A/N: Oh yeah. I should really be revising. But whatever. I don't care. I'm all good. Sure, I get the feeling I've totally failed my first exam, but... pfffff. I don't give a shit.

And, a huge, massive thanks to Mystic Pendulum for their lovely review! It was lovely to see, and please, I'd adore hearing some of your theories! I'm also happy to see you like my writing style! You don't know how much that means to me. It's been years since I've written purely for fun, and this writing style is certainly a new one, but it's nice to see you're enjoying it.

Warnings: Talk of boners, because teenage boys are stupid. There's also a small description of violence involving a car accident towards the end. So please make a note of that.

Apart from that? Nothing! On with the chapter!


Chapter Three

"I've Been Having These Weird Thoughts."

Have you ever had the feeling of falling?

It creeps up on you whilst you're drifting off, and tilts your world on its axis, jerking you roughly from your slumber.

That exact feeling swept through Sora like rushing water as his eyes gazed at the picture of a mischievously smiling redhead boy.

Sora could feel pressure in his lungs, as though he'd been holding his breath underwater for longer than he was capable of.

Time seemed frozen around him.

His eyes stung.

"Axel," he whispered reverently, in a voice that wasn't entirely his own.

Trembling fingers lightly traced the outline of the redhead's sharp features, and Sora started with the realisation that his body had moved without his command.

His sudden movement seemed to jerk the world around him back into motion, and Sora felt his friends' eyes burrowing into him.

"Who's Axel?" Sora heard Tidus mumble from the other side of Riku.

Placing the phone on the table slightly harder than was strictly necessary, Sora, stood up from his chair so fast the thing clattered to the floor, ignoring Kairi's cries for him to be careful with her stuff.

The entire room had gone silent at Sora's abrupt action.

Sora felt oddly trapped under the hundreds of pairs of eyes, his chest tightening further at the probing feeling of accusation within his peers' stares, as though this was something he had been forced to go through before.

An image of a stake flashed through his head.

The tall wooden structure was on fire.

Sora clutched his head, the thought stabbing at his brain like an ice pick.

He took an unsteady step back, ignoring Riku as the taller boy snapped his hands out to steady his friend.

He refused to look at any of the others as he managed a rushed "I'm going to the toilet," before he turned his back and fled from the cafeteria, ignoring the hushed murmurs that started up as soon as the doors swung closed behind him.


Sora stared at himself in the dirty mirror, reflection slightly distorted by the thick layer of dirt caked upon its surface.

The restroom he had chosen was deserted, being one of the smaller, filthier ones available in the school.

He counted himself lucky as he wiped tears off his flushed cheeks.

The poor boy could see no reason why, exactly, he had broken down during lunch, or why, for that matter, it had seemed for a moment as though he had been floating outside of his own body, outside of the events happening around him, as he stared in awe at the figure on Kairi's phone.

Axel.

For the boy, Lea, Kari's older brother, had been Axel.

He had the same, untamed, red spikes atop his head.

The same pale, flawless skin.

The same thin, chapped lips.

The same passionate, fiery green eyes.

The only difference had been Lea's lack of upside, triangular tattoos, which Axel sported just beneath his eyes.

He forced the thought from his head, focusing, instead, on his red rimmed eyes.

That was real.

That was grounding.

He was snapped from his musings as the door behind him opened slowly.

Sora caught Riku's steady, sharp stare in the mirror.

The door closed behind the silver haired teen with a muffled thump.

"What was that about?" Riku questioned.

The older boy had the talent of ignoring Sora's tears when his friend obviously did not want his break downs to be acknowledged.

Turning to face him, Sora's lips thinned as he frowned slightly in confusion.

"I don't know."

Riku stared at him steadily, face empty of emotion as he attempted to pick apart Sora's expression for any signs of defeat.

After a moment of silence, Riku smirked, and Sora's frown turned into a grimace.

