"He's going to say 'No'. You know he is." The clumping of Roxas's boots followed after the quick patter of Xion's steps as he followed her down the stairway, running his gloved hand across the wall more on instinct than necessity of support. Running down at this speed, following his companion, was rather risky to begin with being that the territory was unfamiliar.
Xion seemed right at home though. Her pace was quick, assured and entirely casual as she hopped down, skipping the last few steps. "No, he'll be fine with it. Trust me on this." She said offhandedly, casting Roxas an assured glance before stepping along. To the blond boy, they seemed to have stepped into a labyrinth of pristine silver and chrome lab instruments, shining in startlingly bright lights which illuminated countless, unnamable and unrecognizable specimens. The young keyblade wielder tried to squelch the growing feeling of dread, taking Xion by the arm to hold her back for a beat of a moment.
"Really, it's cool. Maybe we should just go back." He muttered, giving a dark look to their surroundings.
"But, I really wanted to-" She began, but at seeing the trepidation on Roxas's young features, she couldn't help but grin mischievously in response. "Unless you're too scared to try sledding, of course. I could always just try it all by myself." Roxas blushed with indignation, his mouth set in a stubborn grimace.
"Let's do it."
Resigned, they both dashed forward, Xion leading the way (Roxas following gladly. He wasn't sure he would ever be able to find the scientist among all these twists and turns and wayward stacks of journals and computers. The dark haired girl seemed assured enough for the both of them).
Finally they spotted him. Vexen was furiously taking notes, observing a specimen of heartless as it hopped about in the glass case before him. His lean figure seemed taunt with the tension of recording every minute detail of it's armor and attacks. Roxas hesitated. He had only come in contact with the scientist once before and the experience had been anything but pleasant. Between his biting wit and his quick mind, Vexen did not make the most hospitable company. He looked over to Xion to motion for her to wait, but she was already moving forward rather fearlessly.
Pausing directly behind the scientist, she waited to be noticed, then finally after a moment she cleared her throat and called up gently. "Vexen."
He jumped in surprise, nearly dropping his pen and with a look of searing anger, he rounded on the culprit, but upon locking eyes with Xion, his expression instantly melted to something akin to relief. "Oh, child." He replied, giving her a fond pat on the head. "What's the matter? Are you unwell?"
She smiled in response, shaking her head. "No, I'm alright. It's just that Roxas and I have a question." The scientist perked once again, peering at Roxas who stood a few feet away. The keyblade wielder gave him a somewhat weak wave, and academic quirked a brow in response.
"We were talking to Xigbar-"
"You know how I feel about him." Vexen cut in disapprovingly.
"I know, I know, but he didn't say anything 'uncouth' this time. He mentioned worlds where ice which falls from the sky, saying that he was slated to go to one sometime soon." She looked up at the scientist, her expression hopefully and captivated by the very idea of it. "I don't even know how that would work, really, but when we asked, he just laughed and said that 'a kid that hasn't been sledding, hasn't really lived'."
Vexen tilted his head in mock curiosity. "Is that so?"
Xion nodded. "So, we thought we would ask the most knowledgable person about it, of course." Xion continued hopefully. "And you just happen to be a master in ice and all that..." She trailed.
"Yes?" The academic played along.
"So, yes. Um, we were just wondering, you know, Roxas and I were thinking," Xion bit her lip, as her brow knit, perplexed. "Can you make some ice rain so that Roxas and I can do sledding?"
Vexen's expression tightened as though he were trying to keep from smiling, after a moment though, he failed miserably. With a knowing grin, he replied, "These are purely academic reasons, correct?" Xion nodded once again. "Of course. I assumed as much. Alright then, follow me." He set his notes down on the table before him, leaving his rather bored looking heartless to mill about as he led them away, further into the labs.
