Time. An irreversible thing. It was a thing neither man, nor scientist could change or alter. Perfect in it's design. Flawless is in it's job, and what it was meant to do, and yet…it was so obsolete to them. It rarely mattered what time of the day was, or, whether an hour, two or three had passed. That was their fate. People run from it. Yet they do not. They accept their time cherishing the moments and remnants of memories they have of once having hearts. Of times where they could feel, laugh, cry, without the façade, the porcelain mask they wore each and everyday, pretending to have something they did not. He mastered time, it was his element, surely he could stop it and turn the wheels backwards, back to when they all had hearts. He did not, though. He looked at the spinning card lazily, sighing as it twirled a few inches above his black gloved pointer finger. His dull blue eyes flashed.

"Luxord?!" he focused on the man seated before him and straightened.

"Honestly, can you at least pretend to pay attention to me?!" Vexen growled turning back around and typing something onto the computer positioned on a desk behind him. Luxord sighed again and looked around the room.

"Why Vexen…you appear not to have any clocks in your room, why is that?" the blonde snorted in contempt.

"Don't be stupid. You know as well as I that time has no meaning to us. So why bother with keeping track of it, it'll only clutter the room." Vexen replied, Luxord looked around them room and rolled his eyes.

"I rather think it's cluttered already…" he mumbled his card disappearing as Vexen spun around and slammed his hands onto his desk. Luxord blinked, looking at the nobody perplexed.

"Just leave. You're no use to me anymore…I've examined your wounds and you're fine. Now get out!" Luxord shuffled to his feet, his hands interlocking into one another as he did a mock bow.

"As you wish." He disappeared through a portal, leaving the blonde alone.

"LUXORD!" His eyes shot open as he looked at a pair of not two, but three eyes. Two belonged to Xaldin, and the other one to Xigbar.

"You gunna deal or what?" Xigbar asked his face expressing an annoyed looking expression.

"I had the strangest daydream…" he replied shuffling the cards without even holding them, they whizzed by one another rapidly as he held both right and left hand parallel to one another.

"Did you now? Care to tell us or are you just going to brood over it?" Xaldin asked smirking a little and the cards where dealt. No one spoke.

"It was nothing, really. Just the first time I met Vexen is all."

"Ooooh you mean the time Xaldin stabbed ya! Hahaha I remember that! Superior was pissed!" Luxord chuckled. Xaldin's eyes narrowed.

"WHY! Why won't you go back?!" Vexen asked his shoulders hunching over as his head spun over towards the man's back. Number X…

"I don't want to."

"BUT! You can change everything!!! You can stop this from happening at all! Why won't you!"

"I told you...I don't want to. Going back and setting things right won't mean that they can't be set wrong again." He saw Vexen grip the balcony railing his teeth gritting together.

"Time is an irreplaceable thing, my dear Vexen. It is not to be meddled with."

"Don't give me that! I've had enough with your stupid chancing words and selfish manner! You can save us! Save all six of us!" Vexen's voice, it had a pleading sort of tone to it. Yes. But that's not quite possible, is it? But it sounds so real. His blue eyes from the corner seem so dark, but in truth they are merely tainted by the chances of fate, a fate in darkness.

"I'm sorry. I just can't do that." He pushed his seat back as he stood up, the light of Kingdom Hearts illuminating one side of his face, leaving the other in darkness.

"Now if you'll excuse…I have some rather important business to attend to."

"When…when will we get our hearts back?" he paused his eyes widening a little at Vexen's question. They narrowed as a die appeared in his hand, he threw it up into the air and watched it spin, a motion in time. A constant unending motion

"Only time will tell…Vexen." He smirked as he walked away; he heard it, pausing to listen. A loud crack and a yell erupted from the balcony.

He remembered they were standing by the railing; it was perfect, just like most of the castle, except there. Where a rather large dent was made. It would stay there forever, untouched, a memory set in time one of first memories he would have as a nobody, and he wanted it to last for as long as possible.

