Disclaimer: I don't own the characters. They belong to Tetsuya Nomura, Square Enix and some to Disney.

Author's Note: Thanks to Maxie, my superb beta who catches all my stupid typos and more. Set sometime between the present and not too distant future, mostly in Chicago, lying somewhere between reality and pure fantasy. Axel/Saïx with eventual Axel/Roxas. Some other pairings here and there. Great big music industry AU. Rated M for sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.

Chapter 1: Too Drunk to Fuck

Quite possibly, Leon thought, the only thing worse than riding in a crowded elevator was doing so when you were crammed in the corner and couldn't look at the door. From that position the only option is to make awkward eye contact with an equally awkward stranger. Only viable option. It was entirely possible to look up at a corner or just past someone, but then you wound up looking like an antisocial douchebag. Not that Leon had a problem with that.

Of course, this second option only worked when you were the tallest person in the elevator. It was infinitely more awkward to make eye contact with the tall stranger in the opposite corner when you were expecting to see wall. This particular stranger quirked an eyebrow, his lips curving into a knowing smirk.

Leon stared blankly at the stranger, as though he could look right through the bright flame red hair, spiked back sharply, and past the vibrant green eyes surrounded by smudged eyeliner - and were those tattoos under his eyes? His expression didn't falter and neither did the other man's. The elevator dinged and the stranger moved to exit the elevator, maneuvering through the crowd of people in such a way that he brushed past Leon on his way out.

The door was about to close when Leon realized this was the floor he needed off on too and he scrambled out of the elevator, regaining his complete sense of unaffected cool within seconds of the elevator door closing behind him.

"The name's Axel," the stranger said from his position leaning against the wall, his arms crossed and that same smirk from in the elevator still playing at his lips. "Got it memorized?"

Leon paid - Axel, was it? - no attention and turned to head down the corridor to his client's room. He didn't have time for this.

"I'll be down in the bar later. Come find me," Axel called out after him. "You know, if you get bored... or anything." His last words trailed off as Leon turned out of sight. Axel thought that could have gone much worse than it had.

The next day found them in a similar situation, both men in a crowded elevator forced to make awkward eye contact. Not that Axel found it awkward. He found it so opposite of awkward that he went out of his way to make it more awkward. Speaking loud enough for Leon to hear him - meaning loud enough for the entire elevator to hear him - Axel asked, "Why'd you blow me off like that last night?"

The elevator dinged and not paying attention to what floor it was, Leon got off and walked away. He didn't turn around to see if Axel was following him. He didn't need to. He didn't care.

"This isn't your floor, you know," Axel said, catching up to him. When Leon didn't respond Axel continued. "So, maybe we got off to a bad start. Let's try again. The name is Axel, and yours is?"

"Leon," he responded, staring straight ahead as they walked. Leon wasn't sure where they- he was walking to, or how he was going to lose this man that was following him around.

"So, why'd you blow me off last night, Leon?" Axel turned around and stepped in front of Leon, walking backwards.

"I didn't."

"You never came down to the bar," Axel pointed out.

"I wasn't bored." Leon sighed and turned down another corridor, which lead to the elevators on the south side of the hotel.

"Oh. Well. I'll be there again tonight," Axel said, stopping in front of the elevators. "I won't bother you again if you don't show up," he lied.

"How thoughtful." Leon crossed his arms as they waited for the elevator. Just a few more minutes of this and he'd never have to see Axel again.

"You know what I don't get," Axel said. Leon was quickly becoming aware of just how much Axel didn't like silence. "Is why this hotel has no name. It's just called 'Hotel'. Which would be fine if it weren't for the fact that Chicago is a pretty big city to have a hotel without a name." He paused for a breath and to give Leon a chance to say something, but when his pause was met with nothing but silent agitation (well masked agitation, at that) he continued on. "If a hotel doesn't have a name it may as well not exist. I like to call this The-Hotel-That-Never-Was. What do you think?"

