And yet another fic. xD I never stop, do I? –fall over-

This one's a three-parter, written especially for my dear GeeGee...who I don't think has an account with this site. xD Ah, well. But this is her birthday fic! Everybody send mental 'Happy Birthday!'s to that random person. Yeah, that one over there. Heh, heh.

This is something I've been wanting to write for awhile, actually. They need to make a game just about Axel and Roxas, seriously. Hmph. Maybe I'll create some of my own scenes at Megacon. I'm cosplaying as Axel this year, and my best friend's going as Roxas. Bwhahaha.

Anyway! Enjoy part one. :D

We Were Strangers

No place made sea-salt ice cream like Twilight Town.

Well, Roxas supposed that this wasn't a really a fact. After all, sea-salt ice cream was probably made the exact same way everywhere, not that he had ever been outside of his quaint little hometown to ever taste it anywhere else.

However, it seemed like the best kind in whole known world when it was the first warm day of spring after an unusually cold winter that he could eat the stuff and not freeze into a human Popsicle. Ah, bliss.

"Whoa, Roxas! Save some for the rest of the town." Hayner ran up towards Roxas and clapped a hand on his shoulder, grinning goofily.

"I am!" the blond protested. "This is only my third ice cream today!"

"Third!?" Olette said, raising her eyebrows. "You really are eating enough for all of us."

"C'mon guys, let's get some before Roxas snarfs them all down," Pence joked, digging around in his pockets for some munny. "Ugh, we're gonna have to take on some odd jobs soon..."

"Not until summer!" Hayner declared. "We're too busy with school and all this dumb homework to take on any jobs right now."

"But weren't we going to plan ahead for a trip to the beach this year?" Pence asked, grinning as he found some change in his backpack. Roxas unintentionally flinched. "I'd hate for us to miss it again."

"Yeah, Hayner," Olette teased. "So c'mon. It won't be that bad. Plus, you three always end up copying from my homework anyway!"

"Hey!" Roxas frowned around a mouthful of ice cream. "I only copy from yours half the time! Hayner's the one who's a blockhead."

"And yet I'm the brilliant one who came up with the idea of going to the beach in the first place," he smirked, handing the cashier at the ice cream place some munny. Pence, Olette, and Roxas turned to each other and rolled their eyes behind his back, holding in chuckles.

Hayner, Pence, and Olette were his best friends ever, and nobody understood or knew Roxas better. He had met them all completely by accident when he wandered into their 'Usual Spot' one after many years ago, and even back then was taken aback by the strange sense of familiarity he felt around the three. Years later, it still hadn't diminished and only came back full-force when Pence had mentioned going to the beach.

He couldn't understand it. Why was he so worked up about earning extra munny to go on vacation this year? A lot of kids around Twilight Town did just that. Roxas couldn't shake the weird feeling forming in his gut, but he decided to ignore it and downed the rest of his ice cream, following his friends as they slurped theirs.

"Hey, did any of you guys do the Independent Studies homework?" Hayner suddenly asked when they were all back at the Usual Spot. "I can't figure it out."

"You're impossible," Olette sighed. "Here, let me see it."

"You're a lifesaver."

"I end up doing your homework half the time, so you can make it up to us by buying all of us the ice cream tomorrow, okay?" She smirked a smirk only Roxas could see.

"Fine, fine. Hey Roxas, wanna have a practice Struggle match tomorrow?"

Roxas didn't even blink at the abrupt topic change. Hayner got very bored quite easily. "Sure, I guess, but the Struggle isn't for months. Don't we usually start practicing during spring break?"

"I saw Seifer out on the sandlot the other day." Hayner narrowed his eyes. "He's obviously already practicing, and we can't let him win this year! If it means a few more weeks of practice to win, I'm willing to do it!"

"If only you put as much energy into your homework," Olette said good-naturedly, handing the paper back to the blond. "You'd win the title match and pass all your classes on your own."

"Hmph." Hayner shoved the most-likely-correct homework into his bag. "Thanks, Olette. Double ice cream for you tomorrow."

"Hey!" Roxas and Pence protested.

"Kidding." Hayner grinned. "Hey, I wonder if Seifer's off the sandlot yet. Maybe we could have our practice match now."

