Chapter Two: Twilight Town

"Come on you guys! Hurry up!" Called out a blond boy in green camouflage pants and a green vest.

"Hold on Hayner, I just need to get my stuff together." Said a brunet girl in light tan pants and an orange shirt.

"Hey Olette, Hayner! What's keeping you two?" A black haired boy wearing blue jeans and a red jersey with a white shirt underneath called over.

"Just waiting on Olette here, then we're free as birds for the rest of the weekend!" Hayner said with excitement.

"Oh hey Pence, I'm all done so lets go." Olette said as the three of them ran out the front gates of their school.

After they had dropped off their backpacks, they headed over to their favorite place in Twilight Town, their "Usual Spot". It was just a dead end in an ally that they had added a few things to make it homey, like a small beat up couch, a large curtain over the fence for a door and some posters of the town.

"Hey you guys, what do you think of calling Namine up and having her come hang with us? I'm sure she's done with her schooling for the day." Olette said. Their friend Namine was a home-schooled girl, so they only got to see her after school and on the weekends.

"Hey yeah, go ahead and give her a call, then we can have an even number for a ball game." Said Hayner.

So Olette pulled out her phone and called Namine.

"She said she'd be here as soon as she can, but she has to walk so it might be a while." Olette informed them.

"Ok, well why don't we go outside and play some handball until she gets here? And the teams will be me and Olette against you Hayner, cuz your good enough to cover for two." Said Pence.

"Ok, I'm up for that, get the ball and lets go." Hayner said as he headed for the door.

The game had been one sided the whole time, Hayner had triple the points Olette and Pence did. So when Pence played a little more aggressively, he had by accident sent it flying into the Twilight Town Underground Concourse. A system of tunnels used as short cuts under the town.

"My bad, I'll go get it." Pence said as he ran off after it.

"Oh great, where did it get to?" Pence said to himself as he wandered further and further in. "Found it!" He said as he saw it lying beside a pile of empty cardboard boxes.

As he pushed a few of the boxes out of the way to reach the ball easier, he noticed something else lying among the boxes. What he saw made him yell out in terror and run back to his friends.

"Hey, hey you guys!" He yelled out as he came out of the tunnel way.

"So where did the ball go? Couldn't find it?" Hayner asked with his hand on his hip.

"No, you wont believe it, there's - there's a dead guy down there!" Pence said in between gasps.

"What? No way! It's dark down there so I bet your eyes were just playing a trick on you is all." Olette said to him.

"No, I know what I saw, and he was dead alright! In nothing but his underwear!" Said Pence in his defense.

"Oh alright, show me and I'll believe you." Hayner said. So Pence lead them all into the underground concourse.

"The body is right behind those." Pence said as he pointed to the boxes.

"Well all I see is our ball you failed to bring back and – " Hayner stopped talking when he saw what Pence was talking about. Olette screamed.

"Calm down! Everyone just calm down! I don't think he's dead, just unconscious." Said Hayner.

"What makes you think that?" Asked Pence.

"Because, he's still got some color in his face, plus I can sorts see him breathing. I think we should try and get him out of here. Who knows how long he's been down here." Hayner said to them both. "Grab his legs, I got his arms." And Hayner and Pence carried him out, Olette not far behind.

They placed him on the old sofa in the Usual Spot and covered him with a beat up looking blanket.

"Wow, who do you think he is? I've never seen him before, and this is a small town." Olette said.

"It's anyone's guess, but I think he might be an insane asylum escapee. He is in nothing but underwear after all." Hayner said.

"Well I've never heard of any insane asylums around here, maybe he was at a party and got too drunk and didn't make it home. Then got mugged?" Pence said.

"Or maybe his girlfriend beat him up and locked him out." Olette said with a slight giggle.

"Well whatever the reason is that this guy is like this, it can't be good." Said Hayner, and just then Namine came through the fence door.

"Well I'm finally here you guys! Hu? Who's that there?" She said, noticing the blond sleeping boy lying on the sofa.

"We have no idea," began Hayner, "Pence found him unconscious in the underground concourse."

"And he's wearing nothing but his underwear, really makes you wonder where he came from." Olette said to Namine.

Namine walked over to get a better look at him.

"How long ago did you find him?" Namine asked.

"Oh not too long ago, he's been in here 'bout 5 minutes." Pence informed her.

Namine reached out and placed her hand on the sleeping blond's forehead, to see whether he had a temperature or not, and as suddenly as her hand made contact with his forehead, his eyes shot open, his bright blue orbs gazing into hers. Nether moved for a few seconds while they stared into each other, then the boy suddenly bolted upright and darted his eyes around the room wildly, looking at each teen individually and each looked back at him with almost the same feeling of sock and terror.

"It's ok, your safe here." Namine said as soon as the boy was standing up on the couch.

"No, you're lying! Nowhere is safe! Get out of my way, I have to get out of here, no, get away from me!" The boy cried out as Namine slowly walked closer to him with her arm reached out towards him.

