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“Oblivion has fallen.” Saïx liked the way it sounded, liked the finality in the echoes ringing throughout the empty room. “Tragic, of course, but–”
“Now hang on, hang on…” From across the room, Xigbar readjusted his posture, propping himself against the armrest of his throne. Despite the momentary movement, the casualness of his sprawl spoke volumes of precisely how much he cared. “That’s a hell of a thing to just drop like that, don’t ya think?”
Saïx, to his credit, managed to keep his gaze even as it flit from Xemnas to Xigbar. He afforded him a look he hoped was withering enough to convey the gravitas of the statement. “I’ve been in contact with Axel, and he assures me–”
“Oh, well, if Red’s sayin’ it, then it’s obviously true…” Xigbar snickered, cocking his head to the side just slightly. “Say it ain’t so. By the bye…” he really did straighten up, then, gesturing widely to the empty chairs to his right. “Where is the little scamp? Sure hope nothin’ bad happened to him.”
“Axel is finishing his business at the Castle as we speak.” Again, he had to stop and admire the authority in his voice, the weight of it. It wasn’t the first audience he’d had with them, but never before had he felt so very in control of his situation. It was he who held the cards, now. “He’ll be joining us shortly, I’m sure.”
“And the traitors?” Xemnas spoke slowly and calmly, chin resting against a gloved hand. He seemed too blasé–too unaffected. The failure of Oblivion should’ve shaken the Round Room with indignant shouts. Instead, there he sat, measured as ever. “Have they been eliminated?”
“Some of them.”
Saïx froze.
He didn’t know how he hadn’t seen them appear, didn’t know how he hadn’t heard them. But suddenly, the throne room wasn’t half so empty as it had been; someone was sitting to his right, two others perched directly across from him. And he knew their shapes, knew their voices, knew simply by the way the air churned around them. None of them were Axel.
“Ah! Look who dropped in!” Xigbar’s smirk hooked itself into something barbed and terrible. “Man, I gotta say I’m a little disappointed. Here we are, getting all this news that Oblivion’s gone ass-up, and I for one was kinda crossing my fingers that at least one of you three would’ve gone with it…” He chuckled to himself, “So bossy. Ah well. Good to have you back, I guess…”
His mouth ran dry as he watched them remove their hoods. Vexen, Lexaeus, Zexion. It was impossible–absolutely unthinkable–that he would be sitting among them. They were dead. They were dead.
Axel had assured him.
“XI and XII were staging a coup, as suspected.” Vexen was the first of them to speak up, tone reminiscent of a doctor delivering a death sentence. “Unsurprising, but pathetic.” He turned his gaze to Saïx, and there was a horrible, almost obscene moment of jamais vu. How many times had he spoken to Vexen? How many times had he given him orders or delivered an assignment? How could he have missed it for all that time? “You know how neophytes can be–always thinking they’re so much brighter than the rest of us.”
“Their status?” Xemnas asked, maintaining his bizarre calm, despite the unexpected appearance of the others.
“Eliminated.” Lexaeus’s voice was a roil of thunder in the room, his own eyes joining Vexen’s to burn holes through Saïx. It was there, too, much more noticeable from that proximity. How had he never seen it? How had he never suspected?
“But, as I had begun to say, before Number II thought it prudent to interrupt me…” Zexion curtly flipped his hair out of his face, and there it was again; he smiled as he watched realization–and resignation–dawn on Saïx’s face. “There are still those among our ranks who have their own agendas.” His eyes gleamed fiery gold, just as Vexen’s and Lexaeus’s did, “There are two I can think of, just off the top of my head.”
He felt himself open his mouth, felt himself flounder for words. He cleared his throat and adjusted himself, hating how tight his throat had become. “This is…a welcome surprise. I was informed by Axel that the three of you had been destroyed.” Their eyes were still on him, relentless and hungry. In that moment, he was a child again, frozen to the spot as the scientists advanced on him, pointed implements glinting in their hands. It wasn’t fair–it wasn’t fair. He’d finally had the upper hand, finally had bested them at their own nefarious plans, and now…
“I’m afraid the rumors of our deaths have been…greatly exaggerated.” Zexion’s smile only seemed to widen, even as his posture relaxed to mirror Xemnas’s. “How was it, may I ask, that we were said to have been destroyed?” He raised his eyebrows in a pantomime of curiosity.
“Axel didn’t speci–”
“And isn’t that strange, that he wouldn’t know?” Vexen cut in, drumming spidery fingers against the armrest of his throne. “Considering, of course, the central role he played.”
“Oh, Number VII…” Zexion’s voice was saccharine, curdling the contents of his stomach. “What have you done?”
“What have you gotten yourself into?” Lexaeus added.
“You’ll never believe some of the things we’ve heard about you,” came Vexen’s snide retort. “Well. I suppose you probably would believe them. But we couldn’t–oh no.”
“Neither could we.” It was only then, when Xigbar piped up, that Saïx knew the battle had been lost. “Could we, Boss? Nah. Not ‘til we dug a little deeper, that is. Not ‘til we really started thinking about it.” He laughed, shoulders shaking with amusement. “You really thought you and Red, of all people, were gonna be able to pick them off? The assholes sent to Oblivion to make clones??” He threw his arms out to his sides, “For real, though?”
Xemnas sat up, gaze sweeping across them all. “Number VII,” he began, voice echoing ominously as it filled the air around them. “Remind us of the assignment given to Numbers IV, V, and VI, if you would.”
All he had wanted was to recover his heart; he had only wanted to recapture the life they had stolen from him. It wasn’t fair…it wasn’t right. “They were meant to complete the replica project,” he said, tone robotic and clipped, voice tight in his throat.
“And…?” Xemnas prompted.
“And,” he swallowed, feeling finality’s icy fingers creeping into the empty spaces between his ribs, wending around them like barbed ivy. “Eliminate the traitors among our numbers.”
“We intend to,” Lexaeus said, just as the Round Room began to tremble beneath them. “Fully.”