Axel's past.
Disclaimer: Do not own the characters, most owned by Square-Enix, a few co-owned by Buena-Vista.
Warnings: Angst, Implied AkuRoku at the end, and YuffieXReno. Written LONG before we knew anything about Lea, so don't flame me about his name being Lea and not Ale.
A lot of people have asked me if Reno was my Somebody. Unfortunately, he's not. Instead, it was a boy named Ale Rose. Yes, you read that right. Ale. Like the alcoholic beverage. Though Reno wasn't my Somebody, he was very close, and had Ale not been an idiot… 'Axel' wouldn't exist. Instead, Reno would have a Nobody.
Reno was Ale's father.
You probably think I'm crazy. Probably wondering whom Ale's Mother was. Well, if you didn't think I was crazy before. You will now. Yuffie of Wutai. Yuffie, who hates ShinRa. Married to Reno of the Turks; Who works for ShinRa, and who was her opponent once upon a time, back when Sephiroth was running rampant across their world.
Well. They got together. The result was Ale. Reno was the one who named the child; Yuffie raised him because Reno was always being pulled away by work… though it was always with obvious regret that he left Yuffie and Ale.
As Ale got older, it became obvious that he was… unusually gifted. Now, this wasn't necessarily in brains or manners. It was in abilities. Ale was a pyro. And he didn't bother to hide it with anything more than a pair of leather gloves courtesy of Tifa.
He was also unusually gifted with Yuffie's shuriken, which he'd started messing with at about the age of ten. Yuffie had caught him throwing her Giant Shuriken around and catching it as it came back. The end result was Yuffie having Reno buy the boy a pair of the weapons. Only of a different style. Chakram. Specifically made to be able to handle the heat of Ale's fire, and so that they'd come back like a pair of boomerangs.
Another small gift the boy had was being ambidextrous. Reno had taught him early that the use of both hands was important. In the long run, this made it easier to use his chakram. And it made him all the more dangerous.
Ale had his Father's charm and personality, but his Mother's love for 'shiny-orbs-of-mako' as Reno had taken to calling Materia to keep Yuffie from freaking out and going on a Materia hunt or swiping Materia from who-ever was visiting, and her persistence. He had both their tempers. Making for a very short fuse, paired with very little patience.
Ale was a smooth-talker, managing to get out of trouble, and a hypocrite, always speaking against rule-breaking, but then turning around and breaking rules himself. Somehow, the people of Wutai came to accept him, probably because they were used to Yuffie.
The young pyro… was a lady's man in his teen-years. Though he never dated, he was a shameless flirt. And he wasn't only into girls. He didn't care about gender; he had a fairly open mind. And if he ever got to go to a party, this was usually reunions for the groups that helped to defeat the Silver-haired Fiend that was Sephiroth; he'd dance with just as many guys as girls, if not more.
Despite, or maybe because of all these things, Ale was as happy as a clam, always boasting either a charming smile or a cocky smirk. He was well known for his sarcasm while speaking, and he rarely used formal speech. The times that his smile was gone, was during times of extreme mourning or extreme irritation. Such as when he was put in the same room as Marlene and Denzel for any length of time.
He lived a rather carefree life… until his parents started arguing. Over the smallest things. Ale managed to gather enough information to understand that his mother was angry that Reno couldn't spend more time with her and Ale, and Reno kept trying to make it clear that if he left the Turks, he'd be killed. He knew too much.
The arguments got worse. Before coming to a sudden stop. But that didn't mean things were better. Quite the contraire. Things were suddenly a whole lot worse. Yuffie and Reno had both gotten fed up with the arguing… and now simply refused to speak in each-other's presence. Ale would try to lighten the mood, but in the end his own bright mood started dropping… and with it… his control over his flames.
Ale wasn't really sure what ha happened. It was at a social gathering for some big-shot in ShinRa. Attendance of ALL ShinRa employees and their families was mandatory.
Some time during the party Ale heard for the first time that Yuffie and Reno were getting divorced, and it left him devastated. For a while he was shocked… and then came the pity. The constant pats on the back, that were meant to soothe. The false words of apology from the other teenagers and children there. His fuse was lit, slowly the short fuse started making it's way towards the bomb that would unblock all his fire.