The elevator arrived and Leon stepped in, followed quickly by Axel. "It doesn't matter." The tone of Leon's voice made it clear that the conversation was over and for once, Axel took the hint. When Leon arrived at his floor, Axel remained, allowing them to go their separate ways. Axel held the open door button until Leon disappeared around the corner.

Midnight rolled around and Axel spotted Leon sitting alone at a table near the back of the hotel bar. Not the only bar on the hotel's lobby floor, but the only one explicitly for the hotel's clientele and their guests. There were several empty glasses around him, rings of condensation surrounding them. The chair opposite Leon was askew and Axel took this as an invitation to join him.

"So, decided to come be social after all or did I interrupt a one man pity party because it looks like you're on the way to drinking yourself into oblivion," Axel said, nudging one of the glasses with a knuckle.

"Business meeting," Leon replied, his voice clear and crisp - a rather obvious sign that very little, if any at all, of the drinking had been done by him.

"Of course you're here on business. Everyone in this hotel is. Music industry, or other?" Axel asked, though he already knew the answer. "I'm in music. Manager for a band called Eight-Finger Dichotomy. Ever hear of them? Recently got signed to an independent label - Thirteen - but the owner is a real controlling bastard. They're working on cutting their first record, making use of one of the recording studios and the practice rooms up on the nineteenth floor. They're pretty ace if you ask me, though a bit eccentric in their choice of instruments. They don't have any regular electric guitar, they have an electric sitar. Have you ever heard of a electric sitar as the main guitar in a rock band? I know plenty of bands have used it for a song or two, but for nearly every song? Anyway, they've also got a drummer with a pretty wicked sense of rhythm, though you gotta be careful around him - he's got a temper like I've never seen. All calm and collected one second then BAM!" Axel slammed his hand on the table, causing Leon to blink. "He's a fucking berserker the next. He destroyed his one of his drums earlier this week and I've been sitting here bored out of my mind waiting on him to get it repaired. He refuses to replace it. Said there's too much sentimental value in it or some crap. I think he's just pissed off at Xemnas - that's the independent label bastard. Oh, and then their keyboardist and lead vocalist has this unbelievably enchanting voice. You'd swear she was a witch," he laughed, talking about the band members as though they weren't some of his best friends, but some kids who hired him because he could talk.

Leon wondered when he was supposed to answer the questions that Axel had asked when the other man finally took a break from talking to laugh. "Yes, music. No, I haven't." He was about to excuse himself from Axel's company when the waitress came over to the table.

"I'll take a Long December and he'll have," Axel motioned towards Leon, "two of whatever it was he was drinking before I joined him." The waitress nodded and walked off. Axel watched for a brief moment before turning back to Leon. "She was a looker, wasn't she? Did you see that rack?" He tastefully refrained from using his hands to imitate the size of her chest.

Leon stared blankly at Axel. This was quickly becoming routine. Axel would say something inane and Leon would stare blankly at him in response. The conversation continued this way until the waitress returned with the drinks - Axel struggling to wheedle any little bit of information from Leon that he could all the while making it impossible for Leon to get a word in edgewise. The waitress set down Axel's drink in front of him - a mixture of rum, hot cinnamon schnapps, sweet & sour and apple juice on the rocks - then placed two lowballs of scotch - neat - in front of Leon before walking away.

"Oh no. No. I can't let you drink that. No wonder you're so boring and stiff," Axel said. "You're going to drink this and I'll take those." He pushed the oversized cocktail glass of full of a fruity yet spicy mixed drink across the table and stole the scotch lowballs from Leon pounding them down one after the other. Completely the wrong way to enjoy scotch, but Axel wasn't going to waste his time sipping something as boring as that. He flagged down the waitress and asked for another Long December.

"What is this?" Leon asked, eyeing the drink with disdain. The look only increased as Axel listed off the ingredients. "Sounds like a girl drink."

