of Firelighters and Firefighters

by lamatikah

“Darlin', you don't know the meaning of 'Oops, I just blew up the house'.” kairel//demel

disclaimer: do not own jack, or jill or that damned hill
pairing/s: kairel, demel
warning/s: omg deff and psychoness and stuff

OF FIRELIGHTERS AND FIREFIGHTERS.

- - -

"Darlin', you don't know the meaning of 'Oops, I just blew up the house'."

- - -

The smell of smoke burnt his nose and threw a tight clasp around his neck. Uncaring for his immediate need to breathe, it smothered his face; shakily he inhaled the grey, dust filled air. It scattered about the room and settled on the objects around him - the cabinet, the chair, a table, his bed. Nothing would be saved and the next day, when they found the charred remains of his room, neither would he.

- - -

Axel flicked it on and off in an irregular pattern, much to the irritation of Demyx. The boy tapped his foot impatiently, a bright spark lighting up in the corner of his peripheral vision every now and then. Frankly, he was getting fed up of it – if he wasn't allowed to play with his baby (that super-duper, bright-blue sitar) then neither should Axel (with his clicky-clicky, annoyingly obnoxious red lighter of his).

Crossing his arms, he folded one leg over the other whilst pulling his scowliest pout onto his face.

…Only to have uproarious laughter pulled it back away again.

"Seriously, Demyx, if you can't handle this," Axel tapped the device, "then you sure as the fiery pits burnin' away in Hades can't handle whatever this girl is gonna give you." Then he paused, "Dude, I thought you wanted to be a psychiatrist." Flick-click. Flick-click. Stare.

Demyx rolled his eyes and groaned, trying to hide the anguish he felt when Axel said it. He'd heard it all before; he wasn't "cut out to do the job", he was "too emotionally involved" – and it was all crap, crapcrapcrap.

But when Axel said it... it sounded like it really meant something.

"I mean, what did she do, again? Some psycho murderer who wants to kill every single human she's ever come in contact with, right? Like that chick from that movie I got the other night that youu," he teased Demyx, tickling his nose, "wouldn't watch."

Demyx looked away, waiting for his heart to stop beating erratically so he could effectively hide the blush. He wished he knew why he blushed.

He knew why that Sally woman had thrown her husband into an open grave then buried him six feet under (she forced herself to believe he was dead). He knew why that Mulan girl saw a little dragon on the shoulder that told her to do things – terrible things (she forced herself to believe she did need help). He knew why that Hercules guy killed himself to "save" his escaped wife (he forced himself to believe that he was a hero).

And yet... he had no idea why every touch Axel gave him sent shudders creeping down each vertebrae; he had no idea why every word Axel said to him, no matter how heartless, made him blush like a schoolgirl, and he certainly had no idea why every time Axel even looked at him in a café or at a party sent his heart – his poor, poor heart – into hysterics.

Axel was his very, very, very best friend and the thought of love never once cropped into his mind. At least, not until one sunny evening where the air was thick and humid.

Axel and Demyx were fifteen and in Demyx's back garden, sitting on his rickety old swings. Not even Rikku, Demyx's (much) younger sister played on them at the time. Axel's hair was shorter, impossibly shorter. Demyx couldn't imagine it except when looking at old photos. It was a duller shade, too - he guessed moving to the big DI for Uni did something to the glossiness of it.

The humidity that evening was tiring them out as they sipped their homemade lemonade. It had been a messy job and Demyx found himself at the sink more than four times, tears streaming from his face as a laughing Axel dragged him over to the porcelain eye-saver. He brushed Demyx's wet hair off his face each time and choked out, through his smirks and chuckles, "Be more careful, Demy." Demyx laughed it off with his puffy red eyes. But they eventually finished making the lemonade, although it was a little too bitter and somewhat off colour.

"Hey, Dem."

Demyx could remember the words exactly, even now. Especially now.

"...yeah?"

Sometimes he looked back on that night and wondered what Axel had been thinking.

"What do you think it would be like?"

"What do you mean?" Demyx sat up.

Axel was looking at the floor, twisting his swing round and round and round. "To... kiss someone." Demyx snorted.

