Roxas sighed as he left Twilight Town's walls, exiting the sewer tunnels and finding his way out into the south woods.
Deep, dark forest with tall, thick trees.
Familiar territory. Or, it would have been, if that big, old mansion were still standing. All that was left now were burned out ruins and broken stone.
The mansion had been destroyed weeks back, when Namine and- Luxu had had a fight.
He'd heard a lot about that day from people around the city, too. No one seemed to know it had been the result of a battle, though. They just knew that there had been some kind of explosion that had destroyed the mansion and set the surrounding forest on fire. It had taken a lot of work to stop that fire, from all he'd heard.
When they'd first learned about it, Namine had seemed pretty upset - she felt guilty over it. Thinking it was her fault.
The same went for Luxu. He'd even tried taking all the blame away from Namine...repeatedly.
They still argued over that sometimes.
Roxas shook his head, crossing the burned out clearing. He found a place to sit, near the crumbling, scorched stone wall.
He wasn't sure why he was even out here today.
He guessed he just needed to...get away from it all for a while. The house, Namine and Luxu - school - the busyness of Twilight Town in general. It was all way too much, most of the time. He liked getting to go back to Land of Departure to continue his Keyblade training - that was a lot simpler, way easier to handle...
Suddenly, the air the clearing distorted, and Roxas gasped as a silvery being rose up out of the ground.
It was a Nobody - a...lesser one.
One with long arm sleeves, a tall helmet with slits in it, and two swords held behind its back.
Roxas jumped to his feet, summoning his Keyblade instantly, glowering. But waiting. Because he was thinking; why was another Nobody here? Was it because of Xehanort? Was it here to destroy him, or something worse?
Roxas gazed at the Nobody...the other Nobody...
Because they were the same, weren't they? Really, Roxas was more like the "lesser" Nobodies than Namine or Axel. He'd never had memories of his "human self." Nothing from Sora. And his appearance came from Ventus, someone else he'd never had a clue about.
The lesser Nobodies...they were the same as the "greater" ones. They had forms, they had minds...right? They just hadn't had the strength of mind to...keep their human memories...to keep their human forms and experiences. Everything that made them - themselves. Made them unique...
But even Lesser Nobodies could think, and even talk - hadn't one spoken to Kairi before? And he knew the Dusks had spoken to Xemnas and Saix before. He'd just never really thought...thought about it...
But-
The young liege wields the Keyblade...
Roxas startled. He gazed at the Nobody. "Yeah. I do." He hesitated. "Are you here to try and take my Heart - like before?"
The Nobody drew a blade out, giving it a sharp flourish at its side. "We have heard of that incident..."
"And...?" Roxas hedged, wary. Ready...
"We hope for better success."
The air rippled again, as all around the large clearing, Nobodies began to appear - more of these blade wielding ones! Ten - twenty - more and more, until the whole clearing was crowded with them!
And Roxas was surrounded by a mass of sleek, dangerous enemies so thick he couldn't even see beyond them.
"This is a big mistake!" Roxas shouted out, turning on the spot and raising his blade before him.
"Why is that?" came the voice again, directly before him.
"Because this won't get you a Heart - but you can get one! All of you can! Hearts of your own, just like this one's mine! Like Namine's got hers, and even Saix has one now! And Axel had one too! And I'd bet anything Xemnas had one all along! He was lying to us, using us like tools for his big plans! But he didn't care about any of us, and he wasn't helping us! But I can!"
The Nobodies made no move to attack.
The one before him stepped forward - and moved in a flicker of twisted air, reappearing before him.
Roxas stepped back - but the Nobody didn't attack.
"How?" came the simple question.
Roxas froze. He struggled, thinking hard. "Uh...I- I don't exactly know how. But - but Luxu would! Uh, Xigbar, I mean! I bet even Namine would know! Maybe they could even help you become humans again - or at least get your memories back!"
The Nobody lowered its weapons. "You will take us to him, then, and he will help us."
"Okay."
Luxu stepped outside the house as he saw Roxas approaching - pretty fast, too.
Watching the boy get nearer and nearer, he sensed it before he saw it.
Dozens of Samurai Nobodies materialized around the kid, standing and shifting on the grassy hilltop.