The boy jumped clear over her head and landed in the middle of the room, causing everyone to stare at him in shock of his little maneuver, then he located the exit and made a dash for it, only to be tackled to the ground by Hayner.

"Oh no, your not going anywhere like this! Just calm down, we only want to help!" Hayner tried to convince him.

"No, get off, let me go!" The boy was working himself into a panic.

"Your alright, I promise nothing will happen to you here, please, calm down!" Namine pleaded with him.

"Olette, grab that blanket!" Pence called out to her.

She brought it over and Pence gave it to Hayner and Namine, and with it they wrapped up the struggling boy with it. Namine wrapped herself around him too, while sitting on the ground, hoping to prevent him from hurting himself by thrashing around so much.

"Please, calm down, it's ok, shh." She repeated over to him. And finally, he slowly went limp in her arms, his head hanging over her left shoulder while he breathed heavily.

He didn't understand it, but having this girl's arms tightly wrapped around him made him feel at ease, for the first time in his whole existence.

"Is everything ok now?" Namine whispered in his ear.

As his breathing became normal again, he muttered a "Yeah…"

"Come, sit down over here." Namine said to him.

He slowly got up and walked over to the sofa with her. She kept one arm around him and the blanket was still wrapped around his body tightly.

"So, what's your name?" She asked.

"…I'm called…13." The boy said.

"'13'? That can't be right, who called you that?" Pence asked.

"My, my creator." The boy responded.

"'Creator'? You mean a parent?" Olette asked.

"A what?" The boy asked.

"A parent, you know, a mom or dad." Hayner said to him.

"I don't think I understand." The boy said as he looked up at Hayner.

"Well, I guess that doesn't matter at the moment, so can you tell us where you came from?" Pence asked him.

"I, I don't really know."

"You don't have a home?" Namine asked.

"A home?"

"Ah don't tell me you don't know what a home is ether." Hayner said in surprise.

"I don't understand."

"Well, what about your clothes? Do you know why you're practically naked?" Asked Pence.

The blond boy looked down at himself under the blanket, stretched a leg out and flexed his foot, then looked at his right hand, flexed it around too.

"Is there something wrong with me?" He asked.

"No, but people usually wear clothes when they go outside. How long have you been running around like that?" Hayner asked him.

"Not sure, but there was no light when I got here." The boy said.

"So you mean to say you've been out for about a day?" Pence said.

"I believe so." Said the boy.

"Well, if you say you don't have parents or a home, then maybe you have amnesia. Does anywhere on your head hurt?" Pence asked him.

"I'm in no pain." He replied.

"Then you're the most confusing person I've ever met." Hayner said to him.

"Why don't we go out and get him some clothes then?" Olette said to the group.

"Good old Olette, solving our problems with shopping." Pence said in a sarcastic note.

"Well if you want we can walk the streets with a boy in his underwear all day!" She said back to him.

"No, I actually agree with you Olette, lets get this poor guy some clothes before he dies of embarrassment." Hayner said as he got up.

"Here, in the meantime while we're out you can wear these." Namine said as she pulled out an old baggy white T-shirt and a pair of light blue jeans.

He took them from her and held them up, looking at them with a confused look on his face.

"Here, take this," she picked up the white shirt, "and put it on like this." She slid it over his head and helped him pull his arms out.

"And for these," she took the pants, "put them on one leg at a time, like this." She mimicked the action of putting pants on, which he copied. She helped him zip and button the pants then walked outside with him.

"Oh, he's looking better already!" Hayner said as he saw him walk out with Namine.

They all went to Market Street, all the while 13 was looking around as if he were deathly worried about something. The group kept asking him what was bothering him, but he just responded with a complement of the town.

They had found a store that carried clothes that would fit the blond boy, and quite quickly they chose him an outfit. It consisted of a black sleeveless zip up shirt, a white jacket with a red collar and a checkered pattern running around towards the top, a pair of black and white pants with a pair of black shoes with red lacing. Olette also got him some things from the accessory shop, a checkered wristband to match his jacked and two rings, one white, one black.

"Wow, now aren't you look'in good!" Olette said as 13 looked at himself in a mirror.

"Hey I'm starved, lets get some ice cream." Hayner said to the group.

"Oh, sounds good to me!" Said Pence, and then they all went off towards the train station.

…………………

"Sir I think I found where it spent the night." Riku said to a hand held device. On the receiving end was Ansem.

"And where would that be?" Ansem asked to the phone on the computer.

"In the Underground Concourse, but it looks as though it left hours ago, the Dusks are hot on its trail though, no need to worry."

"Hm, I believe it would have come across a human by now, I'm incredibly curious to see how it would have reacted. Maybe its escape isn't such a bad thing after all."

"Sir?"