"Please, Axel, you've kissed half the girls our year." Axel smirked at the memory. He stopped twisting and let the swing go, lifting his feet from the ground. He twirled round clockwise, now facing Demyx.

"I mean... not girls." Demyx paused, the drink's descent to his lips halted; arm frozen in mid-air. "I mean... like, what... what would it be like to kiss a-a," he took his voice down to a whisper, "boy."

Demyx gingerly took a swig of his lemonade and, in his haste to make things look normal – as though it was the sort of conversation he had all the time – managed to choke on the bubbles. Axel snorted – embarrassed? - and thumped Demyx in the back. Demyx burped which brought an onslaught of nervous laughter to both boys.

"So," Demyx began, trying to shy away from the subject, "what shall we do tomorrow?" He coughed slightly. Axel shrugged – detached and uninterested. "We could… go swimming?" Axel nodded at the suggestion, head heavy as if weighed down with rocks.

"Sure."

Demyx narrowed his eyes at the ground. Axel hated swimming – he wasn't acting normal. This thing was really bugging the redhead, obviously. He sighed and turned to his friend, hoping to inject some normality into the situation. "Axel..."

"Yeah?"

"I thought that you hated swimmi-"

Axel's lips pressed firmly against the fair-haired boy's. Demyx's eyes widened. It was weird. Not that he had never kissed anyone before - there had been that blonde girl and the senior who thought it would be funny to mess with a freshman. But neither kiss felt quite the same as this one; lips seeming to smoulder under the other boy's, captured with a sudden sensation of pins and needles.

Axel pulled away quickly (a little too quickly) and self-consciously wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

"...Huh." Demyx stared at Axel with wide eyes and open mouth. Axel looked back sheepishly. "Um, sorry, Demyx." He turned away, Demyx could see he was touching his lips, before running out of the garden and – probably – down the road, round the corner and to home.

In his haste, the lemonade glass had smashed to the floor.

Demyx sighed. He looked up at the redhead, he remembered that he had gotten little to none sleep that night, tossing and turning, remembering how his lips burnt afterwards and how pretty Axel's eyes were and how his fingers felt soft on his face. He thought that maybe he loved Axel, but then shoved the idea aside – he was his best friend and, he reasoned, it was a thought from when he was younger, a thought which was apparently very common, from what he discovered on the internet, in magazines and from various classes. He kept telling himself that. He believed it.

He sighed and leaned against Axel, trying to get some sleep; it was going to be a long journey. "You're not falling asleep are you, Demyx?"

"...uh huh..." Demyx yawned and buried his head into Axel's side. The red-head rolled his eyes but, despite his outer annoyance, still turned for him to rest more comfortably.

Demyx's heart beat like the flicking of Axel's infernal firelighter; thump, thump, thump; flick, flick, flick.

- - -

"And here," the woman paused, scowling as Demyx yawned. She had been showing them round the institute all day and Demyx was tired – he'd had a massive journey from Destiny Islands to Hollow Bastion and wanted sleep. As much sleep as possible.

With that sigh, the woman threw her short blonde hair back – she was surprisingly young to be working in such a place but, then again, so was Demyx – and motioned towards the door once more. "And here is Kairi Amane's room."

Sure enough, scrawled in slanted, faint writing were the words "A M A N E, K A I R I" on a board hanging to the door.

The woman smiled a sickly, sugar-sweet smile.

"So, are we just gonna stand here while some crazy little girl plots our death?" asked the ever unperturbed Axel. Demyx noticed that he seemed indifferent to all the crazies they'd seen that day, hand constantly tucked behind his head as though he were leaning against it. It looked more like he'd been going round an art museum rather than an Institution for the Criminally Insane. Well, to be fair there had been that one patient who drew pictures when she was let out of her cell, but they weren't exactly Van Goph standard.

(Or maybe they were – Van Goph only ever splodged paint around, which was very similar to the girl's ham-fisted daubing techniques.)

"Axel," Demyx rolled his eyes. "Kairi isn't a 'little' girl – she's fifteen."

