Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom - ooh, cookie!
Pairings: Axel/Zexion, Demyx/Roxas. Weird but true.
Warning: (deep breath) Angst, pathetic poetry, butterflies, suicide a-plenty, made-up medical conditions, boy/boy pairings, loud music, confusing time switches (EDIT: hopefully not as confusing now) and word repetition. No likie, no readie.
Seka would like you to note: This is written off a story challenge Zume Rokkata wrote for me, which was to write an angst one-shot where AkuRoku wasn't the pairing, was at least 1500 words long, and featured a butterfly. I think I kinda failed one of those points though... R&R please peeps!
XxXxXxXxX
Blood red....
Side by side.
Demyx watched the butterfly flutter past his face, and thought about the days when he and Zexion sat on this very bank, watching the birds and the bees, and the flowers and the trees. He sat very still, ever the butterfly enthusiast, and stuck out his finger slowly. This particular butterfly knew this gesture well, and knew that there would be a honey reward at the end.
The butterfly, a beautiful specimen of the Monarch species, fluttered down onto the mullet-haired boy's finger, and sat with her wings spread.
Demyx, although he had finished studying this butterfly a long time ago, loved her, and always found something new in her body shape to entertain him; whether it was the way her antennae perked up near the end of his study, or the way she would shift from small foot to foot, impatient. This time, he noticed a small spot on her wing, one that, unlike the laws of Nature, wasn't repeated on the other wing. He peered at the spot closely, startling the butterfly, and realised that it was a very odd presentation of a dying wing.
It had felt like that when the one he loved had been killed in a freak accident. He remembered everything from that afternoon, from the knock on the door to seeing his lover's beautiful face, staring blankly up into the sky at something only he could see.
He sighed, and rustled around in his bag for his honey pot. This butterfly wouldn't be around for much longer; that wing looked like it would be fully dead in a few days.
After letting the butterfly go, Demyx lay back on the soft green grass, staring up into the apex of the azure sun, watching the sun's rays begin to fade from the world. He didn't feel the damp that gently started to spread through his hoodie.
Side by side...
XxXxXxXxX
"Mr Demyx Noua? I'm extremely sorry to say, a young man was killed in a car crash this afternoon. He mentioned your name, and we thought it best to let you know as soon as possible."
Memories, memories..... The policeman, the funeral, the blank, vague days afterwards as he tried and failed to imagine his new life without him...
"Axel?"
It was hard to tell over the phone, but the redhead sounded like he had been crying.
"You too, Demy?"
"Yeah."
"...Y'wanna come over?"
"See you in a moment."
XxXxXxXxX
Demyx lay and watched memories falling away, like grains of sand slipping between his fingers. He saw nothing but red, filling the world, staining the sky, tainting the grass bank and the little laughing stream at his feet. He remembered... it was less painful, more vague, grey, more like a dream than real life...
Blood red.
XxXxXxXxX
He ran back to Axel's house, which was the closest to the river. He found Axel in his room up the stairs, in an empty house, with his music pumping out the windows.
"Hey, Axel! You need to lock the door when you've got this much loud music playing, man! You can't hear a thing."
"That's the point." Axel sounded oddly detached. "I don't want to hear anything. I don't want to see or hear or feel or taste or smell anything he can't."
"Axel....." Demyx bit his lip, swallowed a lump in his throat. "I know just how hard it is. I'm going through this too, remember? But you're eventually just going to have to accept it. He's left, and there's nothing you can do about it. I'm sure that he's looking down on us right now, and he's probably mentally headdesking because he wants you to be happy. I know it's difficult to accept. But you just have to put this behind you."
Axel raised his head slowly. There were tear tracks tracing his cheekbones, dripping down to tumble off his chin. "Demyx, I know. That's all they tell us in those rehabilitation lectures, remember? And in case you've forgotten, they really didn't seem to stop me getting depressed."
Demyx stared at Axel. "You've completely missed the point. They're there to help, not to lecture. It might seem like they're lecturing, but they just want to help."
"I don't care! That's all they seem to do! I can't get a word in edgeways! They aren't helping, they're just making it worse!"
Axel ran from the room, with Demyx in hot pursuit. His heart caught in his chest when he saw the redhead was taking the stairs to the roof.
There was a thump, and silence.
"Axel? Axel?"
Lying, spread-eagled, on the ground -
"AXEL!"
- with a suspiciously red liquid dripping from an outstretched hand.....