"I wasn't aware drinks had gender identities," Axel said with a sigh. "If you don't drink it I will and then you're going to have to escort a very drunk me back up to my room because there's another one on it's way and I'm not letting good booze go to waste." He paused and then smirked, "Unless that's what you were hoping for." He was determined to get a foot in with Leon, knowing full well what company he worked for. Through sex wasn't the option he'd prefer, but if that's what it would take, it was a sacrifice he'd be willing to make. Saïx would forgive him. Maybe.

Leon took a sip of the beverage - a little sweet for his tastes, but oh, a little spicy too. Overall, it was a fairly well balanced drink in terms of flavor. He took another drink from the glass and decided that maybe Axel did know what he was talking about.

The waitress returned shortly with Axel's drink. The fiery young man continued speaking at a breakneck pace, pausing only to take long draws from his glass, his speech slurring slightly as he drank more and more of it. Leon slowly worked on his own drink, nodding and filling Axel's pauses with the occasional yes, no, or other monosyllabic response. It was lucky for them both that Axel liked the sound of his own voice. Or at least lucky for Axel. Leon thought he could deal with sitting here in silence and enjoying a lowball or two of scotch.

"You know. This reminds me of Lost in Translation. Kind of. Maybe. I'm drunk and might be making random connections. You ever see that? Good movie, you should watch it sometime. Only thing we're missing here is a dotty red headed lounge singer..." Axel paused, then laughed, "...want me to sing you a song?"

Leon wasn't sure how he should respond, but his train of thought was abruptly cut off when Axel continued speaking, "I have to warn you, if you do. There's a reason I'm the manager and not out there owning that stage," and did he ever shut up? Not that he was complaining, the more time Axel spent talking the less time he had to.

He made a small noise in the back of his throat that Axel took to mean 'I'll pass.'

The night stretched on, the number of empty glasses on the table slowly multiplying, speech getting more and more slurred, harder to comprehend. Shortly before two in the morning, the waitress returned to sort out the tab (Axel said to put it on his room - he wasn't the one paying for it anyway) and kindly informed them that they should find somewhere else to continue their conversation, the bar was about to close.

"Well, Leon," Axel slurred, standing up, wobbling only slightly as he tried to find a sense of balance - any would do, it didn't necessarily have to be his own. "It was nice chatting with ya. I'll be down here again tomorrow night. If you decide that loosening up and pretending to be social isn't such a bad thing, I'll see you." With that, he turned and made his way across the bar, out to the hotel lobby and waited in front of the elevators where Leon joined him moments later. Axel turned to him and laughed, "Following me now? I thought it was supposed to be the other way around."

"We're both going up and these are the closest elevators," Leon replied, his tone indicating that he didn't find Axel's comment nearly as amusing as Axel did.

"You really need to work on your attitude," Axel said, shaking a finger at Leon. The elevator dinged and they both stepped inside, the elevator once again crowded (it was always crowded) and Axel standing less than a foot away from Leon. One hand resting on his shoulder for balance as the elevator made it's way up. They reached Axel's floor and he staggered out, Leon stepping out a moment after.

"I'll walk you to your room," Leon said. "I know what you're after, and if you had a demo on you, I would have expected you to hand it over hours ago."

Axel laughed as they reached his door, realizing he'd forgot he had it with him. "Got it right here," he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a jump drive. "I assume you have a computer. Give it a listen and I'll see you in the bar again tomorrow if you like it." He grinned and clapped a hand on Leon's shoulder, pretty sure he'd just said what he wanted to. "Good night."

Leon examined the jump drive before pocketing it. "Good night," he replied before turning and heading back to the elevator.

"You're shitfaced," Saïx said, glancing up from his book as Axel stumbled into the room after listening to the door beep off and on for the last several minutes as Axel had tried to open the door.

"No I'm not, the door's just being an asshole..." Saïx's expression screamed bullshit. "Okay, maybe a little," Axel laughed when he could see he wasn't buying it, flopping down on the bed, the back of his head landing on Saïx's legs as he brought his leg up to remove his boot. He fumbled with the laces before Saïx sighed and set his book down, pushing his hands out of the way and helping him remove the boot.

