A/N: Tra-la-la. It's been a while, and gosh, this sooo isn't Euthanasia in any shape or form, is it? And it's due up next...Fear not, you will be handed something angst-y and horrid soon enough. I just thought it'd be better for you to gigle a bit (whether at my expense or the story, I'm not sure).
Disclaimer: The title belongs to John Milton's epic-poem (which I have never read, and probably never will) "Paradise Lost". The beginning bit is of Sublime's appropriately subliminal song, "Date Rape". Riku's sing-along is of Mika's "Love Today", the bold&italics part if of Every Avenue's "Where Weere You?" and I don't know where "Born to be Wild" is from, but I sure as corn don't own it. Neither do I own the Hannibal part...that's all Thomas Harris right there... or the kiddie porn quote, which is all Zoe Trope. Screw it, I don't even own the characters of this story. How depressing.
Special Dedication: Static Lull, as always. OH, and sweet pandamonium, 'cause she's well, a sweetheart. Can I dedicate this to RosalynAngel and Uzumaki-sama as well? You know what? I WILL. Because their RikuAxel goodness is inspiration and all twelve shades of coolness.
Paradise Lost
that's when things got out of control.
She's just another statistic waiting to happen; a little girl-child on the corner of the red-light district with reddened knees and her fingers in her mouth. She's probably biting her nails, but from where Riku can (almost) see from behind the fogged glass, it looks like she's attempting to gnaw off her whole hand.
"Hannibal. Hannibal-ina." Riku mumbled into Axel's neck, shifting himself upwards to see properly. His thighs unglue themselves from the upholstery and his hand gropes for the switch ("Fuckin' A!" hissed Axel when he thumbed him in the eye), tugging the window down.
"Hey! Hey, you! Little girl!" he shouted.
Her gaze snapped up at him and he smiled, waggling his fingers in what he hoped is a friendly manner.
"Come here." He said, and in an instant, Axel's all over him like white on rice, stuffing his pretty face into the sedan's cheap leather seats.
"You've gone nuts, haven't you?" the man scowled, fingers roughly sticking themselves into Riku's arm. "Absoeffinglutely nuts. Don't talk to her—she's what, ten? You look like a pedophile!"
"I do not!" Riku said, shocked. Or, at least he tried to be. Mostly he just sounded heavily inebriated. Which, being Riku, he was, because it had seemed like a good idea at the time-- to go and flirt with that pretty little bartender with the wide blue eyes. And a cute little thing that bartender had been, even if he'd made Riku purchase drinks for however long he was at the bar.
And even though, for all of the hour he'd known Riku, he'd smashed his heart to bits.
And even though the silver-haired boy was driven to downing half a dozen god-knows-what's and had to be pried away from the bar by his best-friend-forever-friend, who he had known for the majority of his pathetic life, but whose name he was currently finding a bit hard to recall.
Again: It seemed like a good idea at the time.
"I am offering her a ride…Ax-el." Riku slurred, gesturing intricately for reasons he had yet to be aware of. "Look at her. She's all alone. All on her own-y."
"Shut up." Hissed Axel, cuffing the side of his head. "She could be a child prostitute. She looks like one. And god, where would you even take her?"
"To paradise-"
"Nasty little sonuvagun, aren't you?"
"Yum, hookers…"
"Don't you have any decency? What if she was your kid?"
Riku stopped his gleeful song about hookers and their merits (this, he felt a bit sorry for. It was a lovely little tune, and he was quite proud of it.) to look outside once more. "I am eighty-five percent sure I didn't spawn her." He clambered over the seats and into the driver's place, Cheshire-cat-grinning over yet another rolled down window at the maybe-child-prostitute.
"Any day now, princess." He said cheerfully, flapping a hand at her. She stumbled towards him, blinking her baby blues up at him and clinging to the car's lock.
"Mummy said not to ride with strangers." She said worriedly, as if the fearful 'Mummy' would suddenly appear, a whirling dervish of neon stilettos and thick make-up…possibly with a deep voice that belonged to transvestites.
But this, however, was just Riku' imagination at work. In reality, the girl's mother was not a transvestite, or partial to wearing thick shields of cosmetics. She was a relatively-normal looking woman, and obviously a bit of a nice 'mummy', as Axel felt the urge to ask, "Who's your mom, girlie?"
"Rikku!" said the girl proudly. "She's a…mmm, well, they call her lotsa stuff…like a whore…"
Green eyes slid over to where Riku was boring a hole in his forehead. His darling smiled sweetly. "Don't make me castrate you, Axel, that's messy business." To the child, he said, "Tell your mummy to suck it, princess. What's your name?"
"Alice." She said slowly, as if she wasn't quite sure.
