(AUTHORS NOTE: A little bit nuts, both the characters and my writing style. Not many people's cup of tea. AxelRoxas, DemyxRoxas, vague MarlyNamine. Rated M for non-con and general strangeness.)
Roxas and Demyx were both outcasts, but they weren't friends. Demyx was a punky teenager, all styled hair and lanky limbs, displaced among these hardened fighters. Back in his own world, he had been "tough"- master of playground insults, trash-canning freshman and spitballs… none of which made any difference here. Back in the world, he'd been at the top. Now he was the lowest of the low.
Demyx was always frightened. Shortly after being brought in, he'd learned that death was the only form of entertainment in the World that Never Was. When the Organization recruited Demyx, they recruited another Nobody as well. His name was… Jacob or James or Johnson or something. They had taken him into another room. They'd left Demyx in the hall and told him to wait, that they were taking the other nobody into the lab for a routine check-up. They were smiling. Demyx waited, and waited, and then the screaming started.
The screaming followed Demyx as he ran down the hall, followed him into the closet and assaulted him even as he fell to his knees. It went on for minutes that seemed like hours, until Demyx was sobbing and clutching his ears. He was relieved when the screams turned to whimpers, which turned into a gurgle, and finally silence. Demyx never saw the other nobody again.
And so Demyx had learned his place in the Organization. He avoided the other members at all costs, slinking from room to empty room. He wondered if he would go mad without human companionship. He wondered if he already was.
Roxas was a pretty face, a fair skinned child with dandelion puff hair and bliss blue eyes. Roxas kept to himself, doll-like in his silence and his serious demeanor. His mouth was small and delicate, and always turned down at the edges in a slight frown. Axel noticed this, and was intrigued.
In The World that Never Was, the only exciting events were new arrivals and deaths. The empty days spun out behind them and stretched out ahead of them. Xemnas insisted that Kingdom Hearts would soon be completed, but soon never arrived. Axel found small ways to pass the time.
Axel liked to burn things. At first he had burned small, inanimate things, lamps and shampoo bottles and dead flies on the windowsills. Eventually he moved on to bigger things. He went daily into Marluxia's old gardens, which were nothing but row after row of black roses. Once, Marluxia had grown all sorts of trees and flowers, but towards the end he only planted roses. When Namine was with him, he'd only planted roses.
Marluxia wasn't around to plant roses anymore. They had grown wild, taking over what was left of the other flowers, turned the gardens into a sea of black. Axel burned them methodically. The roses made a terrible smell as they burned, like rotting fruit, as though the black coloring was caused by decay. Glossy black bees, the size of an infant's palm, were snapped up by the flames.
More recently, Axel burned people.
But he was getting tired of burning things, and Roxas was a new toy. Axel found a new hobby in Roxas, counting the times he could make the boy smile, how many times he could get his clothes off. How many times they'd fucked in each room, and how long they huddled together afterwards. In the monotony of The World That Never Was, counting Roxas's smiles was a way of keeping time.
Occasionally, Roxas encountered Demyx in the halls. He didn't like the older boy's expression. He always looked frightened, a little mean and a little horny. Roxas pitied him. Sometimes, if Demyx was feeling plucky, he picked on Roxas. He teased him about his size or his duck-butt hair, but his heart (ha, ha) wasn't in it. Even when he called Roxas names, his voice was tinged with fear. His mouth twitched and his eyes wandered.
Roxas allowed Demyx to make fun of him. The insults slid off easily, because they meant nothing. Demyx was a shell, no better than a dusk, latching onto a memory of his old life by haranguing Roxas. It was nothing short of pathetic. So Roxas let it slide.
Roxas thought Demyx might be a little insane, but weren't they all?
One day (it was a day quite similar to the one before it, and nearly identical the one that came next) Roxas found Demyx in the kitchen. Nobodies didn't need a kitchen, they didn't need much of anything, but they had one anyways. Kitchens and bedrooms and friends, they were their last vestiges of humanity. Without humanity, they would be no different then dusks.
Demyx rarely ventured into the kitchen, so Roxas was surprised to meet him there.
"Hello," Roxas said, the end of the word lilting up like a question. Demyx waved, leaning nonchalantly against the island countertop. He ignored the unspoken question.
