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There was truly a mismatch of rivaling personalities in one space. Radiant Garden was cold, snow threatening but a glow with lights and good spirit. It was still a world that was being rebuilt but so much had been done already and people were feeling remarkably hopeful that they could put that time of darkness behind them and move on.
With Christmas looming only days away, Merlin’s magical house was filled to the brim with occupants that were both permanent and only visiting to share the season like one big family.
The house smelled like cookies and the occupants were bickering, as was their right as being relations tossed together for a holiday.
“Turn the music off.” Vanitas complained, tired of the same twenty songs. He’d been told there were hundreds of Christmas songs but you wouldn’t know it by the freaking radio.
“You’ll have to talk to Sora.” Riku offered, half covered in flour. The other half of the flour was on Sora as he rolled out another batch of cookies.
“Over my dead body.”
“That could be arranged.” Vanitas snarked. He was seated on the couch beside Naminé who was busy doing her best to sketch a picture of Xion sitting across from her holding baby Jessie without Xion finding out until she opened it as a gift on Christmas.
The advantage to her leaning against Vanitas as she sketched was that no one else would try to peek over her shoulder. “That doesn’t sound like holiday spirit.” Naminé hummed.
“Whatever, this is like the third time we’ve heard this song just since Sora started to attempt whatever it is he’s doing.”
“Baking!” Sora called.
“Doesn’t look like baking.” Roxas snickered, rocking Azure as he slowly moved around the dining area in circles. He’d already had his bottle and was sleepy but evidently not sleepy enough to actually fall asleep.
“Bite me.” Sora said pleasantly. “I can cook but what little baking experience i have didn’t involve Christmas cookies. Riku’s sisters never let us help.”
“They’re harpies.” Riku agreed with a hum and pulled out his phone. “The dough is too melty, i’ll call my mom…”
“I still don’t believe she exists!” Yuffie said, walking in with an arm full of decorations that she threw at Lea and Isa. “Okay tall boys, time to put your height to use.”
“Tall boys…” Isa repeated, making both Xion and Roxas snort back a laugh. It had both babies focusing on them oddly trying to figure out the noise.
Lea pushed the garland away. “Woah, we were invited to dinner, not to be put to work.”
Yuffie raised a brow, hand on her hip. “What’s your point?”
“Point is to let the magic house decorate itself. For crying out loud, there’s no more room for that shit.” Cid said, from his spot at the dining table.
“Language!”
“Watch it.”
“Around the babies…”
“If i can’t, you can’t.”
The Strifehart teens all complained, making Cid roll his eyes.
“Cloud and Leon have just gone and corrupted all of you.” Cid huffed, secretly finding it hilarious no matter how much he complained.
The two of them were noticeably absent for the afternoon. Cloud and Squall had excused themselves, signaling silently to their kids before they made a break for it. They so rarely got any time alone together, especially since the twins were born.
Aerith and Tifa were also off for the day, planning a tree lighting ceremony for the following evening. They’d all likely be home for dinner but for the moment, that left only Yuffie and Cid to loiter around all the teens.
The only Strifehart teen missing was Ventus but it was only a matter of time before he showed up with Terra and Aqua. It seemed like they were rarely on time.
“Chop chop.” Yuffie eyed Lea and Isa. “I wasn’t messing around, you know? Hang that stuff up.”
“Where?” Isa deadpanned. Cid had been right, it was already reasonably festive inside the magic house.
“Oh where ever, there are plenty of empty places.” Yuffie sported a grin, gesturing vaguely.
Lea grunted. “I’m starting to get the vibes that you made some kind of bet on… either decorating this place or specifically getting us to help.”
“I would never.” Yuffie responded back without missing a beat.
Still circling the dining table, Roxas snorted. “Okay, now everyone here is also suspicious.” His attention was still on Azure, his little brother sucking on his fingers.
“That’s just rude!” Yuffie complained.
“But probably accurate.” Cid huffed, glancing into the kitchen towards Sora and Riku. “Are any of those things actually done yet.”
Sora made a face. “They’re melty and spread out too much but they taste okay.” Sora poked at one of the cookies from the first batch that he and Riku had been trying to fix.
“Mama said to put the dough in the fridge for a while. Said it’s probably just too hot.” Riku said, looking up from his phone. “Worth a shot.”
“Yeah, okay. Let’s try another batch too.” Sora said, not bothered when Roxas stole a cookie as he walked past them.
