Flame and Steel

"Be careful Lea" Sora said. Lea nodded as they parted ways. She to the underside of the Guild Castle and them to the upper levels.

Lea ran into the dungeons. She could feel the presence of a magical being inside one of the cells and some kind of damper on it. She cursed. Her mortal senses were not as sharp as that of a Nobody. As Axel, she could have gotten into this place easily and broken le Fay out in a flash. But now…

Lea noticed that there were a few barrels of gunpowder stacked in the room she had walked into. A storeroom of some sort. With a mischievous grin, she rolled the barrels out of the door and into the hallway. She threw a chakram and created a spark. An explosion of fire filled the hallway. Lea could hear screams of Bastion Knights and other prisoners inside the dungeon.

"Ahhhhh! Help, fire!"

"We're gonna burn in these fucking cells!"

"Shut up! Find out where that fire is coming from!"

"(cough, cough!) What's (cough cough!) happening?!"

Lea went to the side of the smoke and flame that filled the hallway. She headed to another one of the storerooms. She hid under a table as several Bastion Knights and Swordsman Nobodies ran in to fill buckets with water. She then used the time they were gone to gather more gunpowder to fill her pouches.

"That's an interesting hobby, Axel. Collecting gunpowder pouches. I would think the Flurry of Dancing Flames wouldn't need to do that." A voice drifted in from the door. Lea spun around to see Nexumair standing there, his six sword scabbards buckled on his back. He was smiling, but like all Nobodies, the smile didn't reflect any real emotion. Nexumair began to walk around the large dungeon storeroom. "Hmmm…so you're a Somebody now Axel? Could this be the first time you've betrayed the Organization's trust?"

Lea uttered a small laugh. "Now that's the pot calling the kettle black" she said.

Nexumair shrugged. "Are you talking about Xemnas and my knowledge of his plan?"

"Whether you know about his madness or not, is not the matter at hand here!" Lea said.

"Then we should have no problems" Nexumair said. "During my time as number thirteen, I have accomplished more than Xavier and Roxas combined in help to the group."

"Yes, but you're betraying us---betraying them from the inside."

"Yes, them" said Nexumair. "You are no longer one of us, Axel."

"My name is Lea. And I don't want to be one of you anymore. Being immortal and powerful is nice…but what's the use if you have no emotions to feel with?"

Nexumair shook his head. "We Nobodies are superior to humans. We are the closest there are to gods in this universe."

"There aren't any gods!" Lea said.

Nexumair shook his head and sighed. "No, but there are the dead." He drew one of his sabers with lightning speed. "You are one of them, Axel!" he lunged forward.

Lea dodged, and Nexumair's sword buried itself within the stone of the wall, cracking the stone. The Confident Fencer pulled the blade effortlessly out of the wall. "Hmmm" he said. "It's too bad. Without your Nobody powers, you are reduced to having to use gunpowder to create an explosion or fire. But if you're trying to dodge my blades, you can't do that, can you?" He attacked again and Lea dodged again. The saber's silver blade nicked her bare arm, causing blood to spray up in the air. Clutching her arm, Lea faced her enemy. Nexumair smiled again. "Unfortunately for you, I can see the sound and light barriers and cross them. You're too slow to create fire Lea. But surely you, the wonderful Flurry of Dancing Flames realized this by now!" he ran forward again, a blur too fast to be seen. Lea jumped over the boy and threw a pouch of gunpowder down, followed by a chakram. The spark touched the gunpowder, enveloping Nexumair in an explosion. It blew out threw the back walls of the storeroom and through the hallway, killing several people. The blast tore into another, empty dungeon. Lea picked herself up off the storeroom floor. She groaned. She picked up her chakrams and stood looking at the holes she had blown in the walls. Suddenly, her breathing stopped as she saw a figure emerging from the last hole. The smoke cleared to reveal Nexumair, his clothes and hair singed, but otherwise unharmed. There was a small, harmless red burn on one of his arms. He smiled and leveled two of his swords in the en garde position.

Lea growled to hide her fear. Sweat trickled down her face and it was not from the heat of the explosions. This was going to be harder than she expected.

Donald shot a Bastion Knight with a blizzard spell, knocking him down. That was the last one of them.

"Now we've gotta find Tron before Nexumair find us" said Goofy. "But where's the computer room?"

Goofy had a point. The Castle had changed since they had last been there a year ago. "I don't know" said Sora. "What do you say we just go into every room we find until we find the right one?"

Donald was about to say how stupid that was, when Sora smiled. "Just kidding!" he said. "I wouldn't do something like that."

"Don't kid around like that!" Donald said, jumping up and down. "We've got a serious situation to deal with---" he was interrupted by a loud boom! and all the lights went out for a moment and then turned back on.

"What was that?" asked Goofy.

"I think Lea's keeping Nexumair busy for a while. We've got to find Tron and fast!" Sora said. He took off running before his friends could respond. Donald and Goofy took off after Sora. After a while the three of them stopped at an intersection in the hallway.

"Which way now?" asked Goofy. "Everything looks the same!"

"Ohh, I wish they hadn't redesigned this place" Donald muttered.

"Well, there's no use complaining about it now" said Sora. He ran down the left side of the hall.

"Wait for us!" Donald cried as he and Goofy pursued the Keyblade Master once more.

