"Lea. This isn't going to help."

"Yeah, yeah, just give me a minute."

Lea kept tapping on his phone as they walked. He knew Twilight Town's streets inside and out, so it wasn't like he needed to watch his step. Besides, the messages he was sending were worth the risk of falling on his face.

He was so, so, so close. He'd seen Donald's Kingstagram post about waking up Ven. That had been almost a month ago. Now that Sora and co. were done with that, they had to have time to help Lea get Roxas back.

If only Sora would answer his dang phone.

"Lea." Isa's hand rested on his shoulder.

Lea froze, resisting the urge to brush his friend off. He knew how hard prolonged physical contact could be for Isa, especially in public. Not that anyone was paying attention to them, but still. It was the thought that counted.

"I just don't get it." Lea gripped his phone in both hands. The pressure would've been enough to crack any cellphone that wasn't made by insane rodent engineers.

"Sora wants Roxas back too, right?" He grit his teeth. "Why won't he answer me?"

"There are any number of possibilities. He could be in an area of Gummi Space with no service—"

"These things work everywhere."

"—or he could be incapacitated somehow. He has plenty of enemies, and those social media posts will make it far too easy for the Organization to find him."

"Well they haven't made it any easier for me to find him." Lea scowled.

Donald's celebratory selfie—which for some reason only included himself, and was an unflattering undershot of his bill at that—had been taken in Castle Oblivion. By the time Lea had convinced Merlin to take him there, though, the place had been deserted again. If only Aqua had bothered to teach him how to summon a keyblade glider, like she had for Kairi.

But nooo, Aqua was too busy getting her friends back.

"We will," Isa said quietly. His hand was still a comforting weight on Lea's shoulder.

We will. Lea wasn't sure if Isa knew how much those two words meant. After struggling for leads on his own for so long, it was hard to remember that someone had his back again.

Isa was back. Lea hadn't even dared to hope that Isa would want to be back, and now they were here, bickering without the bite that divided Saix-from-Isa. Lea had to give Aqua and Vanitas some credit for that.

"...Yeah. 'Course we will." Lea forced a grin. "You think Chip and Dale put a tracking device in Sora's phone?"

Isa snorted and shook his head, continuing their walk towards the Clocktower. "And here I thought your days of stalking teenagers were in the past."

"Hey! At least half of those times were your fault, y'know!" He jogged to catch up and elbowed Isa in the side gently. "I would've given the kids a longer leash, but someone didn't trust them that much."

"I hardly think that asking you to keep an eye on Marluxia and Larxene counts as 'stalking teenagers,'" Isa deadpanned. "Their actions would have been detrimental to our plan."

"Huh? I wasn't—I mean, I know you like to act like you're pushing forty, but Larx and Marly were older than us." Lea's head tilted. "I know you practically asked me to babysit them too, but…"

"You said the kids. Plural," Isa said with a frown. "What were you referring to if not the Castle Oblivion fiasco? Roxas was the only teenager you were commanded to retrieve."

"No he wasn't. Don't tell me you forgot about making me… bring back…"

Lea stopped in the middle of the street. Who had he been thinking about? There was something—someone. He was so sure of it…

"Are you feeling well?" Isa asked, already passing Lea the water bottle he always kept on him. "Perhaps we should get some real food before buying ice cream."

Lea shook his head, and the phantom memories dissipated.

"Nah, I just need some dessert to wake my brain up. Don't worry about it." He pocketed his phone and took a drink of water anyway.

This was the first time he'd gotten to take Isa (well, gotten Merlin to take him and Isa) off-world. The old wizard apparently had a book to give to Sora and figured that Twilight Town would be the best place to catch him. Lea wasn't getting his hopes up on that front, but it was probably a better shot than waiting back in Radiant Garden.

He passed the water back to Isa and checked his phone again out of habit. No new messages. Why did he bother?

He was sick of being patient. He'd done all the thinking and planning he could. He wanted to act.

