Title: Last Train
Author: nikki_ntm
Beta reader: Shattered Apocalypse
Chapters: 11/20
Genre: Drama/Adventure/Suspense
Rating: M for language, violence and disturbing themes such as bullying, crime and disease.
Characters: Axel, Saïx, Larxene and Marluxia amongst others (Lea, Isa, Seifer and Org. 13).
Pairings: Implied past/present/future pairings, mainly past Axel/Larxene, current Leon/Arlene, and implied one-sided Isa/Lea.
Setting: Modern Japan (yakuza-themed)

Chapter 11: The Blue Haired Girl

The sirens had gone silent and Axel tried to hear if there were any screams out on the streets, but the more he tried, the less he could focus. The red lights in this place were buzzing, and in the silence the sound became louder until it seemed like it was coming from inside Axel's head.

Saïx had lay down on a stretcher once they had gone back to the room where the safe was, and it seemed like he had fallen asleep. Axel had thought of leaving, he wanted to make sure that the people outside were alright, that Kairi and her mother were safe from whatever it was Saïx had unleashed, but there was something else he had to deal with first.

He glared at the safe; the small screen above the button pad was still lit green. Axel got up from his seat and looked at Saïx carefully, maybe he would have the decency to stop him from opening the safe if there was something dangerous in it.

"I've hated you for a while."

Axel froze and gulped. The safe was an arm length away, he was so close to find out what was in that safe and yet he couldn't bring himself to open it. What was behind that door? More of Ansem's experiments? Did he even want to know? All the leads up until now had been nothing but confusing, and his trust in Saïx was brittle at best.

"Me?" He asked as Saïx's statement slowly sunk in.

"It's strange. I thought I hated you for a particular reason, but everything you do pisses me off."

"Are you okay?" Axel walked up to him. Maybe he was delirious from being in here for too long, and Saïx had never been good with small spaces.

"You're selfish."

"No need to go that far with the compliments. You know I don't do well with an inflated ego." Axel leaned back against the long white table and dug his hands into his pockets. "Why do you hate me?"

"Because you're a despicable human being. You actually think that there's a way for you to redeem all the things you've done, you think that you are worthy a second chance and you chose me as the charity case. Nothing in this world can erase all the bad things you've done, Axel. They should haunt you forever, and you should suffer for it. If there's any justice in this world, that's how it should be."

Axel snorted, "There's a really nice proverb that you might've heard before, let he without sin cast the first stone. You've pulled some ugly stunts yourself, so don't get too comfortable up on that high horse of yours."

"That's the second time I've heard that today," Saïx said, never once taking his gaze away from the ceiling, "I don't take pride in being what I am. I don't understand why you or anyone else would think that I do."

"You do a great job of giving that impression. You love bossing people around and getting all the credit for it. Quite a carefree life you've created for yourself while I was gone. Now you have loads of people cleaning up your messes. I can't really blame you for wanting to go back."

Saïx chuckled bitterly and rubbed his eyes gently, "The only messes I've had to clean up are yours, Axel."

"Pardon?"

"I told you to stay away from Larxene and yet you kept at it, all the while Zexion got angrier..."

"You didn't kill Zexion for me, Saïx. If you wanna play the blame-game, fine, but let's keep the bullshit to a minimum. Zexion had no interest in Larxene. She was of no use to him, you brought her into this."

"Marluxia wanted her."

"In that case I'm glad I meddled. That psycho isn't good for anyone, and who knows what he wanted to do with Larxene. Bottom line is that you need to face facts. You have lots of blood on your hands too, and for reasons far more selfish than I ever had. You know why you killed Zexion –" Axel stopped and felt his mouth go dry as he realized what he was about to say.

Saïx sat up and looked right at him.

"Why did I kill Zexion, Axel?"

Axel fumbled with the words to say to not make matters worse. The words "for power" lingered in his mind as he looked away. He had tried to convince himself that he really didn't know why Saïx had done it, but the rest of the family seemed to know why, Axel was the only one who wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt.

