diatu | Kingdom Hearts Catch All

Kingdom Hearts Catch All

Who: Lea and other Kingdom Hearts characters
When: Various times through May and June
Where: Various locations
What: Any random tidbits of interaction for the messed-up key-children and friends that don't fit elsewhere.
Warnings: Kingdom Hearts drama. It's inevitable. Also probably more than a little ice cream.

Discussion of dancing with Xion

Xion would find Lea sitting on a bench under a tree, sketching something on a pad of paper. He'd look at it, frown thoughtfully, then erase a bit and redo it until he was satisfied. It was still a little while til sunset, but he was always up for a little chat.

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"...I don't think that will work this time, Xion." He frowned as he said it, the words making him turn his head and glance away.

"Back then, Sora's heart and memories were incomplete, and we were the pieces that he needed to wake up. That's why we needed to return to him. But his memories are repaired now, and his heart is whole. So he doesn't need us to fill in the pieces anymore; he's got them all already. And we're not the only connection Sora has. He's got connections to Riku and Kairi, Naminé, Axel, Donald and Goofy... even Ventus and his friends." And that's not even counting all the hearts he's come in contact with across the various worlds that Sora's traveled to.

"There are so many hearts connected to Sora's now... and even with that many connections, none of us know where he is. This is different than just a piece of his heart being missing or his memories being lost. He used a power that none of us fully understand, and King Mickey even warned him that he would have to pay a price for doing so. I know he's out there, I just... can't find him." He slowly rests his free hand over his chest as he speaks, and his tone almost sounds wistful; the rage he once felt at Sora long gone. He pauses for a moment before he turns to Xion.

"Him being gone has nothing to do with us this time. And if us being connection for Sora to return is the way to bring him back, then how can we do that if we're trapped in his heart?"

"I don't know," she said quietly. "There is so much of this that I don't understand. I just... I don't want you and Axel to be hurt anymore."

"There are parts of it I don't understand either. But I know I don't want to lose my friends if I don't have to."

He turned back to Xion, gently squeezing the hand he was holding. "And if you disappeared, I know for a fact Axel and I would both be hurting. Just like you and him would hurt if I disappeared again."

She closed her eyes. "I don't want to ever hurt either of you," she whispered. "But... what if..." She really didn't want to ask this. She was afraid of the answer. And more afraid he wouldn't care. But if her vanishing would hurt him... he and Axel needed to understand why, so it would hurt less. "What if my being here hurts you worse than my being gone?"

"It won't."

He said it with certainty, almost as if she asked if the sun would rise in the west, or if the sky would turn green.

"And you want to know how I know that? Because if it did, we wouldn't have made it out of the Keyblade Graveyard. That might not make sense right now, but maybe one day it will. You deserve to be your own person just as much as I do, Xion."

He was right that it didn't make sense to her. But it also meant that he didn't realize what she had almost said, which had her again hesitating to say it.

"Deserve?" All she had ever done was make things worse. How could she deserve anything positive?

"Yeah. Because we're the same."

He let go of her hand and turned slightly, shifting a nearby box enough so that he could take a seat on it before he continued.

"We never asked to be born, and people used us to get to goals we didn't understand. But just because we're born that way... it doesn't mean we're only tools."

A small frown graced his features and he briefly looked away, remembering DiZ's mocking words, how he should have considered himself a tool, at best. But he shook his head; it won't do him good to dwell on the past.

"We're living things, and we deserve a chance at living our own lives. That's what I fought for, back in the Keyblade Graveyard. A second chance at life, without someone dictating it for me." He looked back at Xion, the small smile returning.

"You were fighting that same fight beside me. And Sora fought for that, too. He wanted us to have our own lives... he wanted all of us to be freed from Xehanort's plans. And we accomplished that goal. So even if Sora did something stupid, we don't have to be afraid anymore. And knowing Sora, he'll find his way back to us, and probably find a way to bring another friend along with him."

She sat down beside him. "I want to believe that," she said softly. "But I wasn't born the way you are, Roxas. We may have come from the same Somebody, but we're not the same." She was broken in ways none of the others were.

"Our situations were the same, though." Roxas turned to her, frowning at her. "We were both put in the same spot by the Organization, weren't we?"

Both of them had just been kids, who both came from the same person, and happened to wield the Keyblade.

"I know it probably doesn't make sense right now, but... you've gotta trust me. You're more than just a part of Sora, just like I am."

She wanted that to be true, very much she wanted that to be true. But she didn't know if it was, or it just was what he wanted too. She looked down at her gloves, unsure.

He wanted Xion to believe him, though he wasn't sure how. He could see how nervous and unsure she was, and he hated seeing her like that. He didn't have much to offer her other than his words, but he hoped that, at least sometime soon, she could trust him as she did back home.

They sat in silence for a while, before he gently nudged her with his arm. "Hey... do you know if they have ice cream here? I could really go for some right now."

She looked up shocked. "You didn't go to have ice cream with Axel at sunset?" she asked, stunned. "He waited there alone and neither of us came?" She jumped to her feet, pulling Roxas by the hand as she ran for the ice crematorium.