Before you begin reading, I'd ask you to please FORGET any back-story you know about the members of Organization XIII, because this fanfiction ignores all of it.
And FYI- This fanfiction is rated TEEN because of swearing and some dirty jokes later on.
Enjoy! 3 numberVIII
Chapter One: An Interesting Turn of Events
It was late in the afternoon at Castle Oblivion and the nobodies of Organization XIII were all seated around a rectangular table in the castle's informal meeting room. This was the room where the Organization crammed into once a week for regular meetings regarding issues in the castle. The formal meeting room, which was a large, white, circular room with unreasonably tall chairs, was only used to discuss more important matters, such as defeating the Key Bearer and reaching Kingdom Hearts.
The scene unfolding in the meeting room was not particularly unusual; Xemnas was droning on about some insignificant matter, and none of the other nobodies cared enough to pay attention. Zexion, sitting near the middle of the table, had donned his reading glasses and was now completely engrossed in his book, while Luxord and Larxene had begun a game of war, at which Larxene was losing rather badly. Axel was busy wadding up tiny pieces of paper, torn from Demyx's notebook, and flicking them at Roxas, who had fallen asleep at the end of the table. The rest of the nobodies were preoccupied with other forms of day dreaming and thumb-twiddling and anything else that would keep their minds out of the meeting.
This week, Xemnas was droning on about the subject of morale. He expressed concern that Organization members weren't doing a satisfactory job at completing their missions, and that this would ultimately cause the Organization to fall short of their goal of controlling Kingdom Hearts.
"I think it would be in our best interest to try to make life at this castle more tolerable. Since I cannot authorize any more vacation time, I have decided that I will allow a family visitation period to take place next week. You are strongly encouraged to invite a parent or some other relative to come to the castle during this period." Xemnas stood up from his chair, trying to end the meeting quickly before anyone objected. "This concludes our meeting. I expect you all to go clean yourselves up and prepare for our visitors next week. Meeting aj-."
"Now wait just a minute-" Xigbar said, pointing a finger in the air. Xemnas's plan to end the meeting painlessly had apparently failed. "I mean, don't you think you're getting ahead of yourself, Superior? Maybe this needs just a bit more discussion."
"I don't exactly see the need for re-evaluation on the matter."
"Look," Axel interjected. "I think what Xigbar's trying to say...maybe in nicer words...is that...well...we think your idea is stupid."
"Speak for yourself!" Demyx blurted out from the seat next to Axel, where he had been quietly twiddling his thumbs during most of the meeting. "I think it's a wonderful idea, Superior." Xemnas smirked. Although Demyx's approval was not at all important to him, the nobody usually kept quiet at meetings and it was quite unusual to see him so excited about Organization business.
"For once, I'll actually have to agree with Nine's opinion," Saïx said, rather apathetically. "I'm in favor of the holiday."
"That's just because no one will visit you..." Axel taunted. Saïx, as usual, ignored his comments.
"I'm afraid that this really isn't up for debate-"
"That doesn't mean it's not a bad idea," Larxene said from the other end of the table. Xemnas let out an exasperated sigh and fell back into his chair.
"Duly noted, Twelve," he said, as sarcastically as he could. "Would anyone else like to complain?"
"Personally," Zexion said without looking up from his book. "I think it's just going to distract us from our missions. We don't need all of these extra people running around making a mess of the castle."
"I could use a few new test subjects, though," Vexen commented. "My corpses are starting to smell, and Demyx won't let me near him anymore."
"If Vexy's going to contaminate more people then maybe it isn't such a good idea..." Demyx said. Axel raised his hand.
"I don't want the castle to fill with that smelly fog like the last time Vexen got fresh cadavers."
"And it killed all of my plants."
"Marluxia, no one cares about your plants."
"I'm in favor of killing Marluxia's plants."
"No, we should use them to make the castle prettier for all of the guests!"
"Or we could not invite useless meat-sacks to visit our castle."
"Maybe we should burn down the whole damn castle..."
"Alright, enough of this!" Xemnas said, forcibly pushing himself out of his chair once more. "I am the Superior of this organization and I will not stand for anymore of this ridiculous debate. The inhabitants of Castle Oblivion, namely, the members of Organization XIII, will be holding an open-door, family visitation week. Anyone who does not produce a relative during this week will be severely punished. Meeting adjourned."