The red lights flickered and Axel looked around and then back at Saïx. The temperature dropped and as the light steadied, blood started to run down Saïx's nose and he swayed briefly, trying to sit up straight.

"That's it, we're outta here." Axel grabbed Saïx by his arm, turning his back to him to push him up his back gently. He took Saïx's other arm and put it over his shoulder, "Hold on." Axel put his arms under Saïx's legs to keep him up and hurried out of the room and towards the long corridor.

"We can't leave," Saïx breathed when he noticed that they were on the move.

"We can't stay either. This place is really messing you up and I'm not gonna stick around to see how far it can go."

He looked up the ladder, hoping that the monster had been scared off.

"Saïx, hold on, okay? It's gonna hurt like a mother if you fall off," Axel pushed Saïx higher up his back and made sure that Saïx had clasped his arms around his neck before he reached for the ladder.

"You're gonna get the fish stuff on you like this..."

A shiver ran down Axel's spine as he recognized that from somewhere and his surprise came out as a shaky exhale. For a second it wasn't Saïx on his back, it was the person he was hoping to save, the person he many times had thought of as long dead. Sometimes he thought he saw glimpses of that person, but he usually shrugged them off as nostalgia or wishful thinking, but there was no denying in what he just had heard – he was still here.

"I don't mind."

He climbed up the ladder, making sure that Saïx had a firm grip every step of the way. Just a bit from the exit, Axel stopped and nudged Saïx, "You have to climb up the last bit yourself, we won't fit through there together."

Saïx reached for the ladder and climbed over Axel, slowly, until he was back in the room above them. Axel hurried up after him and pushed the tatami back in place as quietly as he could. He took a quick look around to make sure that there were no monsters in the vicinity. It was oddly relaxing to back be in the old house, the red lights downstairs had put him on alert and made him more irritable than usual.

"I'm bleeding." Saïx wiped off the blood from his nose with the back of his hand.

"Nah, it's stopped already." Axel took a quick look and then hurried up onto his feet, helping Saïx up as well. "Let's go before Psycho and the Bulky Giant come after us."

As Axel pulled the door aside and stepped out on the porch slowly, he expected to see chaos, to hear screams, to feel the overwhelming stench of blood, but there was nothing. He wasn't sure if he was disappointed to see that everything looked exactly the same.

"Something's wrong."

The wood squeaked under his weight. He stopped to peer around every corner they turned and he tightened his grip around Saïx's wrist to drag him along. Marluxia and Xaldin were probably gone already. If the monster hadn't scared them away, the siren had.

It took them at least five minutes to come back to the street from which they had entered the house. There were a few cicadas singing softly, but the street was deserted and the trees swayed with the gentle wind.

"Axel!"

He turned to where he heard a soft voice call for him until he saw Kairi step out of a bush by the house they had just gotten out of. She brushed away some leafs off her blue jacket and hurried up to them with a frown on her face.

"What happened? I was worried sick. Are you okay?"

"Yeah. We're fine. What are you doing here, Kairi? I told you to stay put, it's dangerous out here."

"We have to hurry back home. I saw what you're running away from and mom told me that you had to seek cover."

"I don't know. We can't be putting you in –"

"What's wrong with Saïx?"

Axel turned around and saw that Saïx was shaking and he had a blank look on his face as he stared out into nothing. The sudden noises coming from the house was enough for Axel to decide that maybe Kairi's home was the safest place right now. He carried Saïx on his back as he followed Kairi down the street and out of Shimabara and back to the house they had left only a few hours ago.

~ooo~

2004

~ooo~

"Isa! Stop!"

Lea ran up to Isa, grabbing his arm to keep him from walking away. The rain was pouring down over the city and the sudden breeze sent a chill down Lea's back.

