The room was cold. So cold that as Roxas lay there, his arms fastened to the side of an examination table with metal chains, he could see his breath frost in front of him. The room was bright; brighter than any sunlight could have been, and his body hurt. He stilled and listened to the dull drone of a beep somewhere beside him, trying to steady his uneven breathing. Swallowing hard, he felt the metal close about his neck, preventing him from looking around as the clogging stench of disinfectant drowned his lungs slowly.

Fear crept up his spine and prickled his nerves until his heart stumbled with sheer petrification and the hairs on his arms stood on end. He growled at the bindings, desperate to break free, but he couldn't remember why the idea of chains tormented him so much. Everything—every single detail of his life—it was gone, wiped out and lost, but the pain was unbearable. It was so bad that it broke and tore him down, leaving him vicious, aching, throbbing, and completely terrified of the rush of emotions flying through his heart.

He closed his eyes and tried to ignore the artificial lights. He was afraid, but of what? He remembered darkness, fire, and a voice… A voice he had come to hate. But whose was it? Delving deeper, he uncovered a pure source of rage, an uncapped bottle ready to burst, and his fingers flexed into fists. With great effort he ignored the pain and forced the bottle back down into his heart.

And that was when he stopped moving, stopped breathing, and listened. There was nothing: no heartbeat, no thump, no rhythm. Just emptiness.

The panic returned with a vengeance and he squirmed against the chains. He was heartless; completely devoid of the most important organ of the human body… or was it just hiding from him, like his identity?

Before he could question it further a voice broke the silence, bringing him back to the world.

"Roxas, are you okay?"

That was it. The voice. The voice he hated so much he wanted to rip the tongue from whoever was speaking. Snarling, and still unable to see who it was that was talking, he struggled against his bindings and felt the steel rattle dangerously. The voice inhaled deeply and tried again.

"Rox, it's okay. You're safe now. We got you out."

Roxas thrashed harder, but when he finally realised it was useless he stopped. The anger abandoned him and fear trembled through him. He panted, stared up at the white ceiling, and blinked the liquid away from the corner of his eyes. He was wounded, hurting, trapped, unable to attack and unable to defend. He felt like an animal.

A soft touch traced along his arm and Roxas inadvertently whimpered, shrinking in on himself, and the words left his mouth before he had time to think. So long had he been subjected to his mental state that his body no longer required his brain to tell it how to act.

"Please…." His voice was scratched and rough, as if it hadn't been used for a long time. "Please, I'm sorry. I won't run anymore. I promise."

The words were desperate and a small part of him, a very miniscule part, hated himself for even thinking of using them, but he knew they would prevent the pain. He didn't know how he knew, but he did. But this time the man kept talking. His voice was as gentle as his touch, but all Roxas could do was look for the knife he knew was hidden somewhere.

"No. No, Roxas, it's okay. You're safe. You don't have to run anymore. It's okay."

The tender touch returned to his arm and Roxas choked a little on his own saliva as it intensified in his mouth. He was sure that if he would have been able to move his body would have automatically cowered from the voice, let alone the touch. "P-please. I-I'm sorry, I won't run anymore. I won't!"

"Axel, I think it's time to leave. Roxas obviously isn't well enough to talk. Maybe in a little while," a different voice said.

Roxas frowned at the name. It was familiar, oddly familiar, and as Axel, the man next to him, let out a deep sigh, Roxas felt grateful to the new voice for removing the touch from his skin. But before the two men left Axel spoke again.

"I'll come see you soon, Rox. Bring you some of that ice cream you like... How's that sound?"

Roxas tensed. He just wanted the voice to leave.

A mechanic door hissed and silence settled, but Roxas couldn't stop tensing. He was afraid that one of them could still be lurking in the room, waiting to catch him off guard, yet, for some reason, the isolation scared him more than Axel's voice ever could. A small part of him wished that the voice would come back and talk to him. Not touch, just talk. Just to keep the monsters at bay for a little while longer.

Outside, Axel released a heavy breath. The lines under his eyes were heavy, and his cheeks were red from the tears he had shed in the anxious hours he had been waiting. He looked at the row of seats opposite him where his friends slept soundly.

His friends had all turned up the moment he had informed them that he had got Roxas out, and for an instant joy had overcome him to think that he had saved him… but, looking at the unrecognisable blond on the bed, he feared he may have been too late, and it could have cost him everything. To hear the blond cry and beg him with a mouth that had once been so confident and cocky was heart-breaking.

He looked left as a hand landed on his shoulder, and Zexion squeezed it comfortingly.

"Axel, I know it's hard, but Roxas is going to need time. He was treated badly, even for a Slave."

Axel looked away. "He didn't recognise me…"

"No, he recognised you."

Axel raised an eyebrow in confusion and Zexion explained.

"Xemnas was strategic about his behavioural corrections, Axel. Roxas recognises your voice because Xemnas used this when correcting him to hurt him. And I am sorry to say that it wasn't just physical corrections, either. Both mental and emotional corrections can be extreme, and what Xemnas has done flirts with the term torture. This brutality was planned… but, let's try and look at the positives. Roxas is stable. That's a good start. His memory is gone, but for now I think the main issue we need to tackle is his recognition of you as non-dangerous. After that, maybe we can start to help him break down the walls he's built around him. After all, you do own him, and he used to trust you more than anybody else alive. I think once he remembers that, and he recognises that you don't want to hurt him, he may recover his memories, and we can start to work through them and undue what Xemnas has done."

Axel nodded and looked at his friends, some of them slaves and some of them Owners. "Zexion, if you could describe Roxas in one word, what would it be?"

He had asked all of his friends the same question the day he had bought the blond, and they had all given him the same answer. Now Axel found himself needing to hear that answer again.

"In a word?" Zexion retracted his hand and sighed. "Broken."

Axel's world shattered. He slowly nodded again and saw Zexion return it before his friend offered him a sad smile and left to treat his next patient. The redhead was grateful to his friend for allowing him to bring Roxas to the hospital free of charge when it would normally cost extra to have a slave treated.

Leaning back against the locked doors, Axel closed his eyes and released a shaky breath, sliding down the metal until he was crouched on the floor. He covered his eyes with his hands, buried his head against his knees, and curled in on himself.

"I was too late…"