Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts II. Otherwise, there'd be no doubt of everyone's true sexualities. (:

Summary: The mysterious Ishida Zexion, by day, a twenty-four year old writer isolated in the depths of his apartment. By night, he's something different all together. When Demyx, an overworked college student, approaches him one night, he becomes convinced something's up with the man. Can he draw out the writer enough to help him, or will he get sucked into Zexion's shadow? ( Zemyx, AkuRoku if you squint )

Author's Note: Yes, this is an edited version cause the first one had past/present tense problemos! I'm back from hiatus, btw. (: The two songs I used are A Whisper & A Clamor by Anberlin and Cute Without the 'E' by Taking Back Sunday. x3

Growing tired of bedside resolve

(Politics lay out the pressure)

Something's got to give now

Something's going to break down

Zexion jolted involuntarily from his bed, his buzzing phone dropping from his night stand. With dark, blue-tinged hair straggled over his forehead, he cracked open his sandy lids, groaning to himself. His bedroom swirled in his eyes, bouncing and throbbing to the rhythm of his pulse. Breath staggering,

Zexion gripped the feathery sheets stuck fast to his bare chest. His fingers began to tremble at the force.

I grow tired of writing songs

While people listen but never hear what's really going on now

Tell me what's so wrong now

Zexion clenched his teeth and forced himself to sit up. He managed halfway and would have succeeded, had not his back stiffened the last minute. He crashed back onto the comforter. Sweat trickled from his sore temple.

Clap your hands all ye children

There's a clamor in your whispering

Clap your hands tonight

"Damn it, I get it! I'm awake!" he called out angrily. His hand slapped messily in the general direction of his fallen phone. He gasped, forcing himself to stop panting. Had he been dreaming? Was that why he was so feverish?

He mentally shook his head. No, he'd woken in the middle of the night; he'd been dreaming then. And then he'd gotten a drink and lain in bed again, waiting for darkness to reclaim him.

He couldn't remember when it did.

For most of men believe hell is never knowing who they are now

(Tell me who you are now)

Finally saved from the outside trapped in what you know

Are you safe from yourself? Can you escape all by yourself?

Shaking his head, Zexion shut his lids and relaxed, releasing the pressure built in his fine jaw line, dropping the tension knotted in his shoulders; his gnarled hands lay restfully. He waited silently for the sporadic tightness to drop from his breathing before reopening his eyes. He waited for the cool rest.

Contented finally and breathing regularly now, Zexion slumped to the side, reaching for his blaring alarm phone. With a grim smile, he silenced it. He was acutely aware of the new silence. There was nothing to do but wash and dress.

Zexion's loose, black jeans slipped over the edge of his mattress, and he stood, fully on his way to the bathroom. A malevolent glint of light stopped him midstep.

Clenching his fists, Zexion made his way to the full body mirror in the room's only lit corner. It was the mean area that sunlight managed reach, where two diagonal window's of the penthouse faced together. Beams of gold sun danced at the feet of the mirror, cut intricately at the pointed shadows of leaves raking the windows.

Zexion stared hauntedly at the looking glass, shaking fingers smoothing over his hard chest.

At the age of 24, Ishida Zexion was of well build, though he did nothing to indulge his physical needs. He hated sports; consequently, he had no talent for them. Gathered at his face, he had features that, combined, could pass as handsome. He was a half-breed, as he jokingly referred to himself. His mother being Japanese, he had sculpted, witty edges to his face. His natural hair was stark black. Zexion could barely recall his father's heritage. He remembered simply the man speaking something of being raised in Venice, Italy.

Zexion's eyes were an alarming blue, a deep color harboring both the depths of the expansive skies and the shine of the canals of his father's home. But these eyes were unfocused, blurred at the irises and shaded a faint purple beneath. His lips were a pale color, pressed always in a marred, tired expression.

Weariness, however, played no roll in the so-called flaw in his persona. At the rare events that his blue eyes did become bright, setting straight off his translucently discolored skin, they were almost always narrowed, calculating and seeing nothing worth venturing. When his lips did not part in fatigue, they would tighten with derision or disgust.

Now, though, Zexion stared with neither his overbearing exhaustion nor his cold outter skin. Unraveled, he stared almost fearfully at his reflection. Marks, bite marks, sank irregularly at areas around his neck and collarbones. Zexion's throat sank with utter dread.

