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Disclaimer: Can’t I just buy the rights to Kingdom Hearts? Really! How much can they cost?!
Author’s Notes: /Blinks/ I am not quite sure that review marker is correct. I do, however, know well enough not to question a good thing, so I’ll leave it be and hope that the wonderful feedback continues. Well, anyway. I just realized that I have a month left of summer vacation. This sent me into near-hysterics were I contemplated super-super-gluing myself to the hardwood floor, tying myself to the bed, and running off to Canada. Upon deciding that none of these were viable solutions, I instead sat in front of my laptop and began typing the latest chapter of View.SGW is on the way, but with the way the latest chapter is going, all I can promise is that there will be an update before I go back to college. Please forgive Dual her ineptitude. Well, much love, and I do hope you enjoy!
Warnings: Crack. The KH crew as Greek gods, and the bastardization of some relationships found therein. Yaoi, het, and Demyx as Persephone (which deserves its own warning, as far as I’m concerned). And about a thousand different anachronisms.
Dedications: To ShadowAili, for whom this fic is written. To all of my readers, and especially those who review. And to Sorceress Fantasia, whom I have ever intention of throwing myself into the raging sea for, should she should ever require it. Like, for seriously. I was not aware that I possessed the capability to gurgle up until I read Coffee, as I shall hereafter affectionately call The Fic That Killed Me Dead Out Of Sheer Glee. I think I spoke in nothing but consonants for about five minutes. It was that wonderful.
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Chapter Two: In Which Marluxia Confronts Xemnas
If there was one thing Marluxia - Mother Earth, Wielder of Scythes, and Horticulturalist Extraordinaire - prided himself on, it was being all-knowing. Omniscient, as it were. At least in regards to the planet he liked to call his own, and particularly in regards to his family - including, but not limited to, and in no particular order (though Demyx would contest this) the birds, the bees, the squirrels, and his little darling boy (who, of course, has never been referred to as such by either mother or father - both parents being of the psychopathic sort and too busy luxuriating in the pleasures of the flesh to pay their little boy any heed).
The point was, Marluxia liked to consider himself omniscient in all matters concerning his house and home, i.e. the world. The planet Earth had been given to him by Xemnas, the bastard, and Marluxia held it covetously. He studied its intricacies, learned its secrets, formed friendships with plants and animals, held sway over the weather and seasons, and reigned supreme over the world in all its wonder. It was his, and - if nothing else - Marluxia protected what was his. Or at the very least, he hid it away where no one would ever be able to take it from him.
(This, in fact, is precisely what he’d done with his son, but that is of little bearing to present events, and shall most likely not again be mentioned - excepting, of course, that a flashback be necessary, in which case said explanation will most likely be alluded to and elucidated in great detail.)
This bit of character study shows us two things. Firstly: Marluxia is a cocky sunuvabitch with a superiority complex the size of Pluto, who believes that he knows everything about everything, and who, quite frankly, hates Xemnas. Secondly: Superiority complex or not, Marluxia does know everything about everything - assuming, of course, that this ‘everything,’ deals with the earth, in which case he is god and all mortals must bow to his pwnage of all matters concerning planetary aptitude.
Which is all a very long and convoluted way of saying that, when Zexion bludgeoned Demyx on the shores of the lake in Enna, abducting the poor boy on a misguided whim - which was not so much misguided as it was forced, Zexion just having been confused for a squirrel and hit with a love arrow - and stealing him away into the depths of the Underworld, Marluxia felt it. Oh, he didn’t quite know what exactly had happened, had no idea that his only son had been all-but-beaten up and kidnapped, but he knew that something was wrong. He could feel the earth screaming, could hear the flowers shrieking, and Marluxia took heed of their voices and opened up a portal of darkness that led him to their origin.
The lake was calm. Freakishly so, considering it was four p.m. on a Sunday and Demyx should have been swimming laps at the moment, as per his training regime (as decided by Vexen, who served as the kid’s coach for the upcoming summer Olympics). Marluxia frowned, striding forward to the water’s edge. The very dirt beneath his feet was sliding, moving underneath him, easing his passage and speeding his footsteps. Behind him, the trees were groaning laments, blades of grass shuddering in pain. He felt a sympathetic jolt flash up his spine, and he knelt by the lake.
This was his son’s spot. Demyx’s retreat. The boy had always loved water, had always wielded a strange sort of power over it. He’d been able to call down rain since childhood. If Marluxia were the paternal sort, he’d almost be proud of him.
“Boy!” he called, glaring down into the opaque liquid, ignoring the groans and moans behind him. “Come here!”