He stepped along quickly, hearing the startled sound of two extra sets of feet following along afterward. "Computer, two sleds, if you will." He ordered to seemingly no one. Out of nowhere, the tabletop that they were passing slid open soundlessly to reveal two concave shining disks. Vexen picked them up with a flourish, handing them off to Roxas and Xion. Surprising for their metal exterior, they were both rather light. "You will be needing these."
After Roxas had lost track of how many turns they had made around the labs, and how many creepy hearts in jar-like containers were stored, they finally approached a rather mundane looking metal doorway. Vexen punched a code into a panel on the outside, his lithe fingers working quickly and naturally across the computer screen as though he were brushing his hair or stretching his own muscles before getting out of bed. Opening the door, he stepped aside for the other two to enter. While Roxas began to feel that creeping sense of foreboding once again, Xion seemed to be picking up on nothing of the sort. She stepped boldly forward, walking through without a second thought. Roxas rushed in afterwards, giving Vexen a sidelong glance and noticing that his angular features were revealing absolutely nothing.
The gargantuan room which greeted him inside was empty. Completely empty. Expectantly empty. It was almost as though an artist had gone partway through a still life painting and decided to abandon it for something far more promising. Roxas's brow furrowed in confusion, looking back to Vexen who had now entered after them and had soundly shut the door behind them.
The Academic wasted no time. "Computer," He began, tapping his chin thoughtfully, finding the correct wording. "Give us a portion of a mountain-range. I'll take care of the rest." Roxas watched him curiously until suddenly, he felt the floor moving beneath his booted feet. Xion yelped in surprise, watching the grids of the walls morph, bending, shaping until finally they settled. Rocks grew from the shapeless forms of the walls, grass swayed into existence out of the very air around them. Clouds formed overhead in a vast, pristine blue sky. Trees sprouted here and there along the mountainside, spiraling upwards and adding a deep verdant green to their surroundings. Roxas couldn't believe that just a beat of a moment ago, he had been standing in the Castle that Never Was. Surely this was some sort of portal...
"It's a simulation." Vexen defined as though the keyblade wielders had asked. Distracting them from the marvel of their surroundings, he gestured for them to come closer. Convinced by now that Vexen wasn't about to drug them and use them for his next dissection (as Axel had told them both he would so many times), Roxas and Xion moved in, as asked. Vexen held up his hands and, feeling a crisp drop in the temperature around them, he summoned forth what looked like an intricate circular design which stemmed from the center and delicately laced it's way into the air. The design itself was flat in nature, and it's folds and patterns were so intricate that Roxas couldn't bring himself to memorize the entirety of it. "This is the type of ice crystal which would fall from the sky. It is called a snowflake. A countless number of these make up the 'ice rain' which you referred to before, child." He gestured to Xion, causing the snowflake to flip over amiably. "Ice rain is not an entirely incorrect term for it, but it typically goes by the name of 'snow'. One can 'go sledding' when it has 'snowed' outside. You see?"
Roxas and Xion nodded, eyes shining with amazement at the beauty of the design before them, the harsh edges of the crystal but the awesomeness of the pattern itself. It was enthralling, intriguing and just flat out...kinda weird. Xion smiled; she rather loved 'weird'.
"Now," Vexen withdrew the large crystal. "this is what it looks like when it does snow." In the course of a mere moment, the drop in temperature became staggering. Roxas could quite suddenly see his own breath as the air around them became freezing. "Brace yourselves." Vexen said with a wicked little grin. He drew his hands up once again, and with a moment's concentration, his eyes snapped open, arms extended forward and the very grass beneath their feet was suddenly coated in a shining layer of white. It grew forth from there like a great voracious and beautifully unstoppable plant, spreading across the range about them unhindered, freezing the very blades of grass beneath their feet.
The snow spread across the landscape, rolling over the hills and rocks, freezing the trees into crystalline figures, caught in the action of swaying in the soft breeze. Roxas moved his foot, testing the substance which now surrounded and found that it crackled slightly underneath his weight, leaving an almost comically large footprint in his wake. He smiled widely in response, sharing an excited look with Xion and then glancing back to Vexen.
