A/N: I haven't updated this in more than a year, I haven't realized. *facepalms* I'm sorry for my failure. XD Anyway. To make up for it, I'll try to make sure this chapter somewhat long. Sorry for any typos, I'm kind of...sleepy. XD
The small building of the pre-school was filled with silence. Tifa Lockhart walked around the room, looking at the innocent faces of the children who were sleeping on the mats laid out on the floor. She bent down to adjust the blankets of some children who had sprawled out and got themselves tangled in their sheets.
They would be asleep for a while. She needed to get a drink though, so she carefully stepped out of the room to head towards the school's small teacher's cafeteria.
The click of the door was Axel's signal. Immediately his eyes opened, and he sat up. Nap time was never for him, he always had too much energy to ever sleep it off. He looked at the bed beside him to see Roxas with his eyes closed, and curled up like a cat. His eyes darted to the side of the room, where the new kid was sleeping.
Demyx was never someone who could sleep still. He always tossed and turned, and ended up throwing his blanket off himself, then later tried to look for it while half asleep and shivering. Just a minute ago, Tifa had tucked him back in, but already his blanket was off him, tangled around his legs.
Axel made quiet steps toward him and shook his shoulder. "Psst. New kid." He whispered straight into his ear.
"Gwaaah!" Immediately, Axel clamed a hand over Demyx' mouth and stood still, to make sure that no one had gotten up. He saw one person sit up, and knew immediately by the blonde spiky hair that it was Roxas. Just as well, it would save him the trouble of having to wake up the kid himself. Roxas looked around groggily, and saw Demyx and Axel. He stood up and came over.
Demyx grabbed Axel's hand and put it off his face. "What's th' big 'dea? It's nap time!"
"Forget 'bout nap time, this is when all th' kids are 'sleep, so we can do what we want."
"…B-b-but…won't we get 'nto trouble?"
"No, 'course not. Only 'f we get caught, right, Roxas?"
"Yeah, me and Axel do this all th' time."
"'Cept Roxas is hard to wake up sometimes."
The mullet-head toddler yawned and rubbed his eyes. "So what do you guys do around here 'stead of sleeping?"
"We play, of course. This is when everyone's just sleepin', so we have all th' toys to play with."
///
Tifa drank down the bottle of water as she walked back down the hall. That was some good water, she thought as she threw the empty bottle in the trashcan right next to the door. Normally, she would be gone longer, but today she wasn't very hungry. She turned the door knob and entered the room.
---
"What's this?" Demyx raised up a doll, and stared at it curiously.
"Aw, that's just some lame doll. It's got cooties on it." Axel shrugged as he continued to poke his head into the toybox.
"Cooties? What's cooties?"
"The stuff that girls got. They're icky." Roxas made a face to emphasize his point. He picked up a toy truck on the floor. "Riku's always playin' with this cool truck, none of us get to play with it."
"Why not? Don't you ask to borrow?"
"Nah. He'd prolly say no."
The three kids immediately looked up when they heard the door knob turn.
"She came back early t'day!"
"Run!"
Axel and Roxas scurried back to their beds and immediately pretended to go back to sleep. Demyx, however, didn't understand what had just happened, so when Tifa walked back into the room, she saw Demyx wide awake, sitting by the play area.
"Demyx! Why're you awake?"
"B-but…" He looked back at the beds and saw Axel and Roxas looking like they were fast asleep. How could they…?
"I'm afraid I'll have to give you a 10 minute timeout."
He frowned and pouted before walking over to the time-out counter. He looked over to the two mats where Axel and Roxas were, and saw Axel mouth a "Sorry."
///20 Minutes Later///
The kids had gone to color the pages that Tifa had distributed.
Axel excused himself and walked over to the nearby shelf. Ms. Lockhart wasn't looking, so while he pretended to be looking at a box of crayons, he stood up on tiptoe to reach the top of the shelf and felt around. Soon enough, he found it-his fingers closed around a small box.
"Waaaah! Ms. Lockhart! I got a boo-boo!"
All eyes turned to the source of the loud cry, and saw Sora bawling loudly.
"Pfft. What a baby." Axel muttered as he pocketed the box of matches and went back to his table.
Sora sniffed and rubbed his tearing eyes as Tifa walked over to him with a first-aid kit in hand.
"A-am I going to die?"
"Of course not, Sora. It's just a papercut."
"B-but it really hurts!" He went back to sobbing.
Axel used the fact that everyone was distracted as his chance-he immediately took the box of matches out and stroke a matchstick against the box. He always loved watching fire, it fascinated him more than anything. Unfortunately, most people just didn't understand…
"What're you doing?"
The call caught Axel off-guard, and he immediately stroke the match too hard while the rest of the box was still open, and the fire quickly spread. As a reflex, Axel immediately threw the matchbox far away from him.