Silence. He grit his teeth, fighting down the sudden swelling of discomfort in his gut. “Child,” he cried. He frowned, dipping a hand into the water and closing his eyes, listening. Every living creature in the pool was yelling in wild discord, shrieking at him, begging to be heard. He withdrew his hand quickly, climbing to his feet.
“Demyx!” he shouted.
Nothing.
Fisting his hands against the unexpected flash of irritation mixed with worry that swept through his chest, he strode over to the forest line, casting haughty eyes over the plants and animals there.
“What happened?” he asked silkily, jaw tense. “Where is my son?”
As one, flora and fauna raised their voices in a symphony of agony. “Gone! Gone, your son is gone! Demyx is gone!”
“Where?!”
“Gone!” the woods wailed, offering no explanation. “Gone!”
Marluxia shouted in frustration, turning in a circle to glare at the circle of trees surrounding the calm lagoon. The place in his chest where mortals wore their hearts was seizing, contracting strangely. Pain and anger and righteous, jealous fury. “Who has taken him? Who has taken my son!?”
The woods grew silent. Then, slowly, murmurs began arising, hardening into incoherent shrieks, wordless wails.
“Tell me!” Marluxia screamed.
Stillness. Whispers. And then finally, a name: “Zexion!”
Marluxia stilled. “Zexion?”
“Yes!”
“Hades!”
“Your child is gone!”
“Demyx is gone!”
Marluxia stood there, facing a line of trees surrounding the huge lake in Enna, looking for all the world like a complete and utter psycho - because as we all know, people who talk to trees are Not All There, and should be given strait jackets and sent to live in rooms with padded walls so they will not do themselves an injustice - and blinked.
“Well,” he said, voice almost awed. “The bastard’s finally trying to get laid. Good for him.”
And then another blink. “With my child.”
A frown. “My underage child.”
A glower. “My underage male child.”
He blinked once more, and every flower within a twenty meter radius spontaneously combusted.
“That homosexual son of a bitch.”
“Cloud,” Zexion said, the calm in his voice belied by the way his left eye had developed a quite unattractive tic. The spike-haired blond flinched. “I thought you told me that Marluxia had a daughter.”
“Err, no,” Cloud murmured, shaking his head slowly and averting his gaze towards the river. “I didn’t.”
Zexion’s eyes narrowed, and he irritably batted Demyx’s hands away, shoving him a few steps back. “You’re trying my patience.”
“But, uh, sir,” Leon mumbled, shoving his hands into his robe’s pockets. “He really didn’t. If you’ll notice, Cloud used ambiguous pronouns all through his descriptions. Neither one of us ever used the words ‘she,’ or ‘her.’ You’re the one who decided that Lord Demyx,” and here he aimed a curt nod at the boy in question, “Was a woman.”
Zexion opened his mouth to protest, then snapped it shut. “When I said that I wanted a bride,” Zexion finally murmured slowly, “I assumed that the implication in favor of females was evident. Because most wives are, you know. Female.”
“Tell that to the Big Man,” Cloud muttered. “He doesn’t seem to mind.”
“Xemnas and Saïx are not what you’d call a conventional couple!” Zexion hissed. He drew himself to his fullest height. “I wanted a woman! And instead I’m saddled with this…this…”
“Right here, ya know,” Demyx mumbled. “I can hear you just fine.”
“Silence!” Zexion snarled, aiming an angry finger at the younger man. “If I may remind you, you’re not exactly in a position to be acting the fool. If anything, you’d do well to-”
“I can do whatever the fuck I want!” Demyx shouted, tossing his head back furiously. “I’m Marluxia’s fucking child! I’ve just been fucking kidnapped!”
“You know, for a divine being, your language leaves much to be desired,” Zexion sneered, lifting a hand to brush long locks of hair out of his eyes. “To be expected, I suppose, when one is the spawn of those two psychopaths. But I promise you, kidnapping wasn’t my intention. I never meant to bring you here in the first place.”
“Then why did you?!” Demyx cried. He took a step backward, his shoulders curving in on themselves in an instinctive desire to make as small a target as possible. The initial shock seemed to have passed, draining the anger from him and leaving him with nothing but panic. “I never did anything to you! I’ve never seen you! Why would you do this?! Do you not understand what you’ve done?! My mother’s going to kill you! My father’s going to neuter you! I’m going to miss the fucking Olympics!”
Zexion shifted from one foot to another, hands flying up to smooth his bangs out of his face in what was quickly becoming a nervous gesture. “I assure you,” he murmured, averting his eyes towards Styx. “I did not mean to bring you here. I was not…in my right mind when I made that decision. A momentary lapse of sanity that I find myself deeply regretting more and more as each moment passes.”
