AN: …So this is probably the last chapter I'll update before school starts. But I'm excited about this one. You won't be, you've been warned. This is gonna piss all of you off, I'm sure. But I don't care how many threats I get, the beginning of chapter 20 is already written and I'm keeping it the way it is.

This was a very hard chapter for me to write and to type, but I'm very happy with the end results. The beginning is a bit slow because I was still working through my writer's block. But the ending…the ending is everything I wanted it to be.

WARNING: ONE SERIOUS CLIFFHANGER

Word Count: 3,455 (the most I've ever written for this story, I think)

*EvilScotsman: I kind of worked in "Find out who your friends are". I know it's not the right story, but I fit it in anyway cuz it worked. And it's a very small line, "…what's in it for me, or this is too difficult…' Yeah, if you listen to the song, there's a resemblance ^_^

Chapter 19 – He Doesn't Look a Thing Like Jesus

Cloud really did force me to go to the hospital, where I avoided questions like I had a dirty secret. And I did. Whenever you say you used to do drugs the doctors only look at that, so I failed to mention that tiny tid bit. I simply told them I was drugged and raped. After a ton of indecent poking and prodding, many needles, some stolen blood, and a sucker that I forced them to give me, I walked into the waiting room.

I pulled the sucker out of my mouth and waved my and above my head in greeting, "I played my part. Ice cream time!" I informed everyone.

Cloud looked at me expectantly, "Axel, what happened?"

"What happened with what?" I stuck the sucker back in my mouth as I sat down next to Roxas.

"What did the doctor say?" Roxy asked me with his blue eyes full of concern.

"I'll be getting my blood test back in two weeks, all of the instant tests were negative, I should report the rape, and apparently I'm a child because I wanted a sucker. I don't think the doctor liked me." I answered Roxas. "So, ice cream, yeah?"

"Are you going to report it?" Sora asked.

"No."

"Why?" Cloud, Leon, Riku, Sora, and Roxas all asked in shock. Ah…so ignorant, my friends, so ignorant.

"There are many reasons, why don't we talk about it over ice cream." I said trying to make it sound exciting. Why anyone would choose to sit in a hospital over ice cream was beyond me.

"Fine, let's go." Cloud responded and we followed him out of the waiting room.

oOo

I couldn't imagine why Axel would want to protect Xemnas so I was incredibly curious as to why he wasn't going to report the rape. However Dad beat me to the questioning after we all sat down with our ice cream at a large round table.

"So why aren't you reporting it?" Dad asked in a disapproving tone.

Axel swallowed and extremely large spoonful of his strawberry ice cream, how the hell he didn't freeze his head off, I'll never know, before answering. "Firstly, the cops in this town suck, secondly Xemy has a cop friend who'll conveniently loose the papers, we live in a seriously fucked up town. Thirdly I've reported him before, and thanks to the previous reasons, nothing good came out of it. And being practical, the only evidence I have is my bruising, I'm a man, I'm an ex junkie and my record show that, and it's my word against his, I lose." He explained and shoved another unbelievably large spoonful of ice cream into his mouth.

"You could be an inconvenience to him, though." I suggested.

"Yes, I could do that. I could be a fly on his watermelon, but he'll just smash me into the juices and laugh as I drown in the sweet nectar I thought I wanted."

"That was colorful." Riku commented.

"Why, thank you Riku, the point Roxy, is that no matter what I do to him, he has more power." Axel finished as he started licking the last bits of ice cream out of his bowl. It was pretty damn cute if you ask me. When he successfully cleared his bowl, he stared hungrily at mine. I smiled and pushed my bowl of chocolate ice cream between us. Giving me a thankful grin, he shoved his spoon in.

"But who's smarter?" Leon asked.

"Well I am, in some ways. Neither of us went to high school, well Xemnas did put he dropped out. And Saix made me get my GED." Axel responded.

"So, maybe if you outsmart him, you can beat him." Riku continued Leon's thought.

"Yeah, I've thought of that and I've been thinking of a plan."

"Oh, what's the plan?" Dad asked.

"Think of a plan?" A wide grin filled Axel's face.

"It's going that well?" I joked.

"Well, Xemnas has friends in high places. Who do you think the mayor gets his drugs from? He hasn't corrupted the police chief, as far as I know, but he's got a few of the other cops supporting him. It's not easy to find a weakness in someone who has none."

"No one has no weaknesses." I said.

"We can ask Zexion. He's pretty good at reading people, being that he's a shrink and all." Axel suggested as he finished my ice cream.