How many times had he waken to find those marks spread erratically on his skin? How many times had he found his lips to be chapped in the morning, or bruised? How many times had he lifted the sheets from his chest to find--

He grimaced, voiced the grimace. "Why?" he whispered to the blue-haired boy before him. His hands moved to the mirror's surface. "Why can't I ever remember? What's happening to me?" His features crumbled in horror. "Has this happened before?"

However, his thoughts were interrupted by a loud yelp from his phone. He flinched at the sudden noise but recovered almost as quickly. Grimly, he lumbered back to his bed, where he'd left the device.

Zexion's ring tone was the blurred sound of static, a sound he'd stumbled into while searching something or another on his handy laptop. It intrigued him, but beyond that, it calmed him, gave him nothing apprehend.

Fumbling with the touch pad, Zexion managed to answer the handphone. "Hello?"

"Zexion Ishida, is it?" an unfamiliar voice startled him.

Brows coming together, Zexion frowned to himself. "Yes--"

"My name's Xaldin. Plain, simple, Xaldin," the voice cut in gruffly. "I'm familiar with your old editor, Na--"

"Naminé," it was Zexion's turn to interrupt. "What do you mean 'old' editor?"

"It would do you good to not interrupt me," Xaldin reprimanded. "And yes, 'old' editor. The firm assigned her to someone else--"

"Without first consulting me?" Zexion nearly yelled. "Your writer?"

"Twice," growled Xaldin. "Do I have to tell you twice to not interrupt me when I am speaking?"

"I'm sorry," Zexion replied rushedly, "but this mean's that you--"

"Yes, I am your new editor," Xaldin said brusquely. "Your new editor calling to remind you that your deadline passed almost a week ago. This is the fifth day, so I'll be expecting drafted chapters on my desk this afternoon, by four o'clock, Zexion."

"What is this? School?" Zexion demanded. His frown became a heated glare.

He heard Xaldin scoff. "Might as well be. I looked over Naminé's reports on you. What you need is discipline. Shall I come over now and check on you?"

Zexion's stomach made an unrelenting back flip as his eyes scaled the expanding penthouse. Books lay ripped, footnoted, and disheveled at every corner of the room. Notes and papers were stuffed unceremoniously into draws and dressers that seemed to produce themselves at the most unsettled places. The other day, wanting in all ways to experience the marvels of being surrounded by giants, he'd just succeeded in arranging every piece of furniture in each room into wide circles. Not to mention the graffiti flourishing every inch of his bedroom walls.

"Zexion?"

"Four o'clock, got it," Zexion mumbled before snapping the sleek, silver slide-phone shut. He rubbed his temple; the headache had returned quickly enough. He stared wearily at the device in his hands.

It was a top-of-the-notch sort of phone, but, of course, he hadn't actually picked it out. When he was lost on his way to the underground bar one day, Nocture, it had occured to him that having a handphone would be more than useful. So he'd asked Naminé to buy him one, promising to pay her back. Consequently, she'd returned with the most expensive cell phone money could buy.

That was no matter for Ishida Zexion, prodigy writer, known for his occasional fantasies and accounts on the unwatched life. And what a wonder he knew so much about it, considering his newfound isolation in his dear apartment. Nights were an entirely different matter...

Zexion sighed, his fingers quivering on his chest again, kneeling at the feet of his bed to extract a black laptop from beneath. He started toward the desk but, on seeing its filled capacity, decided otherwise. He promised himself dully to straighten everything later but forgot the notion almost exactly on leaving it.

Dropping the laptop on his bed, Zexion went to dress and, hopefully, to wash. Once he finished this draft, he'd have to force himself out the door to hand it in. There'd be no going back this time or, judging by Zexion's first impression of Xaldin, it would be his head.

This same morning, Hitoshiri Demyx rolled over his bed sheets, his dirty blonde hair falling in messy clumps over his turned head. His face collapsed in the sea of his lumped pillow while his legs dragged over the edges of his small dorm bed.

"Demyx, honey bun," a masculine voice rumbled in his ear, "if you don't wake up in two seconds, Ms. Expensive-Bass is gonna meet Mr. Hot-Hot-Flame."

"Mrrrhm," Demyx mumbled, waving his hand limply. His heavy head bobbed lazily as he heard the sound of skin hitting nylon string. Absently moistening his lips, Demyx sank back immediately. "Later, Mommy..."

