This delay was brought to you by a broken heart, a shellfish allergy, and Final Fantasy XII. My apologies for skipping a week!

Chapter Six: Sweet Emotion

Thursday morning dawned, finding Riku bleary-eyed and confused in the backseat of Axel's Firebird. There seemed to be a strange absence of his bed, seeing as it was only a half-hour past six, and therefore Way Too Fucking Early. He sat up and looked around, surprised to find Kairi half-asleep in the front passenger seat, a Venti caramel macchiato clutched in her hand like a lifeline. Axel, however, was wide-awake, singing along with the music under his breath, thankfully aware that the world did not need to be graced with his musical talents at Way Too Fucking Early in the morning. He was further surprised to realize that Axel's prized Ghetto-worthy speakers were playing Journey of all things.

"What th' hell?" he said drowsily by way of greeting, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.

Kairi yawned, sipping her macchiato. "That's what I said. Early bird here decided that we should try and catch the worms. Here." She handed him another Styrofoam cup. "Double chocolate chip Frappuccino with an espresso shot."

He took the cup as though it were the Holy Grail filled to the brim with the Elixir of Life. "I love you."

"I know," she replied, her words distorted by another yawn. "Now prove it and put on a shirt. The duffel bag's in the floorboard."

Riku looked down and noticed that he was still in his pajama bottoms, suddenly very thankful that he hadn't opted to sleep in his birthday suit, which he had seriously considered. The duffel bag was filled with mostly Axel and Kairi's clothing, and Riku wound up holding his breath to squeeze into a pair of Axel's freakishly skinny jeans and somebody's old band t-shirt. He didn't bother looking at the name, deciding he really didn't care either way.

"So," he said after the caffeine had finally reached his brain. "How'd you get me in the car?"

Axel glanced at him in the rearview mirror. "Carried you, dumbass, how d'you think?"

Axel, apparently, was still not in the best of moods. Riku was glad that he wasn't Demyx at the moment. Of course, he was usually glad he wasn't Demyx, because Hawaiian shirts were not his thing, but at this exact point in time, Riku was extra glad. Axel's rage was not to be taken lightly. Especially when he was playing Journey on the radio.

With that final line, the rest of the ride seemed doomed to be spent in silence and contemplation, and a good, long nap on Kairi's part, mostly due to Axel's lumpy couch and a late-night Lifetime movie marathon. Riku slipped into a stupor of sorts, resting his head against the window's cool glass, his hand mechanically lifting every two minutes or so to bring the life-giving caffeine to his lips. Axel sang along with Journey under his breath, out of tune and off-key, mimicking the guitar riffs with quiet wails.

At a quarter past seven (still Way Too Fucking Early), the Jeep passed them.

Riku let out a yelp, the Frappuccino went flying – all over Axel's leather seats, might he add – and Kairi shot awake with a loud and slurred, "I wanna be Jesse's girl!"

"Was that…?" Axel asked, slightly in shock.

"It was," Riku replied. "Gun it."

With those two simple words, Axel's bad mood lifted away like a hot air balloon out of control in the middle of a hurricane. A Cheshire Cat grin graced his face as he reached over, pushing a button to flip CDs, and his foot met the floor. The sounds of AC/DC filled the car, and Riku leaned forward, eyes on the Jeep not so far ahead.

"Oh God!" Kairi gripped the little pocket in the door, the one that has no real name (like the dangly thing in the back of your throat), her other hand still holding her coffee. "What the hell's going on?"

"We have the worms in our sights," Axel replied, zipping around a silver Malibu.

"Good job, early bird," she said, still looking as though she'd rather be anywhere else than in any car that Axel was driving. "Please don't get us kill- ohmygod!" She lurched suddenly to the side as Axel swerved into the next lane, following the green Jeep and narrowly missing colliding with a Prius. Riku's cell rang and he absent-mindedly grabbed it off the seat beside him, watching the Jeep up ahead and glad that he wasn't in the shower for once.

