we're officially in M territory

Sora sat comfortably on the bleachers, watching the collection of children sprint across the gymnasium floor, bouncing and tossing a basketball between them. Their sneakers squeaked against the hardwood floor; someone tossed and scored.

He saw her before he heard her. One of the side doors opened and Kairi stuck her head in, her red hair shifting wildly as she quickly scanned the room, her eyes coming to rest on him. She smiled genuinely at him and he couldn't resist smiling back. She made her way over and climbed the bleachers.

"Hey," she chimed, coming to sit beside him.

"What's up?" Sora asked her.

"I didn't see you in the cafeteria, so…"

"Yeah," Sora turned his gaze back towards the basketball game, "I figured it'd be better if I came here."

A funny silence followed, neither knowing what to say.

Kairi cleared her throat. "Were you at that street festival the other day? Roxas said you were coming but you never showed."

"No," Sora said, "I got sick." It sounded unconvincing even to himself.

Kairi looked at him for a moment. "Well…" she chewed her lip. He noticed she had a habit of doing that, briefly wondering whether she might just be nervous more often than she let on.

"I wanted to ask you something," she said, her eyes darting down to the floor.

Sora nodded. "Shoot."

Kairi opened her mouth to speak. "Would-"

The bell rang. The kids around them sprung up almost simultaneously, some rushing down the steps and others choosing to hop over the bleachers, eager to spill out into the halls and indulge in six minutes of freedom.

"What?!" Sora called, straining to hear her against the multitude of shouting adolescents. Kairi shook her head, seemingly having given up on making her voice heard. Instead, she bent over and brought her lips to his ear.

"I'll ask you later," she said, and the sudden huskiness in her voice made his chest tighten. Kairi held her pose, one, two; Sora breathed and then she was gone. Lost in the crowd. He remained seated for a while, waiting for the stream of children to thin before leaving the gym.

Sora walked to his locker, navigating through the halls with the skill of someone with several years of accumulated expertise. In his case, that was mostly true. Sora stopped at his locker and fiddled with the lock, twisting it aimlessly, his attention drawn to the flyer posted on the neighboring locker. It looked more like a banner than anything else, white with a blue background, covered in aqua sparkles; big bold lettering declaring:

Riku's Winter Ball

Additional information covered the bottom. Sora stared at the flyer. Was it really December already? He tried to think back to when the color of the leaves changed, and realized there were no trees with which to make comparisons. He lifted his books from his locker and made for his next class. Time flies.

Keeping with infrequent tradition, he didn't immediately leave for home when the last bell rang. Instead he wandered down the streets, the sky darkening much quicker than usual. Or perhaps he just hadn't been paying attention. He thought about going down to the docks, something he hadn't been able to bring himself to do since he had met Goofy. The image of that tall, funny boy pointing to that spot in the river, the water rippling like someone had just fallen in, remained with him. In a way, it soured his image of the city just beyond.

No, instead he stopped at the park he had taken Kairi to. A day that, in retrospect, was not too long ago. Sora took a seat on one of the swings, rocking himself back and forth. He looked to the garden, barren after years of neglect, and tried to remember what it looked like before people stopped coming. He couldn't.

The darkness of the sky maintained a dull gray hue; it was probably going to rain. Sora began the walk home. Some crickets chirped and he heard a bottle smashing somewhere off in the distance. He flinched, his body tensing at the sound. Walking around at night, given what had previously occurred, probably not the best idea, he thought.

Sora came to his apartment without incident, but he stopped when he saw the front door ajar. He stepped inside.

His apartment looked like another one of Roxas's parties had been thrown in full force. The couch was overturned, the television smashed, kitchen appliances lying about the floor, one of the curtains torn from the window. Roxas was sitting in a chair at the kitchen table, looking dazed.

Sora took a sharp breath, taking in the ruined sight before him. "Roxas?"

Roxas jumped, his head snapping to Sora. "Oh," he visibly calmed.

"What the hell happened?" Sora asked, stepping over pieces of glass.

