![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zenellyTitle: The Twilight Between
Pairing: Zemyx
Disclaimer: KH = NOT MINE.
Dedications: to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
prettypixiechan. Because she is my lovely beta. All other mistakes are my own.
Rating: NC-17
Summary: The thing that Demyx wants most in the world is a break from feeling the emotions of other people. He doesn't get that (in fact, it might be the opposite), but what he does get might actually be better. But either Zexion can save his sanity, or be the one thing to push him over the edge.
Chapter Summary: Pounding, rushing, vibrating to his core and all he hears is the sound of distant earthquakes as he covers his ears with his hands, fingers pressing hard and heavy against the back of his skull.
Warnings: This fic contains dubious-consent at times, and severely distressed mental states at others. I will post warnings on specific chapters, so you know what you're getting into.
WARNING: This chapter contains something that could be triggery for some people. Implied Dub!Con is in this chapter, and I think that part of the description can come a little too close to drug use, because Demyx is sorta a junkie on his own thing, okay? Also, minor character death. Read with Caution, but let me know if something in here is too much and I’ll try and edit around it, okay?
* * *
Chapter 3...
* * *
This Ain't a Love Song
* * *
"-and then, with a HUGE ROAR," Demyx raises his arms and starts stomping about the room, gnashing his teeth exaggeratedly to the delight of his captive audience, "the monster swoops up and GRABS the princess!"
Sora gasps in terror, eyes wide, fists clenching hard in the bed sheets. "Is she okay?" he asks earnestly, mouth hanging open.
Demyx waves a finger at him, blinking his way through the thrumming excitement beating bruises into his skin. "Now, now, Sora. Wait until I'm done. I'll get there, I promise."
A soft scoff comes from the doorway, and Demyx lets out an almost embarrassing whimper as wonderful, beautifully smooth amusement runs against his mind, wrapping around to guard it gently from Sora's rampant enthusiasm. Zexion is leaning in the doorframe, eyes sardonic as he murmurs, "Oh please. Sora? Patience? Are we talking about the same child?"
Sora pouts and frowns and generally whines his way into getting Zexion to admit that no, he's really not quite that bad, and all during that time Demyx drinks up the sight and feel of Zexion like a water-starved sunflower turning its face to the sun.
For the sixth day in a row, Demyx has woken up with no headache and with his stomach growling and grumbling at him. For six days, he has stumbled through his morning routine, making breakfast and getting ready for a run, and this is the (he checked the calendar blearily that morning, spoon hovering halfway between his mouth and his food) third day since the last time he threw up. His milk is finally starting to go bad, and the dishes in his sink are being cleaned slowly, day by day. For six days, he has clattered down the stairs, steps uncoordinated and shaky from mere physical tiredness for once with no underlying mental exhaustion. Six entire days, and Demyx stares straight at Zexion, knowing full well that this is the reason why.
A quirk of curiosity plucks against his fingers, and he can see Zexion raising an eyebrow.
He shakes himself, grin sliding back onto his lips like it has never left. As pleasant as getting lost inside Zexion's emotions is (he swiftly curbs the swamp of want he feels just thinking about it), Demyx really can't afford the distraction. "Sorry, where was I?"
"The monster just STOLE the Princess!" Sora throws up his arms in grand gestures that are probably meant to describe either the story or his frustration with Demyx forgetting where they were in said story. The young boy pauses to cough hoarsely, hacking barks that bend his body over itself, and immediately, Zexion is there, one hand running up and down Sora's back, worry creasing his brow and winding itself in the cracks of Demyx's psyche. Eventually, Sora rasps out, "And the hero was about to go save her, right?"
"Right. Now see, the hero-"
"Demyx, what is that? Are you okay?"
Concern.
Demyx blinks at Zexion a little, inwardly delighted at the curls and waves of concern and worry butting against his hands like curious cats even if he doesn't know why. "What is what?"
With a sigh, the slate-haired man reaches out and pushes one sleeve of Demyx's scrubs up, exposing the – oh man was that bruise turning yellow? – scrapes and contusions on his arm. "What in the world is this?" (Demyx braces himself for every bit of skin contact now and isn't whisked away to the inner channels of Zexion's mind when Zexion gently runs his fingers up the scratched area, mapping the damage there with the warm pads of his fingertips.)
Still, he has to concentrate hard to reply nonchalantly, "Oh, this? It's nothing. I fell down a few days ago is all."
"Nothing?" Zexion snorts a little, crossing his arms as he eyes the fading bruises on Demyx's arm. "I think the sun is rising in your arm, Demyx."