"Sure." The word was barely out of Roxas's mouth before Hayner was up and running, crying that the last one there was a rotten egg. Roxas blinked, and suddenly Olette and Pence were off running and laughing. "GUUUYS, WAAAIT!"

"Shake a leg, rotten egg!" Olette giggled when Roxas had arrived at the sandlot huffing and puffing. He just glared between deep gasps of air.

When he'd caught his breath, he realized that Seifer was still taking over the sandlot, and having a match with his buddy Rai at that. However, the minute Seifer noticed Hayner standing there looking very, well, pissed off, he finished Rai off with a whack of his Struggle club ("Geez, that really hurt, ya know!?") and pointed it at Hayner. "Guess I've gotten finish one of you lamers off now."

"You wish." Hayner poised his own Struggle bat and got it ready for battle.

Roxas stayed on the sidelines with Pence and Olette and cheered him on, but some odd reason, couldn't help himself from feeling a little...regret. Was it regret? He didn't know. All he could think was that it was supposed to be him up there having a match with Seifer.

And no ordinary match, either—the title match at the official Struggle tournament. He rubbed his temples. Was he becoming freaking psychic or something? Did this mean he would face Seifer in the title match? Roxas had no idea, but something about that event just pounding in his skull as a misty black fog.

He didn't get it. He hadn't been able to make it to the title match last year because Hayner and Fuu had surprisingly kicked his butt in the preliminary rounds. It was really weird, but now he was totally ready to dominate the title match, hold up the dorky champion belt they always gave the winner, have everyone chant his name proudly--

It wasn't until Hayner had thrown his club in the air in victory that Roxas came out of his thoughts. Blue eyes blinked rapidly and everything quickly came back into focus, his hurried heartbeat slowing down with it. Seifer looked pretty angry, but hey, it was his own fault for challenging Hayner in the first place.

"Just wait until next time, chicken-wuss!" Seifer threatened. He spun around and angrily left the sandlot with Rai and Fuu walking after him, and Vivi slowly tailing behind.

Hayner grabbed the blue club and propped it on his shoulder, grinning broadly. "That should teach him to mess with us. C'mon Roxas, let's practice."

"...Alright," Roxas agreed after a pause. The weird familiarity was still stirring in his stomach, but he cast it aside for now and found another Struggle bat, putting his best battle-face on. Hayner was still grinning, waving his club around with one hand while Roxas held onto his with two, something that only added to the weirdness he was feeling.

In fact, charging at Hayner and yelling battle cries just gave him the strangest sense of...deja vu?

--

"Wow Roxas, you keep that up, and you'll definitely take the title match!" Pence said while the friends were all walking towards their respective homes. "How many matches did you win against Hayner?"

"Okay, okay, Roxas got better at Struggling! I give!" Hayner threw his arms up in defeat, trying to sound angry, but turned and grinned at Roxas to show he wasn't really. "That was really cool the way you fought today. Maybe now we'll finally have someone to put Seifer in his place!"

"Let's hope I can retain my awesome battle skills until then," the blond joked, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Oh, you will!" Hayner paused in front of a very early poster for the Struggle tournament that summer. "Only if you keep working at it, that is. Let's practice every day until then, okay?"

Roxas stared at the poster with unblinking eyes, wondering why it evoked even more weird feelings in him. "Sure." He held up his arm. "It's a promise."

The friends slapped their fists together in some bizarre kind of high-five. "Definitely," Hayner replied.

"Every day?" Olette sighed. She put her hands on her hips and pretended to look annoyed, but it was plain to see that she was trying not to smile. "I hope you're not expecting me to do your homework all those times."

Hayner held up his hands. "I didn't say that!"

"Maybe we could let Olette go up against one of us," Roxas laughed.

"Are you crazy!? She'd kick our butts!"

"Darn right!"

"Uh oh, you guys! You might have a new contender in the tournament!" Pence added, and the four friends laughed for what seemed like ages.

Not for the first time, Roxas wished he didn't have to be apart from them when he went home that night.

--

Roxas knew that it wasn't very unusual to have recurring dreams, but he imagined it was pretty weird to dream the exact same thing for a week in a row, especially if every single time you woke up gasping for air and your heart pounding wildly in your chest.

The dream itself wasn't all that interesting. It was just him in some kind of vague, empty place where colors were a once in a lifetime opportunity. He was always surrounded by a strange black mist that prevented him from seeing more than a few feet in front of him—not that there was much to see.

