Old KH FANFIC Chapter 4: Tell Me, a kingdom hearts fanfic

Kingdom Hearts

The Untold Stories of Organization XIII

Chapter 4: Tell Me.

This was the first night that Axel spent to himself. Or rather, the first night he fell asleep, and woke up, alone. Whatever time Roxas had returned and left was beyond his knowledge. Still...the feeling was almost as hollow as being a nobody was itself. For the first time in three months since Roxas' return to the castle, he felt alone.

In the silence of their room, Axel lay sprawled on the upper bunk in nothing but a pair of shorts. Arms crossed behind his head, legs crossed over one another, his right foot tapped midair to the beat that drifted through his headphones.

After what he'd seen the previous night, when Roxas and Larxene had stood face to face before the Screen of Lost Memories, he knew for certain now.

Roxas wasn't just a kid anymore...it wasn't misconstrued feelings, it wasn't teenage hormones, it was sincere feeling. Sincere feeling that would space Roxas and himself further apart.

"Gah...no way..." he sighed aloud. "Roxas wouldn't just ditch like that..."

Would he?

No...no way. He was certain of it. Roxas was his best friend, they were like brothers. A woman wouldn't come between them like that, even if it was Larxene.

Larxene...

That alone brought another question into his mind. Larxene...though what he'd warned Roxas of before had been merely teasing, it was true that Larxene's history displayed little compassion compared to what she showed now.

Larxene had always been cold, dark, sadistic, and seemed to love nothing more than watching others squirm beneath her feet. Even when...Sora had entered castle Oblivion, his bout with her had been...vicious. She'd played with his mind, tormented him with false memories, then taken it upon herself to strike him down.

Yet...since her return to the World that Never Was, it seemed like...she'd reformed. In a sense, she was still the cold and dark Larxene, but her sinister malevolence had all but faded from her. And...the night before...it had seemed like everything they'd said to one another...all of it was sincere.

Down to the smile on her face, it was as if Larxene were no longer Larxene.

And Roxas...loved her.

"Jeez..." Axel sighed once again, rolling onto his side among the ruffled sheets. "This drama is too much..."

Clicking his music to a stop with the press of a button, Axel slowly pulled the sheets over his head and lay beneath the darkness of the empty room. Just one night to himself shouldn't get to him this much...that's what his mind repeated.

However...the vacant space that once held his heart said otherwise.

Roxas walked silently along the Hall of Empty Melodies, his eyes looking floorward as the silence embraced him. The night had consumed the day, though the darkness outside showed no difference. Pacing silently towards the crooked ascension, his mind was muddled with different thoughts.

Most dwelled on Larxene...thoughts that brought a smile to his face the more he thought about her saying yes. Tonight was a night to clear his head, to decompress from all the stress that had riddled him for the day. The emotion of affection, his longing to be with larxene was still a strange feeling. But...it wasn't unwanted.

What troubled him was perhaps his lack of confidence. In his life as Roxas the regular kid of twilight town, the false school memories had provided basic classes. Math, Science, Literature, Health...

A slight redness crossed his cheeks as he tilted his head further down. Though there was no one else around, the brief thoughts that phased over his mind were enough to make him hide his face. Quickly shoving them aside, he returned to his initial focus.

The only girl he'd ever talked to on a regular basis was Olette, and she'd never appealed as anything more than just a friend. Even if she'd been more, Olette and Larxene were on completely different levels.

"Man...I don't even know how to be a boyfriend," he sighed in defeat.

"You propose a relationship with Larxene and yet you hold no knowledge of what one does as a 'boyfriend'?" came a soft, light spoken voice from somewhere overhead, "You're certainly a strange one."

Roxas tilted his head up, reflexively backstepping from the sudden voice. Glancing upwards towards the ceiling with a currious expression.

Hanging upside-down above him, a novel in his hand, was the light violet-gray haired slender figure of Zexion, the Cloaked Schemer. His posture, aside from hanging upside-down from a balcony overhead, was relaxed and casual, though his eyebrows were peaked with a hint of curriosity.

"Ah...hey Zexion," Roxas greeted, taking a few steps back to glance upwards more comfortably. "What are you doing..?"

"I do believe that question falls more upon your character," the figure notioned plainly.

"I was heading out for some air..."

"And mulling over your own short comings," Zexion added.

"Right...that too."

With a trivially fluent motion, the figure fell swiftly from his perch, and peformed a circus array of midair flips before coming to the ground in perfect posture. Closing his book, and tucking it under his arm, he announced clearly.

"I, also, will head out for some air."

Roxas glanced at him questioningly at first, but soon set it aside. Zexion was...always unique, since Roxas had first met him all that time back. However, it was clear that Zexion was simply...Zexion, that this behavior was his natural attitude in a manner of speaking, and therefor nothing to be currious about.

Walking side by side, Roxas took a moment to further analyze the mysterious figure as they drew along Naught's Skyway. Zexion's appearence was that of someone young, who couldn't be much older than himself. Though he almost never appeared without his dark cloaked attire, Roxas had seen him only once dressed in a casual pair of ripped jeans with a tank top and sweatshirt over them. Obviously, Zexion was capable of normality. How far normality went with Zexion was still a debatable topic.

