C11
LOCATION: Meeting room of Organization XIII headquarters, The World That Never Was
DATE: Wednesday, November 28th 2X60
TIME: 0845 hours
"Here's your first assignment."
Hiro grins, passing Sora and Naminé each a stapled stack of papers. Sora internally groans at the thought of assigned reading (it reminds him too much of school). As he flips through the papers, the words blur and he waits for Hiro to explain what they have to do.
"It's quite simple. To make Synergy easier to activate, we need you guys to know everything about each other. First off, what do you guys know about each other?"
Sora pauses for a moment, glancing at Naminé. Descriptors easily come to mind.
"LODer who's good at operating but sucks with Keyblades," he says.
Naminé looks like she's about to fire back but pauses to consider her words. "Sora's from HB, he's 21-years-old, he's a field agent with HBRC."
"Naminé's still in school—she's actually a kid," Sora adds.
"And you're an idiot who keeps saying things everyone already knows!"
Aha, so she definitely can't hold her composure as well as Riku (Calm, Cool, and Collected™). It's kinda funny that she gets riled up so easily when she tries to be serious all the time.
"Just stating facts, cause Hiro asked," Sora points out.
"Hiro didn't say to state the obvious." Naminé pauses, sheepishly glancing at Hiro. "It still feels weird calling you by your first name."
"Huh? Oh, I mean, it'd be weird if you called me anything else, especially cause I'm younger than you guys." Hiro shrugs. "And though I may seem like an intellectual, I am in fact but a humble high school graduate."
"Very humble," Sora points out, cause the brat's been getting comfortable with them. He definitely sassed them a few times earlier.
Hiro smirks. "Like I said."
Oh, the brat's definitely aware that he's getting real comfortable.
"Anyways, it sounds like you two barely know each other," Hiro concludes. "So, how do people get to know each other better?"
"By chatting and hanging out?" Sora volunteers.
"By doing...icebreakers," Naminé states.
He wants to mock her answer—icebreakers? What are they, kids at summer camp?—but Hiro perks up and waves the papers in his hands. Oh, no way in hell—
"Icebreakers!" he exclaims. "I've printed out a list of icebreaker questions for you guys to do! That's your assignment for today. I have a few things I need to do in my lab, so I'll leave you guys to it. I left my lab extension number on that Post-It, so let me know if you need anything. Have fun!"
Speeding through his words, Hiro beams at them and then dashes out of the room. Sora and Naminé stare at each other incredulously. Get to know each other? Icebreakers?
He chose to extend his stay in this foreign world, hoping to learn how to fight Heartless, and is now doing icebreakers?
"Well, how do you want to do this?" Naminé begins with a no-nonsense tone, not the slightest bit affronted by the nature of their task. Maybe this is just another homework assignment to her. Cause that's what it feels like to him, and he doesn't like being treated like a kid.
His eyes glance at the first question. "Okay. What's your name?"
"Naminé."
"Age and birthday?"
"18, September 19th."
"Favorite ice cream flavor?"
"Vanilla."
"Boring."
"Well, what's your non-boring favorite ice cream flavor?"
"I don't have a favorite, I pick something different everytime." He grins. "Cause I'm not boring."
Too. Easy.
"You're boring as hell if you think that's a witty answer," Naminé deadpans. "And favorite ice cream flavor isn't even a question on here!"
"We're supposed to get to know each other," Sora points out. "I want to know your favorite ice cream flavor."
"Let's follow the order Hiro gave us," Naminé states, eyes trained on her copy of questions.
Sora huffs. This might actually be more boring than all those presentations they attended.
Sora quickly loses steam with the sheer amount of questions they have to go through. And they're all super mundane questions, mostly biographical information like they're learning about a historical figure. He doesn't remember all the details of her life that Naminé shares—and he thinks that Naminé realizes that, cause she occasionally prompts him to recite some facts.
"...and that was when I was 12. You remember where I lived when I was 12, right?"
"Yeah, yeah," Sora mumbles. He's met with an expectant look. What, is he supposed to recite the street address she'd rattled off earlier? What's the point of knowing that information—she doesn't even live there anymore!
"Okay, I feel like it might be better if we write out our responses to each question," she says. "That way we'll have a record to refer to if we forget."
"You're literally maximizing the amount of work we have to do," Sora points out.
"Well, if your brain was capable of remembering a few simple facts, we wouldn't have to do this."
"My brain is very capable, thank you very much. No one can remember a bunch of obscure facts at once! Do you remember the name of my pet dog growing up?"
