I was planning on writing the tutorial missions, but they turned into a copy and paste of the game vision, so I scrapped it and instead focused on other parts of the story. I am taking certain plots out from KH3, but this whole thing won't follow the cannon, so I do not feel it's important to make spoiler warnings.

Saix lies in bed, his mind wandering on that first meeting, and to see that face again on the replica's face. It made him wonder. 'Could it really have been her? Or was it just another trick?' He can't really say, maybe he should ask Axel, hear what he sees in Xion… oh, he forgot that Axel is no more. The yellow orbs land on the night sky from the window, void of stars. He suddenly feels incredibly cold from the thought that struck him. Axel is gone, the last remaining thing of Lea has faded away. He is all alone now.

'You do not need him.' A whisper inside his head, but Saix cannot bring himself to agree with his inner voice. He pushes the thoughts aside that he has no emotions, for the coldness every Nobody feels has become greater as if he's standing outside in the snow, and this time there no fire to warm him.

'He'd served his purpose, you have come closer to the goal.'

But was that goal truly worth it? More important than his best friend? Saix finds no answer worth that question, only the agreement that nothing is worth it. 'He's never coming back...'

Never will he see that cocky grin, eyes beaming as if the sun is shining into them, listening to whatever comes to Axel's mind and he would've retorted back with a sarcastic but goodhearted remark… well, lately, his comments have not been goodhearted. In fact, Saix realizes that he has been quite the asshole towards his friend.

'Now it's too late.'

He cannot feel regret, but… of all the times he wishes to feel anything about this loss, it would be now. He wants to feel something other than these phantom emotions, want to get sad, angry even—he wants to go into his Berserk stage and tear down this whole darn castle and show how much he misses that obnoxious man to Axel.

A sound he hasn't noticed before comes into focus, takes him a moment to fully register and when it does. Saix turns to the wailing alarm clock and he is struck with a very vivid memory on how to feel panic. "Shit!" He swears and leaps out from bed and continues his swearing as he dresses up.

He has been in such deep thoughts that he hasn't heard the clock, and not by ten or twenty minutes, but several hours! He has never done that before! Why the in Kingdom Hearts light did he do it now?! No, no time to think about that now. Saix quickly grabs the papers, not even bothering to look at them and merely hands out what lies above the pile to the other members.

Fortunately, the others didn't seem to notice his huge blunder and if they did, no one mentioned it. Saix prefers this incident will be forgotten as soon as possible. With Luxord gone through a portal, Saix notices that he is still holding one mission sheet. Okay, is Demyx trying to avoid missions again? He scans the room but does not find a lazy musician. Should he check the man's room?

Saix finds himself that he honestly does not care about that idiot.

Saix leaves the room, and with nothing better to do, he begins sorting through the sheets for future missions.

Saix stops when he gets to Xion's upcoming mission and is reminded of what happened last night. 'Right, still has to deal with Xion.'

She should consider herself lucky if he does not— wait, why is he suddenly considering Xion a she now? Is it because of the face?

'Better haul it back, it's not like hearts are collecting themselves.' He hums but first; coffee. Now that he is over the fake panic attack, Saix is pretty sure he has been wrecking his brain all night, but honestly, he cannot tell since there's no night and day cycle in this world.

Saix brews some coffee and makes some toast, slowly consuming both as his mind is once again wandering. It has finally sunk in that Axel might be dead and will never come back.

'and whose fault is this?' Saix pushes that thought aside, reminding himself that there is nothing to do about it now. All he can do is keep moving forward.

All on his own.

Saix hurls the half-empty cup right into the nearby wall, breaking it to a million pieces, not enough; he feels like breaking the whole wall in how angry and lost he feels. The same emotions that went through Isa the day where he and Lea lost their hearts to the Heartless that guy sent at them. He was so useless, and lately, he has been such a jerk to him.

How could he treat his best friend like that?

What the hell is wrong with him?

Why did he send Lea there?

