This Frenzied State [8/?]

[chokethewind]

Title: This Frenzied State [8/?]
Rating: M
Genre: Drama/romance
Pairing: Axel/Roxas (AU)
Warnings: Abuse of miscellaneous Final Fantasy characters. Seriously. Any mischaracterization is obviously all my fault.
Summary: When Roxas stands on the edges of buildings, he tries to see into some eternity. When Axel stands on the edges of buildings, he tries to see how he'd survive a fourteen floor fall.

Author’s Notes: There are mutant turtles in this chapter. I hope this makes up for the update failure. Also, question for those on FFN: I'm attempting to put a linebreak in my profile and it will not stay put when I save it. I'm about to kill someone. I don't get it.

No beta still, so feel free to point out any errors, constructive crit is always welcome. The hangover experience is brought to you by many years of experience. I turn 21 in a few weeks, I expect to be even more of an expert in it after that delightful day occurs. I’m hoping I’ll have a brand new fic by that time, a short one-shot I’ve been semi-sorta working on. I posted a fic last year on my birthday, so attempting to continue that, er, pattern. Also need to change my layout, I've had this one for just as long. Hmm. Anyway, enjoy. There is lots of awkward in this chapter. Also, zombies and snarky little bastards.




It was the shaking that did it. Not the pounding in his head, or the throbbing in his neck, or the way he felt hot. Something was shaking him, shaking him hard, and he moaned pathetically, trying to bat off whatever was interrupting his sleep, but it was insistent, and eventually he realized that someone was saying his name and that were was a light suddenly blaring in his eyes.

With a panicked yelp Axel grabbed the pillow and pulled it tightly around his head, the cool surface easing the temporary pain he’d felt in his head. His stomach felt hot, fiery almost, and he moaned into the fluff, legs curling up into a fetal position. Oh god it was hot.

“You’re not going to puke are you?”

He moaned. The voice was loud and brass and Axel whimpered, biting the fabric with his teeth. Oh god, was he going to die? Maybe the alcohol had been laced. Maybe he’d been lured here just to die. Maybe it was some vicious plot to snag his inheritance, whatever that was, and they were going to destroy him right now. And make him suffer before that happened. Oh god, that was so not fair.

“Okay, stay there. I have to go to work, and so does Demyx. But you can stay here as long as you want, don’t worry about it dude. There’s a spare key outside underneath the squirrel, use that if you leave though and just put it back. Feel free to eat whatever you find.” There was a pause. “Or well, I guess you won’t want to eat anything for bit, huh? Okay, well, there’s aspirin in the bathroom and just get the water from the sink. And if you have to blow it, just do it in the bathroom please. I mean, that is kind of rude, doing it in someone else’s bed.”

Oh god, was this person ever going to shut up? There was a pat on the pillow over his head and he snarled miserably.

“I think that’s it. Take care of yourself. Don’t get the hell out of Dodge without saying bye though, that’s rude too. Got it dude?”

Axel muttered an agonized affirmative, forcing himself to speak weakly with as much malice as he could muster, “Yes, I have it memorized, thanks, leave me alone.”

The weight on the mattress was gone and Axel almost breathed a sigh of relief before the voice drifted back, this time thoughtful and amused and concerned all at the same time, “And you should probably talk to Roxas when you get the chance… I think he’s upset. Not that I’m judging you or anything dude, I mean you were both fucking smashed… but you should probably talk to him, because he sure as hell won’t talk to you if you don’t say anything first.”

This time Axel made no noise at all, and there was a heavy sigh and the door was shut.

A few minutes later, he threw himself out of the bed, yanked open the door, and was on his knees in front of the toilet, back arching as he emptied his stomach into the bowl. Oh god he was never drinking again. He sank to his side on the tile, not having the energy to move, and because he felt that in a few minutes he’d been having a repeat. It was cooler in here and there was no sunlight, just the cool tile on his face. He breathed laboriously, his stomach aching, and then was up again, dry heaving into the bowl before sinking miserably back onto the floor.

Nope, never drinking again.

Staggering back up, he found the aspirin that Xigbar had mentioned, dry swallowed them, and then went back to the bedroom, falling onto the mattress, curling into a ball and clutching his sides. Oh god, what was it? Beer? No, he’d had like four shots and like nine beers. Oh god he was an idiot. Oh god when was the last time he’d been so drunk? When Reno had been here last? No, when Aerith had gotten into the teaching college she wanted? No, oh fuck, it didn’t matter, he was never drinking again, if he survived, he swore, he was never, ever drinking again. He gritted his teeth as his head pounded and licked his dry lips, wishing he’d brought some water with him back from the bathroom, but now he didn’t want to move, didn’t ever want to move again. Burying his face into the cooler sheets, he wondered if he could commit suicide by just throwing himself off the bed. Maybe if his head hit first.

The aspirin kicked in a second later and he blearily blinked his eyes, the pounding in his head starting to subside. He heard something in the hallway, past the door he’d forgotten to close, something that sounded suspiciously like a gasping sob and then gagging. He tried to find the energy to move, but he had no energy to do anything except sag there bonelessly, wondering distractedly who it was out there puking. Maybe it was his shadow. Maybe his shadow was puking, and thus, was saving him from having to do it again. That would be cool, if he had some sort of clone who he could call up to take that pain away from him. That way, anything unpleasant he didn’t want to experience, he didn’t have to. Everyone should have one. That way, the clones would feel the awfulness and their world could be peaceful and there would be no war. He had the answer to world peace. Right here, right now.

