CHAPTER 13
~ Unlucky Thirteen ~
"Roxas... wake up..."
In his bed, Roxas tossed and turned, unable to settle into a restful sleep despite being so tired he could barely stand. Once again, the voice in his head called out to him, attempting to stir him awake.
"Fangirls... in the base..."
Roxas' eyes suddenly popped open, and he sat up in his bed faster than he thought he would've been able to in his condition. Looking around at his room, he saw that it looked exactly how it did when he had went to sleep--nothing out of the ordinary, and most importantly, no Fangirls in sight.
"Whew," the spiky-haired boy sighed, wiping some sweat from his forehead and brushing a few strands of his hair out of the way. "Just another bad dream..."
"Roxas! Wake up!"
For a second, he glanced around the room again, not quite awake enough to figure out what was going on. He then groaned slightly as he realized whose voice he was hearing. Roxas paused and closed his eyes, attempting to focus enough to communicate with Xion despite his groggy state.
"Xion? What's going on?"
"Didn't you hear me before?", she asked, "Fangirls have somehow gotten into the base... I can sense them."
Roxas threw his sheets aside and stepped out of his bed, stretching his arms slightly in an attempt to stay awake.
"What? Fangirls in the base... but wouldn't that set off a Fangirl alarm?"
"Yes... normally, it would. I'm not sure what's stopping the Fangirl alarm from going off... but I can definitely sense the presence of Fangirls."
He reached up to remove his cloak from its hanger on his wall, then remembered that it had been destroyed in his last battle with the Fangirls. Grumbling slightly, he dug an old T-shirt out of a dresser and threw it on before heading out through the door.
"Xion... those Fangirls that got into the base. Where are they right now?"
There was a short pause, and then the girl's voice answered.
"I... I think there somewhere near the main entrance," she said, "But... that doesn't make any sense. The main entrance only opens from the inside... how could they get in that way?"
A flash of light briefly illuminated the hallway as Roxas began to run, summoning his twin swords without stopping.
"Guess there's not much chance that someone just slipped up and left the door open," the spiky-haired boy mumbled to himself, snapped fully awake by the thought of the only possibility left that could explain the situation. "Someone on the inside... a member of the Organization... must have let them in."
At the main entrance to the Organization's base, a small group of Fangirls sat cross-legged on the floor, fidgeting around out of boredom. A Stalker Fangirl, sitting in its cardboard box, used its clawed hands to scribble vaguely-humanoid shapes in the dust and mud covering the floor. Several Glompers yawned loudly and glanced around the room. Apparently, they were waiting for something.
"Hey, boss," one of the Glompers blurted out, turning toward a cloaked figure standing up against a nearby wall. "When is Roxy gonna get here?"
The man standing against the wall chuckled slightly. He was fairly tall, and wore the black cloak of the Organization; his features were completely obscured by the shadow of his hood, compounded even further by the fact that it was very late and there was almost no light coming into the base from the outside.
"Don't worry, he'll be here. That little voice in his head's bound to have picked up on us by now... and Roxas isn't the type to just sit back and do nothing if he feels like he's the only one who knows that something suspicious is going on."
Leaning back up against the wall again, he turned toward the Glomper that had spoken up and added one more than before returning to total silence.
"And by the way... you really don't have to call me 'boss.' I'm just another humble servant of the Fangirl Queen."
A few minutes passed before the sound of footsteps began to echo from the hallways leading up to the base's entrance. The bored Fangirls suddenly jolted upright and turned their heads in the direction of the sound, abandoning the pointless little things they had been doing to pass the time and preparing for battle.
Once again the cloaked man chuckled, whispering to himself before backing away even further from the Fangirls so that his form became nearly invisible against the backdrop of the dark room.
"And here he is..."
As Roxas charged into the room, he slowed down slightly and held out one of his twin blades. An aura of light surged up around his arm, flickering slightly as if it was about to run out of power; the light spread until it had surrounded the white-bladed katana, illuminating a small area of the room and revealing the Fangirls.