“You know, for a suitor, you’re not very nice,” Demyx mumbled.
“And I’ll speak with your parents,” Zexion continued, voice dropping slightly in something that might have been nervousness, had it belonged to anyone else. “Or Marluxia, at the least. Truth be told, I’d rather not have to deal with your mother.”
The young god lifted an eyebrow, and for the first time since his abduction it wasn’t in absolute disdain. “Uh, no,” Demyx said, shaking his head slowly and turning to stare at the slate-haired god in something resembling curiosity. “Marluxia’s my mother. Larxene’s my father.”
Zexion blinked. “What?”
“The kid’s not lying,” Leon muttered helpfully. “Marluxia bore the child.”
“What?”
“Scandal, remember? And anyway, do you think there exists anyone in this universe capable of topping Larxene?”
“But…physiologically…how would that work?”
Cloud shrugged. “Well, when two people love each other very much-”
“Still here,” Demyx mumbled, waving sarcastically. “And I’d rather not have to think about the intricacies and complexities of my parent’s sex lives, if you please.”
“You know,” Zexion hissed, turning to glare at the young god through slitted eyes, “You’re fast becoming the most annoying creature I’ve ever had the displeasure of meeting-”
“Kidnapping.”
“-and I’d thank you to keep yourself silent,” Hades finished, eyes narrowing further. Demyx took an indignant step backwards, his hands fisting.
“Listen,” the younger male hissed, lifting a finger and pointing it at the stoic god standing before him. “I did nothing to you. You dragged me here against my will, on the mistaken belief that anyone would take kindly to being forced into marriage.”
“I’ve told you,” Zexion snarled, struggling to retain his composure. “It was not my intention to-”
“-knock me unconscious, stuff me in a rucksack, throw me into the backseat of your unholy chariot, and canter off past planes of existence into the vast reaches of Hades, where my mother has no dominion and thus cannot enter.” Demyx laughed, the sound a strange mixture of panic and rage. “Yes, I heard you the first time. But intentional or not, it’s what you did. You knocked me out and whisked me away. To Hell. Because…because you wanted me to…” He shook his head, mouth opening and closing for a moment before he apparently regained his speech capacity. “To marry you.”
“I thought you were a woman,” Zexion grit from between clamped teeth. Demyx scoffed.
“And how the hell did you think that?!”
Zexion’s brow furrowed. “It was dark.”
Demyx’s eyes scrunched in disbelief, and he waved an angry hand through the air. “I don’t look like a girl!”
Zexion ripped his gaze away from where it was trailing across the younger god’s abdomen and cut his eyes angrily towards Cloud and Leon, who were both trying to make a clean getaway. “No,” he admitted grudgingly. “You don’t.”
“Then how the hell did you mistake me for one?!”
“It was dark!”
“I’m wearing boy clothes! Do you see the blue?!”
“Oh, well, that’s not completely sexist.”
“Shut up!” Demyx shrieked, wildly flailing his arms about. “I’m distraught! I’ve just been kidnapped! I’m allowed to be sexist!”
Zexion stamped down on a groan, rubbing at the bridge of his nose in an effort to stem the headache looming threateningly over him. “Would you please calm down? You’re only working yourself into greater depths of panic.” He sighed, taking a step forward and outstretching a hand placatingly. “Please. Take a few deep breaths.”
“Oh shut up, you Zen master wannabe!” Demyx shouted. His voice squeaked embarrassingly on the last syllable. “I’m in the Underworld! Which means that I’m dead! I can’t take any fucking breaths!”
“Please stop and listen to yourself,” the god of Hades snarled. “You’re immortal, or don’t you recall?”
“No, actually, I think you killed my short-term memory when you clubbed me upside the fucking face!”
“So,” Cloud interrupted, waving a thumb over his shoulder. “You obviously have no further use for us, so me and Leon are just gonna-”
“Sit down, please,” Zexion growled. Cloud and Leon both fell flat on their asses, and Zexion sighed to himself. Dear Xemnas above, he was losing his composure in front of his underlings. What would his brothers say?
“Listen to me,” Zexion said, visibly trying to restrain himself from smacking the blond upside the head. “I’m going to make an effort to explain this to you in terms your diminutive mind might possibly understand.”
“Well thanks, buddy,” Demyx muttered.
“I understand that you’re upset,” Zexion continued, ignoring the interruption. “I understand that I acted hastily. And I understand that this is not an entirely happy situation for either of us. But once you crossed the River Styx, you lost the ability to return to your world. You cannot go back. It’s impossible. There is nothing you can do.”
