Re: The Key and The Flame: On The Run ~ Days, BBS, and perhaps Re:Coded Spoilers are included
~New Recruit~
Day 366
Ten days earlier, Xemnas walked into Vexen's room. The long-haired, light blonde forty-year-old turned to face the intruder. "Xemnas, what brings you in here?" Vexen asked the hooded leader of the Organization.
Xemnas looked around the small, ivory room that belonged to No. IV, the Icy Academic. Graphs and maps of paper littered the floor, several white books littered the long white bed, and the shelves were stacked with beakers and tubes containing a charcoal colored substance within it. "I came to check on how progress is coming with the Replica Program," Xemnas replied.
"Oh really, and might I ask why you didn't send Saix here like you usually do?" Vexen asked annoyed.
Xemnas didn't pay no attention to Icy Academic's words as he was about to exit the room. All he saw was two dolls clothed in black coats that were by Vexen's bedside. "I trust that those are the replicas, right?" Xemnas asked as he was about to exit the door.
"Indeed, they are," Vexen replied. "However, I am very fond of one of my replicas, No. i. I've been working very dilligently on it for quite some time now."
"Finish it," Xemnas said cutting off Vexen.
"Excuse me, but you cannot rush progress," Vexen interjected.
"That replica better be ready before he shows up. If it isn't than you'll pay for your mistake," Xemnas said in a cold voice that made Vexen quiver. He turned away from the blonde and exited the room.
~~~
Xemnas had called a meeting in the Round Room the day before. Xigbar, Saix, Xemnas, and of course me were selected for this meeting. Xemnas smirked with satisfaction. I called out to the elderly silvernette, “Hey boss, why’d you call us here?”
Xemnas replied, “We have reason to believe that we have found our new member.”
“Finally,” snorted Xigbar.
“That’s great! But, who’s going to be the one to locate him?” I asked.
With that, everyone just laughed. Xemnas gave a slight smirk. “Why you Number VIII, of course,” replied the old man.
“Me?”
I was sitting on the couch in the Grey Area, a rest area for us, Organization members as you would say. The Savage Nymph and the Graceful Assassin sat across from me on the same couch conversing about who knows what. “Lord Xemnas has order you to Twilight Town today,” said a cold voice.
I turned around to see the Luna diviner glaring at me. He walked over to a corner of the room far away from the other members (Marluxia, Larxene, and Zexion). There we conversed. “What do you want?!”
“Lord Xemnas has ordered me to give you an important mission to retrieve a possible new member. We have gotten word that he appeared in front of the old mansion just days ago.”
“Isn’t that Xaldin and Xigbar’s jobs?”
Saix rolled his eyes. “You remember what happened days earlier, right?”
I remained still for a couple of moments and gave a slight nod. “Yeah, so what about it?” exclaimed me.
“Number VIII, we have reason to believe that this might be Sora’s Nobody. We need you to go there right now, use force if necessary and bring him back to us, unharmed.”
“Okay, I get the deal. I’ll go, right now.”
I flicked my wrist open and summoned a vortex of dark energy. This vortex is what you call a Dark Corridor.
We, like the Heartless use them to get from place to place. I headed through the vortex. My body was swallowed up within the darkness as it usual was.
My body emerged out from the vortex into a lush green forest. I looked around to see there was an old gate up ahead. The gate was locked heavily, but behind the gate was a two-story building, which appeared to be in disrepair. Shocking thing was that were white curtains in one of his unbroken windows. “Big mess, but no
Nobody in sight,” I thought.
It was already four and I was ‘upset’ with the fact that I didn’t find anything. So, I went to end my mission and did what I usually do, go into town, buy a Sea-salt ice cream, and probably go to the clock tower to eat my ‘Icing of the cake.’
I was at the shop, buying myself an ice cream when three voices broke the calm silence of the large, empty street, which several shops, houses, alleyways, and even the local tunnel stood known as the Tram Commons.
“Hayner, no fair, why do you get to hog the ice cream?”
“Because, I’m the eldest.”
“Guys, please calm down.”
I turned around to see three kids. One cocky blonde teen around fifteen walking ahead of two dark-haired teens with a frozen, blue treat in his hands, and he had a big smirk on his face. There I noticed something out of the ordinary. I wasn’t the only person there. A boy about the same age as the teens, wearing a grey jacket with black-checkered stripes going up to his arms were, sandy-blonde spikes, brown and black pants, and dark tennis shoes walked passed the three. He stopped and stared at the three with curiosity.
