A/N: Valentine's special go! :D

"Dearest Xemnas,

I know this might seem sudden. It feels like just yesterday was the first time you raised your arms to proclaim your undying non-feelings for me. I am pleased with your offerings. Your praise makes my many hearts race. Come to me, and I will fill the Void within you.

Eternal love,

Kingdom Hearts."

Demyx cracked up after reading my "love letter." I'm surprised he got through it first; his cheeks had been bloated with suppressed laughter the whole time.

"This is awesome!" He exclaimed. "Sounds like you've had a lot of practice, heh."

"Shut up." I snatched the heart-patterned stationary back from him. I didn't think it was even that great, but considering I knew how to spell, I was at least a better choice than him. "So you think it's convincing enough?"

"Considering no one knows how a giant floating heart-moon would write, I'd say so," Axel confirmed. "Besides, I don't think anyone else knows you can write like that. Unless you've been sending your own love letters…" He wiggled his eyebrows, and I rolled my eyes.

"You've caught me," I replied sarcastically. "I admit it. It's Dusk #8794."

They both get a good laugh out of that. Really, my note was mainly a mixture of what I'd heard Xemnas say himself and a "chick flick" Demyx had gotten me and Xion to watch. Contrary to his belief, not all girls liked cheesy romance movies. Xion didn't even know what love was, so I had the big-sister-like job of explaining it to her, as well as I could. I felt bad for the younger girl. Love was complicated enough if you were a Somebody, much less a Nobody, and even less a Nobody with amnesia. Besides, I didn't think I'd ever felt the romantic type of love, so my explanation might've been way off.

"Look, Xen-Xen!" R-2 rushed over from the other side of his room, holding up a paper heart. Silver glitter cascaded off of it. That was the main reason we'd picked his room this time instead of Axel's; R-2 didn't care if the floor got covered in glitter and glue and every other art supply. "It's shiny! Like metal stuff you make!"

I laughed a little. "Yep, it is. Is the glue dry?"

"Uh…" He poked it; glitter stuck to his black-gloved finger. "Nope."

"Then let it dry. We don't want them to stick together when we leave them for Xemnas."

"Okay!" R-2 grinned, rushing back to set it on his windowsill, where a long row of other sticky valentines had been set out to dry. It felt good to see him rushing around like that. His prosthetic was barely giving him trouble now; it was a miracle how fast he was adjusting. Sometimes I wondered if Vexen created him with the ability to adapt and bounce back faster than normal humans (or Nobodies).

"How does mine look?" Roxas held up his valentine, a jagged heart with a Shadow Heartless drawn in marker in the middle.

"Let me see that," Axel said, walking to the corner where Roxas, Xion, and R-2 sat surrounded with piles of markers and glue and glitter. Roxas held out the rough paper heart for Axel to see. "Hey, not bad, Rox." Then he squinted. "Does that say 'I love you'?"

Roxas blushed, pulling the paper heart back in embarrassment. "Is that bad…?"

Axel looked back at me and Demyx, eyebrows raised, silently asking if we had anything to do with this.

"Trust me, we're not trying to parent your kids," I told him. But then I remembered watching that movie with Xion. Plus R-2 had already proclaimed his love for me and Demyx on a few occasions, so it was only a matter of time before the subject came up anyway. "Actually, I talked to Xion about it. Figured it was my job as the only other girl." There I went, picking up more kids to mother… Xion had been a good acquaintance ever since our raid on the armory, though. She may be the same age as Roxas and R-2, but sometimes she seemed more mature; I felt comfortable talking to her more on the rare occasions it was just the two of us. Maybe that was just because she was the only other girl.

Axel looked relieved. "Just wanted to make sure no one was taking Xigbar's place as resident Troll. So, uh, Roxas… do you actually know what love is?"

"Um… Xion told me it's something good. A good feeling. Like eating ice cream. And Demyx said it's what Valentine's Day is about."