He let out a sigh, opening his eyes. Xaldin and Xigbar had left him! He smirked. He looked down at their hands, now facing upwards. He smiled, looking at his own. Royal Flush…go figure. He placed the cards down on the table, the clicking of clocks creating a harmonic symphony of something he could only remember…and yet, never transcend its borders. He looked out the window towards Kingdom Hearts; it's glow illuminating his face. His eyes widened a bit as his fingertips went to his chest, cold, still, unmoving like an ice statue.

"Why do you have so many clocks in your room?" He heard the dirty blonde scientist asked quizzically, he saw Vexen tap one of them, it chimed for five o clock, Vexen jumped back wards a little, holding his chest, instinctively, they had no hearts for fright to really matter.

"Oh I don't know." He shrugged, smiling a bit.

"It makes me feel at home, you know?" Vexen huffed.

"I'd go crazy with all the racket…" he mumbled under his breath as he sat down at the table. Luxord joined him a few moments later placing a stack of cards between them. Vexen's eyebrow rose, a slight twitching of his lips.

"Such superfluous things…"

"The noise comforts me." Luxord responded shuffling the deck absentmindedly, as he stared back at the scientist.

"Hmph! Potions make no noise."

"Only when mixed wrong…"

"I rarely ever do things wrong, gambler." Vexen said a hint of annoyance in his voice.

"Your current state of existence doesn't really help make me believe that, Vexen." Vexen slammed his hand onto the table, Luxord just looked up passively.

"That…THAT WAS NOT MY FAULT! Sure I was oldest out of all six of us, but who knew…who knew Xem...Xehanort would open that door! I wasn't there to baby-sit! I was there to learn from Ansem the Wise." He knew he hit a nerve, always did. The six, when confronted with their past blunder, never responded…even Zexion was at a lose for words, truly amazing to see them turn a blind eye to it. The only one he never spoke to about it…was him.

"And then you let Xehanort's ambitions command you. And then you opened the door and in the process ruined twelve perfectly good lives along with thousands of others, surely you knew of the consequences." Luxord replied a snap of his fingers and a die fell from the air onto the table. Vexen sighed heavily sitting down again, his head down casted.

"If I knew that he was…going to do that, I'd never would have-"

"OH COME OFF IT VEXEN! You knew perfectly well the dangers of your experimentation; it's your goddamn inability to not be left in the dark that killed you! You…" he snapped his mouth shut, remembering Vexen's number and ranking.

"If you just invited me here to lecture me, I don't need it! I'm trying to figure out how to set it right again…"

"Heh. You're not doing a-"

"Let me ask you something." Luxord blinked at the dullness of number IV's tone. The man had his hands intertwined and resting under his chin, his dirty blonde hair falling like a river falling over a cliff, down his black clad shoulders. Luxord pursed his lips, cocking his head to one side.

"Hm?" the incessant ticking of the clocks seemed to go one for hours, though it was only minutes of silence between the two. Never ending rhythm.

"Do you think…the superior…do you think he really is capable of giving us what we want?" Vexen asked in a rather hushed tone. Luxord's blonde eyebrow rose.

"Are you questioning the one man you've known since before this happened, Vexen?"

"He's not the same!!! Something…something is different about him, very different. It's like he's a whole different being now, nothing like the Xehanort we once knew and worked with. Ask any of the others and they'll tell you." Luxord rubbed his chin, rolling the dice effortlessly on the top of his hand, he spun it on the tip of his index finger and watched it, his mind buzzing with the current conversation.

"Why are telling me all of this, Vexen?" the blonde sighed, looking down at his hands.

"I don't really know. I don't feel that you'll tell the others, you're a man of your word, am I correct?"

"On the contrary. I could be a man of many things, us gamblers…we know how to pull a decent façade, you know?" Vexen smirked.

"So it would seem." Luxord chuckled.

"Like a joker in a deck of cards…" Vexen stated looking at the red and black joker card. Luxord blinked.

"You know about cards, Vexen?"

"I've had my fair share in gambling with and with out the devil." Vexen responded placing the card face up on the table. Luxord reached for it, shuffling it back into the deck.