Roxas sighed and shook his head, he buried his face in his hands. "Mom," he mumbled.

Sora stopped and his heartbeat began to speed up. "What happened?" he asked again.

"I don't really know," Roxas let out a strained laugh. "Should I even ask where you were?"

"Roxas," Sora put his hands on his brother's shoulders and shook him. "Come on, man."

Roxas looked up at Sora, and Sora could see clearly the pained expression on his face. "She just barged in, I don't know. Screaming about whatever…I couldn't – what was I supposed to do?"

Sora stepped back and surveyed the damage. "What did she say, exactly?"

"I don't know," Roxas answered, "screaming about munny."

Sora felt glass crunch between his shoes as he moved into the living room. The sound was damning, and he suddenly felt hot under the collar.

"She didn't look good, Sora," Roxas spoke sullenly. "Really bad, I've never seen her like that."

Sora said nothing. He moved down the hall to his room. His mattress was untouched, the pouches of munny remained where he had left them. Roxas' room was torn to shreds.

"Sora," Roxas called again, his voice heavy with emotion.

"What?"

"We have to go after her, we have to…we have to – "

Sora looked at him, amazed. "Do you see what she did?"

Roxas nodded. "I know, but you don't understand. She looked sick, out of her head."

"When doesn't she?"

Roxas' gaze hardened. "Sora."

"She trashed our apartment. I'm serious, Roxas."

"She's not right," Roxas argued, "you didn't see her."

"No, but I have seen her," Sora bit out. "How are we gonna replace this?" he muttered, running his hand over the broken television.

"She's our mom, Sora. She could end up getting herself killed."

Sora breathed in deeply. "What do we do?"

"We find her, we get her help, like we should have-"

"And then what?!" Sora turned on his brother. "I'll tell you what happens, they take us away, separate us. Isn't that why we went to work for Riku? To prevent that?"

"I can get myself emancipated," Roxas said, "I'm seventeen, almost eighteen. We'd be okay."

Sora sighed, leaning against the overturned couch. "I just – I don't know."

"She's family."

Sora said nothing.

"You don't turn your back on family."

He dreamt of beaches and wide open spaces. Vague, cloudy images that popped in and out of existence. Flaming red hair and mouse ears. Water.

Roxas woke him up for school, though to Sora's eyes, it was his brother that needed to be woken up. With dark bags under his eyes and a pale complexion, it was clear that Roxas hadn't gotten much sleep.

It was Wednesday. The date the man who called himself Axel had prepared for a meet up. He had been given an address on a slip of paper, told not to lose it, and to arrive at the specified time. Sora felt his skin crawl at the thought. He wasn't sure if he would go through it, if he was actually capable of doing it. He questioned whether it all wasn't some big mistake.

He had placed the paper deep in his jeans pocket and left it there. Today he threw those jeans on. There was still time. There was always time.

They walked to school and it wasn't until English when he was thrown from his thoughts. He felt a finger poking at his cheek. He turned to the perpetrator in annoyance.

"Hey," Kairi said, her smile quickly evaporating into a thin wariness at his expression. Sora hoped he didn't look too peeved.

"Hi," he responded. Sora looked around the room; people had moved their desks together and were chatting amiably. He turned to Kairi, still looking at him with that ambivalent expression. He tried to smile and failed miserably.

"Sorry," he mumbled, looking down at his desk in shame.

"Hey," Kairi said, moving to catch his eyes with hers, "what's the matter?"

"It's nothing," he said.

"Come on," Kairi pressed, "you can talk to me."

Sora kept his mouth shut.

"You know, part of being friends is about trusting people, like, confiding in them," Kairi huffed.

Sora relented. "It's home stuff."

"Oh," she said, "well, do you want to talk about it?"

"Not really," Sora shook his head, "if that's okay."

"Of course it is," Kairi assured. She pushed her desk closer to his. "We've gotta work on this project, though."

"Right," Sora lifted a notebook from his bag. He opened it and stared at a blank page. "Uh…what are we doing again?"