After letting his words sink in for a second, Xemnas turned and left the meeting room, shutting the door loudly behind him for dramatic effect. A few disgruntled sighs rose out of the rest of the Organization, who remained at the table in a shocked silence for several minutes before filtering out of the room to get on with their regular nightly activities.
And so the madness began. Each member of Organization XIII would be required, under threat of severe punishment, to invite a parent or other relative to visit the castle during the following week. Xemnas's hoped that this would somehow raise the spirits of the Organization, which would in turn allow them to move forward towards their goal of reaching Kingdom Hearts at a much speedier rate. And in spite all the objections, Xemnas was moving forward with his apparently-brilliant plan, completely unaware of the chaos it would ultimately create.
After the meeting, Axel, Demyx and a sleepy Roxas made their way up to the castle's lounge. Zexion was already there, slumped into a large armchair in the corner, reading a thick hardcover book. Vexen was seated at a desk in the other corner, doing work on his laptop. The trio situated themselves in three armchairs in the center of the room, all of which surrounded a considerably worn coffee table.
"So I still don't understand," Roxas said as he sat down. "What Xemnas's plan with all of this?"
"You should really stop falling asleep during meetings," Axel replied, grabbing a magazine off the coffee table and flipping it open. "I'm getting sick of explaining everything…"
"Then don't, I'll just ask someone else…Demyx?" Roxas turned and looked to Demyx, who was sitting sideways in his chair, with his legs slung over one armrest. Upon hearing his name, he sat up and leaned forward.
"Of course, Roxy!" He said, trying to sound knowledgeable. "You see, Superior wants us to have our parents or other relatives come and visit because he thinks it will raise, ah, mm…mor…morrr-"
"Morale."
"Right. And that will make us want to complete missions and stuff so the Organization can actually start moving forward."
"Wow, you really do pay attention," Axel commented, not looking up from his magazine.
"That's only because I think it's a super fantastic idea!" Axel gave Demyx an are-you-crazy? look. "What? I haven't seen my parents in forever!"
"Well I couldn't care less about mine. They can go to hell for all I care."
"Sorry, Demyx, I have to agree," Roxas added. "There's a reason I don't go running home every weekend."
"And you don't miss them a bit?" Demyx asked, sounding surprised.
"Nope," Axel said bluntly. "And even if I did, they wouldn't miss me, so why the hell would I want them to visit?" Demyx pouted and looked over to Roxas, hoping to get a different response. Roxas shrugged and shook his head. Demyx slumped back into his chair and continued to pout. After a minute or two of being ignored, he looked over at Zexion.
"Zexy, what are your parents like?" He called. Zexion looked up from his book for the first time since sitting down.
"I find them extraordinarily overbearing," he said flatly, and turned back to his literature.
"How about you, Vexen? Have any family?"
"Don't ask him that!" Roxas warned in a hushed voice. "He probably used his parents in one of his creepy experiments." Vexen didn't turn away from the computer.
"That's nothing you can prove," he said. The trio gave each other uneasy looks before returning to their conversation.
"Sorry Dem," Axel said, still staring at the magazine. "But it seems that you're the only one who's actually excited about this."
"I don't know about that," said a voice from above. The trio looked up to see Xigbar hanging down from the ceiling. Demyx was so surprised he nearly fell out of his chair.
"Don't tell me now you're on board with this ridiculous scheme, Xigbar."
"Well, not really, but at the very least, I think it'll make life interesting."
"What are your parents like, Xigbar?" Demyx asked, hopefully.
"Dead." Axel unsuccessfully tried to hide a laugh as Demyx began to get angry.
"Fine, if you guys don't want to be excited with me, I'll go be excited somewhere else," he said before vanishing from the room completely.
As Demyx wandered out of the room and down the hall, he suddenly regretted his decision to leave the room. It was still pretty early in the night, and most of the people he planned to bother were sitting back in the lounge. And certainly couldn't go back, because he had been trying to make a point, however ineffective, by walking out. Eventually, he ended up back in his bedroom, laying on his bed while lazily strumming cords on his sitar and staring at the ceiling. After an hour or two, he got bored and decided to go knock on Axel's door to see if he had returned from the lounge.
Axel had been listing to rather loud music though his headphones, and Demyx had to knock several times before the door actually opened.
