Title: Any Other Night
Author: DJ aka
_sexorcist_
Rating: PG
Pairing: Luxord/Zexion
Author's Notes: So, I'm on a caffeine high, and I'm greatly lamenting the utter lack of Luxord/Anybody around (no pun intended), let alone my fave crack pairing, Luxord/Zexion. So I decided to write some, at five in the morning, on a sugar high, with no beta. Don'tcha love this setup? Yeah, I'll continue it if people want it continued, and add more pairings, and actually make a plot and such, but I'll leave it a one shot otherwise. As it stands, it's just a straight to the jugular dose of Luxord/Zexion with no real plot. Yet. I'll stop rambling now.
Also, I take my own route with Org. Roxas's characterization. It's different from what I've seen, and it's what I was feeling at the time. So, yay. (Or it may just be the lack of sleep telling me that I'm totally being original when I'm not, who knows.)
On any other night, Luxord might have been insulted that he was assigned to such a menial task as patrolling the area surrounding the castle. Marluxia was preparing for the move to take up his new post at Castle Oblivion, Saix was training the new kid, and the scientists of the group were hard at work as usual, with the exception of Zexion. Zexion was out on some sort of mission, one that was being kept quieter than most of the missions handed out.
The orders were always on some sort of heavy parchment in a language that had to be translated from ‘pompous smart talk’ to ‘go there and do this by this time’. The newer members would often gather together, toss the orders in a pile, and gamble or duel it out to see who was going where.
But the orders had gotten less trivial lately. Even Demyx was off on something other than reconnaissance or surveillance; he’d been sent with Axel to retrieve an artifact Vexen needed. Xemnas was finding more use with the musician now that his training was finally going smoothly.
But no such orders went out to Luxord. No, the Gambler of Fate was patrolling, something that the Dusks could do on their own. And had Zexion not been five days late coming back from this mysterious mission, he might have been so angry as to approach Xemnas about it.
But Luxord, for all the supposed lack of emotions, was worried. After all, Zexion was the only one who had the real mind power to defeat him at his own mind games. Out of all the Nobodies, he’d found the youngest one of the bunch to be the one most on his level. It was unexpected. Welcome, of course, but unexpected.
A few chilly raindrops hit his face and neck, breaking him from his thoughts. He glared at the sky, as if attempting to intimidate the raindrops back into their respective clouds. It didn’t work. For once he wished Demyx was around; rain was his thing, after all.
He heard a familiar sound. A portal. He turned around, but in the inky blackness of night, he couldn’t see very far. He certainly couldn’t see where the portal had opened.
“Who’s there?” he called out, pulling a pair of dice from his coat. Not the normal dice he’d use for gambling, no; these dice were flash-bombs. If it was someone unfamiliar, he could stun them long enough to get the upper hand.
He heard a gasp. A scuffle of shoes against pavement, of loose pebbles scattering. His hand tightened on the dice.
“Luxord.”
He stuffed the dice back in his pocket. He knew that voice, that smooth voice, but right now it was strained, edged with pain.
He’d not once heard Zexion sound like that.
He broke into a run toward the alley the voice had come from, and when he turned the corner, at first he saw nothing. Peering closer, he saw movement, close to the ground. A small Nobody, crouched on his knees, head down, his silver hair visible only under the reflection of the heart shaped moon.
With a shaky gasp, Zexion looked up, blood running down the visible side of his face and caking his hair.
“Luxord…I’m…”
“Fading,” Luxord finished, rushing forward. He lifted the slender Nobody in his arms, well aware that there was no time to lose, not one second. Zexion whimpered in pain, but couldn’t even manage to stiffen under the agony he must have been undergoing. He was like a doll in Luxord’s arms, a puppet whose strings were simply the black tendrils of life escaping him, not attached to anything.
“Have to…t-tell Xemnas, the…the mission…” Zexion murmured, shivering violently. Luxord shook his head.