"Wait 'till I tell Kairi you were crying in the toilets," Riku snorted, as he pushed the door open, waiting for Sora. He could tell from the slump of his friend's shoulders that he didn't want to talk about what in Gaia's name had happened in the cafeteria.

Splashing his face with water to clear it of any tear tracks, Sora managed a muffled, "Don't you dare Riku!"

As he turned to follow his friend, Sora missed the way his own eyes flashed electric blue.


Kairi was worried.

This was not an unusual mind set for Kairi to be in. The poor girl ended up worried at least once a week with Riku and Sora for best friends.

However, Kairi believed she had met her quota for the week. In fact, Kairi had the feeling that she had not only met her quota, but she had also beaten it in an alley and rifled through its pockets for spare change before leaving it to bleed out on the ground.

In other words, Kairi was exhausted from worry.

And it was only Monday.

Kairi did not like to pry into her friend's business. She knew from experience that both Sora and Riku would shoulder their own burden for as long as possible before they buckled under the stress and spilled their secrets to her.

And it was always to her. Despite the fact that their friendship was equal between the three of them, Kairi was the better listener, and much better at giving her boys advice than her boys were at giving advice to each other (which Sora had learnt the hard way at thirteen, when Cloud had lost his job and Kairi had not been in town to talk to. Riku had simply told him, "a job is not that important." Damn rich people).

But, as Kairi stood against the wall outside a particularly disgusting boys' toilet, she had the sinking suspicion she wouldn't be able to help Sora with his problems this time.

She wasn't quite sure why this was either. But there was something about Sora's recent nervousness, his twitchiness, which told Kairi that Sora's problems were too serious for her to deal with on her own.

Sure, she would help him in any way she could, but she knew that wouldn't be enough.

Not this time.

She glanced at her phone, clenched in her rapidly warming fist.

The image of her brother smiling back at her was still on the screen.

With a small frown, she moved back to the home screen.


Riku let Sora walk under his arm as he held the door open for the smaller boy, flicking a concerned look at his back.

He shook his head at Kairi over Sora's spiky hair, and the girl sighed surreptitiously.

Sora, thankfully, didn't notice the small exchange, too busy looking around for any sign of other students.

Finally, he turned his attention to Kairi and, without preamble, said, "Sleepover at Riku's tonight?"

Riku immediately started spluttering, and Kairi raised an eyebrow, a smile spreading across her face.

"Are you sure?" she asked, and Riku flailed slightly.

"Yeah."

"Excuse me!" Riku snapped, and both of his friends turned their attention on him. He flinched at the sight of dual puppy dog eyes. "Okay."

Kairi and Sora grinned at each other.

"That's good. I've got some things I want to talk to you guys about."

Kairi and Riku shared a look over Sora's head as the boy walked ahead of them to lead them to their next class.


To be fair, Sora felt it wasn't right of the school to expect him to remember an entire book, and that was without the added stress of over two weeks of a bad sleep pattern.

He didn't understand how Riku did it. The boy was constantly sprouting quotes from 'the classics' that they had read years ago to this very day.

He was a pretentious douche like that.

Sora's attention kept creeping from his English paper and to Riku's broad back directly in front of him.

After the fourth time it happened, Sora was content to let his eyes remain there, although he wasn't actually thinking about Riku's broad back (thankfully. The last time he'd done that, he'd popped an embarrassing boner during History, and he'd had to flee the room without waiting for his friends. Luckily it was the end of the school day. Unluckily, he'd been forced to walk the entire way home).

He caught sight of Kairi chewing on the end of her pen in aggravation as she glared down at her paper.

It was as blank as Sora's.

But Sora's thoughts were drifting into the Nether.

He desperately wanted school to be done, so he could head to Riku's house.

Sleepovers at Riku's house were a longstanding tradition between the three friends (occasionally, other members of their group would join them, but after that event with Yuffie, the whipped cream, and Sephiroth's new motorbike, Riku had begun limiting the number of people who stayed in his house overnight). Their guardians never seemed to mind when the three would have an unscheduled one simply pop up, including if it was in the middle of the school week, or, even during the exam period.