"Part of the writing portion," she explained, "we've gotta write about our thoughts on the wave speech and compare them."

"Well, um…I haven't actually gotten around to reading the book yet," Sora admitted sheepishly.

Kairi looked at him, exasperated. "What have you been doing, exactly?"

Sora picked his brain for some kind of excuse. "I've been…kinda busy."

"Busy, huh?"

"Yeah," Sora nodded vigorously. "Look, I promise I'll read it tonight, okay? Won't stop 'till I'm finished."

Kairi looked at him with an odd expression that he couldn't quite discern. Her eyes seemed to glaze over.

"Kairi?"

She snapped out of it. "Huh?"

Sora stared at her. "You uh…nevermind."

Kairi turned to her work and neither spoke. Sora wiggled uncomfortably in his seat, unsure if he should be speaking or not. A thought occurred to him suddenly.

"Hey, what did you wanna ask me?"

Kairi looked at him, seemingly surprised. "What?"

"Yesterday you said you wanted to ask me something?"

"Oh…" Kairi looked away, embarrassed. "Well, I kinda wanted to see if…maybe you would…well…" she trailed off.

"You can just say it, Kairi," Sora said, unable to refrain from chuckling at her jumbled speech.

She tried a different course. "You know that party…the one Riku's having?"

"Yeah…" Sora nodded slowly. "The one that's pasted on every locker in the school?"

"Right," she confirmed, her voice dropped to a level barely above a whisper. "Do you think you could go with me?"

Sora almost recoiled from her, stunned at her request. "What?"

Kairi let out an anxious breath. "You don't have to answer me now, but just think about it, okay?"

"You do realize who you're asking, right?" he questioned, unsure if he had actually heard her correctly.

"Yes," she said. The teacher was prowling the rows, peeking over the shoulders of students to view their work. "I'll explain later," she turned her attention back to her notebook, scribbling hastily away.

"Uh huh," Sora slunk back in his desk. What a world.

"You look troubled."

"You always say that," Sora said smartly, watching Aerith as she settled into her big leather chair. Always the chair.

"Well, it's particularly noticeable today." They had gotten themselves into a routine and Sora could not help but find that they were well acquainted at this point.

"Yeah," he said, tapping his hands on the arms of his chair.

"Anything you'd like to discuss?" she asked.

"Well…" Sora looked around the room, his eyes darting from one location to the next. Aerith looked at him expectantly.

"I don't know," he shrugged, "my mom came home last night, made a big scene, shook Roxas up pretty bad."

Aerith considered this for a moment. "You never talk about your parents," she noted.

"There's not much to talk about," he said.

"Well, what are they like? How is your relationship with them?"

Sora looked at his hands, finding his fingers very interesting. "My Dad was never around…I've never met him, actually. Apparently he skipped out when he found out…found out my mom was pregnant...with me."

"Did she tell you this?" Aerith inquired.

"Roxas did. He would've been maybe one at the time…so who knows if it's true. But he swears by it…said there was a big fight…just up and left one day and then he was just gone," Sora swallowed.

Aerith remained quiet, allowing the words to linger in the air. "And your mother?"

"My mother…" Sora felt a sting in his eyes, "my mother's a drunk, a druggie, not really around much."

Aerith nodded. "What happened last night?"

Sora bit his lip, shaking his head dismissively. "I wasn't there, but she tore our place up real good. Roxas was there, said she was going off about this and that and then she just left."

He laughed derisively when Aerith didn't speak. "Roxas wants to go out and find her. I could barely keep him from leaving."

"Why do you think that is?"

Sora looked up at her, he felt the wetness gathering in the corner of his eyes. "He said you can't give up on family."

"And what do you think?"

"Me…" Sora chewed on his inner cheek. He changed tack. "She wasn't always like this, or so I've heard."

"What do you mean?"

"Roxas used to tell me stories. He would tell me how she used to…how she used to feed us, hug us, give us baths. He told me she would read us stories before we went to bed…"

Aerith listened intently, he continued. "That's what he tells me. I don't remember any of it."

