Author's Notes: HAPPY AKUROKU DAY! Sorry it's so late but I had to work today so this was the only time I could upload it. I hope you all had a great 8/13. It's a two-shot. Also, since I'm a terrible fangirl I only have the first chapter for you today. But that just means I'm spreading out the goodness to tomorrow (I hope) as well. So…enjoy. Also reviews are my life. So give me some? I apologize for the complete lack of editing. Let me know what I've done wrong (but some compliments are appreciated too).

He was all tight skin stretched taught against the curves of his acid-bleached bones, gaunt hands shimmering in the near-sunlight like some sort of porcelain doll modeled after a Holocaust survivor. He could have been beautiful, but ended up leaning on the brink of disturbing instead. The skin under his eyes sagged under the weight of insomnia and slight bruises darkened his cheeks like a sinister blush, spreading down to below the collar of his worn out hoodie. He was the sort of guy that Roxas avoided like the plague, that much he could tell by the two small purple triangles inked onto his face. But he looked different from the other streetrats that wandered the trash-filled alleyways of the city. Something made him stand out other than the shockingly brilliant hue of his stiffly spiked hair. Roxas paused and glanced at his watch. 7:47, as always. Thirteen minutes exactly to get to class. Two for each block and one extra in case he ran into trouble. For a moment he thought that if he just walked a little faster he would have time to stop…before he remembered that the only reason people are homeless is because they don't deserve a home. He took a deep jagged breath and then held it as he walked briskly by so that he wouldn't have to smell the layers of filth on that shining shell of a body. He was so focused on making it past the man without breathing that he totally missed the way a piercing green gaze followed him as he weaved through the early morning crowd for three blocks before he turned the corner.

The sight of the man haunted him throughout the day. He'd never seen a homeless man outside his apartment before and it shocked him a little. They were easier to ignore when they were far from his home. It was easier to write them off as drug-addicts and lazy lunatics when he hadn't just stepped out of the (questionable) comfort of his sleazy apartment building. Something bothered him about the picture he had developed in his head. He had seen so many men crouched in the slime of the streets, hunched up in gray hoodie sweatshirts and dark, stained jeans, and they all fit the same mold.

It was Luxord who helped him figure it out. Between classes Luxord always liked to go down to the Papou Café and engage whoever was willing in a (questionably) fair game of poker. Roxas had agreed to accompany him today but he preferred to sit back and watch the other players slowly drain their pockets to Luxord's greedy hands. It was the fourth round when it hit him, just as Luxord was shuffling the cards for the last time, that the cards were the key. The homeless man in front of his apartment had looked like any other except he had been holding a deck of cards, aimlessly shuffling them in and out of place as he eyed the passerby and glanced longingly at the hollow emptiness of the small tin bowl in front of him. What was a homeless man doing with a deck of cards? It occurred to Roxas that perhaps it was a way to pass the hours – with no job and no family or friends it would be nice to have something to do while the sun shone. But somehow that didn't fit his image of the man. He could be trying to lure people into a game of poker, thereby stripping them of their loose change. But Roxas couldn't imagine anyone stopping on the street and just kneeling on the corner for a game of poker. He practically burned a hole in his head trying to reason it out for the rest of the day, but nothing quite made sense.

He stayed at the library late that night, trying to accomplish everything that he hadn't done during the day because of the distraction of his thoughts. By ten he had to admit to himself that nothing else was going to get done until tomorrow and just turned off his computer, packed up his bag and hurried home. If he walked a little faster than usual it was because it was late and he didn't want to get mugged. There were any number of horror stories about the shady alleyways in this part of town and Roxas didn't want to be a main character in any of them. So he kept his head down and clutched his briefcase with practically white knuckles and didn't look up from the sidewalk until he reached his apartment. There was no sign of a pale, bright haired man with a deck of cards, not that Roxas had been looking for one. He was glad that the strange man was gone. Now he wouldn't have to worry about what stupid tricks he had up his sleeve for parting Roxas from his money.

