After his reawakening, the scientist had spent many long hours at his window, gazing out at the borders of his enclosed world with a vacant expression on his face. He was one of the last to wake, although nobody could say for certain why: and even once he had he still slept frequently, sometimes for days at a time. His body still showed ghosts of trauma, littered across his skin like old scars. The others fretted over him. The boy he had raised as his own son, a man now, sat by his side as he passed through those long transitions from sleep to lucidity, nightmares they had all fought through, when the scientist would jolt at imaginary stimuli and cry out as though the torments of his past had returned to his flesh. While he was awake, they receded to dark corners, leaving only apprehension and paranoia; each time he slept anew their hold on him was a little weaker, until one morning he appeared in the bowels of the castle and asked to meet with the man who had once been his assassin. Many things had changed since the death of the Nobody named Vexen. They made their peace. Below them Radiant Garden sprawled with new life, new promise, new beginnings.
"Do you think," said Even to his companion, "That the others will have awoken too?"
Lea, with his face clear of irony, no longer the wild card he had once been, shrugged. The black coat of old days was gone now. "I'd be surprised if they hadn't."
In his other life, Lea had made many enemies. They all had. The Darkness showed them what monsters lay in the pits of their beings, what creatures without love and compassion were truly capable of. What desperation would do to a man possessed by its bitter, invasive tendrils. The Heart is a complex thing, Even had written in his journal; Even when we did not have Hearts, we were never able fully to ascertain what we had lost. His journal was full of many such statements. They sounded attractive. Wise, even. But they served no real purpose, answered no questions. They were little more than exercises of poetry.
Even said, after a long silence, "Do you think we will encounter them again?"
The sun was beginning to set, turning the fountains to diamond dust. Lea glanced away, lost in the recesses of his mind.
"Not the ones that mattered."
Even recalled the Boy, the special boy and his special shadow, and the special boy who came before him, who saved Ienzo from the clutches of his special shadow, once. Then blue eyes of a different tone found hold in his mind.
"No," he said, cold. "No, indeed."
He looked up into the sky. The stars were still invisible, but soon he would catch their glinting flickers, tantalising promises of brave new worlds separate from his own. Somewhere out there was a man who recalled through the glass of changing lives engaging in a great and debilitating battle of wills, and winning. Even hoped that his victory was hollow.
The clash between the personalities of Vexen and Marluxia had been both immediate and inevitable. Most assumed that they fought because of their differences, but the truth was that at their core the two Nobodies could not have been more similar: both vain to a fault, stubborn past common sense, and cripplingly proud - it was nothing more than their purposes that were crossed. Even could not recall who had struck the first blow, but it didn't really matter. They had done terrible things to one another, to others, all for the sake of some personal one-upmanship that they should not have even had the capacity to care for. The other apprentices bandied around the word "betrayal" when they spoke of Marluxia's final order against Vexen, but no: a betrayal would have been if the Graceful Assassin had not taken the opportunity to usher in that one last, final and spectacular revenge.
Even had made his peace. The others thought he had been tortured, abused, by his superiors in that castle where memories go to die. It was worse than that. His heart thudded reassuringly in its cage, keeping controlled the part of him capable of such acts of shocking inhumanity. He gazed impassively into the darkening sky, comforted by the knowledge that out there, somewhere, was a man his equal in depravity.
He turned from the window. His room was plain and bare. He had not lived in it yet. The others, some of them, rushed to fill their spaces with memories of their more human lives; but Even was taking his time. He could not find ground within himself to argue that he was the same as the Even who had come before. Lea, close to the door, was inspecting the empty trinket shelves, the unlit fireplace. Noticing Even again, as though for the first time, he shook his head and made his leave.