Didn't he think this might've spelled the end for him?

Why doesn't he care?!

A pain at his right hand clears up the mess of thoughts, Saix blinks, staring at the wall and the hole his fist made. Slowly he removes his hand and testing it with the other one, yup, he just broke pretty much every bone with that stunt.

"It's not me losing control like this…" He muses, never has he lost control over himself when not going into a Berserk stage, but his body is uncomfortably cold. It's making his mind repeat how to feel certain emotions, making it feels like his chest is burning of the thoughts that his actions have caused the demise of his best friend. Saix really has to struggle with not punching the wall again. He wants to hit it; does not matter if it will break what remains of his bones in it. He wants to feel the pain— he needs to feel any sort of pain that can represent what he should be feeling. 'What the hell is wrong with me?'

Saix leaves the room, letting the Dusks handle the cleaning and repairs. As he walks, his thoughts try to sort out what changed all of this? Well, it started when he started being such an asshole to Axel, not being the friend he was supposed to, but another, darker side. whispers with a soft voice, 'Xion is at fault, make it pay.'

What? No, Xion isn't at fault of what happened to Axel. all she did was hit him in the chest, sure she needs to be punished for that but not…

the whisper kept insisting that Xion is at fault of all of this, it keeps pushing and pushing, and finally: He listens to the voice.

"Find Xion!" Saix commands the Dusks loudly and they all take off, for even they know it's a bad idea to argue with Saix when he's in this kind of mood.

One of his Berserker Dusks return and report the whereabouts of Xion, Saix heads straight down to the streets of the city below the castle. Near the Memory Skyscraper, he finds a small figure sitting at the stairs in a manner very much like a child that knows they have done something wrong.

This makes him pause. 'Does a puppet even know how to emote such emot— it does not matter! Strike it down, give in to your fury, take its life!'

Wait that does not sound like him. The other members might not believe this, but he isn't a temperamental person. He shouldn't hurt people just because they struck him from his cruel taunting.

'The puppet is at fault, embrace your rage.'

Saix slowly turns back to Xion and summons his weapon.

Sensing someone is near, Xion looks up and fear strikes her in seeing Saix standing nearby, holding the claymore in a manner that he is planning on using it against her. That's not what really scares her, it's the face, it's twisted in rage. Xion jumps on her feet and summons her keyblade, terrified but not willing to let Saix beat her without a fight.

This actually catches Saix off guard,

'Strike it! let it know fear.' The voice commands, but… Xion already fears him. She genuinely fears him for that small body is trembling and even though he cannot see the face thanks to the hood, only one knowing how much in danger they are will be desperately searching for an escape.

'I wonder if I looked like that when the Heartless attacked?' Saix can't help but wonder and dismisses his weapon. He hesitantly approaches the girl. She tenses up and if he does not eases her down, then he can look forward to getting hit with that keyblade again. "I'm not going to hurt you." Xion seems surprised, but it's hard to know with the hood up. Honestly, he's also a bit surprised by this. He's acting like Isa.

But that's a good thing, right?

"You won't?" She asks, sounding confused. "But… I really hurt you."

Saix does not answer right away, he a bit caught off guard by the voice. It's not the voice he's used to hear from the puppet, but… her voice.

Can it really be…. he reaches out and carefully pulls down the hood. Instead of a doll's or even his younger, human self's face, he sees the same teenager girl from before— from all those years ago. She has the same face, same raven black hair and those iconic sky-blue eyes. Eyes currently wide in fear but also confusion. Saix stares at this face, getting flashbacks of the times Isa and Lea snuck into the castle to play with her. He remembers that girl had an ability to summon very colorful animals, it was weird, but Saix (fondly) remember he and Lea would hurl some of these animals at the guards before running off with their female friend to a guard-less area inside the castle.

But one day, she was just… gone. Never found a trace of where she went, and now she is here? No, it can't be her. Xion is a puppet!