“You just concentrate on not fading. Then you can worry about your mission all you like,” he said, opening a portal to the new kid’s room. Each room came fully stocked with potions and other medicines, and Number XIII would’ve used the least of anybody so far, since he’d only been here a few days. Luxord didn’t want to be caught short of just one elixir.
Zexion was nearly unconscious already. How he made it this far in this condition, Luxord didn’t have a clue. Roxas looked up and blinked in surprise as the two stepped through into his room.
“Off the bed,” Luxord said, and Roxas scrambled to do just that. Normally the pissy little Nobody might have made a comment, or simply refused to move on the principal of being stubborn, but his first sight of a dying Nobody must have been pretty effective in getting him to do as he was asked.
Luxord gently laid Zexion on the bed, getting only a soft moan from the silver-haired teenager in response. The sheets were already soaking through with dark blood.
“What happened?” Roxas asked, surveying with a clinical eye as Luxord began to rifle through his drawer of potions.
“Don’t pretend to care, XIII.”
“I didn’t say I cared. I simply want to know how I can avoid ending up like him.”
Luxord felt a rush of something; anger, fury, whatever it was, it was something that Xemnas told him he wasn’t supposed to feel. A potion in one hand, he used the other to palm an ace and flick it at the blonde Nobody. The card cut through Roxas’s hair, strands of golden hair flying in every direction before the card buried into the wall behind him.
It didn’t take a word, and he’d shut up the Key of Destiny. The boy would probably whine to Xemnas and get Luxord in trouble, but at the moment, the gambler didn’t care. His closest friend was fading.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, helping Zexion sit up. The schemer’s eyes were glazed, his expression distant as Luxord lifted the potion to his lips.
“Come on, now. You owe me three days of cooking duty from that last game of roulette. No fading yet,” he said. “Drink up.”
Zexion barely managed it. It took three tries for him to get all of it down, and then his eyes fluttered closed, and he fell limp against Luxord. Not a result of fading, but a result of exhaustion; it likely took all his energy to fight fading, create a portal, and get to help.
“Is he going to die?” Roxas asked, blue eyes wide with curiosity. Luxord sighed, shaking his head, even though the uncertainty still lingered in his mind.
“No. He’ll be fine.”
“It was close.”
“Someday, Saix will break you of that habit of stating the obvious.”
Luxord began to remove Zexion’s coat, finding the heavy leather and the clothing below it ripped apart and soaked with blood. Whatever Zexion had run into, it was strong, fast, and smart. Zexion wasn’t that easily taken down.
Roxas leaned over Luxord’s shoulder to have a look at the injuries. “What was it?”
“If I knew, I would’ve killed it by now.”
“Why?”
Luxord rolled his eyes. “Because that’s what you do when something hurts a friend, kid.”
Roxas snorted. “You consider him a friend?” he asked, as if it were the strangest idea he’d heard since he was ‘born’.
“I do,” Luxord said, and then he gestured toward the door. “Go train some more. You’re getting on my nerves.”
Roxas ignored the order. “You would confront some beast over the death of a colleague? That seems illogical, considering that you would likely fade as well.”
“Out, Number XIII,” Luxord said, his tone more stern, reminding the boy of his place. Roxas lifted his chin, considering the words, and then he shook his head, turned on his heel, and left.
Luxord looked down at Zexion. A bit of the color had returned to his face; only someone who knew him well would be able to tell, since he was normally sickly pale. It would still be close. He managed to give the unconscious teen another potion, then took up the task of cleaning and bandaging the wounds as best he could.
Emotions. They were running through him, leaving him shaken, even though he wasn’t supposed to be feeling them in the first place. He had a natural talent in keeping his composure in the worst of situations, but at the thought that he might lose Zexion, that composure was a fond memory.
“I’m going to have a few choice words with Xemnas for not sending backup on a mission like this,” he said to Zexion, even though the other was unconscious. He was cleaning the cut across the other Nobody’s forehead when the already cracked door pushed open further; Luxord heard the door squeak, but didn’t look up from what he was doing.
“XIII informed me that VI had returned.”
