Disclaimer: I own none of the characters or concepts in this story, but I love KH and most of what happens in it!
In The Beginning: Dinner, As Demyx Sees It.
They arrived in the dining room almost simultaneously. At the sight of Axel, Xigbar let out something that sounded like a growl, but Xemnas's loud greeting to the two new members drowned it out.
"So glad you found it OK, especially with Axel for a guide," said a not entirely happy Xemnas, still managing a rather frightening smile.
"Oh, we thought he could do with the help after what you told us!" Roxas improvised quickly, softening Xemnas smile, and causing the rest of the room to crease up at Axel's expense.
Not that he cared, he had noticed that his plate was free of any telltale signs of interference, and had already sat down to enjoy one of life, in this weirdo community's, few pleasures.
Demyx sat down next to Axel at the oversized round table, in the chair with a nine on it. Ax, whose mouth was full, just nodded at Demyx that his plate appeared to be untouched too, and with a hand gesture invited him to tuck in.
Dem did, and used the opportunity to look around the table at what Ax had described as a crowd of weirdos. True, they we're a little different from most people he had known, but then so was he now. Determined to make the best of it, he tried to think of a positive thing about each one of them.
First, the boss. Well, he had been effusive in his welcome, even if he hadn't been exactly truthful, and he seemed very fond of Saix. Did he really just blow him a kiss? OK, not a place he wanted to go.
Demyx decided to assess, the number two of Axel's wiggle. Difficult since the look he was giving Axel made him look like a brutal killer, and that eyepatch wasn't helping. When Xig noticed him looking and he heard an actual growl emanate from Xigbar's throat he decided that he could assess him later – or never!
Xaldin, in chair three was smiling broadly. At last, Dem thought, someone normal. Then he noticed that Xaldin's hands spent more time doing something under the table than using his cutlery. He was actually turning the pages of his magazine, but Demyx who was not in a position to see that, decided that some things were just not right in public – and moved on to the slightly strange and quiet guy in seat 4.
This man's power had to be creeping people out, thought Dem. What he was doing to his food with his knife and fork looked like dissection in a lab, and when he did look up and smile at Dem, Dem felt sure it was the way a cat looked at a mouse before it pounced. Shivering up his spine, he wondered if Axel might actually be right about these guys. Still he had several more to go, and he already knew that Roxas and Axel were kind of OK.
Number 5. This guy was tall even in his seat, brawny, and wolfing down his food. When his eyes met Dem's though, he drew a complete blank. There was nothing. No recognition, no welcome smile, it was as if nothing lived in the body. Dem tried smiling at him, and drew another complete blank. OK, the guy's an enigma, thought Dem, but at least no bad vibes.
He turned his head to the number 6. Purple, interesting choice of hair colour, was his first thought. His second nearly caused him to be sick, as he noticed that the only guy around the same age as himself, and his two new acquaintances, was making very sick suggestive motions towards the creep dissecting his food, whilst pointing at diagrams in a book open next to him on the table. OMG was nothing right in this place?
He already had a suspicion that he might not find a redeeming feature in number 7, but being Demyx, decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. This was the guy who had brought him here without a change of clothes, and who bossguy was blowing kisses at. At first sight Dem had been impressed by him, tall and statuesque, with flowing blue locks and an interesting criss-cross scar, not to mention his apparent concern for his, Demyx's, wellbeing. Now watching his sickeningly coy looks in Xemnas's direction, he felt he had to turn his head before he threw up a perfectly tasty meal.
He found it difficult to assess Axel, partly because he was sat right next to him, partly because he already felt like they were getting quite close, after all he was wearing the guy's clothes, and partly because he found Ax's proximity made rational thought about him impossible.
The man on his other side was equally difficult to assess. It was the goatee Axel had warned him about, and worryingly he was already quite definitely very drunk, one hand resting on the back of Demyx's chair, and his head lolling to the side, an inane grin plastered on it. Demyx edged a little closer to Axel, and carried on his virtual tour.
By the time Demyx got to the pink-haired guy, he was getting up to leave, in deep conversation with the weird looking bottle-blonde. Immediately noticing Demyx's gaze on him, he raised his right eyebrow, and then smiled the coldest smile Demyx thought he had ever seen. It made him feel like an insect, which he supposed had to be better than looking like one, as his blonde companion did. Her response to Demyx had been to grin maniacally and beckon him with her index finger. He felt like a fly in a spider's web and felt another shiver run up his spine.
He knew Roxas better than anyone else at the table already since they had spent most of the day together, and catching Roxas's eye, he waved vaguely around the table and raised his shoulders questioningly. Roxas just shook his head. He had apparently from what Demyx had seen, been earwigged by the boss all the meal, when said boss hadn't been blowing kisses down the table.
"Couldn't eat another thing," said Axel, pushing his plate away, "and I don't know about you Dem, but I'd like to get out of here before people actually start talking, and you have to field idiotic questions from stupid people," he said looking straight at Xigbar, who looked more like falling asleep than anything else, sprawled back on his chair with his one eye closed, until "Shut up you psychotic moron!" boomed across the table.
