Don Quixote had not been doing the best. It was supposed to be a regular encounter with villainous foes, like any other, but the encounter turned sour fast. Heathcliff was dead, Ishmael and Faust had been staggered, and Don Quixote noticed that you were starting to panic. Fearlessly, Don Quixote attempted to run ahead towards her foes, trying to save her noble love, but the dastardly villains in her way managed to overpower her. In her last moments, she looked back on the horrified expression on your face, the face she so desperately wanted to protect.
There was a small voice in the back of her head, ‘ You love her with all your heart... ’ Don Quixote didn’t recognize the voice, but almost wanted to nod along with it in agreement. Yes, Don Quixote did love you. Any knight-errant was lost without their noble love, and thus, she was lost without you. ‘You love her enough that you want to melt away with her, together forever? ’ The question almost made her giggle, what a funny way to put it! Of course she did, she wanted to be with you at all times. It wouldn't be wrong to say that she’d even prefer to be sewn directly onto you, just so she could be with you at all times, but that fearful expression of yours…. ‘Then, let’s melt away with her, become one in your love… ’ Yes, yes she did like that idea a lot.
Quickly, the battlefield became a mess of oozing, yellowish-pink slime. The hand of the villain that had once been clutching Don Quixote’s arm, intent on breaking it, had started to slough away like snow in a heatwave, until, eventually, there was nothing left but a puddle of slime. Don Quixote herself was barely recognizable, her entire body covered in a layer of thick, pink slime that covered her like armor, constantly dissolving and regenerating the flesh inside it. The process looked excruciating, but if there was any pain, she didn’t wear it on her face. She maniacally giggled as the people around her, enemy and ally alike, dissolved into pink slime.
With no hesitation, Don starts making her way towards you, a sickening squelch noise, similar to the sound of squishing flesh beneath your heel, follows as she takes struggling steps toward you, fighting against the sticky slime that’d rather hold her to the floor, but that does nothing to stop her as her arms hold you firmly, slime quickly starting to eat away at the fabric. “Oh, my dear Dulcinea~” Her voice gurgles as she tries to purr out her sweet pet name for you, you can’t tell if it’s from slime in her throat or slime replacing her throat, “My dearest… Please melt away with me and accept thy noble knight’s love..!” A confession wrings out, a genuine emotion from the deepest pit of her heart. “My love for you matches no other… I only desire to love you and only you, to defend you and cherish you for all eternity, to watch your skin dissolve into mine,” Her eyes still hold their normal shine, maybe even brighter than normal from the slime, glazing her like a sweet pastry, “... to become one with you forever!” She begs for your love, her sweet, desperate, glazed eyes searching for any emotion they can on your face. The way she boldly announces these statements, emblazoned with sickeningly sweet love… They remind you of wedding vows.
The adrenaline pumping through your veins finally catches up to you, and you yank yourself out of the slime as fast as you can, maybe you could outrun her until the corrosion wears off-
Ah, but, Don Quixote wouldn’t let her betrothed escape her so easily.
No, instead, she tackles her to the ground the moment she tried to escape, smothering your body with hers, and the thick pink slime. She holds onto you desperately, as if she’s the scared victim in this situation, and not the monster. Her arms wrap around you, like a child’s most favored doll, and you can slowly start to feel the pain of acidic slime eating away at your skin. You whimper in pain, but Don Quixote misinterprets your pained struggles as lingering fear as she nuzzles her melting face into your bosom, “Shhh… You need not fear… I’m here now, to protect you forever and ever…” Her gurgling voice immerses herself further into her own delusion. She rubs her slimy arms over yours like she is comforting a lover, but she only makes the pain worse as she works more of her acidic slime into your still-open wounds like an infection.
"D- Don Quixote- Please let me go-" You try to struggle out of her grasp, but it's practically impossible, as the slime clings to your skin, smothering you like a blanket. The pain of the slime eating away at your skin is unbearable, it's almost tantalizingly slow, unlike the rapid decay of her other victims. You can't help yourself as pathetic tears start running down your face, unable to stop the pathetic whimpers of pain anymore. Don Quixote attempts to kiss them away, slimy "lips" pressing against your skin, leaving behind a trail almost similar to saliva against your face, leaving it just more messy.
"It- it h-'' You open your mouth again to try to croak out another plea, but Don Quixote immediately places her "mouth" upon yours, at first, you think she's trying to shove her "tongue" into your mouth as well, but you realize with dawning horror that she's trying to force more slime into your mouth and down your throat. Your struggles become more frenzied, thrashing around like a wild animal as if there was any possibility of being able to survive this situation, but there's no use. It feels as if time has slowed down as you watch with horrified eyes as Don Quixote pulls away from you with sultry eyes, as if this were any other moment of passion between lovers. You can only watch as a thin strand of her slime connecting you both together dissipates after a moment, and you can feel the thick glob her slime travel down your throat. Adrenaline has drowned out any pain you feel, but it doesn't stop the slow, uncomfortable, disgusting feeling of the ooze violating you from the inside-out.
You desperately want to throw up, cough, find any way to get this pathogen out of you, but there’s nothing you can do that helps. The slime coats your entire body, inside and out, stopping all action like a disease. You can feel your body slow down as your muscles melt away with your will. Your mind fades in and out of consciousness, the pain finally becoming too much for your nerves to bear. Don Quixote is back to resting her head on the little remaining muscle that makes up your upper torso. As you finally stop struggling, having accepted your fate, you close your eyes once and for all. When your mind and body start melting away, there’s one last sensation you can distinguish from the pain. A gentle touch, a movement, rocking. A comforting rocking, and a hum. It takes a moment for your mind to distinguish what the song is, but when it clicks, you’re too out of it to be horrified. There’s a small voice in the back of your head that wants to sing along,
‘Here comes the bride.’
…
Being brought back from the brink of death wasn't an unfamiliar feeling, but it still felt weird to die and be brought back from something that was supposed to be as permanent as the afterlife, and yet here you were, back on the Mephistopheles as if you hadn’t met a grisly end inside that dungeon, gently stroking the hair of a sleeping Don Quixote. Apparently, during or after your death in the dungeon, Faust was able to finish off the last of the enemies, despite Don’s… predicament, if Dante and Faust’s recounting of events were accurate. They left out any mention of Don’s grand display of affection, so you assumed they were either too busy with other matters to notice, or too embarrassed to make and comment on it. Either way, it didn't really matter. Don seemed to lack any memory of what had happened in that dungeon, and you intended to keep it that way. Her vow… it was genuine, even if through the corroded voice of an abnormality. Maybe it was selfish, but you’d be lying if you said that you were glad to be the only one that got to hear it. You quickly glance around the bus to make sure no one is watching, before nuzzling your blushing face into Don’s hair, pressing a secret kiss to her scalp.
Maybe, one day, she would be able to recite that vow to you, without the influence of another.