Damn! It has been a long time!
I made the chapter, lost it, wrote it again, couldn't post it because of computer problems, deleted it, restored it, got deleted again when I went to get my computer fixed, and wrote it again, and now I'm posting it.
It only took... a few months.
Riku and the others had been doing really well in changing the minds of the crime bosses that had allied themselves with the information tono. Only a few remained.
Rhyme looked up at Joshua as she walked. She blushed and looked away as Joshua turned and smiled at her.
Shiki rested her hand on Rhyme’s shoulder and slowed her pace to increase their distance from the boys.
“You really like Joshua don’t you.” Shiki whispered to the younger girl.
Rhyme’s face became bright red with embarrassment, “Umm… well….” She stammered as she started to fidget a little.
“That’s so cute,” she thought with a smile on her face, “Rhyme has a crush on Joshua.”
“If you like him you should tell him.” Shiki said.
Rhyme blushed even more, “Do… do you think he likes me?”
“You’ll never know if you don’t tell him how you feel.” Shiki responded.
Rhyme smiled a small smile and giggled girlishly and Shiki did the same.
“Well guys,” Riku said in a loud voice interrupting the girls’ laughter, “You know the drill. Split up and look for this guy’s runners and dealers.”
They gathered together. Riku was with Joshua, Shiki with Neku, and of course Rhyme would be with her brother Beat.
Riku was just about to walk away when he felt something tug on his shirt. He turned around quickly and was met by Rhyme’s smiling face.
“Something wrong Rhyme?” Riku asked in a kind voice.
Rhyme shook her head.
“Well then… what’s up?”
Rhyme hesitated a moment and then spoke.
“Would you tell Joshua to meet me on the roof of that building when you guys come back? I have something important to tell him.” She said in a hushed voice.
Riku smiled. He could piece together what she wanted to tell him by how much she was blushing.
“Sure thing Rhyme, no prob.”
She smiled and ran off to the safety of her older brother.
“You come’n Riku?” Joshua yelled.
Riku turned around and sprinted after Joshua.
“AQUA NO!!!”
Roxas woke up to the sound of himself screaming. He looked around his room franticly, searching for any danger. He found none.
His dreams had been getting worse. Roxas was starting to remember more and more of the dreams. A girl with blue hair called Aqua and a young man you looked a lot like Xemnas named Terra. They visited him each night in the same dream.
Roxas flipped his bedside lamp on. His body was bruised all over. He put his head in his hands. He whimpered.
How was he meant to deal with this? How did Xemnas expect him to kill people and then try to be normal the rest of his days? It was just too much for a 14 year old kid to deal with.
“Roxas?”
Roxas’s head shot up and he looked over in the direction the voice came from. It was Axel.
“You okay?”
Roxas let his hand run across his sweat covered face.
“I’m o-okay…” He replied as he tried to pull himself together.
Roxas cringed as pain ran through his body making him let out a mild scream.
“You’re not okay.” Axel said as he walked closer to Roxas.
Roxas pushed himself away.
“Don’t t-touch m-me!” He stammered as he swung his fist at the older boy weakly.
Axel grabbed Roxas’s arms and pulled him off his bed.
“Hurry up and get dressed. We’re going to go in a few minutes.” Axel ordered
.
Roxas fumbled around his room and toppled over.
Axel rolled his eyes and helped him up and to get his undershirt and traveling robe on. He put Roxas’s arm over his shoulder and helped him walk to the landing bay.
“Where are… where are we going?” Roxas said his eyes glossed over in a daze.
“You’ll see.”
“Okay! I’ll tell you!”
Riku lowered his keyblade as the man fell to his knees and confessed everything he knew about his crime boss. Riku smiled. The keyblade always made ‘em talk.
The man’s name was Chalk. He had his headquarters up in blue district.
“Well that’s some good news.” Joshua said with a smirk on his face.
Riku didn’t like it when that boy smirked like that. He was hiding something.
“Listen… Riku, I gotta make a call.”
“So?”
“In private.”
“Why in private?”
“Because I said so!”
Riku’s eyes went wide. That was the first time he had ever heard Joshua scream. It wasn’t until that moment that he realized that Joshua rarely ever had really any inflection in his voice other than sarcasm.
