Stop Right Now
Chapter 2

"I had this great idea for a story."

For the amount of talking they'd done when first meeting him, Roxas assumed that Sora and his posse-like just chattered all the time. Within the first week he realized that this was not all true all the time. At lunch there was silence with everyone looking awkwardly at their food, and sometimes eating it but more often than not, not. Roxas' mind did backflips over itself trying to explain these odd boys' odd habits.

He concluded, eventually, that it was after the initial introduction they had all quieted down and now felt awkward. All confused with nothing to say. Axel later told him the truth... Or as much of it as he knew.

And Roxas hadn't then been so wondering the rest of the week, and he did his duty sitting in silence at the lunch table and enjoying himself later. Though he did this still not knowing why because Axel's explanation on that first day of school was really just pure shite.

"We don't talk during lunch. And none of us really know why. But it's like a ritual you know. I mean– oh yeah we talk sometimes you know. Sometimes. But mostly there's just nothing to say... Or rather there's lots to say but it goes unsaid. Lunch is just an awkward time, you know. Who talks during lunch?"

Roxas did not mention everyone else at every other table in the cafeteria. Instead he nodded wisely, and felt that much wiser for it. (And Axel was one of the only ones to actually speak to him about it. Plus a lot of other things. The others– aside from Sora– started to seem a little hostile, in fact. Which shocked Roxas but he didn't mention it.)

So when Sora broke the silence on the next Monday, Roxas' fifth day of school here, having come last Tuesday, he was shocked (even though Axel had said there was sometimes conversation.)

He looked up briefly but then looked back down, because everyone else was. Looking down, that is. Sora, speaking now, was looking down too. At his food. Staring at your food was odd, but necessary, he realized. He also knew that at his old school he would've been curious as to why these boys acted so strangely. But here on their turf, as it were, their habitat, he would follow their rules. It still felt strange.

"Basically–" He heard Sora lick his lips on the verge of the next word. "...Basically," the brunet repeats... "there are these four people. Three men and one girl I'm thinking but the details still haven't come to me–" There's a collective murmur of understanding from everyone else, as if Sora really should be waiting to receive the details, like in a dream, rather than thinking them up... Like a normal writer. Roxas didn't know Sora was a writer. "And... They're evil, I suppose. Really bad. And in this place where they live, wearing a person's clothes makes you turn into that person.." Sora sighed, and then added hastily. "Depending, I mean.. On how imprinted their soul is into the clothing. Like their favourite piece of clothing would turn you completely, inexorably into that person. And something they wore only once... well you might start liking their favourite food, perhaps, but no more... And this is... Filtered, of course! from the original vision, you understand." Everyone understood but Roxas. Roxas could feel the understanding in the air without looking up. Feel it like a heat that reached everyone but him. Roxas shivered in the limbo that is misunderstanding.

...He genuinely thought it was a serious story, thought that Sora was being... well. Serious, for once. Until he heard the next line.

"...And these four evil people find... They find– " Sora wet his lips again. "The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles."

Roxas almost burst out laughing except that no one else did, and he still felt that the understanding was beyond him.

"And... They catch the Turtles, and skin them. And wear their skins as a costume. So obviously... They start... turning into the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles... But of course, once a person is evil, a person is always evil. You never lose that part of yourself." Roxas heard the rustling of fabric that meant heads were nodding. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that no one looked up.

"So... It's... Basically, I mean... Just a bunch of... Like 20 chapters of the Teenage Mutants Ninja Turtles killing people and throwing cars through buildings... Buicks, specifically."

Roxas couldn't help himself. "Why Buicks?"

"Pardon?" Sora seemed genuinely shocked that Roxas had spoken, and when Roxas looked up, everyone was looking at him. He knew that Riku, Tidus, and Wakka would probably seem even more hostile after this.

"Why Buicks?"

"It sounds good" was Sora's reply. And Roxas nodded in understanding, though he did not understand.

They all looked back down to their food. Sora continued to speak. "Anyways," he said, and Roxas heard the frustration in his voice riding like the crest of a wave, about to flip over and be all that remains of the original tide... "I haven't actually... I don't know, that is to say, how it will end."

Roxas thought the ending probably involved icebergs, though he couldn't say why. (This was happening more and more now. Random instincts that really didn't make sense had become a dime a dozen in his mind.)

"Does it involve icebergs?" he asked. This was the first time he'd voiced a random insight and he felt really stupid. Everyone was looking at him, most of them angry-seeming but Sora looked confused, then he smiled.

"Actually yes, I was thinking it would. I just don't know how. But I'm thinking maybe... Maybe a bunch of little kids sail in on icebergs. Or just... Not icebergs but patches of ice anyways, because... and there's an abandoned barn involved but I'm not sure how... Anyways though a lot of little kids sail in on these broken ice patches and maybe get killed or maybe they save the day."

And that was Sora's story idea.

Roxas thought it sounded like junk Sora had in a dream. But everyone else took it seriously, so he did too. And he was seemingly more welcome after the iceberg thing.

Honestly, he just didn't know anymore.

But among very small rocks and turtles and Disney movies and (he'd learned this when a boy in his class made a joke and got degraded immediately after by Tidus, Axel and Riku) a severe aversion to baby jokes (of the eating or molesting sort), Roxas added Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Sora's story ideas to a list of things that were important.

Things to be revered was a better term. Because they were great, but somewhere back in the times before he'd met these boys, he knew they weren't important.