I scratched the back of my long, crimson spikes and watched the boy. His face turned to my direction. The boy’s face reminded me of Sora. But, that couldn’t be Sora. Sora was now a Heartless, specifically a Neoshadow and it was locked up heavily somewhere within the Castle That Never Was. The only conclusion left was this kid was his Nobody or something.
I had a moment where Saix’s words flashed through my mind.
“If you ever encounter a boy who appears to resemble Sora, you are to call him by this name. Got it?”
“Okay, I got it memorized, Saix!”
My thoughts returned to the present. I stared at the boy and he stopped and stared at me. “Roxas?”
The boy’s eyes almost bulged out of his sockets. He got a nervous look on his face and stepped backwards. The boy looked around and then fled. Now, I knew this was the promised possible member. I followed after the boy. He ran into a hole in the wall, which led to the outskirts of the town to that old mansion. I squeezed in and chased after him.
He led me back to the old mansion. Roxas stood in front of the locked gate. I made way through the forest.
“There’s no use running, Roxas. If you don’t accept your fate and come with me then I will leave you to perish.”
The blonde spun around. His face, those aqua-blue eyes glared at me with anger. He spat as he summoned a Keyblade, similar to the one that Sora had when I first met him back at Hollow Bastion in his hands, “I am not going with the likes of you.”
“Oh?”
“Shut up. You know, what your kind did to me. You took away everything from me. I want Riku, Kairi, Donald, and Goofy back. I want my life back!”
“You do realize that you aren’t Sora anymore, right?”
“Shut up!”
The boy, Roxas dashed towards me with that sword shaped like a giant key. I jumped out of the way and towards the gate. My red and silver chakrams appeared in my hands in a fiery of red flames. “What are you?!” yelled the boy as he ran back at me again with his Keyblade.
I was about to chuckle at this comment. Didn’t this kid know that he no longer had a heart and that he was an empty vessel now?
I held my chakrams in front of me to block the kid’s swings. “Axel, good job in luring our new recruit here,” said a voice.
Roxas and my eyes’ opened wide as a hooded figure appeared in front of us. He wore the same, black coat as I did. “Boss, why are you here?” I asked.
Xemnas just snickered and looked back at the boy and then at me. “Axel, you may go. I want to test this boy.”
My chakrams disappeared within the flames that came. Xemnas’ Etereal or those neon-blue light saber-blades appeared. He turned to the boy. Roxas attempted to swing his Keyblade at Xemnas, but little did he realize that Xemnas was stronger. He knocked that Keyblade out of the boy’s hands and into the dirt. “It would appear that you need some discipline, Roxas.”
“Stop calling me that!”
I found my way out of the fight. Roxas was no longer concentrated on me but now on Xemnas. Xemnas cast a Graviga on the boy. It brought the boy helplessly up into the sky and attached to a black, liquid circle. The boss held out his light sabers and struck an electrifying current towards him. Roxas was struck unconscious by the fierce current.
The Graviga vanished and Roxas fell to the ground. Xemnas approached the unconscious boy and waved a hand over the boy.
“What are you doing to him, boss?” asked I.
“Number VIII, I am only just erasing his memories. It will take some time, but when I am finished. He won’t remember this fight and all his memories will be gone. Roxas will be no more than an empty mind that will left to mold according to our liking.”
I disappeared within the darkness from which I came.
I returned later on that day. Roxas stood upwards and stared at me. I approached him, but something different appeared. He looked out of it, like a zombie. I called, “Hey Roxas.”
The boy didn’t reply. He just stood there staring into space. “So, I guess this is what Xemnas meant by empty mind.”
I approached the Keyblade Master’s Nobody. He didn’t flinch away or move an inch. I took him into town to get a Sea-salt ice cream. He was still transfixed by those three kids. I placed a hand on his shoulder and tried to snap him out of it. It didn’t work until after those kids vanished from sight.
After that, I gave Roxas his Sea-salt ice cream. It was hard getting him to eat it. He had to stare at me and copy what I did. To my amazement, Roxas began eating the frozen treat.
“It’s salty,” said the boy as he held his lips together and then brought them back together to take another bite of it. “But sweet.”
I shrugged, “I guess it is.” My lips made contact with the ice cream. The coldness made me gasp.
Roxas gave me a shrug and then laughed.
I rolled my eyes.
The two of us didn’t leave until the sun went down. I summoned a portal open to the World That Never Was.
“We’re going home, Roxas. Are you ready?”
“Home?” said the boy.
“Yeah, it’s the place that you and I are going to right now.”
Roxas got up. I entered the vortex. The kid stared at it with fear, but he reluctantly followed.