Demyx stared at him, eyes narrowed. “You’re telling me,” he snarled, hands fisted at his sides, “that I can’t swim across this river.”
“Yes.”
“This river.”
“Exactly.”
“I…cannot swim…across this river. That is what you’re telling me.”
Zexion closed his eyes in weariness, mentally congratulating himself on finally being able to explain the facts of un-life to the ditzy little immortal (who, quite honestly, was becoming a bit less worth it with every idiocy that came from his mouth). “Yes,” he said tiredly. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
Demyx stared at him for a very long moment. And then he snorted. “Well, fuck that.”
And so, Demyx took a header into the River Styx.
Zexion, Cloud, and Leon stared at the place where Demyx had once occupied. And then they simultaneously yelped.
And then Marluxia teleported himself inside Zeus’ private chambers, all haughty glares and furious sneers, and the delicate calm shattered like Zexion’s rigidity after his poor kidnapped wife-to-be took a nose-dive into the River From Which None Return.
“Xemnas!” the god of the earth hissed, regally tossing his pink locks of hair over a broad shoulder. He managed a jerky bow, mocking eyes glaring daggers at the pair staring curiously up at him. “I would like an audience!”
Xemnas’s brow lifted in a perfect example of sardonic disdain, and he slowly detached himself from his wife. He stood, completely unmindful of his nudity, and lazily waved an arm. The small cluster of clouds the couple had been using as a makeshift horizontal surface shifted, tendrils extending to cover Saïx’s modesty. Another wave, and a single black tunic floated into his hands. Only then did he turn fully towards the irate god requesting an interview.
“Yes, Marluxia,” he drawled. He lifted a hand to the nape of his neck and tilted it backwards, stretching the muscles there. “I gathered. What is so…pressing…that you‘d come directly into my private chambers without waiting for an appointment?”
Marluxia grit his teeth against the drawl in his Superior’s voice and lifted his chin defiantly. “Your brother,” he almost snarled, restraining his anger by the merest modicum of dignity, “has kidnapped my child.”
This drew the sovereign short. He paused, one hand stuck inside a long black sleeve. “Your underage child?” he asked curiously.
“My underage male child,” Marluxia cried.
Silence. And then from Saïx, who was still sprawled languidly on the puffy little cloud: “Amazing. The bastard’s finally trying to get laid.” The blue-haired man smirked. “Good for him.”
“Amazing,” Marluxia spat contemptuously, eyes narrowing into slits. “That’s exactly what I said. You know, right up until the point where I realized that, ‘Hey! The God of the fucking Underworld just abducted my only fucking son, thereby forcing him into an eternal life of darkness, deviancy, and damnation.”
“Marluxia,” Xemnas said sagely, slowly wrapping the sheer black robe around himself. “You really should work on that temper. And those alliterations. And all that cursing cannot be good for the child. I shall be quite vexed if I ever visit the boy and discover that he’s as foul-mouthed as his sires.”
Marluxia narrowed his eyes, trying to rein in the righteous indignation coursing through his chest. “Sir, with all due respect,” he managed, “I’m not quite sure that’s the point.”
“On the contrary, Demeter,” Xemnas disagreed, casting a noble eye over the furious lesser god. “It’s precisely the point. You and Athena have never done a good job raising that boy. I’ve heard that he spent much of his younger years with my older brother, learning the ways of the sea and how to control the tides. Was it not from Vexen that he gleaned every bit of seasonal knowledge he now possesses - for truly, are not all seasonal changes and weather shifts affected to a large degree by water? Sister-”
“Brother,” Marluxia bit out irritably.
“You have, by all accounts, scarcely ever paid any heed to that lovely son of yours,” Xemnas sighed patiently. “Larxene, in fact, is rumored to have thrown the child into a pit of vipers. All because he was yelling too loudly.”
“He was yelling pretty loudly,” Marluxia muttered.
“He was two months old; he had a reason,” Xemnas retorted, voice as calm and long-suffering as a gentle sky. “My point, dear kinsman, is that neither of you have ever proven yourselves to be what one would call model parents. Why then do you ask me to help your cause? In fact, I’m quite sure that Zexion would do a better job of…ah…caring for the boy than either of you would.”
“If by ‘caring for’ you mean ‘stealing his virtue!’” Marluxia howled.
“Oh, dear, he still has that?” Saïx asked interestedly. “Poor thing.”
“Sir,” the earth god interrupted, pausing only momentarily to shoot a contemptuous glare at the queen god still lounging naked and breathless on the puffy white cloud. “He is my son.”
