When Axel woke up, it wasn't in a sunlit living room, but a stark white room with the shades drawn.

He winced and blinked a few times, still feeling unnaturally groggy. Then, he remembered what happened.

Demyx.

He shot up in an instant, looking around the room. An empty bed was to his right; two, if he counted his double vision. So where was Demyx?

He could feel the difference. Before, he could've cared less- sure, he'd worried about Roxas, but it had never hit him like this. He was shaken to the core, unable to cope with the overload, the new sensation of feeling emotions fully and completely. Having a heart was, once again, more of a drawback; he didn't like feeling panicked and helpless.

He swung his feet off the side of the bed and tried to stand up, stumbling a few feet before leaning against a chair near the bed. He was weak, tired, and dizzy. Definitely not normal.

The door suddenly swung open, and a man in a simple blue outfit stepped in. "Oh! Oh, sit down, sir!" he yelped, taking hold of Axel's shoulder and trying to steer him back toward the bed. Axel shrugged him off.

"Where's Demyx?"

"Who?"

"He was with me, he passed out too, where is he?"

Recognition lit up the man's eyes. "He's right down the hallway, in a different room. No need to worry. You need to sit down or you might pass out again."

"I don't believe you," Axel snapped, taking a few more shaky steps toward the door. "I need to see him."

"At least let me take you in a wheelchair…"

Axel gave the man the most effective glare he could muster; it was enough. He backed off.

"Which room?"

The man sighed. "Three rooms to the left."

Axel gathered his strength, and then stepped out the door into the hallway. He felt like he'd been asleep for days; maybe he had.

Three rooms to the left…here.

He pushed open the plain-looking door to reveal a room exactly like his own, only with two people occupying it instead of one. Demyx lay on the bed by the window, still unconscious. In the first bed sat a chubby teenage girl watching TV, her leg encased in some kind of metal frame and bolted. It looked painful, to say the least, but she looked up and smiled as Axel walked past her.

Axel dropped into the chair beside Demyx's bed, relieved that he'd made it this far. He didn't get peace for long, though.

"One of my nurses told me you'd left your room."

A man in a white coat stepped up to the foot of Demyx's bed, taking the clipboard out of the slot on the end of the bed. "You're related to this patient?"

Axel hesitated. "I'm his…his roommate."

"I see," the doctor said, setting the chart back down. "An odd case, both of you collapsing at the same time for no apparent reason. We did testing, found nothing but an elevated heart rate."

Ironic.

"How long has it been?"

The doctor glanced down at the chart again. "Almost 24 hours."

I knew something was wrong with this place. I knew it wasn't over, Axel thought, looking back down at Demyx. "Is he okay?"

"He'll be fine, assuming he follows your example and wakes up as well. I'd like to keep you for observation a little longer, but otherwise…you're perfectly healthy. You'll be free to go home."

Axel nodded. The doctor only stayed put a few more moments, as if he wanted to say more, but then he turned and left the room. Axel sighed, leaning back in his chair.

"He's not really telling the truth," the girl in the other bed said quietly. Axel glanced over his shoulder at her.

"What?"

"I heard the nurses talking when they brought him in," she continued. "They were talkin' about you two. Something about the cat scans they did wasn't normal, but they weren't going to tell you because it wasn't conclusive. And they didn't think it was harmful, didn't want to scare you."

Axel wasn't surprised. He muttered a 'thanks', and then turned away, planning on ignoring her once again.

"Were you abducted by aliens?"

Axel frowned, swiveling in his chair to look at her again. "Were we what?"

"I promise I won't tell if you were. I heard they do all kinds of experiments and stuff, and I was just thinking that maybe you'd been-"

"Shut up."

"Oh. Right."

A chuckle from the bed drew Axel's attention, and he looked back at Demyx to see those blue-green eyes open.

"Be nice to the poor kid, Axel," Demyx said, his voice slurring a bit. He seemed even more dazed than Axel.

"About time you woke up. I've been here for hours."

The girl giggled. "More like six minutes."

"Didn't I tell you to shut it?"

Demyx laughed again weakly, pushing himself up to a sitting position with some evident difficulty. "What happened?"

Axel shrugged. "Evidently, we got abducted by aliens."

"Wow. I'm never buying that flavor of ice cream again. But seriously, what happened?"

"Don't know."

Demyx chuckled nervously. "See, every time you show up, strange things happen."

"Either way, they said we can leave soon."

"Can't wait. I hate doctors."

vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

True to his word, the doctor allowed them to leave soon after, with the guarantee that they'd both take it easy for a couple of days- and no driving. So a cab ride was their best option to get home.

The ride was mostly in silence. Axel and Demyx were both lost in their own thoughts, knowing that there was more to what had happened- they just hadn't figured it out yet.

"Maybe it's a simulation. Like what they did with Roxas," Axel suggested with a shrug, breaking the strained silence.

