Here in My Head

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[It's beautiful and quiet when Roxas lifts his head to find himself in Twilight Town.

It's not the real Twilight Town, of course, because he's not in the real world. He knows instinctively that it's a piece of memory. His, or Sora's—it doesn't matter, especially when their memories are supposed to be one and the same now. Right? But he's still not so sure of that.

Maybe it's the thought of his other half's name that summons him, because when Roxas looks over to the side, Sora's there.]

Comments

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[Sora's been having these strange thoughts headaches lately; they're nothing too serious, kind of like the type you get when you eat ice-cream too fast and you have this strange sort of pain right between the eyebrows. Except these headaches don't go away with time, and only really stop with a nap.

So that is what he did today. He got a strange headache, and then decided to lie down and take a nap under a palm tree, letting the sound of the waves lapping the shore lull him to sleep. He fell asleep pretty quickly, but when he wakes up, he's definitely not on the beach anymore. He's in Twilight Town. And it's strange, because he's not alone.]

Hi!

[He rubs his neck and then looks over at his companion with a sheepish expression.]

Uh... how did I get here?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Hey.

[This is a lot more peaceful than the first time they met face to face in their own mind. No Keyblades this time.]

I don't know. I just looked up all of a sudden and I was here. Not sure where I was before—it's different when we're...whatever we are.

You okay?

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Yeah I'm fine, I just got a bit of a headache, that's all.

[He grins, though a moment later his face becomes thoughtful.]

Hey Roxas? Not that I'm not happy to meet you properly, but how are- aren't you, like... uh...

[He puts his hand over his heart.]

Aren't you supposed to be in here?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Huh.

[And that's all he can say about that. The smile makes him feel a little weird—not bad, exactly, but he's not used to anyone being that happy to see him. Not since...well. But he still gives a little half-smile back.]

What, do you think I just hang out in there all the time?

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Well I dunno, I guess I maybe thought so. Or that, you know, you're everywhere. Like... we share, right?

[This is very strange, because he's never really thought exactly where Roxas resides in him. Not really. He's just... there, a part of him as much as he was a part of Roxas. Bound in many inexplicable, inescapable ways, but not the same.]

So you hang out here then?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure. It's like...have you ever had a dream where you're watching something, but you're doing something at the same time? It's sort of like that. I don't feel so separate from you most of the time.

[He's never thought of it either—not that he's been able to, exactly. It's not what he thought it would be in those moments just before they merged, when he thought he had no choice.]

Not really...I mean...I did before, you know. [He makes a vague gesture between them.]

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know.

[What he says about seeing things while dreaming, watching while someone's doing something... it's not a strange thought to him. Sometimes he remembers glimpses of things that he's done but he can't remember doing. It's weird.

He smiles at Roxas, happy to be learning more about him.]

It's a cool place! I liked coming here, seems like there's a ton of neat stuff to do round here.

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[It's strange. He's here with someone he's never been here with before, but he's always been here with him—at least, that's how it feels. He knows Sora and he doesn't. It's something he's not sure he'll ever understand. Maybe between the two of them, they can.]

Yeah...it was my favorite place to come. We'd come here for ice cream every day after missions, and Hayner, Pence and Olette and me would...

[He trails off. The memories are getting mixed up again, his time with the Organization blurring with seven days that spanned a lifetime. One memory is real, the other isn't, but they both meant something to him.]

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, those guys! They're really great, I met them you know.

[He tucks his hands behind his head, grinning.]

It seems like a cool place to get ice cream. What kind of missions did you do with them? Like, finding cats and stuff? Or helping old ladies with their groceries?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they are.

[He believes that. Even if he didn't know the real ones, the versions he knew had to be the same.]

Well...while I was there, we got jobs. I helped move some garbage and put up posters and delivered mail. But you know—I meant my real job, and the missions I got there.

You know. When I was with the Organization.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Oh.