Roxas shrugged and made his way to the cupboard, rummaging through it with vague disinterest. Nothing looked appealing. Nothing ever did. He felt something move behind him and stiffened, but he realized it was just Demyx and went back to plundering the cabinet. He was shocked, therefore, when Demyx came up behind him and touched his shoulders.
Roxas spun around and shoved, as hard as he could, and Demyx stumbled backwards. He fell back against the island and caught himself, barely. He brushed away a few strands of hair that had fallen in one eye, and grinned. The grin made Roxas uneasy.
Demyx had picked on him, but had never made contact before. He was too timid for that, or so Roxas had thought. The wimpy teenager was getting too bold. Roxas wondered if he'd made a mistake in allowing the abuse to go on this far.
"Fuck off, Demyx."
Demyx just laughed, though his eyes darted nervously in his sockets. There was something predatory in his eyes today, in his smile. Despite Roxas's warning, he stepped towards him again, a little tentatively. Roxas snarled and tried to edge out of his reach. Demyx moved in quickly, pinning Roxas's arms against the counter. At first Roxas was so shocked that he didn't struggle. Then he writhed furiously, trying to break Demyx's grasp on his arms, but he was held with surprising strength.
Roxas looked down at Demyx's hands. His knuckles were white, the tendons stuck out- it was the grip of a person on the brink of sanity. It was the desperate way of a mother holds a dying child, or the way a man dangles from a window ledge. The way a baby clenches it's fists, holding tightly to it's own hands, afraid to be lost in the world.
Demyx was not playing around. He threw Roxas against the adjacent wall, hard enough to make his head knock against the plaster and his teeth clack together. For a second, his mind swum. It was long enough for Demyx to be on him again. The older boy unzipped Roxas's coat, his own was already undone. What hadn't Roxas noticed that?
Roxas struggled, but Demyx had the size advantage. Demyx unbuttoned his pants and yanked them down to his ankles unceremoniously. Roxas considered yelling, but he didn't want to be found like this. Anyways, he never knew who would answer.
It was painful and fast, like a desperate teenage fuck in the dark. Demyx bit Roxas's neck as he came, shallow teeth marks that slowly welled up with blood. Roxas examined them later, in the bathroom mirror. Bathrooms- another non-necessity that they couldn't live without. The first thing he'd done was to take a shower. He dried off quickly and stepped back into his clothes before he could be missed. He zipped up his robe and slipped down the hall, unaware that he had been seen.
But someone was watching. Axel had noticed Demyx and Roxas leave the kitchen together, and he'd ducked around the corner. They parted down different hallways. Their coats were unzipped, Demyx was trembling and muttering under his breath. Roxas looked dazed. One hand was at his neck, as if he were afraid his head would drop off if he didn't hold it there. The atmosphere smelled like sex and fear.
Axel's hair bristled like the hackles of an angry wolf. He followed Roxas down the hallway, a shadow on the wall. It wasn't hard to stay hidden, Roxas was too bewildered to be wary. Axel didn't wonder what did this too him- He knew. He'd seen the bite marks on Roxas's neck, as he let his hand drop limply to his side.
Roxas disappeared into a bathroom, and Axel stood outside for a moment, considering. Then he slunk off the way he had come, a shadow receding into the dark.
The next day, there was an accident in Demyx's quarters. Probably an electrical fire, caused by his lava lamps or his tangle of stereo wires, the other members mused. Only two of them knew the truth, and neither of them were telling. Demyx was in his room at the time. Although he should have easily been able to fight the blaze, he had been asleep when it started, and only awoke when he caught on fire. He had third degree burns nearly everywhere. A somebody would have died.
Vexen took Demyx into the lab, despite his screaming protests, and wrapped him in skin grafts and bandages. A few weeks later, his bandages were removed, and his body was as good as new. Nobody's were incredibly resilient, being that they were not, in a technical sense, alive. But if Demyx was paranoid before, he was schizophrenic now.
The night of the fire, Axel had slunk into Roxas's room. He'd eased into his bed and plastered himself on top of the boy. Roxas woke silently, eyelashes fluttering, and Axel felt something tug at his heart. It was a strange sensation, considering that he didn't have a heart.
"Hmm?" Roxas murmured, attempting to push Axel off him. "What?"
Axel ignored the boy's absent-minded protests and kissed him. "Demyx had an accident. His room caught on fire. I have a feeling he won't be bothering you were awhile."
And Roxas smiled.