"What do you think changed?"

Sora shook his head, staring up at the fluorescent light embedded in the ceiling tile above. "I don't know what changed. She just…lost her way, I guess."

Sora wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. "If family gives up on you…why shouldn't you give up on them?"

He held the slip of paper tightly in his hand and stared up at the large metal door. He had decided to go, after all, and meet up with Axel. The address written down had led him to Red Hook, by the docks, where there was a large collection of warehouses. Ostensibly used to unload shipping that came in from the south, it had all been abandoned years ago, courtesy of deindustrialization.

Sora stood uncertainly in front of the big metal door, one of the many that led into the numerous warehouses dotted across the long forsaken docks. Knocking seemed too formal, but he couldn't just barge in.

The answer to his question came in the form of a sharp, cool blade that pressed into the nape of his neck. He froze and slowly lifted his unbroken arm.

"Who are you?" a feminine voice demanded. Calm and collected.

Sora slowed his breathing. "I'm Sora. Axel sent me?" He held up the slip of paper, which was promptly snatched from his hand.

A few moments passed, and he felt the blade leave his neck. He turned and came face to face with a girl. Slick blonde hair and clad completely in a black robe, high heels, and armed dangerously with strange blue and yellow knives tucked firmly between her knuckles.

"Well, come on in," she smirked, and pulled open the metal door, revealing the inside of a warehouse, shelves stripped bare of all of its essential components. A single wooden table was placed in the middle of the room, with several robed figures gathered around it. They turned to Sora when sunlight filled the room.

"Sora!" he heard Axel call. "Glad you could make it."

Sora stepped into the room and walked up to the table and the people who sat at it. He was conscious of their stares. He suddenly felt very small.

"Larxene here give you a scare?" Axel asked, looking from Sora and the blonde girl with amusement in his eyes.

Sora shrugged, not trusting himself to speak.

"That's okay," Axel said, more to himself than anyone else. The others, three of them, said nothing, simply watching Sora.

"You know," Axel continued, pulling the robe from his head and freeing his spiky red hair, "I didn't think you'd actually show up."

"I didn't think I would either," Sora admitted. "But I have to ask…something."

Axel turned to his companions, giving them a mischievous smile, and then turned his attention back to Sora. "Shoot."

"What did you mean when you said Riku was on his way out?"

"Ah," Axel's smile turned into a grin, "that pique your interest?"

"I'm just wondering."

"Well," Axel leaned forward in his chair, "you know a bit about our operation, considering you were out there for a bit, am I correct in assuming this?"

Sora nodded.

"Then you understand that sometimes it's important to inject new blood into an old system."

"I'm not killing anyone," Sora interrupted sharply.

Axel's eyes widened. "I don't think I asked you to."

"I know – I – I just…I'm doing this for the munny," Sora sputtered, trying to place into precise words the odd sequence of events that led him to this moment.

Axel and the others just watched him and he felt besieged by their unwavering stares.

"No violence," Sora shook his head, "I'll sell your stuff, but I don't want to…I don't…" he struggled to break free from the confused thoughts that were being uttered aloud. "Nobody dies."

"Nobody dies," Axel repeated.

There was an uneasy silence. The others in robes shuffled and one of them lifted the hood from his head. His dirty blonde hair fell into his face, and his cyan eyes did not move from Sora's.

"This is Demyx," Axel introduced. "He's going to be showing you what to do. Do it quick, do it right, and you'll be compensated handsomely."

Demyx tossed a large plastic bag and Sora caught it, he peeked inside, holding it tightly to his chest. It was filled with a white powder. Sora remained rooted in place, mind urging him to move but matter refusing to do so. Demyx turned to look at him.

"What are you waiting for?" Axel's voice filtered into his head. "Go."

He moved towards the exit, Larxene following closely behind. He had just stepped out into open air when Axel called his name.

"Sora."

He turned his head and met Axel's gaze.

"Don't forget," Axel brought his hand to his mouth and twisted it, as if he were turning a key in a lock.