Axel gave Demyx a look, but he just shrugged. "We're doing a Valentine's prank. I thought you would've told them already."

Axel rubbed the back of his head. "I'm not exactly the most qualified to explain love…"

Xion put down her markers, looking up at him. "But I thought you knew everything, Axel."

R-2 kept snipping at another Valentine, making more of a paper snowflake than a heart. "Xen-Xen knows everything," he stated matter-of-factly.

"Hey, why doesn't anyone think I know everything?" Demyx protested. Axel and I had to laugh at that.

"Because you're you, Demyx," the redhead said.

Honestly, Demyx had to know more than me, at least about the things of this world. I hadn't even known what Valentine's Day was until he told me. Apparently it was another holiday, not as important as Christmas, so we didn't get a vacation day for it. Demyx said it's "kind of lame when you're older 'cause it's just about having a girlfriend and buying her stuff, but when you're a kid you get to do crafts and give cool valentines to your friends and get candy." So another holiday mostly about getting stuff. I didn't care; it was just a fun excuse to prank Xemnas. Plus Roxas, Xion, and R-2 got to do arts and crafts, so bonus.

"Come on, Xen-Xen! Dem-Dem! Skinny Flaming Pyro Man! Come color with us!"

Axel shook his head. "You already got me to play arts-and-crafts for one holiday. I'll pass."

"Please?" Xion turned on the Puppy Eyes.

"Are you scared the kids'll out-color you~?" Demyx taunted. Axel just looked at him like his was an idiot.

"Do you think you can do better than them? 'Cause I'd sure like to see that."

Well, it wasn't like it was a contest. I didn't care how good I was. The kids were having fun; I might as well join in. Xemnas was the only one who'd see the valentines, anyway.

I sat down on the floor, picking up a pink sheet of construction paper and a pair of tiny safety scissors.

"Yay!" R-2 leaned over my shoulder, perched on his knees. "What are you going to color on it? Is it going to be pretty?"

"We'll see," I answered. My paper heart was pretty lopsided and jagged so far, but when I took control of the metal in the awkward tiny scissors with my magic instead of my hands, my cuts straightened out.

Demyx plopped down beside me, taking a blue sheet of paper and scissors for himself. "Bet I can make a better valentine than you."

"What are you, five?" I rolled my eyes. "It's just to prank Xemnas. Who cares how pretty they are?"

"I do," R-2 pouted, sunset-orange pajamas darkening to a gloomy blue. "Making pretty things is fun."

I sighed. Whenever he sulked, it drained the energy out of me. But Demyx was right; I could be a "buzzkill" sometimes, making him feel bad when I didn't mean to. For "not having hearts," they were both pretty sensitive.

"That's not what I meant… I meant it doesn't matter who's the best. All of the valentines will work, even if they're not as pretty as yours."

R-2 giggled while sketching out a picture of Xemnas with his five hundred count pack of crayons. Did he have a photographic memory or something? He'd only seen Xemnas when the silver-haired man had introduced him to the Organization as Kirux.

While I squirted a glitter glue into a heart shape (like I did on Xemnas's pancakes), Axel started filming. I hadn't realized R-2 had finished the Xemnas picture, but he was already holding up his next valentine for the camera.

"It's a sunset," he explained to Axel. "Because sunsets are happy, and love is happy. So sunsets are like love."

Axel chuckled at the warm-colored heart. "Guess your logic's close enough… sort of…"

Of course, then Roxas and Xion wanted to show off their valentines, too. They climbed around me to get closer to the camera – and Roxas's boot squelched into my glitter glue. Oh well, it'd probably be fine if I threw more regular glitter on it. "Abstract art" or whatever R-2 called it.

"What are you doing on yours?" I asked Demyx, who threw his arms over his blue valentine protectively.

"It's a surprise!"

"O-kay…"

I started cutting a new heart; the more valentines we had, the more spectacular this prank would be. I was perfectly content to dump glitter on all of mine, but R-2 had other ideas.

