Demyx wasn't stupid.

He knew that the rest of the Organization thought he was, and even most of the people he met, but he wasn't. A bit naïve and a pacifist, maybe, but not stupid.

He'd been reading a lot lately. He didn't know where half the books in the library came from, despite attempts at explanation by the late Zexion. Some of the books looked like they had belonged to many people, while some were covered in handwriting Demyx couldn't recognize. Today, one book captured his attention.

It wasn't that the book looked interesting. It was a basic biology textbook. What was interesting was that it was clearly crammed with bookmarks and notes. As he opened it, several of these notes fell out. Most of them came from a section on the central nervous system. He picked one up and read it.

I've been thinking about this. If our brain is controlled by these impulses, then when we die, they must turn off, right? Nothing needs to be on anymore. But that means that even hallucinations of an afterlife aren't possible. You'd just… turn off. You wouldn't be able to sense anything, not even the flow of time around you. In a way, you'd exist forever, but you wouldn't be able to tell. If that isn't the most depressing thing I've ever thought of, I must have forgotten something.

So even Somebodies didn't really have an afterlife. Demyx glanced at the page the book had fallen open to. It told the story of a man who had had a metal rod driven into his skull and survived. However this man changed completely. He couldn't get along with people, and his temper grew short. Written next to this was:

Kind of makes you wonder how many people have parts of their brain missing and can't even tell.

Maybe Nobodies weren't that different from Somebodies. Or maybe everyone was screwed up. Or maybe this book was from an entirely different world, and the information didn't even apply to him. He didn't care. It was a pinprick of hope in the despair that surrounded the World That Never Was, and Demyx clung to it.

Demyx, aren't you supposed to be out on assignment? his thoughts nagged at him. He closed the book, carefully placing it back on the shelf, and created a portal to Hollow Bastion. If he died out there, he could be comforted by the fact that maybe, just maybe, he wasn't missing anything after all.