Author : Ariani Lee

Fandom : Kingdom Hearts

Pairing : AkuRoku

Beta-reader : Lyly (u)

Disclaimer : I do not own nor Kingdom Hearts neither Axel or Roxas. If I did, they wouldn't have died that way T_T

Auto-evaluation : ***

Note : This fanfiction is made of one or two shots, most of the time without any connection between them. There's no chronological order neither. They can be completely contradictory. You have to read them separately, not like a whole. I hope it's clear… Not sure at all x)

Love

It's common knowledge that Nobodies have no heart. That's why, despite everything he [tought he] was feeling for Roxas and despite all that there was between them, Axel had never told him "I love you". He had often wanted to do so, in moments when the mood was especially favorable and there were only both of them. He had even almost let it slip out, one time.

They were alone, sitting on the clock tower looking down on Twilight Town, eating salt-sea Ice cream and admiring the setting sun. Well, Axel was watching Roxas profile rather than the sunset. The twilight was throwing changing glows and shades on his face, putting pink on his cheeks – a thing which actually didn't have much chance to really happen.

Axel thought that Xemnas was wrong when he was asserting that they were unable to feel any emotions. The Number VIII felt different from the other members, because even if he didn't have a heart, he [was certain that he] had feelings. When he was with him, peeking at him like this when Roxas was absent-minded, it was causing things to happen inside of him. He often thought about their relationship. It was special; there was something else between them. Something that was making them sit side by side to eat, spend all of their free time with each other, always going together on mission when they could choose their partner. Something that was making they having their ownplace. The clocker tower, the salt-sea ice cream, it was all about them. Nobody could interfere with that. It was their thing.

Staring at his friend's face, startled by his own thoughts, briefly losing control, Axel had felt his mouth opening and heard his own voice saying:

- Roxas, I lo –

He had only just caught his words and swallowed them back like a bitter medicine. Roxas had looked at him, leaning back on one hand. Axel had captured this picture of him as clearly as if his eyes had been the lens of a camera. The thick bangs of ash-blond hair, the shades on the face turned towards him in the dusk light, the flexibility of the wrist under the raised hand which was holding the ice cream, the angle formed by his neck and his shoulder, the extraordinary forget-me-not blue of his eyes. Then, the lips which were parting….

- Yes, Axel?

Still, calm Roxas. Always faithful to himself, always so sure of everything. Was that a façade? Axel sometimes doubted the fact that Roxas truly was the one he seemed to be. He threw the wooden stick of his ice cream. He had been in a state of grace, and now it was gone. He had gotten back to earth – just in time.

- Nothing. I was going to say something stupid.

Anyone else would've had been curious and insisted to know what he had almost said. But not a Nobody. Not Roxas. He hadn't said a word and had carried his attention back to the everlasting sunset. Axel had felt disappointed and relieved at the same time.

No heart meant no love… right?

AKUROKU