I completely disclaim almost everything right now. The 'origin of love' myth stems from Plato's Symposium and Aristophanes' speech on love within it. The song from which the title is derived from is Origin of Love, from Hedwig and the Angry Inch (which, in turn, is again based on Aristophanes' words). Finally, the characters are those of Square Enix's Kingdom Hearts. I have, basically, no rights to any of this. Except the plot. The plot is mine. Oh yes. The plot is mine.

Enjoy. I love you.

(x) (x) (x)

Perfection is perfectly impossible.

(x) (x) (x)

Like I Killed The Giants

Of The Sun, Part One.

Riku is currently positioned to be the next big man of power for his generation.

Having undergone a good many years of rigorous education, during which he diligently perused his collection of comic books front to back and back to front again while single-handedly mastering the thought processes of classic literature and delivering ground-breaking work to his ever-watchful professors—Riku is entirely ready to conquer a great many things, least of which is the world. It is spread before him, like so many blue and green picnic blankets and such, and all he has to do is settle in and enjoy. All he has to do is sit and take it. And yet at this particular moment in time, he is finding the sitting and taking part of it all to be more than he bargained for when he became a prodigy.

Yes indeed, it is at this particular moment in time that he is sitting in his new, angular office, carefully studying the potted plant located exactly thirteen feet, nine and three-quarters inches away from his oversized, over-polished desk. He was placed in this room maybe three, maybe four hours ago—it's all bit of a blur by this point—and he was told that his task for today is to study this plant.

This plant, Riku realizes, is like every other goddamn plant he's ever sat across from in his entire life. The more he thinks about it, the more he realizes that he has, in fact, sat across from a great many more plants in his lifetime than most people really, logically should. There is nothing special about this plant. It might even be fake; Riku is caught up in that thought—Is it even real?—for he's not all that sure if getting up from his desk and walking over to poke at the plant is entirely within the job description. Maybe by getting up and poking at the plant, he will be defiling some unknown rule about plant-touching versus plant-observing. Riku doesn't know. And it kills him that he doesn't know.

Pause this.

You and I both know that no one—no matter how talentless an individual in an utterly talentless world—is paid to watch plants. Especially possibly-fake ones. No. Really now. What Riku is doing is this:

He is waiting with the utmost diligence for his superior to arrive and tell him exactly what it is he's really supposed to be doing. The only problem is that he's been waiting for the past three hours and he's developing muscle spasms in his left ankle and his neck is beginning to cramp up on the right side. He doesn't know how long he's supposed to spend in this office that has absolutely nothing in it except for the Untouchable Plant and, quite frankly, he feels rather pathetic for being driven so close to boredom-induced insanity on his first day in his new position.

He is twenty and his life is new and hopeful and good and he will do Great Things, according to many.

Yet no matter how great his life and no matter how hopeful his future, he can't really seem to get around to doing the Great Things if he's not given them to do. And really, he can't be given the Great Things to do unless his superior comes in and gives them to him—holds out his hands and says, "These, Riku, are a precious few Great Things I've handpicked for you to do today. Enjoy! Let me know when you're done! But before you come see me to tell me, pick me up a vente caramel macchiato! Good luck, now!"

No, there is no caffeine-crazed superior to order him around and Riku is beginning to realize that the real world is nothing like what his education prepared him for. Mostly, this is because the real world is full of incompetent assholes, apparently, and no matter how lowly Riku may ever have thought of any of his instructors, he at least always held them in some respect for existing and breathing and taking up physical space.

Riku is done philosophizing about the plant. He's moved on to his superior. Maybe I don't have one, he began to think. Wouldn't that be strange. Maybe my superior isn't real. Wouldn't that be stranger. …Maybe. …Maybe my superior is the plant. …Wouldn't…. that be still stranger.

It is quarter past three when Riku wakes up from sleeping face-down on his desk. Having not been disturbed, he's decided he's had enough. He considers bidding farewell to the plant, then thinks twice of it, curses, and turns off the lights on his way out the door. One thoroughly unremarkable day down—lord only know how many to go.