“And you fail as a mother,” Xemnas responded, turning his back to the infuriated god. “Sometimes,” he sighed wistfully, “I wish that I’d taken the child in when I’d had the chance. Things might have turned out…differently.”
Marluxia resisted the - quite powerful - urge to call the old coot anything synonymous with ‘dirty ugly pervert,’ and instead inclined his head deferentially. “Superior,” he murmured slowly, straining against the furious indignity that was welling up in his gut. “You have fathered many, many children-” and here he aimed a spiteful sneer at Saïx, who narrowed his eyes back at him, “-with an aplomb I have only ever seen in bunny rabbits. I know your love for each is vast. You know the happiness of looking at a strong, successful son, and you know well the agony of losing one. Please,” he mumbled, pouring as much false subservience into the word as he could muster. “Do not begrudge me the only son I’ve ever borne.”
Xemnas paused in his dressing, back still turned towards the rose-haired god of earth. He tilted his head slightly towards the right, the calm in his profile belied by the visible quirk of interest tilting his lips upward. “You speak in earnest. You truly care for him?” the age-old god asked, almost to himself.
“It is not a lie,” Marluxia lied. “He is my son. I held him in my…uh…womb…err…the place in my body where…you know, between the liver and the…” He sighed in defeat, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. “Look, I carried the brat inside me for nigh on a year. I nursed him, put up with him, and did not throw him into a well, no matter how much apparent pleasure he seemed to take in interrupting Larxene and I at all hours of the night. And Vexen’s a big fat liar. I raised him, I cared for him, and I showed him the ways of the earth, all at great personal cost!”
Xemnas raised an eyebrow. “How so?”
Marluxia tossed his mane of hair back. Hah. This was the kicker. “Larxene got tired of the brat’s yelling,” he said, sneering. “She told me to get rid of him. I, being blessed with a veritable wealth of maternal instincts, refused. I couldn’t throw my child out of house and home!”
“And I take it my daughter wasn’t too pleased with you?” Xemnas asked.
“I didn’t get laid for years,” Marluxia cried, almost proudly. “And did I throw away my son? Absolutely not!”
Saïx twitched. “A mark of love if there ever was one.”
“Damn straight,” Marluxia spat, gracefully sweeping a hand through the air. “And now, even after having suffered the agony of not knowing the warmth of female flesh for nigh on a decade, I am expected to stand by while some pasty-faced madman abducts my precious child into the depths of the black abyss?! I fucking think not!”
Xemnas frowned. “You make a convincing case,” he muttered finally, almost to himself. “Ten years of celibacy?” He shuddered, and Marluxia stamped down viciously on the triumphant grin that was forcing its way onto his face.
“Superior,” Marluxia murmured slowly from between clenched teeth, keeping his eyes carefully trained on the stone beneath his feet. He would not lose his composure, and he would not lose his son. Demyx was his, dammit. He’d endured six fucking months of morning sickness, irritable bowel syndrome, and bad breath. He’d gained nine pounds. His thighs grew as thick as hams. He’d raised the kid for years - if not affectionately, then at least willingly, which was more than you could say about the majority of the jerk-offs populating the heavens.
Demyx was his son. His only son, and as annoying as the brat was, he was still his. And really, Marluxia kind of liked the boy. Was proud of him, in some small, reluctant way. The kid was talented, blessed with an innate knowledge of weather patterns and aquatic life. He formed friendships easily, was as companionable a teenager as could possibly exist. The fauna listened to him, the flora bloomed under him. He was a magnificent asset to an earth god.
Demyx would not be taken from him.
“Zeus,” Marluxia murmured, dipping his chin a notch further downward. “I want my son back. The earth has fallen in love with him. It will not thrive without him. It will not survive without him. Please,” he whispered, smothering a victorious smirk. Oh, Xemnas was his! Just one more push, and he’d have the king of the gods on his side.
“Please,” he whispered. “I want him back.”
Xemnas exhaled, dramatically outstretching his arms towards the pink-haired god. “You know I cannot bring him back forcibly,” he sighed, eyebrows tilting upwards in a ostentatious expression of remorse. “I have no dominion over the Underworld. I could no more trespass on Zexion’s domain than I could demand you turn spring into autumn.”
Marluxia nodded to himself; he’d expected as much. His goal had been less the immediate return of his child than the seeking of an ally. With Xemnas on his side, Zexion was bound to cave in sooner or later, the lecherous little-
“But I am curious about something,” Xemnas continued theatrically, rolling his eyes up towards the sky. “Zexion is not what one would call the…romantic sort.”
