[KH] Christmas at the Castle, chapter 8

Christmas at the Castle, a Kingdom Hearts fanfic by Raberba girl

Chapter 8 - ...FIVE - BALLS - OF - FIRE!

Roxas twirled his ice cream stick and sighed.  "I just need to find presents for you guys and Saïx now, but I have no idea what to get him.  Axel, you know him better than me, what do you think I should give him?"

"I don't know, man...the guy deserves a box of coal for working us so hard this year," Axel grumbled.

"I heard that you two grew up together," Xion said.  "Did you ever get him a Christmas present in the past?"

Axel frowned.  "Someone's been telling you too much."

"What kinds of things did he used to like back then?" Roxas asked curiously.

"Ah, it doesn't matter, he's a different person now."  Axel's discontent expression suddenly turned into a grin.  "...He's a werewolf, you know.  He turns into a big ugly dog every full moon.  You should get him a chew toy or something."

Xion gasped.  "Saïx is a werewolf?!"

"Yeah, we've all known it for years."

"Oh my gosh!"  Xion's hands were over her mouth, her eyes huge.  "I can't believe it!"

Axel looked at her more closely.  "Xion...you do realize I'm kidding, right?"

She stared at him.  "What?"

"Saïx is not a freaking werewolf.  It was a joke."

"...Oh."

o.o.o.o.o

After dinner, Roxas screwed up his courage, went to stand in front of Saïx's room, drew in a deep breath, then knocked on the portal.

A Berserker came out.  It looked at him for a minute with its non-face.  Just when Roxas lost his nerve and decided to make a run for it, the Berserker lifted its dangling arm and seized him around the neck, the heavy claymore dragging them both inside.

Saïx was working at his desk, the lamp throwing his facial scar into sharp relief.  As his servant and its prisoner entered, he put down the pen, swiveled around in his seat, and studied the boy for a long, disapproving moment.  "What do you want?"

"Can you call him off?" Roxas asked, finding it hard to breathe as he gestured at the Nobody who had him in a chokehold.

Saïx nodded, probably issuing a silent command, and the Berserker stumbled off.  Roxas got to his feet, rubbing at his sore throat.

"Is there a particular reason you are disturbing me at this hour?"

"Well...yeah.  I...wanted to ask...if...."

Saïx raised an eyebrow.

Roxas took in another deep breath.  "What's your homeworld?" he blurted out.

"Pardon?"

"You...you and Axel are from the same world, right?  I wanted to know where it is...."

"That is no business of yours, and if Axel did not tell you, I see no reason why I should."

Roxas sighed.  "Never mind.  I'm gonna go to bed.  So that I'm all rested up for tomorrow's super-fun mission," he could not help adding, a little resentfully.  "I'll probably just give Axel a Bronze or something for Christmas...."  He turned around and walked out.

Saïx watched him go, then simply sat frowning at his desktop for a long time.

o.o.o.o.o

The next morning ("Give me an Elixir"), Roxas went to the Grey Area and was very surprised upon receiving his assignment.

"I will be your partner today.  Stay out of the way until I've gotten everyone else packed off."

Roxas sat on one of the couches and fiddled with his deck.  'There's never enough Slot Releasers,' he thought ruefully.

Xion arrived and came over to join him. "Good morning, Roxas."

"Hi, Xion."

"Are you working solo today?"

"No.  I'm paired with, um, Saïx."

Xion's eyes widened.  "You're working with Saïx?"

Roxas sighed.  "Yeah."

She put her arm around his shoulders.  "I'm sure it will be okay."

"Yeah."

"He can't be that bad, if Axel used to be friends with him."

"Yeah."

"I'll buy you an extra ice cream when you get back, okay?"

"Okay."

Xion squeezed him in a comforting hug, then got up to get her mission assignment, wishing she could do more to cheer him up.

When everyone else had departed, Saïx sighed, put his clipboard into his backpack, and opened a dark corridor.  "Let's go."

"Okay."

