Avatar), Azula (Avatar), Dawn
Summers, Original Watcher Character(s) (BtVS), Original Slayer
Character(s) (BtVS), Aang (Avatar), Suki (Avatar), Toph Beifong,
Xander Harris, Willow Rosenberg, Ursa (Avatar)
Additional Tags: no beta we die like yue, this came to me in a day dream (i'm not kidding),
Not Canon Compliant, Sloow burn, like really I mean it,
Interdimensional Travel, don't play with portals kids, Alternate Universe
- Canon Divergence, think of the comics for both fandoms as mere
suggestions, just a heads up that most of this takes place in the AtLA
universe
Language: English
Stats: Published: 2021-08-01 Words: 1,108 Chapters: 1/?
 divine utterances, or the wisdom of time
by greyeyed_athene

Summary

Chronology (noun):
From the Greek chronos (time) and logos (word, explanation) meaning “the arrangement of
dates in the order of their occurrence.”

These are the events, not in the order they occurred, but how they were remembered in the
end by those who lived and breathed them.

Or the BtVS and AtLA crossover no one wanted or asked for. You’re welcome.

Notes

Requisite disclaimer: Obviously nothing belongs to me save the words on the page.

Honestly? This is just an excuse to write 1) whatever the hell I want in two of my favorite
fandoms, and 2) practice different characterizations and writing styles. Essentially, this is a
fun writing exercise that has way too many aspirations, including creating a believable
crossover between two diverse fandoms and allowing my favorite non-canon ships to come
into angsty, romantic being in as realistically and in-character a way as possible (read: slow
burn, baby).

See the end of the work for more notes

The Abyss, Present Day

Fuck.

The shock of her body plunging through dark and formless space erased all coherent thought
save that one fitting expletive.

Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck.

The fricative and velar sounds ran on a loop in her mind and were the only familiar thing in
the inky abyss. She could not see her hands, though she felt her calloused, rough fingers as
she wiggled them voluntarily. And the only reason she knew that she wasn’t seeing the backs
of her eyelids was the continuous slap of hot air at her pupils as she fell face first into
darkness.

If someone (Richard) asked what hellish thing had possessed her, what insecurity rose from
her psyche, what temporary loss of her mental facilities had convinced her to borrow the
Scythe, she would have no answer. No good reason. She would look at you with her lips
flopping open and closed like a fish in its tank, floating dull-eyed and ignorant among its own
feces.

A nagging voice told her softly, barely audible against her mind’s continued litany of fucks,
that she did indeed know. There was a reason she borrowed (stole) the Scythe from Buffy’s
room for that night’s patrol.

It’s my turn.

Fortunately (or rather unfortunately for her own personal growth), she had no time to pursue
this train of thought, which would be more at home in the mind of a badly behaved four-year-
old than a grown woman. A sharp, silver light sliced through the void. It was small at first,
only a ripped seam, a tear in the ass of a pair of cheap blue jeans. But it widened quickly and
soon the velvety blackness opened like stage curtains, giving the metallic light centerstage.

Then her vision blurred and all around her was powdery white, translucent blue, blushing
pink, glittering silver and gold.

The air changed in addition to the light. No longer did a humid wind whip past her, like those
hand-held portable fans that mist your face with tepid water. The kind old southern ladies
hold against their faces as they gossip on the front porch, rocking back and forth in wicker
chairs. Instead, pins now pricked the skin not covered by her clothing, burning cold as they
embedded in her flesh.

She didn’t see the ground. She felt it. The impact forced out any trace of air in one harsh
exhale that left her lungs crushed and burnt.
For the space of twenty heartbeats, she lay face first in the ground catching her breath in
shallow, desperate gasps. Something melted under her hot breath and pooled in the nooks
around her nostrils and eyelashes. Gently, she lifted her head off the ground enough to gather
the barest hint of her surroundings.

Snow. Lots of it. As far as she could see as she turned her head slowly left and right; her
bones creaking in their sockets at any slight movement.

She realized it (wherever it was) was twilight as her view of the world expanded as she
pushed to her hands and knees; the blood drying under her short, neatly trimmed fingernails
was a glaring contrast to the snow beneath her hands and between her fingers. (“A manicure
and hand-to-hand combat go together like peanut-butter and salami” Dawn had said once
during a friendly spar. One-too-may nails bent and broken at the quick after a lightning-fast
chop convinced her of the truth behind her friend’s words. Long nails, while trendy for a
woman in her twenties, were not appropriate for a slayer’s uniform.)

Forcing herself into a seated position, butt on bruised thighs and ice soaking ripped jeans, she
continued to survey the area around her. It was a tundra.

And it was about to be a tundra at night.

Suddenly the crude, one-word song that serenaded her during her fall through the dark abyss
could not encompass the anger (fear) that coiled around her intestines and squeezed.

I am going to die here.

How ignoble. A slayer dying of hypothermia. She was prepared to die fighting for the world.
Fighting evil. Fighting for humanity. The grandiosity of her envisioned death, the details a
smorgasbord of the grisly ends met by those young women before her, made it easier to
swallow the pending inevitability of it. Or at least, that was the lie she told herself. The lie
was harder to sustain when faced with the fate that would occur in the coming hours, if not
sooner. Shivering in her wet and rapidly freezing clothes, drooping her eyelids as a mind-
numbing weariness sets into her bones, and eventually succumbing to all-consuming
darkness as sleep takes her, never to wake up.

She tried to think of high school health class, hoping some grain of wisdom would appear by
remembering her teenage years. They discussed hypothermia, didn’t they? Or at least they
read about it in the textbook. That rough and tumble thing with missing pages and an
atomically correct penis doodled on the inside cover from a previous owner. She went
through a poorly conceived list of half-remembered and half-fantasized solutions in her brain.

Drink something warm.

She quickly discarded this as access to a kitchen in the middle of a frozen wasteland seemed
out of the question.

Share body heat. Naked.

Well, that’s not possible…unfortunately. A fragment of a romance novel flashed behind her
eyes; one read years ago on a one-way transatlantic flight to London (her first and only flight,
her destination the Watcher’s Council Headquarters). In it, the scantily clad, buxom damsel
cuddled up against the stone-chiseled body of the naked hero. His heavy Scottish brogue
warming her in ways his body heat could not.

She choked on a giggle. Laughter is a good sign she thought (it isn't).

Generate body heat.

“Walk.” She ordered her numb legs and stood. It was little more than a hobble; she sprained
her right ankle on her way down into darkness, and she was certain at least two of her ribs
were broken. She reminded herself that the magic flowing through her would fuse broken
bone and repair torn ligaments at inhuman speeds. And so, she forced herself to walk through
the pain. To believe that the movement of muscle and sinew and blood and breath could
possibly be enough to warm her insides. At least enough until she found shelter. Found
others.

Whether or not this shelter existed or if these others were friendly were considerations
beyond absolute necessity. Right now, in this desperate moment with a chill running through
her bones, she had to have faith that walking could save her.

Because she refused to die cold and broken in the snow.

End Notes

A note on the meaning of logos in Ancient Greek and a (sort of) explanation of the title. In
some instances, logos refers to the words spoken by oracles. Later when Greek became the
language of Christianity, it referred to the wisdom or words of God.

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