And then came the joke from one of the employees. The joke that all three members of the Rose family took offence to. The guy who made the joke found out later in the hospital that he would never be able to leave a wheel-chair. This was caused partially from the beyond third-degree burns over his entire-body, partially by the beyond-beyond third-degree burn on his back, that was caused not only by Ale's flames, but by Reno's Electro-magnetic-rod at full charge coming into extremely sharp contact with his back, and partially from the scar left by Yuffie and Ale's Shuriken and Chakram which had broken the mans spine. The entire 6-9th floors of ShinRa HQ were burnt to utter-crisps, only barely able to hold the weight of the rest of the heavy building.
Ale didn't leave his room for anything more that the bathroom and meals for weeks. And he came out when Reno started to move back to Midgar. It was the first time since he was a child that he was seen outside without his gloves, and the first time he'd ever raised a hand to either of his parents. Reno wound up with a black eye paired with a minor burn next it. And Yuffie wound up with a red-cheek from Ale's back-hand slap before the boy ran back inside sobbing after having screamed at his parents that they were idiots.
Three weeks later, strange creatures started appearing in Midgar. Yuffie brought Ale along to check it out with the rest of the group. The found that Reno and the other Turks had been given the job of 'pest control'. Ale seemed to be the only one who really cared.
And then the creatures attacked. Flying out of the shadows, the forms of the Heartless swarming around the group. Everyone fought valiantly. Ale working on breaking away to find his Father.
He found Reno and Rude fighting off a group of Neo-shadows and Soldiers. They were struggling, both severely injured as the creatures tried to get their hearts. Ale jumped in the way of a Neo-shadow seconds before it would have reached Reno. The last thing he heard was his Father's voice screaming his name in shock and loss before the world went blank and his senses died.
He woke up near a large white-gray and black castle in the middle of an empty field disrupted only by hills and a single path. He only remembered 'Ale' and an empty haze. He was greeted by a fairly quiet man in a black cloak. Said man was fairly short and small statured. Not much older than Ale's 19 years.
Flame licked at the air, forming the letters of the teen's name before forming a ring around him, spinning faster and faster, dizzying him and making his stomach lurch as he felt something cold settle in the confines of his soul.
"Your new name, Is Axel." The man stated in his quiet tone. 'Ale' glanced up and saw that the flames were once again hovering in front of him.
"Axel." He echoed. Shocking himself when he saw a brief flash of Reno when he heard his own voice. "…Ale… Axel… my new name…" he closed his vibrant green eyes. "I am Axel." He confirmed. He could have sworn that he heard the man smirk.
"Come, Axel… number VIII. You must meet The Superior." He stated, the boy formerly known as 'Ale' stood shakily and fallowed. Wishing he knew what had happened.
His meeting with Xemnas earned him the name: Flurry of the Dancing Flames. And knowledge as to what happened to his weapons, his chakram could now be summoned by darkness… he learned of the beings known as Nobodies, and that he now was one…
Roxas stared at Axel, surprised at the sudden revelation of his partner's past. Axel's gaze was distant and empty.
"Axel?" the blonde boy asked. Axel glanced at him and smiled lightly.
"Sorry… I shouldn't have…" he was silenced by Roxas pressing his lips comfortingly against the pyro's.
"Thank you, Axel… for trusting me enough to tell me this." He whispered softly once the kiss had ended, wrapping his arms around Axel's neck and pulling himself closer to the older Nobody.
Axel smiled.
"I… should be thanking you. You've given me a reason to let this off of my chest. And you listened patiently, with-out interruptions. I… appreciate that… Thank you Roxas. I love you."
Roxas felt his non-existent heart leap and he smiled as well.
"You're welcome; Axel… and I love you too." He purred.
Five minutes later, they were both asleep on the soft mattress, snuggled together under the warm black and red comforter, Roxas using Axel's shoulder as a pillow, and Axel curled protectively around the small Nobody.