“Well either way, the house still smells good from what you’re doing.” Xion said, turning to sit sideways on the couch and completely missing the way Naminé’s face scrunched up from her moving. Jessie was peering around the room but seemed content for the moment to lean against Xion. They gave her only a short amount of time before she realized how long it had been since one of her daddies had held her. She was definitely more vocal compared to her twin.
“Thanks Xion.” Sora chuckled. “We’ll get the hang of this.”
“Baking is difficult.” Isa offered. “Your first batch might just need a little more flour.”
Vanitas snorted, silently patting Naminé’s knee. “When did you become an expert?”
There was a moment when Isa looked fairly embarrassed, but he just shrugged, deciding not to get into it. Lea however, had no such problems.
“His grandma was a baker back in the day. Had a shop here in town and everything.” Lea said. “I remember that woman’s pie like it was yesterday.”
“What?!” Sora yelled. “And you’ve just been watching us struggle!? Get over here, Isa.”
He still wasn’t used to being included, and Xion specifically inviting him was the only real reason he’d come. Even though they lived together in Twilight Town he gave them as much space as possible.
“I dunno what you’re making…” he excused.
“My mom just texted me the recipe to make sure we’re doing it right.” Riku said, using it as an olive branch to include him. “Come see.”
“It’ll get you out of decorating duty.” Lea grumbled and that was all it took for Isa to toss everything Yuffie had thrown at him to the side and get up.
It had been ages since he baked. “Guess it can’t hurt to take a look.”
“It’ll be fun.” Xion encouraged him with a smile, but that sort of thing had become the norm between them. Isa and Lea didn’t return to school the way Roxas and Xion had and at first, both had found themselves restless being outside of the organization.
Xion had been a huge advocate of hobbies and unbeknownst to her brother, had used Vanitas as a great example of occupying his time. He seemed to enjoy his art classes.
Baking was even something they could do at home.
“Guess that leaves you to be tall and hang things up, Lea.” Roxas teased.
Lea tsked. “Didn’t we decide that was a con job?”
“Excuse me? Con job?” Yuffie parroted, “Say that too my face!”
“Okay but you’ll have to stand on the table or something to make eye contact.” Lea’s snark was in fine form. Cid was laughing, slapping the table in amusement as Yuffie scoffed dramatically.
“You’ll pay for that!”
Naminé was the one to clear her throat, sounding remarkably like Aerith. “Isn’t it a little too close to Christmas for all of you to be misbehaving so much?”
“Yeah!” Sora echoed, leaning against the counter while Riku and Isa looked over the recipe to see where they went wrong. “You’ll end up on Santa’s naughty list.”
“Is that a thing?” Xion asked.
“Yep.”
“If you believe in Santa.” Lea rolled his eyes.
“Take your blasphemy out of here!” Sora pointed to the door. “You will not besmirch the name of Santa.”
Lea actually laughed, seeing so much of Roxas and Xion in Sora’s antics. There was no denying where they came from. “I swear. Sometimes i really can’t tell when you’re being serious and when you’re just being a dork.”
“Hey now, that’s not fair.” Roxas grinned slowly. “He’s a dork almost a hundred percent of the time but he’s been known to be serious on occasion.
“I’m being totally serious.” Sora crossed his arms, creating a small puff cloud of flour that disappeared just as quickly. “Why do you think i’m trying to make cookies? We gotta leave Santa cookies on Christmas Eve.”
“C’mon Sora, really? Santa? Santa’s not real.” Lea was shaking his head but didn’t expect Sora to nearly sneer at him.
“That’s what Riku said, and that attitude put me on the naughty list. Never again!”
“So there is a list?” Xion asked, a bit lost.
Lea shook his head. “No.”
“There is!” Sora yelled over him.
“Hey wait…” Vanitas cut in. “Santa? The old man and red you pointed out in Christmas Town?”
Sora brightened. “Yeah! That’s where he lives and works and stuff. You know? You saw his elves too.”
“Sure.” Vanitas said, remembering that day well. He turned his attention to Lea. “So, why don’t you think Santa exists?”
“Because he doesn’t.” Lea puffed out a laugh.
“But i saw him.” Vanitas deadpanned.
Yuffie was giggling at the shift in conversation. “You can believe in Santa if you want to, Van. Santa is like, a legendary figure. A myth.”
That didn’t seem to satisfy him at all. “Myth means not real.”
“You saw a guy that Sora said was Santa.” Lea offered the excuse.
Vanitas clucked his tongue. “Sora. The fat man was Santa?”
“Yeah.” Sora said. “That was the real deal.”
