(no subject)
uwaaaah! Once Upon A Dream is completely finished, meaning it was betaed (♥!) so I'll post it all here in one go for easier formatting. And also to get the word length and I wanted to make my notes, so. :Db 'tis be a fanfic post, yo.
Sora. You're lucky. It looks like my summer vacation is... over.
---------
When Roxas wakes up, he doesn't sit bolt upright on his bed, a sheat of sweat on his face. He simply opens his eyes slowly, accomodating himelf to the light in his room. Only when the thought hits him -- his room -- does he sit bolt upright. He takes a look at his hands -- they're ungloved, he thinks -- then, at his clothes -- his sleeping clothes, not Sora's outfit -- and a quick turn to the window let's him see his reflection.
His breath catches in his throat when he sees himself. He passes a hand through his hair -- blond, not brown -- and holds the windowsill with the other. He throws open the window and breathes the air of Twilight Town, sees the everlasting sunset.
"Sora," he calls, breathless, almost a question, and suddenly he feels more awake and he laughs. He laughs, and laughs, and laughs. He feels like dancing.
He's not sure why.
---------
Once he's dressed, the first thing he does is run to the usual spot. He can't help it -- what if that whole ... thing hadn't really been a dream, what if he was stuck in a deserted Twilight Town after having merged in Sora? But his heart is ready to burst, and if that hadn't been a dream, how is it possible? His heart is beating and he feels exhilarated and terrified.
Mostly, he feels, and that's the first proof he has that this is real.
He arrives at the usual spot breathless, shoulders shaking, heart beating -- beating -- fifty times faster than normal, it seems. Hayner turns and raises an eyebrow at him.
"Woah, man, what happened? You look like you've seen a ghost," Hayner says, completely bewildered.
Olette and Pence turn towards him, too. Olette puts an hand on his shoulder as he tries to catch his breathing while grinning like a fool. It's harder than one might think, he decides. His breaths come out in laughs. Pence calls his name tentatively, as if he's gone nuts, and Hayner makes the "cuckoo" motion, which only manages to make Roxas laugh harder. He can't breathe.
"Roxas, you're turning blue," Olette says worriedly, her hand moving in circles on his back to calm him down.
It does. A little. He grins and lifts his head to look at them. They look worried. He realizes he's half bent over, hands on his knees and he gets up slowly, catching his breath. He shakes his head and shrugs, half apologizing, half unsure.
"Sorry. I'm just -- really, really happy right now," he mutters sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head a little.
They still look worried and Hayner is the first to shrug it off.
"What you are is really, really weird, Roxas," he says, crossing his arms and shaking his head, smirking. Olette and Pence laugh and Roxas can't even take offense to it.
They're alive and real and breathing, and so is he. They all laugh and talk together.
It's like waking up from the worst of nightmares, Roxas thinks.
He tries not to think of the parts of the nightmare that weren't so bad.
------
He tries not to, but he can't help it, he finds, when the day has ended and Hayner, Pence and Olette are taking him back home. They spent the whole day, the entire town together, trying to find out what had caused the recent case of events. They found nothing, as if it had never happened, and they all shrugged it off. Even if they had found nothing, everyone had had fun.
Except now that the fun has ended, he can't help but think about it all. The memories seem as real as the ones of Twilight Town, even if he knows they're all from a dream. Still, he thinks, lightly licking his ice cream, what of Naminé? What of Axel?
He had promised he'd see them again. Even if only in a dream -- he couldn't have imagined them. Naminé, with her small smiles and mysterious air, her apologizing tone and sad eyes. 'We will meet again', she had said. She had been his only comfort in all that was happening. He really did want to meet her again. And Axel, what about Axel --
"Roxas, I didn't know you were getting new neighbors," Pence's voice sounds out, and Roxas blinks out of his thoughts.
New neighbors? Since when?
"Oh, let's go say hi, guys," Olette says excitedly, licking, absent-mindedly, at her own ice cream.
But ... the house next door hadn't been on sale, Roxas remembers, and he blinks at the huge truck in front of his neighbors house. Now that he thinks about it, he can't remember who had lived there.
"No way, it's probably just some old geezer," Hayner mutters around his ice cream, looking dejectedly at the moving truck.
He couldn't remember if there had ever even been a house next door. What was going on? He frowns at his ice cream and misses Olette's rebuttal of Hayner and Pence's agreement to see Roxas's new neighbors. There hadn't been a house, was there, and there hadn't been neighbors before, either, and it couldn't have been built in a day --
"Roxas," Olette's voice cuts through his thoughts and he looks up at her, "Come on. We're going."
He nods at her and follows them. He's probably just thinking too much. A house didn't pop out, he probably just never noticed it. He probably had old, quiet, reclusive neighbors and never saw them. There. Explanation found. He nods at himself and looks up, ready to see his new neighbor -- he'll know this one, at the very least -- and stops completely, almost dropping his ice cream.
It can't be, he thinks, it just can't be. He must be hallucinating, it's a trick of the light, it's --
"Axel," he breathes out, and then, shaking his head, tries again, louder, "Axel?"
The other three are looking at him oddly, and Axel -- he's sure, he can feel it, it's impossible -- turns and the shaking feeling is true. It's Axel. Without the coat, but it's the same ridiculously spiky red hair, the same vivid green eyes with dark marks under them, the same insanely skinny frame.
It's Axel, and he's frozen into place after having called out his name. Roxas's ice cream drips on his hand and Axel looks wary. Hayner, Pence and Olette share the same shocked look.
"Roxas," Olette finally murmurs, "Do you know him?"
He doesn't respond but forces his legs to advance towards Axel. His steps are small, shaken and slow, but he needs to -- he needs to. ... He's not sure what he needs to do. But he wants to see him.
Does it count as the next life if neither of you are dead, Roxas thinks, and Axel moves the box in his arms. He still looks wary, but he hasn't run away. Yet.
"Axel," he tries again, his voice managing, unlike the rest of him, not to shake.
Axel tilts his head at him and narrows his eyes. Roxas feels his heart clenching -- doesn't he remember him?
"How do you know my name?"
Axel's voice his harsh and very unlike Axel, he thinks. Even if he didn't remember -- Axel isn't the kind to be worried if someone knows his name, is he?
And why doesn't he remember? I know you, he wants to say. His mouth opens to say the words, but, he hesitates to speak, after all. What is he supposed to say? I know you, I dreamt of you once, I saw you in my dreams.
Of course Axel doesn't remember and of course he doesn't act the same. He had never known Axel, had he? He looks back up at said man -- he looks definitively wary, and who wouldn't, after a complete stranger shouted their name -- and he smiles tentatively.
Way to look crazy, he thinks.
"Ha, well, um," Roxas tries, muttering, "See, um -- it's written. On the box."
And it is, actually, but Roxas isn't sure since when. Had it been there five seconds ago? Who cares, it's a useful scapegoat, he thinks.
"Okay," Axel begins, still looking wary, "but why the need to shout it?"
He doesn't know what to say, so he turns back and tries to see where his friends are. They're hanging back, unsure what to do -- help Roxas, or ask him the question themselves? -- and he licks his hand. It's covered in melted ice cream.
"I thought it seemed familiar," Roxas mutters, and then shrugs, "but I must've imagined it. Sorry."
The tension in Axel's shoulders seem to relax as he accepts the answer and Roxas refrains from breathing in relief. He holds out his hand -- the one not covered in sea-salt ice cream and spit -- and Axel lets go of the box a little to shake it.
"I'm Roxas. I live next door," he says, smiling a little. Axel smiles back.
"Axel, though it looks like you already knew that," he answers, "Nice to meet you, Roxas."
"Uh... you too, Axel," Roxas says, even if his heart is screaming 'We know each other'. It was just a dream.
He misses the next thing Axel says -- 'see you around', maybe? -- and the other boy leaves, entering his house. Hayner approaches him and puts an hand to his shoulder. Roxas drops his ice cream in surprise. It's half melted on his hand anyway, and he shakes it in annoyance.
"Man, you okay? What was all that about?"
Roxas shakes his head and Hayner's hand off, too.
"Nothing. M'going home. See you at the carnival," he says quickly and, runs back to his house.
Over his shoulder, he raises his hand, and waves them a speedy goodbye.
--------
He drops on his bed, completely clothed, and looks at his ceiling.
He almost feels as if his heart is bursting in tears.
He turns his head in his pillow when one tear does fall, because he doesn't even know what he's crying for.
(You really don't remember? It's me, you know.
Roxas.)
Still, they are nothing but empty shells, destined to return to the darkness.
----
It had been a week since Roxas’ encounter with Axel, and there had been a massive and demoralizing change; school had started again -- much to Hayner's disappointment -- and it seemed to Roxas as though had dreamed up the whole encounter with Axel; There was no trace of him anywhere, neither at the carnival, nor in town. He was almost ready to chalk it up to a dream, even though, it had seemed so real, but, then again, so had those other dreams, and there was no way any of those were true... right? When he finally caught sight of the red-head. He almost ran into a mailbox at the scene.
Axel is just sitting idly on his front lawn -- Twilight Town is a city and having a lawn is ridiculous, no? Was it even there the other day? Maybe he should sleep more, if he keeps forgetting these sort of things -- with a paintbrush in his hand. He's on a stool, with paint and a painting and…!
And Axel is painting! Roxas stares at Axel's long fingered, bony hands. He hadn't thought Axel to be the kind of guy who would paint.
He hadn't though Axel had any kind of artistic talent, really. But this Axel isn't the Axel he knows, well, dreamed of, and so it's perfectly fine for him not to do expected things. He tries to tell himself that, at least, but his stare doesn't waver. Feeling watched, Axel stops stroking his brush and looks at him, an eyebrow raised.
"Never seen a guy paint before?"
The sarcasm sounds just like the Axel he'd dreamed of, and it's enough to make him do a double-take. Axel's paintbrush is hovering in the air, dripping red paint on the green grass. The contrast is sharp, Roxas thinks, and knows that if he looks up at Axel's face, it'll look even sharper. Instead, he crosses over in some vigor he didn't know he had in himself, and stands next to the sitting Nobo --
(He's not a Nobody, he repeats to himself, and neither are you.)