Except maybe it would probably suck for the clones. Ethics, that was a question for ethics, not him.

The noises in the hallway continued and there was a high pitched whimpering that came along with it. Poor whoever it was. Must be miserable. More whimpering, more ceaseless groans, and Axel groaned himself. Damn ethics. Damn ethics. It was probably just some straggler from last night, probably one of Xigbar’s friends. Maybe it was the mean blonde girl. They probably didn’t need his help. He hadn’t needed any help. They just sounded miserable. They could find the aspirin. Unless… unless it was one of Demyx’s friends who was Xigbar’s enemy. Because they were trying to hit on Demyx and Xigbar would be more than content to let them suffer. Axel felt himself growing cold. Maybe they were dying, dying in the bathroom, and he was here patting himself on the back and saying they deserved it.

Damn ethics.

Groaning again, Axel vaulted up from the bed, swaying on his bare feet a second, before coming around the other side of the bed and trying to open his eyes fully. He hit the door with a thud, then rebounded and hit the wall, before flailing into the hallway and catching himself before he hit the opposite wall. He wasn’t as clumsy as Reno, he needed to calm this shit down. Blinking until his eyes cleared, he moved forward, still slightly swaying in his steps, coming to stand in front of the open bathroom.

Roxas was curled up on the tile floor, whimpering in what looked like a fevered doze, twitching and rocking back and forth, holding his stomach.

Axel stared, blinked slowly, and it came back to him in almost some sort of flurry. Him, pressed up against the wall. Roxas’s lips. His mouth. Roxas, pressed up against the wall. The desperation. Roxas’s eyes, and the way his hair fell over his forehead, over his eyes, over those too blue eyes that were full of longing and hurt and need. And then Roxas with his hand on the doorknob, those eyes turned on him, and then the door shut again and Axel standing there, shirt still on the floor, alone.

Axel backed up slowly, as not to wake him up, and then stood there, pressed up against the wall, listening to the kid pitching and moaning on the floor.

Oh, what the fuck now.

Axel went back to his room, found the mirror on the back of the door, and removed his shirt again. He found the bruises on his upper torso, the teeth indentions on his stomach and navel, and the marks on his neck that were all too visible… and numerous. He went back to the bathroom, quietly, listening to the sounds that were much the same as when he’d left, only this time the gagging sound was louder. He was throwing up again. Axel didn’t dare look around the door frame and instead listened to Roxas pant loudly and then the whimpering again. Axel bit his lip.

He could A) let the kid suffer or B) let the kid suffer but intrude upon his perceived solitude and possibly make it better or more than likely, worse. He remembered too clearly Roxas’s flashing eyes when he had rested his hand against the knob, ready to leave, and his plea not to talk to him. Axel had hesitated then, but he remembered the rigidness in the kid’s stance, and the way his breath had hitched with near panic when Axel had taken those steps forward, to stop him.

And he remembered Roxas biting at his lip, and Roxas’s skin beneath his fingers, and his eyes, all passion and desire and need and heat.

Axel heard him moaning weakly on the inside of the bathroom and bit his lip, harder, and he remembered too, Roxas’s teeth at his neck, at his side, and the way he’d kissed him, all dangerous and needy, all fire and sultry, all slow and lonely.

Damn. Ethics.

He came to stand in the doorway, came to see Roxas with his eyes closed, whimpering and his hands clutching and his stomach.

“Roxas?” he asked, softly, rapping his knuckles weakly against the door frame. “Roxas, are you okay?”

The boy’s fevered eyes sprang open and were unfocused for a second before they sharpened. His face visibly twisted into a near state of panic as he clawed himself up into a sitting position, wincing and clutching his stomach still, closing his eyes as he swayed where he sat before he opened them and refocused on Axel. There was no answer for a second, as Axel took a hesitant step into the bathroom. He saw Roxas’s eyes sweep up, briefly meeting his eyes before dipping lower again, to linger on Axel’s neck, where the bruises stood out, all purple and dark and deep, on Axel’s pale skin. His eyes immediately dropped and he mumbled something incoherent.

“There’s aspirin in here,” Axel said, still softly and hesitant. He opened the mirror and took out the bottle, wrestling with himself about what he should do with it. He stepped forward after a second and extended the bottle. Roxas didn’t look up at him, but stretched out and took it anyway, mumbling something again that Axel couldn’t hear. A shudder wracked his body suddenly and his eyes screwed up as he clutched at his own arms. He looked ill, more ill than he should.

“Are you okay?” Axel asked sharply, now more than concerned.

The episode seemed to pass, though he was still pale. He looked up finally and nodded, small. “Y-yea, I’m fine. Thanks.”

Awkward silences didn’t come as awkward as this.

“Do you need anything?” Axel asked, breaking it and nervously running a hand through his hair.

“N-no, I’m fine, thanks.”