With a nod, Vanitas narrowed his eyes at Lea. “So why don’t you believe in Santa?”
"Believe!" Sora threw his arms up dramatically.
“This got weird.” Roxas snorted, finally taking a seat at the dining table. He was sick to death of walking in circles and Azure seemed more or less chill.
Lea grunted his agreement. “Just because Sora says he’s real, doesn’t exactly mean he is.”
At that, Vanitas scoffed openly. “Sora can’t lie for shit. Especially not to me. If he said that guy we saw was Santa, then he is.”
“I dunno if this helps or not, but i definitely also got an earful for telling Sora Santa wasn’t real when we were little and getting him put on the naughty list along side me. I haven’t seen him, but it’s not the weirdest adventure Sora’s had so…” Riku just shrugged, but he was willing to believe Sora either way.
“Another one.”
Naminé shut her sketchbook. “Why don’t you just go to Christmas Town and see for yourself.”
“Oh! That’s a good idea.” Sora said. “It’ll have to wait for the new year though. It’s like.. Santa’s busy season right now.”
“So, why leave cookies?” Roxas asked, only half paying attention.
“Mama said it was a tradition once to offer snacks to travelers.” Riku said, helping Isa measure out more ingredients. “I’m not sure how that turned into milk and cookies but it evolved somehow.”
“Plus, i’m sure Santa appreciates the kindness.” Sora offered.
“If he were real.” Lea added.
Sora glared and cut an oddly threatening look in Lea’s direction. “If i get put on the naughty list again for telling you to shut the fuck up, i’m gonna be pissed.”
"Language." Naminé reminded him.
"Sorry..."
“Sounds like we’re heading to Christmas Town in the next couple weeks.” Roxas mused, tossing Vanitas a look. “Christmas Town, right? You really saw elves?”
“Pointy ears and everything. Looking at my Unversed like something got loose from Halloween Town and they weren’t sure how they felt about it.” Vanitas said with a nod, casually slinging an arm around Naminé’s shoulders.
“You know what, cool.” Roxas grinned.
“What do you think, Isa?” Xion turned enough to look at him, bouncing Jessie in her arms. “Are you a Santa nay sayer?”
Isa shrugged. “I don’t really have an opinion. I agree with Vanitas though, Sora is a terrible liar so if he says so… Could be true.”
“Traitor.” Lea grumbled.
Sora made a face at Lea before turning back to watch what Isa was doing with their cookie dough. “You’re totally getting coal.”
“Dunno how you kids don’t drive your parents to drink.” Cid commented dryly from where he’d watched the entire fight unfold and wrap up just as quickly.
Vanitas snorted. “Are you saying we don’t?” Cloud currently couldn’t because he was still feeding the twins but many of them had spied Squall sneaking shots when no one was looking. The holidays were a stressful time.
“They also just leave for a while and hang out.” Roxas said, jumping when Azure let out a yell. “Hey…” He draped his brother against his shoulder and patted his back. “It’s okay…”
“Like now.” Sora added. “It’s nice to give them an impromptu date day.”
“What?!” Yuffie’s voice shrieked and she looked around the room as if just realizing that both men weren’t present. “A date!? They’re on a date right now? Around town!?”
“Probably.” Xion said slowly, wincing when Jessie also started to cry as if needing to answer her brother. “I don’t think they’d world hop without the twins... It's fine, Jess. No tears...”
“And they didn’t tell me!” Yuffie looked mildly offended.
With a chuckle, Cid spun a cigarette around in his fingers but he didn’t dare light it in the house around the babies. “Course not. Why would they want you crashing their limited alone time, brat?”
Yuffie dug into her pocket and pulled out a sprig of mistletoe. “Opportunity!” She stomped once and just like that, was all but flying from the house. “I’ll find them!”
The silence that followed was almost funny, but Lea finally tossing all the garland aside had most of the teens laughing.
“Guess i’m not hanging all that up after all.”
"First you don't believe in Santa. Then you don't decorate." Sora made a face. "What a Grinch."
Lea made a thoughtful sort of wound. "Is he real too?"
Sora just stared, eye twitching in realization that he didn't know. "I'll have to ask Santa, or Jack. Jack might know."
"So this is up for debate?" Roxas grinned, knowing he was starting the arguments over again.
"Yes!"
"Nope."
Cid got to his feet and headed for the door, leaving the teens to bicker and change diapers. He'd go outside for a smoke and wait for adults to get home before dating to go back inside again. Hopefully by the time he did, there'd be cookies actually finished and decorations off the floor.