They also didn't mind that Kairi was a girl. She had been the boys' best friend for an incredibly long time, and, as far as their guardians were concerned, it would be unfair and stupid to leave her out of the boys' fun.

The three had left all the stuff they needed for the night at each other's house. There was, in all honesty, enough that they could have moved into one another's bedrooms for a month with no worries.

However, sleepovers at Kairi's were rare as her parents were terrifying, so the boys limited their time at Kairi's house to when her parents were away, whilst Sora's room was a bit on the small side, so he tended to only invite them over when Riku's room couldn't be used for the night (which was usually down to Kadaj, Yazoo and strange images printed off the internet).

Their sleepovers were much the same as any sleepover had by any kid that they knew. They would sit up until midnight, watching movies and playing idiotic games, and, depending on whose house they were at for the night, a sibling may join them or a while.

And then, after midnight, shit would get deep.

The trio would usually sit up until three in the morning, or even later, talking about the stuff they couldn't talk about during the school day, such as their greatest fears, or matters concerning life and death.

The heaviest their discussions had ever gotten had been that time Sora, at the tender age of eleven, had broken down crying over his parents and the stress his brother had to face, raising little Sora all by himself. When they had been woken up by Sephiroth for school the next day, the three of them were in a Sora-snuggle-sandwich.


The sound of Angel's singing (or the sound of the bell, but that was the same thing to exhausted teenagers) pierced through the silence of the classroom, and student's immediately jumped to their feet, leaving their answer papers scattered across the desk for their teacher to collect.

Kairi grimaced at Sora and Riku on the way out.

"Please tell me you found that as hard as me guys?" Kairi pleaded, blue eyes wide.

Riku snorted.

Sora blanched.

"Oh crap. I forgot to write anything down."

There was a short second of silence, before Riku started laughing so hard he doubled over.

Kairi sighed.

"Sora."

Sora grinned sheepishly, tousling the back of his hair.

"Ah well," he muttered, before his eyes landed on the tallest teenager. "Riku, stop laughing before I kick you!" Sora snarled at Riku, watching in annoyance as the older teen straightened up, wiping tears of mirth from his face.

"Okay, okay. I'm sorry. Let's go," Riku held up his hands in front of himself in a placating gesture, but the smirk never left his face.


Kadaj was peering at his well-manicured nails as he leant against his car, waiting for Riku and his little buddy.

His attention was broken when he heard the sound of annoyed shouting, and he groaned as he looked up.

'Oh great. He's bringing the angry little redhead with him as well.'

Kadaj simply sighed, before jumping into the driver's seat, and rolling his eyes at his brother's antics (to Kadaj, the simple act of Riku breathing the same air as Kadaj was an antic, but then, Kadaj was a prima donna).

"I take it," he practically purred (everything Kadaj did had to be done with a stage worthy flamboyance, including the act of interrupting his idiot little brother squabbling with his idiot little friend, whilst their idiot female companion giggled), "you're all coming back to my house."

Riku instantly shot Kadaj a glare (mainly because he despised it when Kadaj attempted to steal Riku's place as the main source of drama within a miles radius of Riku himself).

"Yes," he growled, green eyes hard.

Kadaj smirked back, before saying, "Well hurry it up then. I've got more important things to do than wait around here."

Sora and Kairi grinned at each other as the two brother's started snapping at each other.

"Oh yeah! Like what?"

"My workout routine, of course."

"I'll believe that when I see it, fatass!"

Sora and Kairi started sniggering as the car took off.


Sephiroth was a simple man.

He did his best for his brothers and mother.

He did his best at work.

He did his best to capture the attention of the flustered, pretty Strife boy.

He did his best to keep his temper.

But Sephiroth had learnt long ago that his best wasn't always enough.