"Or wait," the voice continued ruefully. Now, Demyx could hear the speaker's hand venturing, and his ear pricked irritably. "No, I think he's into someone else. This pretty little sitar right he--"

"No!" Demyx practically shrieked as he lunged at his smug roommate. His bare feet ricocheted from the wooden bed frame, awoken eyes bright with intent. He howls, smooth hands clawing in the air. "Axel, get your fucking paws off of her!"

"Alright, alright!" Axel, an exceedingly tall redhead, yelled, trying to talk above his screaming friend. He held out the electric blue sitar loosely. "God, take your stupid stick of junk. No one else wants it anyway."

Demyx's cheeks burned the color of cherries. The cute, almost childish features of his face twisted foreignly into an indignant scowl. "You know what, Axel?" he seethed, and Axel took a step back, making sure to extend the full length of the lanky arm--the one holding the sitar. Maybe he'd pushed his blonde friend a little too far. "I think," Demyx snatched his instrument back, "you're the one with a stupid stick of junk. And it's not an instrument, if you know what I mean."

Axel gaped, his wide mouth resembling a doughnut. But the moment of shock passed quickly, sizzling like a quenched flame. Throwing back his mane of firey hair, Axel laughed loudly, hysterically, a great sound that bounded through every corner and inch of the crammed room.

Demyx, now calmed, looked uneasily at his friend while settling back on his bed. Usually impressed by the room's exceptional acoustics, the blonde now rubbed his ears with an uncertain expression. "Er..." his voice trailed meekly. "Axe?"

Stopping finally, Axel could only grin at his roommate, panting for breath. "Sorry, Dem, but you, trying to look angry--and that crack about my junk--" he stopped short, laughing a little still. He wiped tears from his emerald eyes. "Ahh, what a way to start the morning."

Glaring half-heartedly at his friend, Demyx rubbed the glittering frets of his electric sitar. "Shut up, Axel," he said. He cracked a wistful smile, looking down.

"You know how long it took me to find this thing? Aw, and then that day I left the city and spotted that old shop. She was sitting right there at the w--"

"Yeah, Dem. Save it for the biography," Axel yawned, stretching and flexing lengthy arms. Demyx was suddenly acutely aware of his friend's half-nakedness, and he coughed, rightly perturbed.

Face red, Demyx turned his head away, his long, blonde bangs jostling along. "Axe, put on a shirt before France comes to reclaim your scrawny chest."

He heard Axel snort in response. "Oh, my scrawny chest?" Axel's bright eyes glimmered with amusement as he snatched an old band tee from the floor. "Why don't you take a look in the mirror, skinny boy?"

Demyx, in his white tank top and camouflage boxers, blushed again, hitting another loud chord. He mumbled something about an amp cable.

Contrary to the blonde's comment, Axel was exceptionally built. Hard abdominals were accented on his taut, bronze skin while his otherwise noted "skinny" arms flexed with evident muscle. However, his condition was known by few--with the exception of his numerous affairs. The loud-mouthed redhead was undeniably handsome, with foreign emerald eyes and electric, spiked red hair--all natural, also known by said affairs. But he did appear almost unhealthily skin and--if described by an unnoted bystander--freakishly tall.

Thinking this all over, Demyx's face only colored more. Who was he--aside from an undiscovered musician and an underpaid employee--next to the great Axel? Shaking his head, Demyx smiled faintly to himself. Maybe saying "great" was pushing it a little.

"Are you guys okay?" a familiar voice called from the doorway. "I heard screaming."

"Roxas!" Demyx's smile grew, but he doubted the boy heard him. Axel had beaten him to a greeting.

"Roxy!"

Axel had abandoned the task of stuffing his T-shirt over the great spikes of his hair and was clad only in a pair of tight, tight jeans. Making his way over the piles of cloth and paper, Axel perched himself right at the doorway, crossing his arms and donning a sexy smile. "Hey, Rox," he grinned. "See anything you like?"

Roxas was a small boy in general, so he and Axel appeared as opposites. His eyes were a bright cerulean, while his blonde hair shot up in short, natural spikes. He, much shorter, glared up. But his small cheeks betrayed him and brightened the red of the taller boy's hair. "Axel, if I did," Roxas said carefully, "I would've dumped you a long time ago."

Demyx saw Axel bend to peck Roxas's lips but looked elsewhere when it became clear the two weren't finished. Drawing a chord stream to mind, Demyx played contentedly, patiently.