After running around for a bit, he'd see something—or someone among the fog. It was faintly outlined by slivers of light, and it kept Roxas's attention until a flurry of flames would suddenly erupt and engulf him.

It was when things would start to get interesting that those blue eyes would fly open and he'd be panting for breath, wondering if this all meant something or nothing at all.

--

He knew he probably should've told his friends about the dream and asked them what they thought it meant, but something always stopped him. Roxas always figured that they just wouldn't understand, although now he was wondering if that was really true.

Pffft, like his friends would even take him seriously. Especially Hayner. They'd write it off as nothing but a dream and continue on with their nice, normal lives.

Roxas had to laugh at himself for that one. He'd never been very normal.

"Hey Roxas, you awake?"

"Huh?" The blond blinked and looked around. Hayner, Pence and Olette were standing near the entrance of their Usual Spot, and Hayner had his Struggle bat with him.

"We're heading out to the sandlot," Olette said. "Are you coming? You and Hayner need to keep practicing!"

"Yeah..." Roxas frowned. "Hang on, I don't have my club with me. I'm gonna run home and get it first."

"They got stuff you can borrow," Pence pointed out.

"Hey, that club's my lucky weapon. Who knows how many times I'll beat Hayner with it?" Roxas, Pence, and Olette laughed while Hayner just scoffed and looked sheepish. "Anyway, I'll be quick. You guys go on ahead."

"Okay, man. We'll see you there." Hayner gave a two-fingered salute and started off towards the sandlot.

"If you've not there in fifteen minutes, we'll check the ice cream place." Pence grinned and quickly dodged a smack from Roxas. "Hey, it would be the first place you'd wander off to."

"Yeah, yeah." His friends knew him too well. "I won't get distracted, though," were his parting words before he darted for home, intending to just quickly dash up to his room, grab his Struggle bat, and race back to the sandlot.

Of course, intentions are only as good as the people who have them.

There were a ton of people out and about this time of day; mostly fellow kids that went to Roxas's school or businesspeople getting a late lunch break. Twilight Town was a very quaint little place, but when everybody gathered at once, it could seem overwhelming.

Roxas ducked past a gaggle of schoolgirls onto a relatively empty sidewalk. Ah ha, he knew a shortcut back to his house from here. Awesome. Even better, there was only one other person going this way—well, the opposite way.

The blond didn't even bother to really look at the other person; they were there and going about their business, and that was all that mattered. Roxas was going to get home and then to the sandlot to duel with Hayner in hopes of winning the tournament that summer. Very routine. Very safe.

And then it happened.

It wasn't something Roxas could easily explain to himself or anyone, ever; it was one of those unspeakable things. Sacred.

But as fast as it had happened, it was over. Roxas and the other person on the sidewalk crossed paths on opposite sides of the concrete, and something attacked his very core, a feeling so strong that he was forced to stop in his tracks and turn around to glance at this other person.

The Other Person had stopped and was staring at him. The Other Person wasn't anybody Roxas had ever seen around Twilight Town before; he must've just moved here. There wasn't any doubt he'd forget those outrageously spiky red locks, startling green eyes, and strange facial tattoos.

The redhead frowned, narrowing his eyes slightly. "Have we met?"

For some odd reason, Roxas hesitated to answer 'no', even though he was absolutely positive he'd never seen this guy before. He racked his brain, trying to remember if he'd seen this Other Person somewhere, anywhere before in his lifetime.

But he came up blank, and could only answer the question with, "...No, I don't think so."

Green eyes narrowed even more, seeming to size the blond up with an emotion Roxas couldn't recognize or decipher. After a moment, the redhead shrugged and turned away to continue to wherever he had been going, unaffected by the exchange that had just taken place.

Roxas spun around and began walking home again, but he couldn't ignore how fast or hard his heart was pounding. It felt somehow felt familiar.

It was only a few steps later that he realized it was the same desperate, grasping feeling he always felt when he was woken up from that dream.

Who was that guy?

One thing flitted across Roxas' mind, and he knew the thought would stay there until he obeyed it:

Follow him.

- - - - -

WHAT WILL ROXAS FIND? Tune in, uhh...whenever I write Part II of this, which will hopefully be by the end of the month. Meep.

Reviews are totally loved and appreciated! And you get one of my awesome brownies. Mmm, brownies.