"Think about it, out on its own, we can study its true behavior and its reactions. And if it responds to our liking, then we can go ahead and recapture it and begin training it for its true purpose. But Riku, you must find it quickly, for we must watch it for any unwanted behavior, such as aggression towards any human. We don't need our ultimate weapon unleashed upon the one thing it's supposed to be saving." Ansem explained to Riku.

"Understood master Ansem." And with that, he ended his transmission.

…………………

"Well here we are, this is where I live." Namine said as she opened the front door of her house in Sunset Terrace, letting the blond boy she met that day in.

The group had decided since he had no home or parents, that he should stay with one of them until something more permanent was figured out. They didn't want him sleeping in the Underground Concourse again. So they decided Namine's house would be best because she has an empty guest room for him to stay in.

"Ok, you sit down in here and I'll go get my mom to met you." Namine said.

13 looked around the room as she left. He found a sofa to sit himself down and looked around the room some more. He saw a lot of things on the walls and shelves; they made him wonder what they were for and why they were there. His gaze took him to an odd object sitting on the table in front of him. It was rectangular and had many buttons on it, he pressed to top one out of curiosity and it turned the TV on that sat across the room.

It made his head shoot up and he stared transfixed at the TV screen, not fully understanding that there weren't actual people standing within it. He soon realized that it was just a device similar to the computer he saw in Ansem's laboratory, and it made him uneasy. Then Namine finally came back into the room with her mother.

"Here he is mom, this is the boy I was telling you about." Namine said as she walked over to him.

"Hello there, I'm Tifa, Namine's mother." Tifa said as she extended her hand to the blond boy, but he just stared at her hand, then back up to her face. "Ok then." She said as she took back her hand.

"He doesn't really understand social etiquette," Namine said, "they did find him sleeping in the Underground Concourse in is underwear after all."

"Well in that case, he does seem to desperately need somewhere to stay, your welcomed here as long as you like. I'm almost done with dinner, you two look starved." Tifa said before leaving the room.

"So that's my mom, well, step mom actually. See, a few years ago my parents were killed in an accident and Tifa was my godmother, so now she's my legal guardian." Namine explained to him.

"So your sort of like me, no parents." He said.

"I guess so, but do you even remember who your parents were? Or are? You have to have had parents, how else can you exist?" She asked.

"I- " He began, but something told him to keep Ansem's laboratory and his origins a secret.

"Yes?" Namine said, waiting for him to say something.

"I don't remember anything past yesterday." He said.

"That's too bad, I really hope you remember soon. It must be such a lonely feeling, not being able to even remember who you are."

13 looked to the floor, he was beginning to feel something he had never experience before, and he didn't like it at all. Just then, Namine's voice broke that feeling apart, which he couldn't have wanted more.

"Hey, I got an idea, why not until you remember your real name, I'll give you one."

"But 13 is my name."

"13 is a number, not a name! Well, not a proper one at least. I'll think of a good one for you."

Tifa interrupted their conversation by telling them dinner was ready. The both of them came into the dinning room and sat down to eat, Tifa had made a chicken dinner, with rice and steamed broccoli on the side. Namine had to show 13 how to properly use a fork and knife, because he was attempting to eat the rice with his hands.

After dinner was cleaned up, Namine showed him to his room.

"And this room here is all yours." She said as she turned on the lights.

The room was a decent size, the bed was a twin sized one and was under the window, the walls were a tan color and there were many shelves built into one wall. There was also a desk against the wall with a computer chair, but there was no computer.

"Well then, I guess this is good night, the bathroom is just down the hall if you need it, and feel free do get what you want from the kitchen if you need anything in the middle of the night. I'll see you tomorrow morning." Namine said as she left the room and closed the door behind her.

13 stared at the back the closed door for a moment before turning and walking over to the bed. He sat on it and stared out the window. He was on the second story of the house, and had a relatively good view of the street.

As he kept an eye out for his pursuer, his mind attempted to put together that day's events. Even though next to none of it made any sense to him, he had enjoyed the company that found him. Especially that of the girl who now housed him.

…………………

There were five Dusks swarming around an old blanket in Hayner and company's Usual Spot. And in out of the cold night air came Riku, dressed in his back robe.

"I see we're getting closer to finding our experiment." Ansem's voice came through on Riku's hand held device.

"Yes, these Dusks of yours are a wonder."

"It's one of the better abilities I gave them, they are able to track down anything I happen to be looking for, that is, if it has a sent. Best to keep moving, if it slept last night, it wont sleep again for two more nights, so it might still be on the move."

"I'm on it." And with that, the five Dusks and Riku continued their search.

Chapter two end!

Roxas finally has some pants :B

And he apparently can't comprehend a simple handshake.

In the next chapter Seifer's gang will be meeting Roxas, and we all know how well Seifer and Roxas mix. And we will also be seeing some qualities that make Roxas the "ultimate weapon".

And will Riku and those annoying Dusks find him? You'll find out eventually :3

And as always, thanks so much for reading! I hope this story is interesting for you in some slight way…