It was clearly spring, for leaves sprung sporadically from the trees outside--not that Demyx's dorm window allowed such a sight. No, the blonde's window revealed a very detailed view of the next building's red, brick wall. Demyx's smile didn't faze. He, Roxas, and Axel were saving up for an apartment. The three weren't far from the goal, and it was good timing. The school year was ending.

"So, Dem, are you covering the bar tonight?" Roxas asked, walking inside the crammed room. Demyx could see the boy's lips bruised and his eyes bright.

He sighed; it was time he found a relationship. The only problem with the matter was the requirement of a partner...

Demyx focused on his friend's question. Tapping his sitar's neck, he looked up thoughtfully. "Let's see," he said.

Demyx had three jobs--four, counting the occasional drop-in's at the underground bar owned by a friend. During the week, he worked behind the register at the college bookstore and the CD shop around the corner of their campus. Over the weekend, he waitered at a coffee house.

"Today's Friday," Demyx lifted his fingers, as if counting, "so I'm only working at the Ambiant from twelve o'clock to two-thirty. And all my classes end at six o'clock, so..." Demyx's face curled into what resembled a grimace as he thought through the times. Finally, he lifted his head with his usual smile again and nodded excitedly. "Yeah, Rox, I'll drop by around six-thirty," said Demyx.

"Sweet," Axel slipped his arm around Roxas and pulled the two onto his unmade bed.

"You know, you don't have to," added Roxas with concern, "I don't get how you survive like this."

Demyx shrugged and gingerly placed his sitar beside him. "It's no big deal," he lied, suppressing a nod. "They're fun jobs." He bent over his bed and fished for clean clothes.

"The Ambiant," stroking Roxas's hair, Axel smirked to himself, "what a stupid name for a CD store."

Roxas ignored him and continued. "What about classes, Dem? How do you deal with those?"

Forgetting the name, Demyx stood abruptly, petrified. "C-Classes," he managed, pale. "What time is it?" he demands. "I don't wanna be rude or anything--"

"Seven-fifty five!" Roxas yelled, startling redhead beside him. "You're gonna be late!"

"Right--" Pulling up abnormally tight skinny jeans--he'd grabbed Axel's in the confusion--and zipping a hoodie around him, Demyx snatched a worn backpack from the bedside and stomped into his shoes. Waving to his two friends, he shoved himself out the door at a full sprint to his first class. The long cuffs of Axel's slumping over his shoes, Roxas and Axel could hear Demyx's breathy apologizes as he stumbled over the other students in the dorm.

Roxas sighed, but Axel, smirking still, twisted to directly face his partner. "Well, Roxy," he brought his voice to a whisper, "it's just you and me."

Rolling his eyes, Roxas shoved a bookbag at Axel's bare chest and stood.

"Get to class," he called behind him as he left the room.

And will you tell all your friends,

You've got your gun to my head

This all was only wishful thinkin,

This all was only wishful thinkin

And will you tell all your friends...

"You've got your gun to my head," Zexion hummed beneath his breath.

Music echoed through the short hallways of Ishida Zexion's apartment. Before he had moved in, Zexion had arranged for soundproof walls. He did not want to be disturbed by noise complaints.

Brushing blue-dyed hair over his right eye, Zexion exhaled lowly. His lithe fingers tapped erratically over his laptop keys and paused every two minutes or so. During these short breaks, the twenty-four year old would absently chew the inside of his lip, curl his brow, delete at least half of a written line, and then continue on his way.

Since he was only editting instead of adding--something Naminé had had to drill in his mind long ago--the process was diminished to shorter typing spurts and longer pauses for deleting and chewing.

Hoping for the best just hoping nothing happens

A thousand clever lines unread on clever napkins

I wil never ask if you don't ever tell me

I know you well enough to know--

Zexion's hands collapsed on his keyboard, and he gently leaned his head back. His rectangular bed was pushed to fit right in a corner of his room, and it was in that exact corner that he sat. His head was propped between the two adjacent walls.

"I know you well enough to know you never loved me," he sang tunelessly. He adored that verse; he despised it. It took a curious person, Zexion thought, to welcome humiliation. However, it took an even more curious person to stand always beside one they loved, one who insisted they loved back. It was understandable if the person was simply foolish enough to believe such a lie.

However, Zexion imagined someone living in constant pain of a well-possessed knowledge, someone who embraced the life anyway. A masochist, Zexion had considered at first. Or maybe it took a wise man to realize lies were much more beautiful than the truth. Maybe it took another fool.

