"Zexion?" Demyx whined in Siax's general direction, arms raised over his head in indignation. "What on earth do you expect me to do with Zexion?"

"Eliminate the giant heartless in Traverse Town," Saix sniffed, looking pointedly down his nose at the blond nuisance. "I thought even you would be able to understand orders that clear number nine."

"But he doesn't fight!" Demyx was starting to sound rather desperate. "You only send him on recon, do you really expect me to defeat a big badie with him?"

"I suppose you'll just have to pull your weight for once number nine, now get to work."

Defeated, Demyx trudged over to the sofa, and began dusting off one of his nicest sitars. Her name was Sanctuary and she was his best for combat, during those unfortunate missions when he had been forced into combat that is.

"Are you ready to go?"

That was Zexion, good old creepy, gloomy Zexion. Come to lurk over his shoulder and force him to work. Demyx knew Saix expected him to take out the heartless, that Zexion was really just there for show, and it's not like he didn't have it coming with all the work he shoved off on the others. But still, making the newest member of the organization complete a two person mission on their own just wasn't fair. And he wouldn't even get credit for it! Since Siax had assigned him Zexion as a perpetual cling-on. Demyx's mind was made up, he was having none of this bull Saix was dumping on him. If he was going on this mission, he was not fighting by himself. In fact he wasn't going to fight at all, if all went according to plan that is...

"Yeah," Demyx said, rising to his feet. "Let me just grab something from my room and we'll head out."

The air was turning chilly as the sun continued to dip down under the roofs of the city strip. They had been at the search for roughly an hour, though on the plus side they had managed to avoid fighting most of the smaller heartless that showed up from time to time. Demyx figured this was mostly due to his, rather perfected at this point, talent of running faster than a dusk away from any approaching danger. Zexion, tag-on that he his, tended to just sort of sweep along after him, with surprisingly long strides for such a little guy. Still, it was getting cold and dark and Demyx's feet were really starting to ache. He wished they could just find the giant already, because Demyx had never been much of a waiter and he'd been waiting way too long already to put his plan into motion and get back to a nice comfy couch.

"Do you think it's up there?"Demyx asked hopefully, gesturing up at the large bell tower over looking them.

"No." Zexion replied flatly, "You're not looking properly. Haven't you noticed the fountain?"

"The wha?" Demyx glanced over at the large engraved fountain decorating a far corner of the courtyard. "You think it's in the fountain?" Demyx asked, clearly a skeptic.

"I don't think, I know."

"You can't know something like that! Where's your proof?"

"Take a closer look at the fountain," Zexion was walking over to the fountain and Demyx followed a short ways behind. "Look," Zexion pointed to the fountain's spouts, "no water."

"That doesn't prove anything." Demyx grumbled, "They probably just shut it off at night."

"And the mural behind the fountain." Zexion continued, "Doesn't it look off? The block of stone it's on is pushed just slightly to the left; you can actually see part of a different picture on the right."

"That still doesn't mean there's a heartless in there. There could be a whole bunch of other reasons for that!"

Zexion grabbed hold of Demyx's wrist, pulling the blond forward until his fingers brushed against the granite surrounding the mural. "Claw marks," Zexion said pointedly, releasing Demyx's wrist from his surprisingly strong grip.

Demyx recoiled away from the stone, which was indeed marred with several scratches made by a particularly lethal looking heartless. "Yikes! Zexy, when'd you notice that?"

Zexion flinched slightly at the nickname but cleared his throat and answered. "I'd say this is our fourth or fifth time passing through here, so about twenty minutes ago."

"Why didn't you say something sooner!" Demyx asked slumping forward in exhaustion. "No, never mind that, the sooner this heartless's dead, the sooner we can go back. So," Demyx turned to give Zexion an expectant look, "how do we get it out of the fountain?"

"Well you could try attacking the fountain." A sneer spread across Zexion's face, "Unless you have a better idea."

"Why do I have to do it?" Demyx asked, eying the gouges in the fountain dubiously.

"I'm sorry," Zexion drawled, not sound sorry at all, "would you like me to chuck my book at it instead?"

"Fine, fine," Demyx stepped back before aiming for what he figured was the center of the mural and firing a blast of water. The stone clicked into place and before Demyx could retreat to a safer hiding spot, a giant purple heartless, made up of what seemed to be disembodied pieces of armor all floating together to shape a body, burst from the fountain, sending water in all directions.