"Care to play a game, then?" he quirked an eyebrow at the scientist, whose dull green eyes gleamed for a fraction of a second.

"I must warn you…I've never lost before." Vexen said smirking.

"Yes to the others, but I, dear Vexen, am rather different."

"I should think so, only a fool would gamble with his own fate."

"My fate has been predetermined for me, I merely use the cards dealt to me."

"Spoken like a true tragic hero." Luxord smirked at the man's words.

A loud bang made him snap out of his reverie. He looked around, head shooting back and forth. He looked at his hands, thinking. He'd never daydreamed like this before…why was he remembering all this now? It puzzled him, and made him agitated that he didn't know. He jumped out of seat, pacing across the black and white checkered rug, beneath his feet. He threw and caught a dice in consecutive time periods, a pattern, and formula, a trick of the die. He rubbed his goatee absentmindedly, an action he'd grown accustomed to. Something didn't feel right, not right at all. Like a piece of the puzzle was missing, something just wasn't there. He paused turning an eye to the giant heart shaped moon. He remembered…his first time coming into this room.

"This shall be room, number ten." A man with a dour face and long blue hair replied stepping back as to let him pass. He looked at the bland room, sighing in modesty.

"Are they all…so bland?" he grumbled snapping his fingers and jumping back a little as a nobody appeared. Cards flew out of it's deformed, yet fitting, hands as it stood on heel and toe for his command. The man behind him grunted and the door slammed shut. Sighing, he took a seat at the bland white table, with it's bland white chair to match it.

"You think it's boring too, don't you?" He mumbled spinning a card on one finger; the nobody just cocked its head to the side, unable to grasp the meaning of his words. He hung his head in defeat. He looked out the window.

"Kingdom…Hearts…can you really give us…what we need?"

The ticking of his multitude of clocks filled his ears instantly. He looked back at the room, it seemed eerily quiet all the sudden, even though there were clocks all around him. They chimed, Eight O clock in the evening that neither existed nor ended. He stepped out into the darkened hallway.

"Hm…strange. It's so very quiet."

"Indeed…so it shall be as with your death!" Luxord spun around a card flying from his fingers. It embedded itself into the wall like a knife in soft dough. His eyes flicked back and forth.

"Who' s there?! Show yourself." A chuckle from an unknown origin filled the hallway.

"Fool. You gambled your life away working for this organization…you don't deserve to continue to exist. This meaningless life! What purpose have you for living if you're fate has been predetermined?!" Luxord backed up against the wall, four individual cards forming in between his fingers.

"I must say. My fate has been determined already, and yet…I have no idea what it is. Taking chances is what I do; it's what gambling is all about. I have no qualms if I lose." Luxord replied, he didn't realize it but the ground around him shifted, morphed, shape shifted into something only too familiar. He gasped stepping away from the wall as jagged spikes protruded from the once smooth surface.

"Then you shall die by doing what you do oh too well!" He spun around his hand shooting upward as a silver dagger flew at him, he backed away as he heard it thud, and saw the tip, pierce his giant card with the Organization symbol on it. The card disappeared and the dagger lay on the ground motionless. Luxord picked it up looking at it. Another cackle and he gasped as the glowing tip of a sword, or knife was now protruding through his arm. He spun around throwing two cards at a black figure. An organization member?! No! Why would anyone attack me? He panted tearing out the dagger; he heard the sickening splash of blood as it hit the floor, a pool already forming around him. The dagger slipped from his coated hands, clattering to the floor.

"So…you still want to play with me, oh dear Gambler of Fate? You gamble with the lives of others, not noticing how much you affect them so! So. Lets see if you can gamble your own life so carelessly." His eyes narrowed.

"An empty life! A predetermined fate! Tell me! Why is it that you didn't turn time back all those years ago?" his eyes widened a little as he saw more clearly now, a figure about his height, or just a bit shorter, pacing back and forth, a black form following behind him. The figure paused.

He gasped as he saw the hooded being now inches from his face, he stumbled a little falling into a chair.

