Here goes... my first and second chapters are always a bit weird or sucky, in my opinion. Eh...
If I owned Kingdom Hearts, Roxas wouldn't have such a ridiculously sad story. Which means, he wouldn't forget stuff, or he would and he'd remember it later, Xion would come back, he would have bonded with Namine, he would have had Axel tag with him as outcasts from the Organization, he would find out about those wet things on his cheeks and what they meant, he would have met Sora without merging with him, and Sora would awaken and they could go on having adventures together... but not in a sense of being merged together. Or at least it would be happier when they merged. Yes, I put disclaimers on here more because they're fun to write than just for the sake of putting them here.
I better hurry up, before the A/N is longer than the actual story. ;)
_-Day I-_
A young boy of fifteen looked down at his feet, sitting in the corner of his cell. Golden wings concealed his body, as he quietly shifted his knees, so that his left was pulled to his chest instead of his right.
He had woken this morning to this strange puzzle. He knew what it was, though his memories weren't as clear as the others...
His wings twitched as he stared at it a bit more.
XIII, you will be permitted to breakfast once you solve this, the note on his door read.
So he stood, looking at the numbers beneath the letter. It really wasn't much of a puzzle. He just had to punch in the numbers.
He snorted. Who did they think he was?
An experiment, a nobody, a voice whispered in his head.
So he sighed, punching in the code with his fingers. 9202120213. The door flew open, and Roxas flinched. Then he regained his composure, and walked through the passage.
He flinched again. There was VIII, the fire subject. What was the name again...?
He smirked. "You're late," he muttered, then walked over, chuckling to himself. Roxas tilted his head after him, marveling over the strange behavior. Then he realized the man's words and scurried after him.
"So," the spiky haired red-head started, "Two months and still no memories, huh?"
Roxas looked at him with curious blue eyes, as if VIII were another species... which he technically was. His golden wings were tucked neatly against his back, yet hiding his face partially. "..."
The older man looked at him curiously, then after a pause, said, "Name's Axel. Got it memorized?"
Roxas paused, then nodded.
Somewhat startled and somewhat pleased by his understanding, Axel nodded back, making his fox ears bob up and down a bit, and went to get a treat of meat, tail flicking behind him.
After parting, Roxas blinked after the fourteen other experiments. There was one, large table, and all of them shared it. Marluxia was outside, the lucky thing, and Xion and Namine were alone at one end of the table. It was dead silent; what was the point of talking, when there was nothing to talk about, and when any secrets were being monitored on high security cameras?
He took a dirty tray and picked up a couple loafs of bread with mold, along with two half-rotted fish. Food here wasn't too good, but it was sufficient enough to live with.
He decided to sit at the middle-end of the table, where no one would bother him. It wasn't because of them that bothered him, he just liked being... a bit alone.
Axel tilted his head at him, but sighed and shoved some meat in his mouth. Somewhere in the room, someone burped, but no one responded.
Xemnas sat next to Saix, who was next to Lexaeus, and so on. Larxene quietly sat alone, like Roxas, and Namine was close to Xion, who stared blankly at her food. The only thing she did on her own was eat, drink and sleep. But that was enough for the scientists not to discard her. But she already ate enough food for her stomach.
Namine shook her head. She was eating like a bird, compared to a human. She should be eating more. If she didn't, she'd get sick. Illness meant no flying...
Saix simply gulped down food as Xemnas studied everybody else's food, not bothering to eat his own.
Roxas hardly finished his food when the testing bell rang. He moaned loudly, but ceased his noise in unison with the bell.
Everyone picked up their trays and dumped them in the garbage, then headed to their testing rooms, each room labeled for their number. Namine was simply escorted.
Roxas sighed, pushing open his door and heading inside the testing room. It was gray, like a cylinder, so high that not even his acute eagle eyes could see through the darkness to the ceiling. Along the way was a few glass windows.
"Roxas, today we'd like to see you fly," a voice echoed through the cylinder.
"But...." he went quiet. There were no 'but's. Not here. So he spread his wings slightly, and flapped them. Wasn't anyone going to teach him how to fly? How could he learn on his own? A memory pricked at him- birds were taught flight when they were still babies. He could imagine himself as a 3-year-old human baby, with wings, flying, couldn't he? Like Cupid, or something?
"That's it. Go on," the voice told him impatiently.
Roxas looked up nervously, then began frantically pedaling his wings.
"No, no. Get a running start. Jump."
Roxas blinked at the directions, and started running to the other side of the room. It was very wide, about a quarter mile long if you ran by the wall, seeing as the testing facility was just a bit bigger than a school able to hold two thousand students, including the PE area. But he cleared that quickly, without much difficulty, and jumped.
He fell flat on his face.
He looked up for help, but none came. He tried again, this time spreading his wings to his fullest, jumping much higher... he glided for a few seconds and then fell.
The thrill of flying flooded through him. Spots danced in front of his eyes. Wonderful!
He ran, faster, actually putting a bit more effort in it this time, and pumped his wings, a bit harder. The strain of not using them for two months almost made him collapse to the ground, but Roxas toughed it out. Faster, faster. He was about a foot from the ground, a determined look fixed on his face, and flipped right before he hit the other wall, kicking as hard against it as he could.