“I always assumed the poor man was a eunuch,” Saïx muttered curiously. “You can’t go that many millennia without having sex. It’s just not possible. No one’s right hand is that good.”
“Precisely, my dear,” Xemnas agreed with a magnanimous nod to his queen. “My brother does not seem the sort who would swoop in on a winged chariot and whisk a beautiful maiden-”
“Man,” Marluxia corrected irritably.
“-away to his vast kingdom, whereupon he would then rape the child into submission, locking him away until Stockholm Syndrome got the best of him, seducing the brat until his every breath was devoted to Zexion.”
Marluxia swayed on his feet. “My poor baby.”
“It’s all very strange,” Xemnas continued. “Zexion does not act on his passions. He is not unwise, impulsive. He would never risk an all-out war between the gods, just for the sake of a bit of extracurricular activity. It’s absolutely out of-”
“Xemnas is gonna kill us-”
Xemnas blinked. “…character,” he finished. He cocked his head to the side theatrically, eyes widened in confusion. “Did either of you just hear that?”
“Not if he doesn’t find out, he won’t,” another voice answered the first. There was the sound of a struggle outside of the chamber’s door, and all heads turned towards the entrance.
“We have to tell!” the first voice cried frantically. “If he finds out-”
“He won’t!”
Xemnas narrowed his eyes, because as we all know, mighty and powerful gods dislike having their omniscience called into question. He began striding towards the entrance.
“Riku!” the higher-pitched voice muttered furiously. “You shot Zexion!”
Xemnas froze in his steps. Behind him, Marluxia and Saïx blinked.
“Does that sound like Sora to you?” Saïx asked curiously.
“And no one has to know!”
“Sora,” Marluxia mumbled. “As in Eros. The one with the arrows.”
“The love arrows.”
“The love arrows Riku’s been aching to get his hands on for months.”
“The love arrows,” Saïx concluded, lips twitching in an expression of supreme satisfaction, “Riku just used to shoot Zexion.”
Silence. Outside, the sound of slaps and squeals grew progressively louder.
“Well,” Xemnas said finally, voice a bright parody of lightheartedness. “That does answer a few questions, doesn’t it?”
“No one has to know?! Riku! You shot the god of death! You turned him into a horny sexpot! Did you even recognize who it was he kidnapped? That was Demyx! As in, Demeter’s son!”
“Well, Demeter’s an insensitive jackass! He probably hasn’t even realized-”
And this was when Marluxia, in all his flowery glory, strode to Xemnas’s front door and shoved it open. Riku and Sora stood before him, each locked in a headlock. Slowly, ever so slowly, they turned to stare up at him.
“So,” Marluxia drawled, raising a delicate eyebrow and reaching an elegant hand outwards to grab the white-haired once-mortal by the collar. “You’re the one who got my beautiful baby boy abducted.” He smirked. “Huh. Sucks to be you.”
If Riku then chose to use his vocal chords to squeak like a little girl (and you will never get him to admit that he did), the reader will at least be relieved to know that the break in character was for good reason.
“He’s not coming up, is he?” Leon murmured, peering down into the opaque mire that was the River Styx. Underneath the uppermost layer of thick, viscous water, a hundred million souls drifted, ready to drag any unsuspecting mortal - or immortal, as it were - into the thick quagmire of limbo.
“Don’t think so,” Cloud muttered, tugging idly at a long blond spike of hair. “I reckon the idiot’s panicking right about now.”
“I told him he couldn’t swim across the river,” Zexion growled, stomping down on the near manic urge to wring his hands together. God, this irritant was wreaking havoc with his emotions, sweeping his feelings this way and that. “I know I did. Repeatedly.” He groaned, thumbing a finger against his temple and rubbing it in small, counter-clockwise circles. “Cloud,” he murmured, kneeling on the river bank. “Go and get him.”
The blond boatman squawked. “What?!”
“You heard me,” the Underworld’s god hissed, eyes narrowing just slightly. “As far as I’m concerned, this is all your fault. You deliberately manipulated me into kidnapping the fool.”
“With all due respect, I did no such thing,” Cloud disagreed, averting his gaze. “I just recommended the child. You, my Lord, are the one who decided to make off with the poor boy.”
“And you, my faithful boatman, are trying my patience,” Zexion said, his right eye beginning to gain a subtle tic. “Remember, Cloud, you belong to me. If I say sing, you say ‘name that tune.’ If I say I want Wonderboy’s head on a platter, you say-”
“‘Medium or well-done,’ yada yada yada, I saw the movie, too,” Cloud muttered, voice just this side of miffed. He sighed, poking a foot into the river. “Just because I man your personal ferry, it doesn’t mean I can hop into the river of death and hope to survive, much less have enough time to grab your sweet-cheeks and haul him back up before the water sucks my life away.”