They arrived at a world Roxas had never seen before, though he had an odd sense of déjà vu as he looked around.  Maybe the boy in red had been here.  "What's this world called?" Roxas asked.

"Ra--  That is, they call it Hollow Bastion now."  Saïx started walking.

"You never gave me a mission brief.  Are we doing heart collection, or looking for a specific Heartless, or what?"

"All my jobs are recon."

"...Oh."  'Jerk.'

Saïx frowned as if he could read Roxas's mind.  "It's not quite the usual recon.  My role in the Organization is to monitor Heartless activity in all the known worlds, and arrange missions for the other members based on their suitability to handle the workload.  It is more difficult than it sounds."

'Yeah.  Sure.'

"Since I have a Keyblade wielder today, I expect you to collect hearts as we go, but there is no specific goal to aim for.  Follow my lead, and don't fall behind."

They trekked through what seemed to be an entire mountain range, taking out any small Heartless who dared show their faces.  As for the bigger ones....

"Roxas!  What are you doing?  Get out of there!"  Saïx grabbed Roxas's arm and corridored him over to the next valley, just as a Clay Armor nearly squashed him.

"Huh?  But that was a Heartless!  I have to exterminate it."

"I told you to follow my lead.  You are not to battle any tough Heartless today, it will take too long to defeat them.  We have far too much ground left to cover, and we're running out of time."  Saïx took out his clipboard and scribbled something on it.  "Clay Armor in Hollow Bastion," he muttered to himself, "send XIV after it tomorrow...."

"What do you mean, we're running out of time?  It's not even noon yet."

Saïx briefly closed his eyes, which seemed to be the Saïx-equivalent of rolling them.  "The earliest anyone has ever returned from a mission is 2:30 p.m.  I have to be back by then, but before that, we've got to finish combing the mountain path, I.D. any noteworthy Heartless, record the locations of every single blasted treasure chest, plant badges, set up barricades, capture a specimen of any new Heartless breed so that Vexen can run an analysis on it, coordinate a suitable return corridor location, and investigate the town without anyone seeing us.  All by 2:30.  That's not even counting the tasks that can be done at home, such as deciding on suitable mission rewards, processing mission reports for the entire Organization, and determining an appropriate workload for a reasonable mission, as well as who should be offered the assignment and whether or not they should be allowed a partner.  Some days, I don't even get a chance to eat."  He suddenly blinked and stopped speaking.

"Oh."  Roxas fidgeted uncomfortably.  "I guess it is harder than it sounds.  I didn't realize how much work went into organizing mission stuff."

"Hmph."

The work seemed to get harder from then on, so that Roxas was exhausted by lunch time.  He was grateful to be allowed to sit down on a crumbling set of steps that led to a pile of rubble, shaded by a small tree that had grown out of a blackened stump, and eat the sandwiches he had packed.

They did not speak for a while.  Roxas looked out at the silent, devastated neighborhood, a debris-riddled street lined with shattered and half-overgrown dwellings.  Saïx sat nearby, nibbling absently on his own sandwich as he worked on a complicated-looking diagram, occasionally scratching things out and making frustrated sounds.

"This place feels...sad," Roxas mused, not really expecting his companion to answer him.  "I wonder who used to live here."

"Axel did."

"Huh?"  Roxas looked at him, startled.

Saïx glanced up briefly.  "This used to be Axel's house, back when he was a teenager.  You're sitting on the porch steps."  He pointed with his pen.  "Mine was across the street, three houses down."

"Whaaaat?!"

Saïx went back to his clipboard, seeming to have lost interest, but Roxas was fascinated.  He got up and began combing through the debris of the house behind them.  Amidst the rubble were some easily identifiable items:  a spoon, a broken mug handle, a doll's arm, a ruined video game cartridge, half a book with singed pages, an earring, a bike helmet, a tube of gooey lip gloss....  Roxas picked up a Frisbee, dirty and cracked along the edge, but with a picture of a Bomb monster still discernible on the front.  "This kind of looks like one of Axel's chakrams," he called to Saïx.