"They're not even tied. Other foot," Saïx murmured and Axel let one leg down then lifted the other.

"Thanks," he said, as his boot joined the other on the floor.

"You're more than a little shitfaced, Axel. You were supposed to loosen Leon up, not yourself." Saïx shook his head then went back to reading.

"Oops," Axel laughed. He glanced over at the other bed in the room. "Where's Demyx and Naminé?"

"Working on writing a new song. So did you get Leon to take the demo?"

"He's supposed to meet me down at the bar tomorrow night if he likes it." Axel looked up at Saïx and grinned. "I think I got our foot in."

"I'm coming with you tomorrow."

"Why? You don't need to, I can hold my own. I'm the manager. I manage. It's my job to do all the boring meetings."

"They can't be that boring if you come back like this." Saïx scowled.

"Jealous~?" Axel teased, elongating the word and smirking.

"Hardly." Meaning yes, Saïx was very jealous.

Axel gracelessly flopped around on the bed until he was laying on his stomach face inches from Saïx's. "I'm sure," he said with a laugh, arm nudging his leg.

Saïx tucked a strand of his hair behind his ear and sighed. "Not tonight. You reek and probably won't remember it in the morning."

"I always remember it."

"Except for when you don't." Saïx set his book down on the night stand. "Go to bed, Axel."

"Fiiiiiiiine," Axel huffed. He rolled over and stood up, nearly losing his balance. "You know, you're no fun."

"I'm plenty of fun when I don't have to deal with drunk assholes."

Axel started stripping out of his clothes, pausing after getting his shirt half off. "Where's my pjs?"

"I don't know. Does it matter? Just go to sleep already. Don't expect any sympathy when you're nursing that hangover in the morning."

"Bastard."

"That's you."

"Love you."

"No you don't. Good night."

"Ha ha. You're right," Axel laughed as he tossed his shirt to the floor. He unfastened his jeans and began shimmying out of them, falling back onto the bed to get them off once they were down to his knees. He struggled with getting them past his feet.

"It's not that complicated. Stop attention seeking." Saïx turned off the light, annoyed by Axel's drunken answer as he properly crawled into bed next to him, passing out within seconds.

"He's still not up?" Demyx asked, throwing a glare at the sleeping redhead. "What the hell? It's three o'clock. He was dead to the world when Naminé and I got in last night. How much did you exhaust him before he passed out?" He crinkled his nose.

"It was all his own doing," Saïx said, too focused on the computer in front of him to notice the look of distaste. "Someone decided to get plastered last night. Feel free to go scream in his ear if you want him up."

"I'll pass, thanks. Did he at least get our demo to Leon? Only reason Xemnas isn't breathing down our necks about your drum kit is because we got those lyrics in to him last night. Man, Axel better pull through on this." Demyx fidgeted with the torn sleeves of his hoodie.

"He got it. Axel's supposed to be meeting with Leon again tonight. I'll be tagging along to make sure he doesn't get wasted. You and Naminé should take the night off. We'll be back in the rehearsal studio tomorrow." Saïx looked up and pointed to the drum case in the corner. "I got the head replaced this morning."

"Good, because we've got a new song that won't be complete without your input. You know Nam and I are shit at coming up with anything you approve of for the rhythm section."

"That's not true."

"Name one time when you didn't scrap what we came up with."

Saïx pursed his lips and glared, biting back the anger threatening to well up within him.

"My point exactly. And we wouldn't be here right now if it weren't for your rhythmic genius and Axel's ability to talk our way into anything... for better or for worse," Demyx said with a sigh, pleased when Saïx's expression went placid, a sure sign his ire had cooled.

"Don't be modest." Saïx glanced over at a snoring Axel then back to Demyx. "Get out of here so I can wake Axel. We'll meet you at Standee's in an hour for dinner."

"Aye aye," Demyx said, running out of the room as quickly as he could.