Naminé pauses. Aha, in your face! He's about to gloat over proving his point when she responds.
"You didn't have a pet dog, because your dad's allergic. You had...a pet turtle?"
Damn, how'd she see right through his trick question? Not wanting to give her the satisfaction of confirming her answer, he rolls his eyes and changes the topic.
"What's the point of knowing this information? Are we really gonna be able to fight Heartless if we know every house the other person has lived in?" he complains.
"Well, we're never gonna find out if you keep dragging your feet like this," Naminé returns. "At least give it a shot so we can tell Hiro we tried."
You're making a big deal over something you chose to stay behind for, Conscience-Kairi points out.
Now Naminé and Conscience-Kairi are on the same side? That's not good.
He hates busy work, and he'd thought the extended mission would be more hands-on. Hopefully that comes later, because he can't imagine doing paperwork for the entire month.
Deciding to try and match Naminé's commitment, Sora gives the questions his best shot. The room falls quiet sans the scribbling of pen against paper. Contemplating his favorite animal and his middle school class schedule is kinda fun at first, but the list drags on and he eventually starts giving shorter, flippant answers.
"Okay, let's swap?" Naminé proposes as they trade completed questionnaires. Sora stares at her long, extensive answers. She literally spent a paragraph describing the view outside her bedroom window.
He'll probably remember some of the mildly interesting factoids, like the one time Naminé almost got in trouble in middle school but got away with her crime (of breaking into her classroom to retrieve an unfinished homework assignment, oh how horrific!). But there's no way he's gonna remember this detailed list of her ever-changing favorite animal.
"Is the most important person in your world really...you?" Naminé says with doubt and a healthy dose of judgment.
"Of course," he returns. "I wouldn't exist without me, so I'm definitely most important."
"I think you mean most narcissistic."
"Hey, self-love is very important," Sora insists. To be honest, that question had been towards the end, and he'd long given up on composing thoughtful answers.
"And if you had a million munny, you'd give it to...uh, this Riku person?"
"Yeah, he's my best friend," Sora confirms. This answer is partially cheeky but also sincere. "I have zero sense of finance but he's smart about this stuff. I'm sure he can manage my money, maybe even turn a profit or something."
"You trust him to not run off with all that munny? Why not give it to your parents or something?"
Sora narrows his eyes. "I trust Riku. I've known him since forever."
"Okay...I can't tell if that's a good thing or bad thing," Naminé murmurs before returning to his list.
Sora scans through the remainder of her list and soon finds himself with nothing to do. He's not sure why Naminé is carefully examining each and every word he wrote. He feels a little self-conscious now. Maybe he should've put a little more effort into his answers. But this assignment definitely took way too long, and are they really any better at Synergy now?
"Let's try it," he decides, jumping to his feet.
Naminé glances at him with alarm. "What're you doing?"
"Relax, we're just doing what we did earlier," Sora says. Sticking out his hand, he quickly summons his Keyblade. He glances at her. "You too. Let's see if this Synergy thing is actually any easier now that we 'know each other better.'"
"Wait, I haven't memorized everything yet," Naminé mumbles, flipping through his answers.
Sora stares. "You're actually trying to remember everything I wrote on there?"
She shoots him a quizzical look. "Isn't that the point of this assignment? To know these things about each other?" She pauses, brows furrowing. "Did you even look at my answers?"
"Of course I did!" Sora exclaims. "But there's no way I'm gonna remember all of that!"
"Then what's the point of us filling it out?"
"I don't know, you decided to do that!"
"So that we can have something to reference as we're getting to know each other better!"
"Oh my god, this is such a LODer thing to do." Sora rolls his eyes. "C'mon, it's not like there's a formula to get to know someone! You just have to spend more time and talk, and you'll eventually know each other better. You know?"
"While that makes sense, we're on a mission and I don't think we can casually hang out and chat to get to know each other," Naminé returns. "That sounds really inefficient, and it's impossible to gauge whether we're making progress. At least with this, we can concretely say how many things we know about each other."
"This is so...forced!" Sora protests.
"This whole mission is forced!" Naminé exclaims frustratedly. "You think I want to do this? That I want to be here? I'm an OATS operator trying to learn a new technique for fighting Heartless. What's the point?"
Sora is about to protest that he's also here somewhat against his will, but she makes a good point. There is actually no direct benefit for her as an operator. It's truly for the abstract greater good that she's stranded from home to get to know him, this random guy from HB.
Not for the first time (and probably not the last), Sora realizes the situation really sucks for her.