"You're pushing yourself too hard," Isa said quietly. "You've been training with Merlin, and you've been working at the worst Starbucks in Radiant Garden. This has been your first true vacation day in over a month."

"I went way longer than that when you were the boss."

"Lea. I was literally heartless."

"You were literally Nobody, actually—"

"No." Isa caught him by the arm, but this time the touch was rough rather than comforting as Isa dragged him up the street. "We're not playing this game again. Pretend I'm still your boss, and I am ordering you to take a vacation day."

There were too many jokes Lea could take from those two lines, but Isa wouldn't appreciate them even if he weren't already annoyed.

"We're here, aren't we?" Lea said.

"We are." Isa sighed. "I just wish—but perhaps I'm being selfish." He shook his head. "I should know better than to expect your full attention…"

"No, I meant—we're here, at the ice cream stand. You can let go of my arm now."

Margie, the lady who had run the little shop for at least ten years, was squinting at them through her half-moon glasses. Lea gave a grin and a little wave. It would've been years since she'd last seen Isa, but she still recognized Lea, judging by the way she smiled when she realized he wasn't in danger.

"...Oh." Isa released his grip, face pinkening slightly. It was as close as Lea expected to an apology.

Lea ordered two bars of sea-salt from Margie. He wished he had any spare change for a tip, but. Isa hadn't been wrong about the Starbucks job. Maybe if he had more free time to actually take down some munny-dropping Heartless instead of battling flying furniture for his training.

"Hey, what's with that look?" Lea asked as he passed Isa his ice cream.

The guilty furrow between Isa's brows only deepened. He looked away, the sides of his hair falling in front of his face.

"C'mon, I don't think you scared Margie that bad."

Isa shook his head.

"If I tell you, you'll only tell me not to worry."

"You're the one who's been telling me not to worry all day, so I think that'd make us even."

Isa's hair waved gently as he walked, giving Lea a brief glimpse of his smile.

"Fair enough."

He sighed. His thumb rubbed the stick of his ice cream, though he hadn't removed the plastic wrapper from it yet.

"You haven't asked anything of me," he murmured. "Despite my best efforts, I have been nothing but a drain on your resources for the past two months, and you still…"

"Woah."

Lea stopped abruptly. A kid on a skateboard almost barrelled him over before swerving around the two of them, letters nearly spilling from the bag strapped to his back. Lea pulled Isa out of the middle of Market Street and into a side alley.

"That's what you're worried about?" Lea asked once they were safe from careening teenagers. "You're right. I'm gonna tell you that's stupid."

"I didn't say that you would…" Isa shook his head. "The ice cream reminded me of how indebted I am to you. That is all. I did not intend to burden you with my guilt, too."

Lea should've known—this was just like him. Prideful to a fault. Lea had been lucky that Isa had accepted his help at all; it shouldn't be surprising that Isa would insist on paying back every perceived slight.

He put his hands on Isa's shoulders, looking him in his bright green eyes.

"We're friends, Isa. Whatever you think you owe me—get it unmemorized."

Isa choked out an almost-laugh at that, just like Lea'd hoped he would.

"Besides, 'nothing but a drain'? Are you kidding me? You clean the bathroom so often I've never even seen a glob of toothpaste on the sink. You're the one who makes sure we actually have food in the fridge—"

"Using your munny."

"—and you cook dinner at least four nights a week. I don't think I even ate four times a week before you moved in."

"You're only making me more concerned, you know."

Lea waved him off with his unwrapped ice cream bar.

"Point is, you're not just a great roommate. You're like—you're housewife material."

As usual, his brain caught up with his mouth two seconds too late. Isa was staring at him, his expression as blank as Roxas's had been in those early days.

"Uh. That's." Lea cleared his throat, ruffling the back of his hair. With the hand still holding the ice cream. A few red strands stuck to the condensation on the outside of the wrapper. "Yeah."

