Chapter 3: Taking Trips

"Rex. I've been looking everywhere for you."

As he held on to her for dear life , afraid that she would leave again.

"Well here I am, Axel." Rexial responded. Axel noticed a sinister edge to her voice. That was odd.

He moved to pull away when he felt a sharp pain in his ear. The wave of agony caused him to inhale sharply and stagger backwards. Rexial's mouth was full of blood. She smiled in a creepy way, blood dripping off of her teeth.

Axel couldn't help pressing his hand to the area, but the sting was too great. He happened to glance down to see half of his ear laying at his feet.

"What the fuck?" he yelled. Rexial merely chuckled in response. Her green eyes darkened into a deep black that covered her entire eyeball. Axel blinked a few times, his vision going hazy. He heard warped footsteps coming near him just as everything went black.

Tyler stood at her best friend's locker, wondering why she was taking so long to get there. If she didn't hurry, they would both miss their buses, She considered asking someone but she rarely talked to anyone. She didn't see anyone in her friend's class either.

"Tyler!" she heard someone yell in the crowded hallway. She looked around, finding the source. It was a short girl that she didn't really like. Tyler sighed.

"Ariel, she, I don't know, she fainted out of nowhere. They called in an ambulance." the girl said.

Tyler's heart sank. She barely thanked the girl as she ran through the crowd of people chatting and trying to make their way home. She got to the classroom Ariel was in, in record time.

"Tsuin! Tsuin!" Tyler yelled, pushing people away to get to the girl.

"Tyler, please stay back," the teacher advised her. She shot him a look and turned her attention back to Ariel.

"Tsuin, please wake up… What the hell happened?" she yelled.

"Calm down. The ambulance is here." the teacher said back.

"How can you expect me to calm down when she's all passed out?"

The ambulance came in and went to retrieve Ariel from the ground. Tyler stepped aside to allow them to put her on the stretcher.

"Look, that's my best friend. Practically family. May I please go along with you to the hospital? Please?" she begged one of the paramedics.

"Sorry, that's not allowed unless you're actual family." he responded.

"It's right down the street!"

"Good, you can meet us there then." he said, "Now excuse me."

Tyler stood fuming while they took Ariel's unconscious body off to the elevator. She was so angry that she could feel hot tears burning in her eyes. She felt as if her whole body was tingling.

Why couldn't they just let her go? There was no way her mom would let her go to the hospital otherwise. She would have to walk to get there, and that involved crossing a highway. She was too pissed to trust herself to go alone.

"Okay, okay, everyone should hurry to their buses or after school activities now." the teacher announced to the people in his classroom who had crowded to see what was going on.

Students filed out of the room while Tyler simply stood there trying to control her anger. The teacher came behind her and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"I'm sure she'll be fine. You should hurry before you miss your bus."

Everything had gone black. That's all Ariel knew.

One minute the bell rang and she was gathering up her and backpack and laptop, and the next, she couldn't see or hear anything. It was as if she were sleeping yet wide awake.

After the initial panic of feeling she had just gone blind and deaf, she realized that was not the case. She was in a random room that was pitch black.

"Hello?" she called, hearing nothing but her own voice echo back to her.

What the hell was going on? She took a step only to drop down into even more darkness. Ariel screamed, but her voice was drowned out by the sound of wind rushing by her ears.

Hard, cold tile met with her when she reached the bottom. It hurt like hell. She was sure there had to be bruises forming.

Ariel stood up, nursing her arm with a wince.

"Rex?"

She looked up. Who was Rex? Better yet, who was down here in the dark? Where was she?

"Rex? Is that you? You look different." the voice spoke once again. Ariel squinted in the dark, barely making out a figure a few feet away from her.

"I-I'm not Rex…" she finally said back.

"What do you mean? Okay then, Rexial. Where have you been? I've been looking all over for you."

The figure stepped forward a bit, Ariel stepped back. Who was this psycho? Then again, it was dark, maybe that's why he thought she was "Rex."

"Come on, what's wrong?" his tone sounded a little hurt, "Wait… you don't remember me do you?"

"Where the hell am I?" she responded back. She had backed up so far that now she was against a wall. Not good.

"Well, we are in a portal. But if you don't remember me, then you don't remember a portal. I guess."

The guy was getting too close. Ariel's body was completely at ease though. That was odd. It was then that she realized she couldn't move.

'Now you have to remember. Don't run.'

And just like that, she took a step closer. She wasn't even trying to. She didn't know who's voice had spoken to her, but it was oddly familiar.

"Is it too dark for you? Maybe that's it. If you see me closely, maybe you'll remember."

Suddenly, a glow was before Ariel. It was coming from the guy's hand.

"How are you-"

Before she could finish the question, she looked up. Bright green eyes. Under them, tattoos that seemed so familiar. But the hair, unnaturally red hair.

"Axe… Axel?" she breathed out before everything went white.

Zexion hadn't moved from his place on the bed the whole day. He knew it was ridiculous and wouldn't get him anywhere but, he was just so drained. He wanted to just lay there and fade away. He finally felt like he had a heart again, now he felt as empty as he was before.

His thoughts just kept racing over the worlds they had searched. Even ones they had never been to or heard of before.

Most worlds were so infected with Heartless that, despite the fact he could never tell Axel, he felt the girls probably would have been destroyed the minute they landed there.

It made Zexion want to give up. It made him wall back up into the boring, heartless asshole he was just barely coming out of being. He was surprised Axel even bothered talking to him, but he knew it was only because he needed help finding Rex and he wouldn't let go of finding her.

No matter what the evidence showed them.

Thinking of Axel made him realize he hadn't heard from him for hours. He was probably hanging out with Roxas. The thought made him cringe. Roxas was not exactly his favorite person.

He had overheard the blonde talking to Larxene about how he was glad that Rexial and Tryxel were gone and he didn't understand why the two were looking for them so hard.

Of course around Axel, Roxas was so sorry and couldn't believe it had happened. He absolutely hated seeing Axel so upset. Whatever.

Zexion couldn't tell Axel though. He wanted him to be able to talk to other people again and have friends. Him and Roxas just now started getting along again. He just tried to steer clear of Roxas, including being around him or talking about him. It confused Axel but he never really questioned it.

Roxas lead Zexion's mind to Sora. He wondered what happened to… Riku.

Again, he cringed at the name. Anger slowly filled his chest but he forced himself to calm down. He had never literally hated anyone until he met Riku. He had left him in a horrible condition after he took that hatred out on him.

Sora had ran off to go find him before all the other drama began years ago and he never saw or heard from either of them ever again. But, darkness never really mingles with light.

It was as if a light was just turned on in Zexion's head. He sat straight up.

"Light!" he yelled, not really caring who heard him. He yelled Axel's name before taking portal out of his room.

The light had to be the answer.