"Oh, there you are," Axel said upon seeing Demyx in his doorway. "I was looking for you."
"No, you were sitting in your room ignoring me at the door," Demyx corrected.
"Well, before I was. Roxas fell asleep ten minutes after you left, so I left to find you, but I couldn't, so I just came back here."
"I've been sitting in my room for hours!"
"I probably could have looked harder. Burnout?"
Demyx shrugged and grabbed a Playstation 2 controller before slumping into Axel's deflating beanbag chair. Axel popped his favorite game, Burnout 3: Takedown, into the PS2 before sitting down on the edge of his bed.
"You're beating me harder than usual," Demyx commented an hour later after Axel had won the eighth consecutive race.
"No, you're the once who's losing worse than usual. Pay attention for Kingdom Heart's sake. It's no fun when you're not even putting up a challenge."
"Sorry," Demyx sighed. "I've just got a lot on my mind, I guess. I'm still excited for next week..."
"Still? Seriously this whole 'family' thing is going to turn out to be a huge mess."
"I just can't believe you really hate your parents that much."
"We just have clashing values, Demyx. It's not that big of a deal."
"Oh yeah?" Demyx asked. "Or is there something deeper that you don't want to talk about? Something psychological. And you're a disappointment to your parents so you ran away to join the Organization. But you still want to make them proud, which is why you can't commit to evil, and now you have all this internal conflict and stuff."
"Please, Demyx, I am not going to turn this into that kind of fan-fiction," Axel said, laughing. "Now stop going out of character. You shouldn't even know half of those words."
"Damn, I really thought I had this one," Demyx said, frowning. Suddenly there was a knock on the door.
"Are you guys still up?" Roxas called from the hallway.
"You can't come in! Axel is brooding because he's a disappointment!" Demyx called back.
"Oh shut up and let him in, Demyx. We need someone to break this awkward tension." Demyx obeyed and got up to open the door and let Roxas in.
"Way to leave me sleeping in the lounge," Roxas said as he pulled out Axel's desk chair and sat down.
"Don't look at me," Demyx defended. "When I left, you were still totally...not...sleeping...and stuff."
"I woke up and Vexen was trying to cover me with tinfoil!"
"Oh trust me, that's not tinfoil..."
"C'mon you two," Axel interrupted. "Can we stop talking about Roxas becoming a human burrito and play this game?" Demyx shrugged and handed the controller to Roxas.
"I'm sick of being beaten," he said. Roxas was considerably better at the game than Demyx, but it wasn't enough to stop Axel's winning streak.
"So, I've been wondering," Roxas said as Axel pushed his way into first place. What do you think Superior's parents are like?"
"In my opinion," Axel replied. "Xemnas is probably the offspring of Darth Vader and Cruella deVille."
"I met her once," Demyx commented as he peeled the wrapper off of a chocolate bar he had found in his cloak. "She is not a very nice lady." Axel leaned over and grabbed a Pepsi from his mini-fridge.
"Well, it's not like we'll have to meet them anyway. No doubt Xemnas will excuse himself from any 'severe punishment.' Saïx too, most likely. But that's good because, I don't know about you, but I really don't need to become acquainted with werewolves any time soon."
"Saïx's parents are werewolves?" Roxas asked doubtfully.
"Well, Saïx is scary, and werewolves are scary, so it makes perfect sense," Demyx explained with a mouthful of chocolate.
"Plus, he's got that whole moon thing going for him, being the Luna Diviner and all."
"So how do you explain the pointy ears?"
"Maybe he's one quarter elf on his mother's side?" Demyx responded unsurely as Roxas cast him a suspicious glance. "I don't know! You really shouldn't ask me these questions."
"That's right Roxas; his brain might explode if he thinks any harder."
Demyx nodded as he bit another chunk off his chocolate bar. Axel and Roxas continued to play Burnout well into the night, with Demyx eventually falling asleep in the beanbag. Not long after, Axel passed out on his bed, and Roxas, after falling out of the desk chair, spend the night on the floor.
*Note* Burnout 3: Takedown, for those of you who don't know, is a car racing PS2 game where you can crash into your opponents and knock them off the road to beat them. There is also a mode where you crash your car into an intersection to see how much damage you can do. Axel likes it because the word "BURN" is right in the title.