and everyone comes back
Everyone is dead now. Demyx, Saix, Zexion, Vexen--they're all twelve dead and gone and buried, and so are the rumors, the whispering, and Ansem himself. Heart attack eight years ago.
The only ones left now are Axel and Naminé, and that means Roxas is dead and buried too.
But he's not gone like the others. Even dead and lacking much of his corporeal body by now, he won't break his promise to Naminé. So he hangs around and scares people and throws things around now and then because he's still mad at Axel for shooting him.
"I did it to save you," Axel tells him when another door slams itself shut before he can get into the room. "If you knew what working here was like, you wouldn't be throwing hissy fits all the time."
"He won't listen, you know," Naminé says as Roxas turns sullen again, like he was when they first showed up at Oblivion. "All he knows is that you killed him. I don't think he's heard anything you said to him after that."
--I'm sorry--
"He's listening," Axel corrects her. "He just doesn't care anymore. About me, anyway."
Roxas gets smug, and Axel almost hears him say Damn right, bitch.
With crossed arms and smirking mouth and lightning eyes.
-
Something changes one day, either Wednesday or Tuesday or Saturday, and Roxas is restless but not irritable like he usually is. He's probably reminded of something, like Axel is every day--when he's not reminded of something just by being in Oblivion.
He never understood why Naminé bothers to stay when her parents would have welcomed her back home after going missing for at least a year.
Axel found Riku's blindfold once, somewhere on the second floor where it was probably lying since ten years ago.
Nobody asked questions when Riku came to work here, out of the blue and with no explanation other than "Ansem told me to work here." It wasn't their business, and frankly nobody cared as long as he didn't screw up too much.
They also don't ask why every one of his customers are either redheads or brunettes, never blonde or blackhaired. Axel notices, though, and he accidentally-on-purpose strikes up a conversation about it.
"Keep that up and people are gonna be dying their hair to get noticed by you," he grins brightly.
"Is that a warning?"
"No, just an observation. Miss them, don't you?"
"Don't screw with me, Axel."
"Can and will--I'm a redhead." The grin widens as he motions to his own fiery-red hair. One shade brighter and someone's eyes are gonna burn.
Riku's sea-green-blue-eyes narrow defensively.
"I really can't blame you for your hair fetish--I bet they'll be lookers in a couple of years. And you're not too bad yourself, you know; I say you grow your hair out."
"Thanks for the compliment," Riku says bitingly. Then he leaves.
The memory stops there because Naminé is opening the door and three familiar-but-different figures come inside.
Roxas jerks like he's been shot again, and Axel can see why.
Standing in front of him, nonchalant and talking with Naminé as if he didn't feel the house get shot, is Riku.
The one who got out.