-- to the sitting Axel. He stares at the sketch on the canvas, slowly being painted with colours. He blinks and turns his head to the side, fascinated.
He has no idea what it's supposed to be.
"What are you painting?" He asks finally, mouth drier than it should be.
Axel, whose gaze hadn't left from Roxas's face since the boy had arrived, finally turns back to his painting. He dips the brush into some water and takes another one, putting some blue paint on it. Roxas watches him dip it in the water and gradually paint the top of the painting. He thinks it might be a sky, but he's never painted before. Plus, for all he knows, the canvas is upside-down and he's painting water.
"A landscape," Axel murmurs, unbothered by Roxas's stare, and Roxas finally notices that he is painting an ocean and a beach, with a setting sun.
He feels like he knows that beach.
"It's a beach," Roxas says, pointing the obvious, "right?"
Axel nods a little, humming in the back of his throat. Roxas scratches the back of his neck and looks down. He wishes he knew what to say. The only thing that comes to his mind is "I know you" or "I dreamed about you". He's not crazy enough to try it. So he looks at his shoes and sometimes raises his head to look at Axel's progress in painting. He feels like he's been standing there awkwardly for hours. A quick look at Axel's watch tells him it's only been five minutes. Roxas gives up, resisting the urge to sigh miserably.
"I'll, uh, go now," he mutters, starting to turn away, but notices out of the corner of his eyes that Axel has stopped painting.
"... Roxas, right?"
Roxas nods and Axel looks at him intensely. Roxas feels like yelling 'We're best friends! You know my name!' but stays quiet, waiting for Axel to go on, because he knows it's ridiculous. It was a dream. Axel puts the paintbrush -- still slightly wet with paint -- behind his ear. It leaves a slightly bluish line on his face and Roxas smiles, resisting the urge to laugh. He looks stupid, he thinks.
"Mind if," Axel starts, rubbing at his cheek as if realising there is paint on it and only managing to spread it all over. Roxas can barely hold his laughter, now, and his cheeks hurt, "I try and paint you, sometime?"
Roxas urge to laugh is downed by that -- barely, because he can see the paint dripping on Axel's ear -- and he nods, startled.
Axel's grin is almost feral.
"Good."
Roxas grins back. He feels ridiculously giddy.
------
The dreams of Sora are still frequent, and Roxas often wakes up in the middle of the night, keyblade in hand, trying to hit a non-existing Heartless.
He doesn't remember it in the morning.
-------
It starts like that. Every week, on a Friday -- he cannot seem to catch Axel on any other day, it’s as if he disappears between those times -- he goes to Axel's lawn, or home (depending on the weather) and watches Axel sketch him. Most of the time, he barely looks up from his sketch, as if he knows exactly what Roxas looks like. Roxas almost finds himself hoping he does.
(Could this be the next life?)
--------
When Axel starts to paint the sketch, Roxas isn't allowed to look anymore.
"Why not?"
"I want it to be a surprise."
Roxas doesn't question the logic. (He's seen the sketch and he's seen himself, how surprising can it be?)
-------
Sometimes, Roxas looks up suddenly, when Axel is painting, completely out of the conversation.
"Did you just say my name?"
"No, why?"
"... No reason."
He's starting to think he might be going nuts. He blames the paint when Axel looks at him oddly, and Axel shakes his head.
As if that much paint fumes could even get him light-headed.
--------
Axel is a college student, Roxas learnt, from one of their many conversations. He loves speaking to Axel while watching him paint. That way, he doesn't have to look in Axel's eyes.
Roxas looks confused at that bout of information. There's no college in Twilight Town. He doesn't voice his thoughts, mulling over them a bit -- it's been happening more and more lately, things he didn't know were there, suddenly appeared from out of nowhere and nobody but him would question their existence -- so Axel smirks and uses the brush he has to paint Roxas's nose yellow.
"Wake up, silly."
Roxas frowns and crosses his eyes to look at his nose. He rubs the paint off and dips a finger in black paint, smearing Axel's cheek. It makes his facemarks look longer and darker. He stares at it and grins at Axel.
"Stay still."
Axel's not wearing any shirt -- it's always hot in his house, as if Axel himself is radiating heat (like the Axel of his dream, except this heat is far less dangerous) -- and it helps things. He dips another finger in red paint and paints a heart over Axel's chest, right where it should be. His grin widens and Axel stares at him with a "you're nuts" look on his face. Roxas laughs at him.
He had felt Axel's heartbeat.
(Thisisrealthisisrealthisisreal we're real)
--------
Once, Roxas finds his blue gem, from the trophy he won at the struggle tournament. He shows it off to Hayner, Pence and Olette and they all lift their gems to the sun.
He feels himself lifted away, as if far from there. The feeling is marvelous and lasts no more than a second.
He gives the gem to Axel.
"For safe-keeping," he says, and ignores the bewildered look on the other man's face.
-------
Roxas has dreams about Axel, too.
He can't remember them, either, but once, after one of them, he wakes up, calling his own name.
His voice doesn't sound the same.
-------
Once, Roxas saw Axel taking a lighter out of his pocket, playing with it, flicking open and then closing the lid. (When Axel is not painting he always had the need to occupy his hands, Roxas has found. On one occasion, he had ended up playing with his own hair with his hands still full of paint. Axel is naught more than a colored spot of paint, most of the time, which makes Roxas laugh so hard.)
"Do you smoke?"
Why else would Axel have a lighter, after all? Or maybe he used to, because Axel never smells like cigarettes or anything else. He smells more like spices. Roxas has found himself wondering, often, what kind of shop sells spice-scented soaps or shampoo. No scent like that can be natural, after all.
"I don't," Axel answers, and he doesn't add anything else. No "I used to", and thus Roxas's interest is piqued.
"Then why do you have one?"
Axel's smile looks slightly insane, slightly melancholic, slightly this and that and everything when he answers.
"To burn my paintings."
He offers no other explanations.
-------
They are friends, Roxas thinks.
And even if that Axel is slightly off from the one he has dreamed of, even if sometimes he gets the urge to hit him for no reason (he's not going crazy, Roxas hopes, but the more time passes the less everything seems to make sense, and so he doesn't mention it to anybody) even if they are only friends and not best friends, Roxas feels unnaturally happy.
It's as if his dream self was given a next life.
(Let's meet again, in the next life.
Sure. I'll be waiting.
Silly. This wasn't life.)
Look, about that. I'm sorry.
------
"You've been spending a lot of time with Axel," Hayner mentions, one day.
Roxas looks up at him questioningly. He's only ever there on Fridays, isn't he? Olette nibbles on her ice-cream and Pence shrugs, both hopeless to the inner workings of Hayner's mind. Most of the time, they all were.
"I mean, you barely know that guy, and you spend all your Friday nights with him. You never even told us what you DO there, man!"
"He's making a painting of me," Roxas answers casually.
Hayner makes a face while Pence and Olette look interested. Olette finishes her ice-cream and smiles at him.
"Really? He's a painter? That's great!"
Pence nods in agreement before adding, "Yeah, Roxas. You need to make him show us some of his paintings one day!"
Hayner makes a gagging motion and Roxas rolls his eyes, and pushes him lightly.
"Oh, shut up! He's a good painter. Just because you have no taste in art that the rest of us have!"
He says this with a grin and Hayner looks up at him seriously.
"That's not it," he starts, then looks up to the sky and makes a face again, speaking around his ice-cream, "I just don't get why anybody would want to paint Roxas of all people!"
They laugh and Roxas rebukes him for good measure with a "He's not going to paint you, he's not Picasso, you know!"
They finish their ice-cream quietly after that.
-----
On a Friday, Roxas comes in Axel's house -- it's raining -- but stops halfway through taking off his shoes, almost sure he's in the wrong house.
The house is the same (as much as Roxas seems to remember places, nowadays, they change in his mind all the time) even down to the smell of fresh paint and spices that Axel seems to carry around everywhere (Roxas doesn't even know if Axel eats spicy food) but what is wrong with the picture is not the house, but Axel himself.
The only thing he can see is the back of Axel’s head as he works on painting some Chinese based mural on his wall -- the walls in Axel's house are full of murals, each with a different theme; under the sea, pirates, a French castle, Ancient Greece, the list went on and on -- but even that is enough to see that Axel is not normal. For one thing, his hair is laying low on his shoulders, as if Axel's head was bleeding in small rivulets of blood, and Roxas shudders at the imagery. He's been spending too much time with Axel. He's about ready to turn around (as if witnessing Axel with his hair down was a crime, was unnatural) but Axel stops painting and Roxas knows he's noticed him.
"Yo, Roxas!" Axel says, nodding towards the couch, "Go on, sit down, I just want to finish it up a little."
Roxas stares at him; he's never noticed how Axel's hair was blood red, or how it would fall past his shoulders when not spiked up.
Axel gets annoyed and calls out again.
"Helloooo! Axel to Roxas, do you register me?"
Roxas's tongue finally untangles itself (Axel has not stopped painting) and he takes a small, cautious step towards the couch. He's being ridiculous, he thinks.
"Ha, um, sorry," Roxas tries finally when he's sure the sounds going out won't only be gargled noises, "It's just that. Your hair," Roxas makes waving movements of his hand when he says that and decides he really has spent too much time with Axel, "is. It's. ... Down." He finishes, pitifully.
Axel scoffs at him. "What, d'you think it was natural or something?"
He moves to make the finishing touches on the mountain (Roxas can swear he's seen it somewhere before) whilst Roxas just stands in the living room feeling awkward. Each wall has a different mural, and the more he looks at them, the more they seem familiar.
Axel sighs and repeats himself, sure Roxas didn't hear him, "Did you think it was natural?"
Yes, Roxas thinks but says instead, "No, it's just... Different."
Axel finally puts the brush down and wipes his hands on his clothes, in an ultimately useless attempt to get rid of the paint on them. Roxas shifts to his other feet and says nothing.
"I was out of hair gel," Axel explains finally and shakes his head helplessly, turning to look at Roxas, "Forgot to buy some."
