#i wrote this before the crossover when joel and jimmy were still enemies i just didn't post it yet

[arthropod-concoctions]

“Pix? What are you digging around in MY empire for?” Jimmy asked, hand hovering over his sword.

“Oh, hey Jimmy! Look, I can explain. My peers told me there was evidence of there being remains of an ancient civilisation, just below-”

“Jimmy?” Statue-Joel hadn't managed to successfully exit the hole in the ground, but he peeked over the edge the second he heard Jimmy's voice. Jimmy looked over, and caught his eye.

There was dead silence for a few seconds as the two stared at each other. Oh great, Pixl thought. Arguing with Joel is not going to make him less mad at me-

Then Jimmy burst out laughing.

“What- what's happened here? Why are you so small? Pix, did you do this?” Smiling, Jimmy walked towards the hole Joel was still stuck in, and broke some surrounding sandstone to help Joel get out. Sure enough, standing on level height, Jimmy was a good several inches taller than the statue.

“Who's a small toy now, huh? HUH?”

Strangely enough, Joel didn't seem at all inclined to mock Jimmy back; he just looked at him, as if he was seeing a ghost. “Where did you run off to, Jimmy?”

“Huh? I was just stopping by the Eversea to get some more gunpowder. Why do you care about that?” Jimmy asked, then shrugged. “Whatever. I don't care. The point is, little man, that...” Jimmy continued his tirade against statue-Joel, who still seemed too stunned to retort. This would be the perfect time for Pixl to bail out of this situation, he realised. He turned around, preparing to leave...

Only to walk directly into the real Joel.

“Did someone mention a little toy man? Are you talking about yourself again, Jimmy?” real-Joel asked, with a mean grin. Jimmy spun around immediately, then looked between real-Joel and statue-Joel.

“No... I thought- Pix, what did you do? Why are there two of them!?”

“Oh, did you make a statue of me? That's nice.” Real-Joel crouched down and tapped against statue-Joel's cheek. Strangely enough, the latter didn't react at all- he just turned to Jimmy. “Two of what?”

“Two of- of you, Joel. You're here, but so is the dumb giant-” Jimmy hesitated for a moment, disgust visible on his face- “the god over there.”

An expression flashed across statue-Joel's face for a moment. “God? What are you talking about? Don't be ridiculous, Jimmy. Gods aren't real.”

“EXCUSE ME?” Joel's voice boomed, accompanied by the sound of thunder in the distance. “That is VERY offensive, I'll have you know! You'll pay for that!”

Statue-Joel still didn't react. This just made real-Joel even angrier; he pulled back his foot and prepared to kick the statue. “No, wait!” Pixl shouted, but it was too late; Joel's foot hit the statue square in the stomach-

And bounced backwards, not moving him even an inch. Real-Joel yelped in pain and grabbed his foot; Jimmy bent over laughing, and statue-Joel just looked at Pixl in confusion.

“Forget this! I'm going to Stratos, where real gods live! Goodbye, toys!” Joel took off flying, leaving the three of them in various states of confusion.

“Oh my gosh. That was amazing. 'gods arent real'- I've gotta use that one sometime,” Jimmy said, wiping tears of laughter from the corner of his eye. “You're much better than the other Joel.”

“...What just happened? Are you two okay?”

“We're fine! I should be asking you, you're the one who just got kicked...” Jimmy trailed off. “Wait... could you actually not see him?” Statue-Joel just minimally shook his head in response. He seemed overwhelmed.

Jimmy stammered for a few seconds, then shook his head and said: “You know what? Don't even worry about it. I've decided, that guy is fake, you're the real Joel in my eyes.” He walked over to the statue and hit him on the shoulder affectionately-

and Joel suddenly wrapped his arms around him in a hug. He pushed his head into Jimmy's shoulder, and- started to cry? Jimmy hesitated, but after a second hugged him back, and patted Joel reassuringly on the back as his shoulders began to shake.

“Well... i'll leave you two to it. Goodbye!” Pix said, gathered up his supplies, and flew off. Well this was quite the afternoon... He'd have to go back and talk to the new Joel later. For now, he was just happy to get out of this mess unharmed.

(ch 1 | ch 2 | ch 4)