But they both underestimated the propensity of those who mattered to be drawn together, no matter how far flung in the universe they might have found themselves. The legendary paopu was just a fruit. The truth was that people who had been connected had a way of finding one another again, even when they didn't want to. Which was why, years hence, Even found himself open-jawed before his assistant, who had just come to tell him that a man with hair the colour of roses was in the foyer, asking for his time. Even was just copying up the last of the day's data at the time; while the assistant stood awkwardly in the doorway he glanced up at his tables and spreadsheets, suddenly picking out every instance of the number eleven, even though he didn't want to.
He said, without turning back, his voice hoarse; "I shall be with him presently."
None of the other former Nobodies, the four that remained, had been located. Braig and Lea had made some paltry attempt to recover the men who had been Demyx and Luxord (the general consensus was that the traitors were better left wherever they had found themselves), but their travels were limited to those worlds with mainstrain connections, and their efforts had amounted to nothing. Even had thought about finding Number Eleven; many times over had he considered hijacking a gummy ship or opening anew the corridors of darkness in order to see those beautiful, malicous eyes again: but such thoughts never stood up to scrutiny in the light of day. What would they say to each other? How could they share the residues of the guilt and shame that their other selves had never felt?
Even cast one final critical eye over his table, but found no gaps in his work. He delayed the inevitable for a moment longer, but eventually empathy for the stranger waiting awkwardly outside won out. Even's mind raced with questions as he pulled away his lab coat, untied his hair, removed his safety glasses, the foremost being how the man once named Marluxia had found him and perhaps more importantly, why? Out of the corner of his eye he could see a tall man through the glass doors, facing away from him. Standing close to the potted plants in the corner. Broad shoulders. Tight clothes. Bare arms.
Even steeled himself, and stepped through onto the mottled-grey carpet, the creak of the door alerting his visitor to his presence.
The first thing that Even noticed was an unexpected warmth in the man's eyes. That same clear blue, the colour of calm seas on a sunny day, yes: but no evil was lurking in their depths. Even realised that part of him was searching for it, for any sign that the monster his other half had known was still hiding beneath that pretty face. Then, a moment later, he noticed that this stranger was watching him searchingly too, perhaps looking for the very same thing. For Vexen may have lost in the dying days of Castle Oblivion, but he had still been a monster.
Finally, Even broke the spell by coughing inconspicuously and offering his hand, introducing himself in a clipped, professional tone. It was surreal, the familiarity of this man's warm palm, when even his name was a mystery.
"Lumaira," said the man, and Even felt a shiver light his spine at that pleasant baritone. "It's a pleasure to meet you." His gaze happened to flick downwards for the briefest of seconds, a movement that Even would have missed had he not been watching this Lumaira's eyes so very intently.
Their hands dropped down to their sides again. Even made a move as though to step forwards and together they left the foyer and its receptionist, out onto the cobbled streets of Radiant Garden. The sun had set some hours previously, leaving unshuttered windows and cast iron lamps to light Even's way. Instinctively, his feet took him homewards.
As they walked, he said almost to the air and not his companion, "How did you find me?" And then he added, emphatically, "Why?"
Lumaira did not speak for some time. He glanced around the town in the way that visitors do, his eyes occasionally lingering on small things: the potted plants on somebody's doorstep, the clock above a shop front, a notice board containing adverts for odd jobs and unwanted furniture. Eventually he said hesitantly, "Marluxia would not rest until I had found you." After another silence, this one more brief, he continued, "Gummy ships. Corridors of darkness. Old magics. It didn't matter." He glanced at Even questioningly.
"Marluxia? Did he not perish in Castle Oblivion?"
Lumaira shook his head, although to disagree or to clear his thoughts Even couldn't be sure. "He haunts me." He opened his mouth as though to elaborate, but a frown came over his pretty features, and when he spoke again his words were hurried, as though he were eager to change the subject. "So all of the elders are here? The apprentices to Ansem? Saïx? Axel?"