Roxas would answer, but he is stricken by Axel's face. His eyes are devoid of eyeliner --he guesses it is normally -- or the upside-down tear drops. With out them and the hair that falls in his eyes, he doesn't look like Axel at all. Axel, if it really is him, notices the stare and raises and eyebrow at him, chuckling.
"Whaaat? Thought they were natural, too?"
Yes, Roxas thinks again, and this time he cannot answer. Axel waves his hand at him impatiently and drops on the couch, obviously giving up.
"Okay, okay, I look weird, I get it, stop staring, geez!" he muttered, rubbing a finger under his eyes and smearing some paint on his face, "I'll buy the stupid stuff tomorrow."
The paint has given Roxas an idea, and he stares at it on Axel's face for a while, concentrating. Axel notices the stare and almost blushes, rubbing his cheek and only managing to aggravate it.
"But you have paint," Roxas says, finally.
Axel stares at him. When it's obvious Roxas won't respond, he tilts his head. "Aaaand...?"
"You," Roxas stops and changes his mind at the last second, "I could paint. Your face, I mean. On it."
Axel seems to think he's crazy, and Roxas almost regrets saying it. But he's come that far and he's not going to back off now.
"I'll be careful. I can do that much. Plus, you're always full of paint anyway," he sees the look on Axel's face and quickly adds, "I wouldn't get some in your eyes, promise. Just. Let me try it, just once."
They stare at each other and Axel finally sighs, defeated.
"Fine, fine. Don't use the lonely kid stare at me," Axel mutters and Roxas smirks in satisfaction. He's quick to hide it at Axel's glare. "I feel so whipped."
Axel moves as if to get the paint but Roxas shakes his head and fetches it, by now he knows where all Axel’s art supplies are kept. He returns with the right paintbrush and the right colour for it, too. Axel raises an eyebrow and Roxas looks at him innocently. Axel sits down on the floor and Roxas kneels in the middle of his open legs (Axel is ridiculously tall, he decides) and gets to work. He starts with the eyes -- Axel closes them obediently and Roxas cups the man's cheek, concentrating. He tries to remember the strokes Axel would do on his paintings, soft and firm at the same time, and he manages to do the first eye without any problem. He tries not to preen at his success and moves to the other, using the opportunity to wipe Axel's cheek clean of paint and ignoring the "Mothering hen" comment he makes. The second eye is finished with no trouble, too, and Roxas smirks in delight.
He's about to move on to the upside down teardrops when Axel stops him. He opens an eye lazily, hand on Roxas's wrist.
"Not the right colour," he explains, and Roxas remembers that they're not black but more like purple.
He doesn't know how to get the colour, he thinks, and opens his mouth to say so when Axel gestures to the multiple paints Roxas has brought (or had he? He doesn't remember bringing so much) and Roxas smiles sheepishly, taking the purple.
When he finishes them, his hand is shaking slightly and Axel opens his eyes and grins. He lifts his hands and claps slowly. Roxas would put some more paint on him but that would ruin the job, so he simply colours Axel's shirt, much to Axel’s mild annoyance.
He takes a look like Axel. It doesn't look exactly like him, but it's more familiar. It's almost like Axel, he decides.
Just like the Axel in his dreams, but he shuts the thought out before it can go further.
-------
"I wonder where Kairi's gone," Pence says softly one day.
Roxas stares at them.
"Who?"
"You know, Kairi," Olette says, blinking at him, "The one who came here once and was taken away by that man."
Roxas feels as if he's frozen.
"Which man? When?"
Hayner turns to look at him slowly. "You don't remember? She was looking for you."
"What?"
Hayner blinks at him. "Dude, man, are you okay? You totally spaced out there."
"...Huh?"
"We were talking, and all of a sudden you got this blank look on your face," Olette says, peering at him with concern.
"I... did?"
Pence nods, "Yeah, like you were totally in another world!"
Roxas swallows. His mouth is dry.
"I guess I must've been dreaming awake."
Which man, he wants to ask. Why her, is another thing.
(He was dreaming, he thinks, dreaming, dreaming, dreaming, dreaming
dreaming.)
-----
When Roxas came to Axel’s house one Friday, something drastic happened. Axel was painting, calmly, with Roxas speaking to him about his friends, about school, about everything except the dreams, when suddenly Axel fell to his knees, coughing as if he was about to shoot a lung.
Roxas was by his side in an instant. The coughing had stopped after less than a minute, but Roxas was still worried.
"Are you okay? Do you want me to get you a glass of water?"
Axel shakes his head and wipes his mouth. He stands up shakily and tries to laugh it off.
"S'nothing, s'nothing. M'probably just getting a cold...and the paint fumes can't be helping."
Roxas nods and doesn't ask more.
But they both know Axel doesn't get out enough to get a cold, especially in Twilight Town's hot weather and Axel has never reacted to the paint fumes before.
But it's just this once, so it should be fine, Roxas thinks.
-----
The coughing fits increase over time. Once, Roxas caught Axel coughing up blood.
He tries to get him to go to the hospital, a clinic, anything, and Axel promises he will. Tomorrow.
Roxas trusts him and doesn't make sure he does.
He asks everywhere if Axel went later, though, and they only answer with "Who?" or "No, kid, sorry."
His heart tightens in his chest.
----
Axel has been vomiting.
Roxas doesn't know what to do anymore.
"I'm just sick," he swears, "It'll pass. I get this stuff at least once a year."
----
Axel has been vomiting blood. There's some on his paintings.
Roxas feels helpless.
Axel promises him he'll go see a doctor. For real, this time. Roxas tells him he'll take him there on his own.
He doesn't trust him anymore.
(What's going on?
Just. Tell me that.
Please.)
Feeling a little -- regret?
-----
Axel has to stay the night, Roxas is told.
He's been gnawing at his thumbnails and the news make him even more nervous than he already is. It's as if fifty billion different things are going on inside his head (like-- this and that and what is what) and he's not even sure if they all have anything to do with what's happening.
But -- it doesn't matter. Axel will be fine. He's sure of it.
He can't stay with him, the nurse adds -- he's only half listening, looking at the walls of the hospital, almost fascinated (they're all so white it seems familiar) -- he'll have to come back tomorrow.
He barely manages to struggle when the nurse gently guides him out the door. Axel will still be there tomorrow, she swears.
While Roxas walks away, he realizes that it's what he's scared of.
Axel won't die. He just can't.
(He has no life to give, and the thought makes Roxas choke.)
-----
Roxas can't fall asleep no matter how much he tries.
(Maybe if I sleep it'll all be a dream and I'll wake up, he thinks.)
-----
When Roxas visits Axel the next day, he's stopped by the same nurse.
"Are you family," she asks him.
Of course I’m not, he almost says, but realizes if he does say that, he might not get to see him.
"I'm his cousin," he blurts without thinking.
She raises an eyebrow but lets him through. If he was dying she'd let him see him even if he wasn't family, he tries to reassure himself.
Or maybe she wouldn't have. Roxas walks a little faster.
-----
Axel lays on the hospital bed and he turns his head towards him. He grins weakly and Roxas tries to smile back.
"They tell you yet?"
Axel's voice is normal despite his pale face and Roxas relaxes a little. He shakes his head and Axel turns his head towards the ceiling.
"I'm dying," Axel says, grin still in place. Roxas freezes and tries to open his mouth, to say something, anything, but Axel continues, unbothered, "I've been ever since--"
He sees Axel's mouth move but can't hear the words. He tries to read Axel's lips, desperately (his ears are blocked or he's turning deaf or he's trying not to register it, but he's not hearing anything and this isn't the time to make Axel repeat himself) and can make out the word "nobody". Roxas swallows. He misread, he thinks. Must have.
"But why didn't you --"
Axel cuts him off with a look and Roxas closes his eyes. Why didn't you tell me, he thinks, and notices Axel sitting up slowly. He looks at him, completely bewildered.
"Help me up, will you," he mutters and Roxas scrambles to help him.
Axel leans against him and he doesn't look like he's dying. Roxas wants to speak, to say anything at all, but Axel cuts him off again. (As if he doesn't want to hear him.)
"Get me back home, will you?"
Roxas can't possibly say no.
Roxas can't possibly say anything, right now.
------
Roxas isn't sure how they bypassed the nurses and doctors, but he couldn't care less, right now. He helps Axel slump against the couch ("Wouldn't wanna bleed on it, y'know?") and half kneels next to him.
His voice is finally working again and Axel lays down on the floor, his breathing shallow. If Roxas concentrates, he can almost make out dark particles, floating out of Axel. (He must be dreaming, and, oh, wouldn't that be so better, just to be dreaming again.)
"Axel," his voice sounds odd, he thinks, but continues, "What were you trying to do?"
Coming here, he thinks, doing all that Axel did, what had he been trying to do, all this time? Axel isn't looking at him anymore.
"I wanted to see," Axel's voice changes, as if the words aren't coming out from the same mouth, "you. You...are," and then Axel's lips are moving but no sound is coming out. Roxas wants to scream at him but no sound is coming out of his mouth, either, it’s as if he's frozen, as if he's not controlling his body and what he wants to say -- he wants to say:
I wanted to see you, too. I dreamed about you.
But he can't, and he can't hear Axel's dying words (because he is, he thinks, he's dyingdyingdying and Roxas can't even hear him) and Roxas is shaking, holding onto Axel. He's stopped moving, and his body is cold.
Roxas gags and looks away, anywhere but at Axel and then he sees it. The portrait Axel had just finished earlier. Of him. 'It just needs to dry, then I'll show it to you,' he had said.
He gets up shakily and reaches it. He turns it in his hands and lets it fall almost immediately.
It's definitely him. But then, as if Axel had changed his mind, the pictures changes and depicts someone else. Someone he knows...far too much.
Sora.
He must be dreaming, Roxas thinks, shoulders shaking hysterically, he must be dreaming and he'll wake up and this will all have been a dream again.
He'll wake up. He wants to, so he'll wake up.
(Wake up!)
And he wakes.
------
Roxas is wearing his black coat. He's not sure how he summoned Sora to this place. He's not sure where this place is. Another dream, another reality, who cares, Sora is here and he's so angry at him, he doesn't care.
