[shock followed by pissed off is about the expected route. after all, no one'd be all sunshine and rainbows after learning all this, not after suffering so much because of it. being told everything by someone who had a hand in that suffering'll pile onto the cheer and joy no doubt.
riku's eyes remain on roxas despite the temptation to look away. looking away from this feels wrong. keeping his gaze on the nobody feels awkward, if unpleasant, but the discomfort at revealing this information due to what it implies is nothing compared to the suffering felt by roxas. saving sora by putting something without a heart back in him? no problem. doing the same with a being in possession of a heart? not okay.
the signs were all there, too. between the nobodies in castle oblivion or roxas' emotions in the fake twilight town (the happiness with his friends, the confusion at everything abnormal, the anger at discovering the truth) and even axel's determination to save his friend, them having hearts seems so obvious now. hindsight really is 20/20.]
You have a heart, Roxas; the whole organization probably did. Xemnas... Xehanort only fed you that no heart garbage because he planned on turning you all into vessels for his own heart.
[which is a whole different can of worms to dive into, but one step at a time. stopping here for a bit to let all this sink sounds good.]
[he didn't forget that riku had mentioned that one part before—about xemnas and xehanort, and using the organization as his vessels.
but this is something so new to him that he really isn't sure how t take it at all.
"you have a heart, roxas."
they're not words he expected to hear. they're words he didn't even think were possible, and while he's sure that this isn't something riku would lie to him about, it's still so hard to believe. but still, what is he supposed to say to that? how is he supposed to react? it makes his chest ache.
a heart.
he... has a heart.
it's a heart that's his own, one that his body demanded. which means that everything he felt was real. even if he's always believed his feelings were real, he now has a reason for why he could feel at all. the fun of eating ice cream with his friends, the anger at the organization's ways, the hurt of axel's betrayal and loss of xion. and what about mary? what does that mean?
there's so much, and it's so complicated that it's incredibly overwhelming. his places his hand over his chest, where his heart should be, and he just sits there in a stunned, silent state of disbelief.]
A... heart... [he isn't sure what to feel. or what he's supposed to feel at all. his mind is swimming too much to even discern that much quite yet.]
[holding off on adding in more info was the right call. going off the reaction, the info overwhelmed roxas well enough. not surprising, really, considering he'd been taught the very opposite of the truth. riku himself doesn't know what this means or how it happened or how roxas has his own heart while sora has his (definitely has that, riku got to check that out) and he's just the messenger so roxas has to be way more confused than that.]
Yeah. Nobodies aren't as much of a nobody as everyone thought.
[people who lacked hearts still had them. who'd have thought, right? all they knew pointed to them lacking it. all they knew, or at least the major details, were ones provided by the puppet master pulling all their strings.]
Xehanort played us all with that one.
[as nice and easy as blaming everything on old norty is, riku won't take that path. he made his choices despite having some doubts. this much he accepts. next step after accepting? saying so aka the hard part. he sighs before speaking once more.]
And I should've put two and two together sooner. There were hints to it, hints I ignored because I was too blinded by my own goals to believe it possible.
[thinking about whether or not your best friend's nobody has a heart really isn't a thing you wanna do while trying to save said best friend. an apology bubbles up but dies on his lips. 'sorry your life was hell and that i made it worse' doesn't really do much. leaving it without admitting to how badly he screwed up won't do, though.]
You didn't deserve what you went through, whether it be at Xehanort's hands or mine.
[roxas listens to the things riku has to say, and the more he says about it, the more real it seems. riku admitting fault (sort of) for his shitty behavior, more about this xehanort guy—which he'd be more leery of if terra hadn't confirmed it...
it's hard to write any of it off as some kind of bs, especially when for all that he may have a dislike for a lot that riku does, there's still a part of roxas that inherently trusts him despite this. still, it doesn't make it easy for roxas to take, either.
he's quiet for a while longer, because he's still not sure how he's supposed to react. and even though he's pretty sure he knows the answer to the next question that sits on the edge of his tongue, he asks anyway, because he needs to be sure.]