Even this many enemies of their type weren't going to be much of a threat to Luxu - but the same couldn't be said for Roxas himself. Or Namine...
"All right, kiddo, what's going on here?"
"They want to talk to you. They want to know - and I do, too - how we got Hearts. Or...got them back, I guess, in Saix's case - or Vexen's. How they became humans again. They want that, too."
"Of course they do," Luxu responded simply, his gaze sweeping the crowd over. "The defining trait of being a Nobody is 'lacking.'"
"And you can give us what we no longer have? Even as we are now?" a voice echoed in his head. Quiet, soft - but neither feminine nor masculine. Androgynous - and flat.
"That's right," Luxu said freely - firmly. He'd never considered something like this before...but now that he was...didn't all of these guys deserve the same chance to restore their existences as the rest of them? To make themselves whole, either as they were, or by becoming what they used to be? "Listen up now - you want Hearts, either old or new? It's the easiest thing in the World. Getting new Hearts...all you've got to do is what people always do with Hearts: you make connections, form bonds. You talk to and get close to people, share experiences with them. You do that, and a new Heart will grow within you. As for your old Hearts...we can turn you human again, but it's going to require a...bit of a gamble on your parts. A risk, if you're willing to take it."
"What risk?"
"As you are now, you'd need to be destroyed. When a Heartless and a Nobody are destroyed, the original person that they were is recompleted - restored to life, wholly. Now, considering that the Heartless threat was cleansed from the worlds when the Door To Darkness was closed about a month ago now, that means all we'd need to do is...eh, to destroy your Nobodies. The you that you are now. We do that, and your human selves will revive again, safe and sound, on whatever world you came from originally. The catch is that...whatever damage is inflicted on your Nobody carries over when you return to humanity - and there's a chance you might not survive that. If you can't recover from it...you're just dead, then. No one can make that choice for you, of course - it's up to you. Continue as you are, gain new Hearts for yourselves, or take the risk and go back to how you were - go back home, get back all your memories, rejoin Body and Heart again - and hope you pull through."
"If we stay as we are, even if we gain new Hearts, we will never remember who we were - where we came from?"
"Yeah. That's right."
"Then the logical choice is obvious to us."
"It's-"
Luxu tensed as the Nobodies began drawing their blades. But none of them moved to attack Roxas or him - they attacked themselves.
He winced as he watched the Nobodies cut themselves down, ram those blades into their own chests...
And fall, and disappear.
Roxas looked appropriately, and unfortunately, horrified at what was going on around him.
Nothing Luxu could do about that, though, damnit.
Another failure. Another mistake.
What sort of parental figure let a kid stand around watching a form of...basically mass suicide?
Luxu growled, stalking out and grabbing the kid. "Come on - in the house. Go tell Namine what's up: and stay there with her while I figure this out."
"Hey - hands off." Roxas pulled free and shoved at him - but he strode inside all the same.
Luxu watched him go up the stairs. Then he stepped back out and slammed the door behind him.
He leaned against it, crossing his arms, and set his gaze on the remaining Nobodies.
There were nine left.
Including the one that had spoken for the rest.
"You guys chose not to risk it, then?" Luxu remarked.
"Yes. I will continue my existence - I will gain a new Heart. The decision can always be changed later - yes?"
"Smart. If that's your choice." Luxu eyed the Nobodies, watching as eight out of nine disappeared to who knew where. He locked eyes with the sole remainder. "But if you're looking to include me in it-"
"No - I choose to bond with Roxas."
"No."
"But I am already his."
"No," Luxu refuted, even more firmly. "Not anymore, at least. Xemnas was the one who assigned you all to us - but that's all over now. The Organization's disbanded, and he was never doing anything for anyone's benefit, anyways...so you've got no reason to follow those orders anymore. So go on - go free. Find someone else."
"You fear I will harm him? I will not; I seek a new Heart through him - through connection and-"
"Look, it's not that - I think we both know he could cut you down in one swing if it came to it." Luxu grinned. "Heh. It's just that we can't have some otherworldly being hanging around the house - it'd get people talking, even if they only got a glimpse of you through a window."
"I can be inconspicuous."
"I know," Luxu acknowledged.
"Why refuse me, then? Why can he not help me?"
"Because the kid has too much else going on in his life to play therapist or babysitter or whatever-have-you to some...lost person."