Either way, such feelings didn't compute to Zexion, and that is why he wrote. He wrote to capture the exact thoughts and interactions of every such "curiousity". It made him feel more himself. If he ever doubted who he was, he could simply read his prose. I am not him, he would repeat to himself.

What he never considered was becoming one such person.

Bzzz...

Zexion grabbed his vibrating phone and slid it open. "March thirty-first, two-fourty PM," he read beneath his breath, "two saved events." His thumb ran quickly over the buttons.

The first event was saved as an audio. Zexion frowned. He couldn't recall ever learning to save an audio; he knew little of his phone's capacities aside from events, alarm, and communicating. Opening the file, he put the phone to his ear.

"Oi, Zexthionn," the unfamiliar voice was slurred, not his. "You jussst told me to leave an eventh, but I thhought I'd ssthpice it up, ussse my voiccce--"

At this point, another stranger's voice seemed to chastise them and take hold of the receiver. "Zexion," the voice was firm, "you promised you'd meet us at the Nocturne next Friday night. You said you'd forget, so we're making sure you don't, Zexion. Seven o'clock. Be there."

The event ended there. Heavy head swaying, Zexion tightened his jaw. It began to convulse ever so slightly, but he took no notice.

If he'd forgotten about the audio completely, he'd probably engaged with the speakers during the night. Shrugging the laptop from his legs, Zexion folded his knees close to him and dropped his head at their caps. His temples began to throb irritably, and he groaned softly. He felt his entire body begin to quiver, and he began panting again.

If the occurence had been so important, then obviously it was practical for him to record it onto his phone. It was the only way he was sure he didn't forget everything.

Zexion didn't see his memory glitch as anything serious. There were only two other people who knew of it--possibly three--and those were Naminé and Lexaeus downstairs. The times he did ponder his problem, he shrugged off the idea of getting checked out. He'd rather not have to describe himself to a stranger.

"I'll go," Zexion murmured to himself in a gasping breath. He forced himself to relax again and pushed his thoughts from his mind. Setting the first event to ring again in an hour, Zexion added a quick footnote to it. Calm now, he checked the next event; it was typed, and he could vaguely remember punching it in that morning.

"It's about the drafts and the deadline," he said to himself. He was relieved to see that he was correct.

He whispered to the air, "A new editor? I remember something as much. He was--" his head throbbed again "--patronizing." He took a peek at the time and nodded to himself. "I have time to get there," he said raggedly.

Turning his attention back to his laptop, Zexion saved his work. "It's not as if my edits will matter," he added mentally. He clicked the printer icon and listened for the soft fan and beep from the printer in the next room. Upon hearing it, he nodded and stood.

Zexion looked down on himself, smoothing the tee that he wore over a white collar shirt. Stalking toward the full body mirror, he grimaced; his brain might forget occasionally, but the body remembered.

He seemed decent, he thought. The long sleeves of his black T-shirt clung presentingly to his miraculously built arms. White cloth from the shirt beneath snuck from the trims of the tee, as well as at the collar and the bottom hem. For pants, he wore loose and wrinkled, black jeans.

Satiated, he twisted away from the glass curtly and left for the small study, from which he could hear the printer. The study was relatively bright, lit by open windows. It was a small room, so the sun exerted little effort in chasing away the numbered shadows. A small desk lay against the wall opposite the door, where a laser printer worked away hastily. Fluttered leaflets with mistaken inkblots and drafts with permanent cross-outs surrounded it.

Zexion sunk into the chair before the desk, briefly checking the printer's progress. He had time before the four o'clock makeshift deadline, maybe he'd take a nap. Relaxing his neck, Zexion's head lulled backwards, his hair tangling atop his forehead. He closed his eyes.

He heard voices.

"I'll be expecting drafted chapters on my desk this afternoon, by four o'clock, Zexion."

"You said you'd forget, so we're making sure you don't, Zexion. Seven o'clock. Be there."

"Zexion, Zexion, Zexion, Zexion--"

"Everyone, I give you Ishida Zexion!"

"You're a quiet one aren't you?"

"Get out of the car! Listen to your mother, go! Go now--!"

"Shh...Zex..."

Zexion's eyes fluttered open, and he shook his head groggily. He hadn't even fallen asleep, he noticed glumly. He knew by looking at the printer and seeing it finish the same page he'd seen it start only seconds ago.

Shaking his head, Zexion relaxed against the desk chair again. His eyes cracked open and remained fixed on the smooth ceiling. Breathing heavily, he tried to recall a Friday night engagement.