"Erhem…"
Marluxia slowly opened his eyes. "Ugh, Axel, what do you want?" He mumbled at the figure that stood beside his bed. He subconsciously pulled the covers of his bed up higher to conceal the fact that he was wearing his pink and green footie pajamas instead of the standard bed-time attire.
As he half waited for the reply, he half drifted off to sleep and was really only half listening when the man spoke again.
"ERHEM…" the voice cleared its throat loudly, making Marley nearly jump out of his bed.
"AHH! WHAT DO YOU WANT, DAMNIT?" he yelled at the intruder, once again pulling the sheets up over his head.
"I would like to have a word with you." replied the voice in a lively and sophisticated tone.
Marluxia poked his head out of the excessive pile of blankets to acknowledge the intruder. "You're not Axel…" he grumbled confusedly.
The man that stood before him was definitely not a part of the Org. He was short, fat, and balding; and appeared to be carrying a fish in his left coat pocket. He wore a grin that appeared to be plastered onto his face and was waving a fat hand in front of Marley; possibly trying to get his limited attention.
What the hell… Marley thought to himself. I just want to go back to bed.
"Hello, Marluxia!" the man said cheerfully. How are you this fine morning?"
"Who the hell are you and why'd you wake me up at 3:00 in the morning?" Marluxia fumed at the little fat man. Nobody woke him up at thee in the morning without a reason, nobody! (Except for Axel, of course. But Axel just liked to get on his nerves.)
"You don't recognize me?" the man replied, still grinning.
"No, I don't."
"Well then," the man said, grabbing one of Marluxia's hands and shaking it vigorously. "let me introduce myself: My name is Death!"
Marluxia yelped and wrenched his hand away from the man. "I didn't do it! I swear!"
"No, no!" the man chuckled. "I'm not the devil, you know. It's not like I'm here to steal your soul!"
The man laughed heartily while Marluxia giggled nervously along with him. He was afraid that if he didn't make some sort of noise, the man would attack him and steal his soul; not that he had one to be stolen in the first place. Oh well, couldn't hurt to be cautious.
"Ha ha! No, you aren't scheduled to die for another month or so. Well, anyways, moving on to why I'm here." He fixed his tie and held out his hand, where a scarlet envelope poofed into view. He handed it to Marley; who could only think to stare at it for what felt like ages.
"Aren't you going to open it?" the man asked finally.
"It won't kill me, will it?"
"Of course not! I just told you that you aren't scheduled to die for a while. Now, go ahead."
Marluxia tore open the envelope and pulled out a thin, black sheet of paper that had been embossed with gold ink. He read the letter aloud, keeping in mind that death was still with him.
"Nigel Warburton, Maddie Sierra, Evix Lawrence, Katydid Jumpingstream, Fuzzy Abraham, Toshio Orafuki." He looked bemusedly at the man. "Is this some kind of list?"
"Right-on, pal! You see, I'm going on vacation, and I need you to take over my job for me! That's the list of people whose time is up: one for every day of the week! I'm going to need you to help me out for a bit."
"WHAT?" Marluxia boomed. "I didn't agree to any of this!"
"Sorry, chum. As soon as you opened the letter, you became the temporary death."
"Well that's just fucked up!" Marley scowled at the man and pouted, looking not to different from a grumpy four year old. "Why do I have to do this, anyways?" he added sullenly.
"Let's see here," Death said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "well, first of all, you know how to wield a scythe. Not everyone can do that, you know. Second; you can teleport. That simplifies things. Third; you're a twisted, unforgiving bastard who doesn't give a shit about anyone else. So from what I can see, you're the best qualified for the job!"
Marluxia clenched his fist, about ready to slap the man; then thought better of it. "Alright, fine. This is only for a week, right?"
"Only for a week."
"Okay, when do I start?"
"I'd say about 5:30 this afternoon."
Marluxia flopped down onto his bed. "Alright, as long as you'll leave and let me get some sleep."
"Sure thing, amigo! Anything else before I go?"
