Chapter 85: deLayed conversation

"37!"

He turned around. Saix was walking towards him. Saix looked rather, well… not particularly happy, but not particularly upset or angry either. However, that did not change the fact that he sounded pretty angry. 37 did his best to act as if that didn't bother him.

"Ah, sir!" he exclaimed. "I was just coming to speak with you."

"Smooth," L laughed.

He had to make a conscious effort not to reply to her. Things would go downhill pretty quickly if Saix knew she was eavesdropping on this entire conversation.

"And why did it take you this long to come to speak with me?" Saix asked, his voice like ice. "Usually, you report to me much sooner after raids."

"Don't you dare think of telling him that I'm what delayed you!" L warned, rather hastily and a tad loudly.

"A few things came up," 37 replied, casually reaching up and adjusting the volume on his headset so that L wouldn't make him go deaf next time that she yelled. "I'll be sure to report to you sooner next time."

Saix was silent for a moment, regarding him with a look that he couldn't quite read. 37 frowned. He never liked not having a rough idea of what Saix was thinking.

He is a Nobody… 37 reminded himself. It's not like he actually has a heart to properly display emotions with. No expression is better than angry one…

"You failed again, didn't you." It was not a question. It was a statement.

37 frowned.

"Tell him it's not our fault that Riku didn't behave like we expected him to!" L hissed.

37 refrained from rolling his eyes and then told Saix plainly:

"Things just didn't turn out like we had hoped."

To 37's surprise, Saix almost laughed then. "That's why you don't hope," he said. "Hope is an absolutely meaningless emotion. It is merely another way of deluding yourself into believing that everything will turn out fine, thus making you neglect to plan accordingly."

"It was merely an expression," 37 argued. "Besides, hope is a typical human emotion. And, as I recall, it can often help one out of a desperate situation by giving them the strength to keep going."

"As I recall, you are not human," Saix replied coldly.

Despite himself, 37 flinched.

Saix may not have actually snapped, but the tone was clear.

37 quickly swallowed the rest of that argument.

"I apologize, sir," he muttered, turning away. "We just didn't properly account for all the possible outcomes of the situation. I'll be sure it doesn't happen again."

"What are you doing!" L gasped. 37 made a face and again turned the volume on his headset down. "You usually don't give up an argument that easily! And why are you apologizing to him! We didn't-"

"Do you want this to work or not?" he asked sharply, though he was sure to be quiet in doing so, so that Saix wouldn't hear him.

She went silent.

Besides, if I kept arguing that, you could've kissed both me and that plan of ours goodbye, 37 added silently.

He cleared his throat.

"Though, sir, you have to admit," he said. "Riku is a pretty unpredictable force to deal with."

Saix frowned. "I thought that was why you took L with you, even though I specifically forbade the Larxene Replicas to continue going on raids. We've lost nearly half of them by now with the way Riku's been killing them."

"He hasn't managed to kill me yet!" L laughed. "Actually pretty proud of myself!"

"That's only because I've been there for you," 37 breathed.

She was silent for a moment. "Yeah…" she said finally, though she sounded like she didn't entirely want to admit it. "Some of that, I guess. I do okay on my own."

37 couldn't help smile at that.

There was no way he was going to get her to admit that she needed his help.

But it didn't hurt to try.

He quickly covered up his smile, though, knowing that there might be issues if Saix caught it.

"Well, as I said," he continued. "We weren't expecting Riku to behave the way he did."

"Namine, too," L added, sounding a tad annoyed. "She woke up sooner than she should've, too!"

37 nodded.

"Namine fought back harder than we expected, too," he told Saix. "She's… got a lot of determination."

"Plus, that stupid 19 had to go and warn her of what I was doing!" L continued, the annoyance in her voice growing.

"19 caused us a few problems, too," 37 told Saix calmly.

"I would've had her, too!" L said, now sounding angry. "But, oh no! Riku had to go and rescue her at the very last second!" A loud thwump followed this, as if she had angrily pounded the desk.