Blinking, Sora reaches out and presses down surprisingly hard for a child as small as he is, curiosity sudden and loud like a detonation in his mind. "I don't get it. His arm's not on fire and they taught us in school that the sun was made of fire. I mean, if it was the sun, then shouldn't it be fiery? And besides, bruises hurt."
"That does hurt, Sora," Demyx winces, pulling his arm away gently.
"Oh. Sorry."
A beep calls from the hallway, and Demyx looks up, tilting his head. When the sounds don't stop for a few more seconds, he shakes his head and smiles ruefully at Sora and Zexion. "Sorry, looks like I have to go now." He overrides Sora's half-hearted complaints easily, wagging his finger at the small boy. "I've been spending time with you. Don't you think your brother gets some alone time with you too?"
Sora smiles irrepressibly up at both him and Zexion, chattering away as Demy exits the room. "Yeah, I guess. Come on, Zexy, how's Dad doing, oh, how's Griever, does he miss me, can I see him, how's Riku-?"
Demyx closes the door behind him. Zexion's laughter is still clearly audible and he wants to tangle himself deep within the emotions swelling behind him, so deep he can never leave. But the call tones haven't stopped, so he walks over to the nurse's station, checking which room is calling and hurrying over.
(It ends up being nothing serious, just an IV change and a bored little boy who can't figure out the hospital's television setup. He's grateful for the distraction anyway.)
Sora's door is still closed when he checks again, hovering around the hallways nervously, like a half-starved dog. Demyx shakes his head, irritated. He isn't that desperate. He isn't. He doesn't have to go and ruin Zexion's time alone with his brother for his own petty, selfish (desperate, vital) reasons. Instead, he determinedly hobbles back to the nurses' station, checking charts and paperwork when he reaches the counter.
"Nurse Fitz. You're limping."
Demyx winces slightly, razor sharp edges of concern flitting near him, grazing him. But they barely skim his surface, only glancing around him, and he turns around to face Lexaeus, a smile already firm on his face as he gestures at his arm. "Well, sir, I'm still feeling a little sore from falling down last week. But the bruises are healing nicely!"
"Hn." Lexaeus shifts minutely, his scrubs pulling at his frame. Fleeting pieces of unnamable emotion scatter in the air like mica flakes, thin, iridescent, insubstantial. Demyx shudders through it, closing his eyes to the small bombardment of reflective light, and suddenly there is a stale taste in his mouth that he has almost learned to live without. Running his tongue across the inside of his teeth, Demyx wrinkles his nose. Slowly, the mica settles and Lexaeus nods, some inner conclusion reached. "Make sure to take care of yourself."
Reopening his eyes, Demyx makes a vague, aborted gesture with his hands. "I'm trying, I'm just…"
Lexaeus immediately focuses on him (and it's like all of those flakes suddenly sit up and shine light directly at him), intent and still. "Haven't been sleeping well?" he rumbles.
"Yeah." Demyx rubs distractedly at his face and he swears that he can feel the dark circles under his eyes with his fingers. He shrugs helplessly. "Not much can be done, though."
"That's no excuse for neglecting yourself."
The words are delivered in a carefully even voice, but it doesn't fool Demyx. He has hit a vein of metallic anger with a chisel, irritation ricocheting straight up his arms to settle inside his sternum. Rigid.
Demyx clenches his fists against the emotion even as it loosens his tongue enough to snap back, "Well, it's not like I choose to stay awake too long just so I can fall down the stairs!"
Lexaeus is about to say something when –panic, shit, panic floods him a moment before– alarms start blaring down the hallway. Hospital codes are snapped out in terse voices. Demyx is moving instinctively behind Lexaeus, following the large doctor with a bleary, jittery sort of consciousness, all of the other emotion dumping out of him to make room for this. He reaches out with his mind to touch –young girl, no more than five, scared, not breathing, world going spotty and distorted around her– the patient's mind.
And as he does, he knows that she's going to die.
(That's the part of his gift that he hates most of all. This fatalistic simplicity of just knowing. At least others have the luxury of hope.)
He finds himself with tools under his hands, a smaller body under those, and there are other nurses and doctors with him who are working desperately, equipment beeping frantically around them. There's a flash of nigh-on debilitating fear and panic (the girl's eyes seek out his own, because in this instant she knows, of course she knows) that he responds to by just reaching out to hold her hand and buoying her with something, anything, letting her terror pass through him – paddles, they're pulling out the paddles, fuck that's not a good sign – and he goes so deep in her mind that he can feel the girl's heartbeat stutter and try, painfully, to restart before just….
For a long, stunned moment, Demyx feels nothing.