"You can't do this. You don't have to do this, Isa. You know that, so why?" Lea tightened his grip when Isa tried to pull away, and he stared firmly at Isa in hope that his friend would turn around to face him. "Please, talk to me, Isa. What's going on? Why are you agreeing to this?"

The cold snort at Lea's question and the indifferent look in Isa's eyes when he turned around made Lea's chest ache.

"It's too late for this, Lea." His voice was so controlled and his face so stern. There was a lot more to it than that, Lea could see that there were a million things haunting Isa behind that facade he had put up, the facade that he had been building on for years. The body of the dragon tattoo on Isa's neck was a taunt and a reminder of when Isa had begun to change.

"What are you talking about? Too late for what? Tell me! What is it? Huh?" Lea shook him, digging his nails into Isa's arm to keep him in place, "Please! Explain it to me, because I don't understand! Are you having money trouble? I can help you with that, we can work together and raise enough money."

Isa remained silent, looking away whenever Lea looked him in the eye. He was breathing heavy, trying to swallow the insisting lump in his throat, "Is it Seifer? Did he do something again? I swear, I'll kick his ass nine ways from Sunday – I'll have him eat his own shit if I have to, but whatever he said or threatened with –"

Isa pushed Lea away with a growl, "Shut up!"

Lea tripped and fell onto the ground with a thump. He hurried back up onto his feet, staring at Isa with a surprised look, wondering if he should say something as Isa gritted his teeth, his fists clenched tightly.

"I don't need you to stand up for me, Lea! I can defend myself. I can fight my own battles. I don't need to explain myself to you. I'm doing this because I want to, because I need to learn how to look out for myself."

"You don't have look out for yourself. I have your back and you have mine. That's how it always has been." Lea tried to find any trace of acknowledgment in Isa's eyes but he turned around.

"That hasn't been true for quite some time, has it?"

With that Isa ran away, disappearing around a corner that led to yet another alleyway. Lea hesitated for a brief moment while trying to understand what it was Isa had meant by that, but he set out after him. He didn't have to understand.

The alleyways stretched through half the city and it made them a perfect hideout place for criminals in training. It was getting darker and the lack of street lamps was making it difficult to see ahead, but Lea knew that he was close. Raijin's words echoed in Lea's head as he saw Isa stop at the far end of the alleyway. Lea reached for the gun he had concealed underneath his blazer and slowed down to quietly get closer to Isa.

"He's going to kill Wada, the boss at the fishery."

Lea could still not comprehend why their boss would want Wada dead or why he would make Isa do it. Zexion was a smart man; Lea respected him as the boss and admired his sense for business, but this had seemed off from the get go.

He watched Isa reach for his gun when he saw Wada walk by the alleyway to move the trashcans. Wada looked up when he saw something move in the alleyway. Lea remembered seeing a smile, a look of horror and Isa's shaking hands. Everything after that seemed like fragments that skipped forward at the rhythm of his unforgiving heart and there was nothing he could do to prevent it.

The bullet tore through the air with a deafening sound that bounced against the old walls, and through the narrow alleyway, and the speed by which it traveled seemed to suck the air out of Lea's lungs as he saw it claim its victim, cutting right through the man's forehead with a certain force that shouldn't be given to something so small and meaningless.

Isa sank to the ground at the same time he heard that gun go off and he dropped his own gun as he saw Wada sink down onto a pool of water, his body lifeless and limb, his eyes staring right at him as the last shred of life vanished from his eyes.

Lea hurried up to Isa as he put his gun away. He had expected to feel something for doing this, he had expected to feel instant remorse, disgust and guilt for shooting down the man he had worked with and had been around for as long as he could remember, but there was nothing. This had to be done. He knew that he could live with this, as awful as it may sound, but he wasn't sure Isa could.

"Hey," Lea knelt down in front of Isa, blocking the view of the murdered man behind him. He took Isa's gun and put it away while he looked at Isa with a gentle smile, "This didn't happen, okay? Isa, look at me. This had nothing to do with you. C'mon, let's get you home. Your mom needs you to be okay. You have to be okay."