"OK by me," said Demyx, feeling a little down that his exercise in humanity had yielded little, "and I think we should take Roxas with us. Xemnas seems to have him cornered, and he doesn't look like he's having a blast!"
"Consider it sorted," said Axel, turning to his other side, and giving his attention to Saix.
Within minutes Saix was having a word in Xemnas's ear, and the pair of them portalled out leaving Roxas free.
"Now's your chance," Axel said to Demyx, "grab Roxas and we'll meet back at mine. I'm off before Xig notices that the Superior just portalled." He almost instantly wasn't there, as a flurry of bullets hit the black ether where he had been.
"Damn. I missed." drawled Xigbar, who was still sprawled back on his chair, with his eye closed.
Demyx jumped as he suddenly felt a hand gripping his thigh, and turned to his right to find that the goatee was not quite as asleep as he thought, and was winking at him, suggestively.
"Rox," Dem managed in a slightly strangulated voice, to his new friend whose head had turned to follow the bullets, "we need to go and do that thing now with Axel, don't we?"
Seeing his new friend's predicament, he immediately agreed. Luxord, of the goatee, merely raised his eyebrows questioningly, having completely misunderstood, as usual, and then released his grip. "Sorry, boys, didn't realise Axel had a prior claim on you both, but if you ask me, that's just plain greedy! Well, if either of you change your mind..." he said, leering unattractively.
The two youths just portalled as quickly as their new skill would allow.
Axel now both recognised and expected the knock at the door, but this time it sounded more urgent.
"Come in you two! I take it from your knock things got interesting after I departed," commented Axel, who was helping himself to a drink from the mini-bar next to his bed. "Help yourselves," he said, waving at the assortment of bottles.
"Too damn right! You missed those bullets by millimetres! How can you be so calm! And what did you tell Saix?" squeaked Demyx, helping himself to a rather large gin and tonic.
"As you just pointed out, I missed the bullets. Therefore I didn't know about them, therefore I am calm. I am still calm now. And I just told Saix, the Superior was looking really cozy with his new toyboy!" chuckled Axel, as Roxas's colour rose. "So, anything else I missed?" he added, looking interested.
"Well, you're right about goatee guy, he touched up my leg, and what the hell is going on with the rest of those perverts. They ALL do weird things. I had hoped you were joking, but I seriously have to question their motives! Why does the Superior blow kisses at that blue-haired guy? And what's the story with that young guy with the purple hair? And what about that big beefy bloke, it's like he was on another planet!" Demyx spluttered, as Roxas searched in vain for some plain fruit juice amongst the alcohol and mixers.
"I told you they'd piss you off without any help from me by the end of dinner, and looks like I'm right again. Axel one, Organization nil!" he said, licking his finger and drawing a one in the air.
"Ax, do you have anything that isn't alcoholic or fizzy?" asked Roxas who was still searching for a drink.
"No, kid. I'd apologise except for the fact that I'm not really sorry, I don't feel emotions, it's nothing personal, you'll get used to it! There's drinking water in the bathroom, and I'll make sure that I stock whatever your favourite poison is, in the future." Axel added magnanimously.
"It's either pineapple or mango, or a mix," supplied Roxas as he headed for the bathroom.
"To answer your questions, Demyx, our beloved Superior, revels in the affections of the blue-haired psychopath, has done ever since he joined, second, I should have warned you about Zexion, avoid him at all costs. He's very clever, very cunning, another complete psycho, but maybe the most dangerous, partly because of his intelligence but also because of the sick alliance he seems to have formed with that mental scientist. Don't let him catch your scent, if you can avoid it - if you see him sniffing - run! Last but not least Lexaeus, he's not so bad but you're right, most of the time he is on a different planet these days. He kind of goes walkabout, it's his way of coping with all the psychos around him. When he first came, apparently, he used to cry a lot. Now he just disappears inside himself, but he is one of the few in here whom you can actually talk to, when his mind is present, of course. Any more questions – or, should we go out for a bit, doesn't look like we're being called into action tonight," he noted, glancing at his computer screen for any summons from the Superior.
"We can go out?" Roxas, who was now ensconced in the only armchair, asked. "Where? Do we have a curfew or anything?"
"Dammit, you really are soooo young," smiled Axel, who was stretched out on the bar side of his king-size bed, with Demyx sprawled out on the other. "Sure we can go out, no curfews, just have to take our cellphones and be ready to jump into action if called – well, that's the theory anyway."
"How does that work?" queried Demyx, "I mean goatee guy was already wasted at dinner."
"Ah, Luxord, it's OK for him, he manipulates time and has this neat trick where he goes back to when he was sober and then remanifests in the present. Yes, he can do it for others, and no, you never want him to, he requires payment of a kind that, trust me, you don't want to give! Got it memorized?"