“You speak as if you had a choice,” Zexion said flatly, and that was that. Cloud groaned in frustration and removed his sandals, aiming furious glares at the slate-haired god standing sanctimoniously over him.
“Alright,” he muttered. “I’ll jump in. Wish me luck.”
“I love you,” Leon said solemnly, nodding gravely. He clasped the blond’s hands between his for a moment, then pushed him gently towards the water’s edge. “And I’ll personally oversee the appointment of the next Charon. You can count on me, Cloud.”
“Well, thank you for that vote of confidence,” Cloud snarled sarcastically. “If I make it out of this, I’m leaving you for Sephiroth.”
And with that, Cloud took a deep breath and hopped into the river.
Blackness. For the first time in his immortal life, he finally understood why humans were so afraid of death. All around him, souls congregated, grasping at his legs, tugging him further downwards. Emaciated faces shoved themselves at him, wordless pleas and screams filling his mind, creating sounds and gasps where there were none.
He shoved them away, doing his level best to ignore the wraithlike, insubstantial limbs clawing at him. God, Marluxia’s brat could be anywhere by now, could have been dragged a thousand feet underneath. There was no way he’d be able to find the boy, not with so many millions standing between-
There! Flesh! A body that was not ringed in ghostly green, and Cloud took off towards it. Arm over arm over arm, moving unbearably slowly, until finally the hundred meters separating them became fifty, became twenty, became ten, became-
Cloud grabbed at Demyx’s arm, and the blond whirled to glare at him. His eyes were wide, and he looked unbearably panicked. Cloud grimaced, then jerked his head back towards the river’s edge.
Demyx stared at him for a minute. And then he shook his head.
Cloud’s eyes narrowed angrily, and he pointed a furious finger to the surface. Demyx shook his head again, pulling his arm away and drawing strange symbols into the water with his fingers. With every subsequent movement, his face grew more and more desperate until Cloud thought that the young god just might cry.
He was trying to command the water, Cloud suddenly realized, and on the thought’s heels was the realization that it would not work. Around him, souls were pulling at their sleeves, wrapping arms around their shoulders in macabre embraces. They were sinking further and further with each passing second, and when Cloud tugged at Demyx’s arms again, the younger male nodded, closing his eyes and sluggishly turning in the water.
They moved at a snail’s pace, struggling desperately for every inch of altitude they could manage. Leg’s kicking furiously, arms pumping almost uselessly, Demyx pulling ahead every few minutes, then pausing to draw Cloud a bit further along.
A hundred feet, eighty.
Souls upon souls upon souls, silent shrieks and wails and groans seizing the cavity in his chest.
Fifty, forty, thirty, and when Cloud glanced at Demyx, he thought the boy just might have been crying.
Ten feet, five-
And then strong hands were wrapping around his arms, hauling him up and out of the water, depositing both boatman and god onto the river’s edge.
“Fuck,” Leon muttered, pulling Cloud into a sitting position. “I really thought…” His hands jerked, frantically smoothing the goo-damp spikes of hair out of the blond’s face. “But you’re okay, right?”
“The kid,” Cloud gasped, smacking the brunet’s hands away and turning towards the gasping young god. Demyx was lying flat on his back, eyes wide, mouth a gaping hole helplessly heaving for breath.
“What was that?” Demyx asked dully, eyes staring almost vacantly up. “The water…it wouldn’t listen to-”
“That was the river of death, you incompetent fool,” Zexion snarled, tossing his slate-colored lock of hair angrily away from his eyes. “It’s not real water! When I told you that you couldn’t swim across it, I did not mean that you could maybe swim across it. I meant that it was impossible.”
“I…thought-”
“I know what you thought, you insufferable brat,” Zexion hissed. “You thought that you could break the laws of the underworld. You thought that just because you hold some strange command over water, that you’d be able to cross my river.”
“I-”
“Silence,” Hades snarled. He took a deep breath, struggling to get hold of the strange clenching in his throat. “You’ve proven yourself to be the worst sort of fool in the single hour I’ve spent in your presence. I cannot believe I risked my boatman to save your miserable hide.”
Demyx’s eyes snapped towards him. He shifted onto his side, limbs languidly pushing himself up into a sitting position. “Your boatman…” He closed his eyes, a hand reaching upward to press against his forehead.