It was clear that the spiky-haired boy wasn't quite recovered from his last fight; instead of easily knocking the Glompers out of the air as they jumped toward him, he had to roll out of the way at the last second to avoid them, only countering after he was back on his feet. Two Glompers were quickly cut in half, but the third managed to jump back in time to avoid Roxas' blows. The lone Stalker scooted up behind the boy in its cardboard box, but even a half-asleep Roxas was alert enough to notice the annoying scraping noise that the box made as it went; before the Fangirl could even attempt to reach out for him with its claws, he swung one of his swords backward and decapitated the creature with a single slash.
Within a few minutes, all of the Fangirls were destroyed, and greenish light filled the room. For the first time, Roxas noticed the cloaked figure standing up against the wall and watching the battle unfold.
"You," he said, raising one of his swords toward the hooded man, "You're the one who opened the gate and let those Fangirls in... but why?"
He stepped away from the wall and unfolded his arms, slowly walking toward Roxas. The boy readied both of his swords in preparation for battle, surrounding both of them with light in an attempt to illuminate the room enough to get a glimpse of the face beneath the mysterious man's hood.
"Why? Hmm, I guess that's a good question," he said, continuing to slowly approach Roxas. "But it's late, and I don't feel like explaining it right now... I think I'll just let you figure it out on your own."
Roxas lunged forward and swiped at the mystery man with one of his swords, but his opponent saw this attack coming a mile away; he easily dodged, leaping into the air and landing a few feet behind the boy's back. He turned and tried to attack again, but this time his swing was interrupted by a sudden kick to the chest that sent him stumbling back and nearly falling over.
"Hmm... looks like you've still got some energy left in you after all."
He held up one hand, causing a dull orange energy to flicker up around his fingers as he flexed each one slightly.
"And that's without even half a night's sleep... you really do bounce back from things faster than the rest of us."
Roxas' mind raced, attempting to figure out the hooded man's identity. He knew he had heard the voice somewhere before, and the manner of speaking seemed very familiar as well... but in his current state, he could barely even keep himself on his feet, let alone remember things about someone without even so much as a glance at their face to help jog his memory.
"Who are you!?", the boy yelled, taking another swipe at him with both of his swords after pulling himself back to his feet. As expected, he didn't get an answer--the man's only response was a short laugh.
The cloaked man backed away from Roxas slightly to avoid another sluggish blow, then pointed one finger toward him. The orange energy flared up for a second, then launched outward, solidifying into what appeared to be some sort of rope as it flew through the air. Roxas slashed away at the rope over and over, but every time he sliced through it, it split into several smaller ropes and continued to reach out toward him.
Eventually, the boy's strength began to give out, and he was no longer able to swing his swords with enough force to saw through the hooded man's ropes. The split rope now looked more like a network of roots, branching out in all directions; on impact, the smaller sections of rope whipped around Roxas' body and lashed his arms and legs into place while the larger strand behind them forced him backward against the wall.
"Huh... that's all? Maybe you didn't have quite as much energy as I thought," the cloaked man said, walking up to Roxas and bending down slightly to get a good look. He grabbed the boy's chin with one gloved hand and lifted it, giving him a clear view of Roxas' face.
"Yeah... now that I've had a closer look, I'd say you've been so tired you were about to drop throughout the whole fight. Those dark circles under your eyes are a dead giveaway."
He paced away from the boy for a few seconds, apparently no longer considering him a threat now that he was tied down and pinned against the wall by the strange ropes.
"Roots," Roxas mumbled weakly, gazing down at the series of ropes that held him in place. "The ropes... are roots..."
The cloaked man turned and paced back toward Roxas, listening carefully to every word the boy said.
"Are you... Marluxia?"
Roxas glanced down at the root-like growth wrapped around his body once again, noticing that they didn't look quite like the roots he was used to seeing. On closer inspection, they didn't look like plant roots at all--they were too rubbery, and not the right color for any kind of plant he had ever seen.
"No, wait... these aren't plants..."
The mystery man laughed.
"Very observant... for someone who can barely keep his eyes open, anyway. But you're right, those ropes aren't plant-based at all... they're made of fungus."
The boy's eyes widened; if he hadn't been falling asleep on his feet, he probably would have gasped as well. He immediately knew who the cloaked man was.