"They go by Isa and Lea now," Even said. Lumaira looked at him again, their eyes this time catching for a longer moment. It was strange to see emotions on the man's face, clear and complex and natural; while Vexen had found it easy to forget that Marluxia's every laugh and scowl was nothing more than a façade his acting was a poor imitation of Lumaira's unguarded expressions.
"And their Nobodies... perished, too?"
Even looked away. A long time had passed since their lost hearts had returned to Radiant Garden; the former Nobodies had drifted apart into new lives, by common consent the Darkness best left forgotten. They paid penance for their crimes together, laying new plaster over old cracks until their lives barely looked mended at all.
"He haunts you," Even parroted, not wanting to answer Lumaira's question. The young man, watching only his hard-heeled boots clack against the pavement now, seemed to slump a little.
"The other Nobodies have perished," he repeated. He looked up at the stars, as though contemplating which of them he had travelled to, searching for just one man. "So Vexen is dead?" Seeing Even nod, he let out a sigh, saying at length, "We did terrible things, Even. To one another. To bystanders. The witch. The boy."
After they had awoken, and after the dust had cleared, the apprentices had found themselves together with their communal burden of guilt and shame. They spoke. They wept for their master and their city. They drove the demons away. They made peace.
Perhaps it was only reasonable that Marluxia had not quite been laid to rest, after all.
"She was a sweet girl, the witch. I suppose she is dead too."
"Nobodies don't die," Even heard himself saying. A flash of burning metal seared his mind for the briefest of seconds. Now instead of being nobody, the girl was nothing at all. She was off the hook.
Even shuddered, despite himself.
"No," Lumaira agreed coldly, "No, they don't."
They had reached Even's house. He lived alone still; few of the town's eligible women ever caught his eye, and moreover they were inclined to give him a wide berth owing - Even liked to think, anyway - to rumours of the ungodly hours he kept thanks to his consuming line of work. Lumaira followed Even in through the door, noticing details again.
"Excuse the mess," said Even.
"Oh, it's nothing."
They said nothing as Even observed the rituals of tea-making, except when he pulled the sugar cubes out of the cupboard, so Lumaira had been alone with his thoughts for a good time when he said, his voice full of trepidation, "Do you think that in other circumstances, things might have been... different, between us?"
Even led him into the front room, where piles of datasheets obstructed every flat surface Even had been able to find. He recalled nostalgically a time in the very distant past when it had been the books and toys of a young child littering the house instead as he rushed to accommodate Lumaira on the sofa, dumping stacks of paper carelessly on top of one another in the process.
"You mean if we had met now, and not then?"
Lumaira was very interested in the surface of his tea. Even happened to notice his nails, short but well kept, a slight glistening sheen to their surface suggesting layers of clear varnish. In the warm light of the room, Even found himself noticing other things, some new and others afresh, like the pinkness of Lumaira's lips and the way he crossed his legs as he sat, idly, as though he hardly knew he was doing it.
Finally, he looked up and said; "He remembers you fondly."
Even frowned. Fondness was not a word he would grace any of his memories of Marluxia with. "There was no love lost between them, I can assure you." But evidently this was a bad thing to say, because Lumaira set down his tea and put his head in his hands.
"He sees things differently now," he said, tone muffled, "We see things differently." And he let out a long, low groan. "He haunts me, Even. Why is that? How can you have lain your ghosts to rest when that monster shadows my every waking thought, reminding me that he represents the darkest facets of my personality?" Even opened his mouth to offer the theory of Lumaira's isolation up for inspection, but before he had a chance to speak his companion said rather forcefully: "It's because he won, isn't it? It's because in the end, he was the one who won."
Even thought about the glassy memories of his former self's demise.
"Perhaps," he agreed carefully, "Then perhaps a truce would lay your mind to rest."