As Riku turns to leave, he nearly yelps as a voice picks up right behind him. "Hey," a man says. He's ridiculously built and towers over Riku like a linebacker who could take him down by breathing. Considering the fact that Riku usually prides himself on his fitness, this is probably saying something. The man speak again and Riku tries to regain some sort of dignity, all the while praying to whatever god there is that this is not his superior witnessing him skipping out of work early.

The man asks, "Are you leaving?"

Riku waits for a few seconds, taking a wild, lucky guess that this man isn't, in fact, his superior at all. He's a co-worker—he must be—and if Riku knows anything about human companionship, he's also a friend in need of being made to climb the supposed corporate/political ladder. Shrugging one shoulder, Riku plays it cools—says, "My superior didn't show… I have nothing to do, is all."

The man nods and returns the shrug. Internally, Riku congratulates himself for knowing at least something about a system completely new and alien to him. The man just says, "Fine, kid. Who cares, right? Just one thing."

"…What?"

"Leave the lights on."

"…Why?"

The man's smile is some sort of mix between amused and cocky as he says, "Janitors turn 'em off after they clean up. They'll take care of it." He nods. "You turn the light off, they know you're gone. You catchin' my drift?"

"…Yeah," Riku says. "I got it."

"Great." One thick, meaty hand claps down on Riku's shoulder and he nearly buckles under the weight of the thing. "Leave the lights on, chief." And with that, the man is gone, though if asked later where the man went, Riku probably wouldn't be able to answer. All Riku is aware of is the need to definitely, definitely befriend the big man in whatever way possible. Or at least—if not befriend—at least not make an enemy of him. One of those hands probably had the power to crush Riku's skull like a hollow chocolate bonbon.

Bonbons aside, Riku suddenly had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. He turned the lights back on in his office, cast one final, empty look at the plant by the window, and closed the door once more.

The working world was a terrible place to exist.

Having missed lunch that day in waiting for his superior to show, Riku realizes his hunger as soon as he sets foot outside the office building. With nothing else to do and nowhere else of great appeal to go, Riku settles for a swing by the hotdog stand at the corner of the street, telling himself it's for convenience's sake. The tram stop, after all, is only six blocks in the opposite direction. It's for convenience's sake that he eat a disgusting unhealthy lunch and then burn off all those calories just getting to the tram.

With two hotdogs—both covered in catsup and pickle relish—Riku doesn't hesitate in the slightest when it comes to downing the first. The second he carries with him towards a small, ugly city park, wondering if it's really all that sane to make an effort at savoring something like a hotdog in the first place. He sits on a park bench, stares at the hotdog in hand, and instantly hates himself for eating such a load of crap—for putting up with such a load of crap.

No one has any control over what makes them think the way they do, and Riku, in this moment, doesn't have any control over the fact that the mediocre hotdog he is eating strikes him in a way that no hotdog really should ever strike a person. He feels, on some abstract, metaphysical level, that the crap of hotdogs is only fitting for the crap of his life as it has come to be. Riku is unfit for real food. Hotdogs are unfit for real stomachs. There is, he is sure, a very good, logical, and symbolic tie between the two.

A woman sitting on the bench diagonal of his lets her dog off the leash and Riku half-heartedly wonders if the thing is dumb enough to run into the road and get itself mowed over. On one level, he hopes so—make the dog suffer for his terrible day—it'll amount to something. But on the other hand, he doubts very much that his stomach could put up with watching that fiasco, so he instantly caps his thoughts and tries to keep his brain quiet. It's not an easy task, especially when the dog—some hairy terrier with a moronic boy dangling in front of its face—waddles over and yaps. …And yaps… and yaps. Were the old biddy not sitting right over there, Riku would probably punt the damn dog across the park. As is, he just blinks stupidly at the thing and then looks at his hotdog.

It doesn't take a man of Riku's intelligence to figure out what it is the dog wants.

