[KH2] - Bad Affection (Xigbar/Xaldin/Replica Riku) (Chapter 8)
Axel actually stopped and stared. The words that had just come out of Braig’s mouth were too outrageous to be believed. Riku? The clone of the boss’s brother? There was no way.
“Are you shitting me?”
“Nope. ‘m serious as a heart attack.” Braig flipped a switch and the fluorescent lights overhead sprang to life with a blinding flash. All manner of sinister-looking silver instruments gleamed in the newly illuminated lab along with a long row of metal cages along one wall. Another wall was lined floor-to-ceiling with stainless steel drawers, like those at a morgue. The sight of them made a shudder go up and down Axel’s spine. He had problems with tight spaces.
“How in the name of God did he pull that off? Even’s smart and he’s a sneaky bastard, but how the fuck would he have cloned the X’s little brother without their knowing?”
Braig grinned.
“That’s a good question. Wanna hear a better one?”
“Sure.” Axel walked over to the morgue drawers and looked at them. A number etched into the steel was the only sort of identification on each one. He ran his thumb across the etched numbers. Had Roxas been in one of these?
“The real fun question is what Ev did with the original.”
Axel looked over at Riku with a deep frown. The clone had been standing beside a shelf of instruments looking blankly into space, but turned and looked inquiringly at Axel. How many pairs of those eyes existed, Axel wondered. How many identical eyes in identical faces were there that shouldn’t by any rights exist?
It was at times like these that Axel could tell that Riku wasn’t human. A human could not have stood there and listened to people explain its horrific origins like this.
“What did he do with the original?”
“Who knows?” Braig’s eyes glittered. “That’s why I said it was a good question.”
Shaking off Braig’s ominous tone, Axel took it upon himself to wander around the room to look for anything suspicious. Look for anything suspicious. He laughed grimly at himself. The whole fucking place was suspicious. Morgue drawers and extra locks and all sorts of instruments and vials and machines that Axel couldn’t even name. Being in here gave him the creeps. But he was here for Roxas, he reminded himself sternly. Finding him, even if he was dead, would be worth going anywhere.
“Are there any other rooms? I wanna look through all of them to see what sort of other nasty goodies Even’s been hiding.”
“Lookin’ for somethin’ in particular, Red?” Eyes glinting, Braig turned and grinned at him.
Axel shrugged, hoping that Braig couldn’t see through him. He didn’t want anyone to know of his true intentions, especially not someone like Braig who would take every scrap of information he could and use it against him. Or he wouldn’t. It was impossible to tell what someone as unpredictable as Braig would do with the knowledge of a past like Axel’s, but Axel had no intention of finding out.
“Nope, just looking. Curious to see what kind of dirty secrets a skeezy old creep like Even would keep in his secret lab.”
“Actually, you should ask Riku.” The cannibal turned to his young protégé and put a spidery hand on its hair. “Riku, you’ve been very good. You want to go see your brothers, right?”
The replica nodded. “Yes, Master. Very much.”
“Wait, brothers?” Axel looked between Axel and Riku. “How is that possible? It’s a clone.”
“It’s completely possible. Think about it.”
Axel thought for a moment.
“The other clones Even made,” he said. “That’s what you mean by brothers.”
“Mmhmm. And you should see ‘em, Red. A whole bunch of little clones just like Riku here, all squirming over each other like a litter of puppies. And they’re very affectionate towards their big brother.” Braig nuzzled his son in a decidedly un-fatherly manner and Axel couldn’t help but wonder how much Braig got off on seeing all of these clones together.
“Riku, why don’t you go show him? And you can play with your brothers while you’re at it.” Braig sounded smug, like someone who expected to be congratulated for their brilliant idea at any moment.
“What about you?” Axel did not want to go about his business without knowing where the cannibal was going to be and what he was going to be doing. “Going to be looking for snacks in these drawers or something?” He grinned a little bit.
“Mmmmaybe. You wanna stay down here and find out?”
“No, I’ll take my chances upstairs with the clones. We’ll be back down in a little bit. Don’t spoil your dinner or whatever.” Axel turned to Riku. “Shall we?”
Riku nodded. “This way.” It led Axel out another door and up a metal staircase and into another darkened room. Axel could hear movement in the room, although he couldn’t see in the dark.
“Riku?”
One of the overhead fluorescent lights flickered to life and the room was dimly illuminated. Several large chain-link cages had been built into one corner of the room. Within each cage were several young boys, all with silver hair and Riku’s face. All of them looked to see who had entered, a dozen aqua eyes turning at once. All of them (the ones that could speak) let out a cry and strained against the chain link towards their brother.
