It's always the same, every night. The darkness comes back, in his nightmares, slick and cool, spreading and weightless, curling and curving across his body, looking for a way in. He shudders and chokes and writhes, desperately trying to fight it off as it penetrates his body, seeking vulnerability, weakness. It hopes to snuff out his light, to smother his heart and split his body asunder.
He cannot fight it alone. He is weakening, lack of true sleep making his skin dull and his nerves shake. Sora sleeps. He goes to Axel.
Axel tries, though Riku doesn't know if he should attribute it to willfulness or stubbornness, or a twisted sense of self satisfaction, but he insists on coming back to Riku, night after night, sleeping on a makeshift bed on the floor of Riku's room. Every night, Riku wakes to Axel's wide eyes and his chakrams glowing dimly in the dark. They try sleeping with their weapons out, but Riku finds it drains him, as if the body is not truly resting when the heart is pouring its energies out into the keyblade. Axel begins to show the strain too, the skin under his eyes darkening, limbs becoming clumsy, falling asleep at odd times of the day.
And Riku is so very very tired, so very ready to give in, to give up and let go. But Axel clenches his fists and shakes his head no, no, you can't.
It's six weeks with no real rest, Riku feeling like even the dim Twilight Town sun could just bleach him out and leave him empty, when he wakes, again, in the night, to Axel leaning over him, whispering his name in hushed tones.
The darkness is still there, shifting and rubbing and rolling around him, around Axel, and he immediately reaches one hand out for Way to Dawn. Axel's hand closes around his wrist, fingers gentle but firm, holding. You have to- he says, stopping with a shiver as the darkness strokes up his side. Licking his lower lip, eyes bright, he leans closer to Riku and says you have to show it that it can't beat us.
What- what do you mean Riku says. The darkness writhes, pressing against his skin, and Axel climbs over him, thighs splaying out to frame his hips, pushing, rolling.
Stay with me, Riku.
The shadows shift, impatient. Axel's chest presses against his, sliding skin, heated and smooth. He gasps; the darkness twists across his flesh, across Axel, seeking to come between them. Axel's hips rock, and Riku's back arches to meet him, neck tipping as Axel's breath spreads warm against his shoulder. He holds onto Axel, wraps his arm tight around his back, shuddering as the shadows push inside him, spreading and shifting. His nerves spark, cock trapped, slick and rolling against Axel's.
Ah, ah Axel pants out, thrusting tight against Riku's skin. He shivers, quakes, and Riku's hand slips down his skin to find where the darkness has entered him, stretching him wide, thicker, as if more interested in Axel than Riku. His fingers press there, teasing sensitive skin, and Axel moans out through gritted teeth. More he hisses, as more shadows slide inside him, and Riku isn't sure if it's a statement of fact or a plea.
He rocks, up up, into the pressure of Axel's weight over him, back into the full burn inside him, writhing between the two. The shadows inside him squirm, slide and shift around each other, pressing at his insides, seeking.
His hands claw over Axel's skin, sweat slipping wet. Heat leaks between them, their pressed chests, bellies, cocks. The darkness frames them, rolls over them, sliding cool over heated flesh. Nerves cut tight, white hot and blistering, and Riku presses his mouth to the taut line of Axel's throat, body aching as he's stretched wider, the shadows churning, desperate, curved in the lower reaches of his guts.
Muscles tremor, thighs tense.
Axel's fingers catch hard in his hair, the skin of his neck.
His body shakes, spasms, convulses, eyes sliding closed and vision flaring out into black-white electric. No, Riku, Axel gasps, eyes scintillating emerald, shamrock, jade, leaving bright streaks in the dark. Stay with me, Riku, stay with me.
He rocks forward as if pushed, sudden and sharp; open mouth crushing at the corner of Riku's own, panting. Riku cries out, the shadows pressed full and thick inside him thrusting, pushing harder and deeper into the soft give of his innards, pain threading hot along the ribbons of want wrapped through his skin.
He rolls, tips, arches up into Axel, cock sliding wet against Axel's own.
He comes apart violently, shatters and dissolves into sparks and fluorescent atoms, pressing harder into Axel, soaking their trapped skin with spunk. Axel bites sharp into his throat, hands clawing at his shoulders, heat pulsing wet between them, again and again.
The shadows slip away slowly, leaving their flesh shivering, stretched and loose, aching. They retreat into nothing, disappearing into the dark dips tucked beneath Axel's bed and the corners of his room.
Riku and Axel are left alone, breath coming hard, chests heaving slick against one another, limbs wrapped tight. Dawn spikes blue and dim through Riku's window, spilling cold across the floor and Axel's spare duvet, across them.
Riku presses his face into Axel's neck, and Axel huffs out something against his cheek, body relaxing, muscles loosening.
Finally, as sunlight pools over them, they stretch out together, and sleep.