Author's Note: Look at this! Two chapters in two days! (actually, it's sort of three days, but last time was just after midnight, I think, so it counts as two days) Unfortunately, I'm less sure what I'm doing with the next chapter, so...yeah...

But do enjoy this. Look, some mild plot development!

Disclaimer: I am not Tetsuya Nomura. This is evidenced by the fact that I am neither male nor of Japanese origin. Also, I don't have Cloud's earring (which, for those that have not yet watched the special features on Advent Children, Nomura does in fact own and wear). So, sadly, I do not own these characters.

Doorbell

Chapter Four

ding, dong

For once, Roxas isn't sent to get the door, for which he is mostly thankful; it does mean he has to put up with the very-in-trouble-again Demyx whining and complaining, after all.

But he is far too busy to get the door - his sea-salt ice cream won't eat itself. And right now no one wants to bother Roxas, because after he threw the Keyblade at a rapidly closing door when Demyx asked what was 'up' for the third time, the others decided that Roxas' link to his Somebody was bothering him again and tactfully agreed not to approach number XIII for the rest of the day.

He munched down on his fifteenth ice cream, trying and failing once more to push the memory of Kairi's actions from earlier out of his mind with the painful coldness.

It was ridiculous how frustrated he was getting over this - no, no, it was ridiculous that he was getting frustrated at all.

It wasn't as if she was even his girlfriend. Well, she was, sort of, because he was Sora, sort of, but Roxas didn't even like Kairi. He had never understood Sora's attraction to her in the first place.

A bony, skinny hand reaches out of nowhere and plucks the ice cream out of his hand; he looks up to see a grinning, fox-like face with laughing green eyes and teardrop tattoos.

"So, Demyx said that Sora was moping. Wanna talk about it?" Axel asks, taking a lascivious lick of the ice cream before Roxas manages to snatch it back.

"Ass." He glares at the grinning redhead, before lapsing into a pensive silence.

Axel watches his face carefully, unwrapping his own frozen treat while Roxas' begins to melt.

"Your lolly is dripping onto your hand." He points out.

Roxas blinks in surprise - he had been lost in thought - and grimaces at the freezing blue drops that are beginning to run down onto his wrist. He transfers the ice cream to his other hand, and licks the offending liquid off his fingers, not noticing the way that Axel tenses, or the mixture of fear and something like hunger in those green eyes.

And when his hand is clean, he doesn't notice how Axel is suddenly fascinated with the pattern on the kitchen table, or the faint dusting of pink on the other Nobodies cheeks.

In fact, he doesn't look at Axel at all.

Because he is remembering what he was thinking earlier that day, just before opening the door to Kairi, and the laughter that was in Axel's eyes only moments ago, and the anger and frustration and pain that he is feeling now and blaming on Sora.

"Axel..."

Axel holds up a hand, cuts him off.

"This better be you telling me what happened, otherwise I ain't listening; got it memorised?"

Roxas reflexively rolls his eyes at the catchphrase that he would never admit to missing.

"Alright." He concedes. "Kairi came round earlier."

"Kairi?" Axel blinks in incomprehension, confusion written all over his face for a few seconds. "Oh; Sora's girlfriend. Red hair, bit of a slut?"

Roxas' lips tauten slightly at that last word, but he nods.

"More than we knew, actually." He admits, staring balefully at the ice cream, not seeing Axel frown in understanding. "It seems she has been cheating on Sora for some time."

There is a moment of silence, followed by the scrape of Axel's chair.

Roxas looks up in surprise; Axel is standing, his back to the blond, and the orange glow that is coalescing around his hands is worryingly familiar.

Axel say something, too quiet for Roxas to hear, but he gets the gist of it.

"What are you thinking?" He asks, calmer than any normal person would be - but he is a Nobody, and Nobodies don't feel panic - and stands, steps over to Axel.

Roxas touches the taller man's elbow, just gently, with a tone of admonishment.

"Hurting her won't help anyone. It's completely illogical."

Axel turns to meet Roxas' eyes, and there is something like disbelief in his eyes, and Roxas can't breathe for a moment, because there is no doubt in his mind now that Axel is feeling.

And that this is impossible.

"She's hurt people. Sora, and more importantly, you." Roxas opens his mouth to protest, to say that he's a Nobody, that's ridiculous, but Axel simply looks at him, and he can't speak, because suddenly he's afraid of the emotion that Axel is displaying.

And it's stupid that he's even considering this possibility, and he knows that - Nobodies don't have emotions; the hollow space where their Heart should be dictates this fact - but what his mind knows and what he can see are two very different things.

"She's hurt you, Roxas, and you can't deny that," continues Axel. "And I personally believe that she deserves some hurt of her own."

Roxas shakes his head, searching for some counter-argument, but he is saved - just in time - by a scar on a wolfish face popping its blue mane around the door.

"Eight, Superior wants you." Saïx says, giving Roxas a curt nod as he removes Axel from the room.

"This conversation ain't over, Roxy!" yells a just barely protesting Axel from the stairs, and Roxas feels a pang of something only partly unpleasant at the nickname, something he hasn't heard for many months.

He had always hated it, before Axel's disappearance, but now...

Now he doesn't know what to think.

Now there is this terrible, wonderful notion that he is desperately trying to avoid facing up to; the possibility that somehow, Axel is able to feel.

He can't comprehend how this has happened; he himself is the only member of the Organization to have found his Somebody so far, and it has not gotten him any closer to finding his Heart.

Could it be that Axel has found his own Heart, in some other way to the two methods that they are already trying - the finding of Somebodies and the creation of Kingdom Hearts - or is it something different?

Roxas frowns, then discards the thought.

Now that Axel is no longer here, he is less sure of what he thought he saw.

In fact, he is almost convinced that he completely imagined it - a trick of the light, that's all.

And with that thought - although he is unsure of whether it is comforting or depressing - Roxas gathers up his last sea salt ice cream, and heads out of the kitchen.

Demyx was saying something about some new fantasy-parody on TV earlier; he wonders absently if it was tonight that that was on, and if the sitar player still wants to watch it, as he wanders in the direction of the lounge.

Some sort of comedy would do nicely to take his mind off these troubling thoughts.

A/N: I's an awful thing, but I won't deny it: I'm suddenly a review whore. I like the attention. It makes me feel good about myself. So if you should maybe feel like feeding my bloated ego...

Incidentally, the show Demyx wants to watch is 'Krod Mandoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire'. Which is pretty hilarious, if you ask me. Oh, but it's on BBC2, so I don't know whether anyone outside of Britain can watch it...

Speaking of, I have no idea what country this is supposed to be in. I instinctively imagine English suburbia, but you don't have to. They could be anywhere.