He was now flying upside down, and felt thrilled by his quick learning. Perhaps it came from the memories of his golden eagle side that let him learn so fast, and not just himself, but who cared? He was flying!
He flipped right side up, zooming past the windows, several feet from the ground, that the scientists were observing him from, fascinated.
"Roxas, you can land now."
He didn't dare land. Not now. It was the one time in his life he actually felt... good. He heard the mutters calculating his speeds, saying that he was even better than Xigbar or Xaldin or Zexion or Namine, saying how quickly he learned...
"XIII. Land."
He didn't want to land. He glared at the windows, at the person commanding him to land, then stuck out his tongue.
He yelped as a shock traveled through his leg, coming from the rubber-like stun ring (though of course, it wasn't rubber because that was impossible, since electricity couldn't travel through rubber) hanging from his leg. He instantly fell to the ground, wincing and curling up to a ball as he held himself with a low whine.
"Obey us and less pain will come to you," the voice said thickly. "Go to your cell." The sound of the microphone switching off hurt Roxas's ears, and he whined again, slowly closing his eyes.
But they wouldn't let him rest here. He yelped as a scientist's foot collided with his back, right between his wings, which needed slits cut through his all-black clothes.
"Go to your cell," the voice commanded in person.
Roxas wanted, so badly, to tear the man limb by limb, but he held himself back. He stepped out of the room, the door now unlocked, limping. He silently returned to his dull gray cell and sat in the corner, finding himself to be the first finished with testing, and leaned against the wall, closing his eyes for an ounce of sleep.
--
Well, well, well.
He had already known that some of the experiments, Organization XII, now Organization XIII (Because, it did fit better), had different things holding them back. Xemnas simply didn't show his alterations. Perhaps he didn't even have a mutation, other than his hair and eye color, so maybe he didn't have anything. Xigbar and Xaldin had chips shocking them if they flew too high, along with everyone else limiting their powers- Larxene only generating static, Demyx not being able to form his tail, Saix not going berserk enough to harm anyone, Lexaeus having limited strength... the list goes on and on.
The only ones he knew with something else, other than chips, were Xion and Roxas. Perhaps Namine, but he didn't get a good look. The only reason why Xion and Roxas didn't have implants yet was because they didn't remember anything- once their memories kicked in, they would think of escape, and then they would have the chips operated in. Right now, they were simply too stupid to figure out that they could free themselves of shocks- but, that wasn't meant to be offensive, since he was the same when he was first 'born'.
For him- the thing that the chip prevented him from doing? He couldn't make flames. Not even static, like Larxene. And he hated it.
...that didn't count during testing, though.
Axel loved and despised testing at the same time. The only glee for his unrelenting fire was during testing, where they shut off his chip. He was free to dance with the flurry of flames... hence his title.
Today, they wanted him to set things on fire. Only a few words for that: Funfunfunfunfun! Okay, that technically wasn't a word, but who cared, really?
He easily sent strong blasts of flames that nearly burned his fingertips at sending them. His blazing emerald eyes reflected, fed off of the flames, and his body burned and flickered with them, until he found himself encased by fire...
...but that wasn't really scary. No, not at all. Who would be scared of the wonderful, intensively beautiful flames? Though his embodied bonfire danced across his skin, it didn't sear it. No, not at all...
Well, well, well. It looked like he now knew how to cover himself with the burning flames... yet also to ward off their licking pain with ease.
He didn't bother looking at the scientists, staring at him and his new-found ability intently. Actually, he didn't dare- he didn't want to ruin the moment. The whole room was ablaze, and he could walk through the beauty without a scratch!
He remembered his, or rather, his whole's mother, warning him of fire. Fire, fire, fire. But even before he loved fire. He gazed at candlelight with eyes dancing to the fire's movements, once lit a hotel with fire and watched it burn to the ground. Of course, he was later punished, and rather harshly as well... but it was still wonderful.
He drowned himself in the heat, twirling, stepping through it without a worry. The black half-diamonds under his skin contrasted with his lighter parts, like with his mischievous green eyes, and he laughed, merrily...
Then water poured down from above.
Why did they do that every single damned time!? At the best moment, at the climax! This was only one of the reasons he hated water...
Water stopped his flames. They drowned them, beat them, made them submit. He hated water, just as much as Larxene. Even if he got his fire powers from the electric eel DNA in the first place, who was a dweller of the seas...
The water smoothed back his hair, and he stood there, shivering in the cold, looking up at those windows with narrowed eyes and clenched teeth, growling under his breath.
"VIII, calm yourself."
Like he was a little kid, or a disobedient dog. He was, kind of... but not like that. But still, not wanting the pain, he looked down. Flames cascaded across his body for a moment, drying himself. At least he wouldn't have to suffer periodic colds from all of that freezing water...
He felt the chip reactivating inside him, shutting the gate between him and his fire. He could hear the flames' cries to be let free, to cascade over those damned scientists, but he had... no choice, but to let them fade into his interior.
Perhaps tomorrow.
He shuffled into the cell room, just the other room, really, seeing that Xion, Namine, Roxas, Xemnas, Zexion, Luxord, and Lexaeus were done testing. They paid no notice to him, excluding Roxas, as he locked himself in his cell.