"He-"

His polite, mandatory greeting was cut off with a rude (and loud, because Riku had apparently accidentally hit speaker-phone), "Call your damn porcupine off!"

After nursing his poor, abused ear, Riku opened his mouth to reply when he was once again interrupted.

"Did the cleaning fairy just call me a porcupine?" Axel demanded, turning the radio down and swerving after the Jeep again, causing Kairi to yelp.

"…Did he just call me the fucking cleaning fairy?"

"Well, you did work wonders in Riku's kitchen, honey," Axel replied. Riku felt his stomach do an unsettling acrobatic trick as he followed the Jeep and nearly went off the interstate. "You put Martha Stewart to shame."

"Oh, I hope to God you catch us," Roxas growled in reply. "I can't wait to castrate you."

"And you'll use Pampered Chef to do it."

Riku debated burying Axel in a suit or in concert swag, and began mentally writing his eulogy. Kairi was making deals with God under her breath.

"Listen, you son of a-"

"My mother was an amazing woman with a great vocal range!"

"- if you don't get off of our asses right now –"

"And what a fine ass it is, going by the pictures I've got here."

Silence came from the phone. Apparently, Axel's last comment had shocked Roxas speechless. Riku was going over tombstones and funeral costs in his head.

"Listen, blondie, you can't outrun my Firebird. Pull over and I'll take you out to breakfast." Axel was grinning in a way that Riku had never seen before and, frankly, it was scaring the hell out of him. "Or, hey, drive to your favorite place and I'll follow your lovely ass there. I'll even buy, baby."

"Follow this, asshole." The line cut off at the same time that the Jeep suddenly cut across the median of the interstate, four-wheel driven trail-rated superiority coming into play. Riku watched it zip away in the opposite direction with a sigh. Kairi was digging in her purse for the small bottle of rum she kept on hand for days like these. Axel was still grinning.

He leaned back in the seat, slowing down and punching the CD player for Aerosmith. He caught Riku's eye in the mirror. "Well," he said, "I think I'm in love."

Kairi passed the bottle to Riku.

They stopped for breakfast at a Cracker Barrel in some interstate town along the way. Kairi managed to slip the rum in and mixed it with the coffee she ordered when the waitress wasn't looking. Axel was still grinning, and Riku was pretty sure that he was probably never going to see Sora again.

"We should still go on to Springfield," he said. "They were headed that way, and they'll probably turn around the next chance they get, thinking they'll throw us off."

Axel shrugged, still grinning and looking more and more like an idiot as he twirled his butter knife in one hand.

"You really think we'll be able to catch 'em today?" Kairi asked. She poked at a biscuit, her appetite for breakfast still struggling to catch up with them. It was probably lost somewhere on the interstate, left in the dust of Axel's driving. "They'll be watching out for us now. Be hard to sneak up on them."

Riku's appetite, on the other hand, had somehow managed to keep up. His eyes flicked from weird historical decoration to the waitresses milling about, hoping one of them was bringing his blueberry pancakes soon. "It'll be like a game of tag."

"Only we're adults – and I use the term loosely – and we have a much bigger playground than when we were kids." Kairi sipped her coffee and blinked at Riku, as though he hadn't thought this through at all and should be better with his comparisons. In Riku's defense, it was only somewhere around eight o'clock in the morning – still Way Too Fucking Early.

"I like tag," Axel threw in. Riku and Kairi glanced over at him and found him grinning dreamily at an ad for some soap from a hundred years earlier. "Hm… wonder what Roxy'll give me as a prize when I catch him?" The smile turned positively lecherous.

"…Oh my god, he wasn't kidding," Kairi said in disturbed wonder. "He's really fallen for the cleaning fairy."

"It was one phone conversation. This is lust," Riku corrected her, scooting away from Axel, just in case whatever strange thing he had was contagious.

The secretary smiled at him. "Of course it is, dear."

"Love at first sight is overrated and nonexistent."

"I agree. However, this was love at first insult, and is therefore much different." She sat back in her chair, cup held in her hands, condescendingly smug smile on her face.