You're... sure about this, right? [a pause.] There's no way that it's something else...
[which is more or less his way of asking how riku knows this for sure. but finding the words to actually say that right now feels near impossible with how overwhelmed he is in every regard.
(the part where he gets pissed at riku for not telling him sooner will come in a little while, that much is for certain.)]
[like he said, there's fun ways to mess with roxas and then there's asshole ways to mess with roxas. doing so now falls completely into the latter. sharing a detail like this without good confirmation wouldn't happen. roxas and the nobodies having hearts is about the most certain detail out of everything they learned, too. any chance of it being another lie went out the window pretty quickly.]
Sora heard it straight from the horse's mouth and a couple other details back it up, too.
[details riku won't mention right this moment. adding in 'oh hey yeah i saw you in sora's heart but you were still you and a data thing of ansem the wise said a bunch of stuff about hearts and somehow ventus plus xion' might make the kid's head explode (and possibly-- probably make any anger even worse than it'll be, something riku'll pass on if possible). instead, he opts to say one final tidbit to drill this fact home.]
Chances are if someone wanted to steal your heart, they wouldn't come out of it empty-handed.
[well, that's something that immediately grabs his attention, because... what. sora isn't here, so if sora said this, it had to be before he got to cerealia, right?
riku's been here for months now; roxas knows that for a fact. three months, and he never mentioned this at all. that... seems like a problem. and even if roxas isn't in the best shape right now, he's got enough sense to be able to figure out that much. he bristles a little as he considers this, because he's pretty sure that has to be the case. so a lot of those other feelings get pushed aside in favor of asking what he now needs to know.]
How... long have you know about this? [his tone is curious, suspicious and decidedly less shocked that the previous statement. roxas doesn't know if having a heart is a good thing or a bad thing yet, nor does he know if having the truth in his hands will help him at all (even though... isn't this all he's wanted? for people to tell him in the truth and not leave him in the dark?), but he does know that riku sitting on this information when they've spoken a bunch of times doesn't sit well with him at all.]
[score one for roxas one-uping sora. his lips even twitch into a fleeting, almost approving smirk. he always wished sora would be a little faster on the pick-up and lo and behold, his nobody does it at the worst possible time. lady luck really is a cruel mistress.]
Around 2 or 3 hours before I came here. Before you chew my head off for not sharing with the class earlier, there's a reason for it.
[just because yelling is imminent doesn't mean it needs to happen right this instant. yelling can come after storytime's done. riku's gaze shifts from roxas and toward the ground.]
I wasn't sure what to make of this town or getting pulled in or Terra being here or any of it. Xehanort manipulated everything. Anything bad that happened back home somehow had his hand in it and that's not exaggerating. I wanted to be sure this didn't.
[some part of him still worries it could be norty at work, but the guy would've made a move by now or brought sora or something! so far? ceres seems like your run of the mill villain type, no xehanort involved. he pauses, frown deepening. truth means the whole truth. roxas doesn't know what happens to him after that fight and has been dealing with that cliffhanger for too long. might as well give him a spoiler for the ending, right?]
There's also a couple things I wanted to wait on you having a cooler head for before spilling everything.
[riku doesn't know how much will come out right now, but what he does know is that he owes roxas. the reason roxas doesn't have a life isn't because he's a nobody; it's because assholes like him and xehanort used him for their own needs. giving the guy some hope and some truth and maybe some romantic push? least that he can do.]
[it's not really an answer that placates roxas, though. while some of it probably could under other circumstances, and while there's now way he could get as mad at riku as he has for things in the past...
well, he's still mad at hearing all of that. some of it is reasonable, some he can't argue—xehanort's machinations could be a factor. knowing how the organization is and knowing this is even greater than that means he does have some reasoning.
not much.
not much at all, because roxas is temperamental and impulsive.
he's also incredibly overwhelmed and feeling too much.]
