"Xion, these are great!"
Xion could face heat up as she started to blush. "You're just saying that." she told Olette, sounding just as embarrassed as she looked. But Olette adamantly shook her head.
"I'm serious." she assured her friend. "You have some serious talent for this stuff."
"She's not wrong," Roxas added in, "And it's great seeing you smile while you write too! When you get into this serious groove, it's like you're in this really weird trance- but when you come out, you've written down this awesome story!"
Well, if the blush on her face wasn't evident yet, it was now. Xion even had to look away from her first friend. Of anyone, Roxas was the most excited that Xion liked writing. He never really said why, but Xion had a good feeling on the reason; they had both started their life as Nobodies. Almost in every sense of the word, really. Xion finding that she liked and was good at writing was her first branch of becoming Somebody.
Almost four months ago, Xion decided to become a writer. Nothing special, of course, just as a little thing to do in her spare time. Today was the first day she was letting her friends read through what she had written so far. None of her little stories really connected to each other; at first, she was writing from experience, using an author avatar to mask that it was truly her. But then she started to experiment a bit more. Sometimes her avatar knew more than Xion did. Other times she had someone else in story teach her avatar something Xion knew quite a bit about.
A lot of the time, Xion felt embarrassed by her avatar. She was almost too idyllic. But a part of her really... enjoyed that perfect version. A world where no one was really hurt, or was lost, or forgotten. Especially not forgotten.
"You should absolutely look into joining the school paper." Pence even encouraged. "One of the main column writers graduated last year- your stories about Ebba would be a great replacement."
Now her ears were starting to glow a bright red as well. "N-no... I don't think I should..."
But that was when Olette and Roxas started to eagerly agree with the idea. Hayner was the one who silenced them with a small, disapproving scoff.
"Well, I don't like them." he told them all. "There's no way a girl can do all of that stuff on her own. It's totally unrealistic."
"What are you talking about?" Roxas then wondered with a defensive raise of his eyebrow. "I've seen Xion do all of that stuff, and more."
"Besides, no one asked you." Olette agreed before chucking a pebble at Hayner's face. The boy was just barely able to protect his face from the attack. The pebble bounced off his arms and down to the ground below. A faint reminder -if any- of the danger in sitting so high up on the Central Station clock tower.
"Hey, hey, hey, hey!" Hayner whined. "That's a long way down, you know!"
"Then you better stop being mean to Xion." Olette informed him with a grin.
"I don't have to take this." came the return huff. Hayner carefully started to get up and crossed his arms in defiance. "I'm going home. Maybe in my absence you'll learn to stop bullying me when I'm only joking."
"We should all get ready to leave, actually." Pence decided as he got up as well. "It's getting close to dinner."
At the agreed nods from Olette and Roxas, the four of them started to make their leave. But Xion wasn't ready to leave yet.
"Are you coming back with us?" Roxas asked her, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder and giving a wide smile.
"Not yet." she told him- meeting his grin with one of her own. "I wanted to write a bit more before heading back. It can get pretty loud with Isa and Lea when they're arguing about chores. I don't think Lea's done the dishes in a full week."
To this, Roxas laughed. "Fair enough." he agreed. "See you at dinner then!"
Xion smiled and waved him goodbye. Alone at last, Xion opened up her notebook. She reread a lot of what she had written down earlier. A smile crossed her lips as a sense of pride welled in her chest. It felt so great being able to create something that didn't exist before. Over time, she had developed bits and pieces of her author avatar, Ebba, that both reflected and deviated from herself. Now came time to do so again. But what was she going to write?
As she lightly brushed the end of her feather pen against her lips, Xion gave a thoughtful hum. Maybe this time she'd have Ebba on the clock tower as well? Yes, that sounded like a great idea. Write what you know was such a common writing suggestion, after all, and what did Xion know better than sitting here?
. . .
The breeze coming up the clock tower lightly tousled the bangs of Ebba's short black hair as the sun set in Twilight Town. The rest of her hair was pulled into two low pigtails that also danced a little in the wind. Ebba trained her blue eyes over the view from the train station with a curious tilt of her head. She wondered how many people were out there in this world she had decided to call home. A hundred? Maybe thousands? They surely didn't have the start on life that she had, that's for sure. Ebba's early life started without free will. For the longest time, she didn't make many of the choices that she thought were her own. But not any more.
For as long as Ebba had a free will of her own, she had decided that everyone deserved a second chance. Where would she had been without the second chance she was given? Today she was going to make it her mission to give him a second chance. Who was he, you may ask? Well, Ebba wasn't sure yet. Her contact had given so little description of her target that they might as well have said she was going to fight the air. Wouldn't have been the first time.
Regardless of who her target was for this mission, she was going to find them. If at all possible she was going to talk to them too. Ebba had seen enough violence and sadness to last a lifetime- it wasn't going to happen again for as long as she could breathe. But it still led the question; where was she going to start first?
. . .
Okay, so that last sentence was more to Xion than to her personification. Where was she going to take Ebba this time? The girl lulled her head from side to side in thought. But then she had it. Xion quickly put her notebook and pen away and started to hurry off of the clock tower. Once she took a back exit out of the train station, she made an immediate right to head into the underground concourse. Xion walked around for a bit- mostly to make sure no one else was there, and to also see if this was where she wanted to take Ebba.
A grin etched itself onto Xion's face. Yes, this place would do. She could see the scene play out before her with pinpoint accuracy too.
. . .
Someone had blown Ebba's cover. Getting into the concourse had been easy- but it had been too quiet for Ebba's liking. Someone knew she was coming. That someone also sent some creature after her as well. This creature looked a lot like a dragon with mostly dark red scales. Ebba barely had time to completely note its three toed feet, poised with deadly talons, and its wings that looked tattered the closer you got to the ends.
