inside the limbo (lol)

Opening Info :)

Hi okay. 

So I am crazy feral stupid for both of these games and also way too attached to the main characters for no reason, so I couldn't not write a weird crossover fanfic with overly complicated lore. #iamanormalpersonwithnormalhobbies

Disclaimer that I haven't finished all of Limbo yet, but I have played through the entirety of INSIDE (multiple times). This is not really accurate at all and is really dumb and oddly cheesy, but it's just for fun tbh so lesgoo. Singlehandedly kickstarting a fandom for these games bc they deserve the attention honestly

This will contain slight spoilers for both and is a post-canon type au for INSIDE, so the ending of that game will be spoiled. I want to say that if you haven't played or watched a playthrough of these games, I'd really prefer that you do that first, as Playdead deserves the support. I promise you they're worth your time.

This is also extremely cringe probably so yeah

Okay so, this fic requires some context because Playdead sure as hell won't do it themselves (iykyk). Obviously this is canon-divergent, it's pretty hard to transfer a puzzle platformer with no set story or dialogue to a written narrative, so a lot of stuff is different.

So here are the starter headcanons/info!

-To make this easier on me as a writer, I will be giving them names. One of my biggest pet peeves is when a fanfic has two characters of the same gender and the author continually uses only their pronouns to refer to them so you have no idea who the hell they're talking about. If I didn't give them names, that would just be... perpetual. (Also I gave them names in my head because again, overly attached.) The boy from Limbo is Rory and the boy from INSIDE is Simon. Just feels fitting, I dunno.

-Rory is 11 and Simon is 13. I feel like Rory's younger because he's a lot shorter than Simon, but it's hard to tell considering he's literally just a nameless dark silhouette (dear lord what am I doing with my life).

-They both can talk, but Simon rarely does and mostly communicates through body language and expressions. A fic with absolutely no dialogue would be a fun challenge but would probably get boring to read after a while.

-I want to give them distinctive personalities and traits, as much as I can. Rory is more on the adventurous and curious side, while Simon is extremely cautious and a bit neurotic. They're both very quiet and furtive. Rory is more sociable, if you can put it that way, motivated by the idea of companionship, and he dislikes the feeling of loneliness. His ultimate goal is to find his sister. Simon has previously only functioned in complete solitude with no desire of ever finding someone to befriend, so he's not used to working with others, but he doesn't necessarily dislike the idea of of it. Simon is fast and strong, while Rory is a bit slower and clumsier but a lot more nimble. Also he can't swim lol (in the game bro literally drowns in like 5 feet of water)

-As for the universe itself, the prologue gets kind of extra with explaining how they combined, but it's basically just an au where the separate threats from the games all exist in one intertwined world. This is also post-canon for INSIDE (but not really for Limbo since I haven't finished it). I'm not really sure where it will go plot-wise. This is kind of just an excuse to dump all my ideas for what a crossover between these two would be like, as well as to indulge in my weird obsession.

-Simon has eyes and a mouth and a nose and stuff lol. Rory basically looks how he does in canon because why not- him being a normal looking person is a lot harder to suspend your disbelief to than Slenderman Jr. having a face for fanfic purposes and I don't want to basically assign an entire design to a character that isn't mine.

I've been talking for way too long, so I'm gonna shut up and actually start with whatever the fuck this is.