It's been months. This... this isn't something I should have waited so long to find out about! [of course, he's equal parts angry and hurt. it's not like he expects riku to be on his side all that much, but still.
this is important to him.
this is the most important thing to him. he's struggled so much with the idea of not having a heart, with not knowing what it meant or what he was missing. he went through all the trouble of hurting mary by telling her he didn't have a heart.
but he has one. he has one, and there's so much more he could have been doing all this while with the information riku's been holding on to. and that's why roxas has gone from shock to angry and upset. he's not crying, but he's probably pretty close at this point.]
[anyone with working eyes can see it's too much, all the feelings. not surprising. riku can't begin to imagine how it feels to suddenly be told you have a heart after not having one. all he hopes is that this simply ends with further hatred directed at himself and nothing worse. a nobody overwhelmed with emotions can go a bunch of ways and not all of those ways end peacefully.
riku meets roxas' gaze dead on. he won't bait roxas or get emotional himself, but he doesn't plan on babying the kid, either. part of the reason for not sharing might rest with riku himself, but some of the blame falls on roxas, too.]
Would you have listened if I told you back when you wanted to lop my head off? And if you had, can you tell me for a fact that you wouldn't have done something you'd regret?
[impulsive, stupid and roxas go hand in hand. what happened in the world that never was, that computer in the lab in twilight town, all the fun keyblade action when riku arrived in the city: all dumb, all impulsive. once again, riku can't blame roxas at all for what transpired. if it were riku in that position, he'd have tried to lop his own head off, too. understanding why it happened doesn't mean it makes roxas seem any more reliable. the kid snapped without a chance to get a word in. not the best way to make someone wanna open up.]
Jumping at my throat all the time after that didn't convince me you could handle it, either.
[lots of glaring and general unhappiness at everything riku did made it questionable. snapping at him alone is one thing; doing so in a space where other people could get hurt is another. what if revealing stuff lead to a fight and innocent people accidentally getting caught in the crossfire? it was a definite possibility.
the other day changed that opinion. seeing roxas back off in the park, even if with mary's aid, illustrated some sense of self control. can it occur with something much more intense and without mary around? who can say, but riku opted to take the risk. he still isn't sure if it's the right move, but giving roxas some answers after making his life hell really is the least he could do.]
I should've told you sooner, I can admit that and even apologize for it, but you didn't make it any easier for me to want to tell you.
That's not something you get to decide! Whether I can or can't handle it or whether or not you want to... it's my body... it's my heart... it's my life!
[he's not doing anything too rash right now, because roxas doesn't even know what he can do but tense up. he's tense, and his hands are curled into fists. his jaw is clenches and nostrils are flared—but that's as far as he goes.
but just because he doesn't lash out in the other ways he's always been prone to in the past doesn't mean that he's going to hold back his thoughts. he won't hold his tongue on this either, because he has the right to be pissed about this more than many of the other things he's scoffed at riku for in recent months.
his anger is getting to the point where he can feel the tears welling; maybe there is a kind of sadness to it, but so much of it is just roxas being overwhelmed.]
You don't know what it's like at all. [he hisses out; his eyes are stinging. even though he's cried before, it's never been like this. it's almost as if everything he didn't allow himself to feel because he thought he wasn't even capable of it is spilling over.] To be told by everyone that you're not supposed to exist. You aren't real. That what you feel is fake, because you don't even have a heart to feel it!
[he endured so much pain and loss, all the while having people like saïx telling him that his friendships and feelings were a farce, that they were pretend. the weight feels like it's going to crush his chest.]
And you thought it was okay to wait because you thought I needed to convince you? What did I have to do to be worthy of knowing about myself, about things I should have known from the start!?
[those tears are about as heartfelt as it gets, riku can tell this much. if any doubt remained about nobodies and hearts, this moment now completely eliminates it. watching roxas cry like this hurts, too. if only he'd taken a chance to just talk with roxas or stood up against diz's insistence on doing things quickly then maybe things could've ended differently.
instead, he hurt another innocent person. no, not only hurt, but put an end to their life. roxas' hearts lives on inside sora, yeah, but living inside someone isn't the same as having a life. even when trying to do good, he still screws up playing the hero, doesn't he?]