The two came to a stop atop one of the landings, a square shaped area in mid ascension that gave sight to both the city of darkness, and Kingdom Hearts. Roxas, first, let his eyes wander skyward, towards the object that still reigned as a mystery to him. Zexion, however, kept his gave upon the city.

"Something still troubles me, Roxas," Zexion admitted softly.

Roxas passed him a curious look, "Really? What is it?"

"You've known me for a while now, I'm sure, and you realize I'm perhaps the most intelectual of Ansem's apprentices. Therefor, when something inscrutable comes along, I am the one to defragment each and every piece of it until I understand."

Roxas gave a slight nod, following each hand gesture that Zexion offered in his speech.

"Yet...there's come to me a problem that I, myself, am unable to determine. And by being unable to determine this problem, I, myself, have become rather displeased."

"So...what's the undetermined problem?" the boy asked.

Zexion turned, and leaned his back to the balcony edge, "I know we gave a vague explanation about this when you first returned but...we all came back from the dead. Well, excluding you, we all returned from a point that none should particularly return from."

"Yeah...you guys told me about that."

"Well...I came to the conclusion that we seven were simply not 'completely' killed," he continued, "Though it's a final determination, it still bothers me that I don't know exactly how it is we're alive."

"Riku killed you...back at Castle Oblivion, didn't he?" Roxas interupted.

"Yes, he did," Zexion's tone faltered, "Why?"

"How do you...know what happened after you passed on?" Roxas asked in sincere inquisition.

"Ah, I had wondered when you would ask something along those lines," he gave a scholarly smirk, "My lexicon, the World Within. Even when I'm gone, it continues recording the annals of the World that Never Was. It recorded the fall of each member, in vivid detail, video and audio data as well. Upon my return, I annalyzed all that had happened after my passing."

Glancing up slightly, he crossed his arms across his chest with novel in hand, "Your original, Sora, managed quite a bit of progress. He destroyed the remaining organization members. Your skills mirror his, it's rather impressive.

However...in regards to you and your original, I come to my prior point of something that troubles me."

"Not just how you guys came back?"

"You never died, Roxas," he said flatly all of a sudden.

There was a pause in his notation, his eyes scanned over Roxas' face to seek an emotion to follow along. However, Roxas' face, for a first time, was unreadable.

"You're right...I never died," he agreed.

Zexion glanced away slightly, "You re-united with your orginal, you and Sora became whole again. Meaning, you regained your heart. So...based on what a Nobody is, being an entity without a heart, by rejoining with Sora you commited a form of suicide. When you reunited, you regained your heart, and in every respect, died.

And yet...here you are." Zexion concluded.

Roxas leaned his form against the balcony's edge, a sense of realization overwhelming him, "Yeah...you're right."

"What do you remember?" Zexion pressed with his words, curriousity taking the lead. "Tell me exactly what you remember, before you came to this place."

"That's the thing..." Roxas frowned slightly, "I don't remember much of anything. The last thing I remember is standing outside the castle. And the last thing before that is when I was on Destiny Island, right after Sora and Riku killed Xemnas. Namine was there...she was Kairi's nobody...and then...then I was back here."

"As I thought..." Zexion murmured, "well...that puts my mind at ease."

"Huh?"

The intelectual stroked his chin in an inquisitive manner, "We all have our memories...meaning we are us. I had feared that perhaps we were projection's of the Castle's memories, but it seems we truly are the nobodies we've always been."

Zexion slid his novel slowly into his pocket, turned casually to Roxas, and patting him gently on the shoulder in an attempt at a friendly gesture, "You've put my mind at ease, thank you, Roxas."

Roxas cantered his head in an uncertain gratitude at the remark, "You're...welcome?"

Zexion turned, crossed his arms behind his head, and gave a casual stretch. Then, he began decending Naught's Skyway with a sense of sleepiness. Arms swaying at his sides, head tilted down slightly with his eyes at a tired squint.

"I'd been losing sleep over that dilema, however your input had helped me get over it. I believe now I will bid farwell and farenight to you," he called from the decending slope of gray, "And as for your troubles with Larxene. She has accepted your feelings, a feat that I have never before seen in my life as Zexion, nor as Ienzo..."

And parting with that final notation, the cloaked schemer vanished into the chasms of the Nobodys' Castle. The dark chill of the night sky brushed around the silent Roxas, who stood with an air of confusion and uncertainty.

It truly was strange, that each would return to life in such a manner. And his return as well...did it mean Sora had become a heartless once more? If that were, would he not remember it?

Roxas gave a quiet sigh to the night, as he realized to his misfortune that he'd only increased the mental baggage that he'd hoped to cast aside. Still...something about Zexion's words had offered a certain comfort, though why it did such was unknown to him.

Whatever the case, he was alive once again. As for Larxene...he decided Zexion's final comment had been meant as a compliment. Without much left, and no more business to treat for the night, Roxas began walking back towards his chamber.

However...a dark figure sitting overhead atop a platform of roof had other plans for the young Keyblade bearer...