A large daub of pickle relish is shifting on the surface of the hotdog, and Riku—for no apparent reason—finds himself gambling and betting in the most immature and unrealistic sense of things. In his head, he tells himself: If that lump of relish hits the ground before the dog's next bark, my life is over and I should kill myself. If it hits the ground after the dog barks again, I'll quit my job and flee the county.

The first high pitched squeaks of the dog's coming bark begin to leave its throat just as the relish falls—landing perfectly in the open and barking mouth of the stupid dog.

Riku stares at the dog. The dog stares back and licks its chops, awaiting more pickle. Without a second thought, Riku drops the entire remaining hotdog to the ground and gets up to walk the six blocks to the tram stop without the slightest glance back at the dog attacking what was once going to be his rebellious sort of a lunch.

x x x

About five minutes into the ride home, Riku actually starts to feel somewhat better about himself. Mostly, this is because he spies his reflection in the glass of the window across from him, and he's now thoroughly satisfied that he looks professional, handsome, clean-cut, and of some mental prowess all in one. That, he believes, must count for something in this world of drabs and dullards shuffling from building to building. At least he can feel good about something.

And that good feeling is a pleasant candle flame burning within, up until the tramcar pauses to pick up a new set of passengers and some obnoxious someone-or-other makes their way on board and roughly plops his person down on the empty seat beside Riku. People come, people go. Riku tries to pretend he's still sitting alone, but it's strange how the guy's elbow is touching his and Riku isn't all that sure why it's so strange, but it is and it's bothering him.

Riku makes to cross his arms over his briefcase, but soon realizes that this is completely the wrong move to make. Now he's actually drawn the attention of the guy and apparently said guy is very much a talker. A talker of weird, weird things, to boot. He shifts slightly to accommodate for Riku, then does a classic double take, complete with jaw-dropping effect. He says, somewhat predictably: "No way, hey? It's you, man!"

"What?" Riku thinks that maybe he should scoot down, but as soon as he makes another motion to do so, the boy just moves closer.

"You're you!" he says. And then, as though suddenly realizing the makings of a truly devastating and unfortunate sort of event, the boy's mouth is warped, tugged back and down towards his ears and then, rather elastic-like, snapped back into a very small frown pinched in the center of his face. He gives Riku a long, steady look, and then says, "You don't remember me, huh?"

"…No." Riku shakes his head and makes to scoot away again. It's taking just about every ounce of willpower he has not to make some expression of disgust and flick the creep off.

But the boy is persistent, if not intelligent. Riku is making every semi-polite signal he can that no, he doesn't feel like talking, but still the boy has him wrangled into some sort of conversation. The way he keeps looking up like he's just about to say something and then jerking his attention back down towards his hands is obnoxious, in Riku's opinion. But still, he can't seem to find it in himself to give the kid the telling-off he deserves. The kid finally manages the words, accompanied by their fair share of wild hand gestures that leave Riku feeling less secure and more at risk than he rightfully should feel on any mode of public transportation.

The boy raves: "I can't believe this! Here I came all the way over here to sit next to you because I thought it was you, and it is you, and you don't even remember me! But how're you doing, man? Really—how are you, huh? God, it's been for-freaking-ever, you know?"

"I'm alright," Riku says—because, really, he is alright, all things considered, and he can't really think of anything else to say that wouldn't be rude or explosive. For once, he feels too tired to engage in conflict.

"No kidding, huh?" the kid asks. And then one index finger flicks out from a fist—it whips up and down—he says, "Hey—nice threads, man."

"Thanks." Though why you're talking to me, I'll never know.

"Where you getting off?"

"Soon." As in, as soon as I possibly can.

The kid grins again—his teeth are ridiculously white as he says, "You always were an anti-social son-of-gun, weren't you?"

Whether it's because the boy's teeth are whiter than his or whether it's because Riku has just had a rather bad day, he's been pushed to the limits of his politeness. He narrows his eyes and rubs his right temple like there's a pressure there that will undoubtedly lead to a headache if the guy keeps at it. And, not bothering to hide the annoyance in his voice, Riku says, "Look, I definitely don't know who you are. Or why you seem to know me."

