Hell yes! It's only been, like, a month since I last updated! This is cause for celebration!

Thank you for reviewing the last chapter:

Hinata's Shadow1: Thanks for the review. And, ha ha, not quite, (; but there will be a lot of talking in this chapter.

Justice Tokidoki: I know… I hadn't updated in forever… But thank you for the review! And don't worry, I like your nitpicking. Can I ask what spurred the name change?

AusisWinds-13: I would just like to thank you so much for you many wonderful reviews. You really didn't have to go back and review every single chapter you'd missed, and I really appreciate it. This chapter is almost like a little treat for you (though it's purely coincidental). I know how much you love Axel. Now you finally get to hear his story.

There's something I haven't been sure how to add in… This story will go through to the twins' birthday in July… I don't know if anyone's been keeping track, but I feel like the timeline for this story is a little skewed. Anyway, it's April right now.

Chapter Eleven: The Flood

Sora felt bad about asking his brother to cover for him. Really, he did! His guilt just wasn't at the forefront of his mind right now.

He shivered. Creeping out to the little cottage in the middle of the woods that Riku called home was, well, creepy the first time. Returning now, the place felt downright ominous. But he couldn't leave things between him and Riku the way they were. It just wasn't in his nature to abandon someone when they so clearly needed help.

He'd obediently retreated after Riku had slammed the door in his face. He'd hidden a little up the hill in the creepy woods, but he hadn't been able to bring himself to go home. There had been distinctive shouting for a few minutes- no amount of optimism could disguise that tone. But not, the little clearing seemed to be at peace. ...Or, about as at peace as it ever got.

Sora made his way down the hill carefully, but the place was eerily silent now. There wasn't even enough wind to rustle the leaves on the branches overhead. This time, he didn't make it as far as the front door. Riku must have been watching because he rushed outside before Sora got the chance to come any closer.

"Are you deaf or stupid?" Riku demanded as soon as the other boy was in hearing distance and coming right up to push him back a little further. "What part of 'stay away' is so hard to understand?"

"I couldn't stay away," answered Sora, as if that should have been obvious. "Not once I knew something was wrong."

The silver-haired boy seemed to deflate a little, though he clearly wanted to hold onto his intensity. It was what kept him going when everything else failed. He glanced almost anxiously back towards the house, but there was still no movement inside. Sora had arrived prepared for anger, but Riku was snappishly irritated at worst. If anything, he looked even more exhausted than before.

"There's nothing you can do." Riku's words were so soft they were almost inaudible.

"You could tell someone," Sora suggested, equally quiet. Desperation was edging into his tone. He couldn't stand Riku looking so… defeated.

Riku's eyes flashed, a sudden burst of life. "Don't you think I've tried that?" He glanced back at the house again and lowered his voice. "Clearly, it didn't work. If it had, I wouldn't be here. And you shouldn't be either."

"Please," Sora continued, begging against circumstance. "There has to be something I can do to help."

For a moment, he seriously considered pulling the lawyer father card. He hated taking advantage of someone else's skills or position for his own needs- it was a trait he and Roxas shared. Ten years of Cloud's teachings on earning everything you were given in life had instilled this feeling in them about as permanently as if his words had been a tattoo gun. But wasn't this a worthy reason to bend the rules?

The strangest sound broke his thoughts. Laughter. Riku was laughing. Granted, they were more like subdued, defeated chuckles, but the fact that the small smile on Riku's face could exist at all was enough to give Sora hope.

"You know, kid, you're really… persistent," he settled on at last.

Sora couldn't stop himself from smiling back, genuine and bright. "Hey, what are friends for, right?"

Riku opened his mouth as if he was about to protest but then sighed resignedly. "Yeah, I guess."

He turned to go back inside, and Sora didn't stop him. He wasn't about to give up- not by a long shot- but he couldn't help being content with how this meeting had ended. He would be back, and he planned to get to the bottom of what was going on in that house. But for now, Riku's acceptance of their friendship was enough.

…

Roxas was always the one people associated with being contemplative, but Sora's walk home was a thoughtful one. He decided that the world was an even stranger place than he'd given it credit for. He found it odd that he could feel so satisfied after a conversation that had solved almost nothing.

'Yeah, I guess.'

Was that the same as agreeing to be friends? Sora figured it was about as close as he'd get, when it came to the surly silver-haired boy. It wasn't much… but it gave him hope. He was at peace.