“You kidnapped me,” Demyx whispered, and his voice strangely hoarse. “You stalked me, you clobbered me, you tied me up in a sack and dragged me to Hell, and after all that you…” His mouth worked wordlessly for a moment, and for a moment the stark rage and indignity and pain Zexion saw there made his heart skip. “You couldn’t even find the courage to jump in after me yourself?”
Zexion drew himself up sharply, glaring down at the young god, lying half-crumpled on the floor. He ignored the sharp twinge pulling at his chest, the swift sweep of guilt that arched through his head. “I’d rather not dirty my hands for one such as you,” he said impassively.
“Lord!” Leon cried indignantly. Cloud narrowed his eyes, just slightly, but nudged himself to the right, shielding the shivering blond as much as he could. Demyx’s eyes narrowed for the barest fraction of a second. Then his face crumpled.
“You’re cruel,” he murmured. He blinked slowly, turning his face towards the river, staring at it blankly as if still in shock at the water’s betrayal. “You’re…really cruel.”
“And you’re my captive,” Zexion hissed, suddenly supremely impatient with everything. He spun on his heels, robes billowing behind him, and began walking away. “That gives me the liberty to do with you what I will.” He paused, then closed his eyes. “And I’ve decided that you will stay.”
The three immortals behind him choked. “What?!” Demyx cried, shoving Cloud to the side and stumbling to his feet. “No! N…no!”
“Yes.”
“You can’t make me!”
“Actually, I can,” the slate-haired god sighed. “No crossing of the river, remember? Huh. I should probably put a sign up somewhere.”
“Fucker!” Demyx shrieked, trying to make a running leap for the arrogant god, only to be tackled mid-jump by said god’s loyal minions. “I hate you!”
“Last I heard,” Zexion drawled, pausing in his footsteps. “Love was not exactly a requirement for marriage.” He grimaced suddenly, half-lifting a hand to his chest.
His heart, golden and immortal and effervescent, was beating furiously in his chest. Some strange emotion, more than anger, more than happiness, was coiling in the pit of his stomach, curling outwards and sending odd shudders through his arms and legs. Ire and joy and frustration and a strange sort of restlessness, boiling his blood and clawing at his belly.
It was irritating the shit out of him
“I’ve brought you here,” he continued, voice rising slightly with every word he spoke, almost angrily. “I’ve risked war for you. I will not have gone through all this trouble only to have you leave. You will not be wasted. You will be my companion, and there’s really not much you can do about it. So deal with it, sucker.”
“Bastard!” Demyx shrieked, and Zexion was quite sure the idiot would have tackled him, had Leon and Cloud not put the kid in a headlock. “Jerk-off! Pedophilic, homosexual son of a bitch! I’ll bite your wang off! Let me goooo!”
Zexion sighed, massaged the bridge of his nose, and felt quite sure that life was about to get a helluva lot more interesting.
Riku, hanging upside down by his left ankle (which Marluxia had a rather loose hold of; Riku wasn’t quite secure in the bastard’s grip, and was sweating quite profusely) managed to shoot the pink-haired earth god a glare. It failed quite spectacularly, as Riku’s face was beet red from the massive immigration of all the blood in his body to his head.
“Go…suck…it…” he gasped.
“Why, Riku,” Marluxia smirked. “That’s not very nice.” To illustrate this, he began swinging the unfortunate Riku back and forth like a pendulum.
“Sir!” Sora cried worriedly, crossing his arms over his chest. “I know that you’re mad, but could you please try not to drop him!”
“What?” Marluxia sneered, lifting a mocking eyebrow. “You’d rather take his place?”
Sora blinked. “Uh, actually, yeah.”
“I love you, baby!” Riku cried happily.
“Oh shut up,” Marluxia groaned, giving the boy’s ankle an irritated tug. “That’s quite charitable of you, Sora,” he said, offering the younger man a reluctant nod. “But I won’t be taking you up on that offer.” He sighed, rubbing at the bridge of his nose with his spare hand.
“And anyway,” he continued, giving the dangling man a fearsome sneer. “You shouldn’t worry. I’ll let him up as soon as I figure it out.”
Sora gave his lover an encouraging pat on the calf. “Figure what out, Marluxia?” he asked curiously.
Marluxia groaned and fell flat on his stomach. Riku squawked and dropped another foot.
“How the hell are we gonna tell Larxene?”
Riku and Sora blinked at him. And then, from the boy still hanging precariously by the ankle off the edge of a cloud:
“Uh…we?!”
End Chapter Two
Oh, and I shall forever love whoever can point every single anachronism I shamelessly used. Just 'cause I'm not sure if even I realized using all of 'em...
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