The trio sat tall atop the clocktower, the sun's bright light quickly melting the freshly bought sea-salt ice cream. Roxas was almost finished with his, while Xion and Axel still had ways to go. It had been three and a half days since their grand reunion, yet they all found themselves to be nearly inseparable from each other.
"I still can't believe we're back together." Roxas said, breaking the silence. "It feels like it has been forever since the organization.". He heard a chuckle from his spiky red-haired friend, who was busy admiring the scenery. At least Roxas thought he was.
"Heh…yeah. It certainly is surreal, isn't it?" Axel responded, waving his ice cream around. When he turned his head over to look at Roxas's reaction, he was surprised to see not only one confused look, but two.
"…Surreal?" Xion asked, the word taking her out of her own thoughts. The smallest grin appeared on Axels face in return as he brought his knee up and rested his arm on it.
I guess they haven't changed much, have they?
"Yeah, surreal. It's kind of like Roxas said…unbelievable." He paused, directing his full attention to Xion. "Out of this world, got it memorized?".
His catchphrase put a smile on her face, an expression Axel wasn't used to seeing on her in the past. If he were being honest, almost all his memories of the past that included her were depressing.
Still, after getting them back, he began to cherish those memories.
As unpreventable as the situation was, Axel couldn't forgive himself for forgetting about her. He knew that he never completely forgot, his training sessions with Kairi proved that much. Yet even after requesting that Kairi refer to him as Axel, he never fully remembered Xion until he met her again in the labyrinth.
And as happy as that moment in the labyrinth was, it brought an equal amount of regret back to the oblivious boy who thought his only best friend was Roxas for the longest time. The moment the girl's name escaped Sora's mouth, all of Axel's memories of her rushed back into his head.
The good memories, like his elaborate plan to help her get back the keyblade, and of course the conversation where the three talked about being best friends, were greatly overshadowed by all the troubling ones that came towards the end of their organization days.
The ones that brought extreme guilt to his mind.
Axel watched every day as the organization used those two as slaves to collect hearts, all the way up until they decided only one of them had to live. He watched as his best friends nearly killed each other on a rigged mission, which would have succeeded had he not been there. And he watched as Roxas left the organization, now remembering the true reason why.
Axel recalled that he personally never heard much from Xemnas about his friends, at least compared to the amount of input from someone else.
The way Isa—no, Saix—treated Roxas and Xion was by far his biggest dilemma.
Four days ago, Axel only had the memories of all the hard times Saix had given Roxas, but now Xion's depressing story was back. If he had a dime for every time he heard 'good for nothing puppet' come out of Saix's mouth, he'd be able to buy a lifetime supply of the sea-salt ice cream in his hand.
And now, the shadow of the person that gave them all hell and was finally dealt with days ago, was becoming a part of their lives again.
Axel easily noted Isa's spot on the edge of the clocktower, which was next to him and away from everyone else. Axel also noted that from what he'd seen, Isa has had little to no conversations with anyone but him. Granted, Isa had only been up there twice with the trio, and only once with the other three, but even then, he can't remember if Isa even said a word to Xion.
Why was he even surprised?
It's not like Roxas and Xion can just move on easily from that past when it is the only thing they know. Those few times Isa was around, they talked very little to even each other. Whenever they did mention something, like the time Roxas brought up ice cream flavors to him, it was always short and…awkward.
Awkward was the kind way of saying it, even Axel felt like the organization massively loosened his previous bond with Isa. Why wouldn't it?
As for the other two, he could see why they chose silence over bonding. Roxas's scenario was self-explanatory, and Xion's…was rather fractured to Axel.
It occurred to him that he had no clue what Xehanort or any of his followers, specifically Saix, did to get Xion to fight for him again. Given that she had a heart now, which gave her the ability to feel…they could have done anything to her. Axel's felt his heart drop, he knew the organization would have done anything to reach their goal.
The image of them torturing Xion was one that immediately plagued his mind.