Luxord chuckled. “I’m not surprised he ran straight to you. He’s still like a baby duckling.”
“Watch your tone,” Xemnas said, stepping closer to the bed. “What’s the situation?”
“Touch and go, Superior.” Luxord set aside the damp cloth, having cleaned most of the blood off Zexion’s face. “He was fading when he arrived. I managed to halt the process.”
Xemnas nodded. “Good work, X. I trust you can continue to watch over him, then?”
“Of course.”
“And refrain from nearly scalping XIII in the future.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“I’ll do my best, sir.”
“Well, you really don’t have to call me sir, but if you insi-”
“Luxord.”
Luxord barely kept the smirk off his face. “My apologies, sir.”
Xemnas stayed for only a few moments longer before retreating, closing the door behind him. The loud squeak-click caused Zexion to stir, shifting with a groan.
“Welcome back,” Luxord said, brushing Zexion’s hair away from his face. “You gave me a scare. I thought I might actually have to do my cooking duties as scheduled.”
Zexion blinked a few times, his eyes slowly coming into focus. “You…I don’t remember…”
“You got your ass kicked, and I kept you from fading,” Luxord said. “That’s the simple version, anyway.”
Zexion tried to sit up, and Luxord caught him when he almost fell back again. Zexion pressed a hand to his forehead, breathing hard. “I need…pencil and paper. I need to make notations, before I forget, and complete the mission log, and-”
“Shut up.”
Zexion looked up, startled. Luxord smiled at him.
“You heard me. You were hurt. You don’t need to do any logs, or any of that science stuff. You need to rest.”
“But…I haven’t done any of the necessary paperwork or recordings. I-”
Luxord made a split second decision. Zexion needed to stop thinking, and Luxord took the quickest path he could come up with to that, going with those emotions once again. He pressed his lips lightly to Zexion’s, just for a moment, then lightly ruffled the scientist’s hair.
“Stop thinking.”
“But…you…and I…that was…”
“Just stop.”
“…okay.”
Author: DJ aka
_sexorcist_Rating: PG
Pairing: Luxord/Zexion
Author's Notes: So, I'm on a caffeine high, and I'm greatly lamenting the utter lack of Luxord/Anybody around (no pun intended), let alone my fave crack pairing, Luxord/Zexion. So I decided to write some, at five in the morning, on a sugar high, with no beta. Don'tcha love this setup? Yeah, I'll continue it if people want it continued, and add more pairings, and actually make a plot and such, but I'll leave it a one shot otherwise. As it stands, it's just a straight to the jugular dose of Luxord/Zexion with no real plot. Yet. I'll stop rambling now.
Also, I take my own route with Org. Roxas's characterization. It's different from what I've seen, and it's what I was feeling at the time. So, yay. (Or it may just be the lack of sleep telling me that I'm totally being original when I'm not, who knows.)
On any other night, Luxord might have been insulted that he was assigned to such a menial task as patrolling the area surrounding the castle. Marluxia was preparing for the move to take up his new post at Castle Oblivion, Saix was training the new kid, and the scientists of the group were hard at work as usual, with the exception of Zexion. Zexion was out on some sort of mission, one that was being kept quieter than most of the missions handed out.
The orders were always on some sort of heavy parchment in a language that had to be translated from ‘pompous smart talk’ to ‘go there and do this by this time’. The newer members would often gather together, toss the orders in a pile, and gamble or duel it out to see who was going where.
But the orders had gotten less trivial lately. Even Demyx was off on something other than reconnaissance or surveillance; he’d been sent with Axel to retrieve an artifact Vexen needed. Xemnas was finding more use with the musician now that his training was finally going smoothly.
But no such orders went out to Luxord. No, the Gambler of Fate was patrolling, something that the Dusks could do on their own. And had Zexion not been five days late coming back from this mysterious mission, he might have been so angry as to approach Xemnas about it.
