"Larxene?"
We'd been watching television for some time when Marluxia finally spoke. There was an uncertain tone to his voice this time that worried me.
I leaned up to glance at him and his eyes were fixed on the screen in front of us. This was unusual. He always made eye contact with me when we spoke.
"Yeah?"
"Please don't hit me any more,"
I laughed at him. Punches and kicks were my way of showing affection; Marluxia knew that. "Such a wuss that you're giving up already?"
His eyebrows furrowed.
"I'm being serious, Larxene,"
It was a tone of voice he'd never used on me before. Sometimes, when other people overstepped the mark, he'd talk to them that way, but never me. I'd always figured that this was because I was different to them; better somehow.
I wasn't prepared for the hardness in his voice, and thought he was still joking.
"Oh, come on, it's just a bit of fun!" I exclaimed, punching him lightly on the shoulder. He recoiled, wincing.
"I know," He said, voice softer now. "It's just really beginning to hurt,"
"Now you're just being pathetic," If anyone had a high pain threshold, it was Marluxia. Once, on a mission to the Deep Jungle, he'd been shot four times in the leg, and without any potions, still kept walking long enough to reach our rendezvous- point, a good half a mile away.
Marluxia squeezed me a little tighter in his arms, and didn't reply.
We watched TV for a while longer, but I felt awkward curled up on Marluxia's lap. So at the end of the program, I excused myself and went to bed.
Just before I left he blew me a kiss. His eyes were sad.
It bothered me so much that I couldn't sleep. I twisted and turned in my creaky old bed, trying to get comfortable in amongst the piles of junk. What I really wanted was Marluxia to be here with me, but he seemed to be having a mood in which I didn't want to get involved. It worried me a little. Marluxia was a man of seemingly endless patience - or so I had thought.
Eventually midnight rolled around and I gave in and portaled to his bedroom.
He was sitting in the armchair next to his bed, reading by the light of the bedside lamp. He didn't seem to notice me.
I crept across the room and perched on the other side of the bed. He glanced up.
"Hey,"
"Hi,"
There was that same underlying sadness in his voice that I couldn't ignore.
He put his book away and stood up.
"I guess you couldn't sleep," He murmured as he opened up his wardrobe to sift through and find a pair of pyjamas.
"No. You disturbed me back there," I tried to joke, to lighten the conversation a little. I didn't like Marluxia like this. He wasn't right.
"Don't worry about it," Marluxia replied. He pulled out a silky shirt and matching trousers - black, with dusty pink trim - and quickly changed.
In the half-light it would have been easy to miss the dark patches all over his arms and torso, but I saw them.
Revulsion flared in the pit of my stomach.
"Wait," I said, and he paused, one arm in the shirt. I quickly walked over to inspect the bruises. They were horrible, blotchy marrs on his perfect body.
I ghosted my hand over one of them and saw his muscles tense briefly before relaxing.
"Oh God, Mar," I said. "Why didn't you tell me?"
He shrugged.
I never thought I'd be in an abusive relationship. And never, ever one where I was the perpetrator.
I felt sick. I was disgusted by myself. I must have been hitting Marluxia for months, repetitively, endlessly. Laughing. And he'd just sat by and taken every single blow.
"What's wrong with you?" I demanded, clinging to him. I knew he knew I meant "What's wrong with me?" but I personal pride made sure that I'd never form those words.
He wrapped his arms around me, and still said nothing.
Hollow flares of almost-emotion were toying with me, I knew that. But I couldn't help myself.
"Why didn't you say anything?" I cried again. "Why?!"
"I didn't think it was that important," Marluxia finally admitted.
"Important? Look at you! That's not important to you?!"
I angrily jabbed at his chest and he let out a harsh, pained breath, stepping backwards.
"What kind of sick masochist are you?!"
"I'm sorry," Marluxia said.
He didn't deserve my ranting tirade, but I was utterly furious with him, heart or no. How dare he just let me hit him for so long?
"Don't apologise!" I screamed, well aware I was making no sense. "Just shut up! How could you?"
He didn't even attempt to reason with me. He just stood there, absorbing all my hatred and fury as I screamed abuse at him, abuse that if anybody didn't deserve, it was him.
"Why won't you talk?" I finally demanded.
He just lifted a hand to brush a stray lock of hair from my face.
Then he leaned down to give me a gentle kiss and I melted, surrendered completely, collapsed into his waiting arms and sobbed all the way to the warm, blissful comfort of the bed and the cosy darkness of sleep, tinted with the scent of roses.
In the morning I made sure to wake up before Marluxia and make him a cup of tea and breakfast in bed as a lame sort of apology for last night.
I was amazed at how easy the man was to please, as he deeply inhaled the tea fumes and let out a fully contented sigh.
"I thought tea was for drinking, not smoking," I joked sardonically as I scrambled back into the bed to give him a cuddle. He laughed, a deep, rumbling chuckle, and relief swept over me. Marluxia was back.