“Sure thing…” Riku finally said.
Joshua walked off.
Riku followed.
Riku caught up with Joshua but it took a little longer than he expected. He had been hidden above him on a low roof top.
Joshua put his cell up to his mouth and spoke.
“Reporting in.”
Silence
“No. They don’t suspect a thing.”
More silence.
“Are you kidding me? Do you know how long it took me to get that high in that bastard’s stupid crime ring?”
More silence.
“You owe me for this. The tono had better compensate better if he wants me to give up on a perfectly good set up.”
Upon hearing that last part Riku dropped down, his keyblade was already out. Since they were in an alleyway he didn’t think Joshua could use any magic.
Joshua turned to face him in a blur of motion. He shrugged his soldiers and sighed.
“I’m going to have to call you back.” He said in his calm voice as he flipped the cell closed.
“So you’re working for the information tono huh!?” Riku shouted at him.
Joshua smirked. He HATED that damn smirk.
“It’s just-“
“Don’t give me that bullshit!”
He smiled.
“Fine,” He lurched forward, his knife drawn, “I’ll save the speech for Rhyme!”
Riku just got his keyblade up in time to block the attack. Joshua was inhumanly fast.
Riku pushed him back and harm swung his blade down.
Joshua sidestepped out of the way and was saved from being split into pieces by mere millimeters. Instead of his head becoming two a lock of his hair was cut.
Riku used his momentum and lunged.
“You’re going to need to do better than that Riku!” Joshua said as he leaped effortlessly over Riku’s head.
He brought his knife up to Riku’s neck before his keyblade defense could even react.
Riku rolled down the length of the alleyway just in time to not get his neck slit.
“Come on! You get’n tired?” his opponent taunted.
Riku could feel the anger rising in his body. Darkness was starting to take over.
Riku’s strikes became less and less precise and wilder as if he were an animal. His eyes were becoming yellow.
“Almost there…” Joshua laughed under his breath.
Riku let out an animalistic war cry as his body was overtaken by darkness.
“I’lL kIlL yOu!” He roared.
Joshua smirked.
“I don’t think so.” He said in his calm voice as he pulled out a pin from his pocket.
Just then a large white beam blasted down from the sky and hit Riku with all of its force at once. He yelled in pain as the darkness was torn from his body by the light. He fell to the ground out of breath and out of energy.
Joshua put his hand up and conjured a magical barrier all around where Riku was so he couldn’t leave the alleyway.
“Come… come back here.” he rasped.
“No thanks,” His eyes were like those of a starving tiger who has just spotted meat, “I have a meeting planned with Rhyme.”
With that he walked off.
Trevor’s eyes went wide.
“Holly!” he called.
“I know!” She cried back, “I saw it in the distance through the buildings!”
“Only Riku has that much dark magical energy!” Trevor said in a loud enough voice for River and Dr. Myanmar to hear, “Can you tell where it was exactly Holly!?”
She shook her head, “No but we’ll be pretty close by if were hurry!”
“That’s that then,” Trevor waved his arm, “Come on everyone. We’re going to find Riku!”
River squealed in delight as she scrambled up to Trevor’s shoulder. They were off.
Roxas’s head was resting on the window of Axel’s ship.
“Hey man stay with me.” Axel said as he shook his friend a little bit.
Roxas looked over at Axel slowly. His neck really hurt. All of him hurt.
“Here,” Axel said as he pulled out a small bottle of pills, “Take one. They’re pain killers. They should take the worst of it away.”
Roxas fumbled with the cap so Axel had to pull out the right amount of pills for him. Roxas pushed the pills to the back of his throat and swallowed.
“Where almost there.” Axel said.
“Almost where?” Roxas asked, his voice nothing more than a whisper. If you weren’t listening for it you probably wouldn’t hear it.
“Twilight Town.” Axel answered as he engaged the landing gear.
Axel helped his friend down the exit ramp. It was early in the morning.
“I think I can walk…” Roxas mumbled as he broke free of Axel’s grasp only to trip over himself.
“No you can’t.” Axel said as he grabbed him again.
“No I can do it!”
Axel hesitated for a second and then let him go.
“Why did you bring me here?” Roxas finally asked.