Larxene pulled the door shut.

Demyx took him around town with such speed that Sora could hardly keep up. There was a lot to sell off, apparently, because they cruised down empty streets and broken neighborhoods, passing through areas that Sora had never dared to enter before. Each time was the same, they entered some run-down apartment or a straight crack-house. Squalid dens of people, hollowed out and hardly capable of movement. Some unconscious, some splayed out against cracked floorboards and peeling walls. There was always someone there to receive them, to scoop white powder from Sora's bag and spread it around. There was always a sizable reward.

Demyx didn't say much, but he cracked an occasional joke or two with whoever they met up with. It was clear that this scene wasn't new to him, but somehow he seemed out of place, those who distributed their goods were certainly pleasantly surprised to see him. Sora figured that he would be doing this alone next time.

The night wore on and the weight of the bag decreased steadily. Soon it would be empty and he could go home. Already he had snagged a decent sum of munny. Sora checked his phone and was relieved to see that he had received no calls or texts. Roxas was used to it by now, thankfully.

When the bag had nearly emptied, they arrived at what Sora assumed to be their final destination. They had made the rounds, had come full circle, and were now not far from Brownsville itself. Sora was glad for this. The run down building they came to looked even worse than the rest, if that were possible. A dim light shone from the inside, but the rest was dark and the whole thing appeared shoddily constructed; like the thing was barely holding itself together.

They entered, this time there was no distributor to meet them. Cautiously, they stepped into the living room, and as expected there was a sizable collection of tenants. Sora stepped over them, disgusted by the sight. Demyx looked around, as if expecting something to pop out at them.

"Wait here," he said, holding out his arm. "I'm gonna look around."

Sora nodded and leaned lightly against a wall, hoping it wouldn't outright collapse under his weight. He gazed at the people around him. Thin and wrapped in worn clothing, many of them were sleeping, others stared vacantly at the world around them. It was a sorry sight to behold.

Someone gasped and Sora turned his attention to the center of the room. Someone was lying on the floor, a woman, he leaned forward, curiosity overtaking him. His eyes widened in shock and recognition.

It was his mother. Sora rushed from his spot and knelt down next to her. Her skin was sallow and her breathing shallow. He shook her.

"Mom? Mom?!" he shook her harder. Her eyes fluttered lazily, they were gaunt and empty.

Sora leaned down, his mouth next to her ear. "Mom."

She groaned in response, rolling over on her back but refusing to wake up. Sora sat down. He could hear the sound of Demyx's boots rattling the floor upstairs.

Sora looked at her, at the sweat that rolled down from her forehead. She didn't look well.

"I guess I shouldn't be surprised," he mused. Sora reached out and gripped her shoulder. "Can you

(love)

wake up?"

She murmured something in what was surely a drug-induced haze.

"What?" he whispered, moving his ear to her lips. "What did you say?"

"Just like your father," she murmured, turning her head from side to side, "rat bastard."

Sora pulled away and felt something sharp strike him deep in his chest. His mouth twitched involuntarily.

In a matter of moments her breathing had quickened, faster and faster, almost to the point of hyperventilation. Something was happening. Sora pulled out his cell phone. Something bad was happening. The sweat poured down from her face. All he had to do was call. Call someone, anyone, Roxas, an ambulance, anyone.

Sora flipped open his phone, his

(heart)

brain moving into overdrive, he moved down his contacts list and selected Roxas, all the while his mother continued to pant, breathing heavily and loudly, dominating the quiet discourse between sound and silence.

His finger hovered over the call button, hesitating, waiting, for what? For what? She gasped, croaking, her fingernails scratching against the ground. And Sora continued to wait.

Time passed. Time flew. How much time? He didn't know. Then it was over. There was no more breathing. Silence settled over the room again. He didn't hear Demyx coming down the stairs, didn't hear him approach from behind. Sora only heard his voice, piercing the veil of consciousness.

"Did you know her?"

His answer was unequivocal.

"No."