Goosebumps visibly made their way up along his arms and his low heart began to race. She had been back for god knows how long now, and he could have helped her.
He was supposed to help and protect them—
"Hey, are you alright? Your ice cream is melting.".
-Yet he nearly killed them both in a weeks' time.
"Axel?".
"Huh?". He snapped back to reality and quickly turned back towards his friends, their previous looks of confusion being replaced with ones of concern. "Guess I'm not that hungry after all." Axel told them, trying his best to disregard his thoughts. But he should have known by now that lying doesn't work on them.
"You're shaking…" Roxas commented at the rare sight, his eyes focused on the propped-up hairs. For one that dealt with fire and used to wear a black coat everywhere, Roxas would have thought goosebumps on Axel were nonexistent. "Is it that cold?".
Axel didn't respond. He was too busy looking past Roxas, at the girl his memory had erased. Speculations filled his mind while she looked back at him dead in the eye, her worried look still clear as daylight. Axel finally realized he was doing what he did with Kairi and turned his head back towards the sun.
But that didn't stop his speculations, nor did it take away his friends' attention. He could easily tell Xion got little to no sle—
"Axel, please tell us if something is wrong." Xion said, breaking him out of his thoughts a second time.
"Yeah, we're best friends! Like you said, they tell each other everything." Roxas backed her up in the only way he knew, thinking of what his opposite would say. The two waited, listening to the deep breath that escaped Axel.
"I just don't want anything to happen to us again.".
A moment of silenced reached the group, their thoughts becoming darker as the past made its way back.
"Even if something were to happen, we'd have each other's back." Roxas replied in a confident tone. But he watched Axel sit his ice cream down and put a hand on his forehead.
"That wasn't how it worked in the past." Axel stated.
"But we—"
"Roxas, I nearly killed you!" Axel yelled before a full response could come out of the blonde's mouth. He hadn't looked over at either of them yet.
"And Xion, I…" he paused, moving his hand down to rub his eyes. "I only made your life harder. Then I forgot you ever existed.".
"You did what you thought was right…for us." Xion made out. Finally directing his head to his right, Axel saw watery eyes all around.
Silence made its way back to the group. They all found themselves closer, their shoulders touching each other. Was this why they had been inseparable? Pain?
"We all did what we thought we had to do." Roxas said, thinking back to his two infamous endings with the two. "But we are together now.".
"Yeah…I feel better when I'm around you two." The black-haired girl told them, relaxing herself against Roxas. "So, I'm not going to let the past ruin us.". A small smile appeared on her face, the two boys noticing her eyes were closed. "Didn't you save us both, Axel?".
"Kind of…" Axel replied, his sense of responsibility coming back to him as he continued to look at his two friends. Seeing Xion's body fully leaning against the side of Roxas was both a newly pleasant and scary sight to see, given their current location.
Did the horrible past not haunt them as much as it did to him? Unless...those two had their own troubles that they hid from him.
Axel had his theory on how Xion disappeared, but he seemed fine for the most part. Maybe, they were better at hiding their problems than him.
Nevertheless, he knew they were right. The future was everything now. More importantly, it was a chance to correct the mistakes that haunted him. To help them with those hidden troubles.
The group's conversation came to a halt, and the silence became peace. Seconds flew by, quickly turning into minutes. Soon, the light in the sky had nearly faded.
Axel wrapped his arm around the two when he recognized Xion had not reopened her eyes and held them close, reminiscing about their hug in the labyrinth.
No problem would separate them again, no organization would terrorize them again. But…on the occasion something bad does happen to them?
Well, he'll always be there to bring them back.
I love this trio so much, and I strongly feel like their pasts would put them in some form of isolation from the other groups. At the very least, I think it would make their relationships with the others harder because of the past struggles they went through.
Roxas and Xion around Isa, with Axel realizing the emptiness in the air? That's difficult.
tellonym: waterbird