In hindsight he should've noticed that there was something much more wrong with Isa than he dared to believe, that empty look in Isa's eyes when Lea mentioned his mother should have tipped him off, but all he wanted was to get Isa away from there.

Isa let Lea lead him back home and on the way there, Lea thought that maybe the damage done had been minimal, maybe things could only turn for the better from now on, but as they approached the front door Isa pulled away from Lea with a disgusted sound at the back of his throat. He didn't look back; he ran into the safety of his own home and left Lea in the rain.

~ooo~

Present

~ooo~

The bed creaked when Axel put Saïx onto it as gently as he could. Kairi stopped by the doorway and watched his every move, which was unnerving because he didn't want to worry her. Saïx was heavier than he should have been if he was asleep. Not knowing what was making Saïx like this had his chest tied in a knot. He slid his hand over Saïx's neck and stopped to find a pulse, trying not to sigh in relief when he found a steady beat.

"He sleeps as deeply as you do."

Axel nodded absentmindedly and tried to think of any substance that would take this long to kick in, but he came out with nothing. He could only blame that strange underground lab and Ansem and his experiments.

"What are you doing up so early?"

Su-mi walked up behind Kairi, her eyes slightly open as they were still heavy with sleep. She put her robe tighter around herself and shivered slightly.

"They had a fight," Kairi said with a shrug.

"We didn't have a fight," he said to Kairi with a sigh, and turned to Su-mi, "We didn't have a fight. It's... complicated."

Su-mi walked passed Kairi, stopping by the side of the bed, and taking a concerned look at Saïx. Axel could see that she suspected that something was wrong, and with what he had seen of Su-mi he felt that he could calmly say that she would meddle whether it was her business or not.

"Is he okay?"

"Yeah, he's just asleep. Heavy sleeper." Axel scratched the back of his neck and looked away to not have to look Su-mi in the eye, "Just like me."

"He doesn't look that fine to me. I can call a doctor for you just to make sure. He's really reliable and discreet."

"No, Su-mi. That's really not necessary. He just has to sleep it off. Honest, if I thought that a visit to the doctor would clear this up, I'd be at the emergency room and not here."

Su-mi didn't seem to be paying attention, or maybe she was ignoring Axel on purpose. She turned back to Kairi with that certain look of a mother who knew that she was doing the right thing by following her instinct.

"Kairi, fetch my phone book and look up Dr. Even. I hope he still has the same number to his practice, but either way, it's worth a shot."

Kairi hurried out of the room and disappeared down the stairs as Axel looked like he was about to pop a vein by the name he had just heard Su-mi say.

"Doctor what now? Dr. Even? Blond, tall, high cheekbones and the eyes of a mad scientist Dr. Even? That man doesn't come within a five mile radius with Saïx like this."

"You know Dr. Even?"

"I'm surprised that you know of him, and even more surprised that you would recommend him to anyone! He's a bad man, Su-mi. He works for the yakuza and is up to all kinds of weird stuff."

"You cannot be talking about the same Dr. Even then. The Dr. Even I know is a well-respected doctor with close ties to the German professor Ansem."

Axel ran his fingers through his hair in complete disbelief. The world couldn't be this small. They lived in a country with over 127 million people and it just wasn't possible for them to run into people who knew the exact same people that had put them in this situation.

"You're not calling that doctor, Su-mi, and that's the end of it."

He didn't want to call it a twist of faith or anything of that nature, but there was no denying the chill that ran down his back as he looked past Su-mi. Just as he ended that sentence, he caught a glimpse of one of the few family pictures Su-mi had laying around. This had to be some insane, sick joke on someone's part. Stuff like this didn't happen in real life. Situations didn't fit together like some intricate puzzle that had to be solved.