"Well, she's underage... that's little to me," Axel laughed, walking through the door the woman (nametag: Larxene) just opened for them.

Kairi was sitting – well, sitting might not be the right word for it; slumped, shall we say – in the far corner, head down, looking at her hands. Larxene stood by Demyx and Axel, the picture of upmost innocence (though her legs were bent slowly like a coiled spring, obviously about to pounce if Kairi dared do "anything wrong").

Axel cleared his throat and, at the sudden sound, Kairi's head shot up. She had violet eyes - once they may have been bright, but now seemed clouded like the surface of an old mirror - and her red hair was pale, wispy. It was not so hard to imagine that same hair as glossy, give or take a few years.

"Hey there, Kah-iri," Axel beamed, holding his hand out to her.

She looked thoroughly disgusted. "It's Kairi, jerk." Axel looked stunned for a minute and then laughed that awful, nasally laugh.

"I know, just testin' you."

She pulled a face, one eyebrow noticeably higher than the other, "You were testing me – me – with my own name? You guys get worse and worse every time."

This time it was Demyx cleared his throat. "Well, my… uh… colleague here," they'd had to pretend that Axel was Demyx's assistant to let him in, "hasn't had as much training as I have. So, you'll have to excuse any of his abnormal behaviour."

"Hm," was Kairi's reply.

- - -

That night, Demyx and Axel lay in separate beds at a nearby hotel. The ceiling was a wonderful sickly yellow colour, spattered with the odd shade of reddy brown. Only in Hollow Bastion... he thought to himself. Hollow Bastion was the hobo-infested, sickly yellow painted, drug-dealers' part of the country. Radiant Garden was the pretty, rich, and they all lived happily ever after and rode off into the sunset on palomino ponies part. They would never allow insane criminals to even step foot in there.

He heard Axel's bed creak in protest as he rolled over. "Dem," he said. "Kairi was like a normal fifteen year old."

Demyx laughed, "Yeah." And then, as an after-thought, "Disappointed? That she wasn't trying to hack out your intestines or whatever?"

Axel grinned a little at this comment, shrugging, "I thought she was meant to be… ya know, crazy. Or somethin' like that. Isn't that what everybody said?"

"She is crazy," Demyx reassured his friend, attempting to settle down in his pillow. What the hell were made from? Concrete. Then again, he shouldn't be surprised; it was Hollow Bastion. "But only 'cause she kills people."

"Oh," Axel paused. "How many people has she killed?"

Demyx snorted; trust Axel to be interested in the macabre side of things. "Well, it depends what view you take. She's either killed one person or four."

"How the hell does that work?"

"Well, the night she..."

"Flipped? Spazzed out? Went mental? Turned into a psychopath with a mad desire for huuuu-man blood?"

Demyx shoved Axel in the ribs – a playful shove, mind, though the drama queen did make a few disgruntled shrieks and whines. "Yes, thank you, Axel. The night she turned into a psychopath with a mad desire for huuuu-man blood…" And here the dirty-blond turned to his companion, adopting a low, 'scary' voice to add to the suspense, "there was a fire in her house. A terrible fire, really - everyone died, save her. That includes her mom, dad and twin sister. So she decided, quite logically, really, that because everyone who was important to her died, everyone else she knew had to die too. Or so the other psychiatrists thought…" He waited for Axel's reaction and, upon getting none, murmured, "Um, do you get it?"

Axel blinked. "But what's this whole 'one or four' thing?"

"Well, some people say that she was the one who set the house on fire."

"Okay... who's the other person she killed?"

Demyx sighed. "I dunno, some kid. Her best friend I think – he went over to console her and she throttled him or something."

"Jeez. Nutjob," Axel rolled over, obviously to contemplate and/or go to sleep.

"...yeah." Demyx turned over and huddled into a little ball, biting his thumb – a nervous habit he had adopted from a senior tutor he had back in college. He mulled over the day. Axel being his stupid self – anywhere else they'd be found out; that Axel wasn't a real trainee, but not here, in the ramshackle, run-down, ruined Hollow Bastion. Pretty much anyone who had gone to high school was seen as a doctor. That Larxene character was certainly a scary woman, or girl. She really did seem far too young to be working in that place.