"You can use my colors, Xen-Xen~" He sing-songed, dropping an armful of Sharpies in my lap.

"Uh…" I picked up the ones that were rolling dangerously close to the glue. "Thanks, but I'm fine. I'm not that good with markers."

"That's okay!" His grin widened; he plopped down beside me. "I'll teach you!"

"That's not really what I—"

Demyx laughed when R-2 slapped a teal Sharpie into my palm. I rolled my eyes at him, but I couldn't get a good look at his "surprise" valentine. As long as he wasn't keeping it secret because it was for me… surely he could think of a more creative prank on me than that. Not that I should want a better prank… I'd better be careful what I wished for.

R-2 positioned my fingers around the Sharpie when I took too long to do it myself. "You hold it like this, so all your fingers can make the colors go where you want them to."

"…Sure," I answered when he stared at me for confirmation. "What am I drawing?"

"Whatever you want." He shifted, crossing his prosthetic under his good leg. "What's something that makes you think about love?"

That was a deeper question than he realized. He knew what love was, but it seemed simpler for him – basically what he felt towards anything that made him happy. For me… well, I didn't love much, even when I was a Somebody. Not much except my family…

I shook my head; it was stupid. I couldn't draw my family on a valentine from Kingdom Hearts to Xemnas. In fact, I didn't have enough artistic talent to draw my family at all. But R-2 had latched onto my left arm, and his magical coloring powers must've channeled through me. It was the only explanation for how five teal-Sharpied, not-incredibly-awful faces now decorated my pink heart.

"Good job, Xen-Xen!" R-2 "patted" (smacked, actually) my back in congratulations.

"Xenan drew that?" Demyx gaped, forgetting to shield his blue valentine. It was just covered in words so far, though, and I couldn't read it upside-down.

"Yep! See, isn't making pretty things fun? It makes me feel like jumping, but I can't jump yet. I hope I get to jump soon. Or cartwheel. Cartwheeling's fun."

I stared down at my valentine. "…It's not even that good," I muttered, pulling it into my lap, away from them. It was just a bunch of lines… how did they come together to make my family's faces? All of us… I hardly remembered what Mom looked like, but I knew this was right. Short-cropped hair, thin lips, eyes that squinted when she smiled. And Henry, with that awful haircut I'd given him right before he left for the academy; the top of his head was practically a straight line, except for one awkward bald spot. And Dad with his smile wrinkles and short goatee (much better than Luxord's), and Elizabeth with her abnormally long hair, smiling like she didn't have a care in the world…

I chunked the heart-shaped paper through a corridor. I didn't care if it was Valentine's Day; now wasn't the time to get emotional.

R-2 gaped like I'd simultaneously punted a puppy and stolen a baby's candy. "Why did you do that?! It was so pretty!"

"Yeah," I said, mustering a smile, "It's too pretty to give to Xemnas."

"Oh." He relaxed at that. "Who were those people? Did they used to be in the Organization?"

Axel hadn't been paying attention before, but that perked his interest.

"No," I replied quickly, shaking my head. "No, R-2, that was… my family."

Axel looked away. Guess he'd been hoping to hear something else, though I couldn't imagine what.

"What's a family?" R-2 asked, halfway climbing into my lap. Urk, that used to be okay when he was weirdly light, but now that he weighed what a normal teenage boy should, I had to push him back off.

"Personal space, remember?"

"Sorry!" He scooted away before asking again, "What's a family? What does that have to do with love?"

It was so ridiculous, if it was anyone else asking I'd laugh out loud. I guess Vexen hadn't felt like it was important for him to know what a family was… so I wondered how he knew about love.

"Family… well…" How could I put it in a way he'd understand? Plus Roxas and Xion were listening now, too. Axel and Demyx sat back on R-2's bed, like they wanted to stay as far out of this Life Lesson as possible. "Family's the people you're born with," I decided on the simplest, most basic way of putting it.