“Are you going to be in here for awhile?”

There was a pause, and then Roxas said in a confused voice, “Uh, do you need to use it?”

“No, I’m okay.” And he was, for at least a bit. For the moment he felt fine, though he knew these things came in waves and he was quite sure he’d be needing to use the bathroom sometime soon, though just not right now and he was sure he could work up the courage to go into Xigbar and Demyx’s room. Though he was also quite as sure that he might die upon entering, with Xigbar being former sharpshooter and whatnot. It was a risk he was willing to take, however.

“Oh.” Roxas’s voice betrayed the confusion

“I’ll be right back.” He spun on his heel and went back into the room he had slept in, grabbing the pillow off the bed as well as the smaller blanket, and then going back to the bathroom, tossing them at Roxas. Roxas let them land in front of him, still curled up against the bathtub, and then leveled his gaze on Axel, almost suspiciously.

“I’m sure you’re too young to know this,” Axel said, almost cheerfully, “but you’re not going to want to move. That’ll make it a bit better until you feel okay. Just make yourself comfortable. You’re not going to die, I promise. It might feel like that. I’m sure it does. It does help to make deals with god you know, you’re never going to drink again, what have you, but let me assure you that you will. But there’s solace in the fact that when you do drink, you will now do it in some consideration. Don’t worry, it’s a phase we all go through. Do you need any water?”

Roxas was staring at him, clutching the blanket in his fingertips now, eyes narrowed and confused and then the corners of his mouth turned up, only slightly, only slightly.

“What?” Axel felt suddenly self conscious, and like a fool. Roxas didn’t want his help. Roxas probably just wanted him to leave. Some one night stand Axel was.

“Do you ever not talk?”

Axel blinked, and then he grinned, a wide, stretched, smirked grin. “Nope. I’ll be in the other room if you need anything. Remember, make some deals, it’ll make you feel better.” He saluted with two fingers and then turned around, closing the door halfway, as to allow some privacy, but enough so that he could still hear if Roxas suddenly decided he needed anything. Say, a gun to the head.

He sidetracked the room he’d been staying in, went inside to the living room where Roxas had slept, found the couch and the pillow and blanket he’d been using, and flopped on there, looking at the ceiling and wondering what he should do now.

A second later he was passed out.

__

Surprisingly, there wasn’t any particular vicious need he was feeling to find the roof. As he’d already established, this one would not do any good. Nope, it was Naminé’s building he wanted, Naminé’s building he pretty much desired and had made a pact with. Some people made pacts with other people; he made pacts with buildings, because they didn’t have feelings and if he failed them in any or form, then well, the retaliation would be very minimal.

Another wave of nausea made him clench his fists together, moaning quietly into the pillow he was resting his head on. Oh fuck. He had known this was a bad idea. Bad idea, bad idea, he should have just gone back to the building when he’d had the fucking chance, should have just taken up the elevator and pitched off it. Because now his stomach wouldn’t stop churning and well, there was that guy outside, who had given him the pillow and the blanket, and his name was Axel… Axel Stone.

He dragged himself up by his knuckles and dry heaved into the toilet again, sinking back down to the tile weakly, blinking up at the ceiling. His stomach was starting to feel better, and though his head was still throbbing, it wasn’t as bad as it had been when he’d first stumbled in here, dazed and sick and limbs flying every which way. He could probably move now, but he felt no desire or need to. Moving required energy. Energy required being motivated to do something. Being motivated generally meant that he’d be going to work sometime soon, but that was funny now, wasn’t it?

Rolling experimentally onto his stomach, clenching his teeth in anticipation of pain, he blinked mildly in surprise when he felt nothing. He buried his face into the pillow, spreading out as much as he could, feeling cool and light and better. Or at least, better than he had. He was still liable to grab the bowl at any rate, but for the moment he was dandy. He tried to sleep, to drift, to forget, and when he remembered, he squirmed. Once or twice he shifted while his head was sloped downward, and he caught sight of the flesh on his stomach, underneath his sweaty and lifted shirt. There were light bruises there, and he pitched around, knocking into the wall and staying there, wondering if the guy outside would be gone when he finally found the energy to eradicate himself from the vicinity of the toilet.

If he could continue thinking of him in that light, in that manner, then Roxas saw no reason why it wouldn’t be safe and pleasant to simply move on from this. No awkward conversations, nothing. Distant, fading memory of some stalker in the future, some drinks in him, and then well, whatever path in life he followed from here. This didn’t merit a footnote. However short the history on his life was going to be after today, well, this guy didn’t get his name indexed. No point, just painless, just some marks and maybe distant memories, because hell if he remembered much of anything. There had been some though, and Roxas rolled back restlessly onto his stomach, half dozing, making soft, whining noises into the pillow, there had been some though, some memories, and he thought they were decent ones. Heat, and touch, and some sort of fire in those green eyes, and it wasn’t lust, no, not lust, it was some sort of desire to understand and at the same time, to forget. He’d been more than desperate, and Roxas whined in his daze, because he couldn’t, not for all the rooftops in the world, figure out exactly what he meant when he thought of “he.”

“Hey!”

The voice was distant, faraway, like the memory right now, of this guy who wouldn’t be here when he finally got up, distant.

