[KH] Battle Stance: Sweetstack (theme 44)

Battle Stance, a Kingdom Hearts fanfic series by Raberba girl for RoseOfADifferentColor's Armory Challenge

Sweetstack (theme 44) [rough draft]

Summary: Post-canon, the BBS trio and Kazé (Vanitas) celebrate Valentine's Day.

o.o.o

Kazé was not a morning person.  The idiot should have already figured it out, the way Ven always rose with the sun and often conked out right after dinner, and the way Kazé might sleep well into the afternoon but could then function in top form all night.

But noooo.  Master Needs A Punch In The Face Eraqus always insisted on dragging Kazé out of bed at the crack of dawn with the rest of them, even when Kazé was so out of it that he could never remember what he was fed for breakfast or how exactly he'd gotten to wherever they were training that day.  Kazé was this close to kidnapping Ven and escaping to Destiny Islands, or Dwarf Woodlands - or anywhere, really, where he'd get to sleep in.  Today. He'd do it today, probably.  ...Later, when he was conscious.

Sweet.  Sooo sweet, his mouth full of it.... Just as Ven had gotten addicted to salty foods after their split, as if questing for a hint of what he'd lost, Kazé could never get enough sweets to fill the figurative hole in his chest.  He blinked up at the ceiling, noticing it for the first time.  As well as the face smiling at him.

"Nnh...?"  He knew her.  He just couldn't remember her name.  Too sleepy.

"Happy Valentine's Day, love."  She stooped down lower and kissed his forehead.

"A...qua...?"

"I'll leave the rest here on the table," she said.

'Rest of what?  Who?  What is in my mouth?  I want more!'

He woke up again encased in ice.  A stab of fury shot through him, since he knew it was Eraqus trying to wake him up; but his second thought was that he still had the lingering aftertaste of whatever Aqua had put in his mouth earlier, and he almost, almost, almost remembered what it was.

"For the last time, Kazé!  Out of bed!"

"Goonedogerdai," Kazé said.  He'd meant to say "You never told me the first time!" but was still half-asleep and couldn't remember how to make words sound coherent.

A Keyblade slammed on top of the ice block, shattering it, and causing a fair bit of pain as well.

'I'm going to kill you today,' Kazé fumed.

"Get UP."

Kazé would have struck out at him if he hadn't known that Eraqus would not hesitate to beat him to a pulp.  The man had tolerated him ever since the other three apprentices had dragged him to the Land of Departure and requested that he become their companion, but there was still no love lost between Master Eraqus and the young man who'd once been known as Vanitas.  "Aqua," was all Kazé managed to say aloud.

"She's been out training for two hours.  For the last time, Kazé, get up."

Kazé rolled over onto the floor.  He struggled artfully until Eraqus went away, then he went still again without ever actually getting up.  'My head hurts....'

He was just about to fall asleep again when he remembered.  Sweet.  There was more.  Wasn't there?  Table, Aqua had said.  On the table.

Kazé rolled onto his back and then gazed at the top of the bedside table above him.  Soooo far.  He couldn't get up.  He just wanted to lie here until the sun set, and maybe, at some point, Aqua would be very kind and merciful and would get whatever it was and feed him some more of it before then.

'Chocolate!!!' he finally remembered.  'There is freaking chocolate up there!'  An idea occurred to him.  "Gravity!"

The pink and red basket lifted into the air.  It drifted for a minute, spinning around and around slowly.  Then the spell wore off, and the basket and its contents dropped back down, the basket bouncing off Kazé's chest and the chocolates scattering on top of and around him like edible hail.

"Heh."  Vanitas picked up the closest one and popped it into his mouth.  He closed his eyes and savored it.  'Chooooocolaaaaaate...soooooo sweet...and good...like Ven.  ...I need Ven.  NOW.'

Sugar rushes always made him want his light half more than usual.  Kazé fought to get to his feet, staggered out of the room without bothering to change out of his pajamas, then paused in the hallway and wondered where to go.  Usually, someone would drag him around and he'd regain full consciousness on the training field, but apparently he'd been left behind today.  "Veeeeen," he whined.  He finally dropped his Keyblade to the ground, silently ordering it to transform into something that looked like an armored boat, then lay in it lethargically as he piloted it out of the castle and around the countryside.  "Veeeeen...Aquaaaaa...Terraaaaa...."

There they were, training together on the mountaintop.  Kazé steered the Glider downwards and let it shift back into a Keyblade so he could collapse on the grass.  Then he just lay there, still too tired to get up.

"Kazé!"  They gathered around him, Aqua kneeling gracefully, Ven crouching on his other side, Terra peering down at him.

"Sweet," Kazé said plaintively.

"Did you like your Valentine chocolate?" Aqua asked with a smile.

"What the heck is Valentine," Kazé mumbled.  He finally found Ven's hand and held it, and felt a little better.

"It's a holiday," Terra explained.  "The way it's done here, girls give guys chocolate every year on February 14th.  Aqua made some for all of us."

"I left the rest in my room," Kazé realized.  "Aaaarrrgghhh." He was too tired to get back on the Glider and go back for more.  "I hate mornings.  Hate hate hate hate hate."

"Poor baby," Aqua said, affectionately stroking his bangs away from his forehead.

"Not a baby," Kazé mumbled.

"I wish I could like normal chocolate again," Ven said wistfully.  "It was really good, wasn't it."

"I wanna sleeeeep."  Kazé remembered.  "Ven.  When I'm awake.  We're going.  Woodlands."

"Huh?"

The trio soon went back to training, and Kazé lay in the warm sun until the fatigue started to clear from his mind and he was able to get up.  He summoned his Keyblade to his hand and examined it for a moment.  Then he looked back up, grinning, and rushed in to attack Terra when the man wasn't expecting it.

