A/N: Holy shit, it's kink meme fic not about/involving Vexen :O, but he gets mentioned a lot anyway, so who knows if that counts.
I started posting thinking I'd finished only to realise the fic was no where near done and spent forever half posted. Apparently, I started five months ago and only finished tonight- my apologises have been offered already on the kink meme. Here's to hoping this'll crack my writer's block.
The thing Xigbar hated about the arrow rifles was the were too quiet, too 'clean' compared to a normal gun.
They did the job just fine, but it simply wasn't as satisfying seeing Axel just fall to the ground with a mild, insignificant click compared to the thundercrack gorespray of a well placed bullet. He wasn't dead, no, of course not -that'd be simple, getting off light.
And in all honesty? Not all that much fun.
Xigbar wasn't stupid, if he wanted to kill, he'd shoot to kill. If he wanted to cause incapacitate someone before he announced himself, that'd be exactly what he'd do. Sure there was the potential for mishaps, it wasn't a taser by any stretch of the imagination.
Regardless, it worked this time and that was what was important as Xigbar approached the rather loud lump of nobody.
"Y'know Axel, you really turned out to be a bit of a dick." Xigbar gave the red-haired man a rather vicious kick in the ribs, Axel reflexively curled at the kick, clutching his gut protectively. "You just had to spoil shit for everyone else didn't ya?" Xigbar 'emphasised' his words with another kick before bending down a little for a closer look.
" Now come on, lemme see where I gotcha," Xigbar nudged Axel's crumpled body with his boot," lemme see." A little more insistently this time, Xigbar forced the other man's hands away from the wound, taking care to step on his hand. "oohoohoo I got you pretty good there, didn't I?"
The arrow had caught Axel across the gut, slicing the skin of his stomach. Though it seemed quite miraculous the wound hadn't quite torn through the entire layer of muscle from what Xigbar could tell through the blood. Not too much risk of organ damage that might make this end before he intended it to.
Whimpering noises and semi-unintelligible babbling (unintelligible only in that Xigbar couldn't be bothered to listen) turned to a yell when Xigbar put his fingers in the wound to check.
"Aw, c'mon, 'snot that bad; I hardly grazed ya. You don't even have any organs hanging out. Aw man, if ya gonna be like this from just a scratch can't imagine what ya going to sound like when I really get started." Xigbar was rather looking forward to that part actually. For all he cared, Axel's voice was already white noise between pained sounds.
He'd always wanted to try something like this with a nobody... Or watch Vexen try, but Vexen wasn't around any more so so much for that then. Vexen just had to miss out.
Given sufficient time for adrenalin to kick in, Axel struggled, managing to get to his feet and call a weapon to hand. A problem Xigbar solved with a slug to the face. Axel may have been bigger than Xigbar, but he was also built much lighter -and with the right application of gravity control he may as well have just been hit by Lexaeus.
Xigbar kicked the armament away before it disappeared in a puff of ash from Axel's loss in concentration. If he'd given Axel half a chance to heat up he wouldn't be able to touch him, but to do that, Axel would have to focus. As it was, all that had been produced was a wisp of steam rising from the open wound and a small pile of ash.
"I'm sorry man, you're getting bored aren't ya? I really should get this show on the road." Xigbar squatted down next to the incapacitated man, "let's start by giving you something to make some real noise about." In an oddly methodical seeming act for Xigbar, he positioned an arrow riffle pointing down at Axel's hand (carefully pinned to the ground, with the wrist under the older man's boot), the end of the weapon barely inches away from the target before he pulled the trigger. Smiling somewhat dementedly as the hand seemingly exploded in a small shower of blood, meat, bone and little shreds of leather. The distance had been important, too close and he'd damage the gun and risk injuring himself, too far and there'd only be an arrow through the hand. It was always the stupid little calculations that it never seemed you'd ever need that Xigbar hung on to the best.
Needless to say, Axel didn't disappoint in the noise department. His good hand grasping at the shredded wrist.
However it emphasised that Xigbar should really move something like this to somewhere more private. As much as he enjoyed the noise, it tended to attract attention. Some moron might think to come to the bitch's rescue and whoop-dee-friggin'-doo he might be back where he started (or slightly worse given his presence was known). Making his decision, Xigbar used Axel's intact glove to muffle the noise before putting Axel over his shoulder to relocate the party elsewhere.