Unfortunately, the direction in which he threw it at was directly towards the same person who had called on him to ask what he was doing- the fire caught on Riku's hair.
The silver-haired boy immediately started screaming and running around, which caught everyone's attention. All the other kids stared at him in shock, wondering where the fire had come from.
Tifa stood up immediately and sighed.
There was always some kind of trouble going on, she thought as she rushed to put the fire out.
///
Man, I'm tired… Tifa walked back to her desk and sat down. Riku and Axel had immediately gone into a fight after she put out the fire, and she had to struggle to separate the two. It got even harder as Sora tried to join in on the fight because Riku was his best friend. It was pure murder to try to pull them apart.
A knock on the door made her look up. Strange, who would come at this time, during the middle of the day?
She turned the doorknob and opened the door, and her eyes widened in surprise when she was met by Cloud. He stood by the doorway with his usual blank expression, and he did a small wave before he ran his fingers through his hair.
"Hey. Thought I'd just drop by."
"Cloud. Nice surprise. Do you want to come in?"
"…Nah, I'm not good with kids."
Her eyes brightened and she put her hands on her hips. "You can handle a lot of fights, Cloud. You're really afraid of a bunch of toddlers?"
"But-"
Before he could react any further, she pulled him in towards the room, and all the children stopped and stared. Some of the girls giggled, and the boys could only stare in wonder at the huge sword behind his back.
"Kids, this is Cloud. A..special friend of mine."
He put his sword down by the door and rubbed at his nape. "Erm. Hi."
"Why don't you go play with them?"
"What? Tifa, you can't be serious."
"Kids, why don't you go and show Cloud some of your toys or drawings?"
"W-wait, I never-"
He was cut short by the surprise of feeling someone jump on him.
"Go Chocobo!" Kairi called out.
"Hey!"
"Hey Mister, where'd you get your sword?" Riku tugged at his shirt.
"I-"
"Mister Cloud, Sir. How did you meet Ms. Lockhart?" Namine' tugged at his hand.
"Well-"
"How'd you get your hair like that?" Demyx looked up at him and grinned.
He was getting smothered by kids. This was why he hesitated to visit.
"Tifa! Help me!"
She giggled and crossed her arms. Cloud was currently struggling not to fall over from all the children pulling him around. Kairi was now currently using his spiky hair as a way for her to not fall from his back, and everytime she slipped; it caused him great pain.
"Grah! Tifa…get me out of here!"
"…I think they like you, Cloud."
///A Few Days Later///
"Class, we have another new kid joining us. Please be nice to him." She gave Axel a stern look as she said it.
"Please…tell the class about yourself."
"…My name is Xemnas…"
"Is that all?"
"…Yeah."
"Alright then. Take your seat over there."
---
Marluxia had always liked Arts and Crafts time. His particular favorite was when they were told to draw flowers. However, on this particular day they had been told to cut out paper hearts and stick them on a big piece of cardboard that Tifa had lain out on the floor at the front of the class.
Cutting out hearts was easy for him. While most of the other kids made theirs disfigured and disproportionate, he always cut out ones that were nicely shaped. He put down the scissors and admired his handy work, and immediately reacted when it was snatched from his hands by…Xemnas.
"Hey! Give it back!"
"Kingdom Heawts will be MINE! Gimme all youw heawts!" He held up the paper heart and ran back to his seat, only to be blocked by Tifa.
"Xemnas. Why did you steal that?"
"…Fow Kingdom…Heawts."
"Give it back and apologize."
He looked down and grumbled. He went over to Marluxia and handed back the paper heart. "Sowwy."
"Now go to time-out."
"Hmph."
Saix' curiosity got the better of him, and when he noticed that Xemnas' time out was over, he immediately walked over.
"Hello. My name is Saix."
"…Hi."
"I heard you talking about Kingdom Hearts…What's that?"
Xemnas went on explaining about the concept he had heard about, and Saix was amazed. They continued to talk until snack time, when they ate cookies and sandwiches while talking about other things.
"Ms. Lockhart!"
A teary-eyed Zexion hurried off from his backpack to Tifa, and tugged at her hand.
"Help. Lexic's gone missing."
"…Lexic?"
"…My stuffed bear. I can't find him."
A/N: Well, it wasn't as long as I had originally hoped for…but meh. It'll do for now. XD I hope you guys enjoyed. Please, I really need suggestions for this fic, because I've been stuck on ideas for a while. Anyway. Reviews are much appreciated. Also, about the writing style…I didn't exactly try to be too descriptive or I didn't try to be very strict about my writing style here...since I kind of consider this a sort-of crack fic. Anyway. Until next time. :D