Demyx rolled out of the way as the Guard Armor lumbered forward knocking into some boxes, stacked there early by some poor merchant, smashing them to bits. Demyx gulped and proceeded to roll again, very nearly missing a blow as the heartless swung it's arms in a wild spin attack. His luck ran its course however when the armor jumped high into the air, smashing down next to the blond and sending him tumbling into the fountain. Demyx sputtered and wiped the water out of his eyes, looking around for his supposed "back up".

Zexion was still leaning against the wall he'd chosen earlier. He'd taken out a book and was now reading it, calm as you please, fingers toying with the edge of the next page. The nerve! Demyx frowned and powered back a particularly high pressured blast before releasing it at Zexion, drenching him and his stupid book.

Zexion looked up at Demyx with a look that was made of three parts hatred and five parts impending homicide, and closed his soggy book in a disturbingly slow way. His eyes were burning behind his wet bangs which seemed to shake along with the small nobody's body sending little flecks of water tumbling.

"Heh, sorry about that Zexy," Demyx said fighting off a grin. "This is going to sound totally weird but I really can't aim when my hair gets messed up like this," He gestured to his hair which had lost its shape and was falling down in a rather unflatering way into the blond's eyes.

Zexion fired off a firaga spell, which narrowly missed Demyx, hitting one of the fountain stones and exploding into sparks.

"Yikes! You gotta watch it, man." Demyx said to a still rather livid Zexion. "Do us both a favor and aim for the heartless, Mmkay?"

Zexion seemed not to have heard him but proceeded to charge another spell. Luckily, or rather unluckily the guard armor chose that moment to smash itself into the fountain, sending Demyx leaping into the air to avoid a rather intimate encounter with rock and metal. Pulling out the hair gel he'd stashed in his bag, Demyx began to put his hair right, sticking it up clump by clump in a practiced way that only came with lots of experience. Remembering his plan from earlier, the nobody reached farther into his pack, producing his secret weapon.

"Listen Zexy," Demyx said, giving Zexion what he hoped was a winning smile. "I just can't handle this one by myself, especially with my hair all messed up." Zexion made an odd growling noise. "But I'm sure you could do it." Demyx said raising his bribery high into the air, "Especially for say, an Encyclopedia Britannica."

Zexion's eyes narrowed but Demyx could tell he was winning. "What edition?"

Demyx grinned, "Tenth."

"Do you have any idea how old that is? Where did someone like you even get it anyway?"

"Do you want it or not?" Demyx asked resorting to another dodge roll.

An odd look crossed the book worm's face and before Demyx had time to blink, Zexion was soaring through the air. Mere inches from the armor he murmured something along the lines of, "You brought this upon yourself," before raining darkness down on the heartless. Letting out one great bone shaking cry, the Guard Armor rose into the air and shattered into thousands of pieces, leaving behind only a heart which ascended swiftly through the air.

Demyx whistled and ran over to the stoic nobody. "Nice work man. I didn't know you had it in ya."

Zexion grunted and held out his hand, waiting impatiently for his payment. The blond grabbed the extended limb and yanked Zexion into a rather spontaneous, and wet, kiss.

Zexion had never kissed anyone before, but he figured as far as kisses go this must have been a rather bad one. Demyx was over zealous and had missed most of his mouth entirely, giving him an unpleasantly wet jaw. But still, there was something about the way that Demyx's lips were curled into a smile at the edges, and the breath coming from his nose, which landed warmly on his cheek. Demyx's eyes were closed and his lashes were long and black against his skin, and Zexion's arm had begun to tingle where the blond still held it.

After what must have been a very shot while but felt like an impossibly long stretch of time, Demyx pulled away, grinning with sparkles playing around his irises. Zexion felt pathetic and sappy. "You were fantastic," Demyx whispered it, the words curling into smoke in the air between them before fading away. "Oh, and this is yours now." Demyx produced the book which Zexion had almost forgotten about at this point, almost. Zexion took the proffered document with a shaking hand, which might have had less to do with literary excitement then he was ready to admit, and slipped it into his cloak.

"We should head back," Zexion said clearing his throat.

"Yeah."

There was a small pause where they both stood still, hovering on the edge of leaving, and then Demyx turned away and opened a portal and Zexion fell into step behind him and over his shoulder Demyx heard Zexion say, "You know none of that would have happened if it weren't for your ridicules hair."
Demyx laughed and Zexion fought down butterflies.