Xigbar dumped the other man none too gently on the ground of the chosen space (not much point being gentle). Before sitting himself down on the red-head's chest, pinning arms to the floor with his knees to keep Axel's hands out of the tools strewn around the floor of what was probably a basement or something equally dank, dark and neglected... and filled with junkyard hoardings.
Taking strips of fabric from Axel's coat, Xigbar tied a strip tightly around the injured arm to stem some of the blood flow. No good if he simply bled out, also the flailing was getting just a little too messy -messy was fun, but primarily when it was threatening other people's things -other people's mess on his stuff? Fuck that.
Though, speaking of stuff he had to wonder which item he should choose next. So many options, but only so many he could try before either the damage or the resulting shock killed him off.
Pruning shears seemed like a good place to start, he was going to go exploring that chest cavity anyway -a little live demonstration prior to the event could be worth a little entertainment; just a little suspense. Taking the tool in hand, Xigbar breifly waved the pruning shears into Axel's view, "bet you just can't wait to find out what these are for. Ooh yeah, I forgot," Xigbar pulled the glove out of the man's mouth. No need to be quiet here, if some one did hear and differentiate echoes, they probably wouldn't be able to get in. For the most part Xigbar was still ignoring those little things that sounded like words that kept pouring from the other man's mouth, they didn't mean anything, were unimportant -he didn't need to listen to the words to have the gist of what was being said, the important part was the fear.
"Now ya see, I could just use those itty bitty nail clippers Vexen claims are supposed to cut bone -but that's not fun y'know? It'd take forever just to get through just a pinkie toe. On the other hand...." Bringing the shears back into view he continued where he left off, "these, will do the job just great. They use these in autopsies 'cause it's easier to cut through the bone. It works great since they don't have to keep things sterile."
The scruffy older man scooted a bit higher on the red-head's chest, settling his weight just enough to make breathing uncomfortable. Xigbar took a firm grip on Axel's uninjured arm, "this here is just going to be a little demonstration, I'll show you what these things a really for a bit later -if I'm lucky you'll still be conscious by then but I'm not gonna go making any promises."
Probably more firmly than need, another strip of fabric was tied around the uninjured arm. Xigbar knew he was probably giving away too much with the 'child-on-Christmas' look but quite frankly, he didn't give a shit. Sure he could unsettle people by not giving anything away but that was more Vexen's deal -keep the girl uninformed, she might hope she'll get out alive. Didn't work all that great when the person knew who you were, and knew a little about what you were like.
So he'd play on the uncertainty of just how crazy the other thought he was... and about now that was... well, pretty damn crazy.
Xigbar took Axel's ungloved hand in his own, carefully squeezing the bony thing to feel out the joints.
He decided to start with the index finger, laying the blades just under the distal phalanx, the smallest knuckle, before closing the blade with a nasty crunch. He'd missed and caught the knuckle below but oh well, it still went through -just might need to sharpen the blade after.
He repeated the process for each individual knuckle until 14 pieces (he'd left the last one of the thumb) were laid out in front of him, of course Axel was fighting him the whole time so it took a little longer than it should have but that was half the fun, nothing a good fist-face introduction didn't handle.
Picking a random joint, Xigbar placed the piece of meat in his mouth. Bony and hardly very good raw it was mostly just good for chewing.
Metal, ash and leather were the easy tastes to pick out past the blood -in theory he probably should have cleaned it first but bah! whatever.
Choosing another phalanges from the line up, Xigbar put the chunk to Axel's lips. The look was priceless.
Prying the other man's jaw open to force the meat in it wasn't surprising that the red-head bit down; though what was probably surprising was for him finding he was biting down on metal rather than flesh like that which had just been shoved down his throat. The older man prevented him from choking on the finger but not much else.
"What? You gotta problem with me not having all my natural limbs? Cause you should take it up with Xally, he made it for me." Some point while talking Xigbar had grabbed another piece of finger; Axel could hear how he was still chewing on the bit he'd put in his mouth before; this one, he was just holding there while he gestured. "Hey you know what? Maybe we should go ask him to make you a set... Oh wait, he's dead -and who do we got to blame for that one?"