Until he got home, anyway.

The second he opened the door Cloud and Leon jumped up from where they'd been sitting on the couch. They'd crossed the room and were standing at the top of the stairs by the time their son had kicked off his shoes in the hall. Sora felt a sinking in the pit of his stomach at the looks on their faces. He got the feeling something had gone horribly wrong with his cover. And yet, he couldn't imagine Roxas breaking his promise out of spite.

"Where have you two been?!" Leon demanded.

"Um…" Sora closed the door behind him, unsure how to answer. 'We?'

"Sora," said Cloud slowly, and his expression reminded Sora of all the times he and Roxas had been forced to do breathing exercises as children to learn to control their tempers. True, it hadn't been often, but the memories had stuck. "Where is your brother?"

Sora's ears were buzzing at the question. He had to work not to blurt out something stupid. Wasn't Roxas here?

It was going to be a long night.

…

If possible, Roxas was having an even worse night. His lungs continued to burn as he ran blindly after Axel. They seemed to be on some sort of wayward path, so he had to hope they weren't getting themselves irreversibly lost.

At least, he hoped this until Axel stopped suddenly, seemingly in the middle of nowhere, and turned on him.

"What the hell were you doing back there?!"

"Me?!" Roxas immediately snapped back, breathing harshly. "I should be asking that question! What's wrong with you?!"

This probably wasn't the ideal way to speak to someone who'd been prepared to burn to death not ten minutes before, but those thoughts would come in hindsight. Right now, he was beyond reason.

Axel snorted cruelly. "Where to start?"

Roxas sat down heavily on a nearby boulder. As he looked around he saw that there were a lot of rocks nearby. They had ventured off the crude path, veered toward a stream. It was a nice little clearing... if anyone knew how to get here. And he got the feeling that no but Axel did. He could imagine the older boy needing an isolated place to cool down, and he got the feeling, even though Axel had brought him here, that he was infringing on something private. Roxas pushed those thoughts away, watching his guide. Axel had walked over to this stream, hands in his pockets, staring down at the running water.

"He died today," he said at last. "Well, two years ago today."

For a moment, Roxas had absolutely no idea what Axel was talking about, figuring the other boy had finally gone off the deep end. Then it hit him.

"Your cousin?"

Axel chuckled darkly and Roxas noticed, with an awkward sort of horror, that his eyes had clouded with tears. "No. He wasn't my cousin. That's just how my parents explained him to the rest of the world. Demyx-" His voice caught on the name and the tears began to run unhindered. "Demyx was my boyfriend."

Roxas shifted slightly, unsure what to do. The fact that Axel was gay hardly made him uncomfortable- he'd lived with Cloud and Leon far too long for that. But Demyx being Axel's boyfriend did change the story a bit.

The red-haired boy's head was bent, tears running past the tear-shaped tattoos and dripping from his face. He had taken his hands out of his pockets to clench them tightly at his sides. His entire body shook with grief.

"My parents hated it," he got out, sounding a little amused at the memory even in the midst of his misery. "They wouldn't shut up about how their only son was tarnishing their reputation. It was the first time they'd really acknowledged me in a long time. But that's not why I did it. Demyx… He was always so happy. When I was with him, it was like my name actually meant something. Like I meant something. I wasn't just another spoiled brat at some rich kids' school. He was my light."

Roxas winced, thinking of Sora. Where would he be if his brother died? Probably trying to kill himself in an abandoned warehouse.

"I'm sorry," Roxas tried to amend lamely. "About what I said…"

Axel shrugged as if to show that it didn't matter, roughly wiping the tears from his cheeks. "I guess Naminé was right… I just needed someone to listen."

Roxas wasn't sure whether to feel exasperated or not. "Let me guess, she's been hounding you about expressing your feelings, too?"

Axel smiled and rolled his watery eyes. "Yeah."

He sat down on a rock closer to the water and Roxas repositioned himself to face him head on. "Well, I'm all ears."

Axel nodded slowly, gently tracing one of his scars with his forefinger. "Two years ago… We got out of school for spring break early. They were doing reservations on the school or something. Demyx's aunt has a house up north. She let us go up there and hang out. There was this big pond… It kind of became our place."

Roxas nodded sympathetically as Axel's features contorted with grief and he broke off again amidst a fresh wave of tears.

