Organization XII: Lost Stories
Hi, my name is Roxas. I am the thirteenth member in Organization XII. Well, I guess your probably thinking something along the lines of: 'Oh, since it's called Organization XII, there's only thirteen members.' Well, you're wrong. There are fourteen members to be exact. But it wasn't always like that. Xion, member fourteen, was the newest member in the team. She acted like a zombie; she never spoke unless asked a question, she hid her face from everyone as if under her hood there was a terrible monster, and she acted as if she didn't know anything at all. I wondered if I had acted like that when I first arrived. My friend Axel told me I was the exact same; minus the covering my face part.
I learned a lot of things about Xion. Some were breathe taking, others….not so much. At first, we all became really good friends. After every mission the three of us would meet up at clock tower and treat ourselves to a sea-salt ice cream. Then one day Xion had to go out on a mission. From what I heard, her mission was to seek out the traitor amongst our Organization, and eliminate them. Xion had failed the mission and was defeated by the strange target. I never really learned much about whom or what the target was, all I know is they wielded the Keyblade; like Xion and me. After that mission Xion started acting strange. She stopped coming to hang out with me and Axel, and it was if she tried avoiding me every time I'd say hello. Then one day I finally got to talk to her and asked her why she was being like this.
She told me that Saix called her a mistake; broken. She told me that when she returned from her failed mission, Saix gave her heck for not coming back with a 'Mission complete!' expression on her face. But broken? A mistake? Xion was certainly not a mistake, and not broken for that matter. I thought you used the term broken when something like an item wasn't of any use anymore because it couldn't work. And a mistake is something you yourself make, something by accident. It was as if Saix was claiming he had command and control over Xion, and that she was an object to him. I became a little furious after that, and I went to tell Axel about it. I told him everything. I covered every detail Xion had told me. Axel seemed to glance away worriedly from me when I explained to him. He got me curious, but he soon gave me a small smile and told me that's just how Saix was; but he said he'd go talk to him and ask him what the big deal was. That's all I know for now, since we're caught up in the present. But I'm going to write everything that happens every day, until I finally understand the truth behind Xion. And why Saix seems to hate her so much.
"Hey! Roxas! Get up already, will ya?" a voice boomed. My eyes fluttered open. I saw Axel standing over me; his eyes squinted at me with annoyance. He threw his arms in the air.
"Geez! Took you long enough." He sighed. I hopped out of my bed and rubbed my eyes sleepily.
"Sorry…" I mumbled to him. We both walked out of the room and headed over to the area –I like to call it the lounge or lobby- where Saix assigned us missions; and where Demyx would sit and play his sitar.
"Good morning Roxas." I heard a voice say to me. I turned around to find Xion walking towards Axel and me.
"Hey." I smiled at her happily. I really hoped that the three of us would get a mission together.
"Don't hold your breath." Axel told me, as if reading my mind. He was right; Saix had never assigned a three man mission before. I sighed and made my way over to the 'boss'.
"Your mission today will be to do recon in a new world." Saix informed me. I waited patiently. Was he going to tell me anything else?
"Um, am I going to be teamed up with anyone?" I asked, getting my hopes a little too high. Saix thought for a moment, then he glared down at me. I felt puny under his gaze, and I couldn't look him in the eyes.
"Now that I think about it you will be teamed up with someone. Today it'll be Demyx. Try to inspire him." He said before turning away to gaze out into the strange world below. I frowned. Great! I was teamed up with the laziest member on the team! He even said he wasn't cut out for combat. I went over to tell Axel and Xion.
"I'm doing recon," I told them. Axel raised an eyebrow as if to say: 'That it?' I guess it wouldn't hurt to tell them. "I'm going with Demyx." I saw a smile flicker across Xion's face.
"With Demyx? Ha! Have fun with that." She giggled. I couldn't help but smile myself.
"Yeah, I guess it is pretty bad. Maybe he'll whack a couple Heartless with that sitar of his." I laughed. Axel chuckled.
"Hah, that'd make him useful." He said. I nodded. Demyx walked over to us, yawning loudly.