Lumaira picked up his tea again, looking deliberately its rippling surface. "A truce," he echoed into his cup. "A truce, yes, perhaps." Then he looked up and said, completely out of the blue, "I am a Prince, you know. Of the highest order. Naturally, my return from the grave was rather less than welcome." And he chuckled humourlessly. "I was not, it seems, destined to usurp any throne, my own or otherwise." He lifted up his tea and sipped at it pensively. He didn't look like a prince, with his modern attire and long, deliberately dishevelled hair. Even wondered for how many years he had been travelling.
"I take it you left your homeworld fairly soon after your resurrection, then."
Lumaira laughed, the sound this time more bitter.
"I was thrown onto the streets like some common beggar." Even noticed that he did not say how long he stayed there. "I have since seen many worlds. Some familiar, others less so. There are hundreds of worlds, Even. Thousands if you seek just one man."
But Radiant Garden is a global hub, Even thought. It has been Connected. People flock here from every corner of the shattered universe. He didn't voice those opinions. Lumaira seemed too tired to be told that his long search may have been unnecessary if he had but stopped and used a little logic.
"You must have a lot of stories to tell," he said instead, opting for a safer conversation topic and hoping that Lumaira would take the bait.
"Oh, yes," Lumaira replied distractedly. He empted his cup and set it down again, this time making the effort to reach over to the coffee table. "My journeys were..." he hunted for a suitable word, "Eventful." Even couldn't help but noticed that an air of melancholy had settled around him. A thought struck him: Lumaira had spent years of his life searching for him, and what terrible, lonely years they must have been, only to be taken into a dingy living room and offered a hot cup of tea. Even could not be sure what the pink-haired man had been expecting, but he guessed that this was probably an anticlimax.
"It's over now," he said lamely. "You've found what you were looking for."
Lumaira looked down at his own chest, then said rather coldly; "I wasn't looking for you, Even. I was looking for peace of mind." But then he seemed to catch himself, adding, "I'm sorry. It's late."
Outside, Even noticed that it was beginning to drizzle. Radiant Garden had been expecting rain for several days, and now it seemed that the clouds were finally beginning to break. He shook his head, standing to take their tea cups back out to the kitchen.
"I understand. Have you eaten?" A true bachelor, he didn't have much in his cupboards to offer his guest, but he thought it rude not to ask. Thankfully, though, Lumaira nodded.
"Radiant Garden boasts some fine restaurants. I have been here for a few days," he admitted. "It did not take long to establish your residence once I arrived, but..." he trailed off, unsure how to finish. It didn't matter: Even understood.
"So do you have a place to go tonight?" This was perhaps a harder question, given their shared past. A slight flush even appeared on Lumaira's cheeks, and the question seemed to stall him for a few moments before he said - very quietly as though someone were eavesdropping on his conversation - "Could you ever see yourself in the same way again, after the things Vexen did?"
Before Lumaira's sudden appearance Even had not, truthfully, thought about Vexen for some time. At first, his deceased Nobody had consumed and terrified him; but once he had come to realise that Vexen was not his true personality but merely a (dark and perverted, admittedly) facet of a broader self, he had been able to rectify his shame and move on. Perhaps Lumaira was still afraid of his shadows. So he took the younger man up to his room - perhaps the only place in his house that wasn't covered with papers, for Even made a point of separating work and rest - and patiently explained to him that while the creature that called itself Marluxia was a part of him, it was a small and insignificant part. Lumaira listened carefully, eyes rarely leaving Even, whether that was his face or his body. Then, once Even had finished, he looked down and said very carefully; "I have the same desires as him. He just acted on them."
Considering what Marluxia had been capable of, this was quite a confession to make.
"Yes," Even said; "Me too."
Lumaira looked at him for a second, his eyes burning and something in his expression almost afraid. The sexual tension seemed to howl out between them. Even began to rise up from the armchair he had been occupying, but before he could move more than a foot Lumaira suddenly became part of his personal space, body quivering and expression wild.