No, I don't know. I didn't know way too much but didn't care because I was way too focused on saving my best friend.
[it blinded him more than that blindfold ever could. times he questioned things happened and several times. sacrificing someone who so obviously felt sora rubbed him wrong. by the time those uneasy feelings won out, sparing roxas from his fate was too late. the most he managed to do was spare namine from elimination when diz ordered it. ...even with her, she still wasn't spared from rejoining kairi, either.]
I guess I needed you to prove to me that... [he pauses, his frown deepening as he glances downward] That I stole your life from you.
[admitting that is hard. so hard. it implies that his goal for over a year had been a bad one... no, saving sora wasn't bad, but the way they went about it was. they wanted to do it quick. if a few nobodies were sacrificed then so what? no hearts meant it was okay.
but it wasn't. it felt wrong and was wrong. seeing him with mary like that, just being friendly and protective with her, drilled home the fact that he screwed up about as bad as it gets. nobodies like roxas and namine and xion all had hearts, all had lives. like a true villain, riku ignored that possibility and took away their chance at living.]
You had a right to live like anyone else with a heart; I denied you that right. Words don't make up for anything and I don't expect them to, but I... I'm sorry, Roxas.
[there's a lot here that roxas is definitely not quite ready to hear yet; it's all a bit too much.
the first thought that comes is wondering what made sora so important. why? why was sora so important that he was worthy taking down? why did xion have to go too? it wasn't fair to either of them, and even if roxas has some very vague acknowledgement that he's born from sora...
he's not sora. he doesn't think he belongs with sora, either. he doesn't know him—unlike other nobodies who remembered their original lives without much deviation, roxas is sure they can't be the same.
and maybe riku is acknowledging that now too, but it's really hard for roxas to accept that much. he hears the apology, and while time will definitely mend the rift and maybe make things ultimately better for them both later on, roxas isn't ready for any of that. so the silence is long and heavy, filled with tension as roxas tries to figure out what comes next. he wants so badly to brush off riku's apologies and say they're not good enough, because what he did was unforgivable...
but he can't. he doesn't know why; maybe it's because of sora, or maybe it's because he can tell for the first time that riku is being incredibly sincere about what a shitheel he was.
but that doesn't mean he's ready to accept it, either. his head is swimming from the overload, so instead what he lets out is a very quiet, cold question as he keeps his gaze fixed on his hands.]
[silence hanging like that makes the atmosphere all but comfortable, but riku'll take it to being told off immediately. not getting told off period pleasantly surprises him. he deserves it. hell, he deserves a punch to the face and then some. maybe the lack of it means things between them could improve bit by bit in time. hah, nah, that's wishful thinking. this isn't sora who would pursue a friendship even with someone as shitty as himself while not taking a no for an answer. this is roxas, someone who may be part of sora but is not sora. friendship won't happen. riku's fine with that.
what gets said is a not so subtle push to moving on to chatting about something else. topic change happily accepted. riku looks back toward roxas, not hesitating in giving a blunt response.]
Tons.
[a pause comes before he speaks again.]
But instead of throwing more stuff at you, why don't you throw stuff at me.
[no one ever got around to explaining things to roxas properly. good chance that he needs some things cleared up and riku doesn't mind having a q&a session right now. they can chat about more intense things as they come or a different time. adding any more super heavy stuff unnecessarily when the kid's at his limit feels too dick a move.]
I'll answer whatever questions you need cleared up.
[straight answers, no dodging around them. consider it the first small step in making things up to roxas.]
[the problem with leaving the ball in roxas' court is the fact that because he's so overwhelmed by everything else, it leaves him at a bit of a loss.
somewhere floating in his mind are approximately five million questions. questions about hearts, about the organization, about sora—about xion and naminé, about xemnas and xehanort. about castle oblivion...
about why he has the keyblade.
about why he has two keyblades.
there's still so much that remains unanswered, but in this state, roxas isn't able to actually ask them. his mind is blank, it's throbbing and the expression on his face probably indicates that he's having an extremely tough time with all of this.]