"Yay! We're going to the music store!" Sora exclaimed, throwing his arms in the air and causing his shake to splash all over us, and a sheepish smile covered his face at the dirty looks he was getting from everyone. Well almost everyone, Axel was smiling as he started scraping the ice cream out of his hair. Then his eyes met mine and his smile turned wicked. It was sexy but I'd be lying if I said it didn't make me a little nervous. Then out of nowhere my sight was blocked by a mess of red hair and felt my face get warm as Axel poked his tongue at my ice cream covered cheek.

I had to close my eyes and suppress a moan when I felt his lips and tongue moving down my face. I reached my hand up to dig into Axel's somewhat sticky hair, and then I heard my dad clear his throat. My eyes opened reluctantly and I attempted to push Axel away when I realized where we were, and who we were with. But he didn't budge he just smirked against my neck and continued his delicious actions. "Axel," I tried to make my voice strong but it sounded more like a desperate moan, "Axel, we're in an ice cream shop, there's kids around." Axel's lips kept antagonizing my neck, slowly lapping up all of Sora's ice cream.

"Axel, he said to stop." Dad said. Axel pulled away from me with one final lick, and I dropped my hand from his hair at my father's words.

"He didn't actually tell me to stop Cloud. He just informed me of our location. He must have thought I got lost in those lovely sounds he was making." Axel smirked as Dad scowled at him.

"He's got a point Cloud." Leon commented with amusement.

"Aww…Don't worry Cloud, I was just helping him clean up that sticky mess. Something you failed to do for your honey." Axel pointed at Leon, who was using napkins to wipe him and Cloud clean. "See, he's still all sticky." My dad shook his head and grabbed a few napkins.

I smiled when I saw that Sora had bought a bottle of water and was sitting in Riku's lap, gently dabbing the ice cream off of Riku with a wet napkin. Both had loving smiles on their faces as they stared into each other's eyes. It was sweet. I was really happy for him; happy that my brother was happy and that he had Riku. Then I turned to my dad, who was attempting to get the ice cream out of Leon's hair. They were also, staring lovingly into each other's eyes. It could make anyone envious, seeing two people who cared so deeply for one another. Who wouldn't want that?

Then my gaze turned to Axel. He was looking at me somewhat confused, but his eyes, they were filled with love and devotion; love and devotion to me. I smiled at him before I crawled into his lap and hugged him, juts to feel his love. When his arms wrapped around me I felt so content so loved that I couldn't imagine experiencing anything better. We embraced each other just to be close, to show our love with no ulterior motive, other than 'I love you, so let me hold you, because I want you near me'. Looking into Axel's adoring eyes I saw I had the same thing Sora and Dad had. We looked at each other the same way. I had nothing to be envious of because I had Axel, I had everything I wanted with him.

"Okay, let's go see if Demyx ever opened the music store." Dad announced as he and Leon stood. Sora jumped off Riku at the prospect of going to the music store, grabbed his boy friend's arm, and dragged him out of the ice cream shop.

"Your brother's so funny" Axel said chuckling. "Come on lets go." He finished by licking my cheek once more and helping me off of him. It was amazing to think that only a few months ago, it felt like my life was ending. Then that crazy red head forced himself into the living hell that was my life. He had no thoughts of what's in it for me, or this is too difficult, he just jumped into my life and pulled me out of the ocean I was drowning in. Now I'm the happiest I've ever been in my entire life.

oOo

"Do you know how much business I probably lost?!" Demyx exclaimed as he paced in front of the counter I was currently reading a book at.

Emerging from behind my book so I could meet the eyes of that lovely pacing man I stated, "I am aware of the percentage of business you lost, but Dem, you need to relax. It was only a few hours…"

"Only a few hours! Zexy, my emolicious lover, baby, it was not only a few hours. It was like five hours. I have a big crowd that come in on their lunch break. I missed that"

After getting over the 'emolicious' comment, which I scowled at him for, I processed the rest of what he said. "Dem, I know, but it was one day. It's not like you won't make it up. We both know you'll earn back that money. You and I are unbeatable business partners." Ah, finally, he was calming down and walking around the counter. As he reached me he smiled and climbed onto my lap.

"We're unbeatable partners, period." He said before placing a feathery light kiss on my lips. I put my book down and wrapped my arms around him. "I don't know what I'd do without you Zexy." He began to lean toward my face again, when the bell rang and he shot up shouting "Customers!...Oh, it's just you guys."

"Hey!" Sora exclaimed, in an offended tone.