And then it all comes crashing in. Screaming along his nerves like glass, sorrow and loss and pain dig at him, cut him deep, bleed him dry in their savage all-encompassing whirlwind. He is open and vulnerable, pulling himself out of a psyche that doesn't even exist anymore.
Parents. Of course.
Parents, and they know now that their daughter….
Their daughter is dead.
Demyx stumbles back from the bed, shaking, trembling hard and fast like hummingbird wings. Lexaeus – dark strong tired weighty worried – says something, but the sound is swallowed up in the screeching that fills Demyx's ears. (hears it anyway, "Alright, call it," words he hates.) He gets a flare of acknowledgement from another nurse – tired heartbroken shewassoyoung – and thank god, Lexaeus was talking to someone else, so he turns and ducks out of the room, flinching away from the sobbing, crying, vortex of mess that is the parents of – Elena.
Her name had been Elena.
But that's not important.
Where is Zexion?
Zexion is…
Not in Sora's room, he realizes as he reaches the door, because the door is open and there is no siren-call that is the safety of Zexion's mind. Fuck. Fuck, why now? He needs the sweet protection of Zexion, and the man is nowhere to be found.
He runs.
Hallways flash past him, and he spreads himself over the entire hospital, searching desperately, so desperately for something that isn't there. Zexion isn't in the hospital anymore. There is no water to cool his mind, no smooth and wonderful barrier between him and the rest of the world and everything is so loud, he can't stand it. How the hell did he ever stand this? Sliding down to the floor in an abandoned section, Demyx rests his head against his knees and closes his eyes, trying desperately to keep everything, everyone, else out and as far away from him as possible.
Pounding, rushing, vibrating to his core and all he hears is the sound of distant earthquakes as he covers his ears with his hands, fingers pressing hard and heavy against the back of his skull. The sliding sparks of people's minds rush past, and he samples them briefly in his vain search for relief.
"-bored-"
"shit these chairs are so uncomfortable-"
A confused haze of nebulous emotion "Who…?"
"-an, I hope Rude doesn't hurt me for this-"
"Daddy…"
So much noise so much noise, oh god-
But that isn't them, is it? That… That one is him. (He can hear a high whining noise and it's not until he swallows that he notices it was him making it.) That was him. He was… something. Or no. No, he just. He is.
"-ion… Ze-"
"So young… God, why did she-" (he tears himself away from that one as fast as he can, panicked and gasping, scuttling back into the last mind he had.)
"-exion… I wonder where Dad is… Zexion said he'd be here… And where's Demyx? I like Demyx, he's nice, brings me cookies, I'm hungry, where's Zexion…"
S.
O.
R.
A.
(The name is spelled out, but all he reads is 'refuge'.)
Demyx reaches out to brush his hands against the edges of Sora's mind, because there, in the forefront, is Zexion, smiling slightly at him, at Sora, at him-Sora, and it's the closest he's going to get to actually having Zexion there, no matter whether or not it hurts because it does and he doesn't know how to make it stop. Sora is drifting to sleep, and Demyx almost desperately clings to the fading image of Zexion (and it's not the same as seeing him there, of course it's not because Sora isn't an empath, so Sora doesn't know how Zexion feels.) But the world around him is pulling together as the small boy slips into slumber, gravity-bound and trembling. Slowly, he relaxes his hands, smoothing his fingers over the sore spots he leaves on his scalp.
But he does not look up. Every inch of him still hurts and he feels like he's been bleeding. He knows, though, that if he looks up, he will be pristine, clean, in scrubs and outwardly fine.
God, it's never been such an unconvincing outside.
He has no idea how long he sits there, mind whirling, tipping precariously between the dark between-space and the bright, harsh, real rasp of everyone else around him. He only knows that eventually he takes a breath and he can feel it all the way through his body, sharp like the snow falling outside, ice crystals biting his lungs.
Demyx opens his eyes.
He stands up. Hands, shaking and jittery, smooth down his scrubs, tugging everything into the right place even if it was never wrong to begin with. Perfunctorily, he checks his badge and keys as he slowly starts the long walk back to his unit. Lexaeus will kill him if something is out of place.
The next hour is a blur of pain and focus because Demyx knows that if he lets go of his precarious hold on his own mind right then, he's going to go insane. Patients blur by, Demyx ignores the sobbing parents of the child – Elena, his mind hisses, Elena – when he passes them, and he goes through the motions of taking care of people like an automaton.
(He feels so exhausted by the end of it that changing into his t-shirt and a pair of jeans is a monumental task. But he manages, as always.)