Naminé huffs, dropping the papers on the table. "Whatever. Let's try."
She holds out her hand and pauses for a moment, her entire arm and fingers going rigid. Sora watches somewhat amusedly as she inhales and exhales deeply, Keyblade nowhere in sight. Perhaps a little self-conscious, she then whirls around to look the other way. It's funny watching her fumble with the simple task of summoning her Keyblade. Well, he understands that as an operator, she doesn't need to wield Keyblades—in fact, it's pretty impressive that she has some basics under her belt.
It's been almost a minute now, so he tiptoes towards her. "You know, you can't force it. You just gotta let go." His hands press down on her hunched shoulders. "Relax. You did it just now."
It takes awhile for Naminé to release her rigidity. A few deep breaths later, her Keyblade materializes.
"You did it! Not bad for a noob," he jokes.
Naminé whirls around to face him with narrowed eyes. "Do you usually teach people how to summon Keyblades?"
"Huh? Not really. I'm an agent, so I mainly focus on missions. Riku does some mentoring occasionally, but I don't really have patience for noobs. Why?"
Naminé pauses and then shrugs. "You just seem...pretty well-practiced with walking me through summoning my Keyblade. I thought you did it a lot."
"Nah, it's all talent." He grins. "When you're as good at summoning Keyblades as I am, teaching others is easy peasy."
Naminé snorts. "Yes, all ego, I see."
"You definitely heard me say talent."
"Uh-huh, but your ego said something else." She raises her Keyblade at him. "Okay, let's do it."
"Alright! But side note, you should really brush up on summoning your Keyblade."
"I'll get to it," she promises with a frustrated pout.
It's funny that she actually gets worked up about her lack of Keyblade skills. Oh, to be bad at something you never have to do! Sora snorts. Naminé does always seem very keen on showing off her skills.
They raise their Keyblades to point at each other. What had Hiro said? To focus on the same thing.
"What're you thinking of?" he asks.
Naminé blinks. "Uh. Synergy?"
Sora makes a face. "Too abstract. Let's think of something simpler. Stare at that Post-It." He points at the wad of Post-Its Hiro had left behind.
It's quite easy for him to get in the zone. Before a mission and before fighting Heartless, he always has to focus on the task at hand. Though he's staring at the Post-It, he isn't really thinking of it per se. His mind acknowledges the colored object before him but also recognizes that any detailed information about it isn't pertinent at the moment. It's simply a Post-It.
Naminé breaks the silence with a sigh. "I don't think I can do this."
"C'mon. Did you even try?"
"I did!" Naminé protests, exhaling deeply. "Let's try closing our eyes and thinking of the same thing. We won't have time to stop and stare at an object during a battle anyways."
Sora concedes to her point. "What're you gonna think of?"
"Let's do...an apple?"
He closes his eyes. "This a Gala apple? Granny Smith? Or are we talking about like a Red Delicious?"
"...what the hell?"
Sora's eyes shoot open, looking at Naminé incredulously. "You don't even know your apples? C'mon, Naminé! This is like elementary school stuff!"
"Just think of a red apple!" she barks and Sora quiets down with a grin, deciding he'll stop teasing her about apples...for now.
(Seriously, does she not even know the different colored apples? It's okay if she has low standards for food, but this is basic knowledge! They should talk about this sometime.)
Back to thinking about...a red apple. Red Delicious it is then.
For awhile, silence enshrouds the room as Sora focuses on the picture of an apple in his mind. It feels like an eternity has passed and nothing's happened, until suddenly the darkness in his vision grows bright. He feels a lightness in his body, a sensation he's beginning to associate with Synergy.
Opening his eyes, he stares at his Keyblade with awe. It's...actually glowing.
"We did it!" he exclaims. Looking at Naminé, he realizes her eyes are still closed. She's really focusing on thinking of that apple, huh? Slowly her eyelids flutter open, and she looks at their glowing Keyblades. Gradually, her lips stretch into a smile.
The light then fades. The lightness in his body dissipates, and his feet are firmly rooted on the floor once more.
"Dammit," Naminé curses under her breath, evidently a lot more upset about things than Sora.
He eyes her cautiously. "That wasn't bad. We got it to last longer this time."
"Yeah, but it still took forever to activate. Plus, if it suddenly drops like that, it won't be very useful." Naminé huffs, evidently more put off about their lack of progress than he is.
"Well, I didn't think doing a questionnaire about each other was gonna be a big game-changer," Sora points out. "Plus, this is supposed to be a gradual thing. Stop being so hard on yourself. And me."