"Lets see how well a gambler's poker face is when he has nothing worth hiding."

"What do you mean by that?!" Luxord yelled, the room reverted back and he fell onto the cold hard floor flinching a little from the pain. The figure was still there, standing outside his door. Waiting. He got up and followed, clutching his still bleeding arm, if it's a game this man wants, and then it's a game he'd get. He stepped into the darkened room, a room that was only recently filled with a good-natured game of munny and chores for the week. Only…now it seemed more ominous, he didn't like it, this feeling. This dread pooling up in the pit of his stomach, he felt…uncertain. The figure chuckled as the room once again changed.

GUNS?! Luxord spun around as the wall filled with sliver guns the room sounded with the actions of cocking guns, their barrels filled with lead.

"What're you trying to pull?" he growled his hands clasping and unclasping in agitation. The man chuckled again looking over his shoulder; he fingered something in his hand.

"T-That…poker chip…where did you?"

"Why. I just want to play an interesting game this time, Luxord. Your life or mine, you determine your own fate…you could've become so much more, instead you didn't. You stayed here, this disgusting castle, where everyone fends for themselves, in there no unity in this organization?" the man said angrily. He didn't know what to say, that chip…something about it, made his head hurt, oh so bad. A hand went to his head.

"Fine…I'll play your game, you fool."

"Wonderful…shall we deal?" they both sat at opposite ends of the table, he gasped as black leather bands wrapped around his feet, waist and neck.

"It's all part of the game, Luxord. I thought you liked taking chances?" the man smirked from under his hood. Luxord growled. Why…why were his hands shaking.

"You're not very good at your poker face, I'm surprised…"

"Shut up…"

"What with having no emotions and all, you still express them like a well trained dog. Never missing a mark to show off your acting to the world, just to fill that empty void you once called your heart."

"I said shut up and deal!" he yelled back, his nerves getting to him. The atmosphere around the man was calm, cool, collected. Yet he, he felt nothing of the sort chaotic, hot, his eyes darted to the cards as the man dealt them, he turned them over, smirking a bit. He tried to put his hand under his chin, but no longer was he able to. He could only move a minimal amount of his arms he fiddled with the cards, looking up at the relaxed composure of the man in all black. He heard a the click of a gun trigger.

"AH!" He cried out in pain as he looked at his cards, now splattered with his blood. The man laughed, eyes gleaming from his hood.

"Oh so sorry! I forgot to warn you about this little game we're in. You see…if you get a bad hand, you get shot. More to lose that way, wouldn't you say?" He was panting, his chest was wet from the wound, and he winced looking down at his cards. How did he manage…to get a bad hand? Was he slipping?

"NO! I'm the gambler of fate! This…this is wrong!"

"TAKE A GOOD LOOK AT WHAT YOU REALLY ARE!" The man slammed his hands onto the table; the lone poker chip flipped effortlessly into the air, and clinked to the table once again.

"You're nothing but a fake! All of you! You don't deserve to live! Nothing matters to you but destruction and your own personal gain! Gambling with the lives of others, disgusting. Take a good look at yourself, Luxord." He looked, his image reflecting on the tables smooth clear surface. Nothing but…

"You're nothing but a shell now…number ten." The man with silver hair replied as he looked down at the bloodied, new nobody that had just come into the world that never was.

"B-But…how…how can this…"

"Stop dwindling on the past. There' s nothing left for you out there." The man made a sweeping gesture to the abysmal darkness surrounding them. He edged back a little as the black floor seemingly was being swallowed by the darkness.

"Then…what's the point?" he looked up with hollow eyes. His green ones met orange, burning fiery orange, nothing he'd ever seen before. This man, his presence….it was over powering, he didn't like it one bit.

"Come. There is much work to be done. Help me regain Kingdom Hearts, and in return…I shall give you that which you seek most…" His cold pallid hand went to his stiff, dead un-beating chest.

A heart?

He gasped snapping out of yet another past memory.