"I will have his help."
Luxu uncrossed his arms, taking a step forward and casually raising an arm - conjuring No Name. "You want to push this? I'll send you back to humanity right now - and I'd be doing you a huge favor there, so I won't feel a trace of guilt about it."
The Nobody stood silently, swaying with the wind. Then it- they, disappeared at last.
Luxu let his weapon vanish, turning back to go inside the house.
Good riddance...and good luck.
Roxas thought it was all behind him - dealt with. That Luxu had dealt with it...
But, as he was skateboarding through the back alleys of Twilight Town the very next day, he suddenly came to a halt as another of those sword-wielding Nobodies appeared in front of him out of the ground, with a swirl of black and white tendrils of Nothingness!
"Again?" he said, clenching his fist at his side, wary. Ready to draw his weapon if he had to.
"Will you help me, my liege?"
"I'm not your 'liege'. I don't even know what that means..." Roxas admitted. "My name's Roxas."
"Will you help me...Roxas?"
Roxas stared at it - them? He thought about it, long and hard. Thought about how he'd talked to Namine yesterday - and Luxu. How Luxu had told him not to worry about it, that it wasn't his responsibility...
As much as Roxas had been relieved at the man's words, he'd also felt a bit of anger. Defiance. And he felt that again now.
Why shouldn't he help? And who was Luxu to tell him not to, anyways?
"All right. Yeah. I can help you," Roxas said finally. "And maybe my sister could even help you with getting your memories back - that's kind of her thing," he added.
He was actually feeling a little excited at the idea. Eager. But beyond that, it just felt...right?
And he could do it, couldn't he? According to Luxu, it was basically the same sort of thing he'd been doing all his life - with Axel. That was how they'd gotten their Hearts: by becoming friends.
Roxas wanted to do that again.
He could do it again - it was easy, right?
"All help will be welcome in this endeavor."
"Uh...great? So...want to go get some ice cream?"
"Will this 'ice cream' help me get a Heart?"
"It helped me - and Axel - yeah."
"Very well - I follow your lead, liege."
He sighed, picking up his skateboard. "It's Roxas. And you're going to have to disappear for a while - people can't see you around town."
"As you command, my - Roxas."
What was Roxas getting himself into here?
"Can you do anything for - uh - them, then?" Roxas asked, sitting with Namine on her bed, later that day.
"Maybe," Namine said, biting her lip in thought. "Even as Nobodies, we keep a connection to our Heartlesses - to our Hearts somewhere out there. Kairi and I always had a connection, and so did you and Sora, to a lesser extent - and Ven, too. We still do. If I could trace that connection from...them...to their Heart, I could access the memories still sleeping inside it - inside the Heartless. Then I could share those memories with them."
"I'm going to just assume all that makes sense to you..." Roxas murmured, his face heating up.
Namine giggled. "Don't worry - it does. And if we're special because we have memories - which lets us keep our human appearances - then maybe this can even give them back theirs..." she went on thoughtfully.
Both of them turned at a sudden knock at the door.
"Hey - what are you kids doing in there?" Luxu called in.
Namine and Roxas shared looks.
Then, Namine called out with simply: "Mischief! Don't come in!"
Silence.
A deep exhale of breath was heard.
"Is this mischief of yours dangerous - or going to hurt someone?"
"No," Namine said firmly. "Roxas...back me up!" she added, hushed and furious.
"No," Roxas agreed, without thinking.
"All right, then. I'm trusting you two - and I'll leave you to it. But if I wake up from my nap with marker doodles on my face, I'm going to think up some reaaally complicated ways of getting you back for it. And remember, I'm the guy who spent millennia cultivating his patience and intricate plans..."
"Well, I wasn't going to do anything like that to you...until you just gave me the idea!" Namine responded brightly. "We can call it a new kind of art!"
"Hah! If you think you can handle the retribution, go for it! I'll be waiting."
With that, Luxu left them alone.
Roxas grinned at Namine. "Are you really going to do something like that to him?"
"Yes," she said, entirely serious - with a matching grin.
"Good luck with that," Roxas laughed.
"Thanks! I think I'm going to actually need it..."
AN: Yaaay the Samurais finally showed up! xD Long time coming! Hurray. :D