Then there was the matter of Kairi – what to do about Kairi? Maybe he should talk to her some more, think about what it is that made her want to kill her friend. Best friend.

He tried to imagine himself killing Axel, expecting to come up blank. But then, in a flash of colour, multiple possibilities opened up; eyes wide, he saw himself poison, hit, run over, stab and drown Axel – all so realistic it felt like it was actually happening. He shuddered. Could he actually do that to the boy he lo- had known his whole life?

He slept, dreaming dreams where Axel poisoned, hit, ran over, stabbed and drowned him.

- - -

The next day, Axel and Demyx were found at the Arkham Asylum, Gotham, Hollow Bastion. Kairi was there, as always, sitting (slumped) in her prison cell of a room, chewing on her thoughts; the look on her face showed she was slipping slowly into her own dreamland. Maybe it was more peaceful than the asylum, rabbit holes and tea parties a-plenty. According to her chart, she hardly ever slept, just stayed there, worrying her lip occasionally.

They brought her into the interview room, with little commotion.

It was a simple grey-green colour with a wooden table and four matching chairs, two either side of the table. There were two doors, one leading outside to the whitewhitewhite corridors, and the other leading to the room behind the mirror – the mirror, placed across the majority of the back wall so that the faces of the damned could be seen from the other side. Because, what's an interview room without a two-way mirror?

Kairi sat in the wooden chair, picking at the edge of her style-42 smock they had her wear – all the time.

Axel sat in one of the chairs opposite her, Demyx in the other. Demyx forced a smile for Kairi who grimaced back.

"So," he coughed, "Kairi. Have you been sleeping lately?"

Kairi looked at him as though he were the stupidest man on earth. "Have you not read my chart?" she asked, adding: "Or is that beyond you doctors nowadays?"

Demyx laughed sheepishly, "In training."

"Whatever." She blew at a piece of hair. Then admitted – begrudgingly, as though it were a shameful sin, "I slept a little yesterday."

"Did you have really crazy dreams?" asked Axel, leaning on the edge of his chair. His steady gaze fixed on Kairi in a manner that vultures seek out their prey and, although his face was relaxed and uninterested, his eyes told a different story. Demyx almost envied the attention she was getting – almost. He knew how intrusive Axel's green eyed stare could be.

But Kairi didn't seem phased; no, she merely curled her lip at his closeness. She obviously wasn't used to it for her voice was slow, deliberate and careful when she replied, "No. I can't remember what I dreamt about."

Demyx flipped through the sheets on her chart, "It looks like you're at your calmest when you sleep."

Axel snorted, "That can't be right. You're meant to have whacked out dreams, aren't you?"

Kairi's lip curled even more. "Are you seriously telling me that this guy is a doctor?"

Gulping, Demyx nodded, "In training..."

"Of course," Kairi nodded, sarcastically, narrowing her eyes.

- - -

And so it continued. Every day they would meet with the psychotic teenager and awkwardly discus what Kairi had been up to ("Oh really, that's... cool." "Yeah, I know. -glare-"), how she had been coping ("So, I hear that you've been acting a lot calmer." "It's called drugs, stupid.") and what she'd been doing in her time out the cell ("So you've been up and about more as of late, Kairi?" "What, do you want, a detailed description of bathroom breaks?"). All in all, Demyx was getting nowhere. The girl just wouldn't open up.

So, after much hard thinking and weighing the pros and cons, Demyx decided to let Axel handle Kairi for a bit, just to see how she reacted with him. Because, like his lighter (and, quite possibly, Kairi), Axel was an annoying fire starter, despite the fact that he wanted to be a fireman. One day he was going to have to decide whether he would stay burning down barns or be one of the heroes throwing water at said barns. He couldn't start the fire then put it out.

It just wasn't done.

When he told Axel that he was to be talking with Kairi solo, Axel laughed and said, "That girl really hates me, but if you think it's the right thing to do."

