Name: Kels (also answers to "Vinny")

Personal LJ: vaultedthewall

e-mail/gTalk: exitmouse @ gmail.com

AIM: Riceballtohru

MSN: whiterosehime@hotmail.com


A Note On Time: Kels operates on PST (Pacific Standard Time), and in that time zone works 3pm - 1am Mondays through Thursdays (internet access there sometimes, depending on how busy the day - v. busy lately), with people attempting to make her social on Fridays through Sundays from time to time. She's also not much of a morning person. As such, she will usually need slowtimes and apologizes greatly for it.

[...TDGB!AU are not necessarily in order >_>]

Everyone always said the same things about growing up.

That you had to discover things for yourself, that you miss 100% of the shots you don't take, platitudes about how it takes a village to raise a child and you need to let them leave the nest and spread their wings and all other kinds of things that sound like bullshit when you're younger and you know are bullshit when you're on the cusp of adulthood.

They - whoever they are, tend to forget a few things.

Life isn't fair, that's the first one. There's no guarantee that things will even out in the end. Sometimes good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people and there's no reason.

The second one is that growing up is painful, and letting people 'get more experience' and 'find things out for themselves' often means them getting burned at least once so they can learn that fire is bad.

Ienzo is seventeen. Seventeen and a half he'd argue as it's six months past his birthday to the day as of midnight. It's two in the morning. On the one hand he wants to put as much space between himself and the club as possible but on the other hand doesn't know how far he can get on his own and the club is the only thing open in a three block radius right now. He's had alcohol and worse- worse than pot, too, he doesn't want to think of the havoc he's wracked on his body since ten that night.

So he compromises, gets to the edge of the lot not occupied by smokers and other drunks and huddles up by a shut down payphone. Another wave of nausea passes but he's vomited up everything in his stomach and washed his mouth out already, so it only means he makes dry choking sounds while his vision swims.

Fumbling for he doesn't know how long, he manages to pull out his cellphone and thanks whatever higher power there may be (statistically unreliable) that it wasn't stolen or broken in the club. He doesn't have many numbers in there and his vision isn't clear enough to tell any of the names apart, but he knows he listed the only people he'd call now as emergency contacts so their names are highlighted in a bright candy red that just makes him feel like throwing up again.

After a few false starts he manages to hit 'call' for one of them, leaning back against the cool glass of the payphone alcove and trying to shut his eyes against the moving world, hoping he gets someone who's home and will pick up.

Ienzo doesn't know how he'll handle the shame of any of them seeing him like this, but that takes backseat to the desire to make it home as safe as he can be in his current condition.

The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Sixth Level of Hell - The City of Dis!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	Very Low
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	Low
Level 2 (Lustful)	Low
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	Low
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Very Low
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Very High
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	Extreme
Level 7 (Violent)	Extreme
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	High
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	High

Take the Dante's Divine Comedy Inferno Test

Yesterday was not good.

Today was not looking promising, either.

Zexion got out of bed once since returning - to bathe, change his bandages (he needed fresh ones again) and then get right back into bed. There he remained, covers pulled firmly over his head. It looked like one of the Bad Days, as he seemed to have no intention of moving.

Zexion - Ienzo has lost count of how many times he's seen this now.

"STOP IT! STOP IT! EVERYTHING'S GOING TO GO WRONG! LISTEN TO ME, PLEASE!" Every scream comes out no better than a choked whisper as the goes through the motions against his will, doing the tests, setting up the experiment with the others. He steals a glance up at Xehanort - how long since he lost his heart? - and for some reason his face was not his own but a man Zexion didn't recognize, even though he knew - knew! - who it was supposed to be.

"Who are you?"

The tests start, and everything goes so, so wrong.

Xehanort welcomes the darkness like an old friend.

Braig goes next, standing right next to the other man. It hits him on his blind side, before he can even react they're upon him, letting a horrible silence ring, punctured only by everyone's screaming. The darkness itself makes no sound at all, nothing more than a whisper of shadows. A moment Braig is standing and a moment later he isn't completely overtaken by the wave. The last Ienzo sees of him is his hand as Dilan screams his name over and over, fighting against the wave to reach him and only managing to brush fingertips before he, too, is pulled down.

Ienzo is frozen on the spot, sick with the sound of what is happening, completely shocked - we planned this so well, this wasn't supposed to happen - and it never gets any easier. Never gets any less shocking to watch. He doesn't even register Aeleus at his side until he's scooped up into strong arms, feels Even's hands at his side, pushing, the echo of "GO! GO! RUN!" and Aeleus runs, with Ienzo and Even in tow, but it's faster and they don't make it past the nanotechnology labs before Ienzo catches Even stumble out of the corner of his eye and that's all it takes. Shadowy black greedy hands grabbing at the edges of his lab coat, slowing him just bit more, just enough and he's swallowed by the wave before he can even scream.