“Roxas, wake up. It’s 2 in the afternoon. You need to get up.”

He growled, snarled, snapped.

“Fine, don’t bitch at me when you recover from this.”

There was a dazzling light in his eyes then and he nearly shrieked, rolling away from the burst of light desperately, right up into the wall, clawing urgently out at whatever was trying to attack him.

“Woah, jumpy little thing aren’t you?” the voice intoned mildly and Roxas snarled again, trying to reach out. “Come on, wake up. It’s a new day. Sunlight, we should go outside and sing. Come on, get up.”

Roxas blinked, once, twice, at the sound of the voice now, and his vision sharpened after a second. He rubbed his palms against his eyelids and then focused on the source of the voice.

It was him again. The guy. Axel.

“What are you talking about?” Roxas muttered. “Shut up.”

There was a chuckle. “No. Come on Roxas. Get up. At least move over to the bed. It’s been long enough, you should probably be getting home. Or at least, you should be getting dressed.”

Roxas whined when he felt the hand on his arm and tried to bat it off, but he didn’t try it very hard and suddenly the hand on his arm was pulling, pulling him up and up, and he opened his eyes truly then for the first time, yanking his arm away rudely.

“What are you doing?” he asked, in a halting, throaty voice.

“Getting you awake. Weren’t you listening?”

Roxas muttered something that could have been “fuck you,” and then staggered toward the door, away from Axel. He nearly fell into the door frame but caught himself, and strode out, succeeding in not falling down but not really succeeding in finding where he was going. He paused, looked around hesitantly, and then turned to see Axel going past him serenely, blanket and pillow in his hands.

“Come on, get dressed. Let’s go.”

Cocking his head, quite sure the fellow in front of him was on drugs, he asked, “Where?”

“To eat some zombies, come on.”

__

“Honestly, how long have you lived here, Roxas?”

“Three years, shut up, this place is a hole in the wall.”

Axel shook his head in a pitying manner and then propped up the menu again, his eye catching on the Friday special, the Glock Gyro with a side of Magnum Shells, which was what they called the fries here. Gyros and fries, interesting combination. He kept on down the list, but decided the cheap combination would be fine. He set down the menu, studying Roxas, who had his menu resting up on the table, so that his face was hidden from Axel’s view.

Axel sighed, leaning back against the seat and jutting his legs awkwardly into the aisle. It would have been easier to just prop them up on the seat across from him but Roxas might freak out. He had been surprised when the kid had let him bully him into getting dressed and then grab his backpack and skateboard for him and start walking toward downtown. He’d followed, pretty mutely, getting by with monosyllable answers until Axel had stopped them in front of the place he’d seen yesterday only briefly. He’d conferred with Xigbar, who had confirmed his suspicions, and so this was their lunch destination. Roxas had stopped in front of the plain wooden door with a single slosh of red paint—red paint that looked pretty accurately like blood- and looked at Axel with an expression made entirely of disbelief.

“Are you sure we should go in here? I mean, the paint…”

Axel had raised an eyebrow at him. “Are you serious? You’ve never been here before? I mean, you live here.”

Roxas had still only looked confused. “What is this place?”

“I can’t believe you’ve never been here.”

He was starting to look positively annoyed now, so Axel just shook his head and opened the door, stepping into the dark hallway. He followed it all the way back, with Roxas trailing dubiously in his wake, and then they turned a corner into a much bigger room. The red paint was more copious here, smeared on the floor in bloodshot patterns, on the tables artistically, and on the walls. The walls were also adorned with movie posters, with predictable names like “Dawn of the Dead,” “Valley of the Dead,” “Evil Dead,” “Shaun of the Dead,” and others, most of them including the word “dead” in the title. There were arcade games in one corner, and there were patrons sitting at tables eating, playing board games, using their laptops, and the servers moving effortlessly from table to table with food, all of them wearing plain white shirts with more splashy red paint. The lady who had come to greet them had her frizzy hair pulled back in a messy bun, had white stage makeup ghosted on her face, and red smears on her neck. She had led them to this booth, that had zombie pictures underneath the protective glass tableau, and then give them their menus, which had a very poorly portrayed cartoon on the cover and had delectable options like the “Bloody Breakfast Special,” the “Undead Delight,” and the “Shotgun Sandwich.”

It was, in a word, classy.

“What can I get you boys to drink?”

It was the frizzy haired waitress, back with a fresh smear of red makeup across her other cheek.

“I just want a water,” Roxas said from somewhere behind his menu.

Axel studied his menu for another second. “Can I have the Molotov cocktail?”

The waitress nodded, then asked, “Are you ready to order?”

Axel looked over at Roxas, who was still buried in his menu, and then said hesitantly, “No, I guess not.” Her eyes went from Roxas, lingered on the marks on Axel’s necks, and a sly little gleam entered her eyes. She was skating away a second later and Axel watched her go behind the counter and immediately started whispering to the other waitress, casting very obvious glances in their direction. He winced, then settled back in his seat a little, wishing he’d had a turtleneck shirt in his backpack but he hadn’t foreseen any need why he would need one.

He hadn’t foreseen a lot of stuff about last night, really.