"Fungus powers... you're--"
Before Roxas could speak the man's name, he waved one hand in front of the boy, leaving a trail of dull yellowish-orange energy in the air behind it. The energy condensed into a cloud of tiny spores before flying into Roxas' face, and almost immediately he began to slip away into unconsciousness...
Axel walked up the stairs toward the numbered members' quarters, looking around for any sign of Roxas. Nobody had seen him the whole morning, but since he had passed out after his last Fangirl-extermination mission, that wasn't much of a surprise--no one really expected the kid to be up and ready to go at the crack of dawn after wearing himself out like that, after all. When he didn't show up for breakfast, however, his absence began to look a bit more suspicious. By ten o'clock that morning, when Roxas was supposed to meet Marluxia and Xaldin for another session of meditation training, it was clear that something was up.
"'Ey, Roxas? You still in bed?", the spiky-haired man called down the hallway as he came around the corner. "I mean, I know that Fangirl swarm wore you out and all, but sleeping for sixteen hours straight? Even I don't sleep that long."
Noticing that Roxas' door was open, he paused in the middle of the hallway, expecting to see the boy shuffle out of the room at any minute. Instead, he heard two more sets of footsteps coming up behind him--Xaldin and Marluxia, apparently looking for Roxas as well.
"Huh?", he said, turning around, "What're you guys doing up here?"
"C'mon," Xaldin said, crossing his arms. "Isn't it obvious? Roxas never showed up for his training, and we've already looked everywhere else the kid hangs out."
Marluxia nodded.
"Hmm... well, I was just about to check his room," Axel said, pointing back to the open door. "But I don't think he's in there, either. The door's been hanging open like that the whole time I've been here."
The three walked over to the boy's room, Axel peeking in first. The sheets were thrown off of Roxas' bed like he had gotten up and left in a hurry, and one of his dresser drawers--full of old T-shirts--was left hanging open. There were no signs of a struggle; just the usual messy room that was to be expected when you were dealing with a fifteen-year-old.
"Nope," Axel muttered, turning back to the other two men. "Not a trace of him in there, either."
Marluxia looked up suddenly, as if getting an idea.
"A trace... that's it," he said, "Get Zexion up here as soon as possible. If there's any trace of Roxas' presence left, he should at least be able to figure out how long he's been gone."
The news of Roxas' disappearance quickly spread throughout the entire Organization. Though numbered members had the right to come and go from the base freely at any time when they weren't busy with their duties, Roxas was not known to travel very far outside the mountain's walls on his own, especially not so early in the morning. Most suspicious of all was the fact that he hadn't told anyone that he was leaving the base, or even left a note; the few times that Roxas did go off on his own, he would always let someone else know first.
Xemnas, apparently believing that he may have run away like Xion had months ago, had ordered an inventory of all the Organization's supplies; this search, however, came up empty. Nothing was missing, not even food or money--if Roxas had indeed run away, he had done it without any planning or preparation beforehand.
Zexion's search of the boy's room came up with a bit more information--Roxas had left the room hours ago, at around one o'clock in the morning. Tracking the boy's scent became difficult after that point, but it was clear that he was headed off somewhere in a hurry; he hadn't even taken the time to stop by the storage room containing spare cloaks before he left, instead taking off with nothing more than his uniform's black pants and an old T-shirt.
"I think we can rule out a repeat of the Xion incident," the blue-haired man said, brushing a stray strand of hair away from his left eye before continuing. "In addition to the fact that no supplies disappeared along with him, Roxas wouldn't have been in any condition to run away last night... so it's time to consider the other options."
Axel scratched his head.
"What other options? Kids don't just vanish into thin air," he said, waving his hands around a bit for emphasis. "And there's no way he could've been kidnapped... if someone from outside tried to get in last night, every alarm in the base would've gone off."
Zexion sighed and summoned his book, flipping through the pages quietly for a few moments before suddenly stopping and turning the heavy tome so that the spiky-haired man could read it.
"In case you've forgotten," he said, "A kidnapping wouldn't necessarily have to involve someone from outside. We've suspected that there may be a traitor at work ever since we noticed certain files missing from the Fangirl Detection System... it's entirely possible that whoever deleted those files is responsible for this as well."