"Yazoo!" he roared, "I don't care if you're just back! That does not give you control of the family room! Get out of there right now!"

Yazoo simply raised a condescending, silver eyebrow in response.

"No."

Sephiroth felt his jaw tense, and he took a deep, calming breath through his nose.

"Yazoo, I have bought Chocopologie truffle's for desert. If you don't get out of there right now you won't be getting any," Sephiroth said coldly, but his narrowed eyes and the jumping muscles in his neck spoke of just how annoyed he was.

With a long suffering sigh, Yazoo pulled himself from the massive couch, before practically dragging himself from the room.

"Now go say sorry to your brother for making him cry," Sephiroth growled as he turned back to the oven.

Ienzo nodded in agreement behind him, the tiny four year old colouring in a picture depicting one of the many Disney Princesses.

Yazoo, with another sigh, turned to the hulking Loz, who was sat at the table, a quivering frown on his handsome, masculine face.

"Sorry," Yazoo said, his voice slightly sincere.

After a moment, Loz shrugged, his dismal expression replaced by a huge smile, "S'okay!"

Again, Ienzo nodded in agreement.

Yazoo sat himself down beside his older twin, patting his shoulder gently.

The rare, blissful moment in the Crescent mansion was shattered as the front door slammed open. The sounds of arguing could be heard.

Sephiroth's brow twitched.

Yazoo smirked and Loz frowned at all the negativity in the house.

Ienzo shook his head in disapproval.

"Yeah, but I told you to shut up you piece of-."

"Riku!" Sephiroth chastised as he mixed the soup in front of him with a little more force than was strictly necessary, grimacing as some of it splattered his apron. "Not in front of Ienzo!"

Ienzo's slate grey eyes flickered up at the mention of his name, before he went back to colouring his picture.

Riku looked embarrassed as he entered the huge kitchen, followed by Kairi, Sora and Kadaj.

"Sorry," he mumbled. "I didn't know he was here."

Both Riku and Kadaj seemed to forget about their earlier feud as their eyes swivelled to face their youngest brother (completely ignoring Yazoo and Loz, as was the way of bitchy siblings everywhere).

"Hey little man," Riku gushed as he approached Ienzo, who stopped drawing to look up at his brother, "you feeling better now?"

Despite how callous Riku seemed, he had a massive soft spot for his little brother (although everyone who met Ienzo had a soft spot for the tiny boy), and he'd been distraught when Ienzo had been up all night, vomiting.

Ienzo nodded at Riku's question, accepting a hair ruffle from him, and lifting his arms up to Kadaj. Kadaj plucked the boy out of his chair happily, an uncharacteristic, gentle smile on his pretty face.

"Wanna go watch one of your shows Ienzo?" Ienzo, after a moment of thought, nodded.

Nobody mentioned the fact that the family room was currently out of bounds due to constant arguments over it.

Sephiroth looked over his shoulder, before offering Sora and Kairi a small, barely noticeable smile.

"Hello there. I take it you two are staying the night then?"

Offering Sephiroth a small 'hello' in return, Sora and Kairi nodded in unison.


Dinner was certainly always… a spectacle at the Crescent residence.

As Sora ducked his third flying forkful of salad, he smiled at Sephiroth.

"Oh, Cloud's doing fine. I texted him earlier saying I'd be here for the night, and he told me to tell you that he can't wait to see you again!"

Cloud, of course, had said no such thing. What he had said, had been something that was unrepeatable, but basically boiled down to Cloud, in Sephiroth's lap, with no clothing.

Sora had a feeling Zack had had Cloud's phone.

Sora would be right.

Kadaj elbowed Sephiroth none-too-gently in the side, a leer on his face.

Sephiroth pointedly ignored him, his expression never changing.

At the other side of Sora, Kairi was grinning as Yazoo regaled her with tales of Riku's youth.

"So then, he walks out of the changing room, all dressed up in this weird 'slutty elf' getup, and you'd never guess who he bumped into."