They reach where the fire doors are and they have precious moments to spare, Aeleus sets Ienzo down and tells him to run, to warn Ansem - the words are lost, their meaning is not, and Ienzo says in return "It's useless - the next set of hazard doors have already closed. You're going to die, Aeleus - Aeleus!" but the memory still plays out like it always does, whatever he says he nods and goes, running as fast as his legs carry him, leaving Aeleus behind to try and hold them off. He can't. He won't. He never does. Ienzo makes it up three flights of stairs and he doesn't know how much time has passed since he last saw Aeleus, but the next set of hazard doors he gets to are firmly closed, locked and sealed, and he bangs on them over and over but to no use.

He smells it before he sees it, before he hears it.

The darkness in every heart.

He prays that this time it will just let him die.

Existence is a curious thing, and not - as Zexion(/Ienzo) is finding out - to be spent alone. Some days are rougher than others, and the nightmares are frequent although he manages enough sleep to function on. Blessedly he is rarely alone, Lexaeus the rock of his existence to hold onto, gone only for the few moments when he absolutely must. Though he did offer Zexion privacy for any company that wished to visit him.

Though Zexion couldn't imagine anyone wanting to do so.

He doesn't have any clothing except the Organization gear, so he spends most of his time in just the pants, the coat no longer needed to keep his solidity against reality. Of course, due to a recent mishap with a mirror he's also sporting bandages from palm to elbow on each arm, and always the puzzle-piece necklace now that he's dug it out of the pile he threw his coat into when he first shed it to sleep.

Zexion doesn't do well with Lexaeus gone for too long. In fact, had he the ability and rationale to sit down and study, he would see that the longer he is alone the more likely something bad is to happen. Usually by his own hand.

He knew the Dragoon had to have left to call someone so he was frantically moving to clean up the mess he'd made of the bathroom mirror, hundreds of tiny nicks and scrapes that were bleeding along his arms from the shards of it. He didn't notice his breathing getting pitched higher and faster as he worked to try and get it all cleaned up before someone arrived. He hadn't had a problem with hyperventilating in ten years, why worry now when there was so much else to worry about on top of it? Powers, there's so much! I didn't hit it that hard! Zexion thought to himself as he worked.

Ask Zexion a question and get an in-character answer here. Go crazy. (If you want an OOC answer or somesuch in regards to a question about the canon, also feel free to ask and just specify! ♥)

"Oh god where is my jacket?"

Ienzo is not panicking. He's got his things mostly packed in an exceptionally orderly manner that would make Dilan proud. They had everything taken care of - car rented, vacation put in for the time needed - the engagement ring was fitted and in its proper place.

Ienzo was going to meet Aeleus's family, because you don't announce these things on the phone.

And he couldn't find his jacket.

"We can't go until I find it my wallet is in there it could be cold where is my jacket?"

Okay, Ienzo might be panicking a little bit.

Ienzo's behavior has been erratic recently these last three weeks. For varying usages of 'erratic' in this context.

He's been spending less time in the labs. You know, just an extra five hours of the day instead of every waking one. He spends a bit less time with Aeleus, and his cell phone seems to be ringing hourly (after the first day he put it on silent mode and only pulled it out of his pocket to frequently glare at and fire off a quick text message it before shoving it back in his bag).

Finally when it lets off the soft buzz of vibration, Ienzo seems ready to snap his pen in half.

"Sorry, I'll be back in ten." he murmurs before heading out into the hallway, looking ready to read someone the riot act. Outside the small windows he doesn't look happy as he paces and talks, but he's actually keeping his volume down.

In five minutes he closes the phone and shoves it back into his pocket, leaning back against the wall to slide down to the ground and just sit there for now. Not upset, or angry... just closed off. Ienzo doesn't come back in right away.

There was a slam of the lab door being shoved open with such force that it banged against the wall and started to bounce back before a small form darted through. A small form in...

Plaid and creme?

A moment later the supplies closet was yanked open and slammed shut with distaste behind the figure that darted in.

"I'M NOT COMING OUT YOU CAN'T MAKE ME." Ienzo declared. He was trying not to touch his face as he paced in the small area the supply closet provided. The only thing more embarrassing than being put in full-on fetish schoolgirl drag with makeup would be having that makeup smudged.

There is a light on in the labs. It's somewhere in the wee hours of the morning, a time unacceptable to have stayed up to but also disagreeable to wake up at. Ienzo falls under the first category.

He went back to his dorms when the others went home hours ago, then promptly returned when he was pretty sure everyone else had cleared out. He preferred to work alone under most circumstances, anyway. The quiet was soothing.

Ienzo rubbed at one of the forming dark circles under his eye before peering into the microscope and making notes on the observations. This was far more important than sleep.

In Agrabah so it was found, in Agrabah it returns to.

That's where it stops, in the pale of the moonlight, landing lightly on the roof.

It stops and waits for it's followers to make themselves visible. It has all the time in the world.