"Grade-school, man!" the kid says. He's gesturing to try and convey his disbelief again, and Riku honestly feels like beating him as he once more accuses, "You seriously don't remember!"

"Who the hell are you?" Riku snaps.

For a moment, the boy looks hurt, and for half a moment, Riku feels guilty. Then the moment passes and the boy bounces back, and the half a moment passes and Riku is just annoyed once more. "Tidus," the boy says. When that doesn't seem to register, he elaborates in the only way he knows how. "…Sora's friend."

It clicks.

Riku blinks. "Oh."

'Oh' indeed! And there the memories are, surfacing rapid-fire, like it's some sort of wild party event or wild drug-induced mayhem going on in Riku's long-term memory. He recalls a life before offices and plants and hotdog promises—one largely revolving around blacktop drama and games of rock-paper-scissors to determine who got the swing set first. In sixth grade, Riku had felt the same approaching-the-top-of-the-world feeling he feels now, but somehow it was better then—possibly more pure, possibly more grand. And amidst it all, amidst the pride and splendor and glory of being one of the elite elders of the elementary school, Riku had felt some small grain of compassion and care towards his many underlings. Two of which just happened to be Sora and Tidus—who is apparently sitting beside him right now.

Oddly enough, Riku can't really drudge up the same oddball affection he'd had for the guy in his youth. This could be because Tidus just came out of nowhere like he did—lightning fast and far too quick and jarring for Riku's likes—but neither here nor there, Riku now feels he has to express some kind of understanding or some kind of remorse, at the very least, for not recognizing the kid. He's not what he used to be, as far as Riku can tell, for the Tidus of his memory is a runt and a mousey brunette who cries over everything. This guy is built, handsome, and sporting a stylish bleached blonde cut that sets of his eyes and makes them glow like two blue headlights.

As though picking up on Riku's obligatory apology about to bubble out of his mouth, Tidus waves one hand like it's nothing. Instead he just grins boyishly—says, "Fifth grade, man. Good year. Baby-school year. Hey. Where'd you end up going to high school anyway, huh? Man, we always thought we'd bump into you again sometime—me 'n Sora, I mean. Was way too bad when we didn't."

"I didn't go to high school," Riku says.

And then, in understanding, Tidus' expression changes drastically. "No shit," he whispers. "D.R.S., man?"

"Yeah."

Tidus lets out a low whistle and leans back against the seat. "Dang," he says, as though the realization has caused him to do an about-face in life—a truly pivotal moment in a truly pivotal sense.

Riku feels the silence between them swelling like a bad balloon, and the fact that it's there and it's very, very real makes him more uneasy than an empty office and possibly-fake plant ever could. With a brief and careless nod in Tidus' direction, Riku all but leaps from his seat at the next stop and moves as one with the crowd exiting the tram. If Tidus has a word of protest to his escape, it is lost in the noise and pulled into the fray as the tram door closes and the thing rolls away on down the line.

x x x

There is only one living presence in Riku's condo aside from Riku himself, and that is the presence of Dio, his oversized teddy-bear hamster who, at this point, he has owned for all of five days.

Five days ago, Riku had gone to the pet store, fully planning on buying a cat. A cat, he had decided, was what he needed to turn his life around. A cat would give him a sense of responsibility and wholeness—a sense of which he was completely lacking in life. Cats were not dogs. They didn't crave people on a social level. No, their need was more basic. Humans were, to housecats, providers of food, water, shelter, and little else of importance. It was the exact sort of need Riku wanted to provide for. Nothing in excess, nothing in shortage.

He had been in the shop for all of five minutes before finding the exact cat he wanted—a marmalade tabby with eyes large enough that they seemed to want to roll out of the thing's cynical, judgmental little head. The cat's gaze said, "I hate you", but the cat's meow said, "I need you." And Riku needed it.