"Do you know what it's like," he said, inhaling shakily, "to find the love of your life and then lose him before you get the chance to see what you could have been?"

Roxas didn't even need to answer that. Of course he didn't. He waited while Axel composed himself enough to finish the story.

"That year… they'd had a really late winter. There were still patches of ice on the lake here and there… We had this… tradition, I guess you'd call it. On the first night there… We'd go to bed early and set our alarms for midnight. Then we'd force ourselves out of bed and go swimming. It sounds crazy… but it was exhilarating."

Axel gave over to a small smile before his eyes clouded again.

"I told him it was a stupid idea when he woke me up that night… But Demyx went anyway. The neighbor across the pond found his body the next morning."

Tale finished, Roxas's eyes sought the ground, an unpleasant lump rising in his throat. Axel had laid out the facts so simply, but he had started to feel like he really knew Demyx. A cheerful, reckless teenager who had probably felt like as much of an outcast as Roxas at one point or another. Maybe his parents were homophobic, like Axel's. Maybe the lake house had been his escape too. Had he been on a high built off of happiness the night he died? Had he planned to rush in and come back, spraying Axel awake with cold pond water? Had he gotten out there and decided to stay a while, a playful 'I told you so' that would never come?

There was a sharp intake of breath as Roxas realized tears had sprung to his eyes as well.

"I should have been there," Axel choked out, eyes closed in a grimace. He was hunched over on himself, his arms wrapped around his torso protectively. The words sounded like they were tearing themselves out of his very core. "Demyx-hic- meant so much to me… And I couldn't even wake up long enough to convince him not to go! I should have gone after him!"

It was heartbreaking to watch someone so strong fall to pieces. "You would have drowned too."

"I wish I had!" Roxas's chest tightened as Axel continued through his sobs. "Demyx was so… alive. He didn't deserve to die!"

"No, but neither do you."

Axel looked up suddenly with the darkest expression Roxas had seen in a long time. "Why? No one would miss me."

"That's not true. I would."

It was a bold statement, met by silence. The blond had to wonder how he'd gotten sucked into this position. With the exception of his brother, he wasn't the comforting type. But for fuck's sake, he hadn't just rescued this boy from a burning warehouse for nothing!

Axel stared at him for a moment longer before chuckling again. As if he found all this talk about his own suicide attempt funny.

He rose suddenly, and there was an uncanny tone of gratitude in his words.

"Come on. It's getting late."

…

Leon was pissed. Cloud was pissed. And when Cloud was pissed, you knew things were serious.

Roxas saw no silver lining to this dilemma. They were so royally screwed, it wasn't even funny. There was no better side to appeal to. So when his parents had demanded to know where the hell he'd been and Roxas couldn't answer them… Well, what could he do besides asking them to trust him?

Leon told him that he did trust him. And that he'd just brutally fucked over that trust. Roxas wished he was paraphrasing there.

And then they'd grounded both of them. For a month. No exceptions, not even if the house was burning down around them. Which Roxas didn't find very funny after the night he'd just had.

He was laying in bed, staring up at the ceiling when Sora crept in. He'd been expecting his brother. They were due for a heavy conversation. He didn't say a word when Sora slid into bed beside him. Cloud and Leon used to find them like this all the time when they were younger. They lay awake in silence for a few minutes.

But the dam couldn't hold forever. And when it broke, Sora listened with wide eyes while the story of Axel and Demyx poured out. He didn't say anything when it was done. What was there to say, really? All Roxas knew was that he'd never had a more exhausting day in his life. And that was saying something.

"What about you?"

Sora's eyes were sad. "I went to go see Riku today."

"Yeah?" Roxas didn't even have it left in him to scold Sora for being reckless and impulsive. Frankly, he'd been expecting as much.

"Yeah… Rox… His dad, or his step dad, or whoever it is… he still hits him." Sora's eyes were bright with tears, his voice choked up. "I don't know what to do."

Roxas held him for a while as Sora gasped out, "I can't… I can't imagine any parent consciously hurting their kid. I mean… at least ours did what they did because they loved us, right?"

His brother held him tighter, knowing he was also reliving those final dark days in the hotel.

"Yeah," Roxas murmured. "At least there's that."

Review please!

I don't own Kingdom Hearts.

And thank you so much to everyone who's already reviewed. The story should get a little more intense from now on. Actually, if it's going to be intense after this, I'm not sure what I'd call it up until now.