Chapter 1

"Heal! Heal! Heal!" came a soft, desperate voice under a dark hood as she tried to force the magic out.

Beside her, another hooded figure rifled through his pockets trying to find a potion, an elixir, anything that would heal the third figure in front of them.

The third figure lay motionless as dark wisps floated up off his body. He was already starting to fade.

It wasn't supposed to end up this way.

How could things go so wrong?

It started when Axel made the choice to be honest with them. Because of the mess of Sora's memories that were inside them, Xion and/or Roxas could cease to exist, and if there was some way they could stop that from happening, Axel was all for it. But to do that he'd need them to work with him, and they wouldn't be able to do that without all the answers.

Still, there were a lot of things Axel didn't know about how Xion was made, but it seemed like a good start to find out.

Breaking into Vexen's old lab was easy.

Finding out that the higher members Organization wanted Xion to fully absorb Roxas and made her like that on purpose was less easy to comprehend, but at least the notes included a method to stop the effect should the Superior change his mind.

Actually using the notes to stop it was tricker. Neither Roxas nor Xion had a scientific bone in their bodies, and Axel hadn't been to school in a decade and hadn't been the best student at the time either, but somehow, thanks to a dictionary, several double-checks, and a couple of leaps of faith, they managed it… they think.

Accidentally stumbling on Xemnas' notes for his actual plans for Organization XIII. His experiments with time travel and exactly how he was planning on inserting his own heart into all of them. That was harder to swallow.

Getting out of Vexen's lab with this information alive… That was starting to look close to impossible.

The rest of the Organization was just outside the room, flinging their weapons and powers at them through the door, and sending the lesser nobodies in to attack. As it was, the three of them had already exhausted their magic fighting back and were running out of options.

"How did they know we were here?" asked Xion as the three of them crouched behind an upturned desk that had once housed several beakers of who-knows-what chemicals. They were now all shattered on the ground around them, and they could only hope they weren't toxic or flammable.

"Musta been some security we didn't know about," said Axel standing up to launch his chakram over the desk at their attackers. "And with those notes, I can see why."

"They can't know we've found them, though!" said Roxas. "For all they know, we just walked in here and didn't see them."

Axel let out a snort. "Trust me, Roxas. They're paranoid enough not to risk it."

"WATCH OUT!" shouted Xion, and Roxas ducked just in time to avoid one of Xaldin's lances skewering him.

Axel made a strangled sound in the back of his throat at the sight, and said, "Okay, that's it. We're out of here!" He raised his hand and opened a Corridor of Darkness. "Go on, get through it!"

Both Roxas and Xion crawled towards the corridor, but in seeming to realize they were trying to escape, the rest of the Organization's attacks increased in earnest.

One such attack, from Xemnas if the red bolt was any indication, hit one of the experiments next to his time travel notes, making the experiment begin glowing ominously.

Axel knew a coming explosion when he saw one, and this one looked to be a doozy. "LOOK OUT!" he shouted, throwing himself over top of Roxas and Xion, covering them and tackling them into the corridor just as the experiment detonated.

All three of them cried out as the experiment rocketed them through the corridor. But Axel's cry was the loudest of all and sent a chill down the other two's spine as they recognized it.

It was a cry of pain!

The corridor dumped them out onto a cobblestone street.

Roxas groaned as he ended up on the bottom of the pile. "You okay?" he asked his friends.

"I'm fine," said Xion from where she was sandwiched between Roxas and Axel. "How about you, Axel?"

Axel didn't reply, nor did he make any move to get off them.

"Axel?" asked Roxas, worry creeping into his tone.

Axel let out a pained wheeze.

"AXEL!" shouted both keyblade wielders.

Scrambling to get out from underneath him without hurting him, the two were horrified to see the back of Axel's coat ripped to shreds and his back underneath it didn't look any better.

"Axel… no!" whimpered Xion at the sight of it. She quickly pressed her hands to the injuries. "Heal!" she said, trying to call on her exhausted magic to repair it, but the healing green glow didn't come.

"Heal!" said Roxas beside her, but nothing happened for him either.

Axel was hurt, and they had no way to heal him.

"W-We need to get help," said Roxas as he scrambled to lift Axel so his arm was around his shoulders, and Xion hurried to do the same on the other side.

"Help where?" Xion asked. "We don't even know where we are?"