The Oblivion keyblade appears in his hand and he tightens his grip on it.
"A Keyblade?"
Sora sounds so surprised to see another with one. He runs at him and hits with it -- he hasn't forgotten how at all. He summons them both to another place; he recognized that one, now, The World That Never Was, that vast abandoned city, and he remembers everything. They run at each other, locking Keyblade against Keyblade. He's not sure what he wants to do.
"Who -- who are you?!"
He doesn't even know who I am, Roxas thinks bitterly, and smiles under the hood. He's not sure, either.
"Someone from the dark."
They push each other back and he has both of his Keyblades out by now, against Sora's one. It looks decidedly like -- he stops the thought there.
"You can't be... Riku?"
The name is so familiar, and he remembers everything but the thoughts are jumbled. Riku is -- Oh.
"Riku? ...I defeated a Riku once."
Maybe. Or maybe it had been another dream. Sora looks so offended that his expression makes Roxas almost want to laugh.
"You what?"
He's not here to play with Sora, though. He just wants an answer.
"Tell me. ... Tell me why he picked you!"
And he runs at him, keyblades grinding against the floor and they clash, keyblade against keyblade against keyblade, completely ignoring any rules or what could be going on around them, except for each other. They fight up in the air, even, and Roxas stops when Sora goes down. He can -- he sees, now, he thinks.
"I see. That's why."
He sees why but he doesn't understand, still, and he's so angry at him so he floats down and attacks again, bashing both Keyblades against Sora's one (it looks so much like --) but again, he stops the thought there, until Sora is down on his knees and has his weapon thrown out of reach with by the Oathkeeper. Sora tries to scramble towards it but Roxas is faster and pins the fallen Keyblade to the ground, he points the Oblivion at Sora. He won.
But Sora closes his eyes and holds out his hand and the Keyblade goes back to him --
"What?!"
-- and Sora slashes at him. Roxas lets go of his keyblades and staggers forward.
------
He sees a flash of his "birth" in Twilight Town, Xemnas talking --
"A new you."
------
He's back on the train tower. Back in Twilight Town.
All he had seen, he thinks, drawing his knees up, all he had lived while Sora was searching for his friends again, it had all been a dream. It had all been fake. He hides his face in his knees and hugs them, looking at the sunset. Everything was fake. Everything was always fake.
"Finally woken up?"
He gasps and turns.
"Axel."
This one is real -- as real has he can be when Roxas is in his own consciousness, but he thinks, maybe they did this before and he tries not to look too happy. Axel stays silent and doesn't look back at him.
"No, maybe you're going to sleep."
He had been sleeping for a while, he thinks. Sometimes he had woken up, though. Hadn't he?
"Soon, I won't even be able to talk to your consciousness like this."
Roxas turns back. So they had talked like this before. Consciousness to consciousness.
"I... I'm going back to how I was."
Back to Sora, he thinks. Back to the dreams, maybe. Axel sits down next to him, still talking.
"I've thought about it a lot," he says, "Naminé said the same the same thing. Roxas..."
He turns back to Axel and wants to ask -- How is Naminé? How are you, maybe. But he knows the answer and so he lets him talk.
"You have a heart, don't you? While Naminé and I...We don't really have hearts, do we?"
Roxas thinks, but you do have a heart. I've felt it. Or maybe I haven't.
"I ... I don't know, either."
Axel looks disappointed and Roxas thinks he had meant it some other way. It hadn't gone out of his mouth right.
"I guess not..."
He tries to make his point again.
"But, the heart's not something you can see," he starts, "I've started wondering whether it's something you can't feel, either...If so, then--" Roxas stops himself. It would probably sound stupid. "Nah, nevermind."
"Huh? What're you getting at?"
He smiles and looks at the sunset. He thinks he's finally got it.
"I'm sure Sora'll find the answer," he starts, then pauses and goes on, "Because he's me."
Axel looks amused a little.
"I guess so."
------
Axel pulls out two ice-creams from the depths of his coat, and offers one to Roxas. They both eat them, acting as if nothing had happened. As if they were both alive, as if they're time wasn't limited, as if Roxas was still in his dream world and Roxas feels deliriously happy at the idea. They speak like the best friends they are, not like strangers.
------
"So... I have to go. Sora's waiting for me."
"Yeah, I guess he is."
But Roxas doesn't go just yet. Just a little longer, he thinks. With the real Axel.
------
"See you later, Axel."
Roxas smiles and thinks he sees a tear fall down Axel's cheek.
"See you later, partner."
At the very least, Roxas thinks, at the very least, Axel,
I'll see you in my dreams.
-----
He stumbles and his hood falls off. He turns to Sora and smiles.
"You make a good other."
(So, we can be together again!
In my dreams.)
First! I'm aware that I abuse italics far too much. Second, I have absolutely no knowledge in paint, except the few classes in art we did paint in seventh grade. It made writing this incredibly awkward XD;;; but the painting idea wouldn't leave me, so.
This idea was born from a mix of things -- the main musical inspiration was "Once Upon A Dream" from Sleeping Beauty, for example, which is where the basic idea came from. Seeing someone in their dreams...! Other things that made this bunny come to life included the new Final Mix+ scene, and Roxas's "see you later, Axel". Roxas truly believes he'll see him again, which is weird, because at that point, Axel is DEAD. That one sentence has been the birth (and death) of a lot of plotbunnies. Another thing was the fake Twilight Town and all those dreams Roxas seemed to be having before. Roxas and Sora are peculiar in that they don't react strongly to weird stuff and will believe everything is going normally until the last second. They won't tell anyone anything, too. (I'm talking of the introductions, here!)
So the main idea was Roxas seeing Axel again (which is something every fanfic writer thought about at least once...), something to do with dreams and Axel not remembering Roxas. Why? Because I wanted to switch their positions around. See if Roxas was going to be as drastic as Axel. (Nope, not at all!)
The major scenes in this are definitively the first time Roxas paints on Axel -- it comes from a fanart I've seen, Axel with a painted heart on his chest and the second. Because Axel looks like he's wearing eyeliner, but the other stuff could be natural, knowing KH. So I wanted to play with them not being natural and Roxas being "... wtf?! IT WASN'T NORMAL?" about it. XD;; There's also obviously the first time Roxas sees Axel again and Axel doesn't remember and the first time Roxas wakes up and believes The Sixth Day had been a dream. The death scene was a major turn-point, but I don't like it (u_u; chuuu) and there's the lighter scene. Don't ask me where it came from, I just wanted to incorporate Axel's fire tendencies. Paintings burn really easily and most artists have a drastic way of destroying the works they hate! I really like the scene where Axel asks Roxas if he can paint him, too...
Aaaah, in a lot of the fic, there are moments where Roxas's reality doesn't make sense -- buildings changing, the town being different, having multiple paints when he brought just the one -- which are clues that this is all a dream. Dreams pretty much don't make sense in the detailed parts and scenery is bound to change when you're dreaming.
During this dream, Roxas is half-awake, actually, which is why there are lots of mentions to scenes in KH2. Kairi's kidnapping, people mentioning Roxas to Sora all the time, Axel's death, Roxas is aware of a lot of major things that are happening, but he's not completely there. He thinks THOSE are the dreams and plus, he doesn't remember it all clearly enough while dreaming.
Axel painting in Roxas's dreams comes from Roxas thinking of Naminé and Axel -- a lot. Naminé was drawing, and so he dreams of Axel painting, and just like Naminé, Axel paints things that are happening/actually happened. Like the beach from Destiny Islands, or the landscapes on Axel's walls (the Land of the Dragons, Beast's Castle, the Underworld/Olympus Coliseum, Port Royal, etc)-- he painted the worlds Sora visited at the same time as Sora visited them, because, again, Roxas is half awake. Dreams incorporate what you did during your day, no? :3
I incorporated a part of Simple and Clean (the daily things, like this and that and what is what) in the fourth part because I felt it fitted. There's no deep meaning about it! X3;
Is this fic meant to be romantic? Yes and no. I'm definitively an AkuRoku (which is still the stupidest pairing name in existance!) shipper, so there are some scenes that are definitively romantic. But the fic in itself is supposed to have, mostly, a friendship overtone. Axel and Roxas are (were) best friends, and that's what Roxas is after. Axel's dream self -- isn't quite Axel, so who knows.
Axel is a little bit OOC on purpose, speaking of that. This is a dream, and Roxas doesn't think this is the real Axel, anyway, and Axel has no access to Roxas's consciousness during that time. It's a milder Axel, a little. (I don't think he's that much OOC, though. ... uwaaah, it's bad, I can't even notice if he is or not!!!! X3!)
Fun fact! My beta (raburabu :3) mentioned that Axel's marks were actually red, not purple. I searched pictures to prove that it was a VERY VERY DARK PURPLE, but a purple nonetheless. (Not red.) It matches Axel's eyeliner. ... Hahaha.
In the midst of writing this, since I only had the "major" scenes thought of (most of the scenes were written/thought of on the spot...) I got an idea for another dream. And another. And then, I thought -- I could do a whole series of Roxas dreaming. Sometimes he'd know, sometimes he wouldn't...! (And most of the time, it'd give me an excuse to AU!) But then I thought, while that's all well and good, he needs to wake up sometime, god. So the sequel idea came to my mind -- nothing is written out yet, but I have some scenes ideas in my head. After all, Roxas and Axel didn't actually get their next life, did they? So the sequel will still be mostly Roxas-centric (I write Roxas's POV a lot, considering how I hate writing in his POV XP) but will include Sora, Kairi, Naminé and Riku. Plus, a certain someone you all know and love... or, is it? Haaa, bad me, foreshadowing is bad. I feel like Nomura, except less liked. (And less sniffing of the paint.)
The little lines at the beggining are almost to make you notice where exactly in the KH2 storyline this "started". I say almost, because it's the ONE sentence that struck Roxas the most close to that period. It can certainly be later! So. Yes.
The last lines are all canon lines, but when underlined, they are not. I just felt the need to say that.
I think that's all the explanation needed, though, so... yeah. Ask if there's anything else unclear?