"Oh yeah, Roxas; funny thing that..." Xigbar paused to pull the knuckle out of his mouth, now bare of flesh. "You don't taste all that good, but he does."
Pure make-believe hate, that look he was getting was abso-fucking-lutely hilarious, Xigbar's laughter was just as fake as the hatred but since he wasn't the one beaten, bleeding and being steadily dismembered he got to say which was more real. This was his fun, and his lack of heart wasn't going to take that away without his sayso.
"Relax dude, I haven't eaten him yet," he started chewing on the second knuckle before he started again, talking while he chewed, "gotta catch the little squirt first. The brat's such a sneaky little thing y'know?"
Xigbar's long, thin, nicely intact hand crept up Axel's face, mockingly gently. He was stroking the tattooed man's cheek, his face plastered with that fake smile to go with the rest of his complete lack of sincerity.
"Ya really gotta keep an eye on him," fingers dove for the eye socket. Metal curled around behind the smooth, squishy orb and yanked back effectively uprooting the organ. Someone might have said something about it being a little poetic he'd chosen the eye he hadn't lost, but then they'd say the same thing if he'd chosen the eye he didn't have -it was hardly sentimental, just not much choice when there was only two options. Maybe if Axel had had a third eye he'd take that one instead and stick it in his own empty socket -a dick move like that....
Axel's brand new empty socket's eye lids were still fluttering to protect what wasn't there, too much blood to really make out it's appearance -personal experience said it probably looked a bit like a dried slug or some twink-eunich's scrotum.
He turned the disembodied eye to face it's previous owner, holding it up to his eye-patch like he was sizing it up; then popped it into his mouth, pulling out the knuckle he'd been chewing on with the same movement.
There was a sickening squishy noise as Xigbar purposely chewed with his mouth open. "Slimy yet satisfying. I'd have offered you some, but, mmn, these are really just too good to waste. Think I'll keep 'em to myself. Tell you what, if your still conscious by then I'll give you a quick taste of your liver to make up for it?"
Axel threw up.
"I'm not going to share if you're just going to waste it like that," actually Xigbar was quite pleased with the reaction. It let him make excuses; he didn't need them (not like there was a heart or something that needed a reason), but they were just too much fun to pass up.
At least Axel had the decency to turn his head enough to avoid drowning -all this effort into making sure he didn't die too quickly only for him to suffocate? Fuck that.
"Look, man, I know that bit wasn't your fault so I'll let you choose how you get punished... Hammer or pliers?" Xigbar waited a little for an answer though it was fairly clear by now Axel was getting too disorientated to do more than groan and cough out whatever was left in his stomach. "Look, if you're not gonna choose that means I get to pick... and I wanna do both, but I guess I said I'd give you a break so pliers it is then."
The metal hand quickly forced it's way in the red-heads mouth, hooking fingers between teeth with no clear intent. The flesh hand, now readily equipped with the intended tool tapped against shiny white teeth. Somewhat rusted the pliers creaked with it's movement, clenching down on a canine. Yanking and twisting, Xigbar grunted as he wrestled with the tooth. The hammer would have been easier but not nearly as hands-on.
Prying the tooth free he tossed it to the side and moved on to the next tooth ignoring the gore and renewed attempts at biting down on the metal appendage. It really did seem just too slow, he made it from one upper canine to the other before deciding his intention to only use one tool was a lie and replicated the results for the bottom row with a hammer. Once again proving the well known truth that Xigbar's word is good for shit.
"I don't do the whole necro thing so it's best I get this outta the way 'fore you bleed out or I get to eating the good bits," Xigbar waited for Axel to try talking again, grinning at the unintelligible groan the was probably supposed to be words, "you make a much better bitch when you can't talk so maybe I'll make an exception, y'know Vexen's memory 'nstuff. Make sure I get all the holes in ya too."
Unfortunately Xigbar had just been bullshitting about the necrophilia, no bodies left after a Nobody 'died' y'see, but blood loss and pain didn't make the most ration sort and the implications gave a delicious struggle. No body, nobody saw Nobodies body; his spirit was gone and his mess remained; made Xigbar wonder if it was actually organ bits he was picking out of his teeth.