But Luxord, for all the supposed lack of emotions, was worried. After all, Zexion was the only one who had the real mind power to defeat him at his own mind games. Out of all the Nobodies, he’d found the youngest one of the bunch to be the one most on his level. It was unexpected. Welcome, of course, but unexpected.
A few chilly raindrops hit his face and neck, breaking him from his thoughts. He glared at the sky, as if attempting to intimidate the raindrops back into their respective clouds. It didn’t work. For once he wished Demyx was around; rain was his thing, after all.
He heard a familiar sound. A portal. He turned around, but in the inky blackness of night, he couldn’t see very far. He certainly couldn’t see where the portal had opened.
“Who’s there?” he called out, pulling a pair of dice from his coat. Not the normal dice he’d use for gambling, no; these dice were flash-bombs. If it was someone unfamiliar, he could stun them long enough to get the upper hand.
He heard a gasp. A scuffle of shoes against pavement, of loose pebbles scattering. His hand tightened on the dice.
“Luxord.”
He stuffed the dice back in his pocket. He knew that voice, that smooth voice, but right now it was strained, edged with pain.
He’d not once heard Zexion sound like that.
He broke into a run toward the alley the voice had come from, and when he turned the corner, at first he saw nothing. Peering closer, he saw movement, close to the ground. A small Nobody, crouched on his knees, head down, his silver hair visible only under the reflection of the heart shaped moon.
With a shaky gasp, Zexion looked up, blood running down the visible side of his face and caking his hair.
“Luxord…I’m…”
“Fading,” Luxord finished, rushing forward. He lifted the slender Nobody in his arms, well aware that there was no time to lose, not one second. Zexion whimpered in pain, but couldn’t even manage to stiffen under the agony he must have been undergoing. He was like a doll in Luxord’s arms, a puppet whose strings were simply the black tendrils of life escaping him, not attached to anything.
“Have to…t-tell Xemnas, the…the mission…” Zexion murmured, shivering violently. Luxord shook his head.
“You just concentrate on not fading. Then you can worry about your mission all you like,” he said, opening a portal to the new kid’s room. Each room came fully stocked with potions and other medicines, and Number XIII would’ve used the least of anybody so far, since he’d only been here a few days. Luxord didn’t want to be caught short of just one elixir.
Zexion was nearly unconscious already. How he made it this far in this condition, Luxord didn’t have a clue. Roxas looked up and blinked in surprise as the two stepped through into his room.
“Off the bed,” Luxord said, and Roxas scrambled to do just that. Normally the pissy little Nobody might have made a comment, or simply refused to move on the principal of being stubborn, but his first sight of a dying Nobody must have been pretty effective in getting him to do as he was asked.
Luxord gently laid Zexion on the bed, getting only a soft moan from the silver-haired teenager in response. The sheets were already soaking through with dark blood.
“What happened?” Roxas asked, surveying with a clinical eye as Luxord began to rifle through his drawer of potions.
“Don’t pretend to care, XIII.”
“I didn’t say I cared. I simply want to know how I can avoid ending up like him.”
Luxord felt a rush of something; anger, fury, whatever it was, it was something that Xemnas told him he wasn’t supposed to feel. A potion in one hand, he used the other to palm an ace and flick it at the blonde Nobody. The card cut through Roxas’s hair, strands of golden hair flying in every direction before the card buried into the wall behind him.
It didn’t take a word, and he’d shut up the Key of Destiny. The boy would probably whine to Xemnas and get Luxord in trouble, but at the moment, the gambler didn’t care. His closest friend was fading.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, helping Zexion sit up. The schemer’s eyes were glazed, his expression distant as Luxord lifted the potion to his lips.
“Come on, now. You owe me three days of cooking duty from that last game of roulette. No fading yet,” he said. “Drink up.”
Zexion barely managed it. It took three tries for him to get all of it down, and then his eyes fluttered closed, and he fell limp against Luxord. Not a result of fading, but a result of exhaustion; it likely took all his energy to fight fading, create a portal, and get to help.