It still didn't take the confusion from R-2's face. "What's 'born'?"

I rubbed my forehead, where a headache was starting to throb. One o'clock in the morning was way too early for Life Lessons, especially ones this big. If I wasn't careful, I'd run into the "where do babies come from?" question. "I'm not a mother. I'm not ready for this."

Axel laughed suddenly, nearly falling off R-2's bed. "Welcome to my life!"

"Axel, do you know what 'born is?" Xion asked. He groaned, dropping his head in his hands.

"Please, if you care about my sanity at all, drop it."

"Why, is it bad?" Roxas asked while pouring glitter on one of his valentines, only he wasn't paying enough attention, so he was pretty much pouring it on the floor.

"Ughhh, I'm not ready to be a father…" Axel grumbled through his hands, but not quietly enough.

"What's a father?"

Roxas's question was the last straw. Axel threw his arms in the air, but he forced uncomfortable cheerfulness into his voice. "You know what? Forget it. We've got enough valentines, right? Great. Let's go."

He opened a corridor and disappeared through it.

"…What did we do?" Xion asked me. Why couldn't they ever ask Demyx these questions?

I shook my head and stood up, helping R-2 to his feet. "Despite what you all think, Axel doesn't know everything. None of us does." And even if we did know all the answers, that wouldn't mean we could explain them. Or that we would want to.

"What?" Xion looked like I'd committed blasphemy; Roxas's eyes narrowed skeptically. R-2 just laughed.

"Haha, you're funny, Xen-Xen."

Demyx snickered too. "Be careful, guys, you don't want to break her like you broke Axel."

"We broke him?!"

"No!" I interrupted Roxas and Xion's panic. "Axel's just a little stressed, that's all. Come on, get your valentines. We've got a prank to pull."

I picked up some of the finished valentines myself, but Demyx snatched up his blue one before I could touch it.

"Still a surprise?" I asked skeptically.

"Yep. It's gonna be awesome." He grinned proudly. Suspicious as I was, I knew it would probably be useless to ask.

I'd find out eventually, one way or another.

XXX

Kingdom Hearts shined brightly in the dark, misty night. Of course, it looked as much like night at one o'clock AM as it did at noon, so that wasn't anything new. It did feel closer than usual, though, since we were at the highest point of the castle.

Axel stood in front of Xemnas's altar, laughing and shaking his head. "Man, I knew the bossman was crazy, but…"

Demyx cracked up too, taking a plush Shadow Heartless off of the altar. "Xemmy's a fangirl! Do you know how great this is? We could blackmail our way out of work forever!"

I rolled my eyes and took the Shadow doll from him, putting it back on the altar. "Something tells me that won't work."

"Yeah," Axel agreed. "It's hilarious, but honestly, have you listened to his monologues? He practically gushes over Kingdom Hearts all the time. I don't think he'd care if we spilled his secret."

I patted Demyx's shoulder. "Nice try."

"Just raining on all my fun," he pouted, making a literal miniature stormcloud to rain on me. I quickly threw up my hood, rolling my eyes.

"Smart one, Demyx. Do you want to ruin all of these valentines?"

Axel whacked him on the arm. "She's right. Come on, we're supposed to be professionals."

'Professional' was a generous term, but Demyx dried up the rain.

"Funsuckers."

R-2, Roxas, and Xion were clearly more professional than any of us – they were already taping a rainbow of paper hearts to Xemnas's altar. R-2 painted I LOV YU on the side of it too, with real paint this time, not his magic. None of us wanted to have a mess like with the Grey Area again.

I laughed a little, taking his paintbrush. "Let me help you there."

"What? What did I do?"

While I fixed his spelling, Demyx took my valentines and spread them over the weird assortment of objects already on the altar.

"So where's your surprise?" I asked him.