Yet when he'd gone and spoken with the shop owner and given her proper ID and credit information, she'd simply shaken her head no.

"Have you cleared it with your superior?"

"No, I haven't started work yet… I start next week," he'd told her.

"The D.R.S. has a policy…" she trailed off. At least she had sounded sympathetic. "I'm sorry, I'm surprised they haven't told you yet. Just last month—you know how it is. Animal ownership restriction for D.R.S. employees." She had broken eye contact for a moment and appeared to be hunting around behind the counter for something—some guidebook, some rulebook, Riku assumed. Some D.R.S. publication, inches thick with rules and regulations. And then, shrugging and giving up, she'd said, "You can have a mouse, though. Or a hamster. Even a rat."

Riku had settled, then, for the fattest hamster the store had. So massive was the thing that it took up the entire surface of his palm when seated there, and occasionally its rear end would drop off the side—stub of a tail dangling helplessly in the air. The hamster was a creature of complete and total dependence. The only difference between the hamster and the cat was that the hamster was oblivious to that need it possessed. Riku could have left it to starve in his bedroom and the hamster never would have thought to blame him in its last moments on earth. Not like the cat. The cat would've been smart enough to blame.

Too bad for Riku, his decision to buy the fattest, largest hamster there was not entirely thought through. In fact, the reason his hamster was so huge was because it was very, very pregnant. Had he not already gone and named the damn thing, he would've returned it without a second thought. But, having decided to just bring the babies back to the shop and keep the mother after all was said and done, Riku felt slightly better about himself. At least he wasn't the abandoning sort.

And so every day when Riku comes home from whatever he's been doing, he sets his things on the kitchen table, hangs his coat on the back of his chair, and promptly creeps into his room, carefully easing open the door and peering in at his hamster. He has not disturbed her for the past few days, leaving her with all the water and food he figures a birthing hamster could possibly need. And it is today, as Riku sets down his briefcase and removes his sports coat, that Dio is delivering.

The delivery itself is not the sort of dramatic torture Riku expects to witness. Instead, it is a rather small-scale event—Riku poised and still outside Dio's glass tank as Dio herself stretches and contorts within—one, two, three, four, and then five little parts of herself ripping free and rolling into the bed of shavings spread out around her. The babies are pink and hairless—ugly little pulsing things that Riku can't help but pity in their helplessness. For a while they roll feebly around in the world they're so new to before Dio seems to become aware of herself, her surroundings, and her offspring once more. And with this awareness, Dio promptly opens her mouth and devours her children one by one by one.

Riku thinks he probably should have seen that one coming.

Unable to do much of anything, he watches as the fifth and final hamsterling is devoured whole. Not a sound or a struggle has been made throughout the process—it all happens with the same ease and silence with which the birth itself had happened. Again, Dio is swollen and bloated with her children, but not nearly in the same sense that she'd been before.

The day, Riku decides, has been a complete and total waste of life. For a while, he wonders if he should kill Dio—punish her somehow for being such a terrible creature of terrible instinct. But watching her lie there, obviously in some sort of indigestion pain from just having eaten five children in one go of it, he decides to leave her. He turns off the light and sleeps on the couch that night. He cannot stand to be near the thing.

x x x

It doesn't take more than a few days for Riku to figure out that so long as his superior doesn't show up, he doesn't have to do anything but sit at his desk for a few hours each day and monitor the plant's state of non-progress across the room. He quickly becomes a lowly creature of habit and is consuming two relish and catsup coated hotdogs on a daily basis. Riku being Riku, he doesn't seem to gain a pound, but he can feel the questionable meat rolling around his gut day in and day out, and after each and every lunchtime splurge, he always regrets eating what he does. But that doesn't mean he can change it.

It's not until Thursday afternoon, sitting at his desk and thinking about his lunch, that Riku is introduced—however strangely—to the roof-boy of the other building. Like so many things in life, this event is a complete coincidence, though the thought of it doesn't occur to Riku until much later. As it is, he just happens to look up from admiring a very small dent on the right corner of his desk and he just happens to have his gaze drawn to and out the wall of windows across from him, honing in on this little speck of movement just on the edge of his field of vision.