“To reward you for being such a good partner and friend, and because you need a break from killing.” Axel said.
Roxas looked over at Axel. His smile was warm and his cool eyes sincere.
They found themselves walking through the city. They passed a SeeD recruiting center. The line was long. With the attacks on Hollow Bastion controlled space it wasn’t all that of a surprise that its citizens of its colonies would raise up and enlist. They overheard a discussion of a few of the younger enlistees. Roxas and Axel wandered over to see what the commotion was about.
“You chicken wuss! You can’t join SeeD! Go join the regular military!”
“Yeah right Seifer! Anything your gang can do mine can do too!”
“Go home Hayner! You have no idea what war is going to be like!” Seifer yelled back at him.
“And you do!?” Hayner yelled back.
“Guys calm down!”
“Olette is right guys calm down!”
Axel pushed his way through the crowd of people to see if they Hayner that was screaming was the one he had met that last time he came to Twilight Town.
“Hey guys look. It’s Axel.”
It was.
Axel smiled, “Hey Hayner, Pence, Olette…”
Pence and Olette smiled and said hello.
“How you been man?” Hayner asked.
“Fine. What’s new with you?”
“Well I’m…” Hayner was cut off.
“Aren’t you going to introduce me chicken wuss?”
“I swear to Gaia, Seifer If you call me that again I’ll,”
Olette pushed the two boys apart.
“This is Seifer.” He said in an angry tone
“Nice to meet you.” Axel said.
“Whatever…” he mumbled back.
Roxas pushed through the crowd after Axel and stood beside him.
“It looks like you have some introductions to do too Axel.” Pence said.
“Oh right!” Axel exclaimed, “This is my friend Roxas.”
“Hey,”
“S’up?”
“Hi…” Roxas mumbled as he looked at the ground. He wasn’t good with people.
“Hi Roxas it’s nice to meet you. My name is Olette.” Olette introduce herself.
“S-same here.” Roxas stammered as he shook her outstretched hand.
There was a long silence before anyone talked.
“Soooo…. What is going on here?” Axel said, breaking the silence.
“Were all enlisting in SeeD to help with the war effort.”
“Really?” Axel said in a fake voice. Them enlisting would mean that they may have to fight each other sometime in the future.
“We’re going to war to defend our homeworld ya’ know!”
“Right.”
“Allow me to introduce my friends.” Seifer said in a proud voice, “This is Raijin and Fujin.”
“It’s nice to meet you ya’ know.” Raijin said
“Pleasure.” Fujin said in a monotone voice.
They talked until they got to the front of the line and against Axel’s secret wishes they enlisted.
Axel looked over at Roxas as he said goodbye to Seifer and his friends. Roxas was smiling the biggest smile he had ever seen. He was really getting along with Hayner, Pence, and Olette.
It came time where they had to leave too though. Roxas walked over to Axel.
“Come one,” Axel said, “I know some place cool we can go.”
Roxas looked out over the city. They were sitting on the top ledge of the city’s clock tower watching the sunset.
“Here,”
Roxas looked over at Axel. He was holding ice cream.
“Thanks,” he said as he took it.
“Hey Roxas,”
“Yeah?”
“How about we come here and get some ice cream after all of our missions. Would you like that?”
“Yeah, of course I would!” He said enthusiastically. "Why though?"
Axel stopped eating and looked over at him.
“We need something more in our lives than just the organization and killing.”
Roxas looked deep into the older boy’s eyes. This wasn’t a trick or some plan to get him to tell any feelings of hate towards the organization. He realized at that moment that he and Axel weren’t just friends, but best friends.
“Here,” Axel put his little finger out, “We’ll make a promise.”
“Yeah a promise.” Roxas smiled as he put his little finger in his and made the promise official.
They sat there and watched the sun set. It was one of the most beautiful things he had ever seen. He had a good day.
“Ah!” Axel groaned, “This ice cream is so salty isn’t it?”
“Salty, but sweet too.” Roxas said in a calm, happy tone.
Roxas bit into the ice cream. Yeah, he had a good day.
Yay. The Jesus beam, Seifer calling people a chicken wuss and in SeeD, and Riku getting back with his friends. Mother of Gawd this took to long to write.