There was some sort of music playing, movie themes, he thought, but it was soft and there was more awkward silence as Axel studied the clips underneath the tableau and Roxas got lost in the menu. Finally Axel couldn’t take it anymore and he asked, “So, where did you live before you moved here, if you’ve only been here for three years?”

The menu didn’t shuffle but Roxas said, “Brooklyn.”

Axel nodded, enthusiastically, “There’s where I live now.”

Roxas’s voice cut out before he could continue. “I know.”

That silenced Axel and he went back to studying the clippings demurely. Maybe he should just shut up. Roxas obviously didn’t want to talk to him. This was nothing more than some sort of polite “the morning after” lunch and after they were done they’d never see each other again. It was probably better that way. No, it was better that way.

The waitress returned a second later with their drinks, all smiles and cherry lipstick this time, her voice practically dripping with suggestion as she said, “Alright boys, what can I get you to eat? Same check, I assume?”

“No,” Roxas said, in a firm voice, as he finally dropped the menu. It was very light, but Axel saw the pink in the tips of his ears, and he had a very sudden vision of clarity. The dark, the cigarettes. His father, Roxas’s job. Outside.

The waitress made a noise in her throat and then went on, “Oh, right, well, what are you having anyway?”

Silence on the other end of the table, so Axel said, “The Friday thing you have. The gyro.”

“And for you, hun?”

Roxas looked like he was bristling dangerously for some reason, and then he said, “Same.”

She practically squealed as she took their menus, then very pointedly looked from Roxas back to the marks on Axel’s neck, and then very nearly skipped back behind the counter, where they could very distinctively hear her going on, “AND THEY ORDERED THE SAME THING, THE SAME THING LINDA, HOW CUTE IS THAT?”

The pink in his ears spilled over into his cheeks, and Axel vaguely noted it was cute, in a weird way.

“Couldn’t you have worn a different shirt?”

The venomous hiss made him immediately rethink the cute idea, and he felt vaguely insulted, but instead he said, with a bit of a smirk, “I didn’t have one, sorry.”

Roxas huffed, and then pushed himself further back into his seat. “Then pull your zipper up more.”

Axel sighed and said nothing and made no move to zip his jacket up any more either. His eyes wandered boredly over to the arcade in the corner, where there were a few young boys crowding around one of the old school machines, the huge ones with the sticks and buttons you had to smack. He leaned a little over, to see more of what it was, and saw a bit of green and yellow on the painting on the side. He tried to remember from his childhood where he had seen that before, the green and yellow, and the brown, the brown too. It had been a birthday party. One of his birthday parties, and it had been at the mansion and it had been a proper birthday party, his only one. He had been nine. He had begged his dad for a real birthday party, a real one like Reno got, and he had wanted it at the mansion, just like Reno’s too. His dad had tried to talk him out of it, to forcibly convince him to have one somewhere else, at his mom’s, or at the park, but no, he had wanted it at the mansion, and it had been a fiasco, because his mom had showed up and she wasn’t supposed to, had shown up and there had been a fight about something, and his uncle Tseng had smacked him across the face.

Compulsively he stood up, surprising Roxas who shot up in his seat, and started moving toward the arcade.

“Where are you going?” Roxas asked, almost panicked.

Axel turned to look at him, a very near smile on his face. “Come over here for a second.” Without pausing to see if he had listened, Axel entered the arcade, striding over to where the boys were crowding in at. He stood behind them, looking at the drawings on the side of the box. They were turtles, and they each had Italian names and had different color themes and different weapons. He remembered the red one, because he had liked red back then, because it was his hair color and thus, made it cooler than any other color in existence. He’d made his dad buy the piñata, just like Reno had, with the blue turtle on it, so he wouldn’t have to beat the red one to death with the stick when they came to that time in the party. The party had been themed after the turtles, more specifically the red themed one. Raphael. That turtle was badass too.

“Hey, are you guys almost done?”

His voice scared the kids, who looked up from their game pretty fast, and then turned back to it, already dismissing him.

“We have enough quarters, we’ll stop using it when we’re done,” one of them said, haughtily.

“I just want one go,” Axel interjected. “Can’t you share?”

“Never had any brothers or sisters, don’t know how,” the same kid said, not even looking back at him.

“You parents aren’t doing a very good job training you to be human beings.”

“They’re not training us, they’re raising us. Leave us alone, we were here first.”

“Training, raising, same thing. Come on, just for a second after you guys are finished.”

“We’ll be finished after we’re out of money.” The kid reached down and patted his pocket. There was a jangle of change. “Oh, well, looks like it might be awhile. Sorry.”

“How many lawns did you have to mow to get that?”

“That’s my allowance.”

“And you spend it all on video games?”

“No, on soda too.”

“Soda rots your teeth.”

“By the time I get old they’ll have machines to fix that.”

Axel folded his arms and nearly started to pout. He was 21 years old and he had just been unsuccessful in getting what looked like an 11 year old from giving up his video game. He deserved to pout.

“Nice job,” came a voice from his side, and he turned to see Roxas standing there, a bemused look on his face. “Nice, nice job. Better stop while you’re ahead, he’s going to be stealing your manhood next.”

Axel snorted. “I’d like to see you do better.”

