Note to self and others: Burning your arm trying to put up dinner, so not cool. I actually had to mutter to myself that I felt sorry for Vexen after he got the Axel treatment.

As for this chapter, it's a bit all over (see the length of it?) but I hope it's still entertaining regardless. And I know I'm updating kind of fast, but when I'm bored, I often write, and I'm not good with waiting for time to pass before posting those chapters, lol! Anywho, read it, like it, love it and review it!

A Rise and Fall for Demyx

If Demyx had to think back on all the worst days he's had in his lives (both when he was a Nobody and the days of his Other), none would probably compare to this day. And all because he had to go on a mission with the lovely Miss Marluxia.

Xemnas must hate him.

Along on the team was Luxord and Lexaeus though, and neither one of them seemed too bad. If he could, he wanted to split things up and take Lexaeus' side. The big brute could do all the work, sparing him from showing the others his pathetic attempts at combat.

"I pick the chickenshit blonde over there for my side," Marluxia suddenly said, interrupting Demyx's thoughts. He gave him a beatific, thin smile. "Water and flowers always go nicely together."

If Demyx wasn't quaking in his boots already, he probably would've made a snide comment about how a guy has a girly ability such as flowers. But as it was, Dem was trying to live to see another day and angering this man wasn't how that would come about.

His nonexistent heart caught in his throat as he watched Luxord and Lexaeus walk away, looking quite pleased with the choice in pairings. Demyx watched them disappear, pleading with large watery eyes for them to turn around and save him from the Pink Menace.

"So, Daniel, let's get going," Marluxia addressed him.

"Um…it's actually pronounced Demyx," the blonde said, hating himself for how weak his voice was.

"Sure thing, Steve," the other said, and continued down the path that they were traveling on.

Yes, today was certainly the worst day of his lives.

~.~.~

"All we're doing is defeating a large heartless here," Lexaeus was saying to Luxord. They were hiding in the bushes, waiting for said heartless to appear in that area, where it was known to lurk. "Afterwards, we'll rendezvous back with Marluxia and Demyx again. This shouldn't take too long and—what are you doing?"

"Nothing, nothing…just wetting my whistle is all," Luxord said, hastily putting the cap back on a flask and pocketing it inside his robe.

"Luxord, please tell me you're not drinking on the job…"

"Oh, and what of you, hm?" Luxord turned to him. His eyes were unfocused and he kept blinking rapidly, as though he couldn't see Lexaeus from where he was crouched only two feet away. "You're crocheting! You have the audacity to judge me?" He tried to stand to yell some more, but Lex pulled him back down, a finger to his lips.

"Lower your voice, the heartless will hear us," he said. He let to of his arm and went back to his thread and needles. "Besides, this is a weapon of sorts. Drinking…is suicide on a mission like this. Sober up, please."

"How about you shut up, ha!" Luxord giggled, stumbling a few steps. "Ya know, I'm tired of waiting. I wanna speed things up—"

"NO!" Lexaeus shouted, knocking his hand down before he could alter time. "Has it ever occurred to you that you might mess up some important events if you keep going back and forth in time? Let's just let things play out at normal speed first. If things get botched, then you can rewind time."

Luxord blinked blearily at him. "You're an utter bore, you do know that right?"

"Better than drunk," Lexaeus muttered to himself. In front of them, the town common area was deserted. From between two of the tiny village houses came an extremely large Darkside, which basically resembled a regular heartless on major steroids.

"Looks like we've found our target," Lex whispered to Luxord. "Let's go." He stashed his crocheting materials into a sewing bag he had taken with him and put this under the bushes for safe keeping. Then he conjured his tomahawk weapon and silently crept out into the open. He paused though once he realized Luxord wasn't following him.

The flask was back to his lips and he was drinking from it like a camel.

"Luxord! What the hell did I—" Suddenly, he found himself flying across the open space and a strong pain coming from his side. Perhaps a few broken ribs?

"Whoo! Alright! Get 'em Lex!" Luxord cheered, not realizing that his comrade's flying body wasn't something of his choosing. "Atta boy, mate! You can…you can…whoa, I feel funny…" He stumbled again, and ended up directly in front of the heartless.

"Wow, what are they feeding you guys?" The man said out loud. "Anyways…wanna play some poker?"