On the plus side, maybe he'd embarrassed Isa enough that he'd forget to feel guilty.

"Your ice cream is going to melt," Isa finally said. His face looked a little redder than usual, but it was probably just from the approaching sunset.

"Hey. That's my line."

Isa smiled, and Lea's awkwardness melted, too.

They stepped back out onto Market Street, and Lea hoped they could make it up the Clocktower before their ice creams actually melted. Without the dark corridors, it took some creative shortcuts to get from the inside of the station onto the roof, but it was still possible.

His ice cream was already dripping inside its wrapper by the time they made it up to Station Heights. Man, Lea missed the corridors. When would Aqua or Kairi teach him how to use those—

Gliders. Swooping down from the clouds. Landing near…

"Lea?" Isa said, but his voice sounded distant.

Lea might have been dreaming. He had to be.

At the edge of the plaza, Roxas stared out at the sunset.

XXX

"Ven!" Aqua called as she landed her glider, in plain sight of any of Twilight Town's locals. Ven knew better than to draw attention like this, even if the hill was more or less deserted. Van had said something about the last train coming into the station before sunset.

That wasn't the point. The point was, Ven had dived towards Twilight Town's Clocktower without warning or explanation.

"You remember this place?" Van asked, dismissing his mask. "We grew up here. Before Xehanort took us, anyway."

Ven's brow furrowed. Aqua couldn't tell if it was from what Van said, or because he was staring straight at the sun. That couldn't be good for his eyes.

"That… doesn't feel quite right." Ven's hands curled into fists, then relaxed, over and over. As if trying to grab something that didn't exist. "It's so close. If i could just—"

"Roxas?"

Ven's head snapped to his right. Aqua followed his line of sight towards Lea standing at the end of the street. An unopened bar of ice cream slipped from the man's hand.

What was Lea doing here? Well, at least he and Isa were the only two who had seen them land, it looked like.

That… was all they'd seen, right? Why did the two of them look like they'd seen a ghost?

"Axel!" Ven shouted—

And then he was running, sprinting, leaping into Lea's arms.

Lea hugged him tight, laughing as he spun a full circle.

"You really do remember me this time!" Lea set him back on the ground, but kept his hands on Ven's shoulders.

"What, you're not gonna tell me you're flattered?" Ven teased.

"...Did I miss something?" Van asked, standing at Aqua's side.

"I… have no idea," she admitted.

Had Ven met Lea sometime between leaving the Land of Departure and fighting at the Keyblade Graveyard? It was possible—they would've been about the same age then. But that still didn't explain why Ven would seem more thrilled to see him than he'd been when Aqua woke him up.

She approached Ven and Lea, feeling strangely like she was intruding. Judging from Isa's guarded expression behind Lea, she wasn't the only one.

"I can't believe you're alive," Ven said. "I thought you were dead—well, I guess I didn't actually remember you until now…"

"Man, you have really gotta cut it out with this amnesia stuff." Lea noogied Ven's head, and he laughed.

"You're telling me…"

Then had the two of them met before Ven had arrived at the Land of Departure? Maybe Van didn't have all of their old memories after all.

"Thank you, Vanitas. Aqua." Isa nodded at each of them, and Aqua tried not to jump. She hadn't seen or heard him move behind her. "Perhaps now Lea will stop worrying and take care of himself."

"Lea was worried about Ven?" Aqua frowned. "He never mentioned that before."

"Ven…?" Isa's gaze grew distant. "Yes, I do remember a Ven now, faintly. Lea foolishly challenged him to a fight when we were younger. We never saw him again, however, and that was years ago. Were he and Sora related?"

"Sora?" Aqua asked. "Sora was holding Ven's heart, but none of us know how that happened."

"That's how I look like Sora," Van said. "But he's from Destiny Islands, and Ventus and I are from here. So I don't think we're blood related, or anything."

Isa shook his head.