Riku shook his head. "That's warped."

"It's got a certain charm to it." She took a sip of her coffee, blue eyes roaming around the room. Suddenly, she sat up straight, placing the cup on the table. "Well, look at that. Our friends decided to join us for breakfast."

The tone of her voice managed to pull Axel out of his fantasies of introducing Roxas to the many uses of maple syrup and he glanced toward the door. His good mood promptly hopped on a horse and waved goodbye heading for the hills in search of greener pastures. Riku simply wondered how much more harassment he was going to have to put up with.

"Red, Little Red, Riku. Got a gig tonight, saw your car, thought we'd stop in and say hi!" Demyx sing-songed, grabbing a chair from a nearby table and pulling it up to theirs. He sat down backwards, folding his arms over the back of the chair, and pushed his sunglasses up to the top of his head. The blonde that followed him pushed them back down, causing him to scowl in annoyance. She took the seat beside Kairi, throwing her arm over the back of the chair and effectively cutting off all means of escape.

"So we're graced with your illustrious presence again, hm?" Kairi said, smiling like she didn't know what they were here for. "And it's been awhile, Larxene! How goes the quest?"

The other girl rolled her eyes. "I swear to God. If I ever see another man again, it'll be too damn soon."

"Aw, what about us?" Demyx asked, smiling again.

"The term 'man' implies masculinity," Larxene replied.

Demyx grinned in response to her smirk. "Well, you've got enough for all of us, so it's okay."

She ignored him and glanced over at Axel and Riku, who didn't seem to share Demyx's joking mood. "Wrong side of the bed this morning, Red?"

It should be noted that Axel hated that nickname with every passionate fiber of his being. And, although he was rather skinny, he did have a lot of fibers in his being. A good number of them were passionate as well.

Thankfully, Riku answered for him, thereby saving him from doing something stupid that would probably have ended in his precious Firebird being blown sky-high. "What the hell did my car ever do to you?"

Larxene laughed, highly annoyingly and matching the malicious gleam in her bright green eyes perfectly. "Hey, you weren't in it, were you? And here I was, being thoughtful!"

"She hated your car, man," Demyx said, snagging Riku's coffee and taking a sip. He shuddered, making an odd face, and reached for the add-ins. "Don't worry, Red, she loves yours." He took another drink of Riku's new and improved coffee, nodding his approval.

"Fantastic," Axel replied, though he was secretly thankful. His Firebird was safe … for the moment.

"So what brings you all to Springfield, huh?" Larxene asked as the waitress brought the trio's food and took down the other two's orders, putting it onto Riku's bill.

"Shopping," Kairi lied easily. "I dragged my two favorite bag-holders with me. Thought it'd be nice if we all just took a day off and bought me new shoes." She took a sip of her spiked coffee.

"Are you super-excited or something?" Demyx asked, resting his chin on his arms. "A hundred miles an hour is a little dangerous, Axel… You nearly took off my headlight!"

Riku had a bad feeling about where this conversation was going.

"You see," Larxene went on for him. "We saw your little stunt on the interstate today…" She rocked back in the chair, black overcoat swishing the floor and one combat boot pushing against the wooden bar underneath the table. "Was the warning yesterday not enough?"

Her hand tightened around Kairi's shoulders. The redhead took a long, deep drink of her rum-laced coffee.

"It was a complete coincidence," Riku said, feeling Axel's arm brush his as he reached into his pocket for the lighter and hoping the redhead could keep his mouth shut long enough for him to lie convincingly. "We saw 'em in the Jeep and Axel ran with it." He suddenly looked at Demyx strangely. "…A Prius, Demyx?"

"Okay, see, here's the thing." Demyx was still smiling at him, scaring him in a completely different way than the one that Axel had worn earlier. "You 'ran with it' and ran our target off the road and into the other lane of traffic. And now, we get to go back and report that we lost them. Because of you. And my Prius is-"

"Now the good part is that we won't get blamed for it," Larxene continued, not really caring about Demyx's headlight or the fact that he drove a Prius. "You will."