"Time flies past you and you don't even see it. From the moment you died and came here, time has done nothing but remind you…curse you, turn you into that which you disgust." He couldn't say anything, it's like his tongue nor mouth would move. He gripped the armrests of the chair, another shot. He winced, feeling the warm liquid roll down his torn arm. He held his cards with a shaking hand, blood seeping down into his gloves.

"H-How do you…"

"Know this? My dear Luxord…I know everything about you. It's so blatantly written on your face. Ha! Just like an open book, exposed for the first time, clean crisp pages." He felt the man's cold finger trace along his cheek, cutting into his skin, he tried to move, but no to avail. It sent a shiver up his spin and he looked up at him, dull eyes flashing angrily.

"Yes! THAT'S IT! Where has it gone?! Why is it missing from all of you?!" the man slammed the golden poker chip onto the table, he turned his hooded face to Luxord and outstretching his arm, he indicated the blood drenched table and cards that lay upon it. But that chip…that was the one thing that caught his eye, never-ending spin of the wheel…roll of the dice. What did it mean?

"You know what it means, Luxord. Open them. Open your eyes to the truth…" the man whispered in his ear, another shot, and he gasped, coughing up blood as he did so. He panted, looking dully at the table. The black coat man standing by his side.

A young man about 15 or so walked into a casino he flicked, with ease, a golden engraved poker chip into the air. A patch of hair was growing between his chin and lower lip, giving him the air of someone much older, yet…he was but a child in an adult world.

"Ruldo!" the boy looked back at another young man waving to him from a table. He smiled, a big grin plaster on his face as he sauntered over, tossing the chip up and down. His crystal blue eyes glimmering in the casino slot machine lights. He sat next to his friend, the other men at the table smirked.

"What're you kids trying to pull, huh?" Ruldo smirked shrugging as he slapped the chip onto the table.

"T-THAT'S A 1 MILLION DOLLAR CHIP!! Where'd you get it you little thief?!" a man asked grabbing the boy by the collar.

"He didn't steal it!"

"It's alright, Knox." Ruldo said looking at his black spiky haired friend, his black bangs falling over his troubled eyes.

"How about we play a little game, hm? Then we'll see who's good enough for this chip, eh?" The group of angry adults looked at one anther smirking.

"Fine. Lets give the kid a chance to make a fool of himself at least." Ruldo smirked, flicking the chip into the air and snatching it out of the air and slamming it on the table, his eyes beamed with a blue radiance only seen when in his environment.

"H-HOW?! How did we lose to a measly kid like you?!" They'd been playing a heated game for about an hour now, everyone in the casino was watching, surrounding the table in amazed gambling frenzy. Ruldo smirked.

"You can keep it though…I don't need the money to prove anything for me. Just this lone chip." He held up the golden poker chip, it glinted in the casino lights. A man growled, the same one from before.

"Little pretentious bastard! Didn't your parents teach you anything?!"

"Unfortunately my parents are long gone…unlike yours."

"YOU LITTLE!"

"RON! Stop! Hitting a child won't do anything!" the man's friends held him back, his brown eyes glaring at the boy, standing there, smirking.

"Ruldo…you sure that was a good idea?" Knox asked as they walked out of the casino. He shrugged.

"Oh well if it wasn't, they wanted a game and they got one. Fate determined the rest." The young boy next to him laughed, his blue eyes turned to him.

"You actually believe in that fate stuff? You're just damned good, man." Ruldo barked a laugh next, ruffling his friend's hair as he did so.

"On the contrary! Any of them could be as good as me if they just put their heart into the game!" Knox paused.

"You think I could be as good as you?" Ruldo stopped turning back to his friend.

"Anything you set your heart to you can achieve, Knox." A flash of black a cry of pain, screaming, who was it that was screaming so much?

"NO!!!" Black. Desolate black abyss before him, the clear table was all that was left.

He looked at it dully, eyes never turning away, he felt numb…emptier then before, why? What where these memories supposed to do?

"You see it now…you lost…lost that one thing that made you truly great." He looked down at the cards in his hands his eyes widened.

"N-No…how…how could I?!" the man slammed his hands on the table again, pointing a gloved hand at Luxord.