And so that day, as Demyx and Axel walked to the Arkham Asylum, Axel wouldn't stop telling jokes like: How many pyros does it take to burn down an asylum? -Who cares 'cause it would just be Demyx's problem anyway! and: Once upon a time there was a boy called Demyx who regretted being a psychiatrist for ever on his first job.

It was all very humorous until they got to the great looming gates, and it all became very serious.

"What do you want me to ask her?" Demyx threw a hand to the bridge of his nose, which had been eroding slowly ever since day one.

"I don't want you to ask her anything, I just want you to... talk to her. Like you would talk to me."

Axel 'hmm'd and 'ahh'd as they walked towards the interview room, where Larxene already had Kairi waiting.

Inside, both Demyx and Axel sat down, and Demyx asked the usual questions, then got up and told Kairi, "I'm going now so you can talk one-on-one with Axel." Kairi shot him a distraught look as he turned and walked into the room behind the mirror. The two looked blurred and disproportioned through the murky glass but he could still see them clearly, and there was a microphone from where he would be able to hear them.

So he sat back and watched them.

They talked about mundane things at first. Well, Axel did. Kairi just listened. He told her that he had lots and lots of friends but Demyx was his best friend because he had known him so long. He told her that he was twenty three. And he told her that his parents were murderous psychopaths.

"Just like you! 'Cept they're just in prison. Not asylums." Kairi scowled. "So, what about you? What ar- were your hobbies?"

Kairi yawned and looked at her fingernails whilst saying, "I-did-dance-and-homework-and-my-best-friend-was-called-Sora-and-I-liked-him-very-much-thank-you." She said it all in one breath, barely any pauses in-between, which made Demyx think she had said this lovely line to all her counsellors and psychiatrists in the past; recycled material.

Axel narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "Liked?"

Kairi rolled her eyes, "Yes he was the one I murdered," and then, under her breath, Demyx was sure he heard the words, "not like he didn't deserve it." He leaned in closer. Apparently, Axel had almost heard it too.

"He deserved it?" he asked. Kairi crossed her arms and scowled even more.

Looking away, she replied with, "Maybe."

"But... why?" Axel looked perplexed, it was a whole new expression and Demyx thought it suited him. But then again, Demyx thought any expression suited him.

"Because," she let out a big sigh, "he just did."

"Oh."

Axel wasn't able to get any more information out of Kairi that day. So, they left an hour later.

- - -

The next day, Demyx sat in the box behind the mirror, watching Axel and Kairi talk with each other. The idea hadn't been as fruitless as he first assumed – the two of them reacted well with each other, they had nothing in common (but their fiery hobbies and personalities) and yet they fit, almost like a puzzle piece. They complimented each others' looks, personalities and nearly everything else Demyx could think of.

It was like it was destiny that the two of them would come to sit in that ugly little room and talk; drawn together like magnets. Opposite attract.

Hell, as cheesy as it sounded, the room was starting to look a lot brighter with the two of them sitting there, chatting away (and something inside Demyx burnt like the fire that burnt Kairi's house). Well, it couldn't exactly be called 'chatting'. Again, it was Axel talking and Kairi listening.

This time, Axel was telling Kairi about his memories, like when all the kids in school avoided him because he got tattoos under his eyes. To which Kairi remarked, "sounds like kids," with a small, sad smile. Demyx quickly noted it down. Axel smirked and then told her about the time when he dropped his ice cream on the carpet and his mother decided that the best choice of punishment would be to try and, "-paintball my face off!"

Kairi actually laughed at that and said, "No wonder you thought purple tattoos on your face would be cool!" She was grinning, a completely alien expression to her; Demyx couldn't help but wonder the last time she smiled. And, unwittingly, couldn't help but wonder why it made something in his ribcage burn. But Demyx wasn't jealous, he wasn'twasn'twasn't, so there.

Axel sat back, shocked, but smiling nonetheless.

"You find my pain funny?" he asked as she giggled silently to herself. "Well, you haven't heard about the time when I burnt this barn down and..."