Roxas woke up exactly ten minutes early the next morning with a mind foggy enough that he really didn't know why he was doing it. Still, he dragged himself out of bed and into the shower and let a bit of cold water shock him awake before he actually got clean and dressed. He tapped his foot impatiently as he wolfed down a bowl of oatmeal and practically choked on it in his rush to finish. He was out the door at exactly 7:37, standing on the corner of the street and feeling a sense of déjà vu as he stared at the strange man on the corner. He had a…customer of sorts, a teenage girl with frizzy hair and a swoop of a skirt that was bunched up around her legs as she crouched in front of the man and stared down at the cards on the sidewalk. She had strings of beads woven into her hair and Roxas could practically smell the weed on her from where he stood. She thanked the man and dropped a few coins into the bowl at his feet and was on her way. Roxas watched the cards get shuffled back into the deck as he approached. The man glanced up.

"You really shouldn't be gambling this early in the morning." Roxas was surprised at how easily the words came out. He wasn't good with strangers. He wasn't good with people in general, actually. The man grinned, amused, and his eyes squinted up at Roxas.

"Tarot cards," he explained, spreading out a few cards so Roxas could see. "Pretty city boy want a reading?" His voice was deep and purring, like some sort of big cat that Roxas had never seen before because he'd certainly never seen anyone like this.

"A reading?"

"The future, the past, which moment's you're last…" his singsong voice trailed off and he gave Roxas another amused smile. "But the pretty city boy doesn't believe in magic." His bright green eyes widened at the last word and he flipped a card off the top of his deck so suddenly that Roxas almost jumped. He narrowed his gaze. The red-haired man turned the card around and studied it, cocking his head to one side and narrowing his eyes. "Interesting…" he murmured and Roxas was sure he had been all but forgotten.

"How much?" he asked and the man's gaze flicked back to his face. Studying him like a card.

"Depends what you want to know." The grin was back on his face, full force. "We've got full readings and three-card and two-card and one-card. You got something specific to ask?"

"Uh…" The surprising eloquence Roxas had found earlier had apparently left and he stumbled across his thoughts like roots in the forest of his mind. "Not really." The red-haired man nodded, face serious. "Something quick," Roxas added, as an afterthought, glancing at his watch, and the man chuckled.

"Pretty city boy has somewhere to be. Got to draw the cards at three," he murmured, eyes trained on the deck as he shuffled the cards. Roxas narrowed his gaze.

"My name's Roxas."

The man stopped shuffling and glanced up, grin stretched across his face like a clothesline. "Mine's Axel. A-X-E-L. Got it memorized? Here, shuffle the cards." He held up the deck and Roxas took it from him, glancing with half an interest at a few of the cards before shuffling it a few times.

"Love. Future. Helps and hindrances. Sound good?" Roxas opened his mouth to reply but apparently it wasn't necessary. "Good, draw three." Roxas pulled the cards one by one from the deck and the man laid them in front of him in a careful line. "Love, future, helps and hindrances," he murmured putting down the deck and studying the cards. He pointed to the first which held a picture of a man in a red cloak raising a wand of some sort. "Love. The magician." He tapped the card, thinking. "A strange card for love. Someone who uses others to succeed perhaps?" He looked at Roxas but the blonde-haired man shook his head.

"There must be a mistake. I don't…there isn't…" Roxas didn't know how to finish the sentence without feeling ashamed of his lack of a love life so he just stammered to a halt.

"Someone confident." Axel said after the pause and moved on, pointing to the next card. A picture of a shining angel looking over a couple that stood hand in hand in the sunlight. "Future. The lovers." A smirk spread across his face as he looked up at his customer. He winked. "There will be someone soon…" The third card held a picture of an old man, dressed regally and sitting on a throne. "Helps and hindrances. The emperor. Strict rules and guidelines." He glanced up. "What do you think? Help or a hindrance?"

"Help," Roxas replied automatically, thinking of his tight schedule and the rules he set out for himself. He couldn't imagine a world without rules and guidelines. They kept him grounded, focused, on track. Axel studied him for a moment.

"Could be," he finally replied, dropping his gaze to the cards and shuffling them back into the deck. "Three munny."

Roxas fished the coins out of his pocket and dropped them into the bowl. He glanced at his watch. 7:52. "Shit!" he turned quickly and started half-jogging down the street, desperate to make up for lost time. Thoughts of work and progress and money to be made kept him occupied until he finally shut down his computer at the end of the day. That was when he thought back on the prophecies Axel had set down for him and what they could possibly mean. That was when he decided to get another reading.

