Here I have taken clips of my absolute favorite video game and written it as if it were a novel. I might have changed around a bit, but these cutscenes are almost entirely the same. I hope you enjoy it!

Oh, and do me a favor. While reading Fading Shadow, please listen to Xion's Theme Song in the background :)

358 ½ Days .

"Out of the two, why choose the puppet?" The Nobody narrowed his eyes into slits and peered at the gnarled figure of his old friend with a certain uncharacteristic curiosity. "Or, let me put it this way. Which would you rather suffer the loss of- this make believe friendship of yours, or a real one?"

Axel opened his mouth to tell Saix their friendship was just as make believe as his with Roxas, but couldn't bring himself to. Something inside of him, inside both of them, connected them together. And it was something that, no matter how desperately he wanted to, Axel could not betray. Because what is a Nobody but a reflection of forgotten memories? And just as you cannot dismiss who you truly are, they cannot dismiss who they truly were.

Fading Shadow

The girl stumbled and collapsed into Roxas's arms, suddenly appearing very frail and small- like a shuddering leaf in the autumn freeze. His soft blue eyes trace her pale skin, trying to place where he had seen her before. Everything about her seemed so familiar… but vague. It was like she was a ghostly shadow of his forgotten past- but his past held nothing to forget, didn't it? No, it was more like she was a dark shard torn from his very heart. "Who are you… again? It's weird, it feels like I'm forgetting something very important."

A soft smile plays along the edges of her lips, and in a voice like a trickling bell, wavering in the still air with a certain distance, she mummers, "You'll be… better off now, Roxas."

His heart skips a beat. She's there. Right there. Only footsteps behind, but she's always been footsteps behind, hasn't she? She is… she is… and then another realization hits him. "Am I the one who did this to you?

"No." The girl shakes her silky black hair with sudden hard eyes, determined to place no fault on him. "It was my choice to go away now. Better that than to do nothing, and let Xemnas have his way. I belong with Sora."And as she says the words, there's a certain desire kindled in her eyes. A yearning that was born within her from the start, and will, at last, fade with her now. The wish to be whole. "And now… I am going back to be with him."

Xion's tie to the world, to Roxas, began to vanish in his arms. The light within her was released, and it drifted, like the subtle, downy feathers of a dove, to the sky. Soft as lips, but it tore at Roxas like daggers. "Roxas, I need you to do me a favor." She says with a fevered voice, her face torn. As if she was fighting a pleasant dream. "All those hearts that I've captured… Kingdom Hearts. Set them free."

"Kingdom Hearts." Roxas repeats softly. The name gave him hope. But her request confused him. "Free them?"

Her words are firm, she holds full trust in Roxas. Without having to explain herself, she knows that he will make the right choice. "It's too late for me to undo my mistakes. But you can't let Xemnas have Kingdom Hearts. You can't." And then, her final task completed, her eyes begin to fade and close, colliding with the warmth of the dream. The dream of a heart. "Good bye, Roxas. See you again."

See you again… She says it like she means it. But how? Is there a chance that she's going to stay here, right besides Roxas, and eat ice-cream with him on the tower once again? "I'm glad I got to meet you. Oh." Her eyes flutter open, and her cheeks that would once flush cherry at the sight of seeing her dear friends set into a paler frost. "And of course, Axel too. You're both my best friends." She reaches a shaky hand to touch the side of Roxas's face, desperate to absorb every last bit of her friend into her mind, leave with only his presence. "Never forget. That's the truth." Her hand falls, but before it meets the ground Roxas catches it. "No! Xion… Who else will I have icecream with it?"

And that thought alone is overwhelming. Everything the three of them are exists only in that solitary, yet treasured ritual. Combined, they were one, but lost, they were shells of an empty heart, scattered pieces of a puzzle. Friends… stick together, don't they? They never leave, isn't that right? Why couldn't their friendship last? And something tears through Roxas. A jolt, like fire. He couldn't describe it. It pained him so deeply, but it was also relieving, pure. It vibrated through his body, shaking him to the core, his bones rattling in his chest. Pulsing, and yet pacifying. Tears were streaming freely down his face then, but he couldn't understand why. "Xion…" he gasps through his sadness. She can't leave him. Neither of them can be complete without the other.

A blinding light overcomes her body, searing at Roxas's hands, stinging at his eyes. He watched helplessly as she disappeared in his arms, shards of the crystalized light drifting towards the sky, soaring with the longing of a grounded bird. Pieces of her were breaking, breaking not only from within Roxas, but from the three's very bond, revealing it for was it truly is: a fantasized reflection of broken dreams, lost memories. Merely a band encasing air, and they were content with that. Still, they all had to wake up sometime.

The heart incased within in her shattered, the connection she felt towards her two friends releasing with a final sigh, then only to be stolen by the wind. She was gone now, and maybe never coming back. With eyes now as deep and burdened as the ocean, Roxas leaned down to hold in his hands the single shell left in her place.

Alone

"Why? Why do you have the keyblade?" The hooded boy snarled from his position on the tiled floor.

"Shut up!" Roxas yelled, swiping his edged blade through the empty air. Why was it he only recognized for the keyblade?

Then, almost suddenly, the boy takes up a new tactic. A smirk formed on his pale lips, looking bizarre set on his stern, weathered face, and he rose to his feet with renewed suavity. "C'mon, Sora. I thought you could have done better than that!"

Blind with white anger, Roxas looked the boy up and down with disbelief. "Get real! Look at which one of us is winning!" And then he froze, his fury echoing the silence. The minute the words spat from his mouth, he regretted it. And it was that frothing poison- sweet and as easy as honey, but as lethal as the snake's jaws- that stained every last bit of strength Roxas was holding on to, snapped his will to fight.

"So it is true." The boy taunted with laughter high in his voice. "You really are his Nobody. Looks like DiZ was right."

"No!" Roxas screeched, frantic desperation replacing his loose courage. Everything was blurring again… that feeling of fading returning. "I'm not! I'm only me- nobody else!"