I'll be posting the parts in kh communities and fanfiction.net, though. Try to get myself a fanbase, haha!
And that's all! :3
Sora. You're lucky. It looks like my summer vacation is... over.
---------
When Roxas wakes up, he doesn't sit bolt upright on his bed, a sheat of sweat on his face. He simply opens his eyes slowly, accomodating himelf to the light in his room. Only when the thought hits him -- his room -- does he sit bolt upright. He takes a look at his hands -- they're ungloved, he thinks -- then, at his clothes -- his sleeping clothes, not Sora's outfit -- and a quick turn to the window let's him see his reflection.
His breath catches in his throat when he sees himself. He passes a hand through his hair -- blond, not brown -- and holds the windowsill with the other. He throws open the window and breathes the air of Twilight Town, sees the everlasting sunset.
"Sora," he calls, breathless, almost a question, and suddenly he feels more awake and he laughs. He laughs, and laughs, and laughs. He feels like dancing.
He's not sure why.
---------
Once he's dressed, the first thing he does is run to the usual spot. He can't help it -- what if that whole ... thing hadn't really been a dream, what if he was stuck in a deserted Twilight Town after having merged in Sora? But his heart is ready to burst, and if that hadn't been a dream, how is it possible? His heart is beating and he feels exhilarated and terrified.
Mostly, he feels, and that's the first proof he has that this is real.
He arrives at the usual spot breathless, shoulders shaking, heart beating -- beating -- fifty times faster than normal, it seems. Hayner turns and raises an eyebrow at him.
"Woah, man, what happened? You look like you've seen a ghost," Hayner says, completely bewildered.
Olette and Pence turn towards him, too. Olette puts an hand on his shoulder as he tries to catch his breathing while grinning like a fool. It's harder than one might think, he decides. His breaths come out in laughs. Pence calls his name tentatively, as if he's gone nuts, and Hayner makes the "cuckoo" motion, which only manages to make Roxas laugh harder. He can't breathe.
"Roxas, you're turning blue," Olette says worriedly, her hand moving in circles on his back to calm him down.
It does. A little. He grins and lifts his head to look at them. They look worried. He realizes he's half bent over, hands on his knees and he gets up slowly, catching his breath. He shakes his head and shrugs, half apologizing, half unsure.
"Sorry. I'm just -- really, really happy right now," he mutters sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head a little.
They still look worried and Hayner is the first to shrug it off.
"What you are is really, really weird, Roxas," he says, crossing his arms and shaking his head, smirking. Olette and Pence laugh and Roxas can't even take offense to it.
They're alive and real and breathing, and so is he. They all laugh and talk together.
It's like waking up from the worst of nightmares, Roxas thinks.
He tries not to think of the parts of the nightmare that weren't so bad.
------
He tries not to, but he can't help it, he finds, when the day has ended and Hayner, Pence and Olette are taking him back home. They spent the whole day, the entire town together, trying to find out what had caused the recent case of events. They found nothing, as if it had never happened, and they all shrugged it off. Even if they had found nothing, everyone had had fun.
Except now that the fun has ended, he can't help but think about it all. The memories seem as real as the ones of Twilight Town, even if he knows they're all from a dream. Still, he thinks, lightly licking his ice cream, what of Naminé? What of Axel?
He had promised he'd see them again. Even if only in a dream -- he couldn't have imagined them. Naminé, with her small smiles and mysterious air, her apologizing tone and sad eyes. 'We will meet again', she had said. She had been his only comfort in all that was happening. He really did want to meet her again. And Axel, what about Axel --
"Roxas, I didn't know you were getting new neighbors," Pence's voice sounds out, and Roxas blinks out of his thoughts.
New neighbors? Since when?
"Oh, let's go say hi, guys," Olette says excitedly, licking, absent-mindedly, at her own ice cream.
But ... the house next door hadn't been on sale, Roxas remembers, and he blinks at the huge truck in front of his neighbors house. Now that he thinks about it, he can't remember who had lived there.
"No way, it's probably just some old geezer," Hayner mutters around his ice cream, looking dejectedly at the moving truck.
He couldn't remember if there had ever even been a house next door. What was going on? He frowns at his ice cream and misses Olette's rebuttal of Hayner and Pence's agreement to see Roxas's new neighbors. There hadn't been a house, was there, and there hadn't been neighbors before, either, and it couldn't have been built in a day --
"Roxas," Olette's voice cuts through his thoughts and he looks up at her, "Come on. We're going."
He nods at her and follows them. He's probably just thinking too much. A house didn't pop out, he probably just never noticed it. He probably had old, quiet, reclusive neighbors and never saw them. There. Explanation found. He nods at himself and looks up, ready to see his new neighbor -- he'll know this one, at the very least -- and stops completely, almost dropping his ice cream.
It can't be, he thinks, it just can't be. He must be hallucinating, it's a trick of the light, it's --
"Axel," he breathes out, and then, shaking his head, tries again, louder, "Axel?"
The other three are looking at him oddly, and Axel -- he's sure, he can feel it, it's impossible -- turns and the shaking feeling is true. It's Axel. Without the coat, but it's the same ridiculously spiky red hair, the same vivid green eyes with dark marks under them, the same insanely skinny frame.
It's Axel, and he's frozen into place after having called out his name. Roxas's ice cream drips on his hand and Axel looks wary. Hayner, Pence and Olette share the same shocked look.
"Roxas," Olette finally murmurs, "Do you know him?"
He doesn't respond but forces his legs to advance towards Axel. His steps are small, shaken and slow, but he needs to -- he needs to. ... He's not sure what he needs to do. But he wants to see him.
Does it count as the next life if neither of you are dead, Roxas thinks, and Axel moves the box in his arms. He still looks wary, but he hasn't run away. Yet.
"Axel," he tries again, his voice managing, unlike the rest of him, not to shake.
Axel tilts his head at him and narrows his eyes. Roxas feels his heart clenching -- doesn't he remember him?
"How do you know my name?"
Axel's voice his harsh and very unlike Axel, he thinks. Even if he didn't remember -- Axel isn't the kind to be worried if someone knows his name, is he?
And why doesn't he remember? I know you, he wants to say. His mouth opens to say the words, but, he hesitates to speak, after all. What is he supposed to say? I know you, I dreamt of you once, I saw you in my dreams.
Of course Axel doesn't remember and of course he doesn't act the same. He had never known Axel, had he? He looks back up at said man -- he looks definitively wary, and who wouldn't, after a complete stranger shouted their name -- and he smiles tentatively.
Way to look crazy, he thinks.
"Ha, well, um," Roxas tries, muttering, "See, um -- it's written. On the box."
And it is, actually, but Roxas isn't sure since when. Had it been there five seconds ago? Who cares, it's a useful scapegoat, he thinks.
"Okay," Axel begins, still looking wary, "but why the need to shout it?"
He doesn't know what to say, so he turns back and tries to see where his friends are. They're hanging back, unsure what to do -- help Roxas, or ask him the question themselves? -- and he licks his hand. It's covered in melted ice cream.
"I thought it seemed familiar," Roxas mutters, and then shrugs, "but I must've imagined it. Sorry."
The tension in Axel's shoulders seem to relax as he accepts the answer and Roxas refrains from breathing in relief. He holds out his hand -- the one not covered in sea-salt ice cream and spit -- and Axel lets go of the box a little to shake it.
"I'm Roxas. I live next door," he says, smiling a little. Axel smiles back.
"Axel, though it looks like you already knew that," he answers, "Nice to meet you, Roxas."
"Uh... you too, Axel," Roxas says, even if his heart is screaming 'We know each other'. It was just a dream.
He misses the next thing Axel says -- 'see you around', maybe? -- and the other boy leaves, entering his house. Hayner approaches him and puts an hand to his shoulder. Roxas drops his ice cream in surprise. It's half melted on his hand anyway, and he shakes it in annoyance.
"Man, you okay? What was all that about?"
Roxas shakes his head and Hayner's hand off, too.
"Nothing. M'going home. See you at the carnival," he says quickly and, runs back to his house.
Over his shoulder, he raises his hand, and waves them a speedy goodbye.
--------
He drops on his bed, completely clothed, and looks at his ceiling.
He almost feels as if his heart is bursting in tears.
He turns his head in his pillow when one tear does fall, because he doesn't even know what he's crying for.
(You really don't remember? It's me, you know.
Roxas.)
Still, they are nothing but empty shells, destined to return to the darkness.
----
It had been a week since Roxas’ encounter with Axel, and there had been a massive and demoralizing change; school had started again -- much to Hayner's disappointment -- and it seemed to Roxas as though had dreamed up the whole encounter with Axel; There was no trace of him anywhere, neither at the carnival, nor in town. He was almost ready to chalk it up to a dream, even though, it had seemed so real, but, then again, so had those other dreams, and there was no way any of those were true... right? When he finally caught sight of the red-head. He almost ran into a mailbox at the scene.
Axel is just sitting idly on his front lawn -- Twilight Town is a city and having a lawn is ridiculous, no? Was it even there the other day? Maybe he should sleep more, if he keeps forgetting these sort of things -- with a paintbrush in his hand. He's on a stool, with paint and a painting and…!
And Axel is painting! Roxas stares at Axel's long fingered, bony hands. He hadn't thought Axel to be the kind of guy who would paint.
He hadn't though Axel had any kind of artistic talent, really. But this Axel isn't the Axel he knows, well, dreamed of, and so it's perfectly fine for him not to do expected things. He tries to tell himself that, at least, but his stare doesn't waver. Feeling watched, Axel stops stroking his brush and looks at him, an eyebrow raised.
"Never seen a guy paint before?"
The sarcasm sounds just like the Axel he'd dreamed of, and it's enough to make him do a double-take. Axel's paintbrush is hovering in the air, dripping red paint on the green grass. The contrast is sharp, Roxas thinks, and knows that if he looks up at Axel's face, it'll look even sharper. Instead, he crosses over in some vigor he didn't know he had in himself, and stands next to the sitting Nobo --
(He's not a Nobody, he repeats to himself, and neither are you.)