"Hey Roxas, it's me and you today, huh? Well at least its only recon. No hearts to collect." He said with a little hint of cheerfulness. I shrugged.
"I guess." I muttered. It was about time we headed off; Saix hated when we lagged around chatting. Demyx held out his hand and a black vortex appeared in front of us. The two of us walked through it and it disappeared behind us. We arrived in the new world Saix had assigned us to. It was strange; covered in sand, with lots of pottery and old walls.
"Strange place, hey?" Demyx said as he peered around. I nodded.
"Well, let's look around for anything suspicious." I replied to him. Recon was all about scoping out the place; finding anything strange or any secret places. It was all about exploration; no combat. Just how Demyx liked it. I walked over to the right side of the city; placing my hand against the rock wall.
"It's like it been blown down and rebuilt a couple times." I noted. Demyx made his way over to me.
"Yeah, it looks almost ancient." He agreed with me. I look over to the left and saw a huge pile of sand. It was filling up an old shop stand.
"Wow, this place must've been hit with a sandstorm or something." I walked over to it. I picked up some sand and sifted it in my glove; nothing seemed to be buried under it; nothing special at least.
"I want to RTC now." Demyx sighed. RTC stands for: 'Return to the Castle.' I sighed.
"Demyx, we haven't done enough recon yet for us to RTC so soon." I told him flatly. He groaned loudly as we headed deeper into the city. I peered around the wall and saw two people standing in the center of the ruined city.
"Hush! We can't be seen. Let's stay behind this wall and listen to what their saying." I suggested to Demyx. He flopped down beside me as we hid quietly behind the rocky wall.
"Jasmine, we have to do repairs to the city before another sandstorm hits! If we don't, this place could be torn apart." I heard the male say.
"But Aladdin, I don't want you getting injured." The female's voice sounded worried. It seemed as though my hypothesis was correct; the city was hit by a sandstorm before. It sounded as if the male wanted to do further repairs on the city before they got hit again, but the female wanted for the boy, so called Aladdin, to be safe.
"Hey you were right Roxas! You must be physic or something." Demyx said to me. I sighed and shook my head.
"No Demyx, I'm not physic. I just examined the city is all." I replied to him. I could hear footsteps getting close to us. I grabbed Demyx by the arm and led him behind a pile of sand; where we could hide and do some more eavesdropping.
"Please Jasmine; you know how much Agrabah means to me; to us! You have to let me do construction. I just want you to be safe." I could hear Aladdin's voice.
"No Aladdin. I can't allow you to do that," Jasmine replied to him. From behind the sand I could see her smile. "At least, I won't let you do that alone." Aladdin smiled brightly and grabbed Jasmine's hand.
"Come on! We'll rebuild Agrabah; together!" he cheered. The two walked out of the city and into the desert.
"I wonder where they're going." I mumbled quietly. Demyx got up and stretched. "Well we won't be sticking around to find out. I think we've done enough recon for today's mission." He said. I nodded. It was about time to RTC. Demyx summoned the portal and we returned back to the base.
"I'll be going now." I told him as I made another portal appear. Demyx gave me a small wave as he flopped down to play his sitar. I walked through the portal and appeared in Twilight Town. This was the town where Axel, Xion, and I would get together for ice cream. I walked over to the shop and bought myself one. I headed up to the clock tower. When I arrived at the top, I sat carefully on the ledge of the roof. The clock was resting high above me. I nibbled on my ice cream and waited patiently for them.
"You're early." Someone said to me. I turned and saw Axel coming to sit beside me. I smiled and nodded.
"Yeah, it was fairly easy. I went to this place called Agrabah; it was covered in sand! I heard two people talking, and they were going to repair the city in case another sandstorm hit." I told him excitedly about my mission. Axel nodded.
"I see. How was Demyx then? Did he do anything useful?" he wondered. I shook my head.
"Nah, he was slacking like usual. Unless you consider complaining as useful." I laughed. Axel laughed along with me. He had bought an ice cream for himself, and he began to eat it. I sighed and looked down below; where I could see the bustling Twilight Town.