Kairi totally could guess, but the sight of Riku stabbing at the lettuce on his plate with all the conviction and rage of a serial killer forced her to ask, "Who?"

"Yuffie."

And bingo.

Across from Kairi, Ienzo's little head bobbed, almost as though he were fighting back a laugh at his brother's expense.

Kairi shot the little boy a quick smile, and he offered her a tiny one back.


Very soon, the trio of friends were walking up the massive spiral staircase in the front hall to Riku's bedroom.

It's been said that an individual's bedroom will offer you a better look at what said individual is like.

Riku's room, however, was practically empty. Sure, it had all the objects a bedroom should have, including a bed, a massive walk-in closet, an en-suite bathroom (well, evidently, a few things most bedrooms didn't really need) but it was mostly devoid of personal defects.

Riku's reasoning for this, went something along the lines of: "My brothers are assholes."

Sora and Kairi had never gotten a deeper explanation than that, but they knew there was a story behind it all somewhere.

They would be disappointed to find out that they would never be privy to it, as long as Riku could help it.

Upon entering Riku's massive bedroom, Sora flung himself on top of Riku's huge, circular bed, before proceeding to roll around in it and mess up the previously tidy sheets.

Riku and Kairi simply watched him fondly, both smiling as Sora popped out from the centre, the duvet now surrounding him like armour.

But Sora's serious expression caused the smiles to quickly slip from their faces.

Kairi took a step forward just as Riku closed and locked his bedroom door behind himself.

"So, what's up?" Kairi questioned as she flopped onto the bed, reclining beside Sora's form.

Riku copied her movements at Sora's other side.

Sora gazed down at his friends, and saw the worry in their eyes.

He sighed deeply.

"I have… I suppose there's something I wanna ask you both. Something that's been bugging me for a very long time. Years."

Sora's entire body radiated tension and wariness, and Kairi quickly sat up, patting the top of Sora's fluffy spikes in comfort.

"Go on then. We won't judge."

Sora tightened his blankets around himself as he collected his thoughts.

"Have you guys ever felt like there's… something… missing?"

Beside him, Riku stilled, his breathing silent. Kairi's hand froze atop his head.

"Wha-?"

"What do you mean by that?" Riku's voice interrupted Kairi's, but the small redhead didn't seem to mind, her eyes staring searchingly into the side of Sora's face.

The small brunet was staring dead ahead, right at Riku's plain, white wall.

His gaze seemed lost.

"Well, I mean… maybe not so much something as someone. Like… augh. I dunno how to put it."

A second passed, and then, "Take your time." Sora would never have heard Kairi's breath of a statement if the room hadn't been silent, but even then, sitting right beside her, Sora still took a moment to realise what she had said.

For a brief second, Sora felt the slightest sensation of a hand curling around his shoulder and squeezing it gently. Before he could focus his attention on it, it evaporated into nothing.

He shivered.

"Okay. I got it. Have you ever felt like someone else is meant to be beside you? Like, don't get me wrong, I love Cloud. I love him so much and I don't know what I'd do without him. But sometimes… I get the feeling that… there was meant to be someone else. Someone other than just the two of us."

Kairi opened her mouth to say something, but Sora quickly shook his head.

"I don't mean my parents either. I had this… feeling before their accident."

Kairi's mouth closed with an audible click as her teeth met.

The dull silence in the room was unnatural, and Sora could have sworn he heard a whisper from in front of him.

He clenched his sky blue eyes shut, and tried to ignore the stares he felt piercing him.

More than two.

More than Kairi and Riku.

It wasn't a new feeling.

Suddenly, Riku sat up, his hair sticking up at the back from where it had become mussed from the sheets.

He pressed a gentle hand against Sora's left shoulder.

Right where the strange feeling had been.

If the situation hadn't been so serious and devoid of life, Sora would have blushed at the tenderness of the gesture.

"Tell me more," Riku whispered.