Naminé falls quiet for a moment, and Sora wonders why she's so upset. She takes a deep breath and then exhales slowly before looking at him in the eye.
"I think...I'm struggling a bit with the focusing part."
"What do you mean?"
"I just get distracted easily."
"What? You can't even think of an apple?"
"It's not as easy as that," Naminé protests. "Look, maybe you have a one-track mind that's good at focusing to fight Heartless. I'm just realizing that I usually have to keep track of a lot of different things as an OATS operator, so I'm not used to thinking about one thing," she finishes with a frown.
"Oh. Well, when you put it that way...you can't focus on one thing?" Sora chuckles. "That's like a kindergarten skill. You're literally a preschooler."
"I'm only three years younger than you!" Naminé protests once more, and Sora concedes he should probably tone down the kid jokes. She really wants to prove she's an adult, huh? Honestly he doesn't think of her as a kid most of the time, cause they talk about missions and Heartless like she's a fellow recruit at HBRC. Everyone grows up a little too quickly because of the Heartless.
"So, what's our plan?" Naminé asks.
Right, back to business. He doesn't have time to regret his youth or feel bad for others. "Well, maybe you should let Hiro know? He'll probably have some ideas."
"How do you focus on something?" Naminé asks curiously.
Out of context, it's a strange question to ask. Sora takes a moment to think about it but then realizes… "Just don't think too much. It's like summoning your Keyblade. If you force it, you'll end up thinking about the process instead of whatever you're supposed to focus on. It should come naturally."
"That's not very helpful."
"Well, I tried." He shrugs. "You know, it sounds like you've got a lot of things to work on before we're gonna get this Synergy thing down."
Naminé huffs. "I told you, I'm an OATS operator. This isn't my area of expertise."
"Yeah, I know, that's fair. I'm just saying, maybe we should start with the basics. You can practice summoning your Keyblade and, uh, focusing."
"And what're you gonna do? Slack off while I do all the work?"
"Hey, how'd you know?" he exclaims gleefully. "Nah but actually, I was gonna ask if they have a gym somewhere. I need to stay in shape while I'm not actively taking on missions or fighting Heartless."
"That's not a bad idea," Naminé concedes. "We can ask Hiro what he thinks about that. It makes sense to me."
"Sweet! Also, it's lunchtime, right? Let's go!"
"It's 11:30 AM," Naminé states. "It's a little early for that."
"Nah, there's no such thing as too early for food," Sora returns. Just the thought of food, albeit of subpar quality, has him excited. He'd chomped down breakfast pretty quickly cause he was running late, but maybe he can enjoy a decent lunch. Plus, going early means getting dibs on the good stuff. That's always the rule of thumb at HBRC—recruits are merciless when waffle fries are on the line.
Naminé shrugs. "Sure I don't mind. I could use a break. Focusing is hard."
"Pfft!"
"Stop laughing everytime I talk about focusing! It's actually a skill, okay?"
"Okay, okay, just—you can't focus! It's like you're a kid who's distracted by everything!"
"If multitasking ever comes a prerequisite skill for something, we'll see who's laughing!"
"Yeah, sure, till then...pfft!"
They head out of the meeting room towards the dining room, where lunch hours have just begun. As he'd hoped, the seats are mostly vacant and all the entrées are fully stocked. Ah, it's really about the little things in life.
"Where do you wanna sit?" he asks Naminé as they grab drinks.
Naminé blinks, taking a moment to think over her answer. "Uh. I guess I don't really care…"
"Okay, I'm gonna put my stuff down over there and grab seconds." He gestures at his destination and plops his filled plate down. While heading towards the soup bar, he notices Naminé watching him from the corner of his eye. Is there something she wants to say?
But she turns away before he can ask what's up. Huh.
Like Naminé had said, he has an incredibly one-track mind. And because she doesn't have to do with any of the important things in his life—namely his friends, food, and family—Sora quickly shrugs off the encounter to focus on one of the former, this delicious food spread.
Okay, he's really trying to will this deliciousness into existence, if that's even possible. C'mon, how bad can fried rice get?
(Pretty bad, he soon learns.)
A/N: Ah yes, icebreakers. Does anyone else also cringe when the teacher announces we're doing them, or is it just me? It's debatable how effective this assignment was, but hey, things can only go up from here...right?
Shoutout to my lovely reviewers, I always get giddy when I read your thoughts about the story! If you haven't reviewed before, I'd really appreciate even just one line to know that you're enjoying the story! Obviously our characters still have a lot of work to do, but at least they have a goal! Here's to friendship!