But what if this is her? What if Zexion used one of his powerful illusion spells and made Xion look like someone else? Would explain why he kept seeing his younger self in her.

"…I know you." He speaks quietly.

Very confused by this change of behavior someone who has been nothing but mean to her as long as she can remember. Now, merely by the action of removing the hood from her face, is claiming he knows her. "You do?" Xion asks, confused but also curious about how Saix knows her. She flinches in fright when Saix puts a hand onto her head, fearing for a moment he's going to strike her, but he doesn't. The hand's weight gives a soothing sense she has never felt before and meeting his eyes, Xion blinks in seeing they are no longer the usual cold yellow but instead, a gentle gleam in the now teal eyes. She stares in awe into those eyes, for the first time, Xion does not fear Saix.

He opens his mouth to explain but realizes that he has to wait for now. Neoshadow Heartless are approaching in the sense of Xion's keyblade. "Let's go back." He tells her and gently but firmly pushes her towards the castle.

Xion obeys and as they walk up some stairs of the castle, she asks carefully. "Do you know me from before?"

"To be honest, I am not sure." Saix must admit, Xion looks and gives the sense that he knows her, but maybe that's just a side effect of Vexen's replica program. Honestly, he cannot recall how the girl he and Lea played with inside the castle really looked like other than the raven hair and sky-blue eyes. And she always would mysteriously disappear with no explanation. He and Lea always went out searching, but it mostly ended up they got caught and then thrown out by whatever guard who happens to find them. But looking at Xion, he gets the strong sense that this is how that girl looked like. So maybe, "Back when I was human, I and… a friend of mine befriended a girl. One day she just disappeared, and no matter how much we searched, I haven't seen her since…" he meets Xion's sky-blue eyes, "until now."

"I'm… I'm this girl?" Xion asks, a bit confused as to why Saix hasn't reacted to her like this before now.

"As said, I cannot say for sure," Saix tells Xion, he turns to leave but cannot bring himself to leave her behind like this. So he waits for her to catch up to him again. "your face… wasn't like this the other times I looked at you." Xion titles her head in confusion, but he does not feel up to explaining that he has seen either a doll or Isa's face when looking at her. Whatever made the change, he welcomes it, although it is making it a bit hard to know if she really is that girl or merely playing him for a fool.

'I have been a fool a lot lately, so what difference does this make?'

"It does not matter," He tells Xion, wants to continue treating her as a mere puppet but finds it hard with that innocent stare holding his eyes. Saix sights, already regretting of have gone after her. "I will overlook your lash out and absences if you promise to work extra hard from now on."

Relief washes over her, Xion dreaded Saix would punish her severely for her screw-up and doing extra work is a simple slap on the wrist, "I will!" and happily runs off to gather extra many hearts, wanting to prove that Saix won't regret this act of kindness.

Saix watches Xion run off and finds himself wondering: "Are you really part of Sora's memories?" He knows how Kairi looks like and although Xion shares some similarities he can easily say that those two girls are not the same— pain strikes his right hand when Saix tries to cross his arms, reminding him of his outburst from earlier. 'Right, better fix up my hand.' Hopefully the Moogle has something that can mend shattered bones. Writing reports with the left-hand sounds like a giant hassle he rather not deal with.

Goodnight, Sora.

Sora? That's not my name… my name is…

Roxas opens his eyes, head thumping and foggy, so it takes him several moments to realizes that his bed has several seashells lying around, this confuses him a bit, who would be leaving seashells for him?

His wondering gets interrupted by a loud growl from his stomach and Roxas realizes how hungry he is. Wobbly on his feet, Roxas heads to the kitchen.

He finds Saix sitting at the table, staring into a mug so intensely that it almost seems like the coffee insulted him. Roxas hesitates for a moment, wondering if he should ask the man about Castle Oblivion but decides otherwise. Saix is most likely not going to give up any answers and always makes Roxas feel small and irritated. He leaves the man alone and makes himself a bowl of cereal.

"You're awake." Saix suddenly states.