The creature regarded Luxord for a moment with impassive eyes before whipping back and knocking him into the air as well.

"Bloody hell! How rude of you!" He actually managed to correct himself in midair and by using the natural gliding ability given to Nobodies, he floated back to the heartless. "Now, I believe you owe me an apo…apolo…say sorry!" He slurred.

This time, the Darkside leaned down to the ground and formed several smaller versions of itself. They ran around aimlessly, not seeing a victim in sight.

"Yeah…see, that works if I were on the ground…" Luxord said. He tilted his head back again as he downed the last of whatever contents the flask had held. "I'm gonna…I'm gonna mess you up. You…*burp*…ugh…what was I gonna say?" He blinked a few more times, then randomly waved his arm. The large creature was suddenly turned into a die, no taller than one of its minions.

"Oh, fuck me," Luxord muttered. "Didn't mean to do that…" He waved his arm again and his cards flew out and attacked the die. "Ohhh…that wind feels nice…" He simply stood there smiling stupidly to himself as the cards whipped around him. He only saw it as excellent air conditioning.

Sometime in the middle of this, he heard Lexaeus give a groan near him. Opening his eyes, he saw the man limping toward him, holding his side. "You…defeated him drunk?" he asked.

"Wha--? Defeated who?" Luxord looked around. There was nothing left of the heartless that had been there.

"That heartless…you destroyed him and yet you're completely smashed," Lexaeus said dryly. He was perfectly sober and got his ass handed to him. Luxord wasn't normal.

"Come, Lexy, let's go and have a celebra…heh-heh…bra…Um, let's go have some drinks because we beat that guy…or something…" He stumbled yet again, but Lexaeus caught him this time. While still being supported, Luxord reached into his cloak for his wallet. He flipped it open and dumped it upside down.

Not a damn thing came out.

"Aw, fuck me…looks like I'm broke, mate," he giggled sheepishly. "Ahh, who cares! I know my boy Xiggy has some. Away to the castle!" He pointed in a random direction.

"Marluxia and Demyx are in the other direction," Lexaeus said with a deep frown. "And you're going to have all sorts of liver problems if you keep drinking like that."

"Memememe," Luxord mimicked in this high pitched voice. "Can it, luv. You're giving me a headache."

Lexaeus decided not to mention to him that the drinking must've already been taking its toll on him, but mainly because Luxord would find out on his own very soon enough.

~.~.~

Demyx and Marluxia were required to gather intel about the world they were currently in. At least Marluxia had let Luxord and Lexaeus handle the heartless, but Demyx was terrible with social interaction as well. It wasn't that he was shy, but it always seemed like nobody wanted him around. How was he supposed to gather information if no one would speak to him?

"Speak to them first," Marluxia said.

"What?"

"The woman over there. From what is already known, the Superior believes she's quite knowledgeable about this place. So, you should speak to her to see what she knows." He smiled his cunning smile at him.

"Uh…okay…" Demyx really didn't know what he was going to say, but figured that maybe winging it would work. He walked up to the woman sitting at the front of the restaurant and sat next to her on a stool. "Hiya," he said cheerily, struggling to keep his voice from shaking.

She gave him a bored stare at first, then did a double take and looked quite interested. "Hello," she said back. Was she grinning?

"Um…the name is Demyx." He held out a hand, and smiled when she shook it. Maybe this was going to be easier than he'd thought!

"Lola," she told him. "So Demyx, never seen you around. New here?"

The two began to converse easily after that and Demyx made sure to remind himself to tell Marluxia that he could shove his better-than-thou attitude up his ass. He could chat with women! He could hold his own! He wasn't totally useless! He…was being led out of the restaurant by the woman…

"Whoa, where are we going?" He asked as she pulled him along.

"My place, silly," she giggled. And then winked.

Wait, where was Marluxia? "Umm…I have a friend waiting on me…"

"Your friend can wait." She left no room for argument here. They soon approached her apartment and she all but dragged him up the stairs to the second floor. Just before she pulled him inside, he caught sight of the androgynous Marluxia peeking from around a corner. He gave him a cruel smile before disappearing in a cloud of darkness.

Demyx was now completely alone.

~.~.~

Sometime later (the blonde had lost track of time), he found himself stumbling from the apartment on weak legs and with torn clothing hanging from his frame. He would've portaled back to the castle from there, but it would blow the cover of Nobodies existing and the others would think something had happened to him when he didn't show up at their meeting spot.