-- to the sitting Axel. He stares at the sketch on the canvas, slowly being painted with colours. He blinks and turns his head to the side, fascinated.
He has no idea what it's supposed to be.
"What are you painting?" He asks finally, mouth drier than it should be.
Axel, whose gaze hadn't left from Roxas's face since the boy had arrived, finally turns back to his painting. He dips the brush into some water and takes another one, putting some blue paint on it. Roxas watches him dip it in the water and gradually paint the top of the painting. He thinks it might be a sky, but he's never painted before. Plus, for all he knows, the canvas is upside-down and he's painting water.
"A landscape," Axel murmurs, unbothered by Roxas's stare, and Roxas finally notices that he is painting an ocean and a beach, with a setting sun.
He feels like he knows that beach.
"It's a beach," Roxas says, pointing the obvious, "right?"
Axel nods a little, humming in the back of his throat. Roxas scratches the back of his neck and looks down. He wishes he knew what to say. The only thing that comes to his mind is "I know you" or "I dreamed about you". He's not crazy enough to try it. So he looks at his shoes and sometimes raises his head to look at Axel's progress in painting. He feels like he's been standing there awkwardly for hours. A quick look at Axel's watch tells him it's only been five minutes. Roxas gives up, resisting the urge to sigh miserably.
"I'll, uh, go now," he mutters, starting to turn away, but notices out of the corner of his eyes that Axel has stopped painting.
"... Roxas, right?"
Roxas nods and Axel looks at him intensely. Roxas feels like yelling 'We're best friends! You know my name!' but stays quiet, waiting for Axel to go on, because he knows it's ridiculous. It was a dream. Axel puts the paintbrush -- still slightly wet with paint -- behind his ear. It leaves a slightly bluish line on his face and Roxas smiles, resisting the urge to laugh. He looks stupid, he thinks.
"Mind if," Axel starts, rubbing at his cheek as if realising there is paint on it and only managing to spread it all over. Roxas can barely hold his laughter, now, and his cheeks hurt, "I try and paint you, sometime?"
Roxas urge to laugh is downed by that -- barely, because he can see the paint dripping on Axel's ear -- and he nods, startled.
Axel's grin is almost feral.
"Good."
Roxas grins back. He feels ridiculously giddy.
------
The dreams of Sora are still frequent, and Roxas often wakes up in the middle of the night, keyblade in hand, trying to hit a non-existing Heartless.
He doesn't remember it in the morning.
-------
It starts like that. Every week, on a Friday -- he cannot seem to catch Axel on any other day, it’s as if he disappears between those times -- he goes to Axel's lawn, or home (depending on the weather) and watches Axel sketch him. Most of the time, he barely looks up from his sketch, as if he knows exactly what Roxas looks like. Roxas almost finds himself hoping he does.
(Could this be the next life?)
--------
When Axel starts to paint the sketch, Roxas isn't allowed to look anymore.
"Why not?"
"I want it to be a surprise."
Roxas doesn't question the logic. (He's seen the sketch and he's seen himself, how surprising can it be?)
-------
Sometimes, Roxas looks up suddenly, when Axel is painting, completely out of the conversation.
"Did you just say my name?"
"No, why?"
"... No reason."
He's starting to think he might be going nuts. He blames the paint when Axel looks at him oddly, and Axel shakes his head.
As if that much paint fumes could even get him light-headed.
--------
Axel is a college student, Roxas learnt, from one of their many conversations. He loves speaking to Axel while watching him paint. That way, he doesn't have to look in Axel's eyes.
Roxas looks confused at that bout of information. There's no college in Twilight Town. He doesn't voice his thoughts, mulling over them a bit -- it's been happening more and more lately, things he didn't know were there, suddenly appeared from out of nowhere and nobody but him would question their existence -- so Axel smirks and uses the brush he has to paint Roxas's nose yellow.
"Wake up, silly."
Roxas frowns and crosses his eyes to look at his nose. He rubs the paint off and dips a finger in black paint, smearing Axel's cheek. It makes his facemarks look longer and darker. He stares at it and grins at Axel.
"Stay still."
Axel's not wearing any shirt -- it's always hot in his house, as if Axel himself is radiating heat (like the Axel of his dream, except this heat is far less dangerous) -- and it helps things. He dips another finger in red paint and paints a heart over Axel's chest, right where it should be. His grin widens and Axel stares at him with a "you're nuts" look on his face. Roxas laughs at him.
He had felt Axel's heartbeat.
(Thisisrealthisisrealthisisreal we're real)
--------
Once, Roxas finds his blue gem, from the trophy he won at the struggle tournament. He shows it off to Hayner, Pence and Olette and they all lift their gems to the sun.
He feels himself lifted away, as if far from there. The feeling is marvelous and lasts no more than a second.
He gives the gem to Axel.
"For safe-keeping," he says, and ignores the bewildered look on the other man's face.
-------
Roxas has dreams about Axel, too.
He can't remember them, either, but once, after one of them, he wakes up, calling his own name.
His voice doesn't sound the same.
-------
Once, Roxas saw Axel taking a lighter out of his pocket, playing with it, flicking open and then closing the lid. (When Axel is not painting he always had the need to occupy his hands, Roxas has found. On one occasion, he had ended up playing with his own hair with his hands still full of paint. Axel is naught more than a colored spot of paint, most of the time, which makes Roxas laugh so hard.)
"Do you smoke?"
Why else would Axel have a lighter, after all? Or maybe he used to, because Axel never smells like cigarettes or anything else. He smells more like spices. Roxas has found himself wondering, often, what kind of shop sells spice-scented soaps or shampoo. No scent like that can be natural, after all.
"I don't," Axel answers, and he doesn't add anything else. No "I used to", and thus Roxas's interest is piqued.
"Then why do you have one?"
Axel's smile looks slightly insane, slightly melancholic, slightly this and that and everything when he answers.
"To burn my paintings."
He offers no other explanations.
-------
They are friends, Roxas thinks.
And even if that Axel is slightly off from the one he has dreamed of, even if sometimes he gets the urge to hit him for no reason (he's not going crazy, Roxas hopes, but the more time passes the less everything seems to make sense, and so he doesn't mention it to anybody) even if they are only friends and not best friends, Roxas feels unnaturally happy.
It's as if his dream self was given a next life.
(Let's meet again, in the next life.
Sure. I'll be waiting.
Silly. This wasn't life.)
Look, about that. I'm sorry.
------
"You've been spending a lot of time with Axel," Hayner mentions, one day.
Roxas looks up at him questioningly. He's only ever there on Fridays, isn't he? Olette nibbles on her ice-cream and Pence shrugs, both hopeless to the inner workings of Hayner's mind. Most of the time, they all were.
"I mean, you barely know that guy, and you spend all your Friday nights with him. You never even told us what you DO there, man!"
"He's making a painting of me," Roxas answers casually.
Hayner makes a face while Pence and Olette look interested. Olette finishes her ice-cream and smiles at him.
"Really? He's a painter? That's great!"
Pence nods in agreement before adding, "Yeah, Roxas. You need to make him show us some of his paintings one day!"
Hayner makes a gagging motion and Roxas rolls his eyes, and pushes him lightly.
"Oh, shut up! He's a good painter. Just because you have no taste in art that the rest of us have!"
He says this with a grin and Hayner looks up at him seriously.
"That's not it," he starts, then looks up to the sky and makes a face again, speaking around his ice-cream, "I just don't get why anybody would want to paint Roxas of all people!"
They laugh and Roxas rebukes him for good measure with a "He's not going to paint you, he's not Picasso, you know!"
They finish their ice-cream quietly after that.
-----
On a Friday, Roxas comes in Axel's house -- it's raining -- but stops halfway through taking off his shoes, almost sure he's in the wrong house.
The house is the same (as much as Roxas seems to remember places, nowadays, they change in his mind all the time) even down to the smell of fresh paint and spices that Axel seems to carry around everywhere (Roxas doesn't even know if Axel eats spicy food) but what is wrong with the picture is not the house, but Axel himself.
The only thing he can see is the back of Axel’s head as he works on painting some Chinese based mural on his wall -- the walls in Axel's house are full of murals, each with a different theme; under the sea, pirates, a French castle, Ancient Greece, the list went on and on -- but even that is enough to see that Axel is not normal. For one thing, his hair is laying low on his shoulders, as if Axel's head was bleeding in small rivulets of blood, and Roxas shudders at the imagery. He's been spending too much time with Axel. He's about ready to turn around (as if witnessing Axel with his hair down was a crime, was unnatural) but Axel stops painting and Roxas knows he's noticed him.
"Yo, Roxas!" Axel says, nodding towards the couch, "Go on, sit down, I just want to finish it up a little."
Roxas stares at him; he's never noticed how Axel's hair was blood red, or how it would fall past his shoulders when not spiked up.
Axel gets annoyed and calls out again.
"Helloooo! Axel to Roxas, do you register me?"
Roxas's tongue finally untangles itself (Axel has not stopped painting) and he takes a small, cautious step towards the couch. He's being ridiculous, he thinks.
"Ha, um, sorry," Roxas tries finally when he's sure the sounds going out won't only be gargled noises, "It's just that. Your hair," Roxas makes waving movements of his hand when he says that and decides he really has spent too much time with Axel, "is. It's. ... Down." He finishes, pitifully.
Axel scoffs at him. "What, d'you think it was natural or something?"
He moves to make the finishing touches on the mountain (Roxas can swear he's seen it somewhere before) whilst Roxas just stands in the living room feeling awkward. Each wall has a different mural, and the more he looks at them, the more they seem familiar.
Axel sighs and repeats himself, sure Roxas didn't hear him, "Did you think it was natural?"
Yes, Roxas thinks but says instead, "No, it's just... Different."
Axel finally puts the brush down and wipes his hands on his clothes, in an ultimately useless attempt to get rid of the paint on them. Roxas shifts to his other feet and says nothing.
"I was out of hair gel," Axel explains finally and shakes his head helplessly, turning to look at Roxas, "Forgot to buy some."