"I wonder if Xion's coming today…" I said quietly. My ice cream began to drip. Axel looked at me, but his gaze seemed to be fixed beside my face; not looking directly into my eyes.
"Eat your ice cream before it melts." He said to me. I licked my treat contently. It was getting late; once again Xion didn't show up for sea salt ice cream.
The next morning I got up early. Saix wasn't in the lobby, so I just assumed he was doing other things. I knew one thing for sure; he wasn't sleeping. Saix was like a zombie. He never slept, he only worked, worked, and worked some more. It seemed like he never got tired. I went over to the pure white couch and flopped down. I figured I might as well get comfortable and relax while I could; Saix will be hauling missions to me soon anyways.
"Who ever said we could lounge about?" I heard someone say. I immediately jumped off the couch and stood stiff and straight. I expected to see Saix stalk in, huffing and puffing and giving me a lecture. But instead Axel came into the room with a big smile on his face. I let out a sigh of relief and settled back into the couch.
"Looks like I gave you quite a scare." He said as he settled down beside me. I crossed my arms and rolled my eyes.
"A-As if, I knew it was you all along. I was just pretending." I tried to sound serious and mature. Axel rustled my hair and laughed. He always treated me like a kid. He thinks he's a know-it-all, a tough guy, someone who's as strong as a leader and as productive as a captain. It irritated me sometimes, the way he acted towards me. I was just as strong as he was, maybe even stronger. I was the one who wielded the Keyblade.
"Axel, you know I hate when you do that. Stop treating me like a kid. I'm just the same as you." I muttered. Axel looked at me. Again, I noticed, his gaze wasn't set at my eyes, but past me instead.
"What's with you? It's like Saix gave you the 'seriousness disease'." He told me with a small smile. I couldn't help but smile back. Saix was known for his seriousness and firm attitude on life. He wanted to achieve Kingdom Hearts so badly. It was like he thirsted to complete the goal. I didn't see what the big deal was. I mean, he acts as if Nobodies like us aren't meant to live. I think that with or without a heart, you're still a person. Even if I am a Nobody, I sometimes feel what they call emotion. I've noticed that I've been feeling a lot of emotions lately. I can't really explain, but I feel like I've had a heart before. I shook away the thought and blinked back at Axel. "Geez, don't zone out on me like that." He said to me. I was about to tell Axel that we didn't need to achieve Kingdom Hearts, but Saix walked into the lobby and interrupted us.
"What's going on? Who ever said you could lounge about?" he asked, his eyes burning with anger. Axel did a really good impression of Saix, I noticed. He stomped over to us and glared at us both. His eyes looked like orange slits of anger. "We were just waiting for you to tell us our mission. Can't two Nobodies like us relax in our own lobby?" Axel retorted. I gulped. Axel always seemed to talk back to Saix like it was nothing. Wouldn't he get in trouble? What if Saix decided that his attitude was so terrible, he had to be kicked out of the Organization? I shook my head. Saix was smarter than that. Axel was a valuable team-mate.
"Humph. Just come to me when your ready for your assignment." He growled to us before going off to stare out into the large window. I looked at Axel and smiled. "Thanks." I said to him. He tilted his head slightly.
"Thanks for what? I didn't do anything. I was only saying what was on my mind." He replied to me. Xion walked into the lobby. It felt like forever since I saw her, and I was glad she was ok. She came over towards us and sat down on the couch.
"Has Saix assigned the missions yet?" she asked me.
"Hello to you too…" I muttered. Xion never gave me a greeting anymore. It made me wonder if we were still friends.
"Nope, we were just relaxing until then. Actually, he told me to go to him when we're ready." Axel explained to her as he stretched out across the couch.
"Well I'm ready." I said to them both. Xion nodded and we both made our way over to Saix, while Axel sat chilling on the couch.
"Are you ready?" Saix asked flatly. I nodded.
"Yeah, Xion and I will go together." I prompted. Saix snorted. I should've known better than to assign my own partner.
"You have quite the humor," he said sarcastically. He gave Xion a glare before returning his burning gaze back to me. "You're going on a solo mission to do recon." I let out a sigh. I had to perform a recon again? I had just done a recon with Demyx. I threw Xion an apologetic glance before opening up the portal and stepping through to my destination.