As Riku looks up, he sees a boy's legs dangling off the roof of the building opposite of his. From the distance he's at, they might as well be two denim-clad toothpicks sticking it out strong in the wind. But as we already know, Riku is no man of ordinary ability or intelligence. At least, he knows legs when he sees legs, and for the first time ever, Riku rises from his desk and moves towards the window.

Below him is the city, gray and reeking of metal and oil. Above him is the sky, smog-riddled, yet still with a trace of blue to be found in it somewhere. And right there, in the in-between, is the toothpick kid on the roof of the offices across the street. He's leaning back, weight on his hands, feet in the air, head tilted and staring at the sky. And for half a moment Riku is torn between two actions. Placing his fingers on the glass where the boy's head is, or flinging open the window and telling the kid to stop being an idiot and go get a life for himself.

As some means of compromise, Riku stands and does nothing. He just observes the boy and he remains next to the plant, which—he can now tell—is very fake indeed.

A knock comes at the door, and before Riku can bolt back to his desk and appear occupied, the door is opened and its frame is filled with the bulk of a man who should not, probably, be called so bulky. He's not bulky so much as he's angular, and his edges and corners somehow seem to stick out all strange and off-balance, and Riku can't shake the feeling that the man now in his doorway is the dictionary definition of ugliness sprung to life and willed to live. The man is old, bald, has misshapen ears and a pointed beard-sporting chin that appears to be capable of jabbing a hole in a body, if thrust forward with enough energy.

And the man does jut his menacing chin forward as he enters the room. He tells Riku simply, "There you are. I was wondering when you'd get here. You've got work to do."

With that, a second man appears in the doorway, moves over to Riku's desk and promptly sets ten thick notebooks down on the surface. A third man appears and does the same. A fourth man scuttles in, bringing up the rear and setting six more notebooks upon the twenty already there, and then all three of them exit in much the same way in which they came in. The angular man—Riku's superior it seems—gives Riku a once-over, and then, seemingly satisfied, turns to go. For a moment, Riku wants to say or do something to make the man stop. After all, he's been going to work for days now and dying of boredom with nothing to do and no purpose to fulfill whatsoever... But the man offers no explanation and he's gone before Riku can muster up whatever it takes to ask.

When Riku looks back towards the window, the boy is standing stable and steady on the roof and staring straight back, locking eyes with Riku. He watches as the boy places his hands on his hips, and for a brief moment he's thrown back to childhood and stories of Peter Pan, and in that same brief moment, Riku's almost dazed enough to wager that the boy actually is Peter Pan and is, right at that very moment, preparing to jump from the roof and come gliding to his office window with ease.

But nothing of the sort happens. However perfect and storybook-like it could be, it's not the case. The boy on the roof presses two fingers together, throwing Riku a mock salute and grinning as he does it, breeze whipping his hair around his face. He seems to laugh, or so Riku settles for thinking, before he turns and disappears, beyond the tilted viewpoint Riku has, further back towards the center of the building's structure. Once there, Riku assumes, he descends.

Well, Riku thinks. That was… weird.

x x x

It has been four days since Riku has seen the roof-boy and he has actually deemed it necessary to turn his hundred-some-odd pound desk completely around so that he no longer faces the window. The window is just too distracting, especially with the presence of the boy now known to Riku and especially with that fake plant sitting it front of it like it is. The racket of the move, surprisingly enough, causes no uproar within the office. Once the desk is in place, the building remains quiet and still as ever, the only noise being that of the custodial buckets and carts as they move back and forth towards the day's end. Already, Riku has started working overtime to handle the masses of notebooks he has to fill. He doesn't know when they're due by, hence his frantic efforts to get them over and done with.

It's eight o' clock and Riku has been in the office twelve hours. Secretly, he's hoping Dio starves to death.

It's eight o' two and Riku flips to the first page of his third notebook—the page his superior has already headed with a single question.