[He looks at his Nobody in his Organization coat, and remembers that yes, he did work for them didn't he? It seems such a strange thing, he can't picture Roxas zipping in and out of Doors and doing the whole 'lurking, mysterious, ooga booga KINGDOM HEEEEEARTS' thing that so many of them did. But then again, after getting to know Axel a little better, perhaps it's more reasonable not to have preconceived notions about the members of the Organization.]

You mean... people in the Organization liked to eat ice cream too?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[Roxas tenses a little at that, like Sora might get mad at him for being part of Organization XIII, but the moment passes and it doesn't look like that will happen.]

Me and Axel did. [There's a bittersweet smile there. It hurts, still, and probably always will.] He said that he took me up there—[he points up to the clock tower]—the day I was gone, when I got my name.

I don't remember that part, but I remember all the other times we went.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[As if Sora could get mad at him for something that's already happened. He doesn't understand why Roxas would work for Xemnas, but he knows that it couldn't possibly have been for the same ends that Xehanort's Nobody. Maybe he might ask him one day.]

You know, we could go up there and eat ice cream now if you wanted. Might be fun, and who knows? Maybe it'll jog your memory?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Maybe...you think there's ice cream here, if it's not a real place?

[He cranes his neck to look all the way upward.]

Actually, I'm not sure how to get there from here. We always took a shortcut.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

How do we know it's not a real place? It could be. And if it's imaginary then why wouldn't there be ice cream?

[Sora also cranes his neck to look up, and lets out a long, low whistle.]

You know, that's a long way up. Think there's an elevator or something?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

I think it's more like a memory.

[He could try to call up a dark corridor, but in their mind, he's not sure that would work. And using the darkness is something he doesn't really want to do here.]

Or stairs. That'd be a lot of stairs.

I guess we can look and find out.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

It sure would be.

[Sora is pondering the idea of a lot of stairs. He actually quite likes racing up stairs; he considers it an endurance challenge. He always beats Riku at stair racing. Sometimes he doesn't think Riku's even trying.]

Well, let's go see if there's ice cream and then try and find a way up!

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Sure. It's this way.

[If this is a memory, it's a completely accurate one, with no fuzzy edges. He knows the way to the ice cream shop without having to think about it, and as they walk toward it, everything is as it should be.]

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[He follows behind him, hands tucked behind his head, smiling to himself and trusting Roxas to take them the right way towards their delicious, salty and sweet goal.]

So do you think you'll be able to find the short cut?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

It's not really something you find...it's something we made. [He waves his hand in an imitation-summoning gesture.] The portals. You know?

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Ohhhh.

[Sora looks as though that thought had never occurred to him- and it hadn't.]

So how do we do the [He waves his hand in the same way Roxas just did.] thing.

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

You're surprised?

[And Roxas is sort of amused by that.]

I don't know if we do. We used corridors of darkness, but it wasn't our darkness, just what already existed in the worlds. I'm not sure if there is any here.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

I guess it's kinda easy to forget that you were one of them, you know?

[Oh wow, there's the ice-cream! Sora's head is clearly pretty much the greatest place ever.]

I guess we're just gonna have to race up the stairs before the ice creams melt then!

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Yeah, maybe. We'll see.

[His head is also a thoughtful place, because Roxas finds he has money in the inner pocket of his coat, and he pays for two ice cream bars. Sea-salt, of course. After passing one off to Sora, he leads them toward the clock tower.]

Is it really easy to forget? Even when I'm wearing this? [He glances down.] I was with them for a year, you know. Number XIII. Xemnas found me the day I was born, or created, or...whatever.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Well... I guess when you think about it, it shouldn't be so easy to forget, but when I think about the Organization I think about bad stuff, and when I think about you it's different. I know you didn't mean any of that, and you left didn't you? That's what matters, right?

[He takes the ice cream bar.]

And Riku was wearing one of those too, and the King. Doesn't mean that they went in for any of that stuff.

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

I never thought of it as doing bad things. I'm still not sure it was. The Heartless hurt people, and if defeating them helped build Kingdom Hearts...I didn't know what Xemnas really wanted. We thought it was the only way to be whole. For most of them, it probably was. But yeah. I left.

[He looks a little sad for a moment, but it passes.]