Well this is different I thought when I arrived. The placed was decked out in Halloween decorations. It was an eerie town with spooky spider webs placed here and there. The whole place was dark, but it felt like it was morning. It seemed like a Halloween Town. Well, that was a lucky guess, since that was the name of the area. I summoned my Keyblade and made my way further into the place. My boots thudded against the cement.
"Hey!" a voice yelled at me. I spun around and saw three small….imp things, glaring at me behind Halloween masks.
"Think fast!" the middle one said. I blinked. Before I knew it, the little devil threw an exploding pumpkin at my face.
"Retreat!" the last one cried as they ran away. I coughed as the smoke cleared. What a bunch of brats. Maybe that was something I should jot down as an important recon note. Nah, if I reported that to Saix he'd think I was joking and give me that scowl. I shook away the though and stepped around the corner and through the little archway. I think I was in the center of the town, since it had a plaza with scary decorations and Heartless crawling all over the place. I bashed away at the shadowy creatures, collecting the hearts. When we collect enough hearts from the Heartless, we would achieve Kingdom Hearts; or at least that what Saix promises everyone. After I finished eliminating the 'pests', I noticed some voices coming from somewhere nearby. I quietly made my way over to a tomb stone and hid behind it. 'Stealth mode', that's what Axel would call it. I could hear someone talking to another person, but the other person gave no reply to anything.
"Oh what shall I do? I need something scarier, more frightening! Something that will make someone gives a blood curdling scream," The voice spoke loudly. I winced. It seemed like they really wanted to give someone a scare. "That's it! Zero, come with me. We have a lot of work to do!" I inched away from the stone and flattened myself against the wall, hoping they wouldn't spot me. I was lucky enough not to be spotted by the…thing, which passed me. There was this skeleton guy who was about, I don't know, 7 feet tall? And this little floating ghost dog trailed behind him. After I was sure they had gone, I stepped out from my hiding spot and let out a big sigh.
"I always seem to run into people while doing recon. Strange." I opened to portal and got ready to RTC. Stepping through, I returned back at the castle and spotted Axel. He was still lounging on the couch. I walked over and sat by him, stretching out and letting out a big yawn.
"You seem tired." He said to me. I nodded slightly.
"Yeah, the place I went was really creepy. There were spooky Halloween decorations everywhere. And to top it all off the place was crawling with Heartless," I explained to him. That's what I liked about Axel. You could tell him anything, even if it was boring, and he'd listen without questions. "Hey Axel, what is Halloween anyways?" Axel scratched his head. He always did that when he pondered a question.
"I'm not too sure. I think it's when people dress up and go get candy or something like that." He replied.
"How come we don't do that?" I frowned. I thought it would be cool to dress up as something, or someone. Axel could pull off a Saix costume or something.
"Who knows? It's probably because we don't have hearts. But when we achieve Kingdom Hearts…" I wasn't even listening to Axel anymore; again with the Kingdom Hearts nonsense. Really, it was getting irritating.
The early bird gets the worm; everyone uses that cheerful morning motto. Well not me, I prefer to think of it as: The early bird gets beaten up by the eagle. You're probably thinking I'm an idiot or something, because to me, that sounded really stupid. What I'm trying to symbolize in that sentence is that when I wake up too early, Saix chews my head off for it. But even if I wake up too late, I get lectured and scolded. Hooray. Either way I get in trouble, so I have to wake up just in time. Like that could ever happen. I usually wake up whenever, and then sneak around the castle without being seen by Saix. When I spot him heading to the lounge area, I wait until he's gone, then follow slowly behind as though I just woke up; pretty clever huh? I thought it up about a week ago. It worked like magic; I didn't get scolded for the longest time! And then Xigbar had to go and ruin it all. He saw me lurking around and told Saix. After that, I got the longest lecture EVER….sort of.
"You seem to be acting suspicious." I remember Saix saying.
"N-No sir, I was just…." My voice trailed off.
"If I even sense you in the slightest, I will mark you off as a traitor. You wouldn't want that, now would you Roxas?"
