KH: Axel + Xemnas, "Dusk Falls"uneditedMay 1 2006, 15:36:06 UTC
"Superior" is a title to Axel; one without any meaning. Xemnas could ask to be called Lord, or Queen of Atlantica, and it would all be the same to him. It's a synonym for "guy giving the orders," and Axel is not exceptionally fond of the guys giving orders on general principle. Respect if something one earns, not demands with a title.
Xemnas knows that his newest recruit wants to be impressed, and so a few months down the line, he arranges for it.
Saix has a servant, a woman with pale brown hair and a quick flashing smile, perhaps old enough to have had a child or two before she became a Nobody and left them to their fate. She wields a broadsword and Vexen once modified Nobodies into her image, but they did not obey her and the project was scrapped, she too weak to be their Number Nine. Axel doesn't have time to memorize her name, although they join the Organization at approximately the same time. It doesn't matter anyway.
Somehow she disappoints Saix. He flies into a fury and appeals to Xemnas, and Superior indulges him.
"It is always a shame," says the silver-haired man, "to have to reduce a Nobody with such promise into a Dusk."
Poor girl, Axel thinks when he hears, but when Xemnas asks him to attend the event, he accepts, because he is curious and new and doesn't know any better.
There is a special basement in Castle Oblivion where they do this; it's easy, there, to reach into the mind. The woman is strapped to a table and struggles futilely and curses like a sailor, and then it begins.
She screams. A blood-curdling, soul-twisting scream that makes Axel bite his tongue, startled, because it comes out of nowhere and pierces his skin. She doesn't stop screaming, writhing until the straps bite into her flesh and blood runs down her arms, arching as if seeking to buck off some imaginary weight. Xemnas's eyes are closed; he is smiling. Saix laughs.
"What did you do to her?" Axel asks, twenty minutes later when the screaming stops. The woman is still and staring, her skin gray, but she yet breathes.
"I only went into her mind," says Xemnas, "and rid her of her memories. Now all that remains is a shell. No heart and no memory, only the will to live and to obey the more powerful... a Dusk. It's an appropriate name," he adds, "don't you think?"
This is the boring part, according to Superior, but he gently advises that Axel stay and watch as her body mutates over the next two hours or so, because he might learn a few things.
Axel stays and watches. He knows now that he will never, ever engage in the sort of blatant disobedience that would merit this punishment.
Re: KH: Axel + Xemnas, "Dusk Falls"libekoryJune 3 2006, 23:52:00 UTC
Oh, I love this so much. <3<3<3 One of the things that always bothers me about fic!Axel is how irreverant he seems towards Xemnas. We don't know much about his interactions with Xemnas (never actually seeing them in the games, at least), but we do know that being turned into a Dusk is enough to make him try to kill Roxas, which, given his latter-game devotion, makes it a pretty menacing thing. It's one thing, at least, which Xemnas can do to keep the otherwise-troublemaking Axel under control.
I think Axel's whole alliegiance to the Organization is a bit tricky to begin with; you've got a character who thinks nothing of stabbing his coworkers in the back, and yet a year later he's somehow still with the company? So he must be loyal to someone, and that loyalty must exist for some reason. *part of her wonders now if xemnas didn't want the castle oblivion people eliminated; they were, after all, traitors...*
But I love this fic, so much, because it portrays Axel's irreverance while making it clear how he avoids getting himself the hell killed. Much props, Kay-san. <3
Re: KH: Axel + Xemnas, "Dusk Falls"uneditedJune 4 2006, 01:40:22 UTC
I'm sure that if Xemnas had known, he would have wanted Marluxia and Larxene dead, but the Seniors who were there, Vexen and Lexaeus and Zexion, they were loyal to him. (Although aware of Marluxia's rebellion, and rather apathetic about it. They were passive-aggressively thinking of their own methods of going up against Marluxia, but seemed disinterested in confronting him.) And Axel was directly responsible for at least two of their deaths as well.
My personal take on it isn't loyalty so much as survival -- the same reason why Marluxia wanted to take down OXIII instead of just leaving, why Demyx doesn't go off and be a sitar rock star somewhere -- and momentum. He's already here and leaving means getting erased or worse, so survive... and do it with flare, causing as much untraceable trouble as possible. XD
Xemnas knows that his newest recruit wants to be impressed, and so a few months down the line, he arranges for it.
Saix has a servant, a woman with pale brown hair and a quick flashing smile, perhaps old enough to have had a child or two before she became a Nobody and left them to their fate. She wields a broadsword and Vexen once modified Nobodies into her image, but they did not obey her and the project was scrapped, she too weak to be their Number Nine. Axel doesn't have time to memorize her name, although they join the Organization at approximately the same time. It doesn't matter anyway.
Somehow she disappoints Saix. He flies into a fury and appeals to Xemnas, and Superior indulges him.
"It is always a shame," says the silver-haired man, "to have to reduce a Nobody with such promise into a Dusk."
Poor girl, Axel thinks when he hears, but when Xemnas asks him to attend the event, he accepts, because he is curious and new and doesn't know any better.
There is a special basement in Castle Oblivion where they do this; it's easy, there, to reach into the mind. The woman is strapped to a table and struggles futilely and curses like a sailor, and then it begins.
She screams. A blood-curdling, soul-twisting scream that makes Axel bite his tongue, startled, because it comes out of nowhere and pierces his skin. She doesn't stop screaming, writhing until the straps bite into her flesh and blood runs down her arms, arching as if seeking to buck off some imaginary weight. Xemnas's eyes are closed; he is smiling. Saix laughs.
"What did you do to her?" Axel asks, twenty minutes later when the screaming stops. The woman is still and staring, her skin gray, but she yet breathes.
"I only went into her mind," says Xemnas, "and rid her of her memories. Now all that remains is a shell. No heart and no memory, only the will to live and to obey the more powerful... a Dusk. It's an appropriate name," he adds, "don't you think?"
This is the boring part, according to Superior, but he gently advises that Axel stay and watch as her body mutates over the next two hours or so, because he might learn a few things.
Axel stays and watches. He knows now that he will never, ever engage in the sort of blatant disobedience that would merit this punishment.
He will find other ways.
Reply
I think Axel's whole alliegiance to the Organization is a bit tricky to begin with; you've got a character who thinks nothing of stabbing his coworkers in the back, and yet a year later he's somehow still with the company? So he must be loyal to someone, and that loyalty must exist for some reason. *part of her wonders now if xemnas didn't want the castle oblivion people eliminated; they were, after all, traitors...*
But I love this fic, so much, because it portrays Axel's irreverance while making it clear how he avoids getting himself the hell killed. Much props, Kay-san. <3
Reply
My personal take on it isn't loyalty so much as survival -- the same reason why Marluxia wanted to take down OXIII instead of just leaving, why Demyx doesn't go off and be a sitar rock star somewhere -- and momentum. He's already here and leaving means getting erased or worse, so survive... and do it with flare, causing as much untraceable trouble as possible. XD
Reply
Leave a comment