"Think so," said Roxas, who decided he had to ask the question that was burning in his mind, but which he was a little embarrassed about, forgetting that Axel, being supposedly emotionless, was unlikely to be either embarrassed or offended.
"Ax, is everyone here gay?"
"Gay? Don't even think that word near Marluxia or your head won't stay on your shoulders too much longer! No, everyone isn't gay although I can see why you would think it, but most of us do swing both ways. Strangely it's the one thing no-one kind of talks about. Most of us would describe ourselves as straight, yet that's blatantly rubbish. It's being cooped up in this place together so much, with so little to do. Sex kind of passes the time, and it's something you can feel – important to people who can't feel emotionally, and no-one except Marluxia would ever go near the insect lady, so given that everyone else is male, it's kind of Hobson's Choice. Interesting choice of question, shortstop."
"Thanks for the 411 on that, I think." Roxas said, wondering if he'd end up the same, and deciding that getting out of there, even for a little while sounded like a really good idea.
Apparently Demyx had the same idea, as at that moment he chipped in, "Hey Ax, you mentioned going out, where is there to go? Didn't seem to be much out there from what we could see today."
"Hell no we don't want to go out anywhere round here, and not just 'cos I've got Xig on my tail. Have you seen the other Nobodies? The ones who didn't turn out like us? No, we'll go to a world with some action, and people who actually talk, and look vaguely normal. What's your preference – a club, a movie, go-karting, bowling, trawling a red-light zone, mini-golf?"
The two newcomers both creased up simultaneously.
"Am I missing something?" queried Axel, trying to work out what he had said to amuse them.
"Ax," said Demyx, when he could speak again, "it's just very strange for us to hear you offer a tour of a red-light district to a 15 year old and, in the same sentence as mini-golf!"
"Oh, again, you'll get used to the incongruities. In the meantime, what do you want to do tonight? Roxas?"
"Well, I think I'll pass on the red-light area," said Roxas, still chuckling a bit, "and ditto on the mini-golf, I was always hopeless at that, and I doubt things will have changed, even if I used the keyblade as a putter. Is there any way we can go and check on our homes, you know, check the folks we've left behind are OK first, and then maybe a club 'cos I've never been to one, but how would I get in? What about you, Dem? You want to do something in particular?"
"I'm up for the home view and club idea as well, I love dancing, and music - and I'm really missing my iPod! Maybe I can pick it up if we go home! And I'm really missing my family, but they are all gone now, I suppose!" he said, suddenly remembering the Heartless attack, and losing all his boyish enthusiasm.
"Hometowns and club it is then," said Axel cheerfully, trying to lighten the mood again, "but you cannot be seen by anyone you know, so Dem you'll just have to buy a new iPod," said Ax, skating over the whole family issue since he felt nothing and could not empathize, "and as for how we get in to a club, it's simple, we portal in. No need to deal with big beefy bouncers on doors, and once we're in everyone assumes we've been ID checked, so we get served. Neat, huh?"
"My only problem is deciding which of my favourite clubs to take you to....oh,shit, what now?" he moaned, as his computer screen began to flash. "We may have to put our little trip on hold, let me just see what the bossman wants."
Axel got up and settled himself in front of the screen. "Blah dee blah, blah dee blah, Kingdom Hearts, blah dee blah. What an arsehole! OK trip's back on, leave your cellphones here, and let's move it! You didn't just see the screen flashing, and you didn't read the message!" which was partially true since only Axel had read it.
"What is it, Ax?" asked Roxas, still enough in awe of Xemnas to feel a little apprehensive about ignoring an order.
"The arsehole has called a motivational meeting. Don't worry, we won't be the only ones absent. Usually only three people turn up to those things. Saix because he's attached to Xemnas with glue or something we don't want to think about, Vexen because he's always on the computer and has no excuse for not seeing the summons, and Zexion to keep an eye on Vexen and make sure he doesn't miss a piece of information he can later use for his own ends. Lux will claim to have passed out, Xig that he didn't see the screen because his eye was focussed elsewhere, Lex that he was in switched off mode, Xaldin that he was engrossed in one of his pervy magazines, and the list goes on! We weren't here, I didn't tell you to take your phones out with you, and I forgot mine in the excitement of showing you two a good time. Got it memorized? Now, let's make not being here true," he said opening a portal.
Their first portal was not so far, Twilight Town. Roxas wanted to go up and see the sunset from the station tower, and get a glimpse of the place he used to hang out with his friends, Demyx pleaded off, explaining he suffered from really bad vertigo, and settled for a sea-salt ice cream on the station steps.
When Roxas had had his fill of looking out over his birthplace, they portalled to Traverse Town, where they sat by Demyx's favourite fountain for a few minutes, and from where he could see his old home, now looking empty and lifeless. It felt strange to be able to look but not touch. He couldn't take it for long, it just felt too nostalgic and incredibly sad, and pretty soon they were ready to move on.