"You lost everything Luxord! Everything that made you, you! There's nothing left for you in this world anymore…nothing but a meaningless existence…you bet too much and now, now you need to pay up. So. That makes it three for three, doesn't it?" Luxord heard another loud bang; he cried out, fire erupting on the left side of his face as a bullet grazed his cheek, blood splashed to the floor in a crimson tide. He panted, left eye closed, staring with his right, blazing blue.

"Wha…what are you?" He whispered his lung collapsing from his earlier wound. The man just smiled, teeth flashing in Kingdom Hearts light.

"I'm all that you lost…I am all that you suffer, I am…" he removed his hood. Luxord's eye widened.

"N-No! IT! YOU! It can't be!" he snatched at the straps around his body, the guns on the wall cocking. He struggled to get them off; the man snatched the chip off the table and turned to leave.

"Where are you going?!" He cried out. He just turned, hood now on once again.

"Do not use emotions you empty shell of a being. It disgusts me to see it."

How could he lose?! Why!!! This wasn't supposed to happen! It didn't make sense, and yet…he felt at ease, his chest no longer throbbed, no longer ached for that which was so close, and yet, so far away. The clocks ticked louder it seemed, his breath coming out in gasps and his body shuddering with the pain of the multiple wounds. He looked at the man in the coat a single strand of hair falling into his line of view.

"You're…just…like…" Luxord managed to say, the man whirled around, slamming his fist into he wall causing a crack and plaster to fall onto the carpeted floor.

"DON'T SAY ANOTHER WORD!!" The man yelled.

"Your time is up, Gambler of Fate. You tried to out run time, but time out ran you, you…lose." Luxord's eyes widened, he turned to see the man opening the door, light from the hallway, spilling into the room. The light…where had he, oh yes that's right…when his body was being torn to shreds, he saw that light so faint and in the distance…and yet, he never flet its warmth, on his skin maybe but never, inside. He felt it now…It's so…warm. He closed his eyes for a second, realizing his true fate, then.

"NO! NOT YET! This isn't how!!! THE LIGHT! I finally felt it it's…so…" the man slammed the door shut blanketing him Luxord in total darkness. Luxord's pleas drifted through the door to an inattentive ear. He smiled.

The light…it's left me…again.

The loudest of all the gunshots ricocheted off the castle walls, filling ever nook and every space of its structure. At first a frown, and then a shattered mask to cover that porcelain face. A silver stream of tears ran down the left, unexposed side of his face, he looked at his shaking hands.

"ARRRGH!!!" He slammed it into the wall, clutching it to his chest afterwards. He slid down the wall, head in his black-gloved hands.

The pencil in his hand snapped in half.

"Ugh…" his hands ran through his silver hair, eyes tearing in response to the agony in his chest and throbbing in his head. He slammed his hand onto his desk, the multitude of books jumping into the air. He growled in annoyance orange eyes flashing in anger.

"Why…WHY DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING?!" He yelled to an empty barren room. He knew these feelings weren't real, weren't supposed to exist for them, and yet…they did. Something, something wasn't right. He looked at the broken pencil the pain and throbbing now stilled. He stood there, unmoving, hands underneath his chin. He looked up as the sound of a bang erupted throughout the castle. His orange eyes narrowed in trepidation. Why was he so wary to move out of this room? He looked down, surprised at his shaking hands.

"Wh-Why...why are they?" he stared at them dully, and then stood up, opening a portal and stepping thorough with mild speed and agitation. Something was definitely amiss, in the castle that never was…

What is time?

But a wake up call to all those too weak to see for themselves.

Time stands still for no one and yet, we created such a thing.

What is its purpose? Why…why does it all come back?

How much longer will we have to wait?

Time will only tell.

You cannot control that which you cannot see. Fate. Destiny. It all comes together in the end.

Why do we fear death? Why do we linger on the past? The deeds already done? There must be something more…something better then this. Life between heaven and hell.

A constant push and pull of the hands of fate.

Time is of the essence…time we do not…

Have.