Leon wasn't sure what to expect when he walked into the hotel bar to find Axel sitting next to a blue haired punk with a large x-shaped scar in the center of his face. He wondered if this was the drummer Axel had mentioned because nothing about the guy said "I play electric sitar," especially not the stoic yet displeased expression that rivalled his own.

"I don't think he's coming," Saïx grumbled. Axel was on his third drink already and frankly, he wanted to get out of there before Axel was too drunk to fuck.

"He's coming, I promise," Axel said. He looked around the room and then pointed out the man approaching from across the room, a manila envelope tucked under his arm, "Look, there he is."

"Which one?"

"The one with half your scar and the sullen looking scowl on his face. You sure he's not your brother?" Axel teased, poking Saïx in the shoulder.

"Positive," was the curt reply.

"Lighten up," Axel said, reaching under the table and squeezing Saïx's thigh.

"Am I interrupting?" Leon asked, noting the slight blush gracing Saïx's cheeks. He sat down across from the pair, placing the envelope on the table and ordered them a round of drinks when the server approached.

"Not at all," Axel said with a smirk.

"Great," Leon said, rather unenthusiastically. "I have some good news and some bad news."

"Bad news first," Saïx said, preferring to get it out of the way as quickly as possible.

"Bad news it is. We can't sign you right now." Axel's expression faltered, and Saïx managed to look even more displeased than he already was.

"And the good news?" Axel asked, his throat feeling suddenly dry.

"The good news is we just had a band disqualify from Radiant Records' annual battle of the bands competition. There are two grand prizes for the competition, being signed to one of Radiant's subsidiary labels - Destiny Records and Heartless Records, the latter being the label I represent. I listened to your demo last night then talked with the head of Radiant Records this morning about the vacancy, and you're invited to fill it. I think you guys stand a good chance of winning or at least making it to the finals." It was the most Axel had ever heard the other man say.

"That's two weeks from now, right?" Saïx asked.

"Yes."

"And it's a week long competition?"

"Yes."

Saïx leaned over and whispered into Axel's ear, who nodded before speaking. "It's going to be pushing it close on our getting out of the contract with Thirteen with minimal financial loss. What kind of figures can we expect for the signing bonus?"

"We can talk actual figures if you get signed," Leon said, taking a drink of the scotch the server had brought him. "It won't be much unless you're planning to record the album in a studio other than one of our own."

"We'd be using your studios, they're the best in town," Saïx said, trading his glass of water for Axel's beer.

"What are you doing?" Axel interrupted.

"I'm cutting you off for the night. You'll thank me later."

Axel scowled at Saïx and took a drink of the water. "And I'm supposed to be the one asking questions. It's my job."

"Very well," Leon said, shrugging off their argument. "If you're concerned about living costs, you don't have to worry. Radiant Records takes care of their own. You won't be seeing much of your royalties for awhile. I assume you write all your own lyrics and music?"

Saïx nodded, "No one outside of the band contributes to the creative process aside from telling us when something stinks."

Leon nodded approvingly.

"So, if we're not going to be seeing much money, how are we going to pay the breech of contract fees to Xemnas at Thirteen?" Axel asked.

"That's something we can discuss when the time comes." Leon took another drink of scotch before pushing the manila envelope across the table. "That contains all the information about the competition. All the rules, regulations and other fine print. Look it over and drop off the paperwork at my office by ten o'clock Monday morning. The disqualified band's entry fee will be forfeit to you should you accept all the terms."

"Why were they disqualified?"

"I can't share that with you, but you're welcome to draw your own conclusions as you read through the information packet."

"It was a pleasure meeting you," Saïx said, holding his hand out to Leon, who promptly took it and shook. "I'm sure Axel has another six thousand questions he'd like to ask you, but we've got a long night ahead of us and a busy day tomorrow, if you'll excuse us."

"Of course."

Axel picked up the envelope and grinned at Leon. "Thanks," he said, before practically running out of the bar to catch up with Saïx.