He stumbles outside after he waves goodbye to Lexaeus and the cold wind bites into him. Hissing, Demyx draws his arms tight around himself. Fuck. His jacket is still inside. He glances back into the warm hospital but shudders away from the broiling mess of emotions the building holds. At least outside, even with the cold snow falling, is quieter than in there. Besides, he knows what he needs, and warmth isn't it.
Hands shaking, he drags his cell phone out of his pants pocket and dials Axel's number without thought.
"Demyx, what is it? What's wrong?" Axel answers immediately, worry lacing his voice.
"Hey, uh, Axel," Demyx rasps out, voice hoarse. He swallows, trying to soften the edges of his voice. "Can we go out to the bar tonight?"
Axel is silent for a long time, too long of a time, and Demyx closes his eyes fiercely to the onslaught of emotion that hurdles at him from the hospital's walls, the buzz of the static across the phone the only thing anchoring him to the world. Finally, Axel replies quietly. "Yeah. We can go. Let me bring the car over to yours, okay?"
Gratefully, Demyx nods, swallowing hard, nausea rising in waves. "Actually, I'm at work still. I just got off. Pick me up here?"
"…Sure. Be there in ten minutes." And the line goes dead.
Demyx slumps against a column, slowly sliding down, hissing as the rough texture of the stone catches his shirt and pulls it up and drags harshly against his skin. Once again, he loses himself for a bit, drifting almost aimlessly in the minds around him as his physical eyes watch the snow drift down. It's almost peaceful.
But eventually, Axel drives up. Eventually, Demyx notices how labored his breathing is, how hard he's shaking, and he knows that it's not all from the cold. The sudden firestorm of Axel's worry does nothing to warm him up, and the lanky redhead doesn't bother getting out of the car to help Demyx in. The crawling, immolating burn of irritation/worry/anxiety/weariness blazes across him as he gets inside the car.
"Do you care where we go?" Axel asks, tone clipped.
Demyx closes his eyes, wondering if he should feel ashamed and only really feeling tired. "Not really."
Axel drives.
They reach a club within minutes, the ride there tense and silent, and Demyx stumbles out of the car. Loud, blaring, rambunctious emotion pounds out of the club, winding through all of the people there until they all feel it too.
This.
Demyx thinks this is the closest anyone else gets to knowing what he feels like. But he's beyond rationalizing it, striding across the pavement and into the bar with a quick nod at the bouncer, Axel trailing somewhere behind him. (They all know him, and he doesn't even have to nudge their emotions to get them to let him in without waiting.)
People.
Everywhere, there are people, pressing against him, hot and insistent, and fuck, he loves it. The tight control he had earlier just slips away from him. Floating between all these people is everything and nothing like the black space, because there he can't feel himself, and here he feels, oh fuck he feels. People sliding along his sides, grinding against him.
Flares of interest spark briefly as he moves through the club unseeing, and he finds one that is more needy, more wanting, less romantic, because what he needs is to be fucked. (Where is he, again? He can't remember.)
But it doesn't matter.
He slides against the person interested in him, purrs out an invitation to dance, dragging him out to wrap himself around the other, hips swaying in time with the bass that has replaced his heartbeat. Interest and emotion and everything shocks into his skin every time he touches someone, laying more and more on his mind, but he just keeps dancing, keeps pressing filthy kisses into the other person's mouth, not caring that it hurts beyond all reason. (He is beyond all reason because reason wouldn't let him hurt like this.)
There is no thought, there is no thought, and it's amazing and effortless but everything still hurts, laced with cyanide and acetone and he loves it.
And then he blinks.
Finds himself in an alleyway, the guy he had –picked up, had he done that, fuck, his head hurts so much – come outside with standing right there in front of him, and for a brief, clear moment, Demyx is so disappointed in himself.
Why does he always expect this to end differently? It never does, but he always thinks (hopes) that maybe tonight won't be the night where he ends up on his knees in a dirty alleyway, face pressed close to someone else's dick, unfamiliar hands buried in his hair and tugging him closer. He stalls briefly, nuzzling at the stranger's thighs, hands going to the sides of his hips, trying to sense what kind of mood the other is in. (The only thing he pick up is need and horniness. He's not surprised.)
"C'mon, Dem," (he starts slightly; had he told them his name? When did that happen?) the man coaxes, shifting his hips closer again.
It isn't that he really wants this, and he knows that even as he shifts on his knees and opens his mouth, haziness slipping back to the forefront of his mind. It is just that he wants something to replace the aching in his head.
Something to distract him from the salt trails on his face.
* * *
Chapter 5...
* * *
I'm sorry that this took so long, but I'm honestly pleased with how it came out. There are reasons for it being so long to post (NAMELY WORK, 21 hour days, fml). BUT THAT DOESN'T MATTER AS THERE IS FIC.
