Chapter Summary (Xion's POV): She's one person for Roxas, Axel, and the others, but she's completely different when she's alone or near the higher-ups. As her friendship with Roxas and Axel blossoms, she is troubled by the thought of which of the personas they really like. Her, or who she is on the outside for them. Inspired by "Breathe No More" on the "Anywhere But Home" DVD by Evanescence.
UPDATE (5.9.2011): I made some art to describe this fic. I put together part of Sora, part of Xion, and the mirror. Sorry if it's not that good. LINK: .com/#/d3evxet
Enjoy!
I face the mirror as I did this morning, and watch the true me staring at me. She has his face, the face of the boy from my dreams. I know the difference between me and my reflection, I am the one on the outside, she is the one on the inside. She is trapped; kept inside by being who the others want her to be, not how she truly is. My appearance is in the eye of the beholder Saїx told me. We would be the same person, were it not for our appearances. Even so, I wonder which of us it is that Roxas and Axel know and love. My fingers reach out to touch the reflection, just to see if it's real. The moment my fingers rest on the glass it shatters into tiny pieces—too small to matter, but big enough to cut me. My glove has a tear, although there's pain, only white light comes out and little crystals spill onto the floor. I back away from the mirror, and my reflection looks back at me from the shards, dejected at my abandonment. I flee my room, running down the halls of the Castle.
I am me, aren't I?
It seemed such a silly question. I am not me, I am Xion. I left myself in my reflection and there is no turning back. I'll never be me, and I'll never know if Roxas and Axel would accept me. I don't notice that I'm running back towards my room, or that the crystals are floating back into the tear in my glove. I catch myself and turn to run down the hallway for the lower-rank members. None of them understand, so why am I here? I stop in front of the very last door, with the number 13 in big white Roman numerals on it. It opens to reveal Roxas, looking sleepy but concerned.
This is it. He won't know what I mean, and he and I will probably drift apart… but I have to know.
I still bleed, and as the crystals fall one by one, he watches them. He picks one up and freezes. I do the same, and I see the boy with another boy and a girl sitting on the edge of a dock. They aren't laughing, but they are talking. Sadness is clear in the boy's eyes as the girl talks. He isn't happy but he refuses to show it.
Like we would be if I didn't exist. If she were me they wouldn't be happy, so I must stay me.
"I'm sorry, but I have to go. It's… um, turtles!" I say suddenly, thinking of what I saw swimming in a pond on one world. While he's pondering what that means, I flee again. I'll never know, will I? He could be friends with the both of us, couldn't he? Maybe neither, maybe he only wants to be friends with Axel. Maybe the memories of he and I are destined to drift far away from us, like we will from each other.
I only bleed more.
So how was Chapter One? It went through a lot of editing, and my ears went through an hour of listening to Breathe No More to keep the story in line. BTW: This is not a songfic, it's just KH characters and a song that reminded me of their short-lives.
Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts. If I did, Axel, Roxas, and Xion would all be alive and Vanitas would NOT lose to Ven (that was just sad).