Marluxia put his hand on his chin, looking as if thinking hard about something. After a few moments, he spoke up.
"But every other member was present this morning," he said, "If someone from within the Organization took him somewhere else, how could they make it back here so quickly?"
Zexion almost closed his book, then quickly reopened it after pausing for a moment. He searched through his notes, eventually stopping at an older-looking page.
"Good point. If the Dimensional Hippievan launched last night, we would have all heard it... so wherever Roxas was taken, it can't be much more than a few hours' walking distance from here."
He flipped past a few more pages, reading over his old notes carefully, then continued before anyone else could get a word in.
"Axel, gather a search party," the shortest of the men said, clapping his book shut as he spoke. "But tell every member originating from Japan to stay put. As it seems likely that Roxas is being held somewhere on this island, those who know the area are to be considered suspects until further notice."
"Sheesh, that's a little harsh," the redhead said, scratching his head nervously. "But I guess there's not much choice until we get a real lead on this thing..."
Naminé sat quietly in her chair in front of the massive Fangirl Detection System computers, glancing up at the screens occasionally but mostly focusing her attentions on the sketchpad sitting on her lap. She was drawing a rather unusual scene: Zagan, slumped over the keyboard, a bubble of drool forming in the corner of his mouth as he snored.
A quick glance to her left confirmed that this picture wasn't just a silly thought that had popped into her head during the slow early-morning hours. Zagan, usually alert and totally focused on his task of monitoring the computers for any sign of Fangirl activity, had fallen asleep on the job. It was a rare sight indeed, and the little girl couldn't resist the opportunity to preserve the image of it in paper form.
Just as she had finished the last few details of the man's reflective glasses and short, stubbly beard, the door to the room swung open and Zexion rushed in. He paused for a moment to gaze over at Zagan, shaking his head slightly at the rather disgraceful sight, and then turned to Naminé instead.
"Naminé," he said, "I'm sure you've already heard the news... Roxas has gone missing, and it's suspected that it was a kidnapping."
The girl nodded slightly, a sad look crossing her face.
"I would normally ask Zagan, but as he's... occupied at the moment, I'm asking you instead," Zexion continued. "If Roxas has regained consciousness by now, the Fangirl Detection System should be able to detect his presence. I'd like you to scan this island for any sign of Roxas... and if that search comes up empty, expand the search to all of Japan."
Once again Naminé nodded, turning back toward the computer monitors and slowly typing in a series of commands. A map popped up on the screen, displaying the entirety of the island the base was located on. Within a few minutes, the scan was finished; unfortunately, it had not detected Roxas anywhere. Naminé paused for a moment, then began typing a bit faster than before, adjusting the scan to cover all of the Japanese islands.
The computer beeped slightly, and the map on the screen zoomed out to show the entire country of Japan as well as some of the surrounding ocean. Before the scan could get very far, however, a thunderous snore erupted from the other side of the room, followed by a loud crash.
Zexion and Naminé knew what had happened, of course, but the sudden sound made them turn their heads in that direction anyway. Zagan had slipped out of his chair, nearly knocking the keyboard down in the process as he went crashing down to the floor. Though the sounds of people talking and computers beeping had not been enough to wake him up, his sudden impact with the stone floor had done the job nicely.
"Finally awake, I see," the blue-haired man said, staring down with mild annoyance at the spot on the floor where the other man had ended up.
Zagan grumbled under his breath as he pulled himself up off the floor, then shrugged and laughed slightly.
"Yeah... had a hard time sleeping last night," he said, adjusting his shiny glasses so that they covered his eyes completely and then scratching his head for a few moments. "A bad case of gas'll do that, y'know. Must've been something I ate..."
Zexion glanced back at the computer screen for a second. The Fangirl Detection System had covered nearly a third of Japan already, with no luck.
"So," he said, turning back to Zagan, "I assume you've already heard the news?"
"News? That's news to me. Last time I checked, we hadn't even had a minor Fangirl alarm all morning."
Zagan stretched, causing a few bones to crack and pop, and then yawned.