They're pretty handy, you know. Protection against the darkness.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

You know, that's kinda sad. And it makes what he did all the worse if he was using you and the others to get what he wanted.

[He sees this, and for a moment sticks his hand out as though he's about to put it on his Nobody's shoulder. He pauses for a second, then he does what he originally planned.]

Are you whole now?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Don't worry about it. It's done now.

[Roxas hesitates, unsure about both how he'd react to the gesture and what the answer to Sora's question is.]

I think so...aren't we? Since we're...you know.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

I guess so. I mean, I know I'm s'posed to be, but is it the same for you?

[The ice cream's melting down his fingers. He takes a tentative lick, humming in approval at the taste.]

This is good!

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

I don't know. I've never been whole before. When I was with the Organization, before I knew who I was, I got pictures of you in my head sometimes, but I didn't really remember being you.

[He takes a bite and chuckles.]

Yeah, it is. We'd have it every day.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

That's 'cuz you're not me. You're Roxas.

[He says it entirely matter-of-factly, before nomming on his ice-cream.]

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[That...doesn't sit entirely well with Roxas.]

I kind of am. Or...I used to be you, and now we're...I don't know. It's weird.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it is kinda. But it's like, I'm not exactly you, and you're not exactly me. So, you know, we're like heads and tails- we both make the same penny but we're not the same.

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

I guess so.

[He takes a thoughtful bite of ice cream.]

Do you ever remember things from my memories, since I remembered things from yours?

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

I think so... sometimes. Like, every now and then I catch myself thinking that I've dones something when I know I haven't. And sometimes I know someplace or something that I've never been to or seen before.

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

That sounds about right. That would happen before, every so often. In Never Land, I knew I'd be able to fly, because I'd already done it once before—as you.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[He shoots him a big infectious grin.]

Flying's pretty great, huh? Hey, did you try doing a loop the loop when you flew?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[He gets a small smile in return, but it's sort of sheepish.]

Not really on purpose...but I got knocked around a bunch when I was fighting a really big Heartless there. It probably turned me upside down accidentally.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[Sora licks the drips from his ice cream from his fingers and sucks away the drops that are threatening to fall from the bottom as the treat starts to melt in the heat.]

Yup, happened to me too! It felt like I'd left my stomach on the ground at first.

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[Roxas eats his ice cream with the dignity that comes of many, many days of practice.]

It was fun. Axel didn't believe me that I really flew until we both got sent there for a mission and I showed him.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[Sora is going in for another nibble when Roxas brings up Axel, and he accidentally catches the inside of his lip with his teeth.]

No kidding.

[He still feels bad... about Axel that is.]

Did he fly too?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

Yeah. He did.

[Roxas doesn't know what it means that Axel faded into darkness. Is he really gone forever, like Xigbar said? Or is his heart out there somewhere, a piece of him? He's too afraid to hope.]

I was really glad I got to show him.

[Hello, lump in throat.]

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[Hello guilty conscience. Sora doesn't know what to say, but he gets the feeling that Roxas is sad. He's still sad, especially now that he understands the situation to the best of his ability.]

Hey, we should go again someday. To Neverland. Whaddya think?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[Not your fault, bro. Axel chose his path. Roxas just wishes it had led a different way.]

Yeah? I guess...that wouldn't be so bad. I'd like to explore it a little more. I never left the area with all the tiny islands. I was...pretty good at following orders, I guess. Until the end.

[happylocksmith.livejournal.com]

[So much for eating ice-cream up at the top of the clock tower; Sora's is practically finished.]

What happened? Why did you change your mind, in the end?

[pullsheavendown.livejournal.com]

[Roxas isn't done yet, and he pauses now, looking thoughtful.]

I was tired of people lying to me. They always told me I was special because I could use the Keyblade, but there was more to it. I had to know who I was, and not even Axel was giving me any answers.

And there was you. I didn't really know who you were, but I'd heard your name, and I had this idea that if I found out what my connection was to you, I'd understand everything. [He sighs] And I thought I could stop Xemnas by myself. Neither of those things worked out.