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The Castle That Never Was slept, silent save for one soul. Axel drifted in and out of the halls listlessly, with neither direction nor purpose. His fists clenched and released sporadically as though he meant to summon his chakrams—perhaps he did. Perhaps not.
It doesn’t make any sense.
Or rather, nothing made sense anymore… after all, wasn’t that all Axel was? Nothing? No one? That’s how the Superior—how Saïx—saw it, but Axel knew the truth. Axel was lacking, negative space where his heart should be like a dark hole, endlessly hungry. He was a void, but from him came… change. Good or ill, didn’t matter; Axel didn’t care about morality. All he wanted was to leave his mark. To mean something, again.
It was Lea’s nineteenth birthday, and Axel couldn’t sleep.
“Well, well, well.” A voice. Artificially jovial, untrustworthy. Axel stiffened as a heavy hand clapped over his slender shoulder. “And here I thought we had a ghost. Awful late to be out and about, don’t you think?”
Grimacing, Axel shrugged Xigbar’s hand off. “Didn’t know I had a curfew. What, you here to tuck me into bed?”
“Hey, if that’s what you’re after,” Xigbar replied. “No need to be coy, Red. It’s not as if either of us are getting any sleep tonight.”
“Oh? Is it your arthritis again, old man?” Axel taunted. He’d yet to figure out Xigbar’s game; the older Nobody had been flirting with him and Saïx for months, but while the diviner chose to ignore Xigbar’s come-ons, Axel wanted to play. He wanted to do something, anything, just to prove his existence.
Inside people’s memories, I can live forever.
“As if.” Xigbar sidled up next to Axel, hip-to-hip with the younger Nobody. “Why don’t you tell me what’s burning you?” When Axel failed to respond, Xigbar scoffed. “What? Don’t you trust me?”
“Do any of us have the heart to trust anyone?” Axel replied, toneless. His fists clenched again; unbeknownst to the redhead, Xigbar’s eye narrowed pensively. The aching lack in Axel’s empty chest intensified. If he were capable, he’d be blinking back tears.
Xigbar rested his fingers, feather-light, on the small of Axel’s back. “What does that matter? Come on, don’t make me order you.” The sharpshooter smirked as he dragged his fingers up the length of Axel’s spine. “Number Eight.”
Axel shivered. Xigbar’s touch felt pleasant, so unlike the awkward fumblings his Other and Saïx’s had gotten up to… before. “Why do you care?”
“I don’t,” Xigbar admitted, absently running his hand up-and-down Axel’s back, feeling the lithe muscles tense under his fingers. “But then again, neither should you. Or don’t you remember how this thing works?” Axel side-eyed the sharpshooter, who shot him a shit-eating grin. “Last chance, kid. Otherwise, it’ll be an order.”
“Don’t,” Axel growled, squaring up to Xigbar, “call me kid.”
Momentarily taken aback, Xigbar’s grin widened at the slightly-shorter Nobody’s feeble attempt to intimidate him. “Ooh, is that it? Your new big-boy responsibilities, they aren’t… bothering you, are they?”
Axel went still. Xemnas had assigned him his role: Assassin. He was no one, nothing, and yet tasked with picking worlds apart, piece by little piece, until they fell to the darkness. He was the void, consuming but never satisfied… the not-crying sensation returned.
Axel was so lost.
Xigbar pushed forward, one hand still behind his back even as he pressed Axel against a wall. “It’s been, what? Three, four months? Gotta say, you’ve been impressive. Almost like you were made for it, don’t you think?” The older Nobody leaned in, cool lips brushing Axel’s cheek as he whispered in his ear: “I bet you’d enjoy it, if you could.”
Axel shuddered, one gloved hand reaching up to clutch desperately at Xigbar’s shoulder as the other man attacked his neck with lips, tongue, and teeth. The bites stung, sharp sensation reverberating through Axel’s skinny frame to pool in his stomach. His groin. No one had touched him in four years…
He’d been dead for four years.
“I don’t… know anymore,” Axel said, words spilling out unconsciously. “Xigbar, what—”
“Shh.” With unexpected gentleness, Xigbar grabbed Axel’s chin with his free hand to pull him into a wet, heated kiss. When Axel gasped at the foreign sensation, Xigbar took his opportunity to slip his tongue into the stunned man’s mouth. While Axel’s inexperience was obvious, Xigbar wordlessly guided him to let his tongue slide alongside the sharpshooter’s, to delve and trace and lick at one another messily.
It should have… felt like something, but it didn’t. When Isa hitched Lea up against the high wall in Radiant Garden, Lea burned with passion, desire pooling low in his belly. With Xigbar, Axel felt nothing but vague frustration even as his body heated and craved. He was the void, never satisfied and endlessly hungry.
Minutes passed as the pair explored one another with mouths and wandering hands, until Axel ached with aroused need. However, as he tried to move his hips, Xigbar retreated. The sharpshooter held Axel at an arm’s distance, both men panting from the previous minutes’ exertions. Axel licked his lips, and tasted Xigbar: ozone and gunpowder.
“Always leave ‘em wanting,” Xigbar said, smirking. “You’re gonna need to know that, with your role.” The older man pulled back, leaving only his hand on Axel’s cheek. Xigbar’s thumb swept across the purple ink. “You don’t belong to anyone, anymore. Neither of you.” Xigbar let his fingers fall away, taking a step back. “Tomorrow, after your assignment? Come to my room. That’s an order.” With a wave, Xigbar turned his back to Axel, disappearing into a dark corridor.
Axel panted, lips tingling and mind spinning. What just happened? Acting on pure instinct, Axel summoned his own corridor directly into Saïx’s darkened chambers. The noise roused Saïx, who murmured a confused, “What—” even as Axel laid alongside him on the bare mattress.
“—Axel?”
Nodding, Axel pressed his body closer to Saïx’s, face nestled in the crook of the other Nobody’s throat. Tomorrow, Saïx would see the marks Xigbar left behind. Tomorrow, Saïx would remain silent, and the distance between them would grow wider. Tomorrow, Axel would go to Xigbar because nothing makes sense anymore. Tonight, however…
“It’s my birthday, Isa,” Lea whispered, warm lips pressed to where Saïx’s pulse would be. “And I know just the thing you should give me.”