Chapter 3: The Lost, the Discovered, and the dead
They spent hours scouring the town and joining places for any sign of the girl. They hand spent hours lurking in different crowds, asking for directions, and getting themselves more and more mixed up. Without a name it was almost hopeless.
"Who knew there were a million girls in Travers Town with brown hair and a blue necklace!"
Riku was exasperated. Roxas hurried along beside him, half panting from the run they'd just had, and watching around for any sign of her.
"What did she look like again?"
Riku sighed and stopped, forcing Roxas to leap backwards before crashing into him. He took one look around and then looked down at Roxas.
"She has brown hair, neon blue eyes, a blue tear shaped necklace, and jeans. The T-shirt she wore came to about half way down her stomach, and she had a silver arm band."
"Well that's specific enough."
Roxas snorted as he peeked around the corner of a building. If they were ever going to find her they needed more help then they had. Continuing on in their hopeless search, a bark caught their attention. Pluto, the king's loyal dog, came barking around the corner in hot pursuit of someone. The woman was carrying a large brown shopping bag and seemed terror stricken as she bolted from the growling dog. Roxas, of course, looked on in wonder at the scene as they got closer and closer. He raised an eyebrow at Pluto and was just about to stoop down and call to him to get him to stop. Riku, however, recognized the girl immediately, and pulled Roxas to his feet.
"Let him be. That's her."
Pluto bounded after the girl, and she ran like the hounds from Hades were on her tail. Roxas stood to the side and glared at the ground, not sure it was ok to let Pluto just herd her around like that. And she pelted on, until she collided with Riku. The two went toppling over, Riku making sure to avoid that pendant around her neck. When they landed Riku sat back, barely propped up on his elbows, and the girl lay in a jumbled mess over his midsection. He shook his head then glared down at her. With out pity or grace he shoved her off him, stood up, grabbed the front of her shirt, and dragged her up with him.
"Where's Sora?! What sis you do to him you witch!?"
He shook her, a bit more violently than he had meant to. He had just regained his best friend, and he wasn't about to lose him again. The girl looked at him with milky eyes and gaping mouth for just a moment before she hung limp in his grasp; dazed and scared her body had given into the unconscious world.
"No!"
Riku threw her down at the ground, giving Roxas a spares few seconds to catch her. She laid there, limp and unresponsive in his arms. He looked up from her to Riku, glaring with just a hint of fear at his friend. He had never seen Riku behave like this before.
"Riku calm down. From how you described it, it was a total accident. What if you had hurt her and she had no longer been able to tell us where Sora went?"
Riku scoffed at him. He simply would not admit that he had done wrong.
"Come on. You came here in a gummi ship right? We gotta get out of here and figure this out."
"Yea we came in the tini ships. But they were totally trashed when we landed."
Roxas stood up with the girl in his arms and headed off towards the landing site. They ignored the groceries that were now scattered among the remains of the tattered bag, and Pluto bounded along at their heals.
"Well we'll just have to fix one then."
Riku glanced at Roxas for only a moment, then hurried to catch up.
What they found when they reached the ships shocked them almost as much as a cow falling from the sky would shock and person not on drugs. Riku had led the way back to the ships, quietly discussing what sort of things they should be asking the girl about, and a small fight that Roxas won on who was going to ask the questions and how.
But at the ships, the met an unexpected and very familiar face. There, sitting on the back blasters, was Axel. Or as close to Axel as anyone could be. He sat with one leg propped against the side of the ship and the other dangling lazily. He had on jeans and a silver T-shirt, black fingerless gloves, sneakers, and his hair looked as if someone had attempted to comb it back a bit. In one had he held a sea-salt ice cream, and the other he leaned back on. The whole feel of him radiated just like Axel had done, and Roxas almost dropped the girl when he saw all this.
"Yo!," Axel look-a-like spoke and saluted like Axel had, "Long time no see! Fixed your ship for you! Hope you don't mind! She's not perfect, but she'll fly."
He leapt off the ship, kneeling for a moment before standing and admiring his handy work. Riku summoned his key blade, crouching and ready to strike, but Roxas handed the girl off to him and slowly started walking forward.
"Axel?"
"Roxas."
The two regarded each other, Roxas with an awestruck dumb look on his face, and Axel with a sleek grin across his.
"Axel!"
Roxas continued on forward, high-fived, then clasped hands as if they were making a promise like they used to.
"But….. How..?"
"How am I here? Dunno, things work out funny like that some times."
"I find it hard to believe that you just poof viola-ed here to help us."
Riku walked up and interjected, looking down at the girl in his arms. Axel just continued grinning and shook his head. Roxas glared at him for ruining the moment.
"Yea you would wouldn't you Riku? But I've been here for a while. Things are fine now that I can't get back to the world that never was. Dunno how I got here or how long I've been here, but I know your ships when I saw 'em, so I figured I'd fix this one up. I've got nothing else to do. So who you got there?"
He walked the short distance over and looked down at the now pale girl. His eyes narrowed and he backed away a bit.
"Now why do you want her?"
Roxas joined them and Riku look suspiciously at Axel.
"What do you mean by that?"
Axel shrugged at Riku.
"She's sort of the town outcast. No one knows much about her, not that many stay here long enough to know much about anything. But I do know that she has been here longer than I have, and she has no plans of going any where else."
"How about a name."
Roxas and Riku spoke at the same time with the same solemness. Axel in response lowered his head and raised and eyebrow.
"Minami."