Roxas gave him a sort of challenging look, and then dug around in his pocket, emerging with two crumpled two dollar bills. “Hey,” he said to the kid, approaching from the side. “I’ve got a deal for you. Two rounds with this machine for 2 dollars.”

The kid looked at Roxas dubiously.

“Costs 25 cents to play this. I’m giving you eight extra plays.”

The kid glowered. “Make it 3.”

Roxas smiled. “No, this is what it is. Take it or leave it.”

“Two fifty.”

“No.”

“Two twenty five.”

“Guess you don’t really want it.” Roxas shrugged and went to put the money back in his pocket.

“Fine,” the kid snapped in frustration then. “Fine. Here, get off Tony.”

“I’m not done yet,” the other kid protested, holding onto the joystick protectively.

“I’ll pay for your next round, get off.”

Once they had retreated to a safe, yet still close distance, the first kid called, “Two rounds, that’s all you paid for.”

“Little punk, he can’t charge to use this,” Axel muttered, stepping up to the console.

“Capitalism, my friend, capitalism.” Roxas went to lean over on the other side, watching Axel fish around in his pockets for quarters.

“I’m taking the red, you can have the blue,” he said, when he had found them. He bent to insert them into the machine.

“I’m not playing.”

Axel looked up at him. “Don’t be stupid. You just got this, you might as well indulge.”

Roxas was nonplussed. “I don’t play video games.”

“This isn’t a video game Roxas. This is, like, history.”

Roxas raised an eyebrow. “No.”

“Come on! If I lose I’ll buy your food.”

“No, I’m going to lose, and then I have to buy your food.”

“I’ll go easy on you,” Axel protested.

“How about you buy my food anyway?” There was an absolute gleam in his gaze.

Axel narrowed his eyes. “Little punk, you can’t charge like that.”

“That’s capitalism, my friend, capitalism,” Roxas said smugly, and stepped up to the other side of the console. Axel muttered under his breath, something like “I’m going to set you on fire,” and then stood up, grasping the joystick and resting his fingers on the buttons lightly.

“I’m going to kick your ass,” he threatened, getting back some of his bite.

“Probably,” Roxas said serenely, watching the screen.

“You’re going to go crying back to your mom when this is over.”

“Assuredly,” Roxas said calmly, starting to tap on his button to choose his color scheme.

“I’m going to rob you of your masculinity.”

“Absolutely,” Roxas said agreeably, and then started to attack Axel’s character without warning.

Roxas severely thrashed him the first round. Axel asked for a rematch and Roxas agreed, solely on the principle they still had one more play left granted by Attila in the corner. Axel started with a spectacular comeback, but Roxas decisively left him in the dust in the second round. Axel bribed two more rounds out of Attila with 3 more dollars. When he inquired about the price difference, he was informed that they had taken longer than necessary, and time was now more precious than it had been five minutes ago, ergo, the cost on time had increased. Axel won the first but Roxas killed him in eleven seconds in the second round and together they pooled their change and put 4 more dollars in Attila’s pocket, and then went back for two more rounds. Roxas did him in effortlessly, and by the time they had recouped, eaten, and left the café (much to the sadness of the waitress, who had positively cooed when Axel had paid for the entire bill), Axel was twenty dollars poorer than he had been when they had entered.

“You so do not suck at video games,” he muttered when they hit the sidewalk.

“Really, I do. You just suck more.”

Axel tried to glare at him, but it came out more pitiful than anything. They started to go down the street, away from the direction they had come from, and Axel realized he had no idea where they were walking to. He fished his phone from his pocket and scanned the missed calls, but he had nothing. There was a text message from Aerith saying that she hoped he’d had a good flight home and one from Reno, jeering in his general direction from shortly after the funeral that he’d just gotten now for some reason, but nothing from his aunt. He sighed as he put it back in his pocket. He had one more day, maybe two tops before he had to go back to Brooklyn. He could put life on hold only for certain amounts at a time.

Roxas appeared lost in thought as they went ahead without talking, so Axel finally said, “So uh. Where are you going?”

The kid looked up at him, and then back down at the ground. “I don’t know. Home I guess. Should probably brush my teeth. Has your aunt gotten back to you?”

“No,” Axel sighed. “I don’t know if she will.”

Roxas quirked an eye at him. “What do you mean? She’s not expecting you?”

Oh. That. Axel laughed, albeit a little nervously. “No. She’s not. I just… got off the plane and hopped on a bus to get here. I tried calling her to see if she would be here but she didn’t answer. I guess I just assumed she’d answer me when I got here. Or at least by the time I got here. But apparently that’s not the case right now.”

Roxas was biting his lip now. “So you just got off the plane to come visit her here without asking if she was going to be here when you came to visit?”

Yea, basically, he wanted to say, but instead he said, “Well.. not really. Kind of. It’s complicated.”

“Right.” Roxas didn’t sound entirely convinced, but he didn’t press the matter. Probably because to press the matter was to step into the territories of “familiar” and “friendship” and beyond the territories of “acquaintance” and “drunken awkward makeout.” Axel didn’t blame him. If he were on the other end, he wouldn’t want to step beyond the “drunken awkward makeout” part either, because that was messy. Somehow they’d muddled through the obligatory awkward morning period, but they were supposed to be going their separate ways now. Not getting more involved.