"Really, now? Seen any rabbits yet?"
"Pardon?" Alice bleated, and Axel fell into a fit of unapologetic snickers.
( home for the weekend, lookin' for a good time)
Alice was bouncing up and down between them, little wisps of blonde hair flying everywhere. She dug her stubby nails into Axel's clavicles as the ratty sedan bounced along. Riku, who was surely not going to win 'best driver of the Year' anytime soon, was deliberately hitting every pothole he both could and could not see. When Axel informed him, in less-than-dulcet tones that he needed to slow down, the silver-haired man merely shrieked that he was "BORN TO BE WIIIILLLLDDDD!" and demanded that Axel shut up, he wasn't the one manning the vehicle.
Even though Riku wasn't so much driving and yowling along with the radio. "Everyone's gonna love today, love today!" he sang, layering a slobbery kiss on the side of Alice's neck. Axel thought of approximately fifteen regulations they were breaking, and felt a little sick to his stomach. "LOVE ME!" Riku bellowed in his ear, nearly rendering him unconscious, but there was no time—the car jerked to an abrupt stop.
"I'm stopping the car!" Riku bawled unnecessarily. He fumbled with the latch before toppling out in a drunken mess into the dirt. Axel managed to weed his way out of the sedan with a bit more grace, holding the door open for Alice to hop out. He allowed her sticky hand to curl around his wrist, and bent down as she whispered, "Where are we?"
"Paradise." Axel replied, for lack of anything better to say. He really, really hates that he's quoting Riku of all people, Riku, who's giggling to himself in the dirt and looking like five shades of green. Not exactly quote-worthy behavior.
"Wonderland?" squealed Alice, and Axel has this totally insane urge to ram her adorable little head against the window of the car. But he blinked, and the moment passed away, only to be followed by WHOA, that's some pretty strong weed. Not that Alice noticed, what with the way she was twisting around and blabbering, "Or, Mr. Axel, it's a wonderful place. All gumdrop trees and umbrella birds and rainbow grass—"
"I've got some of that!" Riku interjected excitedly, shoving a sandwich baggie and a familiarly-shaped object at the bouncing blonde. "Want some?"
Sixteen regulations, thought Axel dazedly at he watched Alice's sapphire eyes grow huge in her face.
(I picked up her up, and she was three-fourths gone)
Riku's gnawing on a strand of licorice that's at least ten feet long, rolling a joint, and attempting to write his name in the dirt at the same time. 'I'm ambidextrous!" he bellowed at Axel, writing the 'k' in his name the wrong way. He looped the red candy around the redhead's neck, tying the end of the edible leash to his wrist so he tug him closer for a little somethin'-somethin'. Axel hissed, "Not in front of the kid!" but either Riku didn't care or wasn't even aware that there was a kid, 'cause he kept going anyways.
"The kid,Riku, the kid."
"A baby goat?"
"No, the kid…the girl, Riku, where's the girl? Small blonde, about yea high…"
"There's no pasture nearby. So no, little Billys and Nannys and what have you running amok, scaring the populace—"
"RIKU." Axel screeched, very nearly losing it right in the middle of…well, nowhere, but it was the thought that counted.
Riku made a face that was supposed to be concerned, but came off as strange-looking and mildly lecherous. "What's up, candy man?"
"We just lost that kid."
"She went to won-der-land, Ax-el-poo."
"Don't screw with me. We just lost a whole person."
"Well, m'boy, it's all sunshine and rainbow sprinkles until the cat mangles the canary. Then it's all down-hill from there."
"It's not funny!"
"…"
"…"
"…Well, no one knows she's gone anyways."
"Her mom knows-"
"Probably not."
"Well, we know."
"Not if the fuzz questions us, we don't."
(back to where we left off baby)
Lying in Riku's shitmobile of a sedan, cheekbones pressed into the worn leather, Axel's eyelids begin to flutter downwards. His arm crossed over Riku's chest, backhanding him into the certifiably ugly cushions that had been propped up earlier.
"Angel-baby." Riku wheezed. "I love you dearly, but you're a fat-ass. Get off."
Axel stayed right where he was, grass-green eyes slipping all over Riku's face like loose marbles. Watching Riku exit his high was a lot like watching an especially bad B-movie. Spectacularly horrible visuals and shitty reception. Earnest acting, although it all falls flat.
"Hey, Axel, what's the difference between love and kiddie porn?"
Axel shrugged into Riku's skin, acquiescing.
"Kiddie porn is FOREVER."
The boy launched into a series of laughter and coughs, washing nasty marijuana-breath all over the redhead. They laid there, squished on the beat-up upholstery until Riku's spastic chuckles lulled them to sleep.