"Yeah. Do you have any other name I can call you? Death is kind of, grim, you know?"
"Um, I never really thought about that…"
"Can I just call you Paul?"
"Sure, whatever floats your boat!" Paul chortled. He gave a little wave, then sheepishly summoned two luggage bags in each hand. "See you in a week, buddy!" He smiled, then disappeared in a flash of blue light.
Well, thought Marluxia to himself as he drifted off to sleep again, I'm fucking screwed.
Axel sat in the meeting room, dozing off for about the fifteenth time that day. He rested his head on his arm, trying as hard as he could to keep from falling asleep.
Demyx sat next to him; his snores bouncing off the walls and echoing around the room.
Poor Demyx… Axel thought. Superior's gonna give him a hard time when he wakes up.
He poked Demyx hard in the side of the head, which, of course, sent Demyx into a fit of paranoid shrieks and girlish squeals.
"Dude," Axel sighed while he tried to calm him down. "it's okay. You just fell asleep again."
Demyx stopped hyperventilating long enough to give Axel a grateful nod.
Axel looked toward the empty seat next to Luxord (Who was currently engulfed by a game of solitaire.) Where the hell was Marluxia? They couldn't start the meeting without him.
Xemnas began to grumble to himself, and after banging his head against the table several times, he stood and walked over to Zexion.
"Do you smell him?" Axel heard him whisper.
Zexion sniffed the air complacently. "Yeah," he said after a few moments, "he's on his way."
Xemnas heaved a sigh of relief and returned to his chair at the head of the table.
Almost as soon as he sat down, the large double doors slammed and an out of breath Marluxia barged in.
"It's okay!" He shouted. "I'm here!"
"About time." Xigbar complained.
Axel rolled his eyes. This was the fourth time Marley had been late to a meeting this week.
Marluxia sat down in his chair; his face flushed with an embarrassed pink tinge.
"That's enough." Xemnas scowled. "We need to get this meeting started. Saix? Would you introduce the issue? I need to go vent my anger.
Saix nodded, and Xemnas briskly left the room. An awkward silence fell across the room as the Organization sat listening to Xemnas's psychotic and angry yells sounding just outside the door.
"Alright then," Saix said just as a loud bang sounded outside the room accompanied by a mantra of angry cuss words. "it has come to our attention that the Organization is running low on supplies. We have decided that immediate action must be taken. A party of five will be chosen at random to retrieve 'groceries' from various worlds. Would anyone like to volunteer?"
The room was silent for a moment before Xaldin warily raised an oversized hand.
"Alright, Xaldin, I'll put you on the list. Anyone else?"
No one else raised their hand."
"I'm disappointed in you all." Saix said, shaking his head.
Why would anyone else volunteer? Axel asked himself. Xaldin's the only one who likes to shop…
Xemnas returned to the room, his face now empty of the formerly angry expression.
"Right." He said when he sat down. "No one else wants to go? Shame. I suppose we'll have to settle this the only way I know how."
"NOOOOO!" Demyx yelled dramatically. "Not that again! Please Superior!"
"Yes Demyx, that." He looked around at the sullen faces of the Organization.
Man, I hate this damn game. Axel thought to himself.
"You all know the rules." Xemnas barked. "You all go and hide, and the first four people I find must join Xaldin."
Yes. They were playing hide and seek.
It appears as if Xemmy Poo lost something. Yes, folks, he's lost his mind.
Axel groaned miserably. He despised Xemnas's methods of choosing. Everyone knew that Xemnas had that weird way of being able to tell where any of the Organization members were at any given moment; so he basically just chose people at random. What was the point of hiding, anyways? The whole thing was just pointless; and to make it worse, Xemnas had to rub it in whenever he found someone. Like it was any surprise…
All of the Organization members (except Xemnas, Xaldin, and Saix) stood reluctantly and awaited the superior's orders. With a flick of his wrist, he sent them away and watched as one by one they disappeared.
Axel, feeling too tired to think up a creative hiding place, stuck with concealing himself in the bathroom. As soon as he walked in, however, he was met with a very disturbing sight.