He stopped halfway through because Kairi had suddenly stopped shaking with mirth and her eyes had gone all glassy, filmy, as though was replaying some sort of memory in her mind; chasing ghosts. Axel pursed his lips then looked in the vague direction of Demyx before snapping his fingers in front of Kairi's face, all the while going, "Kairi... Kairi... Kai-riiiiiii…"

Kairi batted his hand away and said, "I still want to remember."

Axel paused, biting his lip, "Remember what, Kairi?"

Kairi huffed on a piece of greasy hair hanging over her eyes. "Nothing you need to know..."

Axel tried and tried but he couldn't get anymore out of Kairi. Again, he and Demyx left, for Kairi to 'remember'.

- - -

Days and days past and Demyx found out that Kairi liked banana split sundaes, pink pyjamas and going to the park near her house because the swing went really high. He also found out that she hated homework, going to the mall for a long time and sisters.

Kairi was opening up more and more to Axel and, unknowingly, he to her. They were talking about school and subjects when Kairi said, quite out of the blue, "So, you're not a doctor, are you? Not even a doctor in training."

Axel blinked, "...Wh-What?"

Kairi leaned back in her chair and said, "Well, you're studying to be a firefighter." Axel looked away, muttering 'shit' under his breath. Kairi smirked. "I don't care. You're better than any psychiatrist I've ever had. I mean what sort of psychiatrist tells you that they've burnt a barn down before? They're all so dull and professional and boring."

"Yeah..." Axel agreed, nodding his head. "But then again, what sort of psychiatrist burns down a barn in the first place."

"Well, you might've, if you'd decided to be a psychiatrist."

"Nahh, I prefer being a firefighter - you can't believe the smell and the… The feelings and adrenaline rush you get when you're stood there, surrounded by all those flames and black smoke..."

Kairi's eyes glazed over in manner akin to the way they'd done once before, some time ago now. She murmured, "Oh... I do."

Demyx almost fell off his chair. He scribbled down all that Kairi had said. He realised that he hadn't got many notes down. He had been watching Axel all the while, staring at every curve in his perfect face and how he leant back on his chair when he was laughing and how he leaned forward when he was really interested in something. If he wasn't careful, he'd start doodling 'demyx hearts axel' on his sheet, and then he'd really be in trouble trying to explain that.

Damnit, he felt like a schoolgirl. A giggling, blushing, foolish little schoolgirl with her first ever crush. Kairi was the teenager; why weren't her cheeks burning like his, and why wasn't her heart beating nineteen to the dozen?

It just wasn't fair – role reversal sucked.

"How do you mean?" Axel asked, interest piqued; his stare was intense, teeth nibbling at his lower lip.

No one talked for a very long time.

Axel just watched as Kairi sat there, eyes glazed over and staring at a fixed point on the ugly grey wall. Demyx sat behind the mirror, hardly daring to breathe, fingernails finding their way into his mouth. Despite the fact that they were all waiting for something, there was something about the situation that was calming; the sudden stillness in the air warm and nice. It wasn't uncomfortable in the least.

Then, suddenly; "I set the house on fire."

There was another silence, but it wasn't as comfortable this time. It was a sharp silence, like a violin chord left playing too long after the rest of the orchestra had finished. Kairi's line ricocheted round and round the corners of Demyx' mind like a pinball. He let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding and saw that Axel did too, chest deflating.

"But," Axel's mouth was obviously dry from the way his voice cracked, "why, Kai?" Demyx' heart beat a little too hard for a second. Kairi had a nickname. Kairi had a nickname.

Demyx had a nickname, too – had Kairi stolen that? Even if the words 'Dem' did trickle forth from Axel's lips they would leave a bitter aftertaste because, well… Those were the very same lips that had called his demented mass murderer 'Kai' as though she was something beautiful, something special, something…

Something better than Demyx.

Kairi looked back at Axel with those glossy eyes of hers, round like marbles, irises flecked with a thin band of colour. "Because, like you said... the smell and the feeling and the adrenaline… It's like a drug, you know; a high. Oh, and the heat… The heat when it's just me… Just me and the flames."

Axel blinked, "But why kill your... family, too?"

