Author's Note: HAPPY AKUROKU DAY EVERYBODY! I've decided to do my part to spread the love of our wonderful boys, so here's a little drabble for you... Any accompanying picture can be found at my deviantART account angel0fhope by the same title. And oh my goodness, this isn't AU! Cue the apocalypse. Well, anyways, enjoy. :3
~::~
"Axel, what were you trying to do?"
"I wanted to see Roxas."
~::~
Axel stared out into the inky blackness surrounding him. How long had he been here? Hours? Days? He couldn't tell. The last things he remembered were a boy with blue eyes kneeling over him, and a confession he'd never meant to share to anyone but the one it was about.
Where was he, even? He could feel a floor beneath his back, cold and hard, but no light shined in this dark world to show him what sort of miserable Hell he'd fallen into. He couldn't be… dead, could he? What had happened with that boy? A fight. There had been a fight, with two terribly outnumbered combatants pitted against thousands of rubber-like white creatures clawing at them viciously. Did those monsters kill him? Was that why he was here? Axel just didn't know.
Axel. A voice echoed, achingly loud against the silence that reigned in this empty world. The redhead reached up and gripped his head, trying to squeeze the pain out of it. Axel, where are you?
Axel stood, wobbling unsteadily on his feet as he walked forwards, following the sound of the voice. It was so familiar… Why did he know it?
~::~
"He… was the only one I liked. He made me feel… like I had a heart. It's kind of… funny… You make me feel… the same…"
~::~
Axel had walked for so long, his legs were sore, his back ached, and he could feel fatigue trying to drag him down into sleep so he could recover his strength. But the voice still called him on, whispering his name over and over again, a mantra that fueled his tired body as soon as his ears caught the sound again.
Alone in the void, the redhead had a lot of time to think. His memories were coming back in floods now, somehow recalled by the mysterious chanting ahead of him in the blackness somewhere. Afternoons spent on clock towers, black cloaks and battle cries, nights spent wrapped in the embrace of another, all of them returned to him, vivid as if he just experienced them. He regretted many of the things that he had done. He'd destroyed worlds, ruined lives, killed, looted, and vandalized without a care in the world, never once feeling an ounce of regret for his actions. His heart hurt just thinking about it.
Wait. Axel stopped in his tracks, placing a hand over the emptiness in his chest where his heart once dwelled, before it was taken by the heartless. His hand jerked away when he registered the faint thumping of the vital organ beneath his skin, startled. Was he hallucinating? Maybe he'd hit his head, and this was all some strange dream. He was s Nobody. Nobodies didn't have hearts, contrary to one of his fellow member's beliefs. So why was his beating?
The voice suddenly increased in volume, the words it chanted becoming clearer. "Axel… I'll be waiting."
A sharp pain in his newly discovered heart made the redhead fall to his knees. He knew that voice, those words. He knew them.
~::~
"Axel…"
"Let's meet again, in the next life."
"Yeah. I'll be waiting."
"Silly. Just because you have a next life…"
~::~
Axel broke into a run, stumbling and tripping over the ground as it became uneven and covered in cracks. He no longer cared that he couldn't see where he was going, all he knew was that he had to get to his destination. Someone dear to him was waiting.
The world around him began to grow lighter, color spilling through tears in the black expanse, showering rays of red-orange sun on the cobbled streets beneath Axel's feet. Buildings took shape on either side of the road, painted with hues that belonged in a sunset. People were talking somewhere, laughing. Merchants called out to passers-by to come and look at their wares.
Axel knew this town, the streets and the people and that magnificent sinking sun out in the west, bathing the world around him in glorious warmth. Ahead in the distance, high above his head, he could see a clock tower, standing proudly over its town like a sentinel clad in gold-orange.
A dog scavenging for food nearby barked as Axel shot past it, racing the setting sun to get to the tower. His heart pounded with the exertion, but he was strong, and the voice still ringing in his ears gave him the final ounce of willpower he needed to continue.
Leaping over crates and dodging people left and right, the redhead weaved his way through the town, finally coming to the plaza in front of the clock tower. He craned his neck back to look up at the very top, entranced by the way the light shone off the bronze bells hanging there.
~::~
"Bet you don't know why the sun sets red. You see, light is made up of lots of colors. And out of all those colors, red is the one that travels the farthest."
"Like I asked. Know-it-all."
~::~
Wait. Was that a figure standing there? Not caring if there really was or not, Axel sprinted inside the building and began climbing the stairs, not once thinking of giving up or slowing his pace. Finally, he burst out onto the small balcony at the top of the tower and hurried around the corner to find… no one. The place was empty, devoid of any other living being.
Disappoint weighed down his heart, and he stumbled back towards the doorway he came through, unable to process this. What had he done wrong?
Footsteps nearby made him stop in his tracks. Axel turned back and peeked around the corner, barely able to silence a cry of surprise when he did. Is he real?
The redhead walked forwards, careful not to make and sudden loud noises. He tiptoed up to stand behind the figure staring out at the setting sun, and then slowly, gingerly, reached out and placed a hand on the person's shoulder.
Tears welled up in Axel's eyes at the realization that the blonde boy standing in front of him was really there. "Roxas," he managed to choke out, "you really waited for me…"
The blonde boy sounded as if he, too, were crying as he replied, "Of course I waited…" He didn't move, trying to hide his tears from the man behind him. Axel could feel Roxas's racing pulse. "…I love you."
~::~
"Roxas, are you really sure that you don't have a heart?"
"I dunno. I can't… just look inside. But I figure, if there is something in there - inside us - then we'd feel it, wouldn't we?"
"Ha. True enough."
~::~
Axel's heart felt like it was about to burst. He let his tears flow openly as he grabbed Roxas's other arm and sank down on his knees, his hands falling with him to grasp those of the blonde's. "Finally," he exclaimed, unable to keep his voice from cracking with emotion. "All that time we spent playing make-believe, and now we can say that and mean it. Roxas, I love you. I love you more than life itself."
The blonde boy let go of the older man's hands and turned to kneel down in front of him, allowing them to be eye-to-eye. "I don't know what we did to deserve this, but now we can lead a normal life. No more fighting, no more emptiness, just us, happy, together."
"Seal it with a kiss?" Axel said hopefully.
Roxas rolled his eyes, but couldn't hide his grin fast enough. "In a minute," he replied, "I've got something for you."
Axel shifted so that he was sitting on the ledge facing the setting sun and watched curiously as Roxas brought out a box from the shade behind a column nearby. "I'm sure you've missed this." He pulled out two blue-green ice cream bars from the container and handed one to Axel, who stared at it in amazement.
"It's funny to think… Our whole friendship started on an afternoon just like this, all that time ago," he mused, taking a careful bite of the ice cream. The salty-sweet taste flooded his mouth, bringing back so many memories with it.
"Right. And I'm no longer a zombie."
The two of them laughed and stared out at the sun, now almost below the horizon.
"Roxas?" The blonde glanced over at Axel. "I love you."
Roxas smiled. "I love you, too."
~::~
"The day we met, when you got your new name, you and I sat right here just like this and watched the sun set."
~::~