Yea, and well, whatever, he wasn’t on the other end.

“Like, see,” he banged on, “my family’s kind of fucked up. I’m sort of… estranged from my dad’s half. Sort of estranged from my mom’s half, really, too. I only ever talk to my brother—sometimes—and I hadn’t talked to my dad in probably almost three years. And uh… well. There’s my mom and me, and my brother and my dad and then my stepmom. My dad was pretty well off. Actually, my dad was kind of rich and high up on the social ladder and got articles written about him and all kinds of stuff. But anyway, like I said, I hadn’t talked to him in ages and then he died and my mom paid for my ticket—even though I hadn’t talked to her in a few weeks either, she let me know he had died though—and then I get over there and my brother tells me that he’s been sending money to my mom for a long time now.”

He paused, and saw that Roxas was more than confused, because his eyes kept narrowing and then going out of focus, like he was trying to think of the right way to word a question. Axel had thought he had made it pretty clear but then again, he had really left out the best part of the story. Or well, the part that Lifetime would probably be more than happy to make into an original motion picture. Come to think of it, he should probably get on that. Might as well jump on the bandwagon when the bandwagon was new, and all that.

“Like… okay. My dad’s always been married to my stepmom. First marriage, perfect marriage, whatever. I’m his son from… my mom, who obviously isn’t my stepmom so…”

Was he trying to say that his mom was a whore? A mistress? A slut?

He saw the recognition in Roxas’s eyes though, so he deigned to clarify that further and then went on, “And well, I lived with my dad growing up so he didn’t have to pay child support or anything like that, and my mom didn’t get any money out of it either, or she wasn’t supposed to, since she didn’t take care of me, and now my brother is telling me he’s been sending her money for ages. Which doesn’t make sense, right?”He was nodding, but Axel didn’t know if it was because he really understood, or if it was because he had nothing to really say.

He guessed the latter and ran a hand through his hair, sighing a little bit, before saying, “And I didn’t find that out until yesterday and like I said, I don’t talk to my mom really… she doesn’t like to tell me things. So I can’t ask because I know she won’t answer me but she might have told my aunt, and my aunt lives here—somewhere—so I came to see her so I can find out why my brother’s been sending my mom money. He’s my half brother,” he added, like it would help any.

“And he just won’t tell you?”

Ah, he had been paying attention. “No, my brother’s an asshole.” He considered explaining the circumstances of why Reno had dangled that particular piece of information in front of his nose and why he’d kept it back, but he decided against it because A) they were supposed to be going their separate ways oh, about now and B) because it might make him seem like the bad guy in this situation and he didn’t want this kid’s last, lingering memories of him as some heartless guy who hadn’t stuck around for his father’s funeral’s extravagant after party. If he was going to make a mark, he should make one with slightly more flair.

“Oh.” Roxas didn’t say anything for a second, and then out came, in a bit of a subdued voice, “What are you going to do if she doesn’t call you back?”

Axel shrugged, like it was no big deal at all. “I’m going to stick around here until tomorrow at least… but I need to get back home by Sunday at least. So if she doesn’t show up by tomorrow night then I’ll catch the first bus back on Sunday. My aunt’s a freak. She’ll go out of town with no warning to anyone and show back up a few weeks later, having spent her time in like, a monastery in Tibet or whatever. I could have guessed she wouldn’t be here but….”

“You were hopeful?”

“Is that the word?”

Roxas grinned wryly. “Or you’re just a dumbass.”

He blinked, and then laughed. “Sounds about right, sounds about right.”

They went on a few more feet, and then Roxas asked, “So what are you going to do now?”

Axel shrugged, again, like it was no big deal at all. “I don’t know. Wander around here, find a motel. Haven’t got any idea of where one is, do you?”

Roxas shook his head, bit his lip, and then said, “No, but if you need a place to stay you can stay with me. Or with Demyx,” he added, hastily, “Demyx won’t mind, he likes having people over, plus he’s got the spare bedroom and whatever. I mean, it’s up to you, you’d have to ask him yourself but yea, I mean, it’s up to you.”

Axel took the time, and considered the very obvious implications of the answers he could give to both these options. Staying with Roxas sounded… awkward. More than awkward, it sounded pretty painful, to be quite honest. And maybe not so painful or awkward, as so much stupid. They were supposed to be going separate ways. Moses was supposed to be splitting them up. Morning after, they were gone, one night stand, morning after pill, whatever, all those words people used in situations like this, they were supposed to be applying. But Roxas was heading in a distinctly different direction—inviting Axel to stay. Axel didn’t know if he should be flattered or worried.