"Do we really mean so little to you?" Axel joked as he and Roxas walked towards me. "Can we talk with you Zexion."

"Sure." I got up and led them to a table in the back room.

"You and Demyx haven't had sex on this table, have you?" Roxas asked as he hesitantly took a seat.

"Not…today." I smirked and Roxas jumped out of the chair like it was on fire.

"Sit down Roxas, they've probably had sex on every surface here. But Zexion, being the neat freak he is, his best friend is Lysol." Axel commented as he sat down pulling Roxas with him.

"Shut up Axel. Now what did you want to talk about." I asked as I sat down across from the happy couple.

"We were wondering if you think Xemnas has a weakness." Roxas asked.

Hmm…that was a difficult question. Xemnas love's no one, and no one loves him. That meant there was no person that could be a weakness to him. Not like Axel, Roxas was Axel's weakness. But at the same time, being surrounded by friends strengthens you. Axel has several friends, while all of Xemnas' friends are fake, with the right leverage, Xemnas could easily become friendless. Xemnas not only sells drugs, he uses them. Axel is sober. Though Xemnas is intelligent, Axel is most definitely smarter. And despite his thin frame, Axel is very strong. Xemnas has few weaknesses, that much is true, but Axel doesn't have many weaknesses either.

"I would say Xemnas' biggest weakness is his inability to love. It means he has no friends to support him. Another weakness would be his drug use." I responded to Roxas' question.

"He doesn't do drugs all the time though. He has to stay somewhat sober to do business." Axel interrupted.

"There's another weakness. You know Xemnas' schedule and habits. You know him Axel, but he doesn't know you. You remain a mystery to him because he never bothered to get to know you."

"That's a good point." Axel commented and it looked like he was deep in thought.

"I know, I made it." Roxas laughed at my words but Axel was still somewhere else. He has a tendency to seem simpleminded but contrary to that belief, he was quite the opposite. Had he been given the proper schooling he could even be in my shoes. Axel was most definitely a problem solver, and I found it rather interesting to watch him go through problems in his head. The problem was getting him to speak his thoughts out loud. "Axel!" I snapped my fingers, getting his attention. "What're you thinking?"

"Oh…um, this and that." He said in a distracted voice and Roxas gave him a look that said 'what the hell kind of an answer is that'.

"Elaborate please." I said.

"It's just…you're right. I know everything he does. I know that he gets up at two in the afternoon. I know where he does his business. I know what drugs he takes and when. I know how he'll react in most situations. I know him. That gives me a strong advantage. So I was just trying to come up with a plan. I can't allow Roxas and me to live in fear forever. The cops aren't helping us and I need to do something."

"I'd advise you against doing anything illegal, Axel." I warned him.

"Yeah, me too. I don't want you to go to jail." Roxas continued.

"And I don't want you to live in fear." Axel said with determination. "But I'll do my best to keep it legal. It's one thing for him to mess with me, I asked for it, but he can't touch you."

"The day I bought drugs from him, I was asking for it too, Axel."

"But you have the money to pay him. He doesn't have to…" He couldn't finish the statement.

"Okay we're all in agreement that we're going to try to keep this as legal as possible, right?" I confirmed.

"Yeah." Axel and Roxas agreed. We were silent for while before Roxas' stomach growled. I arched a brow at him.

"Hungry?" I inquired.

"Axel ate my ice cream."

"Axel!"

"He was a sharing. Zexy, why don't you take Roxy to go get us some dinner and I'll help Demyx out here, sound good."

"Yes." I said as Roxas nodded. "What should we get?"

"Roxy's choice."

"I think I want Chinese." Roxas decided.

"Hmm…that's not a long walk. Do you want to walk?" Roxas nodded in answer.

"Are you sure?" Axel asked.

"Don't worry Axel, it's not that far and Zexion will be with me." Axel nodded reluctantly. It seemed as though he no longer liked the idea he'd suggested.

"Zexion." He said seriously to me, "You watch him. Don't let anything happen to him. Got it memorized?"

"Yes Axel, you know I'd never let him get hurt. Come on Roxas." Roxas stood up and Axel pulled him into a loving embrace, kissing him like he'd never see him again.

"Would you stay? If I asked you not to go, would you stay?" Axel asked. I could read him like an open book. He was scared.

"Yes." Axel nodded at Roxas' response and let him go.

"Okay, get me something spicy." Roxas smiled at Axel and joined me at the door.