Roxas would answer, but he is stricken by Axel's face. His eyes are devoid of eyeliner --he guesses it is normally -- or the upside-down tear drops. With out them and the hair that falls in his eyes, he doesn't look like Axel at all. Axel, if it really is him, notices the stare and raises and eyebrow at him, chuckling.
"Whaaat? Thought they were natural, too?"
Yes, Roxas thinks again, and this time he cannot answer. Axel waves his hand at him impatiently and drops on the couch, obviously giving up.
"Okay, okay, I look weird, I get it, stop staring, geez!" he muttered, rubbing a finger under his eyes and smearing some paint on his face, "I'll buy the stupid stuff tomorrow."
The paint has given Roxas an idea, and he stares at it on Axel's face for a while, concentrating. Axel notices the stare and almost blushes, rubbing his cheek and only managing to aggravate it.
"But you have paint," Roxas says, finally.
Axel stares at him. When it's obvious Roxas won't respond, he tilts his head. "Aaaand...?"
"You," Roxas stops and changes his mind at the last second, "I could paint. Your face, I mean. On it."
Axel seems to think he's crazy, and Roxas almost regrets saying it. But he's come that far and he's not going to back off now.
"I'll be careful. I can do that much. Plus, you're always full of paint anyway," he sees the look on Axel's face and quickly adds, "I wouldn't get some in your eyes, promise. Just. Let me try it, just once."
They stare at each other and Axel finally sighs, defeated.
"Fine, fine. Don't use the lonely kid stare at me," Axel mutters and Roxas smirks in satisfaction. He's quick to hide it at Axel's glare. "I feel so whipped."
Axel moves as if to get the paint but Roxas shakes his head and fetches it, by now he knows where all Axel’s art supplies are kept. He returns with the right paintbrush and the right colour for it, too. Axel raises an eyebrow and Roxas looks at him innocently. Axel sits down on the floor and Roxas kneels in the middle of his open legs (Axel is ridiculously tall, he decides) and gets to work. He starts with the eyes -- Axel closes them obediently and Roxas cups the man's cheek, concentrating. He tries to remember the strokes Axel would do on his paintings, soft and firm at the same time, and he manages to do the first eye without any problem. He tries not to preen at his success and moves to the other, using the opportunity to wipe Axel's cheek clean of paint and ignoring the "Mothering hen" comment he makes. The second eye is finished with no trouble, too, and Roxas smirks in delight.
He's about to move on to the upside down teardrops when Axel stops him. He opens an eye lazily, hand on Roxas's wrist.
"Not the right colour," he explains, and Roxas remembers that they're not black but more like purple.
He doesn't know how to get the colour, he thinks, and opens his mouth to say so when Axel gestures to the multiple paints Roxas has brought (or had he? He doesn't remember bringing so much) and Roxas smiles sheepishly, taking the purple.
When he finishes them, his hand is shaking slightly and Axel opens his eyes and grins. He lifts his hands and claps slowly. Roxas would put some more paint on him but that would ruin the job, so he simply colours Axel's shirt, much to Axel’s mild annoyance.
He takes a look like Axel. It doesn't look exactly like him, but it's more familiar. It's almost like Axel, he decides.
Just like the Axel in his dreams, but he shuts the thought out before it can go further.
-------
"I wonder where Kairi's gone," Pence says softly one day.
Roxas stares at them.
"Who?"
"You know, Kairi," Olette says, blinking at him, "The one who came here once and was taken away by that man."
Roxas feels as if he's frozen.
"Which man? When?"
Hayner turns to look at him slowly. "You don't remember? She was looking for you."
"What?"
Hayner blinks at him. "Dude, man, are you okay? You totally spaced out there."
"...Huh?"
"We were talking, and all of a sudden you got this blank look on your face," Olette says, peering at him with concern.
"I... did?"
Pence nods, "Yeah, like you were totally in another world!"
Roxas swallows. His mouth is dry.
"I guess I must've been dreaming awake."
Which man, he wants to ask. Why her, is another thing.
(He was dreaming, he thinks, dreaming, dreaming, dreaming, dreaming
dreaming.)
-----
When Roxas came to Axel’s house one Friday, something drastic happened. Axel was painting, calmly, with Roxas speaking to him about his friends, about school, about everything except the dreams, when suddenly Axel fell to his knees, coughing as if he was about to shoot a lung.
Roxas was by his side in an instant. The coughing had stopped after less than a minute, but Roxas was still worried.
"Are you okay? Do you want me to get you a glass of water?"
Axel shakes his head and wipes his mouth. He stands up shakily and tries to laugh it off.
"S'nothing, s'nothing. M'probably just getting a cold...and the paint fumes can't be helping."
Roxas nods and doesn't ask more.
But they both know Axel doesn't get out enough to get a cold, especially in Twilight Town's hot weather and Axel has never reacted to the paint fumes before.
But it's just this once, so it should be fine, Roxas thinks.
-----
The coughing fits increase over time. Once, Roxas caught Axel coughing up blood.
He tries to get him to go to the hospital, a clinic, anything, and Axel promises he will. Tomorrow.
Roxas trusts him and doesn't make sure he does.
He asks everywhere if Axel went later, though, and they only answer with "Who?" or "No, kid, sorry."
His heart tightens in his chest.
----
Axel has been vomiting.
Roxas doesn't know what to do anymore.
"I'm just sick," he swears, "It'll pass. I get this stuff at least once a year."
----
Axel has been vomiting blood. There's some on his paintings.
Roxas feels helpless.
Axel promises him he'll go see a doctor. For real, this time. Roxas tells him he'll take him there on his own.
He doesn't trust him anymore.
(What's going on?
Just. Tell me that.
Please.)
Feeling a little -- regret?
-----
Axel has to stay the night, Roxas is told.
He's been gnawing at his thumbnails and the news make him even more nervous than he already is. It's as if fifty billion different things are going on inside his head (like-- this and that and what is what) and he's not even sure if they all have anything to do with what's happening.
But -- it doesn't matter. Axel will be fine. He's sure of it.
He can't stay with him, the nurse adds -- he's only half listening, looking at the walls of the hospital, almost fascinated (they're all so white it seems familiar) -- he'll have to come back tomorrow.
He barely manages to struggle when the nurse gently guides him out the door. Axel will still be there tomorrow, she swears.
While Roxas walks away, he realizes that it's what he's scared of.
Axel won't die. He just can't.
(He has no life to give, and the thought makes Roxas choke.)
-----
Roxas can't fall asleep no matter how much he tries.
(Maybe if I sleep it'll all be a dream and I'll wake up, he thinks.)
-----
When Roxas visits Axel the next day, he's stopped by the same nurse.
"Are you family," she asks him.
Of course I’m not, he almost says, but realizes if he does say that, he might not get to see him.
"I'm his cousin," he blurts without thinking.
She raises an eyebrow but lets him through. If he was dying she'd let him see him even if he wasn't family, he tries to reassure himself.
Or maybe she wouldn't have. Roxas walks a little faster.
-----
Axel lays on the hospital bed and he turns his head towards him. He grins weakly and Roxas tries to smile back.
"They tell you yet?"
Axel's voice is normal despite his pale face and Roxas relaxes a little. He shakes his head and Axel turns his head towards the ceiling.
"I'm dying," Axel says, grin still in place. Roxas freezes and tries to open his mouth, to say something, anything, but Axel continues, unbothered, "I've been ever since--"
He sees Axel's mouth move but can't hear the words. He tries to read Axel's lips, desperately (his ears are blocked or he's turning deaf or he's trying not to register it, but he's not hearing anything and this isn't the time to make Axel repeat himself) and can make out the word "nobody". Roxas swallows. He misread, he thinks. Must have.
"But why didn't you --"
Axel cuts him off with a look and Roxas closes his eyes. Why didn't you tell me, he thinks, and notices Axel sitting up slowly. He looks at him, completely bewildered.
"Help me up, will you," he mutters and Roxas scrambles to help him.
Axel leans against him and he doesn't look like he's dying. Roxas wants to speak, to say anything at all, but Axel cuts him off again. (As if he doesn't want to hear him.)
"Get me back home, will you?"
Roxas can't possibly say no.
Roxas can't possibly say anything, right now.
------
Roxas isn't sure how they bypassed the nurses and doctors, but he couldn't care less, right now. He helps Axel slump against the couch ("Wouldn't wanna bleed on it, y'know?") and half kneels next to him.
His voice is finally working again and Axel lays down on the floor, his breathing shallow. If Roxas concentrates, he can almost make out dark particles, floating out of Axel. (He must be dreaming, and, oh, wouldn't that be so better, just to be dreaming again.)
"Axel," his voice sounds odd, he thinks, but continues, "What were you trying to do?"
Coming here, he thinks, doing all that Axel did, what had he been trying to do, all this time? Axel isn't looking at him anymore.
"I wanted to see," Axel's voice changes, as if the words aren't coming out from the same mouth, "you. You...are," and then Axel's lips are moving but no sound is coming out. Roxas wants to scream at him but no sound is coming out of his mouth, either, it’s as if he's frozen, as if he's not controlling his body and what he wants to say -- he wants to say:
I wanted to see you, too. I dreamed about you.
But he can't, and he can't hear Axel's dying words (because he is, he thinks, he's dyingdyingdying and Roxas can't even hear him) and Roxas is shaking, holding onto Axel. He's stopped moving, and his body is cold.
Roxas gags and looks away, anywhere but at Axel and then he sees it. The portrait Axel had just finished earlier. Of him. 'It just needs to dry, then I'll show it to you,' he had said.
He gets up shakily and reaches it. He turns it in his hands and lets it fall almost immediately.
It's definitely him. But then, as if Axel had changed his mind, the pictures changes and depicts someone else. Someone he knows...far too much.
Sora.
He must be dreaming, Roxas thinks, shoulders shaking hysterically, he must be dreaming and he'll wake up and this will all have been a dream again.
He'll wake up. He wants to, so he'll wake up.
(Wake up!)
And he wakes.
------
Roxas is wearing his black coat. He's not sure how he summoned Sora to this place. He's not sure where this place is. Another dream, another reality, who cares, Sora is here and he's so angry at him, he doesn't care.
The Oblivion keyblade appears in his hand and he tightens his grip on it.
