A/N: I think I promised someone I would update soon… About a year ago. *huge sweatdrop* Sorry for being a terrible, lying person. Here's Saix's POV, who may also be a terrible lying person, but he's my second-favorite to write anyway. (Van's first, for the record.)
This is a more pleasant experience than I expected. I've glimpsed Axel and Xion a few times, and aside from Axel's utter lack of ice skating skills, their date appears to be proceeding without difficulties. And more importantly, without an excessive amount of romance. That is, as much as I can observe from a distance. It's impossible to hear from so far away, especially with the incessant chattering of other couples, friends, and family units crowding the ice rink, and then of course there is Jasmine's own conversation. I expected this to be the place where the situation would drift into discomfort, but she can be… amusing, in her own way.
"…I thought nothing of Belle bringing Adam over to study with us, but my father…" She shakes her head with a light chuckle.
"What about your father?" I ask, attempting to disguise my lack of attention at the beginning of her story. While not irritating, it's somewhat difficult to balance between listening to her and keeping an eye on my sister.
"He practically begged poor Adam to date me!" Her laugh holds an overtone of exasperation. "And in front of Belle too."
My mouth twitches into an ironic smile on her behalf. "And I thought my father was…" 'Pushy' isn't the right word. Possibly 'insistent'?
"Ready for you to fall in Love at First Sight and be married in the morning?"
"No." My brow furrows. This isn't a conversation I expected to have tonight. I certainly hope she isn't planning on marrying me in the morning. "I think mine would simply like me to… be more social, I suppose." I also have the theory that he wants the Knight line to remain intact, and no one is counting on Vanitas for that. But that isn't something I would like to discuss either.
"Lucky." Jasmine adjusts Aqua's jacket on her shoulders – I had let her borrow it on our way out of my house. "I don't know why my father's so desperate. I still have my whole life to find someone."
"Precisely," I agree, somewhat stunned at the similarity of our thoughts. For all the trouble she's gone through to tease me, is she truly uninterested in a romantic relationship right now?
"Not to dash your hopes," she adds somewhat ironically. Her skating pace slows. "But I'll be honest, I partially wanted to go out with you to get my father off of my back."
Oddly enough, I can't help smiling – frank honesty is something I can appreciate. Especially when it absolves me of romantic responsibility. "I understand."
"Also partially because you're cute," she adds with a smirk and a shrug. Regardless of her intentions, I am not used to receiving compliments, and even less so from girls. The warmth in my face is purely from confusion. "And I doubted you would be crazy enough to attempt to propose on the first date."
Between Axel, Vanitas, and various others who throw out off-the-wall comments, I have learned not to be too fazed by unexpected comments. This doesn't always work when it comes to Jasmine, but I've adjusted to her enough tonight to, as Axel would say, "roll with it."
"You are not incorrect about that," I reply. "Thank you for your honesty." That makes one of us… how would she react if she were aware of my true purpose in brining her here?
She smiles and bumps me with her elbow. At least it's on purpose and not because she's falling, unlike Xion's experience with Axel so far. I hadn't realized my best friend had never been ice skating before – I've never gone with anyone outside of my family until today, but it would have saved Xion some trouble if I had.
"My pleasure, Kitten Eyes."
"I never gave you permission to call me that."
"I never asked permission," she replies teasingly. I believe I could add that to her list of reasons for going on this date; much like Axel, she seems to enjoy teasing simply for the sake of it. "But I'll ask something else – did you have any other reason for going on a date with me? Or did you really just want to show me how fun you can be?"
"I cannot guess what gave you the impression that I am fun," I can't help accenting the word, simply because no one has ever applied the adjective to me. Besides, it draws the attention away from her true question.
"Well, I thought you were going to show me." She twirls on her skates, so she's skating backwards but facing me.
"Perhaps—"
A burst of upbeat classical music interrupts from my pocket. Recognizing the riff from "Future Masters," I answer immediately, hardly taking note of Jasmine's quiet, disappointed sigh.
"Father?" He knows I am on a date; he wouldn't bother me if it were not urgent. I try not to picture the worst case scenarios.
"Have you seen Vanitas?"
The skaters behind nearly crash into me; thankfully, Jasmine pulls me to the edge of the rink and out of their way.
"Is he not with you?" Why am I surprised? Father sighs.
"No, he is not. I've searched the whole house and property. I will check with Aqua as well before I call the authorities." The unspoken 'again' hung at the end of his sentence.
"You haven't called Aqua yet?"
"No. I remember him being here while they left, but it is possible that I'm wrong."
I recall the extraneous noises I thought I heard on the drive here. This really will be a long night. "I will handle it, Father."
"Thank you, Saïx." I can feel the relief in his voice, the weight lifted. I've always thought myself trustworthy, but I realize now how much he relies on that trust. "I apologize for the inconvenience. Truly."
"It is not a matter of convenience. He is my brother, and therefore my responsibility." Especially if he stowed away in my car as I suspect.
"Just know that your efforts do not go unappreciated," Father says before ending the call. I stow my cell phone back in my pocket.
"What was that all about?" Jasmine asks. I sigh – I should not have expected this to progress smoothly. I sneak one last glance at Axel and Xion, but not long enough to process what they're doing, so there isn't much of a point.
"I sincerely apologize, Jasmine. I won't be able to show you anything fun after all."
XXX
"I don't know, this is pretty fun to me," Jasmine says some time later, after we've investigated the arcade and spoken to a few of the employees, one of whom ranted about losing two black-haired kids who had been running about unsupervised. Apparently one was a boy, but one was a girl, which I accepted skeptically. Vanitas would rather take a bath than play with a girl – one who wasn't his sister, at least.