I don't know. [he finally says after another long silence. his tone is definitely strained as he does so—the overload of having so much to ask is just too much for him. he's not "collapsing and passing out in the middle of castle oblivion" level of overwhelmed, but it's too much.
funny, how being told he has a heart suddenly made every feeling that much more intense.]
I— [he hesitates. he wants answers now, he wants to demand every answer from riku that he can. but all the same, he's too overwhelmed to cohesively ask those things, and probably not much in a state to process it either. he still needs to reconcile the fact that his entire worldview has been completely shattered in the blink of an eye.]
I need time. To think about it. [there's just so much.]
[silence is fine. riku remains patient throughout it, understanding that sorting everything out and figuring where to go may take a few. however long the reply takes to come, not a word gets spoken from his end. roxas had zero say in so much in the past. for once, far later than it should've happened, that's not gonna be the case. what they keep talking about and the pace all rests on him.
when the reply comes, it can't be called surprising. so much has to be swimming around in his head... and in his heart, now that he knows for a fact it's there. sorting it out will take time. good thing riku doesn't mind putting things on hold. the last thing he wants to do today is keep on kicking a guy who's already overloaded enough as is.]
All right. We'll call it quits here for today.
[riku stands, stretching lightly after getting up.]
Whenever you're done thinking, lemme know.
[the ball is staying in roxas' court. part two of their chat will happen whenever roxas wants it to.]
[that's all he manages to say. he really just wants to run, to leave and be away from this situation. roxas needs badly to clear his head at this point.
there are still a lot of questions, a strike raid that needs to be aimed at riku, and some form of thanks for at least finally being honest with him about these things he should've known all along. but for now... for now, he just needs to go. so he stands, and rather than leave the traditional way... he's opening up a corridor and scurrying out that way, so he can just go where he feels safest directly without having to travel too much.
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coexistent) wrote2015-07-03 05:05 pm
no subject
riku's eyes remain on roxas despite the temptation to look away. looking away from this feels wrong. keeping his gaze on the nobody feels awkward, if unpleasant, but the discomfort at revealing this information due to what it implies is nothing compared to the suffering felt by roxas. saving sora by putting something without a heart back in him? no problem. doing the same with a being in possession of a heart? not okay.
the signs were all there, too. between the nobodies in castle oblivion or roxas' emotions in the fake twilight town (the happiness with his friends, the confusion at everything abnormal, the anger at discovering the truth) and even axel's determination to save his friend, them having hearts seems so obvious now. hindsight really is 20/20.]
You have a heart, Roxas; the whole organization probably did. Xemnas... Xehanort only fed you that no heart garbage because he planned on turning you all into vessels for his own heart.
[which is a whole different can of worms to dive into, but one step at a time. stopping here for a bit to let all this sink sounds good.]
no subject
but this is something so new to him that he really isn't sure how t take it at all.
"you have a heart, roxas."
they're not words he expected to hear. they're words he didn't even think were possible, and while he's sure that this isn't something riku would lie to him about, it's still so hard to believe. but still, what is he supposed to say to that? how is he supposed to react? it makes his chest ache.
a heart.
he... has a heart.
it's a heart that's his own, one that his body demanded. which means that everything he felt was real. even if he's always believed his feelings were real, he now has a reason for why he could feel at all. the fun of eating ice cream with his friends, the anger at the organization's ways, the hurt of axel's betrayal and loss of xion. and what about mary? what does that mean?
there's so much, and it's so complicated that it's incredibly overwhelming. his places his hand over his chest, where his heart should be, and he just sits there in a stunned, silent state of disbelief.]
A... heart... [he isn't sure what to feel. or what he's supposed to feel at all. his mind is swimming too much to even discern that much quite yet.]
no subject
Yeah. Nobodies aren't as much of a nobody as everyone thought.
[people who lacked hearts still had them. who'd have thought, right? all they knew pointed to them lacking it. all they knew, or at least the major details, were ones provided by the puppet master pulling all their strings.]
Xehanort played us all with that one.
