"~You are the ocean's gray waves~"

A blue-haired songstress, wearing a white dress with blue highlights, was idly singing to herself.

"~Destined to seek life beyond the shore, just out of reach~"

She always came to this spot by the lake whenever she wanted to be alone.

"~Yet the waters ever change flowing like time, the path is yours to climb~"

She finished the last verse and looked down at the water before her. It was not a very big lake, but it was special to her. It always reminded her of home, along with her pendant. She then turned around to make her way back to the capital city of Hoshido.

Suddenly, a loud splash of water followed by coughing made her spin around. She gasped as she now saw a person, soaking wet and hanging onto the lake's pier. This person was wearing blue pants, a blue jacket, a blue hat with a horseshoe on it and all of his clothes were patterned with pink stars. She was able to tell that the person was male when he finally looked up and made eye contact with her. He was relatively skinny and had a small amount of his blonde hair sticking out of his hat.

He pulled his body up onto the pier so he was now out of the water. He panted as he clutched his side, where his clothes were beginning to stain red.

The woman cautiously took a step forward.

"Y-You're bleeding!"

"Yeah," the man groaned, breathing heavily. "I'll be alright though… I've… got to get back to my world…"

She froze and stared at the man for a moment. "Your world…? Who are you?"

"Uh… Johnny. You?"

"Azura. Did you truly come from a different world?"

"… Yeah, I must have come here through that," he answered skeptically, looking at the lake behind him. "But that doesn't matter! My friend probably thinks I'm dead!"

The girl looked at him with both interest and concern.

"I was certain that I was the only one from there still alive…" Azura muttered to herself. "I believe that I might be able to help you get back."

Johnny perked up and asked, "Really? How?"

She smiled and stepped off the pier and into the lake, walking deeper a bit before turning back to him.

"Follow me."

He grimaced.

"Um… Could you… carry me?"

She raised an eyebrow as she was now level with him, with half of her body already submerged.

"I… can't walk, or swim for that matter," Johnny continued.

Azura thought about it for a moment before she finally said, "Alright…"

She picked him up and held him bridal style, grimacing slightly at his surprising weight.

"Y-You're much heavier than you look," the songstress commented as she continued to slowly go deeper into the lake.

"Sorry," he mumbled.

Johnny did not appear to be fazed by what she said. He had gotten used to people carrying him to the point where he no longer found it embarrassing. As they approached the center of the lake and the disabled man's body began to submerge, the water began to rise in a column and shone rather brightly. The man closed his eyes as they both went completely under.

By the time Johnny had reopened his eyes, he was extremely dumbfounded by what he saw. Green grass, stone ruins and islands that could float upside down and sideways. The sky looked like it had been wrapped into one giant cloud.

"Right," the girl carrying him started. "Where would your friend be?"

"Um… This is not my world," he responded, scanning the area in awe.

She blinked and looked down at him again.

"You're not from Valla?"

"Valla…? No, I'm from America."

"Um… where's that?"

Johnny sighed and facepalmed, making Azura gently drop him due to her loss of balance. He managed to balance himself up so he was now sitting on his legs. He then checked his wound once more, to see that the bleeding had stopped. The girl had an apologetic look on her face.

"I… I'm sorry. I thought that you had come from my world as well," she admitted.

He looked up at her and asked, "So, you're from this place? How can those bits of land be floating? Is it some kind of Stand ability…?"

Azura gives him a puzzled look. "Stand…?"

Johnny sighed, "Look, I don't have time for this. Gyro is probably thinking I got shot by Valentine and then-"

The man stopped himself as he looked around them, feeling uneasy. Noticing this, the songstress did the same, dread and fear washing over her.

"This is bad," she whispered. "We must leave. I should have never brought you here."

Suddenly, many figures appeared. They appeared to be invisible, but purple flames outlines their bodies and allowed the two to see them.

Johnny raised his right hand and pointed at them with his index finger, stabilizing it with his other hand, and yelled, "What the hell are these things?!"

"Vallites, but they have been possessed by a great evil," Azura answered. "I hope I still kept a lance here…"

The Vallites appeared to charge at them, based on the approaching flames. Johnny scanned the oncoming enemies and smirked when he noticed that one of them seemed to be riding a horse. His right hand began to glow in the shape of a large pinks star with many smaller ones, much like the ones on his hat and pants. Much to the girl's surprise, his fingernail began to spin around his finger as a rather odd-looking, pink creature appeared next to him.

"There. The golden rectangle…" Johnny muttered to himself as he saw it in the cavalier's movement.