Lea leaned against the wall, panting. Her face was cut in several places, and so was her torso. Her arms and legs were bleeding with various wounds as well. A flaming pile of wreckage that had once been a finely established section of the Castle dungeons lay before her. Please she thought. Please, let that be the end of that little bastard. I'm so tired. I don't think I can---

Suddenly the flames went out and an explosion of flame shot up from the pile. Nexumair appeared, his clothes torn and singed and his face blackened with ash…but he simply shook his head. "All you will gain from such a pathetic attempt is death, Axel" he said. "I always wondered how powerful you were to have gained a place like number eight, but…" he surged forward faster than Lea's aching muscles could react, running her through the stomach and nailing her to the wall. She screamed in agony, blood trickling from her mouth. She had destroyed most of his swords during their battle, but she had forgotten that he had one left.

"But I see that you just joined in the order that your number suggests. You know Axel; you really should have been a little more subtle about your intentions. Such pathetic ambitions can easily be seen through. I guessed your motives as soon as you thought of them. You would never have been Superior anyway, even if you got the whole Organization to rise up against Xemnas. The group would never allow a Somebody to command them."

"I…didn't want…to be…Superior…" Lea choked out. "I was…I was doing it…to stop Xemnas…from absorbing Kingdom Hearts…for himself. I owe it….to Roxas…and to all of them…"

Nexumair shook his head. "Well, you can tell them how you feel when you get to the Underworld, Axel" he said. "Tell Demyx that I always did sort of like his sitar playing!" he pulled the blade up, cutting into Lea's organs. She shrieked, the trickle of blood coming from her mouth becoming a gush of red water. Lea's head snapped back and hit the wall. Through the terrible pain she began to imagine things. She could almost see a white light beginning to gather in the corner of the room. Then she blinked. There was a white light in the corner of the room!

So this is how it is Lea thought. I'm really am dying. The white light is starting to cloud my eyes…but then the light separated into three pixies. The Gullwings. The three of them were struggling with a round, wrapped object that was almost too heavy for the three of them to hold and still fly at the same time. Nexumair turned to them in impatience. Then his face smoothed and he smiled. "Oh, hello you all" he said.

"Wha…what's going on?" asked Rikku, looking at the destruction and the bloody girl who was speared to the wall.

"Oh that" said Nexumair. "I caught the arsonist who's been setting the fires all around the dungeon." He moved the sword a little further.

Lea clenched her teeth to keep from screaming and muttered to Nexumair. "What about them number thirteen? How do you feel about them? They obviously respect you."

"I hate pixies" Nexumair muttered back. He left Lea stuck in the wall and walked over to where the Gullwings were. "Now" he said. "What's going on? Why did you come here?"

Paine looked at the small wrapped bundle. "We heard the fire and some of it spread into the occupied dungeons, along with the one that held the witch, Morgan le Fay. We realized that the Dawn Shard was in danger, so we---"

But Nexumair wasn't listening. The Confident Fencer was staring at the small bundle with an expression of horror and anger on his now pale and sweaty face. He began to tremble. "Y…you…you idiots…what have you done?" he choked.

"Captain, are you alright?" asked Yuna. The three of them floated up to the Bastion Knight captain's trembling body. "What's wrong?" Yuna asked.

"Are you hurt?" Rikku asked. Suddenly their questions were choked off as Nexumair grabbed all three of them in his hands and began to squeeze with all of his strength.

"C…captain?" Paine choked. "What…are you doing?"

Lea watched all of this in horror. Then there was a terrible squishing sound and the sound of small bones snapping as Nexumair brought his hands together. He stood his back to Lea, panting, his hands dripping with blood. "T…tha….that is why I hate pixies!" he snarled in anger.

Lea tensed every muscle in her body and pulled the sword out of her stomach. She groaned and fell to the floor, but it was a controlled fall. She snatched up the bundle. Slowly, Lea rose, the wrappings falling from the object. The Dawn Shard gleamed in Lea's hand, glowing with yellows, reds, golds, and purples---the colors of a heart. "This is it, isn't it?" she asked. "Ramenui's heart went into the Dawn Shard after it left him, didn't it?" she asked. "I guess his heart doesn't like what the rest of him has been doing all this time. Hurts doesn't it?" Lea grinned a very Axel-like grin. "I bet the pain's so bad you can't even move."

Nexumair didn't move, simply snarled, anger and fear twisting his face.

"Nexumair Nevy" said Lea as she took gunpowder from her remaining pouches and smeared it all over the Dawn Shard. "I wonder if this is how Xavier felt as he was lowered into the Kingdom Meter. All I have to say is this: Ramenui, I hope you can forgive me if I have to kill you a second time." She clicked the Dawn Shard against the wall, causing a spark. Fire flared over the Dawn Shard and Nexumair screamed as his body was consumed in flame. Lea did this again and again, until all that was left of Nexumair was a rapidly disintegrating heap of dark matter.

"Finally" she muttered and threw the Dawn Shard on the floor. She staggered away out the door and took a deep breath---and coughed up what had to be a pint of blood. "Got to patch myself up" she muttered as she clutched the wound in her stomach. She wandered into another storeroom and collapsed on the floor. "Ohhhh" Lea moaned. The room began to spin and whirl around her. "Damn….if this keeps up…" she whispered. And then all went black.

Well, now Nexumair's dead. I was trying to think of a way to kill him, and Axel seemed like the best man--er, woman---for the job. It's kind of obvious where the scene from this battle came from isn't it? Well, I don't own that either. But it was a great battle. Those who don't know what the heck I'm talking about, think FMA.

---Mechanist out!