Heya, people. This is my first Kingdom Hearts fanfiction, and I'd like to say off the bat that it's semi Axel-centric to begin with, but will blossom into something more later. I'm not that good of a writer, so everything won't be perfect, but I hope this prologue can draw people in for now as I finish the next chapter. Happy readings! Demyx-kun (BTW I don't own Kingdom Hearts)

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My name is Axel. Commit it to memory.

Shadows... whispers of a promise; a recollection of truth.

What is a heart? What is a soul? Why am I still incomplete?

Even as I fade, from nobody to nothing, I realize how simple the answer was... With my dying breath, the flames in my hand gather and form a small charm, quite like the larger chakrams so often called within my grasp... I press it into the hand of the boy I hate, the boy I love. The love of true friendship, the hatred of my friend's supression... This boy, both one and two alike who I sacrificed my non-life for...

I fade into nothingness as the bond of flame is renewed... and I can rest, knowing that together, my friend and this boy shall stop Xemnas's dark plan, which, even supposedly without a heart; I now know to be wrong...

Is it funny for a nobody to have regrets? I killed Vexen in cold blood; not just to gain Marluxia's trust, no... But because he would have endangered Roxas's very life with his words...

I used Namine like a mere tool; not caring for her own existence. I was willing to kill her just like I killed Vexen, for only she could restore Sora's memories and thus possibly reunite Sora and Roxas.

I only gave Sora half an apology for kidnapping Kairi, never truly explaining myself or attempting to make things right. All I could offer was a name...

I still don't know what happened to Zexion, after I had the fake Riku take care of him. Zexion was always sly when it came to his plans... All I know for sure is that his presence never quite left the castle... even after the doll was destroyed by the real Riku. When I returned to the Proof of Existence to check, I found it smashed; rendered useless; both red and blue shards littering the floor. Do I regret possibly killing Zexion, or is it that he may still be out there, somewhere, still an unknown threat for Sora?

I never again saw Roxas, except for a single glimmer in Sora's eyes... But a glimmer that I saw long before I knew my friend... I wonder if Sora and Riku ever forgot that boy they knew, long ago...?

All of these regrets... It doesn't matter now... My time is over.

I lay here in darkness; the world and Sora already faded from my sight... My heart long gone, and now even the sensations of pain from my body have ceased as well. I have truly become nothing.. nothing, in all except thought. What am I now? Is this my... soul? Is this what death is like for all, or just for nobodies like myself? But I forget... I'm not a nobody any longer; I have a heart. I truly believe that. I hear myself mentally laughing; the solution was so base and childlike, so cliche, that the mere concept was lost from the grasp of world-heavy researchers like Xemnas and Vexen... I now know that one other also came to the conclusion that they could not... but Demyx too, is lost to nothingness at Sora's hand... Returned to the darkness.

And yet, even in this darkness, I can suddenly see a pinpoint of light. That light... it makes me feel like I'm with Roxas again, in those slow, lazy days in Twilight Town... In its wake I feel my regrets washed away; and I feel something stir deep inside of me... Is it hope? Happiness?

The light grows and consumes me, and I feel the last remnants of the flame within me extinguished; quenched as if by a sea of nothingness, yet it's somehow... peaceful, gentle.

I drift here, and finally my thoughts become naught...

Good luck, Sora. Good luck, Roxas. Enjoy the most you can with your new life... The life that I cannot join you in living.

My name is Axel. I think. I feel. I am.

Got it memorized?

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Not the end yet... I've added a couple of things that may have some people wondering, but it will all play out in time, rest assured. ) I hope you can enjoy my crummy fanfiction!