"The thing about herbal teas is that they always smell nicer than they taste,"
"Does that mean that camomile tea ought to be a crime against humanity?" I asked. Camomile tea was one of Marluxia's personal favourites. I loathed it.
He amiably ruffled my hair as he took a sip then set the teacup down on the bedside table.
"I ought to be getting up," He said thoughtfully, gazing out at the dusky light from the moon outside. "I still haven't finished the report from our last mission,"
"You can copy mine, if you like," I offered.
Reports seemed to be the bane of our existence. Once we'd persuaded Xemnas to give us back our proper mission partners (each other), and Marluxia had finally been relieved of his lifetime washing up sentence by Demyx and yet more peas, it seemed like things couldn't get an better. Sure, some of the missions we were sent on were boring to the point of repetitive head to wall contact, but we always found a way of spicing them up. Much to Xemnas' horror, of course.
But there was nothing interesting about reports, ever. We both had our different methods of dealing with this problem; I would make mine short and conscise - perhaps two or three sentences, just to show Xemnas how much I loathed them, and Marluxia-
Marluxia's reports were works of art. He'd spend hours meticulously filling out every single detail, transcripts, diagrams and maps included, until the report was more of, say, an epic novel. We both knew that Xemnas never read either of them. But it was still funny. It was our petty revenge for all of Xemnas' stupid demands and orders.
Marluxia shook his head, laughing.
"I probably have. Several times."
"Well, one more quotation couldn't hurt, could it?"
There was a knock at the door.
Marluxia heaved himself out of bed.
"I'll get it,"
I took my time following Marluxia to the door. Demyx was outside with his silly little note cards.
"Xemnas says he wants your report from the last mission-" The musician paused to check his card- "Immediately. Yeah,"
"I didn't realise you were our beloved Superior's new messenger boy," Marluxia said. Demyx grinned nervously.
"Yeah, well... He also wants to see you in his office,"
"I'm afraid that's not possible," Marluxia said, for all the world regretful. "You see, I'm actually invisible,"
Demyx's expression of utter confusion was hilarious. Once I'd finished laughing, I gently shoved Marluxia out of the doorway.
"Don't tease him, Mar,"
"I wasn't. I really am invisible,"
Demyx laughed a little.
"Ye-heah, I get it," He said. Which was weird, because there wasn't anything to get. "Larxene, what're you here for?"
Demyx still hadn't noticed that Marluxia and I were officially going out. This was, I supposed, understandable, since the boy was about as thick skulled as... well, there was really nothing to compare him with. Demyx lived in his own, happy bubble, oblivious to everything around him.
"I was just about to paint Marluxia's nails," I dead panned.
Demyx's eyes lit up with understanding.
"Really? You know, Xemnas paints his nails. All kinds of pretty colours. I saw him doing it once when I went to drop off a report,"
We usually ignored Demyx. It was for the best.
As soon as he was gone, we resolved to finish Marluxia's report, plus a few odd details that weren't quite true. At least, I was pretty certain that we never actually chained one of our victims to a tree and then repeatedly slapped him with a goldfish until he told us where he'd hidden his secret stash of teddy bears.
The best thing about really, really long reports is that you can slam them onto tables with such force that they send all other loose papers on the table flying into utter disarray. This is exactly what Marluxia always does. Xemnas hates him for it.
"There you are, Superior," Marluxia said with mocking politeness once . "As requested,"
Xemnas picked up the heavy stack of papers and flicked through it. "You know, XI, you don't have to go into quite so much detail," He said, filing our masterpiece into a draw, never to see the light of day again.
"I believe that, as our Superior, you deserve to know the full extent of what happens during our missions. That is, after all, what reports are for, is it not?" Marluxia replied smoothly.
Xemnas ground his teeth. It was glorious to ruffle the man's feathers.
"Perhaps," He said. "I should begin to limit your supply of paper. Then, at least, you won't be wasting both of our time by writing quite so much,"
Marluxia shrugged enigmatically.
"Perhaps,"
Xemnas glared coolly at us both as he stood to reach another filing cabinet, lifting out a stapled collection of papers.
"Your next mission," He said, handing it to Marluxia. "As well as XII, X and XIII will be accompanying you, under your lead,"
Marluxia raised his eyebrows slightly as he studied the mission details.
"Any particular reason for this sudden responsibility?" He asked.
"An experiment, shall we say," Xemnas replied. "I want this mission completed to the highest standard. Perhaps X and XIII will be able to show you something about following orders correctly,"
Not a chance, I thought, as we made our way downstairs to harass whoever was in the common room. Marluxia and I would always do things our way. You couldn't change that by sending us on a mission with an eccentric, British, tea drinker extroardinaire and an emo midget. No offence to Luxord and Roxas respectively, of course.
.... Weird little drabblefic that takes place some time after Gay Boyfriend. And does Xemnas really paint his nails? We may never know...