Kairi shook her head and the glossiness evaporated, though Demyx couldn't help but think there was still something vaguely wrong about the way she looked at Axel. Maybe simply because she was just looking at Axel – face-to-face, eye-to-eye. "Because... that was an accident. I didn't mean to kill them too."

Axel stood up and slammed his fist on the table. "Don't bullshit me."

Kairi stood up as well, following Axel's shining example of how to keep your temper; she slammed her fist on the table too, so hard it shuddered, "Then don't ask me questions."

"Why the hell did you kill your family?" Axel asked again, still stood up. He pushed the table out of the way and it made a horrible, ear-wrecking screech noise, causing the speakers to hiss and whine in complaint. Demyx wasn't even writing down notes at that moment, pen poised in the air, hand frozen.

"Because I," Kairi choked out a sob. The first time they had ever seen her cry. "I loved him! I loved Sora sososososo so much. But... But... he didn't love me, he loved my sister. He loved my sister…" she whispered the last word, leaving it to hang in the air for a long minute.

Lips met lips in a passionate kiss as Kairi stumbled backwards to one of the filth-ridden walls, pinned beneath Axel like a butterfly. She choked another sob before throwing her arms around him and kissing back, eyes squeezing shut; black lashes fell across her pale cheeks, red hair fluttering round her shoulders, face flustered. Beautiful.

Not as beautiful as Axel.

Demyx stared. He went white. "This wasn't meant to happen," he said. Then he said it again, and again and again and again. His hands started shaking, then his arms, and then his whole body. He felt very, very sick and he needed to see a nurse. No, all lies; he didn't just feel sick, he was sick, very, very sick. And so was Axel, obviously. Axel was very, very sick. And he needed curing. Kairi had been very, very sick for a long, long time…

But he could still cure her.

- - -

He pretended everything was alright and dandy when he said they had to leave, not a stutter to his voice, eyes devoid of tears. He told Axel he was fiine and that Axel was fiine and that Kairi was fiine. Because that's what you're meant to tell very, very sick people. You're meant to feed them soup and tell them that everything will be alright, everything will be okay. You're meant to lie.

And Demyx told Axel that everything would be alright, everything would be okay. Axel asked him why he said it but Demyx just told him that it would be better soon.

Of course, just before he left, he had to burn it.

He had to burn the asylum because it was a place with very, very sick people in it – kindness, really, if anything else. He told them it would be alright, it would be okay. But he was the only one who could hear himself say it. Singing to himself in a shaky voice, "it'll be alright, it'll be okay, it'll be alright, it'll be okay".

No time for tears, not when he was making it better.

When he got home, he told Axel to have a good night's sleep and he made him some soup and he told him that everything would be alright, everything would be okay. Axel said that he wanted to talk to Kairi if she was so cured but Demyx said "no no, she's fine, she'll be fine, everything's fiiine."

Axel said that Demyx didn't quite understand what Axel was asking but Demyx said, "shh, you need sleep, now go to bed."

And Axel did. He yawned, he sighed and he slept. Demyx wondered whether he slept and slept right through the burning and the flickering and the heat and noise. Probably not. But at least he wasn't very, very sick anymore. He thought it was strange that Axel had been very, very sick, he couldn't think why he had but he knew it made sense. It was logical.

Demyx thought that perhaps he should sleep on it, sleep right through the burning and the flickering and the heat and noise. That should give him an idea of what to do in the morning.

- - -

Axel inhaled more and more, almost forgetting to exhale. He was a dead man already so he may as well take in as much atmosphere as he could. He would smell the smell and feel the feeling. It reminded him of that redheaded girl. He hoped that wherever she was, she was thinking of him.

- - -

"I suppose that's just your charm."

- - -

an: gaspio. i finished it! hehehe. for the love of all things you love most of ALL, review. this took me i don't know how long and i put my SSsoOSuuUlL in it. i swear -shufty eyes- hm, well, critique, praise, flame (or not) my lovelies. x3
SO MUCH THANKS TO SKITTS WHO BETA'D IT LIKE THE BEST ANYONE COULD EVER BETA.
...i think. :3

extra: anyone who can guess who demyx's senior tutor is will be worship'd.