XxXxXxXxX
Demyx woke up, gasping. Really, really bad dream. He felt the water that had soaked through his hoodie onto the grass, noted it as a pale pink and saw the river as an odd shade of brown.
Shock synasthesia, the doctor had called it. From a massive shock, some people experience very odd sensations. Demyx's had come as synasthesia, but instead of some things being different colours, everything was. The sky was yellow, the ground was orange. His feelings had even changed, so the touch of water was pink, the feeling of wind was black and death was red.
Blood red.
XxXxXxXxX
The waiting was the worst. Waiting for something, anything, to happen, something to relieve the awful stress Axel's condition was causing him to suffer... Axel was cursed with the worst names known to mankind in the day it took him to come out of his coma.
"Axel..... How could you do this? To me, to him... How could you?"
"Demyx...."
Demyx jumped. "Axel? Are you okay?"
Axel struggled up the bed a bit. "No... It hurts..."
"Axel...... Why?"
"Zexy. I need Zexy." Axel looked around the room, oblivious to Demyx's presence.
Demyx choked. "Axel, he's dead. Same as Roxy. They were killed in a car crash, remember? A month ago?"
"Zexy.... Oh, no..." He fell back on the bed as a monitor began beeping omniously.
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
"Sir, you're going to have to leave!"
"No! I can't leave! What's going on?"
"He's having a heart attack. We need to shock him, and we need you to be out of the room. This way, please."
Demyx had never seen Axel again. Alive, at least.
"Mr Noua?"
Demyx rose fearfully. "That's me. What happened? Is he going to be okay?"
"Mr Noua.... I'm afraid Axel died three minutes ago."
Demyx had never recovered. Losing three of his best friends in three weeks - it was just too much. And losing Roxy....
Demyx could remember everything about him - the soft natural spikes in his blond hair, his sapphire-blue eyes, his wonderful figure. Demyx still couldn't believe that he had died a virgin.
Side by side...
XxXxXxXxX
"Mr Noua?"
"Call me Demyx, please. I don't stand on formality."
"Demyx, then. What are you planning on doing at Mr Minasaku's funeral? We need to sort out the programme, times and appropriate songs."
"I'm..... I'm going to say a poem thing that'll be more like a speech. I feel it's appropriate, seeing as Axel loved poetry that wasn't traditional."
"What on?"
Demyx had scowled. "No idea, I'm going to make it up tonight. About him, of course. Just plan the programme around it. Give me a three minute gap, and I'll be fine."
Demyx grinned weakly at the thought of his pathetic attempts. He eventually went out to the place where he first met Axel.... And came home with Ideas.
"Mr Demyx Noua, Axel's best friend, will now say a poem of his own creation in honour of Axel's memory."
Demyx had cleared his throat.
"Axel.
When I first met you,
You were a light against the otherwise dull scenery.
And I don't mean your hair.
Although that was pretty damn bright as well.
Tragedies do happen,
They're the sort people never expect.
I just wish you had listened to me.
One last time, just once.
So you could still be here,
With me.
Axel,
Please say hello to Roxas for me,
And yes, I wrote this myself,
I know you hate traditional poetry,
So I made sure it didn't rhyme.
I'm so, so sorry."
He had looked up at the funeral congregation.
"Please don't be offended; it's the sort of thing he would have loved. I felt it would be fitting. I needed to say something like him, and that's all I could think of. I'm sorry."
He had walked slowly to his seat, fighting back a fresh wave of tears, and had been startled to hear thunderous applause.
The funeral manager had stepped up to the podium.
"Demyx, if you think that's what Axel would like, you have every right to say it. The place for friends and relatives to say something is for whatever they want to say, something that commemorates the deceased. Congratulations! I think I speak for everyone here when I say that was extremely good."
XxXxXxXxX
Demyx sat up suddenly, holding his head in his hands. The memories.... hurt..... for the first time since Roxas had died.
Blood red......
Now that's something you don't see every day.
What a pity it had to end like this...
XxXxXxXxX
The butterfly fluttered past, waiting for some more honey. When the nice person with the sweet treat in question didn't make any effort to wake up, she landed gently on his forearm and squeezed with her feet. That never failed to wake him up.
When that failed, as well, she brushed him with her wing.
The one which happened to be busily dying.
Bursts of agonising pain racked her body, and she fell on the grass, rolling in agony, only making it worse.
A moment later, she was dead.
Blood red....
Side by side.