"I don't really care," was the preoccupied response.

Roxas shifted, and heard a high-pitched crunch.  Looking down, he found that he had accidentally stepped on and crushed a picture frame.  The photo caught his attention - he picked it up carefully, shaking it free of glass dust, and examined its subjects.  There was a tall, dark-skinned man.  A woman with blonde hair and a smile just like Axel's.  Two little girls.  And...a spiky-haired boy, about Roxas's age, smiling into the camera with bright, innocent green eyes that showed not a trace of the world-weariness they now carried in the present day.  "Axel," Roxas whispered.

"Roxas, we need to get going," Saïx called.

"I'll be right there."  Roxas carefully slipped the Frisbee and the photograph into his backpack, then followed the older Nobody as they resumed work.

They did not, in fact, get to finish everything.  At 2:28, Saïx opened a corridor of darkness back to the castle, grumbling that Roxas had slowed him down and he would have to put in overtime that night to catch up.  Back in the Grey Area, he took up his usual post at the head of the room and waited for everyone to check in.

Roxas, after being informed that he obviously did not have to fill out a mission report this time, hid Axel's presents in his room and then opened a dark corridor.  He felt bad about skipping ice cream with Axel and Xion, but if he hung out with them, he would not have enough time to finish his Christmas shopping before it got dark.

He had meant to go to Neverland, but the beach he ended up on was unfamiliar.  At least...he knew he had never been here before, but the déjà vu was stronger than ever.  'White sands...a blue sky...the shining sea...I know this place.  Somehow, I know this place.  It feels like Home.'

He wandered around for a while, soon realizing that this world had seashells that were just as good as, perhaps even better than, the ones in Neverland.  He trekked along the shore, picking up all the pretty shells he saw and dropping them into a small pocket of his backpack.  The terrain was far from ideal for his shoes, and the sun beat down on his black-clad shoulders, so that he was soon soaked with sweat.  'Just a few more....'  His gloves were soggy and covered with wet sand, his coat flecked with it.  'Man, I'm a mess.'

He reached a wooden bridge that had some trees growing nearby.  Clusters of yellow fruit were visible, high in the branches.  Roxas was parched, and he knew from one of Axel's lectures in Neverland that seawater was not fit to drink.  He ended up climbing one of the trees (a much easier task after he had ditched his shoes and gloves), having the strangest feeling that he had done this many times before.  He grasped one of the star-shaped fruits, got back to the ground, and bit into it.  "Ohhh...."

It was delicious.  'This is so good.  I...want to eat this with...someone.'  By the time he finished it, he had decided that he would come back later and pick some fresh ones for Xion and Axel.  'But...there's someone else I really want to give one to...who is it?'

Before leaving, he got up as high as he could and Glided around the beach, wanting to familiarize himself with this place in case he was ever sent here on a mission.  In the distance, he spotted more land, much bigger than the deserted little island he had been collecting shells on.  The land in the distance seemed to be populated - there were buildings and streets, and he could almost make out the figures of people moving about.

Roxas Glided towards the mainland.  He had to swim the last part of it, since the distance was a bit much for the wind to carry him the whole way.  There were people lounging and playing on the beach who looked at him as he came slogging out of the waves.  His coat was sopping wet, so he took it off and slung it over one arm to carry.  His pants and tank top were soaked, too, but at least they would dry faster without the coat over them, and he would not have to put up with heavy waterlogged fabric slapping around his legs at every step.

A nice lady offered him a towel, and he gratefully dried his hair and arms.  "Thank you.  Um...do you know where I can find a chew toy?  Like, for dogs?"

"Why, certainly, sweetie.  The pet shop's on Seagull Street over there, that blue building between the library and the ice cream shop."

