The boy is curled on the sofa, eyelids pulsing in the rhythms of undisturbed sleep, hands twitching and clutching a worn blue blanket.

Only days before had Roxas been found on the steps of Oblivion’s Castle. He looked around 14, but didn’t know a thing; Number XIII could hardly speak and seemed so wobbly on his feet that Axel spent more time picking him up off the ground than he did walking on it.

How pretty he is…

A warm smile spreads across Axel’s sharp features as Roxas stirs from his slumber. He reaches to caress a lock of soft, dusty hair from the other Nobody’s face. Axel likes how wide Roxas’ forehead is. It reminds him of something far, far in his past; something kind of like a feeling.

“Get up honey.” Roxas moans into his covers. “Come on, sweetie. Get up.”

“No!” But Roxas is awake, trying to pound the sleep from his large, sapphire eyes.

“That’s a good boy. You want a present?” The delight in Roxas’ face makes Axel wish. It’s a hollow wish, like everything else about him, but he still wishes that he could hurt. Just for Roxas. The boy can’t feel and he doesn’t know it yet, but it be nice if Axel could hurt and make it so “I’m sorry” actually meant something.

“Please!” Roxas begs, “don’t tease me anymore!”

Axel only ruffles the other’s hair and drops a dripping ice-bar into the other’s outstretched hands.

“Sea-Salt Ice Cream. Got it memorized?”

---

“Axel-koi!” Roxas is trying to dance out from under Axel’s hands, “stop teasing!”

Axel chuckles low in his throat. “You always say that.” He does not yet want Roxas to see where they are. “It’s an odd catch-phrase.”

“Well, your's isn’t any better!” Axel has to clutch the boy tightly to his body to keep the other from jumping out of his restless skin.

Not that he minds. Ever. If anything, the holding is nice and Axel tries to do it as much as possible. Roxas doesn’t seem to care either. The attachment he shares with Number XIII is unique. It has been there ever since he found him; coiled like a sleeping dragon, pulsing and pushing in his chest. He cherishes it: maybe a bit too much.

You’d almost call it love.

“Stop being a tease!”

“Fine.”

Roxas can suddenly see, and it’s beautiful. Somewhere in the worlds of chaos, Axel had unearthed an oasis: gorgeous with flowered orange, pink, and sparkly-blue plants of paradise. The grass is lush, and sprouting large, exotic trees. The animal tracks are fresh.

“Do you like it?” Axel almost forgets.

We can’t like.

“Yes! Oh, yes!” The blonde Nobody stumbles across the grassy plains on his tiny feet. He’s still so unsteady and flighty, that as he frolics, his boots catch his hem and he trips into the flowers, giggling.

Casually, Axel flops himself, belly down, on the ground. His hand seeks the other's, lightly groping for a hold, but Roxas is sly and Axel can hardly believe it when Roxas is kissing his lips—passionately.

Are you sure we can’t feel?

---

“I’m leaving.”

The smile is gone. His knees are to his heaving chest and there is no more happiness.

“But it’s okay.” Axel is lying; they both know. Being incomplete is never okay. Tenderly, he extends his arms and tries to pull the younger Nobody into his lap, “pretending is—”

“Shut up! You’ve lied before so just—fuck off!”

Axel needs to leave the boy to his 'misery'.

So he does.

He can’t reason nonexistence; it’s nature. Light feels; dark doesn’t want to; incompleteness can’t.

The end.

But Axel still wishes he could hurt. Only for Roxas.

---

Axel’s acidic irises focus intently on the photographs laid before him. He is amazed at how different he is; but it’s him. There’s no mistake. It’s just...those black and white clothes, so floppy on an underweight boy; those friends, laughing while he frowns; that smile that doesn’t exist.

“Roxas,” Axel cuffs at his eyes, hoping that this time, maybe, he’ll find some tears.

He has to see him.

Needs to.

---

“You feel?” Hurt etches the other’s mouth in permanent frown lines.

Axel is confused.

“Who are you?” Roxas gives his humming blade a reassuring grip, “What do you want?”

“Oh, darling, if only.” He can feel DiZ tugging at his being, but he has to see, has to, if only once.

“Start making sense!” There’s that pulling again.

“If only.” Axel likes to repeat himself. Axel likes to like. “Roxas, dear, come home with me.”

Then Axel is holding him, enclosing Roxas tight in his needing arms; knowing full well that DiZ was never pulling at him. “Sick fuck!” Roxas can thrash all he wishes, but Axel won’t let go.

New Roxas doesn’t know passion like Axel knows passion.

New Roxas can’t feel like Axel can.

---

He is gone; old; long lost, new; quite fresh in his grave. His Other exists, and, without even trying, he became him once more.

Who’s the winner in all this?

---

The darkest corner of Roxas’ empty room is now Axel’s only haven. He can hear Kairi struggling in her cage a few doors down, and the hollow rattling reminds him more and more of his feelings.

Axel is convinced that he can feel—he can’t explain it, but his inability to move from the grip of a very weathered blanket seems to speak volumes. If he couldn’t feel—then why does he refuse to continue life without that other Nothing? To be without him is—painful? Axel has no clue—but he knows for damn sure that he’s feeling, and he hates it because the only time he ever gets what he wants is when it’s too fucking late.

Kairi is shrieking a name that is too close to what Axel doesn’t want to hear. He begins to yell, too, clutching his head and trying to drown out the cries of “Sora! Sora!”

“Roxas! Roxas!” No one is coming so Axel screams louder.

Chunks of wiry, red hair fall to the floor; the blanket is ablaze.

“I don’t want to feel! I don’t want to feel!” But Axel can feel, from the fire eating away at his glassy flesh to the torment throbbing in his breast. He can burn and he can feel and nothing makes sense.

“Please, Roxas,” Axel begs, “Don’t tease me anymore!”