Pairing: Zemyx
Disclaimer: KH = NOT MINE.
Dedications: to
prettypixiechan. Because she is my lovely beta. All other mistakes are my own.Rating: NC-17
Summary: The thing that Demyx wants most in the world is a break from feeling the emotions of other people. He doesn't get that (in fact, it might be the opposite), but what he does get might actually be better. But either Zexion can save his sanity, or be the one thing to push him over the edge.
Chapter Summary: Pounding, rushing, vibrating to his core and all he hears is the sound of distant earthquakes as he covers his ears with his hands, fingers pressing hard and heavy against the back of his skull.
Warnings: This fic contains dubious-consent at times, and severely distressed mental states at others. I will post warnings on specific chapters, so you know what you're getting into.
WARNING: This chapter contains something that could be triggery for some people. Implied Dub!Con is in this chapter, and I think that part of the description can come a little too close to drug use, because Demyx is sorta a junkie on his own thing, okay? Also, minor character death. Read with Caution, but let me know if something in here is too much and I’ll try and edit around it, okay?
* * *
Chapter 3...
* * *
This Ain't a Love Song
* * *
"-and then, with a HUGE ROAR," Demyx raises his arms and starts stomping about the room, gnashing his teeth exaggeratedly to the delight of his captive audience, "the monster swoops up and GRABS the princess!"
Sora gasps in terror, eyes wide, fists clenching hard in the bed sheets. "Is she okay?" he asks earnestly, mouth hanging open.
Demyx waves a finger at him, blinking his way through the thrumming excitement beating bruises into his skin. "Now, now, Sora. Wait until I'm done. I'll get there, I promise."
A soft scoff comes from the doorway, and Demyx lets out an almost embarrassing whimper as wonderful, beautifully smooth amusement runs against his mind, wrapping around to guard it gently from Sora's rampant enthusiasm. Zexion is leaning in the doorframe, eyes sardonic as he murmurs, "Oh please. Sora? Patience? Are we talking about the same child?"
Sora pouts and frowns and generally whines his way into getting Zexion to admit that no, he's really not quite that bad, and all during that time Demyx drinks up the sight and feel of Zexion like a water-starved sunflower turning its face to the sun.
For the sixth day in a row, Demyx has woken up with no headache and with his stomach growling and grumbling at him. For six days, he has stumbled through his morning routine, making breakfast and getting ready for a run, and this is the (he checked the calendar blearily that morning, spoon hovering halfway between his mouth and his food) third day since the last time he threw up. His milk is finally starting to go bad, and the dishes in his sink are being cleaned slowly, day by day. For six days, he has clattered down the stairs, steps uncoordinated and shaky from mere physical tiredness for once with no underlying mental exhaustion. Six entire days, and Demyx stares straight at Zexion, knowing full well that this is the reason why.
A quirk of curiosity plucks against his fingers, and he can see Zexion raising an eyebrow.
He shakes himself, grin sliding back onto his lips like it has never left. As pleasant as getting lost inside Zexion's emotions is (he swiftly curbs the swamp of want he feels just thinking about it), Demyx really can't afford the distraction. "Sorry, where was I?"
"The monster just STOLE the Princess!" Sora throws up his arms in grand gestures that are probably meant to describe either the story or his frustration with Demyx forgetting where they were in said story. The young boy pauses to cough hoarsely, hacking barks that bend his body over itself, and immediately, Zexion is there, one hand running up and down Sora's back, worry creasing his brow and winding itself in the cracks of Demyx's psyche. Eventually, Sora rasps out, "And the hero was about to go save her, right?"
"Right. Now see, the hero-"
"Demyx, what is that? Are you okay?"
Concern.
Demyx blinks at Zexion a little, inwardly delighted at the curls and waves of concern and worry butting against his hands like curious cats even if he doesn't know why. "What is what?"
With a sigh, the slate-haired man reaches out and pushes one sleeve of Demyx's scrubs up, exposing the – oh man was that bruise turning yellow? – scrapes and contusions on his arm. "What in the world is this?" (Demyx braces himself for every bit of skin contact now and isn't whisked away to the inner channels of Zexion's mind when Zexion gently runs his fingers up the scratched area, mapping the damage there with the warm pads of his fingertips.)
Still, he has to concentrate hard to reply nonchalantly, "Oh, this? It's nothing. I fell down a few days ago is all."
"Nothing?" Zexion snorts a little, crossing his arms as he eyes the fading bruises on Demyx's arm. "I think the sun is rising in your arm, Demyx."
