Musicbox

Chapter 2 - Memories

Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts. :D

Thankyou for the nice reviews. -gives Moogles to reviewers- There's the Moogles I promised. I hope you like this chapter. :3

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Sora shifted in his sleep a little with a yawn before waking up. He was taken back to see Axel's coat wrapped around him tightly, and looked around for an explanation. Goofy, Donald, and Axel were crowded around what looked like breakfast - some sort of mixture of various pastrys. He groggily approached them at glanced at Axel with a questioning look.

"Oh!" Axel grinned, "You were shivering. Freezing, actually. This place seems to change in temperature completely overnight." Sora suddenly sensed the oncoming warmth of the day ahead, and yawned groggily in response.

Sora rubbed his eyes and sat down to eat whatever was left of breakfast, careful not to sit too close to Axel. Axel took Sora's action as a sign of mistrust and his heart sank slightly. He wanted the trust of the boy, which might prove to be a little more difficult than he thought. Within minutes, Sora and the others had finished their breakfast and the four were on the road again. Sora and Axel walked side by side with Donald behind, followed closely by Goofy.

"Sora," Axel raised his eyebrows, "Do you know where we're going?"

"Er..." Sora stopped in his tracks. Where were they going? "Well, no, not really." Sora was answered by a scoff from Axel. "Well do you have any good ideas?" retorted Sora.

"Actually yes," Axel found this to be the perfect time to begin gaining Sora's trust, and even show off a little. He reached into his pocket and revealed an ordinary looking crumbled map. Only this map showed their location, direction, and the area from miles around.

"How's that there map know where we are?" asked Goofy looking over Axel's shoulder.

"Um..." Axel wasn't quite sure himself. "This is the nearest destination." The man pointed to an area on the map marked 'Twilight Town'.

"Hey - haven't we already been there?" Sora noted.

"That's right!" Goofy said, "In Castle Oblivion. They had a Twilight Town there. Only that one wasn't really the real one."

"Seems fishy." Donald frowned.

Axel glared at Donald for just the slightest second. "Tch." The duck could get in the way of him being closer to Sora.

"Well, let's get going," Sora said eagerly, ignoring Donald's remark. Sora felt better about continuing their journey with a map than wandering around aimlessly without one. Axel smiled at this. "If we're lucky, maybe someone there has seen Riku or the King. The more places we visit, the better of a chance we have of finding them."

"Sure..." Donald agreed slowly, but continued to make suspicious glowers at Axel every now and then throughout the following hours that passed.

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It was sunset by the time they had reached Twilight Town; or would have been if the sun wasn't always setting there. A towering clocktower loomed like a mountain before Sora, Donald, Goofy, and Axel and rang out like it did every hour. It was 6:00. Sora heard his stomach growling and wished they'd been able to rest for food sometime between breakfast time and dinner. He had been worn out from fighting the Heartless throughout the entire day, and only wanted to eat an enormous dinner and sleep for hours.

The inside of Twilight Town was identical to the one in Castle Oblivion. Donald, Goofy and Sora were glad, considering they knew where the nearest hotel and restraunts were. They walked down the streets without a word, in awe of the bustling town, it's streets were lined with hundreds, possibly thousands, of people.

"Gawrsh, it sure is crowded," Goofy said with a shudder.

"That's weird." said Sora. "You don't see any Heartless around here, do you? I mean, this place wouldn't be so crowded if there were Heartless. And we've never been here, so the keyhole of this town couldn't be sealed."

"You'd be right about that," nodded Axel, "But this town uses machina."

"Machina?" asked Sora, Donald and Goofy at once.

"Machina. 'The machines of God'. Machina is a mechanical energy created by man. An example, I guess you could say, would be...remember that electrically charged elevator in Castle Oblivion on the Hollow Bastion floor?" The three nodded. "That's one machina. There's probably thousands though, maybe millions. Who knows."