"Of course," he continued, "I have been asleep since just after breakfast, so I guess I could've missed something."
Zexion sighed, then took another look at the computer.
"Lexaeus was right," he said, "You can tell exactly who trained the non-numbered members just by watching how they act. You're being even more like Axel than usual this morning."
The computer beeped for a split-second, catching Zexion's attention once again. However, it was unfortunately not Roxas' presence that the machine had picked up on--instead, it was a lone Fangirl wandering in one of Japan's many cities. Based on the strength of the signal, it was probably someone who had only very recently transformed, and who had not yet fully connected with the hivemind. Once he was absolutely sure that this was the only thing the computer had found, he turned back toward Zagan and continued.
"But, like I was about to say... Roxas went missing at some point during the night, and all signs point toward a kidnapping," Zexion said, flipping through his notes to make sure he didn't forget to mention anything important. "Since the Dimensional Hippievan was not used, it's likely that the kidnapper has Roxas held captive somewhere nearby... Axel should be gathering a search party to comb the area as we speak."
"Hmm," Zagan replied, scratching his beard with one hand while staring at the computer screen. "A kidnapping, huh? Whoever pulled that off must've been pretty careful about it, because I know I didn't hear any alarms going off last night."
"Yes," Zexion said, "That brings me to the other major point... we believe that this kidnapping was the work of someone inside the Organization. Only one of our members could know the security system well enough to manage something like this."
The computer let out another weak beep, once again picking up a lone Fangirl wandering across the city. Zexion didn't even bother looking at the screen this time; he could tell just by the sound that it was only another weak Fangirl signal, nothing like what the machine would pick up if it had found Roxas.
"So... you guys have any suspects yet?"
"Unfortunately, no," the blue-haired man answered. "Though we are keeping the Japanese members out of the search parties for now just in case, we have no real reason to believe that any of them is responsible... whoever did this covered their tracks very well."
Slowly, Roxas began to awaken. The first thing he noticed was that his entire body was sore, most likely a result of the Fangirl-extermination mission the day before. He then realized that he was not lying down; instead, he was hanging on a wall, his arms and legs shackled against it by some sort of rubbery but extremely strong substance. He opened his eyes and immediately shut them again--he was in a room of pure white, and every surface seemed to pulse with a strange, unfamiliar light.
After a few more minutes, he tried again, letting his eyes adjust to the light rather than immediately shutting them again. He looked around the strange room he found himself in, noticing that it appeared to be perfectly round aside from the flat surface of the floor. Other than the rubbery shackles that held him against the wall, the room was completely empty.
Until, that is, a rectangular hole opened up on one side of the sphere.
A shadow began to creep into the room for a few seconds before Roxas got a glimpse of its owner--a strange Fangirl, unlike any he had heard of before. Of all the Fangirls he had seen, its closest resemblance was to the one that had nearly killed him on his first real extermination mission--it was taller than most of its kind, with features closer to a humanoid female rather than the usual cartoonish, long-armed, flat-chested monsters. This one, however, appeared even more humanoid than the mutant that had appeared in the convention center--while that one had looked like a modified Yaoinator Fangirl, the creature that stood in the round room with him now was something entirely different. The Fangirl glanced over toward him for a moment, giggled slightly, and then immediately turned around and left through the same door-like opening that it had appeared from.
"Hey! Come back here! Let me down!"
No matter how loud the boy yelled, he wasn't able to get the Fangirl's attention. It continued to walk away from the spherical room, the door vanishing behind it and leaving Roxas alone in his white prison once again.
That is, until something else began to enter the room. Instead of coming in through a door, it seemed to slowly assemble itself in the room's center, bit by bit, like an image on a computer screen being constructed one pixel at a time. Finally, the enormous, tentacled monster was fully formed, and the air in the room seemed to crackle with energy just from the thing's presence. In a few spots, the air actually appeared to be twisting around in on itself, reminding Roxas of the ripples left behind by Xigbar's space-manipulating powers.
For a few moments, only the strange crackling noises filled the air; then, finally, a familiar voice popped into Roxas' head.
"Roxas," Xion whispered, her voice beginning to distort slightly as she spoke. "This is... the Fangirl Queen."