When we walked out of the back room, Roxas quickly joined his brother and father by the CDs and I joined Demyx at the counter. "Hey, Roxas and I are going to get Chinese. Axel's going to stay here and help you with the store, okay." I explained before giving him a chaste kiss, "See you soon, love you."

"I love you too, Zexy. And don't take too long, you know I can't live without you by my side." He smiled that beautiful smile at me and I walked away with an odd feeling. I couldn't shake the foreboding feeling that had decided to reside in my body as Roxas and I walked down the street, a path I had deemed safe. However Roxas' voice soon pulled me from my worried thoughts, while my eyes scanned the busy streets around us.

"So my dad, Leon, Sora, and Riku are all going home and we won't need to get them anything. I'm thinking I'm not gonna share with Axel this time. He's skinny but he eats like…" I whipped around to face Roxas when his words were cut off with a squeak. My stomach immediately dropped. Xemnas was holding Roxas around the neck with one arm and had a gun in the other. Roxas was using both of his hands to try to loosen the grip around his neck and both he and Xemnas were surrounded by the men who worked for him. He never travelled alone, that chicken shit.

"Hmm…I don't know you." Xemnas drawled, "But if you just walk away, I'll let you live. How's that?" He asked me. The terror in Roxas' eyes was tearing me apart. Live for Demyx, or save Roxas for Axel. I never had problems making decisions before. But this…how do you choose between that? I couldn't even think out another solution. I always had the answer, and I was rarely wrong. But no matter what I chose to do now, someone would get hurt, and I would be wrong. I'm sorry Demyx. I'm so sorry.

I've never lived on the streets like Axel. I haven't spent my life training myself to fight just to keep myself alive like Axel. I had a family to protect me, and a roof over my head. But I'll be damned if I don't try to fight for Roxas. I should've listened to Axel. We should've stayed behind. This was my fault and I promised not to let Roxas get hurt. And I was going to do my damnedest to do just that.

With all the power I could muster up in my anything but athletic body I leapt forward to try to save Roxas. I'm sorry Demyx.

oOo

"They're taking too long Dem. I wanna close up and go look for them." Axel said to me in a worried tone I'd rarely heard from him.

"Okay. Get the front door; I'll close up the back." I couldn't agree more with him. There was something screaming in me. Telling me something was terribly wrong. Damn my business, something felt wrong, and Zexion isn't by my side. He should've been back already.

Axel followed me as I ran down the streets I knew Zexion would've taken. My eyes were scanning every movement, every person I bumped into, ever dark shadow. They were creating images I never wanted to see. Then my mind began to reassure me. You wait and see Demyx, Zexion, your world, your life, your everything; he'll be in the restaurant. You wait and see. He's not going to leave you; he knows you can't live without him. He'll be there.

Then I turned around the corner and my heart stopped. A crowd was gathering. They were gathering around…I heard Axel gasp beside me before I ran, I ran as fast as my legs would take me to him. "No, God, please don't take him away from me." I screamed as I fell to the ground, tears streaming down my face mixing with the rain that had begun to fall. I pulled Zexion's body into my arms. "No, no, no, please God, no." I hadn't gone to church a day in my life. Honestly, I had a hard time believing such things, but if there was a higher power out there, I was begging, pleading with him to hear me. "Don't take him, please."

I kissed Zexion's unresponsive lips, feeling his labored breathes turn into nothing, "I'm…sorry…Dem." He whispered.

"No, no, you didn't anything Zexy," I wiped the hair out of his face and placed another kiss to his lips. "You'll be okay. You have to be. I need you Zexy, I love you." I held him, begging and pleading for him to be okay. I moved my hand over his body, searching for the wound, but I only felt his breathing stop. "Zexion, Zexion! Axel, he's not breathing." My body was shaking everywhere, my heart was being ripped to pieces. "Zexion!" I let out an anguished scream of my lover's name.

AN: …I'm sorry…Please don't stop reading. No matter how pissed you are right now, read Chapter 20 before you stop reading the story. I know what's happening right now seems awful, but it works for the story, and it will bring up some important issues. PLEASE DON'T STOP READING because you're a bit pissed at the moment.

I promise, I have already started Chapter 20, nothing I've already written for it will be changing, it's perfect as it is. And I will try to update it ASAP. It's my priority chapter right now cuz I don't want to leave this story here.

If you want to hear the song that brought me out of my writer's block and very, very, loosely inspired the last section of the chapter it is called "Painters" by Jewel. The specific line that inspired me was "No God, don't take him from me".

Thanks for all reviews, favorites, and alerts. I really do appreciate them, and please, please, read 20 before you give up on the story.