"Aaahh!"

"HA HA!  Got you!"

"Not fair, Van!" Ven yelled, rushing to Terra's defense.

"Guess it's you and me, then," Aqua said with a twinkle in her eye, landing at Kazé's side.  He grinned at her, and the rest of the morning was spent in an exhilarating two-against-two battle.

They ate lunch on the mountaintop, too, and Kazé took the opportunity to fetch the rest of his Valentine treats.  He ate them one by one, unable to stop himself from making appreciative noises and exclamations.

"I'm glad you like it," Aqua said, ruffling his hair.

"I didn't know you could make salty chocolate," Ven said, equally happy as he worked his way through his own Valentine basket. Terra, savoring his own chocolate gifts, had his eyes closed in bliss.

"I had to improvise a bit, but yes," Aqua said. "I wonder if anyone else will like them, though...."

Almost a month later, Ven pulled Kazé aside after dinner and asked in a murmur, "Have you figured out what you're going to give Aqua yet?"

"Huh?"

"You know, for White Day."

Kazé stared at him pointedly until it finally dawned on Ven that his other half had no idea what White Day was.

"March 14th. You know how girls give boys chocolate on Valentine's Day? White Day is the opposite. We have to pay her back, you know."

Kazé felt rather betrayed that the chocolate had not been a free gift after all.

"I mean, it doesn't have to be chocolate, but we have to give her something."

"What if I don't want to?" Kazé challenged.

"Well, sure, feel free to be a jerk - but come on, Kazé, it's Aqua. I know you want to make her happy."

"She wouldn't have given me candy if the holiday hadn't made her," Kazé mumbled.

Ven gently touched his fist to the side of his brother's head. "Hey. She didn't have to give you chocolate on Valentine's Day. She included you because she loves you just as much as she loves the rest of us."

Kazé thought about this for a while, and felt a little better, though he did still grumble, "She'd better love me more than Eraqus."

"Come on, Kazé, focus. What do we do for her White Day gift?"

Neither of them could think of anything original, so they decided to just give Aqua chocolate. Ven said that it ought to be handmade and looked up a recipe, then they had to wait until Aqua would be out for a while so they could use the kitchen without her knowing.

"Kazé! Stop eating the chocolate, it's for Aqua!"

"She won't notice if just a little bit goes missing!"

"That was more than a little bit!" Ven pulled the rest of it away from Kazé, did his best to keep cutting the chocolate into even pieces, went to go look for something to drizzle over them, and came back to find even more missing. "STOP EATING THEM."

Kazé's mouth was so full that his protest was unintelligible.

By the end of it all, Ven stared down at the three small squares of chocolate that were left and said, "This is not enough. You idiot, we can't give this puny amount to Aqua!"

"They were really good," Kazé grumbled. "Not as good as hers, but...really good."

Ven slapped him upside the head, prompting a Keyblade fight in the kitchen that destroyed the pitiful remainder of their gift.

Kazé went to bed that night angry at his brother but much angrier at himself. He apparently had no self-control when it came to sweets, and now that the taste in his mouth was gone, all that was left was the bitterness of realizing that he didn't love Aqua as much as she loved him, that he couldn't resist temptation for just one day.

He lay in bed, watching Unversed ooze out of him in response to his dark thoughts. 'How come I can never make happy Unversed?' he thought resentfully.

Well...that wasn't quite true. He did have a few happy ones.

'Aqua...I care about her...I want to do something nice for her....' After some concentration, he finally managed to produce some Prize Pods. He took hold of one and hugged it to his chest like a stuffed animal. 'If I can just....'

o.o.o.o.o

The next day, Aqua came into the kitchen around noon to find the twins hard at work. "What are you boys up to?"

"Get out, get out!" Kazé yelled. "It's not ready yet!"

"We'll show you when it's done, Aqua," Ven said quickly, pushing her back out the door.

"Hmmm," she said with a smile, "well, then, do you mind making me some lunch while you're at it?"

"Yeah, we'll do that, just don't come in until we say you can!"

Aqua was out training with Terra by the time the younger boys finally showed up with an ice chest and beaming smiles. Aqua smiled back and lowered her Keyblade, which had taken the form of the Keychain Terra had given her for White Day. "What's up, you two?"

"We have something for you, Aqua~"

"We made it."

She dismissed her Keyblade so she could pat them both on the head. "Good job!"

"You don't even know what it is yet, you don't know if we did a good job or not!" Kazé protested.

"It's the thought that counts."

"Don't talk like it sucks when you haven't even tried it, either!"

The twins' gift turned out to be ice cream, a new flavor that they had concocted out of the ingredients from Kazé's Prize Pods.

"Oh, my goodness!" Aqua exclaimed after taking the first bite. "This is really good!"

"Don't sound so surprised!"

The four of them spent the next hour or so very pleasantly, working their way through the batch of ice cream as they talked and laughed together. Kazé looked around at them, cradling his share of the treat in his hands and thinking that a year ago, he would have never dreamed that he'd experience such a warm feeling in his chest. He felt like he belonged with these people, that they truly wanted him here and enjoyed his company, and such a feeling was not something he took for granted.

o.o.o

Author's Notes: Though I wrote most of this more than three years ago (it was meant to be for Valentine's Day 2014), the solution with the ice cream might have been subconsciously influenced by Taliax's Cast a Shadow (I read the ninth chapter last night, where Aqua introduces ice cream to Vanitas, who produces Prize Pods to make more because they have nothing else to eat).

I've been going through old files, looking at partial drafts that I want to finish up and get posted.