Topic #3: How do you break down an unbreakable wall?

x x x

Riku's employer, the D.R.S., is the Destati Regional Syndicate—an organization which stands in place of a government in the Destati island chain, floating as it is off the coast of . Forty-two years ago, the governmental structure of Destati fell to pieces, just as the prime minister then fell to the hands of a rather "questionable" car accident. The capital was seized by a group of radicals no one had ever heard of before, but in the chaos of a collapsed government, their words had power and persuasion, and as many people will now claim—all innocent eyes and clueless heads, the lot of them—"It seemed like a good idea at the time."

Yet the people of Destati are of a rather laid-back persuasion. Sure, the government might sometimes step on their toes, but they've come to understand that so long as they obey the rules and accept the policies, it's all rather easy to exist alongside the Syndicate with little to no attention drawn to yourself whatsoever. The only exception to this rule happens to be if you are, of course, a child of exceptional intelligence.

Riku was once a child of exceptional intelligence.

In his fifth year of grade school, he took a test and passed with a near-perfect score. Every single question on his multiple-choice test had been correct, and all but one of his five essay exams had received a perfect score. The only essay that had not held the prompt: How do you break down an unbreakable wall? To an eleven year old, the answer is simple: you don't. If the wall is unbreakable, the wall is unbreakable, and that is that. Riku said as much and his essay failed. However, he was still a brilliant kid, and the D.R.S. promptly scooped him up, somewhere along the transition line between grade and middle schools.

The very reason the D.R.S. has stayed in power is due to these exams. Those who show their intelligence are employed by the government, and for lack of a better plan, all serve their duty quite diligently, deposited as they are in a think tank of sorts. There, they write essays for the rest of their life. Mostly, the essays have questions of security—If you were hired to destroy five of the most important buildings in the Destati region, which would you destroy? How would you go about destroying them? What materials can be easily obtained in secret to create explosives? Where would you hold a resistance movement? What means of protest would you use against the Syndicate to rally the most support against the government?

All questions pertain to the security and protection of the Syndicate. All questions are handled by the region's brightest minds and broadest imaginations. All questions are answered thoroughly and completely.

All except, of course, the question of the wall.

No one can seem to grasp the concept of breaking the unbreakable. And yet that is precisely what Riku is soon about to do. He does not realize it yet, but within this notebook will be the turning point of his life. The only thing between Riku and that turning point now is a few chance events that lie in wait just around the corner, just down the hill, and of course, just across the street, at the top of the building, at the edge of the roof.

x x x

It is nine twenty-three and Riku has spent the past hour or so writing out a draft of his thoughts on scratch paper beside the Wall Notebook. The draft he has now is a complete and total piece of crap and, if asked, Riku would be the first to admit it. But he is no closer to understanding the unbreakable wall now than he was nine years ago, and no matter how he wracks his brain, he cannot seem to come up with any method for breaking the unbreakable. He sighs, places his pen on his desk, and cradles his head in his hands, eyes closing.

What am I doing here?

Suddenly there is a flash that doesn't fade, an explosive light that fills the room with screaming, whining energy and shoots off and around Riku's back, streaming towards the wall across from him and hitting it, splashing across it—his own outline an inky blackness against blinding, glaring white.

"WHAT THE HELL?!"

The exclamation comes out as a spluttered reaction. Riku's eyes shoot open, then shoot closed again as his eyes scream from the pain caused by the room and the light now gushing in through the window. With a curse and some peculiar noise that seems rather akin to a squawk, Riku tips over in his desk chair and falls to the floor in a heap, reams of paper and stacks of notebooks following alongside him. Scrambling across the floor and seeing spots and swirls at each and every blink, Riku makes his way beneath the window, where he curses still once more.

The light is a spotlight and it's aimed directly at his office from atop the building across the street.