Axel stopped and stared. How could he not? Braig wasn’t fucking kidding. Looking at cages full of the same face was disconcerting, especially since almost none of the clones were whole. Several were missing digits or limbs and almost all had bloody bandages wrapped around various parts of their body. One was even missing both eyes.
As Axel stared, Riku walked towards the cages with a smile on its face, looking as happy as Axel had ever seen it look. It unlatched all the cages (Axel noted with amazement that none of them had locks) and stood still as the other clones surged around it. They ran their hands (or stumps) all over its clothes and face, through its hair. A few that couldn’t get as close as the others merely grabbed a hold of whatever part of it they could reach and held on tightly.
“Reeeee…” They all milled around it and tried to speak. “Mmmm Reeee… Aaahhh…”
“Wh… why are they making those noises?” Axel hadn’t even thought he was capable of movement or speech until he heard his own voice.
“They can’t talk… most of them. They’re trying to say my name.” There was something in Riku’s usually-emotionless voice, something that Axel would have called pride. Riku was smiling as it ran his hands over all of its brothers, stroking their hair and faces and looking into each one’s eyes in turn. It was so proud of them. They’d remembered its name.
A lump had appeared in Axel’s throat as he watched this scene and he tried unsuccessfully to swallow it. Finally, he simply turned away. He wanted to watch - who wouldn’t? - but he had other things that he had to attend to.
“Um… You’re going to just be here with your brothers?” He did his best not to look at them.
“Yes, Uncle Axel.”
“Okay. I’m going to, uh… poke around a bit. You just stay here.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll be here,” answered the clone.
“Good.”
It was only after Axel had wandered off to another area that the clones resurged around Riku and held onto it tightly. They whispered to their older brother in a language that only they understood, a language made as much of thoughts and images than as actual words.
“A… monster?” Riku looked down at them after a few moments, a hint of a frown on its face. “Even’s made… a monster? What about it?”
They whispered some more, placing their fingertips against their older brother’s lips and pressing their faces to its skin.
“Monnnn…” A few of them could almost say the word out loud. “Ssssttttt…”
“What kind of monster is it?” Riku’s voice dropped to a whisper. It kissed the bloody and bandaged stumps and hands that touched its face and stroked all of the silvery heads. “Tell me.”
“Mmmmm… Aaahhhh….” The chorus of soft little voices echoed and Riku listened carefully. When they were done, Riku’s expression lightened a little. It was not capable of smiling on its own volition, but even its stoic expressions could not hide a momentary glimmer of happiness.
“A beautiful monster… a beautiful monster for me? Where?” The clones all looked towards another metal door. Riku remembered that door. Many of its brothers had vanished behind it and none of them had ever come out again. It ran its fingertips across the lips of the nearest clone and the other ones pushed around it. “Thank you, little brothers. I will come and see you again soon.” It extricated itself from the grasping hands and walked towards the heavy metal door. The door was unlocked, so Riku pulled it open and went inside.
The room was some sort of operating room. A large stainless steel table dominated the center of the room. A large assortment of accoutrements were connected to the table - tools and pumps and hoses that Riku didn’t know the purpose of, despite Dilan’s medical training. Along the bottom of one wall were a series of shiny steel morgue drawers, like the ones downstairs. Unlike the ones downstairs, however, these opened with-wise instead of length-wise. The other walls were lined with counters and shelves and cases full of specimens and equipment and all other manner of strange objects.
The clones had said that there was a monster inside this room, a beautiful monster that Even had made. They wanted Riku to find it, they had said, and that it should be Riku’s. A monster for Riku.
While Riku did not understand why its brothers had decided that this “monster” belonged to it, it knew that the others wouldn’t say so for no good reason. Its eyes scanned the room and fell immediately upon the morgue drawers in the wall. That’s where Even would keep it.
The first drawer was empty, but the interior was crusty with dried blood. Even must have been too busy to clean. Riku closed it again, knowing without a shadow of a doubt that the blood belonged to a brother.
Riku paused as it placed its hand upon the handle of the second drawer. It could feel something… different about this one. And when it pulled the drawer open and saw what was inside, it knew that it was right.