"Careful," 37 warned.

"And to make it worse: he can fight left-handed! That just isn't fair!"

37 thought of turning his headset off for a bit and letting her rant, but then thought better of it. She wouldn't be very happy if she found out that he had, and he didn't really want to deal with that. He had enough issues right now.

"Anything else in particular?" Saix asked.

37 frowned, getting an odd feeling that Saix was asking for other reasons than actually wanting to know. However… it was incredibly hard to read Saix…

"Namine was being uncooperative," he replied, anyway. "Riku continued to protect her even though he had been severely injured, and…"

He frowned. The next thing L had listed had been the part about him chucking icicles at the door of the Rebellion's Computer Room.

"No," he told her, firmly. "I am not mentioning that!"

She was quiet for a second, as she thought about it. "Ah! Joseph!" she exclaimed. "He was giving me grief!"

"Joseph was causing trouble as well," 37 finished.

Saix stared at him for a moment, a rather odd expression on his face. "Speaking of Joseph," he said finally. "Would you care to explain why he hasn't been kidnapped yet?"

37 held his hands up in defeat.

"I sent Berserkers after him! It's not my fault a bunch of Keyblade Wielders showed up and killed them all!"

"What's this I hear about Keyblade Wielders?"

Confused, both 37 and Saix glanced around, trying to figure out where the voice was coming from.

"He's up," L said after a moment.

37 glanced up. Sure enough, there was Xigbar (or… was it his clone?), sitting, upside down, on the ceiling. He was looking down at them, grinning slightly.

"Do you want me to come down there?" he called.

"What are you doing eavesdropping?" Saix replied coldly.

"You might want to watch how you speak to your superiors," Xigbar laughed. After a bit of space manipulation, he was standing right side up next to them. "Besides, I don't think I'm the only one eavesdropping!" He cast a glance over at 37.

37 stared right back at him, so that it wouldn't be completely obvious that Xigbar was right in his accusation. It was hard to, though. There was something about the look in Xigbar's eyes...

"You're the real Xigbar, then?" he asked plainly.

"I… think so…" Xigbar replied, pretending to sound unsure about the fact. He made a face and placed a hand over his chest. Then he grinned. "Nope! Don't got a heart! I must be the real Xigbar!"

37 stared.

Xigbar only continued to grin.

"Don't you think someone should tell Xemnas that we've got a couple Keyblade Wielders running through the worlds?" he asked, completely casual about it. "Maybe we can get back on track with forming Kingdom Hearts. I mean, we've fallen pretty far behind schedule ever since we lost Roxas." He glanced over at Saix then.

Saix seemed to almost flinch under the weight of that look. 37 smiled, glad that it wasn't just him.

"Roxas betrayed the Organization," Saix said, voice tense.

"I know!" Xigbar laughed. "I hear there was a girl involved! What was her name again? Shi… Sheena? Shi-something."

37 frowned. He knew that Xion had lived—even though 7 had given his word, but, in hindsight, 37 didn't know why he and 26 had been so trusting of that. The reminder of her existence made him scowl. It probably would have been kinder of 7 in the end to just Deactivate her from the start, as they'd planned.

She was one of the few Replicas that 37 considered a mistake.

Maybe it was just the Vexen in him, but he felt that "mistake" was too harsh a term to use most of the time.

The kids, the experiments, were just that: experiments. Not mistakes.

Not all of the failed Replicas were mistakes, either. They had merely failed.

And, unlike most people, he didn't consider Namine to be a mistake. Sure, she was a bit unstable, but from what he knew of what her data had been through, she turned out surprisingly well.

The word "mistake" was used too frequently…

At any rate, as much as it soured 37 to think about Xion, he pushed thoughts of her out of his head. She was dead, and Roxas with her, and it wasn't his problem. 7 was at fault for that if any Vexen Replica was, and 37 would gladly shove him under the bus if need be. If they could get their hands on 7. If Xemnas decided to bring up the matter again.