Their eyes locked.

Sora did.


At five years old, Sora felt… different.

Alienated.

It wasn't like he didn't have friends. Little Sora was a cheerful, outgoing young boy, and other children seemed to flock to him, be they his age, older, or younger.

But sometimes, late at night, tiny Sora would, on occasion, get crippling pangs of loneliness.

He tried to tell his mama and papa, but they simply insisted he was being a silly boy: why, he had all these friends, didn't he? So there was no reason for him to feel like that.

Sora also told his big brother Cloud.

At the time, Cloud was ten, and, when Sora had asked him about it, Cloud had stared at Sora for a full minute, before he had stood from where he was playing his game, and walked out of the room.

The brunet had been so disheartened by that, that he had never asked again.

But still, that feeling kept attacking him, hanging around his shoulders like some sort of waiting spectre.

Sometimes, Sora would find himself turning around to talk to somebody who simply wasn't there, and every time that happened, Sora would panic briefly.

But then he would remember there had never been anybody there, and such sadness would crash into him that it felt like he had been hit by a sledgehammer, and his knees would begin to buckle.

When he was alone, he would let himself cry.

One day, something big happened.

Something to convince Sora he wasn't crazy.

He had been eleven, and sitting in the backseat of his parents car.

Cloud was beside him, and both brothers were practically vibrating in their seats.

They were going to the Golden Saucer, the greatest amusement park in Gaia.

The small family had packed the essentials for the trip and were singing the 'Chocobo Song' on a never-ending loop.

And then the world exploded.

Later, Sora would be told that the lorry driver was drunk.

But, at the time, all Sora knew was that, one moment he had been turning to tell Cloud a joke Yuffie had told him, and the next, shattered glass was raining down on him, and he was screaming.

The world was turning over on itself, and Sora felt his stomach contract.

And then, he was blinking, his body lying beside the road on an empty, grassy field.

Cloud was beside him.

He wasn't awake.

In a panic, Sora lifted his head, looking for his mother and father.

His eyes landed on their car.

The entire thing was upside down.

The front of it was crushed flat.

Sora broke down sobbing, his body suddenly flaring up in pain.

His watery eyes saw the blurry form of a lorry.

He would find out later that the driver had had a painless death, due to the massive shard of glass that had went straight through his head.

Less than an hour later, the police arrived, along with an ambulance. The nice man inside had offered him a shock blanket, after bundling Cloud up onto a stretcher.

The police had asked him how both Sora and Cloud had managed to get the side of the road.

Sora didn't answer any questions, his mind blank.

But the entire time he had felt a hand holding his.


Sora looked up at his friends, an empty smile on his face.

"I just… I feel like there's someone else who's meant to be with me, all the time. Someone…." Sora's voice trailed off, and he took a deep, shuddering breath, fighting back tears at the memory of his parents' accident.

He swallowed.

"Like a brother."

Sora didn't even flinch at the sudden realisation.

He felt a hand holding his.


A/N: The Nether is from Minecraft, which I didn't know until I looked it up after writing the word. I've only played Minecraft once, for an hour, before it killed my laptop. :L

I also seem to like implications of horrifying events to do with Yuffie, various items, and poor Sephiroth. They're most likely as mentally scarring as they sound, although I'm too lazy to image what the events actually are.

Chocopologie truffle is some rich dish that I discovered whilst looking up rich dishes. Because I know nothing about rich dishes. According to the site I was on, they cost £1,679 a pound (or $2824.08 according to the google convertor). These damn rich people.

So yeah. There's that chapter. And man, are things heating up in here, or is it just me? (It's totally just me, isn't it?)

If anyone is curious, I plan to update every week, although, with the upcoming exams, that may not be possible. This goes for all my stories (all two of them).

But there you have it. Tell me what you think.

Was it... spooky?

Did it... scare you?

Did it... upset you?

Or did you not have any reaction at all? Because that's fine too!