"Okay, wait," Axel said, holding up a hand. His expression was an odd mix of confusion and holy-crap-you-ate-my-mother type of annoyance. "I was under the impression that they were working for you."

Larxene laughed again. It was really starting to grate on the nerves of everyone present, including Demyx, if the falter in his vaguely goofy smile was any indication. "No, no, no… Not anymore, anyway. But that's classified info that you're not getting out of us, and you, my dear little heroes…" She leaned forward and had the audacity to tap Axel on the nose. He looked as though he would have liked to chomp her finger right off, no matter how disgusting black nail polish tasted. "Well, you're practically in the same boat, aren't you?"

Kairi finished off her coffee, blinking before she turned her gaze coolly to Larxene. "So you stopped by to tell us that it's our fault you don't get to kill Roxas and Sora today?" She took a bite of her pancakes, though Riku was pretty sure that there was a stone in her stomach that made it hard to swallow, much like the one in his. "Really, you don't think we were expecting that? And yes, I know that I've probably signed my death warrant. But you're not going to kill me today either. Dogs like you don't hunt without the proper commands, do you?"

Demyx gave her an easy smile. "Yep, you've got the big bad wolves pegged, Little Red."

"No, today…" Larxene patted her shoulder, one of her claw-like nails accidentally grazing the side of Kairi's neck and drawing a thin line of red. "Today we just get to have breakfast with you and chat like old friends. Tomorrow we'll kill you. Just you, of course, we still owe them." She made a dismissing motion with one hand toward Axel and Riku, very nearly hitting the former in the face.

"Actually," Demyx said, one hand untangling to reach for the cell phone clipped at his waist. He flipped it open and studied it for a minute before looking at Larxene. "Change of plans."

Riku felt his heart stop and plummet downwards in his chest as Kairi's fork stilled and Axel tensed beside him.

"No breakfast or chatting for us," he said, standing and pushing his sunglasses down again. "We've got other things to take care of."

"Ta, boys. Good luck with your shopping, Little Red. You really should splurge on yourself, darling. It's not every day you get to pick out the perfect dress to match your coffin." Larxene stood, patting Kairi's cheek a little harder than necessary, and walked past Demyx to snag the waitress and ask for a to-go box. Demyx paused as he was leaving, glancing back at Kairi. Then, he looked back at Larxene, almost thoughtfully.

"For the record," he said with a smile, "if we can't find you, we can't kill you."

"What's that, Demyx?" Axel growled. "Growing a heart?"

The blond turned to him, still smiling, but it was hard to tell just what kind of smile it was when his eyes were hidden behind dark sunglasses.

"Nah," he said. "I don't dedicate songs to dead girls."

He strode off without so much as a goodbye, though Riku had to admit that he wasn't too worried about how rude Demyx's exit was. They were silent as they watched Larxene and Demyx vanish around the corner, black overcoat contrasting with bright Hawaiian print. Finally, Kairi looked down at her pancakes again, and sighed. Riku and Axel, on the other hand, hadn't even bothered to pick up their forks.

"Fuck," Axel said. "I don't like tag anymore."

"I hated it back in kindergarten," Riku replied. "You always pushed me down when you tagged me, jackass."

"It was your fault. I don't know how yet, but I'll think of it later." Axel pulled out the lighter, now that Larxene and Demyx were gone and couldn't ask him where his cigarettes were (though he had the sneaking suspicion that they already knew, the nosy bastards). "So what now?"

"Careful, we're in non-smoking," Kairi warned half-heartedly. "I'd rather not get in more trouble, thank you."

"Do you see a smoke? There's no smoke. Just fire." He stared at the flame for a moment before putting it out and clicking it back on. Lather, rinse, repeat. "Happy fire."

Riku averted his eyes, digging into his blueberry pancake (complete with blueberry syrup), having decided that he was going to eat it if he had to pay for it. "Here's what I'm thinking. Axel and I aren't about to be murdered anytime soon, so-"

"What about maimed?" Kairi interrupted, twirling her fork and watching it strangely. It appeared that the coffee had finally kicked in. "The bitch never said anything about maiming. She could still maim you."