"That's amazing!" Roxas couldn't help the outburst. He hadn't even thought something of this nature was possible.
The ice wielder brushed off his hands, looking just a bit too proud in the wake of their excitement. "Now, to sled, one need only to sit in the concave part of those disks and push off down the hill." He gestured to the now crystalline icy landscape which sparkled in the sunlight. Roxas looked down at his disk, which he had almost forgotten at this point.
Xion was already placing her disk in the snow, planting her hind quarters directly in the center as though she had followed Vexen's orders on instinct at this point. He gave her an approving nod, followed by a look of expectancy in Roxas's direction. The young boy quickly followed suite, shoving his own disk into the snow next to Xion and plopping himself down. The dynamic duo scooted themselves forward and, quite suddenly, Roxas felt himself sliding downwards, faster and faster.
and so much faster.
Quite a bit faster, actually, he realized with a mounting sense of horror. He gripped the edges of his disk and looked to Xion for confirmation, only to find her laughing in delight too hard to even notice his discomfort. She flew ahead, lowering herself to her disk as to make it speed up in it's descent.
"How do we stop this thing?" Roxas cried, but he doubted his words would carry over the rushing of wind past his plummeting figure. To his surprise, the answer came as swiftly as the question.
"Dig your hands into the snow around you to slow yourself." Vexen's voice called to his left. Roxas snapped his head to find the source, only to find Vexen skimming down the side of the mountain right beside him, balancing with an expert grace on his own shield, Freezepride, and using it as a sort of standing sled of sorts. He smiled down at Roxas's incredulous expression, seeming to try to bite back a laugh. "You didn't think I would abandon mere children on a mountain, did you?"
Xion was still cheering in delight up ahead. Vexen shook his head knowingly and sped forward. Tendrils of ice followed in his wake, creating intricate and beautiful lacy patterns on the snow before Roxas. Vexen swerved between the two of them as though it were as natural as walking or breathing.
"Slow down, little one!" He cried at Xion, over her cheers.
"What?" She called back, hardly hearing him.
"I said, Slow down!" But his efforts were far too late. She was going way too fast for her small disk to handle and she flipped over, sending the young girl sprawling into the snow, chunks of soft white puffs cascading down the rest of the hill in her wake. Roxas did his best to slow and steer away from the wreckage, but of course, that only seemed to speed him forward. He road directly into the snowy carnage and ended up adding to the giggling mass of chaos. The duo rolled over in the snow, frozen, elated, and absolutely buzzing with adrenaline.
"That was..." Xion panted.
"That was..." Roxas repeated.
"SO COOL!" They chimed in unison. To avoid the mess entirely, Vexen rather casually jumped, flipping over them with a practiced ease that never seemed to translate into battle for the ice wielder. He landed, keeping himself easily upright and looking down at the two giggling teens with an unmistakable look of reminiscent fondness.
"So, do you two feel rather educated now?" He quipped. They both sat up and nodded vigorously, sending chunks of snow flying from their respective heads.
"Are you ready for another run at it?" Another nod followed as they looked excitedly at one another.
"Well, you'd better go get your sleds." Vexen chuckled. And with a frozen note of horror, both Xion and Roxas looked down the hill and realized that their disks were still journeying downwards into the great icy beyond. Both keyblade wielders jumped to their feet and stumbled past to catch up with them, one demure small set of tripping footprints followed by a comically large pair.
Vexen laughed softly, fondly. This had not been the first time he had taught a child to sled, he reminisced, thinking fondly of little Ienzo, bundled up with so many jackets and scarves that he could hardly move, toddling up and down the hills outside of Radiant Garden. The memory was a treasure and he was sure this new memory was much of the same, wonderful nature. Vexen took a deep breath of the cool, crisp air and certainly hoped this would not be his last time teaching sledding. Watching Roxas and Xion stumble up the side of the mountain back to him, he had to admit that he was getting rather good at it now.