"Maybe he wanted to go on a date too," Jasmine replies playfully when I muse aloud.
"I highly doubt it. He still believes girls have 'cooties.'"
She suppresses a laugh, which tries to escape as an amusing snort. "Well, if all else fails, this date was worth it to hear you say 'cooties.'"
We search the bathrooms and the concession area, but we don't discover any clues until we reach the stairs to the balcony level.
"What do you think this is?" Jasmine asks, squinting at the carpet, which I hadn't thought to inspect. I crouch beside her. The tough, thin carpet looks gashed, like…
"Could it be claw marks?" I can't see how that would be connected to Vanitas, however. He may have brought Flood, but vicious as the blue hamster is, it isn't quite big enough to make marks this size. "But claw marks from what…?"
"How about a rabbit?" Jasmine asks, and my brow creases in puzzlement.
"I suppose if it were a rather large rabbit, but—"
Without warning me beforehand, she places a hand under my chin and tilts my head towards the top of the stairs, where a rabbit is twitching its ears and tail, as if sensing something. I blink, and it bolts away.
"Come on!" Jasmine takes off after it.
"I don't see how this is—" She takes my hand and practically pulls me up the stairs, with more strength than I expected.
"You're the one who's supposed to be a werewolf," she teases, "don't you want to hunt rabbits?"
"Not particularly." I roll my eyes. However, we need to search up the stairs anyway, so I don't protest the red herring.
As it turns out, a different red herring appears soon afterwards – a small girl in a pastel blue dress runs in front of us. She exhales heavily, bracing her hands against her knees as she rests. Unfortunately, I note, she doesn't have black hair.
"Oh, it's no use." She sighs, more to herself than to us.
"What's no use?" Jasmine asks before I can ask the child's name, or what she is doing up here without supervision. I am aware that it's a busy night for the employees, but that's no excuse for the parents not watching their children. Then again, Vanitas is off causing havoc somewhere, so I shouldn't speak.
"I can never hold onto that rabbit," the girl answers Jasmine.
"You shouldn't attempt to hold wild animals," I inform her with disapproval. "You could contract a disease, or it could injure you."
"That's true," Jasmine adds in a kinder tone, crouching down to be more on her level. "Why would you want that rabbit, anyway?"
The young girl, after smoothing out her dress, stands straighter. "You'll find me silly if I tell you."
"I don't know," Jasmine smiles warmly, "I've done plenty of silly things myself."
I snort, remembering our first meeting, but otherwise I add nothing to the conversation. Dealing with children is not my area of expertise, regardless of my interactions with Vanitas. Or quite possibly because of those interactions.
"Oh, alright." The blue-dressed girl lowers her head, as if anticipating ridicule. "I dreamt of a similar rabbit once. In my dream, he led me down his hole to a place called Wonderland."
"And because of that, you think it's safe to–?"
Jasmine silences me with a hand over my mouth. Why has she made a habit of touching my face? Is she like this with everyone?
"That sounds like an interesting dream- may I ask your name?"
"Alice."
"That sounds interesting, Alice. I love dreaming, too, but we still need to be careful in real life. If you get hurt, you won't simply wake up. Do you get it?"
Alice's face flushes pink. "I understand."
"Are you here all alone? Is someone watching you?"
"My sister… but she isn't very fun…"
Jasmine glances in my direction, as if she'd like to drag me into this. No, thank you. "I understand, but I'm sure she still cares about you. In fact, I bet she's worrying about you right now. Would you please go find her and make sure she doesn't worry?"
Alice nods guiltily, then curtsies, as if Jasmine were a princess who has made a royal decree. "I will."
"Thank you very much."
In any other circumstance, I would have escorted Alice to her guardian personally. However, in this case, finding Vanitas requires more immediate attention.
"Oh," Alice pauses halfway down the stairs, "I nearly forgot. I met a rather curious boy earlier. Do you think someone is worrying about him?"
Jasmine and I share a look.
"Yes," I answer. "I believe someone is."
XXX
Vanitas sighs huffily, leaning against the balcony railing. "Look, Aqua's holding hands with that loser now. How is that even fun?"
A girl whose black hair is matted with – is that candy? – swings her legs underneath the railing, an act nearly as dangerous as Axel's and my adventures so long ago, when we would eat ice cream at the top of the Fountains. However, we weren't small enough to slip under any rails… well, maybe Axel would have been. I don't believe there were rails there to test that theory. Either way, that is in the past, before I developed common sense and an understanding of the laws of gravity.
"I'm kinda glad Ralph looks like he's having fun," she says. "He doesn't get out much."
Vanitas turns to her. "You mean you usually have him all to yourself? Lucky. I have to share alllll my siblings, even Saïx. I never thought he was going to get a pretty girl…"
Jasmine stifles a giggle, but doesn't stifle it sufficiently. It's difficult enough to sneak up on two children with the limited cover that the balcony offers; the sound alerts them. I speak up before they can process her noise.
"I should have known you would be spying."
Vanitas jumps up, pale as the ice below. "How did you–?"
"Father is not pleased with you."
I expected him to run – he always runs when in trouble. I did not, however, expect the girl to grab his hand, nor for them to practically teleport away when I blink.
"Where did they go?" Jasmine asks, rubbing her eyes. The balcony is entirely devoid of children. But then where-?
With a sickening lurch in my stomach, I lean over the railing.
"Saïx…?" She doesn't look for herself. I don't take the time to let her; I'm darting back to the rink, so quickly I could have caught the white rabbit had I wanted to. Yet I know I won't be quick enough to catch my brother's fall.
Vanitas, you had better be alright – you will be alright, or so help me I will –
I will ponder that later.
