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Chapter Seventeen
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"I don't think I should be here with you, Roxas… you told me yourself that he gets extremely jealous…"
"Axel, you're my best friend now. He's going to have to accept that… and I'm not getting back together with him unless he does," the blond grabbed Axel's wrist to stop him from pacing back and forth in the living room of the mobile home. "Now sit down… you're making me even more nervous."
A flash of headlights through the front window had them both jumping out of their skin. Roxas stood up and walked up to the front door, hearing Van's key turning in the lock.
"Roxas, you're here!" he was immediately pulled into the arms of his ex, "I wasn't sure if you saw…"
"If I saw you humiliate yourself on live TV? Yeah, Van… I saw," Roxas pushed him away, taking a step back. "I need you to meet someone."
Vanitas stepped into the house, eyes immediately resting on Axel, "Who the fuck is this? …Why do you look familiar?"
"He saved your life, Van… he was there that night," Roxas told him, moving to stand between them, "He's my best friend, and he's who I've been staying with."
"You… you knocked me out… Did I shoot you?" Vanitas tried to remember that night, but it was all a fog.
Axel shrugged, "You grazed me a little, but I was fine. And I'm sorry about knocking you out, but…"
"But you saved my life… right…"
Roxas couldn't tell what Van was feeling. He was on his meds… he could tell that much for sure. "Van… there's more that we need to talk about." Vanitas sat down in the recliner and Roxas sat back down next to Axel. "About my job… I should have told you a long time ago, but… the director I'm assissting, he… he's a porn director. He shoots porn films."
Van's golden eyes went wide and he remained in a stunned silence for a moment.
"I didn't know when I applied for the job, or I wouldn't have done it. But here's the other thing… Axel is a pornstar."
It was then that Vanitas realized why he looked so familiar, "Holy shit… I should have known. I should have recognized you right away… You're Axel Marshall…"
"I take it you've seen some of my work…?" Axel offered awkwardly, not really knowing how to react to this situation.
"Have you two slept together…?" Van's question came as a whisper.
Roxas sighed and shook his head, "That's the other thing… Before I knew you were coming back… I was …offered a position in one of the movies and… I kind of accepted it."
"You mean… like… you're going to be in a porno?" Van's face went completely white as it sunk in, "You'll be… sleeping with a bunch of random people…?"
"Mainly Axel… and some guy named Demyx… But you need to understand, Van… I don't have feelings for anybody but you. This is all just work for me."
Vanitas blinked a few times, "So you're asking me to take you back… knowing that you're sleeping with other men?"
"I'm not choosing you over my job, Van… so yes. You can either take me as is, or go back on tour and forget about me…" Roxas told him, knowing that he would need to spell it out for Van as clearly as possible.
"I… I…"
Roxas stood up, "I'm going to text you the studio's address. Think about it… and if you decide that you can still be with me, you'll know where to find me. Until then… I'll be at Axel's."
The redhead lifted himself to his feet and followed Roxas out to the car, a bit amazed by the ultimatum that he'd given Vanitas. "Rox… are you sure you want to leave it like that?"
"This is my life now, Axe… and I'm done trying to hide who I am from him. He'll let me know what he wants to do… and until then, we'll just focus on the movie."
…
"Axel, why do you look so uncomfortable? Lighten up a little," Xigbar instructed, clearly pissed that Axel wasn't on his A-game that day.
"Do I really have to do a scene with her? She's fucking impossible to work with," Axel grimaced down at Xion, irritated that instead of working with Roxas already, his first scene was with her.
Xigbar narrowed his eyes on the redhead, "Just do the scene and do it right. If you were half as good as Luxord was, we'd be done with the damned scene already."
"Why don't you just come up here and do the scene with her? Huh? We all know you love fucking her, even though she's a fucking banshee," Axel snapped, his mood plummeting lower and lower.
"Don't you fucking test me, you god damned brat. Shut the fuck up and do your scene so we can move on and bring Roxas in."
Hearing that, Axel sucked it up and finished the scene with her, anxious to film his first scene with Roxas. It'd been a little difficult to see him doing scenes with Demyx… but now he would have the kid to himself for most of the upcoming scenes.
"All right… that'll have to do. I guess we can work the angle that you've been getting bored with her or something…" Xigbar muttered, rolling his eyes as the two got change for the next scene, "Demyx! It's your cue to bring Roxas in! Let's keep rolling!"
The cameras started up again, focusing on the scene playing out. Axel and Xion were in the setting of a mansion-esque living room, the redhead fully dressed in a black suit with no tie, the top couple buttons of his emerald green dress shirt undone. Xion was in a leather corset outfit and patent black boots, sitting next to him on the couch when the other two entered.
"Are you Benjamin?" Demyx demanded, pulling an irritated looking Roxas onto set.
Axel raised an eyebrow, "Who let you into my house?"