"The connections of Sora's heart are beyond me. Regardless of how it happened or why he and Ven look similar, we are grateful to have Roxas returned to us."

"Roxas? Who the heck are you talking about?" Van asked.

"That's Ven," Aqua said, pointing to her friend. Her brother. There was no way she could have mistaken anyone else for him.

Isa looked at her doubtfully.

"He responded to the name Roxas. He recognized Lea as Axel. He is the spitting image of Sora's Nobody."

Roxas was Sora's Nobody and Lea's missing friend; he had told her about him while they were searching for her keyblade and armor. She didn't know many details about him, though. It was possible that he and Ven could resemble each other.

She clenched and unclenched her fists, glancing over at Lea and Ven again. Ven was talking a mile a minute, the way he never had around her.

There had to be a mistake. That was Ven. He'd been asleep in Castle Oblivion for twelve years, exactly as she'd left him. He had Ven's keyblade.

(And another keyblade. Something strange, and dark, and sharp.)

While she was trying to find the words to explain this to Isa, Lea suddenly clapped her on the back.

"Aqua! Man, I'm sorry I doubted you." His grin reached his eyes, more sincere than she'd ever seen from him. "I know you said you'd help me find Roxas after you got your friends back, but I kinda expected you to be too busy to actually do it, heh."

He wiped his eyes—his eyes were watering. He was crying.

How was she supposed to tell him that his relief was in vain?

"Hey, I helped too." Van pouted. "I'm the one who pulled his heart out of Sora and stuck it back in him. So, you're welcome."

"Thank you." Lea smiled at him. No jokes, no sarcastic comments. "Seriously. Thank you."

"Van," Aqua tried to whisper as discreetly as possible. "You know that Ven isn't Roxas. Right?"

"Huh? I mean, I'm not really following all this, but from context I guessed that Roxas was one of Ventus's dumb nicknames."

Ven stepped up next to Lea. Their arms were close enough to brush, with none of the awkward distance Ven still kept from her.

"I remember now, Aqua." Ven's eyes glimmered with tears too. "My scattered memories are real. Seeing Axel was the piece that finally made me remember."

His smile shone as bright as the setting sun.

"I was Roxas—I am Roxas."

No.

No.

No.

This couldn't be real. She had just gotten Ven back. He was—he was Ven. He remembered her. He remembered Van. That wasn't something he could fake.

"You couldn't have known that. You were still in the Realm of Darkness when I was… the last time I was alive." Ven ruffled the back of his hair. "I'm sorry, too. For thinking you were lying to me."

Air wouldn't pass through her throat. The sunset was too bright, too hot. Everyone was staring at her, expecting something—expecting her to what? Say thank you? Lie to them? Say she was okay with her best friend revealing he wasn't the same person anymore?

I'm not the Ven you remember, he'd said. He'd shouted. He'd tried to drive it through her skull, and she wouldn't believe him. She couldn't believe him, even with the proof staring her in the face.

"So your heart was just, what, floating around having adventures while you were dead? Did Sora's heart let you out for recess or something?" Van frowned. "Also, who's Axel?"

"Lea," Aqua and Isa replied in tandem.

"You shouldn't deadname him, anyway," Aqua told Ven, because apparently that was the only thing she could get past the tight dryness in her throat.

Lea blinked for a second, before he burst out laughing.

"Flaming pants—is that how you knew I was trans?" His laughter came out in a series of snorts. "Man, that's hilarious."

"Axel is not his deadname," Isa said. "Axel was the name that Xemnas gave him when we were in the Organization. As Saix was mine. I suppose it could be considered a form of deadname, but it has nothing to do with our genders. Lea changed his name long before that."

"That's it, Isa, you're trans too." Lea grinned and elbowed him in the ribs. "You got a deadname and everything."

Isa rolled his eyes fondly. Aqua noticed Ven staring at Isa with a strange expression. She couldn't tell if it was distrust, or confusion, or something else entirely.