"You win," he said with such a growl in his tone of voice that all of Even's senses recalled Marluxia, "You win, you bastard, now stop playing around and fuck me." And then a look of surprise seemed to come over his face, but evidently not enough surprise to stop him bruising Even's mouth. "He was always such a tease, wasn't he, but..." he tried to continue in a rather muffled voice but eventually gave up, nothing but appreciative sounds rising from his throat.
Even tried to think logically, but that was very difficult with Lumaira's solid form pressing desperately against him and moreover his own repressed desires deciding that this was a very good time to make themselves known. All he managed to say was "Bed", and even then it took several minutes for either of them to gain enough conscious control over their bodies to relocate. The spell bent a little as Lumaira dropped Even down onto the covers, and in that moment of lucidity they looked at one another sheepishly, like little children caught red-handed with their fingers in the cookie jar. And chocolate all around their mouths.
Lumaira said; "I suppose it would only be fair if I..." And then his eyes crinkled a little and his mouth widened into an amused, somewhat resigned smile. He shook his head as though many words were vying for attention in his head but he could not make himself say any of them, his hair swinging, and instead of finishing his sentence he kissed Even again. Even could not help but compare the man to his former self, noticing how Lumaira kissed without bitterness or brutality but with something a lot more like affection. Fondness, perhaps.
They arranged themselves according to fairness, and as they were also removing their obstructive garments Lumaira said; "I remember when you first did this to him. He was shocked. And then he longed for it."
"He was certainly very good at disguising that," Even retorted dryly, sitting on this stranger's legs contemplating the sudden surreal turn his evening had taken from the moment Lumaira had appeared. His comment made Lumaira laugh.
"We all have to keep up appearances. He became very accomplished at losing deliberately, when he fancied it. Although not always," he added, seeing Even raise his eyebrows, "You played a hard game."
"Vexen," Even corrected. "I don't play games with people."
"No," Lumaira said apologetically. He closed his eyes and pressed his shoulders against the mattress, taking in a deep breath, although whether from deep introspective thought or pressing arousal, Even wasn't sure: although given that Lumaira then reached out to stroke his bare legs, a sigh escaping his lips, he was inclined to believe the latter. "Did you find any of the others? Larxene? Demyx?"
"You're the only one. We paid the matter to rest some years ago after searches proved fruitless." Even did not mention that they had never searched for Lumaira: after the lengths the younger man had gone to to find him, it seemed somewhat insolent that Even had done nothing of the sort.
And evidently some long chain of thoughts passed through Lumaira's mind, because a few moments later he opened his blue eyes again and said with feeling, "I am so sorry, Vexen." He did not correct himself.
Even recalled his Nobody's ungraceful elimination. Even Vexen, though he had begged for mercy he knew he would never be granted, understood that he had placed his cards on the table, and lost. He had felt insulted, yes, that Marluxia had used Axel of all people to do his dirty work, but perhaps that was the point, wasn't it: they were both constantly seeking to add insult to injury.
Even looked at the man below him. Suddenly he felt sorry for Lumaira, trapped in purgatory for disturbed desires that might never have come to light were it not for fate.
"It was all just part of the game."
Lumaira looked away. Even noticed for the first time that a glistening moisture had formed in his eyes.
"I broke the rules," he protested. I.
"There were no rules."
Lumaira reached out and Even thought for a second that their lips would meet again, but instead the younger man simply pulled him into a crushing embrace. For several long minutes they exchanged no words, until Lumaira relinquished his hold - reluctantly, it seemed to Even - to wipe a hand across his eyes.
"He haunts me," he said again, voice distant. "He looks at men on the streets and tells me all the foul things he would do to them, then leaves me alone with the shame."
Even did not know how to reply. What was there to say? Fortunately, however, Lumaira continued after a brief pause: "Sometimes I don't know where he ends and I begin." Then he looked at Even as if seeing him for the first time, like his eyes had somehow become stuck, and said, "You are as attractive as he remembers."
Even stifled a laugh. "I doubt it," he chuckled, "It's been a long time. And Vexen was hardly a young man even then."