The… thing inside was beautiful. The clones had been right. It had once been two boys and now it was one, joined down the middle by thick black stitches. The features were similar, but distinctly different as evidenced by the slight discord caused in the face as they lined up just short of perfectly. Riku placed its hand on the monster’s hair, half blonde and half dark. There were lines around the mouth of the blonde side, indicative of many frowns, whereas there were smile lines around the eyes of the dark-haired side. It stroked the hair, marveling that the texture changed as its fingers crossed back and forth from the different sides.
A smile crept across Riku’s face as it traced its fingers down the bisected face to the neck and the body. The monster was naked, minus a chain with a metal tag resting on the monster’s chest. Riku had never seen anything so beautiful before.
“Wake up,” it whispered softly. “Wake up…”
The joined boys opened their eyes and Riku noted with delight that they were two different shades of blue. They pushed themselves up in the drawer and stared at Riku with their mismatched eyes. Riku could see that there was something in the monster’s eyes… something intelligent, but primal. And appealing.
“I’m Riku,” murmured the clone. It raised a hand and touched the monster’s face, running its fingers across the stitches. The monster closed their eyes and leaned into Riku’s hand. The mismatched hands found their way around Riku’s waist and the monster looked right into Riku’s eyes. In that moment, Riku realized that it felt the way about the monster that Master and Dilan felt about each other. It was the thing he had read about in so many books before, but had never truly understood. It was love.
Riku pressed its forehead to the monster’s and closed its eyes.
“I’ll get you out of here,” it whispered softly. “I’ll get you out of here and take care of you.”
The monster stared into Riku’s eyes and the corner of the brunette side of its mouth twitched, trying to return the smile. The blonde frowned and the eye swiveled, completely independent of the other, over to the side. Riku had just enough time to pick its head up and look at the door before it opened.
“Riku, are you in here? We need to get back downstairs and meet your dad…”
Axel stepped through the door and stopped dead in his tracks, staring. Roxas. He had found Roxas. Axel’s flesh crawled over his bones and all of the blood drained from his face all at once. His knees wobbled and only the fact that he grabbed the table quickly kept him on his feet.
He wanted to say Roxas’ name, but his voice caught in his throat when the monster turned all the way around to face him. There was something wrong. Roxas’ face… it wasn’t completely Roxas’ face. The line of stitches made for a jarring line of dissymmetry between the two halves of the face that was both Roxas’ and… not Roxas. He could do nothing but stare, wanting to believe in Roxas and yet… not daring to believe that this thing was real.
The spell was broken by the monster uttering a low, savage growl. The blonde side bared its teeth while the brunette side’s eye merely widened. Axel took an abrupt step back, his hand gripping the door so tightly that his knuckles went white.
“Riku.” He spoke in a low, unsteady tone. “What the fuck is that?”
“A monster,” answered Riku simply. Its face and tone remained passive and emotionless, but its eyes were watching the monster and its uncle carefully. The monster seemed incredibly agitated, especially the blonde side. “Even made it. Like he made me.”
Axel’s face worked with emotion and his right hand twitched. He seemed incapable of speech.
The monster started to move, intending to lunge at Axel. Riku grabbed it and held it back, pressing its face into the monster’s hair.
“Calm down,” it whispered. “It’s all right. I won’t let him do anything to you. Just calm down.”
The monster stilled under Riku’s touch and the growl died in its throat. They glanced back at Riku, the blonde side trembling with rage beneath Riku’s hands.
“Don’t hurt him,” Riku said softly into the monster’s ear. “Go back to sleep… I’ll come back and get you.”
Axel’s eyes narrowed. “Come out of there. Right now.”
Riku paused. It couldn’t disobey a direct order, not from someone who knew Master. It stood, looking down at the monster and gently pushed it back down into the drawer.
“Go back to sleep,” it said again. “It will be all right.”
The monster’s mismatched blue eyes watched Riku as the clone gave it an injection of sedative and slowly closed it back into the drawer again. Riku crouched on the floor beside the drawer for a few moments, silent, thinking of its love trapped within the steel wall.
“Riku.” Axel’s voice was cold and clipped, unsuccessfully trying to hide how shaken he was. “Come here. Right. Now.”
Riku stood and walked to Axel’s side, obedient and unquestioning as always. But something was different now. Something had changed within it. There was a knowledge in its eyes that had not been there before, a will that it had never possessed. It was no longer a pretty puppet without a mind. It had evolved.
Had Axel been in his right mind, he might have noticed the sudden difference in his nephew, but he did not. He was far too preoccupied with the one thought that had taken over his mind ever since he had laid eyes on the… the… abomination that Even had made of his great love.
The monster must be destroyed.