Riku set down his fork again slowly, trying to banish the gruesome images from his mind, replacing it instead with dancing puppets and David Bowie music – that always seemed to calm him down somewhat. "Yeah, well… Anyway," he went on, "You're going to have to go on the run anyway, so why don't we just go ahead and jump the train to hell?" She continued twirling her fork. "Kairi. Eat, you lightweight."

She looked down again. "Oh, goodie. A last meal."

"Why not?" Axel sighed. "I've never been maimed before. Could be fun."

"I doubt it," Riku replied. "But cheer up."

Axel was quiet for a moment, alternately watching his lighter and Kairi. "…Hey, gimme your phone."

Immediately suspicious, Riku's hand covered his cell protectively. "Why?" he asked, eyes narrowed.

His partner was the picture of innocence. "I thought of a way to cheer myself up. Now give it."

Reluctantly, Riku handed it over, only to snatch it back a moment later when he heard Axel murmur, "Phone-sex time, my dear cleaning fairy… What the hell, man?!"

"We already have one homicidal blonde after us." Riku shoved his phone into the pocket on the opposite side of Axel. "Do you really want another-" He then found himself being conveniently interrupted for the third time that day by his cell phone ringing. Glancing down, he stared at the number for a moment in bewilderment before answering it cautiously.

"Hel-"

"I don't want to talk to you, Ito," Roxas said, annoyed already. Interruption number four. "Put the other one on. And do you realize that you're wearing a Rick Springfield shirt? Although Sora says you look good in those tight jeans of – ow!"

Riku looked down at his shirt and swore. "Damn it, Kairi!" She just waved her fork in his direction as an apology. Roxas huffed, annoyed again. Did he ever sound not annoyed? "This is going to blow up his ego, you know. And you're going to get hit on multiple ti-"

"Roxy?!" Axel made a grab for the phone, which Riku surrendered easily, mentally marking a fifth tally for the interruptions, deciding to buy all of them each an Emily Post book for the next holiday.

Assuming he lived that long, of course.

"Miss me, baby?" Axel asked. There was a pause as he grinned, which Riku assumed meant that Roxas had insulted him. "Aw, so you called just to cheer me up? It's flattering that you're keeping an eye on me. That overprotective streak is adora- They did what?!" His hand slammed against the table, knocking over his mug of coffee and causing Kairi to look up from her pancakes in alarm. "…Oh my god."

By now, Riku was pretty sure that the three-word phrase was the mantra of their lives.

"What's up?" he asked.

Instead of replying, Axel shot up from the table and dashed out the door, phone still held to his ear. Riku and Kairi looked at each other.

"You go," Kairi said, scarfing down her food. "I'll pay and box it up."

Riku nodded and followed his partner out of the restaurant, ignoring the curious stares from the other patrons. He found Axel standing in the parking lot, staring at his beautiful Firebird, a look of sheer horror on his face and the phone still held to his ear. There was a single round bullet hole in his back window, seemingly the cause of his shock. What struck Riku dumb, though, was not the fact that the side of the car had been keyed, nor the large dent on the driver's door. No, what shocked Riku into speechlessness was the pair standing right by it, one on the phone and the other looking at the Firebird in wounded awe.

"My baby," Axel finally muttered, sounding as though he very well might cry. "My poor baby…"

"That's just…" Sora shook his head, horrified at the scratch running down the side. "That's just wrong."

"It's a car," Roxas said into the phone, like Axel wasn't standing right there. "Now get the fuck in it so we can get the fuck out of here before we die. I really don't want to die."

Slowly, as if in a trance, Riku walked over and tapped Sora's shoulder. Slowly, the brunet managed to tear his eyes away from the poor car and look at him.

"Tag," Riku said, pretty sure that the fates or the gods or whatever ran the world was finally working in his favor. "You're it."