[as nice and easy as blaming everything on old norty is, riku won't take that path. he made his choices despite having some doubts. this much he accepts. next step after accepting? saying so aka the hard part. he sighs before speaking once more.]
And I should've put two and two together sooner. There were hints to it, hints I ignored because I was too blinded by my own goals to believe it possible.
[thinking about whether or not your best friend's nobody has a heart really isn't a thing you wanna do while trying to save said best friend. an apology bubbles up but dies on his lips. 'sorry your life was hell and that i made it worse' doesn't really do much. leaving it without admitting to how badly he screwed up won't do, though.]
You didn't deserve what you went through, whether it be at Xehanort's hands or mine.
no subject
it's hard to write any of it off as some kind of bs, especially when for all that he may have a dislike for a lot that riku does, there's still a part of roxas that inherently trusts him despite this. still, it doesn't make it easy for roxas to take, either.
he's quiet for a while longer, because he's still not sure how he's supposed to react. and even though he's pretty sure he knows the answer to the next question that sits on the edge of his tongue, he asks anyway, because he needs to be sure.]
You're... sure about this, right? [a pause.] There's no way that it's something else...
[which is more or less his way of asking how riku knows this for sure. but finding the words to actually say that right now feels near impossible with how overwhelmed he is in every regard.
(the part where he gets pissed at riku for not telling him sooner will come in a little while, that much is for certain.)]
no subject
If I wasn't sure, I wouldn't have mentioned it.
[like he said, there's fun ways to mess with roxas and then there's asshole ways to mess with roxas. doing so now falls completely into the latter. sharing a detail like this without good confirmation wouldn't happen. roxas and the nobodies having hearts is about the most certain detail out of everything they learned, too. any chance of it being another lie went out the window pretty quickly.]
Sora heard it straight from the horse's mouth and a couple other details back it up, too.
[details riku won't mention right this moment. adding in 'oh hey yeah i saw you in sora's heart but you were still you and a data thing of ansem the wise said a bunch of stuff about hearts and somehow ventus plus xion' might make the kid's head explode (and possibly-- probably make any anger even worse than it'll be, something riku'll pass on if possible). instead, he opts to say one final tidbit to drill this fact home.]
Chances are if someone wanted to steal your heart, they wouldn't come out of it empty-handed.
no subject
[well, that's something that immediately grabs his attention, because... what. sora isn't here, so if sora said this, it had to be before he got to cerealia, right?
riku's been here for months now; roxas knows that for a fact. three months, and he never mentioned this at all. that... seems like a problem. and even if roxas isn't in the best shape right now, he's got enough sense to be able to figure out that much. he bristles a little as he considers this, because he's pretty sure that has to be the case. so a lot of those other feelings get pushed aside in favor of asking what he now needs to know.]
How... long have you know about this? [his tone is curious, suspicious and decidedly less shocked that the previous statement. roxas doesn't know if having a heart is a good thing or a bad thing yet, nor does he know if having the truth in his hands will help him at all (even though... isn't this all he's wanted? for people to tell him in the truth and not leave him in the dark?), but he does know that riku sitting on this information when they've spoken a bunch of times doesn't sit well with him at all.]
no subject
Around 2 or 3 hours before I came here. Before you chew my head off for not sharing with the class earlier, there's a reason for it.
[just because yelling is imminent doesn't mean it needs to happen right this instant. yelling can come after storytime's done. riku's gaze shifts from roxas and toward the ground.]
I wasn't sure what to make of this town or getting pulled in or Terra being here or any of it. Xehanort manipulated everything. Anything bad that happened back home somehow had his hand in it and that's not exaggerating. I wanted to be sure this didn't.
[some part of him still worries it could be norty at work, but the guy would've made a move by now or brought sora or something! so far? ceres seems like your run of the mill villain type, no xehanort involved. he pauses, frown deepening. truth means the whole truth. roxas doesn't know what happens to him after that fight and has been dealing with that cliffhanger for too long. might as well give him a spoiler for the ending, right?]
There's also a couple things I wanted to wait on you having a cooler head for before spilling everything.