"I don't know, your maid? Look, I called you earlier… you said you could help me with my …problem?" he nodded towards Roxas, who had a set of handcuffs around his wrists, a gag in his mouth, and seemed to be fighting like hell to run back out the door.
"Right… you're Nicolas. Bring him over here," Axel waved them over, but Roxas fought tooth and nail.
Demyx forced Roxas to his knees in front of Axel, "Quit whining!" he scolded the blond, obviously at the end of his rope with the kid.
"And what exactly is your problem here?"
"I …acquired… this submissive recently, and he won't listen to me worth shit. I heard that you're good at training the especially difficult ones."
Right… Xigbar had changed the script to more of an illegal sex slave-trade kind of thing. Axel didn't like it as much… but it was kind of fun to see Roxas acting so sassy. "And how, pray tell, did you acquire him?"
"I have my sources," Demyx snapped, "Can you help me or not? 'Cause I'm about to get rid of him if you can't."
"Doms like you make me sick… you think you can just buy yourself a sex slave and they'll immediately obey you without a second thought. It takes time to build the trust that a relationship like this needs."
Demyx rolled his eyes, "Fuck, I don't have time for that shit… can't you just train him for me?"
Axel clenched his jaw, "Do you have the fee I require?"
"Yeah, yeah… how long will you need?"
"Give me two weeks with him… Once I break him, he'll be the perfect slave."
Roxas was struggling against his bondage, starting to yell when Demyx turned on his heels and walked off set.
Axel turned his attention down to the blond before him and locked eyes with the boy, "Stop fighting. You're safe here."
He stop squirming and calmed down a little, his jaw starting to hurt from the gag.
On cue, Axel reached down and unbuckled the gag, freeing the kid to speak. "What's your name, kid?"
"F…Finn…" he whimpered, looking absolutely terrified. Roxas was actually having fun with this scene… it really took a lot of skill to act like he was afraid of Axel.
"All right… I'm Ben. Where did you come from before Nicolas found you?"
He paused, "I… I'm not sure… They didn't let me outside…" Jesus… who wrote this script?
"Do you know how old you are?" Axel looked at him curiously.
"I'm 20…" he mumbled, covering that plot hole up quickly.
Axel smiled and turned to Xion, "Becca, go to the basement and get him a better outfit. This whole jeans and tshirt thing isn't going to work."
"Of course, Sir. I'll be back shortly," she obeyed, walking off set.
"Becca is my …assisstant? She was the first girl I ever trained, and she's been with me ever since."
Roxas looked around the room, "So… you do this often?"
"Unfortunately, yes… It pains me to see Doms out there that don't want to spend the time training their own submissive, but if I don't step in and do the work for them, they usually end up mistreating them."
They continued the scene together with no interruptions from Xigbar, which ususally meant that he was happy with how it was going.
"Damn it, we're out of time… cut! That's enough for today!" he stepped in just as Axel was going to begin their training.
Looked like they weren't going to be having sex today… Axel was actually a bit relieved by that.
"You did a great job today, Roxas," Axel smiled as they cleared the set. "I'm actually kind of amazed that you're so good at acting."
"If you're trying to compliment me, you're doing an awful job," Roxas laughed, taking the collar around his neck off and handing it to one of the crew members. "But thanks… this has actually been really fun."
Axel chuckled, "You looked so terrified when Demyx dragged you in!"
"Yeah, but I—" Roxas stopped short as a familiar figure stepped in front of him. "Van…"
His ex looked down at him, seeming increasingly nervous, "Hi, Rox…"
"H…how long have you been here…?"
"I saw your whole scene… you did really well…" Vanitas shifted on his feet uncomfortably. "C…can we talk? …Alone?"
Axel took the cue, "I'll be in my dressing room. See you, Rox."
As the redhead walked away, Roxas turned to face Vanitas again, "So… what does this mean? Do you want to be with me?"
"I… I want to try, Rox… I can't guarantee that I'll be able to handle this, but… I love you, and I miss you…"
Roxas smiled a little and grabbed Van's hands in his own, "Thank you… It means a lot to me that you're going to try to accept this. …I love you too, Vanitas."
The raven-haired musician grinned and pulled Roxas into a deep kiss, "So… you'll come home with me?"
"Of course, babe… just let me go change and tell Axel what's going on, okay? I've got some stuff at his house I'll need to pick up some time… Wait for me in the lobby, okay?"
"All right… I'll be waiting," he gave Roxas one more kiss before heading back to the lobby.
Roxas wasn't sure what he was feeling… He was happy, but the thought of telling Axel that he was moving out made him really sad. But… he'd see Axel every day at work. It's not like he would have a chance to miss him or anything. He was back with Vanitas… and he was glad. ...Right?
…
A/N: So much happening! :3 Hopefully the transition between the movie and real life wasn't confusing… It's a fucked up movie, eh? You'll never guess who the writer is… *evil grin.*
Thank you to everybody for your wonderful reviews so far! Keep letting me know what you think! :D
Until next time!
Simply Rexene