“Is he going to die?” Roxas asked, blue eyes wide with curiosity. Luxord sighed, shaking his head, even though the uncertainty still lingered in his mind.
“No. He’ll be fine.”
“It was close.”
“Someday, Saix will break you of that habit of stating the obvious.”
Luxord began to remove Zexion’s coat, finding the heavy leather and the clothing below it ripped apart and soaked with blood. Whatever Zexion had run into, it was strong, fast, and smart. Zexion wasn’t that easily taken down.
Roxas leaned over Luxord’s shoulder to have a look at the injuries. “What was it?”
“If I knew, I would’ve killed it by now.”
“Why?”
Luxord rolled his eyes. “Because that’s what you do when something hurts a friend, kid.”
Roxas snorted. “You consider him a friend?” he asked, as if it were the strangest idea he’d heard since he was ‘born’.
“I do,” Luxord said, and then he gestured toward the door. “Go train some more. You’re getting on my nerves.”
Roxas ignored the order. “You would confront some beast over the death of a colleague? That seems illogical, considering that you would likely fade as well.”
“Out, Number XIII,” Luxord said, his tone more stern, reminding the boy of his place. Roxas lifted his chin, considering the words, and then he shook his head, turned on his heel, and left.
Luxord looked down at Zexion. A bit of the color had returned to his face; only someone who knew him well would be able to tell, since he was normally sickly pale. It would still be close. He managed to give the unconscious teen another potion, then took up the task of cleaning and bandaging the wounds as best he could.
Emotions. They were running through him, leaving him shaken, even though he wasn’t supposed to be feeling them in the first place. He had a natural talent in keeping his composure in the worst of situations, but at the thought that he might lose Zexion, that composure was a fond memory.
“I’m going to have a few choice words with Xemnas for not sending backup on a mission like this,” he said to Zexion, even though the other was unconscious. He was cleaning the cut across the other Nobody’s forehead when the already cracked door pushed open further; Luxord heard the door squeak, but didn’t look up from what he was doing.
“XIII informed me that VI had returned.”
Luxord chuckled. “I’m not surprised he ran straight to you. He’s still like a baby duckling.”
“Watch your tone,” Xemnas said, stepping closer to the bed. “What’s the situation?”
“Touch and go, Superior.” Luxord set aside the damp cloth, having cleaned most of the blood off Zexion’s face. “He was fading when he arrived. I managed to halt the process.”
Xemnas nodded. “Good work, X. I trust you can continue to watch over him, then?”
“Of course.”
“And refrain from nearly scalping XIII in the future.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“I’ll do my best, sir.”
“Well, you really don’t have to call me sir, but if you insi-”
“Luxord.”
Luxord barely kept the smirk off his face. “My apologies, sir.”
Xemnas stayed for only a few moments longer before retreating, closing the door behind him. The loud squeak-click caused Zexion to stir, shifting with a groan.
“Welcome back,” Luxord said, brushing Zexion’s hair away from his face. “You gave me a scare. I thought I might actually have to do my cooking duties as scheduled.”
Zexion blinked a few times, his eyes slowly coming into focus. “You…I don’t remember…”
“You got your ass kicked, and I kept you from fading,” Luxord said. “That’s the simple version, anyway.”
Zexion tried to sit up, and Luxord caught him when he almost fell back again. Zexion pressed a hand to his forehead, breathing hard. “I need…pencil and paper. I need to make notations, before I forget, and complete the mission log, and-”
“Shut up.”
Zexion looked up, startled. Luxord smiled at him.
“You heard me. You were hurt. You don’t need to do any logs, or any of that science stuff. You need to rest.”
“But…I haven’t done any of the necessary paperwork or recordings. I-”
Luxord made a split second decision. Zexion needed to stop thinking, and Luxord took the quickest path he could come up with to that, going with those emotions once again. He pressed his lips lightly to Zexion’s, just for a moment, then lightly ruffled the scientist’s hair.
“Stop thinking.”
“But…you…and I…that was…”
“Just stop.”
“…okay.”
exhausted3 | +