Between them, Axel groaned and opened his eyes. "R-Radiant Garden?" he muttered.

"Axel?" asked Roxas hopefully.

"We're in… Radiant Garden," Axel slurred as he looked around with hazy eyes. "But… how? It was destroyed."

Roxas and Xion looked around at the world they'd landed in for the first time. Despite it being night, there was still something bright about the world. Flowers were growing all around, fountains babbled merrily in their ponds, and a tall ornate castle loomed in the distance.

"Pretty," Xion muttered distractedly.

"If you know this place, do you know where we can get help?" asked Roxas urgently.

Axel groaned and gestured vaguely in one direction, and the younger two hurried to follow it.

The three limped as best they could through the empty streets, searching for something or someone who could help them.

But there was no one there.

Finally, Axel pitched over as they walked through an alleyway, dropping out of both the younger two's arms.

They hurried to try and pick him up again, only to freeze as they noticed dark whisps were beginning to flake off of Axel's form.

"No, no, no, no, no!" said Roxas as he began searching his pockets for any healing items, and his eyes scanning the streets for a Moogle.

With a desperate gasp, Xion fell to her knees next to their friend and pressed her hands to his wound. "Heal! Heal! Heal!" she whispered desperately.

But it was no use.

As another wave of dizziness passed and knowing he didn't have much time left, Axel turned his head to look at them, and despite the pain, his eyes widened in surprise.

Roxas had tears streaming down his cheeks as he searched around them for any chests that might hold items or a Heartless he could kill for HP orbs, and Xion was still trying to heal him despite how her words had turned to sobs.

"You're crying," Axel said.

The two of them stared at him in surprise, both at the fact he was talking, and what he'd said, seeming to notice their own tears for the first time.

Their confusion grew even more when they saw Axel smile a bit at the sight of it. "Then you do have hearts," he managed to say. "Need hearts to cry, after all."

"Axel," said Xion in a broken tone.

"Just hang on," insisted Roxas. "We'll- We'll-"

"You'll be… fine," Axel managed to say. "Don't need me or the Organization anymore."

"That's not true!" Xion protested.

"Axel, don't go," said Roxas. "We still need to get you your heart."

Axel managed to let out a weak chuckle. "Funny… Spending time with you… made me feel like I had one…"

With that, Axel faded away completely, leaving nothing behind.

Xion let out a devastated scream as she sobbed, and Roxas surged to his feet, summoning his keyblade and attacking the trash bins and anything else in the alley in a rage of loss. Wishing the things he was destroying was Xemnas and the other Organization members.

IT WASN'T FAIR!

When his anger was finally abated, Roxas dropped back down next to Xion and wrapped an arm around her still shaking shoulders.

"He's gone," Xion whimpered.

Roxas hugged her tighter. "Who else are we going to have ice cream with?" he asked hopelessly.

"I don't know," Xion replied.

They stayed huddled there and miserable the rest of the night.

Meanwhile, in a house several blocks away, a boy with spiky red hair shot up out of bed.

"Roxas," he said breathlessly as ten years' worth of memories suddenly floated around in his head and showed him faces of people he'd never met. "Xion."

Another face floated through his mind. This one familiar, and yet not at the same time with an x-shaped scar and glaring yellow eyes.

Suddenly worried for his friend, the boy shot out of bed. "Isa!"

A/N I honestly came up with and finished this a couple of months ago. Then decided to hold off posting it until I thought of a title, forgot about it, and then found it again and decided to post it even though I still hadn't thought of a good title, and just came up with this one last night. This is a short, five-chapter thing that I may expand on eventually, but for the time being, I just wanted to write something short and lighthearted... I say lighthearted, and then I kill off Axel in the first chapter. It gets better, I swear. Lea just woke up with all of Axel's memories and no way he's going to leave Roxas and Xion in the cold.

Anywho, I love Kingdom Hearts, for all its flaws it's my favorite game series. I also love time travel stories and was happy to try my hand at one. I know Kingdom Hearts has some set (if confusing) time travel rules, but I'm not going to go into how Axel, Roxas, and Xion were able to do that, but just know that taking dark corridors next to exploding time travel experiments is not something to recommend. To be honest, I just wanted to write a Roxas and Xion don't get absorbed story, and this is what came from it. I hope you enjoy.

Updates on Saturdays.

Next Time: Lea tells Isa about his 'weird dream', and the two go looking for answers.