Blinking, Sora reaches out and presses down surprisingly hard for a child as small as he is, curiosity sudden and loud like a detonation in his mind. "I don't get it. His arm's not on fire and they taught us in school that the sun was made of fire. I mean, if it was the sun, then shouldn't it be fiery? And besides, bruises hurt."
"That does hurt, Sora," Demyx winces, pulling his arm away gently.
"Oh. Sorry."
A beep calls from the hallway, and Demyx looks up, tilting his head. When the sounds don't stop for a few more seconds, he shakes his head and smiles ruefully at Sora and Zexion. "Sorry, looks like I have to go now." He overrides Sora's half-hearted complaints easily, wagging his finger at the small boy. "I've been spending time with you. Don't you think your brother gets some alone time with you too?"
Sora smiles irrepressibly up at both him and Zexion, chattering away as Demy exits the room. "Yeah, I guess. Come on, Zexy, how's Dad doing, oh, how's Griever, does he miss me, can I see him, how's Riku-?"
Demyx closes the door behind him. Zexion's laughter is still clearly audible and he wants to tangle himself deep within the emotions swelling behind him, so deep he can never leave. But the call tones haven't stopped, so he walks over to the nurse's station, checking which room is calling and hurrying over.
(It ends up being nothing serious, just an IV change and a bored little boy who can't figure out the hospital's television setup. He's grateful for the distraction anyway.)
Sora's door is still closed when he checks again, hovering around the hallways nervously, like a half-starved dog. Demyx shakes his head, irritated. He isn't that desperate. He isn't. He doesn't have to go and ruin Zexion's time alone with his brother for his own petty, selfish (desperate, vital) reasons. Instead, he determinedly hobbles back to the nurses' station, checking charts and paperwork when he reaches the counter.
"Nurse Fitz. You're limping."
Demyx winces slightly, razor sharp edges of concern flitting near him, grazing him. But they barely skim his surface, only glancing around him, and he turns around to face Lexaeus, a smile already firm on his face as he gestures at his arm. "Well, sir, I'm still feeling a little sore from falling down last week. But the bruises are healing nicely!"
"Hn." Lexaeus shifts minutely, his scrubs pulling at his frame. Fleeting pieces of unnamable emotion scatter in the air like mica flakes, thin, iridescent, insubstantial. Demyx shudders through it, closing his eyes to the small bombardment of reflective light, and suddenly there is a stale taste in his mouth that he has almost learned to live without. Running his tongue across the inside of his teeth, Demyx wrinkles his nose. Slowly, the mica settles and Lexaeus nods, some inner conclusion reached. "Make sure to take care of yourself."
Reopening his eyes, Demyx makes a vague, aborted gesture with his hands. "I'm trying, I'm just…"
Lexaeus immediately focuses on him (and it's like all of those flakes suddenly sit up and shine light directly at him), intent and still. "Haven't been sleeping well?" he rumbles.
"Yeah." Demyx rubs distractedly at his face and he swears that he can feel the dark circles under his eyes with his fingers. He shrugs helplessly. "Not much can be done, though."
"That's no excuse for neglecting yourself."
The words are delivered in a carefully even voice, but it doesn't fool Demyx. He has hit a vein of metallic anger with a chisel, irritation ricocheting straight up his arms to settle inside his sternum. Rigid.
Demyx clenches his fists against the emotion even as it loosens his tongue enough to snap back, "Well, it's not like I choose to stay awake too long just so I can fall down the stairs!"
Lexaeus is about to say something when –panic, shit, panic floods him a moment before– alarms start blaring down the hallway. Hospital codes are snapped out in terse voices. Demyx is moving instinctively behind Lexaeus, following the large doctor with a bleary, jittery sort of consciousness, all of the other emotion dumping out of him to make room for this. He reaches out with his mind to touch –young girl, no more than five, scared, not breathing, world going spotty and distorted around her– the patient's mind.
And as he does, he knows that she's going to die.
(That's the part of his gift that he hates most of all. This fatalistic simplicity of just knowing. At least others have the luxury of hope.)
He finds himself with tools under his hands, a smaller body under those, and there are other nurses and doctors with him who are working desperately, equipment beeping frantically around them. There's a flash of nigh-on debilitating fear and panic (the girl's eyes seek out his own, because in this instant she knows, of course she knows) that he responds to by just reaching out to hold her hand and buoying her with something, anything, letting her terror pass through him – paddles, they're pulling out the paddles, fuck that's not a good sign – and he goes so deep in her mind that he can feel the girl's heartbeat stutter and try, painfully, to restart before just….
For a long, stunned moment, Demyx feels nothing.