Or maybe, just maybe, he was making this into a bigger deal than it was supposed to be. Now, that was quite possible. He had an imagination, and big imaginations boded well for imaginative situations. Maybe Roxas was inviting him back to his apartment to murder him. To seduce him, and then murder him, and take the money he had on him and flee. He’d lost his job, after all. There was nowhere else to go, no way out. Make this his last stand and get out of Dodge while there was still a chance. He must have obviously deduced that Axel had to have some money on him—and besides, Axel had come out and blurted that his dad had been loaded, in any situation. He’d probably be goading Axel in a few minutes to stop at an ATM, withdraw the spending limit so they could do something fun (what that was hadn’t crossed his mind yet, but something like matching bromance tattoos yo fit the bill), and then take him back to his apartment and kiss him and then shoot him while in a state of undress. That’s how these types worked. Sly and slick and coy and all big blue eyes and lonely stares and needy kisses and desperate breaths, that’s how those murderer types operated.

Or, maybe, just maybe, he was making this into a bigger deal than it was supposed to be.

The Demyx option was undoubtedly safer. Demyx couldn’t kill someone to save his life. Xigbar might be able to, but Demyx would probably cry when the gun went off.

“Probably safer to stay with Demyx,” he muttered.

“Huh?”

“Nothing. Sorry.” He shrugged, and then smiled, a very clever ploy to disguise his uneasy feelings of staying with the kid. Murderers, and all that. “We can leave that for later, I guess. I mean, she might call me later, so, no point in making plans now. I’ll just roll with it when it happens.”

Roxas looked dubious. “Because that seems to be serving you very well.”

“Are you implying my simply boarding a bus here without any type of reassurance I’d have a place to stay or an aunt to talk to foolish?”

“Are you implying that your simply boarding a bus without any type of reassurance you’d have a place to stay or an aunt to talk to as anything but foolish?”

“Duh Roxas.”

The kid flushed for a second, and then shook his head, in a pitying fashion. “Beginning to see why your brother thinks you’re twelve years old.”

“Talk to my brother often, do you?”

This time Roxas did flush, more, and the tips of his ears went pink again. “No, I mean, when you called to change your flight, he was in the car with you and you guys were arguing…”

“You’ll have to be a bit more specific, we get into a lot of arguments.”

“The only one I’ve heard! You were going to your dad’s funeral! You told him to stop acting like he was twelve and he said you were acting like you were twelve and on and on and on!”

“Oh, thatargument. Little eavesdropper you are, aren’t you?”

Roxas glared. “I’m not going to dignify that with an answer.”

“Loser.” Axel saw they were coming to the main part of town, or at least the main street, the one that housed the bus station where he’d come in at, and where when they’d gotten off the bus the day before, Roxas had headed one direction and Axel had headed another. Probably meant it was coming up to Roxas’s turn toward his home. He tried to figure out what to say. Roxas had taken a step in offering him a place to sleep should things not work out with his aunt, so did that fall into the category of Not One Night Stand or Polite One Night Stand Morning After?

“So… what are you doing for the rest of today?”

Roxas looked up in the late afternoon sun. “Eh, I have to be somewhere at five.”

He didn’t elaborate, so Axel said, “Oh. Right. This is where you turn to go to your apartment, right?”

He nodded. “Yea. Stalking where I live too, are you?”

“Yep. That’s me.”

Roxas offered a smile. “Yea. What are you going to do? Just hang around here? Demyx should be getting off work at six, you can text him and see if he has any exciting plans… it’s Friday, there should be something going on somewhere.”

Axel quirked an eyebrow at him. “Probably. What, you’re not doing anything fun and exciting yourself tonight?”

There was a dark laugh. “Well, I’m not sure it’s exactly what you’d call exciting?”

Now that was interesting. What was it? Was he murdering people? Killing babies? Selling illegal drugs? Doing illegal drugs while killing babies and murdering people? That would be a great Lifetime original story too, just like his. Maybe they could make a deal with the station, get adjoining movie sets. It would really only make sense. One the poster boy for a dysfunctional family and the other also probably from a dysfunctional family who had turned to murder and crime to offset the effects of that. It’d be a double feature. Great ratings. Lots of tears. Only logical explanation for what Roxas was doing that was so exciting on a Friday night.

“So what are you doing?” he said, voice probably dripping with curiosity.

Roxas spared him a bored look. “Nothing, honestly. Just a lot of nothing and talking to people.”

That invoked a grin. “Roxas, Roxas. You forget who you’re speaking to.”

Again with the bored look. “Trust me. You don’t want to know.”

Now Axel was getting indignant. “Are you just trying to get rid of me? Trying to go somewhere fun and holding back? Come on, you can say it asshole, I’m a man.”

That actually made Roxas laugh, and laugh some more, dropping the skateboard so that the end rested against the pavement as they came to the corner. His mouth was set in a smirk and the gleam in those blue eyes was absolutely devilish. “Are you saying you want to come along?”

Somewhere in the back of his head there went off warning bells that were quite insistent about the fact that he should probably get the whole thing out of Roxas before he agreed to anything. For all he knew Roxas could be dragging him to his drop house that would be full of drugs and hookers. Better safe than sorry.

He’d been routinely shutting off that part of his brain for years, though.

Smirking back at Roxas, he said, full of bravado he was quite good at faking, “Why not? Bring it on. Anything you can handle, I can handle Rox.”

He expected an indignant reply of him, but there was only a widening of that smirk and the gleam in his eyes grew. “Alright then. Come with me.”

One of these days being able to turn off that part of his brain was going to get him into serious trouble.

He’d been telling himself that for years, too.

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