"That still doesn't explain why there aren't any Heartless," Donald folded his arms with a look of anger.

"I'm getting to that," Axel said irritably, "Machina can also block out different kinds of magic, all magic, or even Heartless, from coming within force fields. It took a while, but now the new anti-Heartless forcefield works, which this town is protected by."

"You sure do seem to know a lot about this place," said Sora.

"I should. This is my hometown."

"Oh, wow. I didn't know that." Sora scratched his head. "So are we going to see anyone you know?"

"No. I left here to travel when I was only 11. I can't really remember anyone I knew when I was that young."

Sora was quiet. He thought it could've been lonely to travel alone, until Axel continued.

"I traveled with my two best friends. We'd been wanting to leave this town for years. Nothing ever changed. Everything was always the same, and the three of us didn't want to live ordinary lives like everyone else. And before we could change our lives, we just left. We didn't tell anyone, because we knew no one would approve. So I guess that it was sort of running away. But I spent the best years of my life with them." Axel sounded reminiscent now and not like himself at all.

Before he could hold back the question, Sora asked, "What happened to them?"

Axel stopped in his tracks and so did the other three. "The girl...she died. We didn't know it at the time, we were so young, but she had heart failure. She had a heart attack or something like that, not long after we ran away and had our adventure. And the boy, my best friend...he lost his heart to the heartless when the worlds started vanishing."

"I'm sorry!" Sora uttered.

"It's alright." Axel smiled and simply waved his hand. "I've been wanting to get this out for a while. And I'm glad it was to you." Axel looked at Sora with a sudden determined grin. "But - I've made a promise to my best friend. I've sworn to return his heart to him somehow, and whether it's for good, or just temporary, I've promised to tell him something I've been meaning to for three years now."

"I hope you find him."

"I will."

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Sora had been standing on the porch of his and Axel's hotel room, Donald and Goofy's just on the other side of them. He didn't particularly like this crowded town. The city was always glowing with the setting sun and made it impossible to see the night time stars, unlike his home island. He heard the glass door slide behind him and then close. Axel stood beside him, leaning forward with his hands on the railing.

"So..." Axel droned. He was looking at the sky.

"What?" Sora looked at Axel, still leaning onto the railing.

"How will we get rid of the overly brash duck?" he began grinning.

"Wha-?!"

"Turn him into roast duck for dinner or death by Chocobo?"

"You're kidding!" Sora took a step back.

"Of course I am," Axel smiled at him. "Don't you trust me?" The answer was important to Axel.

"N...I don't know." Sora turned around to leave. He didn't feel like talking to the enigmatic man right now.

Axel frowned. 'There has to be some way...' His eyes suddenly lit up. Axel decided that he would use a more assertive method to gaining Sora's friendship, and instead took held of Sora's wrist tightly, spun him around and forced him into a fixed kiss. Sora made several attempts to push himself away from the older man, but Axel held onto his wrist and lower back with no intention of letting him go while plunging his tongue deep into Sora's mouth, caressing his tongue with Sora's own. "S...Sto-" Sora was cut off by the ever increasing force Axel was putting on his mouth, and until it felt sore he let the younger boy go.

Sora refused to look at Axel, and instead fled into the hotel room, slamming and locking the door behind him.

'Did I just do something wrong?' Axel pondered to himself, clearly not very affected by his actions. He tried looking into the hotel room, which was mostly dark with no sign of Sora. 'I mean, it worked for Cloud and Leon. Well, whatever the case, I guess I'll have to spend the night out here." Axel sat down curled up into a ball and tried to lean as comfortably on the railing as possible. He thought that obviously he wouldn't get any sleep that night on the cold ground of the patio, with only the sounds of the crowds of people below to keep him company.

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There's the second chapter. :3 Thanks again for the reviews. Anyone who does review for this chapter, will automatically win a Chocobo and a lifetime supply of Pocky. Not to mention a Tetsuya Nomura plushie, because he is my idol, God, and fiancee.