Chapter Seven
"I said I was sorry," the blonde whimpered again as they pulled into the parking garage, still cradling his broken arm against his chest.
"Apology accepted, now stop whining," the blue haired young man snapped as he drove.
With a last whimper, Demyx fell silent. Zexion was upset, that was particularly clear to him, even though the blonde could only partially remember what had happened. It was more like it had been a dream to him, hazy and blank in places. He hadn't meant to attack Zexion, really he hadn't, but he was just so hungry, and when he got a taste of blood, it was hard for him to stop until said hunger was sated.
"I already told Xigbar what happened," Zexion said as he pulled the car to a stop, "He's waiting for you."
"Thanks, Zexi," the blonde said honestly, carefully reaching around to unbuckle his seatbelt.
"It's nothing," Zexion said with a small shake of his head.
"You saved my life," Demyx said, "So again, thank you."
The other young man nodded, "Just go, before he thinks something else happened to you."
With a small smile, Demyx nodded as well, "All right," he said, pushing open the car door with his good hand.
Sometimes his job was so easy, sometimes like tonight. All he had to do was sit there, drinking his beer, look pretty, and they came to him like moths to a flame. This time he seemed to have attracted a set of twins. They were both blonde, eyes golden brown, and very beautiful. Attractive or not though, they were both vampires-he could tell by the way they moved, the way they talked. It was as obvious to him as if they had a giant neon sign over their heads.
They flirted shamelessly, and for the sake of his job, the redhead went along with it. They were hungry, he could tell by the way they kept closing in, and eventually he suggested that they "head back to his place". The two vampire women jumped on the offer, and knowing that he was set, he led them from the club. They were soon to meet their end though, as his other half was waiting for them in the alley behind the club.
These vampires clearly weren't warriors, and a few crossbow bolts later, their blackened existence had been ended. This left just the two hunters, and the redhead eyed his boyfriend somewhat warily. He'd been a bit pissed over the incident with the blonde vampire, but he seemed to have forgotten all about it now. Axel preferred "better safe than sorry" though, and approached the other hunter cautiously.
"How many does that make now?" he asked, draping his arms around Riku's neck. He was never the one to keep count after all-he was more of a killer, not a record keeper.
"Twenty-five," the silver-haired hunter responded.
His tone was casual and welcoming, and Axel took this as a good sign. "Twenty-five," he repeated, nuzzling against his lover's neck, "In just a few weeks. Hope this place has a lot more."
Riku 'mhmm'ed, arms winding around the redhead's waist to pull him closer.
"I hope we can stay here for Christmas," Axel murmured, running his fingers through soft silver hair.
"Ax…that's months away, why would you still want to be in this place?" the other asked, aqua blue eyes reflecting his confusion.
"For the snow," the redhead replied, "A white Christmas."
Riku sighed at his boyfriend's childishness-for someone who could be so violent and brutal in a fight, Axel could be so…young at times. "You've seen snow plenty of times," he pointed out.
"Not on Christmas," the redhead protested, tensing a bit as he leaned his forehead against Riku's shoulder.
"What does it really matter? It's just snow."
Apparently that was the wrong thing to say though, because Axel drew back abruptly and turned away.
"It matters because I want to share a white Christmas with you," Axel said, crossing his arms. Body language and tone said he was mad-his boyfriend had missed the point of why he'd brought up Christmas.
Demyx wandered down one of the halls in the mansion, trailing his fingers lightly along the wall as he walked. His broken arm was still cradled close against his chest, supported in a makeshift slung so that it'd be more comfortable. Though he was doing much better than before, well fed again and taken care of, his broken arm was still mending, as bones took longer to repair than other injuries.
He was bored at the moment, waiting for Xigbar to be done with…something that he was taking care of, he hadn't been exactly sure on the specifics, and since they hadn't been mentioned to him, he figured it wasn't his place to ask. He hummed to himself as he went along, after a while, the melody belonging to one of the songs he'd performed a long time ago, when he'd still been human and with his actual band. The exact words escaped him right now though, but he wasn't bothered by that-they'd return to him eventually.
He could vaguely hear voices, one of them he could pick out as Xigbar's, the other wasn't familiar to him; soft and sweet, though right now raised in defense. A woman's voice-or maybe a mere girl, from the sound of it, a teenager, somewhere around sixteen maybe. He could only hear every other word or so, and in his boredom he tried to figure out what they were talking about.
"…not my fault………didn't work…"
"That's what I'm…………follow him."
Demyx tilted his head as he continued to walk, peeking into various room as he passed them. What wasn't her fault? Who was she following? He supposed he might never find out, as there was the faint sound of a door closing, and all at once the voices were much harder to make out. With a shrug, he turned back around, walking the opposite way down the hall, and gave up on figuring out what was going on right now.
"You're all I have left, you're important to me," the redhead said, arms remaining firmly crossed over his chest, "I just figured it'd be nice for us to share a white Christmas because who knows how many Christmases we'll have together, but hey, if you don't like the sound of tha-"
He was interrupted mid-sentence when Riku abruptly turned him back around and kissed him. Axel blinked a moment, but he sure as hell wasn't going to complain-why should he, after all?-and returned the kiss. His arms snaked around his boyfriend's shoulders, pulling him closer, and nuzzled against him.
"All right," Riku said quietly, leaning his forehead against Axel's, "We'll have a white Christmas."
Promptly, the redhead grinned, "Knew you'd see things my way," he said, playfully kissing the other hunter on the nose, "I love you, Ri."
Aqua blue eyes roll playfully in response to the kiss, "I love you too, Ax."
"What's this?" the blonde asked as he made his way over to an ornate black table where a scattering of photographs lay. Though maybe scattering wasn't the right term; there was a good number of pictures on the table-an obsessive amount, actually. And even more disturbing was their subject. The snapshots he was referring to were all of a young kid, probably no more than eighteen, with spiky blonde hair and bright blue eyes. Demyx had never seen him before in his life.
"Hmm?" he repeated, picking up on of the pictures and looking over to Xigbar. Whatever business his sire had to deal with had been taken care of by now, and he'd caught up to the blonde in his wanderings.
"Oh, just a kid that caught my attention," the older vampire said.
Demyx bit his lip a moment, looking back to the picture. Caught his attention? Yeah, no kidding. For the first time since he'd been with Xigbar, he felt jealousy beginning to stir within him, "Yeah, I can tell," he said aloud.
"He's elusive though," Xigbar said, walking over and sliding his arms around Demyx's waist, "Think you could do a favor for me?"
"…What kind of favor?" the blonde asked, leaning back against his sire while running one finger along the edge of the picture he held. He had a bad feeling about this-and his jealousy was going up another few notches already.
"Track down this kid and bring him back to me."
For someone asking for a favor, that sounded an awful lot like a demand. And now, that bad feeling expanded into a sickening feeling of dread and fear in the pit of his stomach. Something like this had never happened before-what did it mean? Was Xigbar growing tired of him? Or was this just some kid who would wind up dead in a few days? As cruel as it sounded, Demyx hoped it was the second option.
"Yeah, sure," he said emotionlessly, going against his better judgment-who knew what would happen if he denied what was asked of him, "Just tell me his name and where I'd be likely to find him, and I'll do the rest."
"Good boy," Xigbar said, affectionately kissing the side of the blonde's head, "His name's Roxas."
"Roxas," Demyx repeated. Already he hated that name.