"I want to know if I'm going to get a job." If the sound of the blonde's voice hadn't gotten Axel's attention the noise of the coins hitting the tin certainly did. He glanced up.

"Pretty city boy is back for more," he grinned. "So you do believe in magic." Roxas decided not to respond to that and just looked expectantly at the deck. "Any particular job you had in mind?" Axel asked as he handed over the cards.

"There's this research position at a medical magazine. There's not much one can do with a major in psychology but this is pretty much my dream job…Anyway. You said you could do specific readings and…" he trailed off and drew the card on top of the deck.

"Ah…the knight of pentacles." Axel smiled and nodded. "He who is dutiful gets what he deserves and nothing less."

"Is that a yes?" Axel shrugged.

"The cards don't tell the future, Roxas, they just let you know your options. But it's a good omen. It means you need to be rational and make good decisions and work hard. But if you do those things you will certainly be rewarded. That a good enough answer for you?"

Roxas swallowed and then nodded slowly, staring at the deck of cards in his hand before he handed it back to Axel. "Thanks," he murmured, but it was more in reference to the use of his name than anything else.

His work, his studies, his future, his past. Roxas had been through it all, gradually emptying his pockets into that little tin bowl as he learned more and more about himself through a medium he trusted more than he thought he should. But Axel had been right about the job, and he was right about a lot of other things too – things that he couldn't have known otherwise because Roxas never told those things to anyone. The death of his mother, the hardships of having a twin who was consistently more loved, his fear of the future and of being alone. Roxas trusted those cards, and the fragile hands that read them so carefully. He was beginning to think that Axel knew more about him than he did himself. And he was beginning to look suspicious. After all, most customers get a tarot reading once, maybe twice. Every day seemed a bit excessive. So he was grateful for the excuse his professor gave him when he suggested that Roxas do an essay on philanthropy, accompanied by at least a few good deeds. He was less grateful now, sitting across from the redhead he'd invited to dinner and trying to ignore the tension humming through his veins. He looked so different in the dark skinny jeans and tight t-shirt he'd borrowed from Riku, and Roxas was more than a little shocked by the transformation. Axel had the decency to at least pretend not to notice the way Roxas was staring at him.

"So…tell me something about yourself."

"What don't you know?"

Axel rolled his eyes. "A thousand things. Your favorite color, the music you listen to, what school you go to, where you used to live, why you live in the city…" he trailed off and glanced up expectantly. Roxas swallowed and looked down at his own plate, trying to find the answers in the half-eaten spaghetti. He took a deep breath.

"Blue, all sorts of music but mostly stuff you wouldn't hear on the radio like Say Anything and Death Cab for Cutie, Radiant Gardens, Destiny Island, because I love to be in the center of everything." He glanced up. Axel was smirking at him. "And you?"

"Hmmm…" Axel leaned back into the padded booth seat and closed his eyes, thinking. "Red. Whatever music I can get. Don't go to school. Used to live in the middle of nowhere. Thought the city would be a nice change of pace," he opened his eyes and gave Roxas an amused glance. "More so than I thought."

"What got you into tarot reading?" Roxas found that now they were conversing he didn't want to stop. Which was unusual for him since he generally had the urge to slap people if they didn't shut up within five minutes of when they began talking.

"Growing up there was this little shop in town that sold all sorts of weird stuff like dream catchers and tarot cards. I found this deck one day and I just…couldn't look away, you know?" Roxas, who was staring again, could only nod. "It was the first time I ever stole something," he murmured, glancing out the window. "And you?" he asked, turning his eyes back to Roxas.

Roxas smiled. "Well there was this crazy guy sitting outside my apartment one day and he told me I didn't believe in magic. I had to prove him wrong."

"And did you?" There was more emotion laced into the question than there should have been and it was making Roxas nervous the way everything the redhead said sounded like an innuendo.

"No," he finally managed, breaking eye contact so he could find the words. "Everything he said was true."

If Roxas slept a little unsoundly that night it was because there was a stray cat in the alley right outside his window and he kept trying to put on some sort of performance. It was not because he was awoken multiple times by a rather vivid dream involving a lot of skin and some brilliantly colored red hair.