Life was made out of a long series of coincidences, that's what Axel believed and wanted to keep believing, but his view on the world was ever changing and he did not like where it was going.

"Who is that on the picture?"

He walked up to the frame and took it to show Su-mi the blue-haired girl on the picture. He pointed at it and saw his hands tremble as he assimilated this picture with the woman he had seen on that tape.

"That's my daughter. Aqua."

"Where is she now?"

Su-mi smiled sadly and ran her arms around herself as if the thought of her daughter left her cold, "She's not with us anymore. She went to a better place."

"I'm sorry." Axel paused, "When did she pass away?"

"Oh, that is such a difficult question to answer. She had been ill for quite a while before I had her institutionalized. I guess, in a way, I lost her long before she actually died."

"How old was she?"

"She had just turned twenty. It was such a shame. She had always been such a wonderful girl, but her life was cut too short."

Axel didn't want to seem insensitive, but he was starting to get really impatient. He forced himself to give her a sympathetic smile while he shifted his weight from one foot to another. Twenty was too young. The woman he had seen on that tape was older than twenty, but he couldn't tell Su-mi that, and he couldn't really think of a tactful way of asking her if she was certain.

"Her hair, was it this short when she passed away?"

On the picture she had short and neat hair, gently brushed behind her ear. She was sitting on a chair in the small front yard of this house with a sweet smile on her face.

Su-mi seemed slightly confused by the question and she shrugged as she shook her head slowly, although she knew the answer to it once she thought about it.

"Yes. She always preferred to keep her hair short. It was perfect for the warm summers here, she always said. Why, Axel? Why are you asking me so many questions about her?"

His head was spinning. He was further in over his head than he had ever imagined and it only kept getting more and more complicated. Su-mi followed him out of the room and sat down next to him on the couch. She watched him eagerly, awaitingthe answers she feltshe was entitled to.

"I..." Axel rested his head against his hands, "I promise that I will tell you everything I know, but first I need you to tell me a little about her. About Aqua. Deal?"

Su-mi nodded slowly.

Kairi hurried up the stairs and reached Su-mi her phone book, but Su-mi smiled at her and shook her head, "Kairi, honey, we won't be calling Dr. Even. It's late, you should go to bed. I'll take care of our guests."

"But I'm not tired."

"Kairi, please. Go to bed. We're having a grown-up talk."

Kairi pouted and turned to Axel, "Will you still be here when I wake up?"

"I don't know. Maybe. Tell you what, I'll wake you up before I go if you're still asleep then, okay?"

"Promise?"

"Yeah."

Kairi walked back to her room and closed the door behind her gently to not wake Saïx. Su-mi looked after her and made sure that she wasn't eavesdropping by leaving the door ajar.

"You said that she was ill and that you had her institutionalized. Where did you institutionalize her?"

"At Tsuchiyama, outside of Kobe."

"Why Kobe when you live in Kyoto?"

"Because that's where Doctor Even worked. He used to have a practice here before, but when he moved I thought it would better for Aqua to be near someone she had already gotten to know. I did a lot of research before I sent her there. Dr. Even said that he wouldn't be working alone and that he could get professor Ansem interested in her case."

Axel reached for a pen and the block of post-it's on the table. He would need to write this down to not forget half of what Su-mi was saying. He didn't know if anything of what she would say would be out of importance for them, but he couldn't risk not putting it down on paper.

"Why would that be a good thing?"

"Because professor Ansem had done a lot of research on memories in relation to trauma, he even – "

"Wait," Axel interrupted, "Why would that be of interest?"

Su-mi looked away, biting her lip gently much like Kairi did when she felt distressed. She fiddled with her robe and looked back at Axel slowly, while collecting her thoughts in a manner that would be comprehensible for her to share with someone she barely knew.