Roxas's whole body tense up, but fortunately, the second-in-command does not notice. Well now that Saix has his focus on him; "Did you ever find out what happened at Castle Oblivion?" Roxas asks, the whole ordeal has left him uneasy and he would like to know what has happened instead pondering about it with this headache he's dealing with.

Saix watches the kid for a moment, he seems greatly affected by the news, must mean the boy is starting to remember how it was like to have emotions. Seeing Roxas like this, Saix finds himself thinking about the times he worried about his sickly mother and does wonder if Sora felt the same when he lost his friends.

'… When have I taken others 'feeling' into my account?' Saix realizes he has let his mind wander. A dangerous thing around here. "We're still looking into the matter," He answers Roxas and not sure why but adds as he checks his now cold coffee, "it is sketchy, but the Dusks have reported there might be a survivor." and he prays it will be Axel.

Roxas blinks, caught off guard by the tone Saix used, it's not the usual cold and uncaring voice. Still emotionless and calm, but the tone was in a way that made Roxas think that Saix did care about the subject. Rather strange but it did ease Roxas feelings, "Okay," and quietly eats the rest of the cereal. When done, he does asks Saix. "Will there be missions for me today?"

"No."

Roxas nods and after having cleaned up the bowl, he leaves the kitchen, does cast one glance at Saix, the man looks like he hasn't gotten any sleep. He wonders if Saix has spent most of the time trying to figure out what has happened in Castle Oblivion? With no mission, Roxas decides to head to the clock tower, his head still fuzzy from have just woken up and that strange dream still haunts his mind. Not to mention his thoughts on never going to see Axel again are deeply bothering him.

"Roxas?" Xion asks and is pleasured surprised to see him up. "You woke up today!" Roxas does not fully respond, seems like he hasn't fully woken up, but at least he's up. "You were out for quite a while, I asked Saix when you would wake, but he didn't know."

"How… how long was I out?"

Xion takes a seat beside him, she does have to count the days to answer his questions. "For about three weeks."

"That long?!" Roxas exclaims startled, no wonder why his head and body is so sluggish.

Xion nods, "The Dusks were taking care of you." and they did but… well, they had a habit of messing with Roxas. She asked Saix about it and although he seemed a bit annoyed of her asking, he did explain that it was their only way of showing who they once were.

"That's so sad." She had replied and Saix had merely given her a strange look she didn't know what meant, and before she could ask, he had left.

"Really? Doesn't feels like it was a Dusk leaving seashells…" Roxas muses, he does not take them having a sympatric side.

Oh, she was going to ask him about it, good timing, "Oh, that was me." Xion giggles, "I thought you would like to have something pretty to wake up to." and since she didn't know he would wake, Xion pulls up another seashell from her pocket. "Here, take this one!" Roxas takes and she explains, "I was sent to a world that has a beautiful ocean during one of my missions. I have been picking a few seashells up every time I finished a mission." and requests Roxas with the seashell he holds. "Try putting it to your ear," He does and after a moment of letting him listen to the sound inside this seashell, she asks, "could you hear it? The sound of the waves?"

Listening to the sound coming from the seashell, he did see strange images before his eyes. Many of them are about the ocean, some of them with two people smiling at him. The girl in those images looks strangely very alike to Xion. Blinking and the pictures disappear, as well as the sound of waves from the seashell, now it just sounds like: "Sounds like stagnate air." He remarks, too busy to wonder why he saw those images to hear Xion huffy exclaim that the seashell makes the sound of the ocean. He pondered about it even as he returned back to his room, but as his mind cleared up, the numbness returned as his thoughts of Axel being gone snuck back into his mind.

Saix is going to be a lot more important character in this story, and I sure hope you guys are going to like the dynamic he will get with Xion.

Xion's personality might change a bit, but mostly my attempt to give her character.

Roxas is still quite down from the whole Castle Oblivion incident, and it's not making it better that he sees strange images in his head.