"What's the news of Keyblade Wielders going to do?" L asked, breaking his thought process. She sounded confused, a tad annoyed even, as if she found the idea ridiculous. "It's not like we can replicate them or anything!"

"I think they plan on sending Heartless out into the Worlds," 37 explained to her, quietly. "The Keyblade Wielders would have to go destroy the Heartless to keep the Worlds in balance, and when they destroy Heartless-"

"The released hearts go to the Organization's Kingdom Hearts," L finished, sounding even more annoyed than she had before. "I'm know that. I'm not stupid!"

37 started to reply to that-

"See!" Xigbar laughed, rather suddenly. "I said I wasn't the only one eavesdropping!"

37 closed his mouth.

Saix threw a glare over at him.

Xigbar smirked.

"Who're you talking to?" he asked.

"No one," 37 replied, calmly.

"I bet you're talking to that Larxene Replica of yours," Xigbar continued, obviously not believing 37 one bit.

"It was nothing," 37 insisted, firmly. "Just a small issue. I can deal with it later."

Xigbar rolled his eyes. "Small issue?" he scoffed. "As if!" He started off then. "I'm gonna go tell Xemnas about the Keyblade Wielders," he called over his shoulder. "You two can go back to what you were doing!"

"Finally! I thought he'd never leave!" L said with a sigh of relief. "He was going to start causing trouble if he stayed any longer…"

37 thought about replying, but then thought better of it. He wasn't liking the glare that Saix was giving him right now. He swallowed.

"You can go now, 37," Saix said, coldly. "Unless you want to continue to waste my time." He turned on his heel and started off.

37 stared, unsure of what to do.

This was NOT how things were supposed to go.

L muttered something very unkind towards Xigbar. "Quick!" she snapped. "Stop him! Say something!"

"Sir!" 37 called.

Saix slowly stopped. "37," he said, not even bothering to turn around. "I am tired of your failures and pathetic excuses. What is it that you want?"

"Well, I was thinking…" 37 replied, slowly. "If we were to try a different approach, maybe the raids would produce better results."

Saix turned to him then, not amused at all. "I think you just need to try harder," he said plainly.

37 made a face. "You think I'm not trying my hardest?" he snapped, his fists clenching together with anger.

"Calm down, sweetie!" L warned. "He's toying with you! Just keep your cool and blame it on Riku!"

37 quickly closed his mouth and did his best to regain his composure. "Riku is just a nuisance," he said, slowly. "I can't help it if he always gets in the way at the last second."

"Send someone else to go distract him, then," Saix replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the Worlds, and he turned to head off.

"Shoot!" L said. "Tell him that that won't work! That, uh, Riku's too strong and- and we'll just lose more people if we do that!"

37 frowned, but then slowly said: "That won't work, sir. Riku'll end up killing everyone we send after him."

"Ooh! It sounded even better when you said it!"

37 ignored her.

Saix raised his eyebrows.

"Humor me, then," he said. "What do you suggest we do?"

"We can- uh…" L paused, fumbling for what she was supposed to tell him to say next. "If we can… ah crap."

"Remove Riku from the equation?" 37 suggested.

"Yes! That's what I was looking for!"

37 just smiled and shook his head.

"You aren't suggesting trying to kill him, are you?" Saix asked.

"No, we-" 37 began.

"Leave me out of this!" L interrupted, crossly. "We're on a roll here! He might lose interest if he hears this was my idea!"

"I was thinking," 37 continued. "Maybe we could do something more… personal."

"Like what?" Saix asked, a hint of curiosity in his voice, now.

"If we captured Namine," 37 explained, slowly. "We could easily Rewrite her. I'm not… entirely sure what we'd Rewrite her into, but there are thousands of possibilities. All of which could easily remove Riku from the equation because he's too busy worrying about her or-"

"We Rewrite her to kill him," Saix finished.