And then it all comes crashing in. Screaming along his nerves like glass, sorrow and loss and pain dig at him, cut him deep, bleed him dry in their savage all-encompassing whirlwind. He is open and vulnerable, pulling himself out of a psyche that doesn't even exist anymore.
Parents. Of course.
Parents, and they know now that their daughter….
Their daughter is dead.
Demyx stumbles back from the bed, shaking, trembling hard and fast like hummingbird wings. Lexaeus – dark strong tired weighty worried – says something, but the sound is swallowed up in the screeching that fills Demyx's ears. (hears it anyway, "Alright, call it," words he hates.) He gets a flare of acknowledgement from another nurse – tired heartbroken shewassoyoung – and thank god, Lexaeus was talking to someone else, so he turns and ducks out of the room, flinching away from the sobbing, crying, vortex of mess that is the parents of – Elena.
Her name had been Elena.
But that's not important.
Where is Zexion?
Zexion is…
Not in Sora's room, he realizes as he reaches the door, because the door is open and there is no siren-call that is the safety of Zexion's mind. Fuck. Fuck, why now? He needs the sweet protection of Zexion, and the man is nowhere to be found.
He runs.
Hallways flash past him, and he spreads himself over the entire hospital, searching desperately, so desperately for something that isn't there. Zexion isn't in the hospital anymore. There is no water to cool his mind, no smooth and wonderful barrier between him and the rest of the world and everything is so loud, he can't stand it. How the hell did he ever stand this? Sliding down to the floor in an abandoned section, Demyx rests his head against his knees and closes his eyes, trying desperately to keep everything, everyone, else out and as far away from him as possible.
Pounding, rushing, vibrating to his core and all he hears is the sound of distant earthquakes as he covers his ears with his hands, fingers pressing hard and heavy against the back of his skull. The sliding sparks of people's minds rush past, and he samples them briefly in his vain search for relief.
"-bored-"
"shit these chairs are so uncomfortable-"
A confused haze of nebulous emotion "Who…?"
"-an, I hope Rude doesn't hurt me for this-"
"Daddy…"
So much noise so much noise, oh god-
But that isn't them, is it? That… That one is him. (He can hear a high whining noise and it's not until he swallows that he notices it was him making it.) That was him. He was… something. Or no. No, he just. He is.
"-ion… Ze-"
"So young… God, why did she-" (he tears himself away from that one as fast as he can, panicked and gasping, scuttling back into the last mind he had.)
"-exion… I wonder where Dad is… Zexion said he'd be here… And where's Demyx? I like Demyx, he's nice, brings me cookies, I'm hungry, where's Zexion…"
S.
O.
R.
A.
(The name is spelled out, but all he reads is 'refuge'.)
Demyx reaches out to brush his hands against the edges of Sora's mind, because there, in the forefront, is Zexion, smiling slightly at him, at Sora, at him-Sora, and it's the closest he's going to get to actually having Zexion there, no matter whether or not it hurts because it does and he doesn't know how to make it stop. Sora is drifting to sleep, and Demyx almost desperately clings to the fading image of Zexion (and it's not the same as seeing him there, of course it's not because Sora isn't an empath, so Sora doesn't know how Zexion feels.) But the world around him is pulling together as the small boy slips into slumber, gravity-bound and trembling. Slowly, he relaxes his hands, smoothing his fingers over the sore spots he leaves on his scalp.
But he does not look up. Every inch of him still hurts and he feels like he's been bleeding. He knows, though, that if he looks up, he will be pristine, clean, in scrubs and outwardly fine.
God, it's never been such an unconvincing outside.
He has no idea how long he sits there, mind whirling, tipping precariously between the dark between-space and the bright, harsh, real rasp of everyone else around him. He only knows that eventually he takes a breath and he can feel it all the way through his body, sharp like the snow falling outside, ice crystals biting his lungs.
Demyx opens his eyes.
He stands up. Hands, shaking and jittery, smooth down his scrubs, tugging everything into the right place even if it was never wrong to begin with. Perfunctorily, he checks his badge and keys as he slowly starts the long walk back to his unit. Lexaeus will kill him if something is out of place.
The next hour is a blur of pain and focus because Demyx knows that if he lets go of his precarious hold on his own mind right then, he's going to go insane. Patients blur by, Demyx ignores the sobbing parents of the child – Elena, his mind hisses, Elena – when he passes them, and he goes through the motions of taking care of people like an automaton.
(He feels so exhausted by the end of it that changing into his t-shirt and a pair of jeans is a monumental task. But he manages, as always.)
He stumbles outside after he waves goodbye to Lexaeus and the cold wind bites into him. Hissing, Demyx draws his arms tight around himself. Fuck. His jacket is still inside. He glances back into the warm hospital but shudders away from the broiling mess of emotions the building holds. At least outside, even with the cold snow falling, is quieter than in there. Besides, he knows what he needs, and warmth isn't it.