"Okay.  Thanks."  Roxas handed back the towel, hefted his seashell-laden backpack over his shoulders, and marched off eagerly to purchase his very last Christmas present.

o.o.o.o.o

Some time later, Roxas was heading for the clock tower when a dark corridor appeared in front of him, and Xigbar came through it.  "Found you," the Freeshooter said in satisfaction.  "I knew you three always crept off to Twilight Town every day."

"Um...did you need something?  Because I have to go meet Axel and Xion, so...."

Xigbar waved his hand dismissively.  "Ah, you can live without ice cream for one day.  Come on, we've got work to do."

"But--"

"No buts!  Listen to your sempai!"  Xigbar grabbed his arm and hauled him into the corridor.

They emerged in Twilight's View, where a very strange scene had been set up:  two Dancers and a Sniper were sitting at a little table, two of them dressed in ragged clothes and the third in a threadbare dress and a yellow wig that was shaped almost exactly like Larxene's usual hairstyle.  A tiny lopsided Christmas tree was set off to one side, while a pot full of something boiling was hanging over a little pile of burning kindling.

"Won't Saïx get mad at you for starting a fire in the castle?" Roxas asked, remembering the numerous times Axel had gotten in trouble for just such a thing.

"Ah, we'll clean it up before he notices," Xigbar said dismissively.  He dug out a long-sleeved shirt, a pair of pants, a floppy hat, and a scarf, and shot holes in all of them.  Then he pushed the ensemble toward Roxas.  "Here, put these on."

"Why?"

"Because Xion's coming any minute now, and if you dawdle, she'll see you in your underwear."

Roxas ripped off his coat and scrambled into the holey outfit, feeling ridiculous.  He had just swung the scarf around his neck when Xion and Demyx showed up via another corridor.

"I caught her!" Demyx announced triumphantly, raising the confused-looking Xion's arm and waving it around like a trophy.

"Excellent," Xigbar said happily.  "Poppet, just hang out over there for now, we'll call you when we need you.  Demyx, to your post!"

Demyx sat down at the little table and twiddled his thumbs expectantly.

"Now, Roxas," Xigbar instructed, handing him a stick and a piece of paper, "go to the top of the stairs.  When I tell you to, hobble down the steps as if it's hard to walk, and make sure you lean on the crutch.  Your lines are on the paper."

"What?  Why do I have to pretend it's hard to walk?"

"Well," Xigbar mused, "I could break your leg so that you won't have to go to the trouble of pretending...."

"No, no," Roxas said quickly, "I can hobble."

o.o.o.o.o

"Axel, who's God?"

Axel nearly choked on his ice cream.

"Because yesterday Xigbar made me ask God to bless everyone, so I wanted to make sure that wasn't a bad thing...."

"X-Xigbar did what?" Axel said weakly.

"You do know who God is, right?" Roxas asked apprehensively.

"Buddy, I am the wrong, WRONG person to be answering that...WTF, Xigbar!"

"What does W.T.F. stand for?" Xion asked.

Axel facepalmed.  "Note to self, never adopt kids ever again," he muttered.

"What does 'adopt' mean?"

"Gah!  You guys are doing this on purpose, aren't you!"

To be continued....

Author's Notes:  Saïx's job?  THAT'S WHAT TEACHING'S LIKE.  Thankless, harder than it sounds, and the work never, ever, ever ends.  On the up side, it was really wonderful when Saïx suddenly decided that he's comfortable enough with me to reveal that we have something like that in common.  I can finally relate to him!   I love him now on his own terms, not just because of Isa or his relationship with Axel.

I realized that I've been writing this fic as if the dark corridors are like teleportation, but the manga and certain bits of canon have made me think that it's probably an actual corridor they walk through, that it's not instantaneous.  (...Sometimes.  'Cause other times it really does look like teleportation. o.O)

I'm pretty sure it was Kairi whom Roxas felt like sharing a paopu with, since he was flashbacking to Sora so much.

A "sempai" (or "senpai") is someone who's higher in rank than you, like a high school senior when you're a freshman, or someone at the company you work at whose position is higher than yours.