"…No sir."
"Good, now be off! I'm a very busy man."
And that was that. That is why I must wait around locked up in my room until my intuition tells me that Saix is already in the lobby. Stupid Xigbar, I can't ever trust that guy. Today, though, I found myself struggling to wake up. I had this dream; it was a little frightening actually. It started off with me being in the castle….
"Roxas, Roxas!" I could hear a screaming voice begging for me. I looked around, but no one was there. The castle was pitch black, these Heartless swarmed around me. I thrashed at them with my Keyblade, but it didn't work as well as I had hoped. At first it didn't even strike me as odd; Heartless being in the castle. I mean, sure, Xemnas would have stationed Xigbar or something in case of a Heartless attack, but no one was around me. But then I realized, the castle was in a floating space time; a different world. No Heartless could get in, right? Wrong. I was wrong, there were tons swarming around me. I was getting overwhelmed.
"Roxas save me please! Help!" the voice got louder. It sounded so familiar. It was a female's voice; that much was obvious. But I could only wonder who. There were too many Heartless, they clawed at my face and ripped at my coat. CLANG! My Keyblade was knocked right out of my hand. The Heartless were on top of me now, my breathing was fading.
"Roxas!" the screaming voice sounded terrified. Then I could only stare in horror as I realized who was calling for my aid.
I bolted straight up in my bed. If I had a heart right now, I'd expect it to be thudding like a bomb inside my chest. That was a strange dream. It was a dream, but it felt so real. I tried to remember who was calling my name, but my memory of the dream was shrouded and blurry. I couldn't remember. Then there was a knock on my door.
"Roxas, wake up. You're late!" a voice growled. I groaned. Great, I was about to get another lecture; this time for being late. I wanted to throw my pillow at the door, but I held myself back from the temptation.
"I'm really sorry." I apologized to Saix as I opened the door. But it wasn't Saix standing there, it was Axel. A big goofy grin was whacked on his lips. I sighed. He had freaked me out! Now the pillow idea was really tempting.
"Gotcha Roxie!" Axel laughed. I rubbed my temples, pretending to be really irritated and upset with him. He didn't seem to buy it.
"Axel, I thought you were Saix."
"Yeah, I know you did. I'm pretty good at that."
"Yeah…"
I glanced away. I wanted to tell Axel about my dream, but I was afraid he'd laugh at me or something. I mean, come on, Heartless defeating me? As if. I could bash them to smithereens if I wanted to! But maybe I was just thinking too highly of myself. I looked up at Axel; his expression was puzzled and worried. I forced myself to cough it up already.
"Axel, I had this really strange dream," I told him finally. He looked at me and nodded, gesturing that I should go on. "I was in the castle, here, but it was all dark and gloomy. There were a hoard of Heartless attacking me; they were going to kill me. And someone was calling for my help. A girl, I'm pretty sure…."
"And then?" he asked me, somewhat interested in my mythical sounding dream.
"And then…I woke up." I admitted. He nodded and looked away. Before he could say anything, someone walked up behind Axel.
"Blabbering again you two?" a voice said jokingly. Axel moved aside and to my surprise, I saw Xion. I was a little taken aback I guess, because Xion usually stayed in her room until noon or so. I guess she went along with the early bird motto….
"Well, I should be going now. Saix will kill me if I don't go to him. He wanted to talk to me about something important; boring, as I'd like to call it. See you guys later." Axel gave us both a nod before walking off; so much for getting dream advice from him. Scratch that off the list.
"It's still a little early. What do you want to do until then?" Xion asked me. I shrugged. There wasn't really anything to do. It's not like we had board games around anywhere. Maybe I should tell Xion about my dream. Nah, she'd probably laugh or something. Xion stared at me with a blank expression. Maybe she thought I was boring or something, because before I knew it, she walked away. I sighed and flopped on my bed. Boredom gets the best of me at times like this. I could always go hang out with Demyx. Don't get me wrong, he's pretty fun to hang around—if you like listening to the sitar all day. I could just go up and be like, Hey; I just had the strangest dream a girl was going to die. And how have you been? But I honestly didn't think it would work out too well.