He grinned, twirling a roll of tape around his finger. "If I told you, it wouldn't be a surprise~"

I took the tape roll off of his finger and started hanging more paper hearts. I didn't realize how many we'd made; R-2 had really outdone himself. Some were still sticky with glue, but overall the valentines were really good – not just R-2's, but Roxas's and Xion's too. Did he share his power with them, too?

When we were done, we backed up, admiring our work. Multicolored paper hearts blanketed all four sides of the squatty altar, except for the part in the middle where R-2 (with my help) wrote I LOVE YOU in bold pink letters. My "love letter" sat on top of the other valentines; hopefully Xemnas would see that first.

"It looks good to me," I said.

"Valentine's Day is fun!" R-2 cheered, slapping hands with Roxas and Xion.

"Hmm…" Axel studied our work, sizing it up, like it wasn't up to our "professional" standards.

"What? Are we missing something?" I asked him, and he rubbed the back of his head.

"Your letter said Kingdom Hearts accepted his 'offerings.' You think it'd be more convincing if we took this extra junk off the altar?"

Demyx whined at the idea of extra work, but it made sense. R-2 and I started separating out our valentines from the piled-up mess, while Roxas, Axel, and Xion threw key-, heart-, and heartless-related items into dark corridors. There went a silver heart-shaped necklace, a key-shaped fork, coffee mugs emblazoned with Heartless and Nobody emblems… On my world, we would've called Xemnas a hoarder. No one was allowed to store this much useless junk when underground space was so limited.

"I'll, uh, keep watch," Demyx volunteered. Axel rolled his eyes.

"If you're trying to get out of work, at least film this." He tossed him the camera.

Demyx grinned. "You know me so well."

There was a lot to throw away, but between the five of us, it didn't take too long. I guess the larger team wasn't always a drawback.

"Not bad," Axel said when we were done. My "love letter" was much more visible now, with a decent amount of space between it and the surrounding scattered valentines. Some had pictures of sunsets, some of ice cream, some of Heartless and keyblades – even one with a rainbow-colored pie, which must've been R-2's imagination at work – but I didn't see any that directly incriminated us. Good. Maybe we'd have our first clean prank in a while…

"Quick! Xemnas's coming!" Demyx alerted us. Guess we did need a lookout after all. But what was the Superior doing awake at around one o'clock in the morning? We hadn't woken him up, had we?

We dove into a corner, behind a large Nobody emblem-shaped sculpture. I wished we hadn't all picked this sculpture; Demyx and R-2 were squished practically on top of me, and Axel was even worse off, flat on the ground with Roxas and Xion sitting on him like a bench. It was hard to keep our collective breathing quiet, but at least the kids had learned by now that when we were hiding, it was for a reason. Silence was survival.

Xemnas's footsteps echoed louder and louder as he ascended the stairs. I held my breath, hand clamped over R-2's now-invisible mouth (just in case). The leader of the Organization walked right past us, purposefully approaching the altar. Something was clutched in his hands, but Demyx's elbow dropped in front of my face before I could make out what it was. As long as he caught it on video, I could always find out later.

"Kingdom Hearts… today is a momentous occasion," Xemnas began, deep voice filling the Altar of Naught. "Today, as your all-encompassing glow must have already discerned, is a day for the celebration of emotions. A day for the celebration of hearts. Hear me, Kingdom Hearts! Today, I pledge to you my… my… what is this?"

Was he so caught up in his monologue that he just noticed his precious altar? He strode towards it, then suddenly collapsed to his knees, dropping what he was holding… was that a bouquet of roses?

"Kingdom Hearts…" He breathed in deeply. "You have sent me a sign. If darkness and light are eternal, surely my gratitude must be the same… Eternal."

I watched him pick up my letter and read it silently. I could tell he was finished when he shot to his feet, then hovered into the air.

"Kingdom Hearts! Your power consumes me!" He floated closer to the heart-shaped moon; I could feel Demyx choking on silent laughter above me. "Already I feel my Void filling… love and anger… passion and despair… your greatest virtues… complete me…!"