"A Keyblade?"
Sora sounds so surprised to see another with one. He runs at him and hits with it -- he hasn't forgotten how at all. He summons them both to another place; he recognized that one, now, The World That Never Was, that vast abandoned city, and he remembers everything. They run at each other, locking Keyblade against Keyblade. He's not sure what he wants to do.
"Who -- who are you?!"
He doesn't even know who I am, Roxas thinks bitterly, and smiles under the hood. He's not sure, either.
"Someone from the dark."
They push each other back and he has both of his Keyblades out by now, against Sora's one. It looks decidedly like -- he stops the thought there.
"You can't be... Riku?"
The name is so familiar, and he remembers everything but the thoughts are jumbled. Riku is -- Oh.
"Riku? ...I defeated a Riku once."
Maybe. Or maybe it had been another dream. Sora looks so offended that his expression makes Roxas almost want to laugh.
"You what?"
He's not here to play with Sora, though. He just wants an answer.
"Tell me. ... Tell me why he picked you!"
And he runs at him, keyblades grinding against the floor and they clash, keyblade against keyblade against keyblade, completely ignoring any rules or what could be going on around them, except for each other. They fight up in the air, even, and Roxas stops when Sora goes down. He can -- he sees, now, he thinks.
"I see. That's why."
He sees why but he doesn't understand, still, and he's so angry at him so he floats down and attacks again, bashing both Keyblades against Sora's one (it looks so much like --) but again, he stops the thought there, until Sora is down on his knees and has his weapon thrown out of reach with by the Oathkeeper. Sora tries to scramble towards it but Roxas is faster and pins the fallen Keyblade to the ground, he points the Oblivion at Sora. He won.
But Sora closes his eyes and holds out his hand and the Keyblade goes back to him --
"What?!"
-- and Sora slashes at him. Roxas lets go of his keyblades and staggers forward.
------
He sees a flash of his "birth" in Twilight Town, Xemnas talking --
"A new you."
------
He's back on the train tower. Back in Twilight Town.
All he had seen, he thinks, drawing his knees up, all he had lived while Sora was searching for his friends again, it had all been a dream. It had all been fake. He hides his face in his knees and hugs them, looking at the sunset. Everything was fake. Everything was always fake.
"Finally woken up?"
He gasps and turns.
"Axel."
This one is real -- as real has he can be when Roxas is in his own consciousness, but he thinks, maybe they did this before and he tries not to look too happy. Axel stays silent and doesn't look back at him.
"No, maybe you're going to sleep."
He had been sleeping for a while, he thinks. Sometimes he had woken up, though. Hadn't he?
"Soon, I won't even be able to talk to your consciousness like this."
Roxas turns back. So they had talked like this before. Consciousness to consciousness.
"I... I'm going back to how I was."
Back to Sora, he thinks. Back to the dreams, maybe. Axel sits down next to him, still talking.
"I've thought about it a lot," he says, "Naminé said the same the same thing. Roxas..."
He turns back to Axel and wants to ask -- How is Naminé? How are you, maybe. But he knows the answer and so he lets him talk.
"You have a heart, don't you? While Naminé and I...We don't really have hearts, do we?"
Roxas thinks, but you do have a heart. I've felt it. Or maybe I haven't.
"I ... I don't know, either."
Axel looks disappointed and Roxas thinks he had meant it some other way. It hadn't gone out of his mouth right.
"I guess not..."
He tries to make his point again.
"But, the heart's not something you can see," he starts, "I've started wondering whether it's something you can't feel, either...If so, then--" Roxas stops himself. It would probably sound stupid. "Nah, nevermind."
"Huh? What're you getting at?"
He smiles and looks at the sunset. He thinks he's finally got it.
"I'm sure Sora'll find the answer," he starts, then pauses and goes on, "Because he's me."
Axel looks amused a little.
"I guess so."
------
Axel pulls out two ice-creams from the depths of his coat, and offers one to Roxas. They both eat them, acting as if nothing had happened. As if they were both alive, as if they're time wasn't limited, as if Roxas was still in his dream world and Roxas feels deliriously happy at the idea. They speak like the best friends they are, not like strangers.
------
"So... I have to go. Sora's waiting for me."
"Yeah, I guess he is."
But Roxas doesn't go just yet. Just a little longer, he thinks. With the real Axel.
------
"See you later, Axel."
Roxas smiles and thinks he sees a tear fall down Axel's cheek.
"See you later, partner."
At the very least, Roxas thinks, at the very least, Axel,
I'll see you in my dreams.
-----
He stumbles and his hood falls off. He turns to Sora and smiles.
"You make a good other."
(So, we can be together again!
In my dreams.)
First! I'm aware that I abuse italics far too much. Second, I have absolutely no knowledge in paint, except the few classes in art we did paint in seventh grade. It made writing this incredibly awkward XD;;; but the painting idea wouldn't leave me, so.
This idea was born from a mix of things -- the main musical inspiration was "Once Upon A Dream" from Sleeping Beauty, for example, which is where the basic idea came from. Seeing someone in their dreams...! Other things that made this bunny come to life included the new Final Mix+ scene, and Roxas's "see you later, Axel". Roxas truly believes he'll see him again, which is weird, because at that point, Axel is DEAD. That one sentence has been the birth (and death) of a lot of plotbunnies. Another thing was the fake Twilight Town and all those dreams Roxas seemed to be having before. Roxas and Sora are peculiar in that they don't react strongly to weird stuff and will believe everything is going normally until the last second. They won't tell anyone anything, too. (I'm talking of the introductions, here!)
So the main idea was Roxas seeing Axel again (which is something every fanfic writer thought about at least once...), something to do with dreams and Axel not remembering Roxas. Why? Because I wanted to switch their positions around. See if Roxas was going to be as drastic as Axel. (Nope, not at all!)
The major scenes in this are definitively the first time Roxas paints on Axel -- it comes from a fanart I've seen, Axel with a painted heart on his chest and the second. Because Axel looks like he's wearing eyeliner, but the other stuff could be natural, knowing KH. So I wanted to play with them not being natural and Roxas being "... wtf?! IT WASN'T NORMAL?" about it. XD;; There's also obviously the first time Roxas sees Axel again and Axel doesn't remember and the first time Roxas wakes up and believes The Sixth Day had been a dream. The death scene was a major turn-point, but I don't like it (u_u; chuuu) and there's the lighter scene. Don't ask me where it came from, I just wanted to incorporate Axel's fire tendencies. Paintings burn really easily and most artists have a drastic way of destroying the works they hate! I really like the scene where Axel asks Roxas if he can paint him, too...
Aaaah, in a lot of the fic, there are moments where Roxas's reality doesn't make sense -- buildings changing, the town being different, having multiple paints when he brought just the one -- which are clues that this is all a dream. Dreams pretty much don't make sense in the detailed parts and scenery is bound to change when you're dreaming.
During this dream, Roxas is half-awake, actually, which is why there are lots of mentions to scenes in KH2. Kairi's kidnapping, people mentioning Roxas to Sora all the time, Axel's death, Roxas is aware of a lot of major things that are happening, but he's not completely there. He thinks THOSE are the dreams and plus, he doesn't remember it all clearly enough while dreaming.
Axel painting in Roxas's dreams comes from Roxas thinking of Naminé and Axel -- a lot. Naminé was drawing, and so he dreams of Axel painting, and just like Naminé, Axel paints things that are happening/actually happened. Like the beach from Destiny Islands, or the landscapes on Axel's walls (the Land of the Dragons, Beast's Castle, the Underworld/Olympus Coliseum, Port Royal, etc)-- he painted the worlds Sora visited at the same time as Sora visited them, because, again, Roxas is half awake. Dreams incorporate what you did during your day, no? :3
I incorporated a part of Simple and Clean (the daily things, like this and that and what is what) in the fourth part because I felt it fitted. There's no deep meaning about it! X3;
Is this fic meant to be romantic? Yes and no. I'm definitively an AkuRoku (which is still the stupidest pairing name in existance!) shipper, so there are some scenes that are definitively romantic. But the fic in itself is supposed to have, mostly, a friendship overtone. Axel and Roxas are (were) best friends, and that's what Roxas is after. Axel's dream self -- isn't quite Axel, so who knows.
Axel is a little bit OOC on purpose, speaking of that. This is a dream, and Roxas doesn't think this is the real Axel, anyway, and Axel has no access to Roxas's consciousness during that time. It's a milder Axel, a little. (I don't think he's that much OOC, though. ... uwaaah, it's bad, I can't even notice if he is or not!!!! X3!)
Fun fact! My beta (raburabu :3) mentioned that Axel's marks were actually red, not purple. I searched pictures to prove that it was a VERY VERY DARK PURPLE, but a purple nonetheless. (Not red.) It matches Axel's eyeliner. ... Hahaha.
In the midst of writing this, since I only had the "major" scenes thought of (most of the scenes were written/thought of on the spot...) I got an idea for another dream. And another. And then, I thought -- I could do a whole series of Roxas dreaming. Sometimes he'd know, sometimes he wouldn't...! (And most of the time, it'd give me an excuse to AU!) But then I thought, while that's all well and good, he needs to wake up sometime, god. So the sequel idea came to my mind -- nothing is written out yet, but I have some scenes ideas in my head. After all, Roxas and Axel didn't actually get their next life, did they? So the sequel will still be mostly Roxas-centric (I write Roxas's POV a lot, considering how I hate writing in his POV XP) but will include Sora, Kairi, Naminé and Riku. Plus, a certain someone you all know and love... or, is it? Haaa, bad me, foreshadowing is bad. I feel like Nomura, except less liked. (And less sniffing of the paint.)
The little lines at the beggining are almost to make you notice where exactly in the KH2 storyline this "started". I say almost, because it's the ONE sentence that struck Roxas the most close to that period. It can certainly be later! So. Yes.
The last lines are all canon lines, but when underlined, they are not. I just felt the need to say that.
I think that's all the explanation needed, though, so... yeah. Ask if there's anything else unclear?
I'll be posting the parts in kh communities and fanfiction.net, though. Try to get myself a fanbase, haha!
And that's all! :3