"They would've erased our memories," Demyx said quietly. "Why make the effort, anyway? Why us? Why this world?"

"…I hadn't gotten that far yet."

"Well, as soon as you do, let me know."

Axel glanced at Demyx again, and then smiled. The dry humor, the biting wit, it wasn't something he was used to hearing from the blonde. Then again, all the other times he'd encountered Demyx were during stressful meetings or even more stressful missions. Not exactly the best time to be gauging a man's normal personality.

The taxi driver was looking at them strangely in the mirror, but neither paid any attention. They finally got back to the apartment complex, paid the cab driver, and headed upstairs to Demyx's apartment.

"I feel like I could sleep for days," Demyx said with a sigh, unlocking the door and practically falling into the living room. Sam was waiting on them inside, and he greeted Demyx with a happy bark and a strange prancing- but as soon as he saw Axel, it turned into a menacing growl.

"Back off, mutt," Axel growled, forming flames over his hands and barely resisting the urge to throw fireballs at the dog. Sam whimpered and backed away.

Demyx frowned, turned around, and his eyes widened.

It was then that Axel realized that he'd just used his powers.

"Holy shit!" Axel yelped, staring at the flames on his own hands. He smirked, then adjusted his stance and summoned his chakrams. The spiked wheels spun and formed in his hands, flooding him with power and energy he never thought he would feel again in his afterlife.

"You…your powers, they're…"

"They're back," Axel said with a gleeful grin, and then he looked up at Demyx. "What about yours?"

"I don't know…"

"Give it a shot!"

Demyx hesitated again, then lifted his hand and formed a twisting column of water around his arm. It shone and morphed, the energy of it causing a breeze in the room. Lifting his hand higher, Demyx summoned his sitar, and stumbled under the weight of the instrument as it appeared in his hands.

"That's why we blacked out! Something restored our powers!" Axel said happily, allowing the chakrams to fade as fire danced around his feet. "This is great!"

Demyx was staring at his sitar with an expression of wonder on his face, his fingertips sliding along the strings of the instrument. He'd forgotten how right it felt to hold this instrument, to play a gentle melody.

"First you show up…now our powers are back…what next?" he asked, playing a few soft notes. They came as naturally as if he'd never stopped playing.

"Maybe we're going back. Maybe this world was just…storage. A temporary hideaway," Axel said, his excitement growing by the moment.

"Or maybe we'll have to fight again."

"That wouldn't be such a bad thing. The fights made things interesting."

The sitar shimmered and disappeared from Demyx's hands, and the musician dropped his hands to his sides. "I was just starting to get used to not having to fight."

Axel gave Demyx a frustrated look. "You're such a wimp. You should be happy. I know you missed that thing."

"I didn't miss beating people over the head with it."

"No one's saying you have to do that! Why is this such a big problem with you, huh? Why can't you just be happy about this? You were happy about everything else before!"

"Because I just started to get things worked out here!" Demyx said helplessly. "I'm just getting on my feet after hitting rock bottom, and suddenly you drop in here with your big ideas and talk about home, and now this? Come on, you know the Organization was never really my thing, and you want me to jump right back into it?"

Axel was taken aback by the sudden show of anger. He crossed his arms and cocked his head to one side. "It doesn't have to be about the Organization. This is about us. You and me. Who cares why we can use our powers now, the point is that we can!"

Demyx shook his head slowly. "You just aren't going to understand. I don't even know why I bothered trying to explain."

"Don't talk down to me, number nine."

"Don't call me that!"

Sam growled and snapped at Axel, obviously defending his angry owner. Axel lifted a hand to pummel the dog with fire, but before his hand even lit up, a fist connected with his jaw.

"Don't touch my dog."

"You little-"

Axel got back to his feet and summoned a chakram- one was all he needed for this. But Demyx didn't attack again, didn't summon his weapon, didn't even move.

"I don't want a fight. But if you even think about attacking Sam again, I will hurt you."

"Yeah right, you pansy. I'd kill you before you took a step."

"Probably just put me in another world where I have to deal with starting another life. So, go right ahead."

"Don't tempt me."

"Look, either start a fight or get out. I don't feel like dealing with you right now."

Axel snarled, then unleashed a javelin of fire at Demyx, who threw up a hasty water block. It worked, barely. Axel was just about ready to attack again when something rose out of the floor behind Demyx. Something fairly large with bright yellow eyes.

A Heartless. All thoughts of the domestic disturbance went out the window.

"Demyx, behind you!"

"Oh, I'm not gonna fall for-"

Axel grabbed Demyx's wrist, yanking him forward just as the Heartless leapt. The black creature landed on the floor right where Demyx had just been, and Demyx spun around, stunned.

"A Heartless? Here?"

Axel gave his chakram a firm toss, slicing through the Heartless and exploding it into a black dust. Demyx and Axel gave each other a worried look, their prior argument forgotten. Demyx let out a sigh.

"I think this is a big clue as to why we have our powers again…"