He floated higher, higher, until he was a tiny black dot against the white of the moon. While he was so obviously distracted, the rest of us corridored back to R-2's room, where we could safely release our held-back laughter. I was shaking with it; Demyx literally rolled on the floor laughing. Tears snuck out of Axel's eyes as he howled. Roxas and Xion giggled a little, but mostly looked confused, and I think R-2's rolling-on-floor-laughing was just to mimic Demyx.

"Whew." Axel wiped his eyes, finally calming down. "Forget Xaldin; I think this was our best prank yet."

"It doesn't look like we'll get caught," I added, "so that's definitely a bonus."

"Don't jinx us, Xenan," Demyx said, sprawled out on the floor. R-2 rolled over next to him, still cackling.

"Heart Man is silly," he said between laughs. "Can he really fly to the moon?"

"I dunno," Demyx answered, combing pink glitter out of his hair. Should've thought that out before rolling on the floor. "It's not a real moon. It's all the hearts Roxas and Xion collected. I guess he can fly to it, since it's not really in outer space."

I shrugged. "Either way, we got what we needed. I'm going to bed."

"Night-night, Xen-Xen!" R-2 sprang up to hug me, only stumbling a little on his metal leg.

"Goodnight." I hugged him back. "I'll help you clean up tomorrow."

"It's okay, I can do it! I'm a good cleaner!" He started throwing bottles of glue into his closet, without putting the lids on first. Eh, at least he was still cleaner than Demyx.

"Do I get a hug goodnight too?" Demyx asked, holding up his arms, but he was still lying on the floor.

"Maybe if you get off your lazy butt and stand up."

Axel laughed at him, but to Demyx's credit, he actually did stand up. Kind of sad that that counted as an accomplishment…

"Fine, bossypants." He hugged me. "Happy Valentine's Day."

I chuckled a little. "Happy Valentine's Day, Demyx."

Axel rolled his eyes before Roxas and Xion could start glomping him. "Cut out all the mush, you two. You're a bad influence on the kids."

"Whatever, Mamma Bear," Demyx teased.

"Axel, we should make each other valentines!" Xion suggested happily, tugging on his arm. "Wouldn't that be great?"

"Gah, no! A prank was one thing; I'm not getting involved in this—!"

"But we love each other, right, Axel?"

"Roxas, please don't say that out loud… ugh, thank Kingdom Hearts Xigbar's gone…"

He finally dragged his two kids out of R-2's room. Demyx, R-2, and I said goodnight too; we needed our sleep for missions tomorrow.

I flopped on my bed, glad I'd changed into my pajamas before the prank, but I heard something crinkle under me. Rolling over, I fumbled around for whatever it was. Something told me I already knew…

Yep. It was Demyx's valentine. The blue one he'd been saving for a surprise. Though it wasn't much of a surprise when I'd already guessed it might go to me. Maybe that was conceited, but we just knew each other too well.

Other than some scribbly drawings that I think were flowers, the only thing on the valentine was a short poem.

"Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

You taste like fish,

But I still like you.

Happy Valentines Bossypants :P"

I snorted, shaking my head. What did roses and violets have to do with anything? Sometimes I had no idea what went through Demyx's head, other than unhealthy amounts of sugar.

I tossed the valentine into my dresser drawer, on top of my Organization-issued diary. Ridiculous or not, I couldn't bring myself to throw away the short poem. Valentine's Day might be about romantic, sappy love, but to me… well, Demyx's valentine reminded me of our kind of love. Maybe it was sappy to think about it that way, but our friendship… the days we'd spent pranking together, protecting each other and R-2, and even just being dumb… I didn't normally bother to analyze it. But we'd been through a lot, and it had brought us closer than I ever would've imagined. I'd never loved much except my family (and a good meal), but the more I thought about it, the more Demyx felt like family.

And that was a kind of love I could celebrate.