"So he's... Isa, now?" he asked, his tone guarded.

Lea winced.

"There's a lot you missed out on, huh..."

Not as much as Aqua had missed. Ven knew Lea. He knew Isa. Knew them both when they were Axel and Saix, which seemed to imply that Ven was… also a part of the original Organization XIII?

It didn't make any sense. Ven would never join a group so obviously evil.

"Wait a second, Roxas. Is that gonna be your deadname too? Do you wanna go by something else now that you're, y'know…" Lea waved a hand at him. "I don't guess you'd wanna go by Sora, but you might have something else in mind."

Ven shook his head quickly.

"I'm still Roxas. Maybe I didn't pick that name, but that's who I was when I met you. I don't want to forget it again."

Lea beamed.

"Man, you're still as sappy as ever." Lea ruffled Ven's—Roxas's?—hair. "You can still call me Axel, if you want. That doesn't apply to the rest of you, though."

He pointed between his eyes, and hers and Van's.

Van shrugged. "Aqua's the only one who can call me Van. Doesn't matter to me if I get to use your special secret name or not."

It mattered to Aqua. It mattered too much. Who was she not to use Roxas's preferred name?

But she couldn't open her mouth to do it. To call him Roxas would be admitting that Ven was gone.

That she had never truly known him at all.

"So, what do you guys say? Celebratory welcome home ice creams?" Lea asked, still grinning from ear to ear.

"I believe ours have melted already," Isa told him.

Lea looked down at the street, where his ice cream was now a popsicle stick marinating in slush.

"Dang it," he muttered, then more loudly, "I can buy a new one! For you too, Isa. Ice creams for everyone, on me!"

"No, you can't. I'm well aware of what our budget is."

Lea grimaced and turned his head away from Ven—Roxas—to murmur to Isa.

"Look, I can just skimp on the dish detergent or something this week. We can water that stuff down, right?"

"Not if we're going to be supporting another person. It won't make up for what we need to allocate for food. I will check with Cid again to see if anyone had an odd job I could assist with—"

"Twilight Town always has odd jobs," Roxas interrupted. Both Isa and Lea startled at him. "I mean, it did, anyway. The, uh."

"Yeah." Lea looked away, ruffling his hair, and Aqua was once again left in the dark. "I saw a kid delivering letters on the way here, so I bet it's about the same. But look, don't worry about that, okay? We'll figure it out. There's always a place for you with me, Roxas."

Aqua turned away, her fingernails digging into her palms.

For the past few days, they'd been visiting Experiment 626—Stitch—in a world called Hawaii. They'd caught up and learned that Stitch had found a family. A place where no one got left behind or forgotten.

Apparently Roxas didn't feel the same way about his own family.

Van slipped a hand between her fingers, stopping her nails from doing any further damage. He didn't speak, though. She couldn't blame him. She couldn't imagine any words that could remove the thorns in her heart right now.

"I… Thanks, Axel, but—I dunno. You're living with Isa, right?"

Aqua looked over her shoulder. Was Roxas trying to find a polite way to turn Lea down? Did he want to stay with her after all?

"I know you do not have fond memories of me," Isa said quietly. "But I would not interfere with your friendship again. I can find lodgings elsewhere, if need be."

Lea smacked him on the back of the head. "No, you won't, you self-sacrificing moron. We've got plenty of space. I can sleep on the couch."

"Not this argument again…" Roxas groaned, making Van snort.

"Hey, you've got your own tent now," Van said. "It's not like we made you watch us make out or anything."

"You might as well have…"

Was that why Roxas didn't want to stay? Because of her and Van?

"We can figure stuff out later, okay?" Roxas told them all. "I've got plenty of munny for dinner, or ice cream, or whatever. I just want to—to let everything sink in, for a minute."

Aqua bit her lip. That was fair. She needed some time to wrap her head around everything, too.

Maybe with a little bit of time, she could figure out what it would take to keep from losing Ven forever.