That didn't mean he couldn't do it at all. The second he rounded the apartment complex's corner, he quickly formed a portal around himself and tumbled through it. Mere seconds later and he fell through the other side, at the feet of the other three members.

"You don't look so good Demyx. What happened to you?" Lexaeus asked, reaching down to help him up, despite his own pain.

"I…I don't know…" Demyx mumbled, eyes wide with fright. His hair also wasn't standing up like it usually would be, but was half flat, resembling trampled grass. "She—she took me into her apartment…and…and…"

"Demyx, did you do something naughty with her?" Marluxia questioned with a knowing sneer.

"I didn't want to!" Demyx began to yell. "She just threw me on the bed, talking about 'I can make you feel really good' and stuff! I tried to fight her off, but I don't like hitting girls or fighting at all and then she just totally ripped my jacket off of me and…and…she raped me!" Demyx put his face in his hands and bawled.

The area was quiet for a moment, save for Demyx's sobs. It was Luxord who finally spoke first. "Sure that wasn't Larxene?"

Demyx gave a shuddering gulp. "Thank heavens no." Marluxia on the other hand cast a dirty glare at the Brit, but the man didn't see it.

"Well, today was quite eventful," Lexaeus said. He knew that Xemnas was going to have his head if those two hadn't completed their half of the mission, seeing as he was the highest ranking of them.

As though reading his mind, Marluxia said, "Well, Damsel, I try to help you out and you still botch it. A woman totally interested in you and you couldn't handle the job."

Through his parted fingers, Demyx looked up at him. "You mean…she wasn't our target?"

"HA! In the words of Xigbar, as if. Someone that knows everyone and everything about a town usually isn't going to be in their teens. They're going to be—"

"She said she was twenty!" Demyx objected.

This time, everyone burst out laughing. "She was seventeen, stupid," Marluxia cackled.

A million thoughts began to race through the blonde's head. Lawsuit. Scandalous. Underaged. Jail. Butt rape. Weakling. Pwnd. Lies. This is absolute and utter bullshit.

"Let's get the hell out of here!" he shouted. The echo of his voice hadn't even died down before he ran into his portal, leaving it open not as a curtsey to the others, but simply because he was too shocked to remember to close it behind him.

As soon as he got to the castle, he went straight to his room and locked the door. Nobody saw him for the rest of the day.

Lexaeus went back to his crocheting, dropping Luxord off at Xigbar's room at his request. The two could be heard singing old time bar songs while playing random Irish tunes at the same time.

Thus it was left to Marluxia to give the mission report. When he handed it to Xemnas, the man read it quietly at first, until he hit a part that made him reread it. Finally he looked up at the Graceful Assassin. "You mean to tell me that Demyx slept with someone on this mission?"

"Yes, it would appear something like that happened," Marluxia said in careless tone, examining his fingernails.

"Well?"

"Well what, Superior?"

"Well, how did he do?"

"…sleeping with this person?"

"Yes!"

Marluxia flicked his hair over his shoulder. "If I had to give my opinion, he's traumatized and will never do such a thing again. But sir, did you not read the part that this was just a teenage girl?"

"Pfft, please!" Xemnas laughed. "I'd fret on that except for the fact that Demyx was the traumatized one, not her! Now this is good ole' fashioned comedy! Make sure you tell the others about this!" He leaned over in his seat with how hard he was laughing.

Marluxia gave a small nod and vanished.

"Wow, you're a bastard," Saix said from where he was standing beside Xemnas.

"Ahh, we're just picking with the boy. We used to do the same thing to you back in school. Remember how kids kept calling you Moony, after one of the Harry Potter characters?"

"Okay, I'm done here," Saix muttered, and also vanished.

Xemnas sighed and looked out the window to Kingdom Hearts. "These men lack vision!" he said to it.

But of course the moon was silent.

"Evidently, you do too…" the man said with a grimace, and with a heavy sigh, he returned to a mount of papers before him.

This chapter wasn't exactly planned out, so again, forgive me if it had a run-on feeling about it. I'm just trying to touch up on all of the members so that I'm not writing chapters with everyone conglomerated into one all the time. Anyways, as usual, please review!