"Age didn't matter to him," Lumaira said, distant again. "He wanted to break you. And then he wanted you to break him. I think..." He considered his words carefully, stretching again as he did so, this time bumping into Even's bare skin, "I think you were the only one he considered his equal."
"What strange ways he had of expressing his opinions," Even remarked, making Lumaira laugh.
"We are strange indeed." And this seemed to be conversation enough; he leaned forwards and kissed Even again, rekindling the cooling coals inside him. When they broke apart for a moment he said, conversationally, "I thought that perhaps you would hate me."
Even smiled. Lumaira was very close. He smelled of hotel rooms and cool nights on open ground. In his pupils, Even saw the stars that he had travelled to. And in those small signs of age that Marluxia had not had - the slight lines around Lumaira's eyes, his skin beginning to grow thin and fragile, a new wiriness to his muscles - Even found beauty, simple and clean.
"Why would I hate you?" He murmured, taking the moment to explore the tendons of Lumaira's neck, "I've only just met you."
Oh, but Lumaira's body was so familiar. Trailing lower, Even found old scars his other self had inflicted, so faded they were barely noticeable, cuts and grazes and the burns of ice. Perhaps he should have recalled the pain that created them, but he merely thought of his own pale memories of laceration and smiled. His mind idly wandering, he thought of the romantic turns of his life since his return from the void - or lack thereof - and wondered if Lumaira had found time for intimate liaisons during his travels. From the way the younger man was moaning at his touch, he doubted it, but he made no comment on the matter, since he didn't want to admit exactly how long it had been for him too.
Oh, but what a beautiful reunion, both with pleasure and this graceful assassin.
"Do you think," he asked - pretending not to realise that he was a little out of breath - as he removed himself from Lumaira to hunt for a satisfactory form of lubrication, "That their battle was to the death?"
"Surely that was self evident," Lumaira muttered.
Even's fingers touched upon the appropriate bottle in his medicine cabinet. Pulling it out from the corner it had become nestled in, he glanced over in Lumaira's direction. He was stretching again, toes just touching the board at the foot of the bed, his chest rising and falling as he gasped for air. He was such a beautiful creature, Even found himself thinking, as much in his demeanour as his appearance. There was something catlike about him. Even was certain that there were many passions hidden beneath those blazing eyes, and all he had to do was touch Lumaira in the right ways to coax them out.
"Well," he said, trying to sound offhand, even though the boundaries were blurring and that was a terrible thing, "We're both still alive, aren't we?"
Lumaira watched him without blinking all the way back to the bed, and then as Even leaned over him he said in a deliciously malevolent voice "Yes, we are," and kissed Even forcefully, pressing against him as though to knock him down and take his rightful place above him. Even's guts curled, with the same mixture of fear and arousal that had always enticed Vexen so much. He had thought over the years quite frequently about the fact that he was a sadist, but he had forgotten quite how much the opposite was true: that the only thing stopping him begging to be abused was pride. He fought against Lumaira's attempts to best him tooth and nail, turning the union of their bodies into a game of tug and war and moreover one that he would enjoy losing as much as he would winning.
"Still ashamed?" He managed to ask once he had Lumaira back down in the pillows, pushing his legs apart just to make him gasp. Lumaira laughed openly, breathlessly.
"I will always be ashamed," he said, and gladly welcomed Even into him. Later, he would cling to Even and weep, for the death of his innocence and the loss of his home, but in the thoughtless world of passion he was a powerful creature even as his body curled to accept the punishments his other self was due. For that was why their war had been so perfect, and so deadly: because they were sadomasochists, the both of them, sick to the core and once liberated from their inhibitions never quite able to turn back.
Happy (slightly delayed) 411 day. I wanted to try to explore a different way of thinking about Marluxia and Vexen's relationship for the occasion. Sorry about that pathetic excuse for a sex scene.