He then fired his spinning fingernail which managed to knock the rider off the horse. As the rider fell, his body began to twist in a spiral fashion around the hole made by Johnny's fingernail. The horse and the other Vallites continued their advance so the man fired three more of his spinning fingernails. Two of them went down and the one that missed left a hole in the ground, which began to move by itself and attacked one of them. Johnny was about to attack once more, but he panicked when he noticed that he was out of fingernails.

Two of the Vallites lunged for him as he braced himself. Suddenly a large, golden lance struck the two attackers and sent then flying away. Johnny looked up to see Azura holding that lance, giving him a slight smile.

"Th-Thanks," the star-patterned man said. "You might want to back up a bit…"

The other Vallites stopped charging in order to regroup, but the horse continued to run. Once Azura had backed up and the horse was right in front of Johnny, he reached out for the half-invisible animal and swiftly spun his body around its neck so he was now on its back. He managed to calm the horse down as he rode up next to Azura.

"I don't think I'll be able to help out much more because I'm out of nail bullets. How do we get back?" he asked.

"They are in our way. I'm afraid that we will have to fight our way out of this. I believe I might be able to help you," she said.

"~You are the ocean's gray waves~"

Johnny looked at the singing woman strangely as he felt a slight pain in his hands.

"~Destined to seek life beyond the shore, just out of reach~"

His eyes widened as he watched all of his fingernail regrow. Azura gave him a smile and readied her lance.

"I hope my song helped…" she said as she focused on the enemies before them.

The man nodded and held up his right hand again.

"Yeah. Thanks," he said as the pink creature appeared next to him again, stars covering his hands once more. "Let's go!"

After some time, the songstress and the disabled man had disposed of the Vallites. Their coordination was excellent, with Azura's attacks being extremely effective and Johnny literally sending them spiraling away.

"Huff… Huff… That's the last of them," the woman commented, out of breath.

"Yeah… WOAH!" Johnny screamed as the invisible horse reared up and ran off, knocking the man onto the ground.

Azura gasped, "Are you okay?"

"Yep," he groaned in response. "He wasn't as good as Slow Dancer anyway. Sh-Should we go back now?"

"… Yes," she answered, slowly and reluctantly picking him up and going back where they came.

By the time Johnny opened his eyes again, they had returned to the lake surrounded by a forest. He frowned once he was reminded of his friend and of the race back in his world. The songstress slowly made her way to the pier, where she set down the man from another world, before walking out of the lake.

She began to dry herself off when Johnny asked, "So, what's up with that world? Wasn't it called Va-?"

"DON'T!" Azura screamed, interrupting the man, who flinched in surprise. "You mustn't say its name here. There is a curse that punishes those who speak of it outside its borders."

"Oh…" he started. "I think I understand…"

"I'm sorry for bringing you there. I thought that you were also from my world…"

"It's alright. You were only trying to help."

"Right… What was that thing next to you? Whenever your hands glowed, some pink thing appeared next to you."

Johnny looked up at her, alarmed.

"Y-You were able to see Tusk?!"

Suddenly, the water in the lake began to ripple and splash as two figures emerged from the flat, reflective surface. One was a man with long blonde hair that curled at the end wearing a long pink suit. The other was an odd-looking, cyan and pink humanoid creature with two large antennae that could be mistaken for ears. Johnny tensed up and raised his hands to aim.

"Valentine!" he yelled at the man.

"You still have part of the spine, Joestar," the man in pink replied.

"You won't have it! I won't let you!"

"Yet I am your only way of going back to the main world. D4C!"

Then the other creature rushed forward and dragged Johnny, while he tried to attack him, into the lake. The two of them disappeared, leaving the man in pink and a dumbfounded songstress by the lake. Azura blinked and just stared at him in confusion.

"A-Are you his friend?" she asked nervously.

"No. Based on your reaction, I can assume that I do not exist in this world, correct?" Valentine said in response.

She slowly shook her head.

"Well, if it helps, pretend you never saw anything. Dojyaaa~n!"

The man in pink fell backwards into the lake and disappeared, not even making a splash once his body hit the water.

Azura blinked and thought about what had just happened to her. She was just wanting to sing by herself, but she ended up taking some person with a strange power to her kingdom who has now disappeared right in front of her. She shook her head and decided to move on with her life, but that was about to change as a woman with platinum-blonde hair silently approached the lake.

Author's Note:

This is a oneshot that I wrote for a crossover contest. I decided to use Fates because that's the Fire Emblem game that I'm not familiar with, and I used Steel Ball Run because Valentine's Stand, D4C, is perfect for any crossover to make sense because of its dimensional ability. This story takes place in the beginning of the D4C fight in SBR and just before Azura meets Corrin, who happened to make a slight cameo at the end. I might turn this into a whole story...

Also, I made the thumbnail for this story myself. I hope you enjoyed it! :)