Hands shaking, he drags his cell phone out of his pants pocket and dials Axel's number without thought.
"Demyx, what is it? What's wrong?" Axel answers immediately, worry lacing his voice.
"Hey, uh, Axel," Demyx rasps out, voice hoarse. He swallows, trying to soften the edges of his voice. "Can we go out to the bar tonight?"
Axel is silent for a long time, too long of a time, and Demyx closes his eyes fiercely to the onslaught of emotion that hurdles at him from the hospital's walls, the buzz of the static across the phone the only thing anchoring him to the world. Finally, Axel replies quietly. "Yeah. We can go. Let me bring the car over to yours, okay?"
Gratefully, Demyx nods, swallowing hard, nausea rising in waves. "Actually, I'm at work still. I just got off. Pick me up here?"
"…Sure. Be there in ten minutes." And the line goes dead.
Demyx slumps against a column, slowly sliding down, hissing as the rough texture of the stone catches his shirt and pulls it up and drags harshly against his skin. Once again, he loses himself for a bit, drifting almost aimlessly in the minds around him as his physical eyes watch the snow drift down. It's almost peaceful.
But eventually, Axel drives up. Eventually, Demyx notices how labored his breathing is, how hard he's shaking, and he knows that it's not all from the cold. The sudden firestorm of Axel's worry does nothing to warm him up, and the lanky redhead doesn't bother getting out of the car to help Demyx in. The crawling, immolating burn of irritation/worry/anxiety/weariness blazes across him as he gets inside the car.
"Do you care where we go?" Axel asks, tone clipped.
Demyx closes his eyes, wondering if he should feel ashamed and only really feeling tired. "Not really."
Axel drives.
They reach a club within minutes, the ride there tense and silent, and Demyx stumbles out of the car. Loud, blaring, rambunctious emotion pounds out of the club, winding through all of the people there until they all feel it too.
This.
Demyx thinks this is the closest anyone else gets to knowing what he feels like. But he's beyond rationalizing it, striding across the pavement and into the bar with a quick nod at the bouncer, Axel trailing somewhere behind him. (They all know him, and he doesn't even have to nudge their emotions to get them to let him in without waiting.)
People.
Everywhere, there are people, pressing against him, hot and insistent, and fuck, he loves it. The tight control he had earlier just slips away from him. Floating between all these people is everything and nothing like the black space, because there he can't feel himself, and here he feels, oh fuck he feels. People sliding along his sides, grinding against him.
Flares of interest spark briefly as he moves through the club unseeing, and he finds one that is more needy, more wanting, less romantic, because what he needs is to be fucked. (Where is he, again? He can't remember.)
But it doesn't matter.
He slides against the person interested in him, purrs out an invitation to dance, dragging him out to wrap himself around the other, hips swaying in time with the bass that has replaced his heartbeat. Interest and emotion and everything shocks into his skin every time he touches someone, laying more and more on his mind, but he just keeps dancing, keeps pressing filthy kisses into the other person's mouth, not caring that it hurts beyond all reason. (He is beyond all reason because reason wouldn't let him hurt like this.)
There is no thought, there is no thought, and it's amazing and effortless but everything still hurts, laced with cyanide and acetone and he loves it.
And then he blinks.
Finds himself in an alleyway, the guy he had –picked up, had he done that, fuck, his head hurts so much – come outside with standing right there in front of him, and for a brief, clear moment, Demyx is so disappointed in himself.
Why does he always expect this to end differently? It never does, but he always thinks (hopes) that maybe tonight won't be the night where he ends up on his knees in a dirty alleyway, face pressed close to someone else's dick, unfamiliar hands buried in his hair and tugging him closer. He stalls briefly, nuzzling at the stranger's thighs, hands going to the sides of his hips, trying to sense what kind of mood the other is in. (The only thing he pick up is need and horniness. He's not surprised.)
"C'mon, Dem," (he starts slightly; had he told them his name? When did that happen?) the man coaxes, shifting his hips closer again.
It isn't that he really wants this, and he knows that even as he shifts on his knees and opens his mouth, haziness slipping back to the forefront of his mind. It is just that he wants something to replace the aching in his head.
Something to distract him from the salt trails on his face.
* * *
Chapter 5...
* * *
I'm sorry that this took so long, but I'm honestly pleased with how it came out. There are reasons for it being so long to post (NAMELY WORK, 21 hour days, fml). BUT THAT DOESN'T MATTER AS THERE IS FIC.