"She went overseas when she turned eighteen. She wanted to broaden her horizons and live a more independent life than she felt she could get here. It was supposed to help her in her life, not destroy her." Su-mi's lips quivered and she paused to compose herself. "There was a boy down the street; he had been friends with Aqua since ever. He always protected her and looked after her. He went with her…"

"What's his name?"

"Terra. His name was Terra. He... died when they were overseas."

"How?" Axel was so into what he was writing that he was no longer aware of how insensitive his questions could be perceived, andSu-mi seemed so distraught by her memories that she failed to notice Axel's lack of emotional response to what she was telling him.

"I don't know. All I know is that he died and that Aqua was never the same again. She started sleepwalking, she had nightmares, and sometimes she even forgot where she was. And then she started hallucinating... She said that Terra came by to visit her – and I just..."

Axel finished writing his notes and sighed. He wasn't sure what to do with this information, it didn't seem like it could help him figure out what he was supposed to do to get rid of his marking. It was a sad story, sure, but there was nothing that could explain why Naminé had seen it necessary to show him that tape and then say Saïx's name.

The phone suddenly rang and startled them both. Su-mi reached for it and answered it quietly. Axel could only make out mumblings from the other side of the line and he leaned back into the couch and rubbed his eyes. There had to be something he could do, there had to be something that he had missed. He was about to reach for the little yellow book in his pouch when Su-mi held out the phone to him.

"It's for you."

Axel must have looked dumbfounded because Su-mi took his hand and made him hold the phone himself before she got off the couch and left him so that he could speak in private with whoever knew of his whereabouts.

"Hello?" He asked carefully, not sure what to expect.

"Axel? It's Dr. Even."

"How did you know I was here?" He tensed and frowned as he got up from the couch, sneaking up to the nearest kitchen window.

"You're an idiot," Dr. Even said matter-of-factly, but there was a hint of worry in his voice. "You set off the siren and the sensors in each and every one of Ansem's lab caught up on it. Xemnas knows exactly where you are and his men are gathering to make the final move. Yet you're sitting there drinking tea with the old lady?"

"Fuck..." Axel breathed and gulped, "How long ago did they leave?"

"They left on the helicopter from Kobe just now. If I were you, I'd put my cup down and run for the hills." Dr. Even paused and cleared his throat softly, "How is Saïx?"

"Why? He's fine. Perfectly fine. Shouldn't he be?"

"You should hurry, Axel. The wolves are breathing down your neck and you're not fit to handle them in the state they're in now."

"Why are you helping us?" Axel stopped by the doorway into the room where Saïx was fast asleep.

"Helping?" Dr. Even sounded surprised, "No, Axel. I'm not helping, I'm just protecting my own interests."

The line went dead and Axel gave the phone a foul glare before he put it onto the boudoir right by the door and hurried up to Saïx. This was ridiculous. In a few minutes he would have a helicopter filled with gangsters chasing him down the street like it was some stupid action-movie, and he wasn't sure why anymore.

This was more than taking back what he had stolen. This wasn't a classic act of revenge, and the amount of time and effort Xemnas was spending on getting them back was seriously freaking him out, he was feeling like there was something important that he had missed or forgotten that would be the answer to all of this.

As he was pushing Saïx up his back, Su-mi appeared by the doorway with a strangely understanding look on her face.

"Are you leaving?"

"Yeah."

"What did Dr. Even say?"

"That we had to leave."

Su-mi sighed and moved away from the doorway as Axel walked out and down the stairs. She followed him to the hallway and stopped at her front door.

"Axel, Ansem was a goodhearted scientist with a Messiah-complex. Whatever he is testing you for will only make you better."

Axel hurried out of the small garden and down the street. He didn't have time for cryptic clues that only confused him more than he already was. He jogged the last bit to the car and took out the car keys that he had taken from Saïx before getting out of the house. He unlocked the door to the passenger seat and sat Saïx down carefully, and put the seat belt on him.

They were almost back on the highway when he heard a helicopter fly above them and slowly disappear off into the distance.