In some attempted expression of anger, Riku leaps to his feet, yanks open his window and—eyes shut—sticks his head out into the night air. His hair is whipped around his face and he's just about had it—the freezing cold, the blinding light, the carnivorous hamster, the oppressive company, the slacker superior, the sketchy, silent rules of the workplace—and NOW, the spotlight on top of it all. From both hands come the middle fingers and Riku shouts, "FUCK YOU! What the hell are you doing?!"

He's sure it's the goddamn roof-boy behind it all.

And then, just barely audible through the wind and city racket, come the words: "Come up here!"

Riku glares behind closed lids. "Are you fucking nuts?!"

"No!"

"Turn off your stupid light!"

The spotlight wavers and wiggles a moment and then swings wildly upwards in a dramatic arc, shooting off harmlessly into the sky. For a moment, all Riku can see in the absence of the bright light is complete and total blackness, coupled by the fading splotches behind his eyelids. Then comes the voice again.

"Okay! Now come!"

"NO! GO SCREW YOURSELF!" Riku closes the window with as much force as he can muster, but ultimately fails to leave the impact he'd wanted—the window gets stuck halfway down and it takes quite a bit of effort on Riku's part to un-stick it. Between the time it takes him to get the window closed and start back over towards his desk (and he's started muttering profanities under his breath again), the roof-boy has regained control of the spotlight and swings it back down yet again, beaming the thing straight into Riku's office once more. And—once more, still—Riku's pupils contract wildly and send him again into blindness, just in time to trip over the pile of notebooks and papers that had fallen from his desk earlier.

For the sake of all things censored, Riku's words will not be stated.

Drawing himself up once more, Riku kicks the notebooks violently, stubs his toe, snarls, grabs his coat, grabs his briefcase, and promptly storms out of the office, determined to beat the roof-boy into an unidentifiable pulp of a thing, and then possibly throw him off the roof. Down he goes, sixteen floors on an elevator and charging out of the lobby, though the revolving doors, through the traffic, through the night, across the street. Into the lobby, into the elevator, up to the highest level it goes and out into the hallway. Riku is breathless now—be it from anger or from fatigue, even he can't tell. Gripping his briefcase tight as he can, he walks up the short flight of stairs that takes him to the roof of the building.

And there the boy sits, waiting for him. The spotlight stretches off pointlessly into the sky.

"There you are," the boy says.

In Riku's mind, this is precisely what he does: he strides up to the boy, sets his briefcase calmly on the ground, and promptly leans forward, gets in the boy's face, grabs him by the shoulders and shakes him around—roughs him up—says, "Goddammit, what is wrong with you? I was working! Do you know what working is?! NO! Apparently all you do is sit on roofs and annoy the living daylights out of anyone who actually has a goddamn purpose in life! Why don't you go get one, moron? There's a brilliant idea for you! Jesus!"

In actuality, this is precisely what Riku really does: absolutely nothing. It is as though, somewhere in some uncolored and unknown part of himself, some thing has armed itself with a pin and promptly punctured the rampant, growing hate and disgust within Riku—causing a light pop followed by a steady, rapid deflate. So now he's got nothing—nothing to feel by and nothing to say. His mouth hangs open because his brain is a little delayed in processing thought and action, and for all that Riku's body is poised to take that very action he had intended on, his brain is leagues and leagues behind.

Man and boy stand across from one another and can't seem to think of anything to say. It is in this instant that Riku becomes aware of what exactly it is that can break the unbreakable wall. The knowledge doesn't hit him in a wave—doesn't hit him with any force whatsoever—but rather, is slowly and surely revealed to him as though the veil covering the thought has finally risen and been removed after all these years.

Riku closes his mouth and swallows thickly. He would recognize that face anywhere.

"Sora," he says, for he has remembered words and knows the secret of the wall.

The boy grins. "Yeah, you. It's about time you showed up."

(x) (x) (x)

OKAY, I know it's wayyy out there and possibly boring or weird or dumb or unlike any of the usual fanfiction I write. If this is a bad thing, say so and I will stop writing this. If it's not… well, then… say that. Or something. I don't even know. I don't even know! Blah!