It had taken Ebba quite a bit of effort to distance herself from this creature in this rather cramped space. She found refuge behind one of the many pillars stabilizing the concourse. The young woman steeled herself, preparing her weapon to fight back, before leaning over the side of the pillar to aim and take the shot.
. . .
Wait. Was it even possible for someone to move that way? Curious, Xion got up and walked over to the pillar she had Ebba at in her story. She pressed her back against its cool stone, sighing a little as she moved her pen in her hand so it was roughly in the same position as a gun. Xion held the pen up near her face, then turned her body to lean over the side of the pillar. Her arm was outstretched- the fuzzy end of the pen faced toward where the enemy in story would be standing. Xion pumped her arm as if she had taken a shot.
"Pow." she mumbled under her breath. Xion unceremoniously dropped her arm after this. She looked down at her pen before giving it an amused half smile. The thing was so ridiculous, Xion wondered that if it was a weapon, it's accompanying sound would have been 'chu' not 'pow.' Too bad Ebba was more of a spy in this story, not a magical girl. Xion gave herself a bemused little chuckle before pressing her back against the pillar once more to sit and write again.
. . .
Sweat was starting to beat down on Ebba's brow. This enemy was a tougher one. It couldn't be reasoned with, and it surely wasn't going to listen, so she had no choice but to take it down. When she succeeded, the wyvern gave a departing screech before bursting into nothing more than smoke. Ebba noticed that a large, glowing heart came out from the creature at about the same time- the heart hovered for a moment before floating higher up into the air. She lost track of it when it phased through the ceiling, but she knew where it was going.
Ebba dusted herself off a bit before heading out of the concourse. Her work here was done. She was no closer to finding out what her real target was, however. This was going to take some time.
. . .
Heading home sounded rather tempting now. Xion wanted to add one more scene before retiring for the day, though. Where would she do it? She wondered rather aimlessly around Twilight Town as she thought it over. Where else did she want Ebba to go? The sandlot, while wide enough in area for a good fight or two, didn't seem like the place for a secret rendezvous. Le Grand Bistrot also seemed like a good place to meet someone, but there would be too many people.
Then the idea clicked. She knew where to go now- she just hoped that it wasn't closed off for the night.
. . .
Ebba took a deep breath in as she leaned over the railings that surrounded Sunset Hill. A train horn snapped her out of her thoughts for only a moment- she waved to it as it went under the tunnel and smiled a bit to herself.
She still had yet to find her target. Every time she thought she had found him, he once more slipped through her fingers like string. He must have known her, or perhaps even following her; they were the only conclusions that made sense. She didn't have to tell her supervisor about this. They were not going to take it very well either.
But then someone said her name. Ebba turned around and was shocked to find a rather handsome man standing there. The two locked gazes, and with a horrible pit in her stomach, Ebba knew that this was her target.
. . .
For a moment, Xion frowned. A handsome guy just waiting there for Ebba? That sounded completely ridiculous, even if he was the villain. It was cliche in and of itself that he was handsome too. Xion grimaced as she scratched out the last paragraph with an extreme prejudice. There was no way on earth that she was going to let her author avatar have a secret infatuation with the villain. No way at all. She decided long ago that Ebba wasn't going to fall in love with any one ever- period.
Flexing her hand a little to ease some of her cramping muscles, Xion started over again.
. . .
She could deal with the loss- for disappointing her supervisors once more. They wouldn't like it, but one some days it just had to be done. She did fear what they would do to her once she got back though. There were rumors in their group that if someone messed up enough, they'd turn them into husks of their former selves. Ebba shuddered at the thought; she had her own free will now, and she was going to keep it, but when her target didn't show up? What else could she do? She could argue about that with her supervisors all she wanted. One of them had to listen to her. At least one.
Ebba's thoughts were broken when she heard the sound of a dog bark next to her. She turned and immediately smiled at what she saw. It was the king's yellow and black dog, Mercury. Ebba greeted the mutt with a grin before bending down to give him a good scratch behind his ears. Mercury was a good old mutt. He liked Ebba too- sometimes finding her when she had once thought herself lost.
Well, even if her mission had been a bust, at least she still had the comfort of a few good friends when she got back. Mercury would put a good woof in for her if her supervisors complained. And if that still didn't satisfy them, then the king himself would have given Ebba a pardon. He may even help her find her target next time, or put them on a special list to keep on eye on. All in all, this hadn't been a bad day. After such a long day, Ebba told Mercury that it was time to go, and so they did.
. . .
Xion held her notebook out as she reviewed her handiwork. She had a rather productive day too, come to think of it. She'd get Ienzo to copy her written words digitally so she could see how much she had written today. By the way her hand hurt, it must have been over 500. Xion once more stretched her hand and wrist muscles before getting off the bench to head on home. Maybe she'd show Roxas what she wrote- Lea and Isa too. Who else could she let read her new short story? Olette, Hayner, and Pence would have to wait until tomorrow. Maybe if she could digitize her work tonight, she could see if Kairi or Namine could get a copy? Would they even like Ebba? Xion couldn't remember if she's actually given them anything about her yet.
She may have to take a day of writing tomorrow though, or maybe just not use her writing hand at all; it really was starting to hurt now that she wasn't concentrating on writing everything. Roxas was right- once she started going, it was hard to stop. She absolutely believed the adage that the pen was mightier than the sword- writing felt more painful after finishing than taking down a Darkside. The only difference was the lack of bruises, really.
Even if Xion didn't write about Ebba tomorrow, she could still daydream about it. A writer never sleeps, after all, and Xion was just getting started.