The bathroom was clean.
It was actually clean! He was in shock. In a castle full of men, he didn't expect anything to be clean, let alone the bathroom. His first thought was that Larxene might have cleaned it, but she wasn't the kind of person to do anything at all that involved putting in her own effort.
Come to think of it, he'd been hearing rumors around the castle that several rooms had mysteriously cleaned themselves, or that certain desks had been organized. Heck, even Vexen's lab had been cleaned up! (To Vexen's dismay, of course.)
Axel personally did not believe in self cleaning accommodations, so luckily for him an explanation was about to reveal itself.
There was a slight whooshing sound as another portal opened up behind him. He turned around just in time to see Marluxia step out of the darkness and onto the white, machine-like floor of the bathroom. They both paused, storing awkwardly at each other for a few elongated seconds.
Marluxia seemed to collect himself first and walked up to Axel, pushing him out of the way. "Move." He said grumpily. "I haven't finished folding the towels."
"What the crap?" Axel retorted confusedly. "You did this?"
Marluxia looked at him with a worried expression. "No! Well, yes… maybe."
"Oh man!" Axel laughed. "What are you, OCD?"
Marluxia turned away from him briskly, looking rather ashamed.
"You are, aren't you!" Axel taunted. "Ha! Hey-hey! Do you excessively wash your hands? Or are you the kind of guy who won't eat until he's rearranged all the food on his plate?"
Marluxia rolled his eyes. "So what if I'm a bit compulsive. It's not like I'm hurting anyone."
"No, you're making me laugh!" Axel gave Marley a pat on the back. "I'm going to watch you, mmkay?"
Marluxia scowled. "Get lost, Axel." He sat down and began to skillfully fold the towels and organize them by size, color, and material.
Axel leaned against the wall and grinned. "So… is this, like, some kind of 'soul searching' thing that you do? I mean, why fold towels?" He remarked thoughtfully.
Marley glared at him stubbornly. "I do it because I can. What other reason need there be?"
Axel shrugged. "I was just wondering. I mean, it's not every day you get to meet a compulsive nobody."
"You've met Luxord."
"Yes, but he's a compulsive gambler. You're a compulsive towel folder. Unless you have some other routine that you've been hiding?"
Silence.
"You do, don't you!" Axel snickered. "Seriously, what the fuck!"
Marluxia scowled and chucked a towel at Axel's face just as a large, swirling cloud of black smoke engulfed the room.
"Shit!" Marley coughed, trying not to inhale the fumes. "What is this?"
Axel inhaled deeply. "Smells like home…" He laughed as he watched Marluxia attempt to wave the smoke away from his face. The smoke, however, cleared away on its own, leaving behind a small red envelope that had obviously been the source of the commotion. Marluxia picked it up and reluctantly tore it open, revealing a black sheet of paper.
"Is it really that time already?" Axel heard Marley mutter to himself.
Being the clever sneak that he was, Axel silently peeked over Marluxia's shoulder to examine the attractive piece of paper.
Dearest Pal,
It appears that the time has come for you to officially take my place as death! Obviously, it is exactly 5:30 in the afternoon, so as soon as you're ready you can press the little green button thingie on the back of this paper and it will take you to whatever world it is that you need to go to. See you in a week my pink-haired anarchist friend!!
Signed,
Death AKA Paul AKA Grim Reaper AKA Luminatus AKA Red Neck Emo Dude Chick Bird Jedi Thing
Axel grinned. There was a button on the back of a piece of paper? How was that supposed to work?
Might as well find out, he thought to himself. "Sneak poke!" He cried as he poked Marluxia hard in the stomach.
"AHHH!" Marley cried as the letter briskly flew out of his hands. Axel grabbed the stray piece of paper and looked on the back. Indeed, there was a large, green button embedded in the back of the letter. Before Marluxia could recover from the poke, Axel pushed the shiny green button, releasing another puff of black smoke into the room.
Axel grinned. "Sweet..."