[riku doesn't know how much will come out right now, but what he does know is that he owes roxas. the reason roxas doesn't have a life isn't because he's a nobody; it's because assholes like him and xehanort used him for their own needs. giving the guy some hope and some truth and maybe some romantic push? least that he can do.]
no subject
well, he's still mad at hearing all of that. some of it is reasonable, some he can't argue—xehanort's machinations could be a factor. knowing how the organization is and knowing this is even greater than that means he does have some reasoning.
not much.
not much at all, because roxas is temperamental and impulsive.
he's also incredibly overwhelmed and feeling too much.]
It's been months. This... this isn't something I should have waited so long to find out about! [of course, he's equal parts angry and hurt. it's not like he expects riku to be on his side all that much, but still.
this is important to him.
this is the most important thing to him. he's struggled so much with the idea of not having a heart, with not knowing what it meant or what he was missing. he went through all the trouble of hurting mary by telling her he didn't have a heart.
but he has one. he has one, and there's so much more he could have been doing all this while with the information riku's been holding on to. and that's why roxas has gone from shock to angry and upset. he's not crying, but he's probably pretty close at this point.]
no subject
riku meets roxas' gaze dead on. he won't bait roxas or get emotional himself, but he doesn't plan on babying the kid, either. part of the reason for not sharing might rest with riku himself, but some of the blame falls on roxas, too.]
Would you have listened if I told you back when you wanted to lop my head off? And if you had, can you tell me for a fact that you wouldn't have done something you'd regret?
[impulsive, stupid and roxas go hand in hand. what happened in the world that never was, that computer in the lab in twilight town, all the fun keyblade action when riku arrived in the city: all dumb, all impulsive. once again, riku can't blame roxas at all for what transpired. if it were riku in that position, he'd have tried to lop his own head off, too. understanding why it happened doesn't mean it makes roxas seem any more reliable. the kid snapped without a chance to get a word in. not the best way to make someone wanna open up.]
Jumping at my throat all the time after that didn't convince me you could handle it, either.
[lots of glaring and general unhappiness at everything riku did made it questionable. snapping at him alone is one thing; doing so in a space where other people could get hurt is another. what if revealing stuff lead to a fight and innocent people accidentally getting caught in the crossfire? it was a definite possibility.
the other day changed that opinion. seeing roxas back off in the park, even if with mary's aid, illustrated some sense of self control. can it occur with something much more intense and without mary around? who can say, but riku opted to take the risk. he still isn't sure if it's the right move, but giving roxas some answers after making his life hell really is the least he could do.]
I should've told you sooner, I can admit that and even apologize for it, but you didn't make it any easier for me to want to tell you.
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[he's not doing anything too rash right now, because roxas doesn't even know what he can do but tense up. he's tense, and his hands are curled into fists. his jaw is clenches and nostrils are flared—but that's as far as he goes.
but just because he doesn't lash out in the other ways he's always been prone to in the past doesn't mean that he's going to hold back his thoughts. he won't hold his tongue on this either, because he has the right to be pissed about this more than many of the other things he's scoffed at riku for in recent months.
his anger is getting to the point where he can feel the tears welling; maybe there is a kind of sadness to it, but so much of it is just roxas being overwhelmed.]
You don't know what it's like at all. [he hisses out; his eyes are stinging. even though he's cried before, it's never been like this. it's almost as if everything he didn't allow himself to feel because he thought he wasn't even capable of it is spilling over.] To be told by everyone that you're not supposed to exist. You aren't real. That what you feel is fake, because you don't even have a heart to feel it!
[he endured so much pain and loss, all the while having people like saïx telling him that his friendships and feelings were a farce, that they were pretend. the weight feels like it's going to crush his chest.]
And you thought it was okay to wait because you thought I needed to convince you? What did I have to do to be worthy of knowing about myself, about things I should have known from the start!?
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instead, he hurt another innocent person. no, not only hurt, but put an end to their life. roxas' hearts lives on inside sora, yeah, but living inside someone isn't the same as having a life. even when trying to do good, he still screws up playing the hero, doesn't he?]
No, I don't know. I didn't know way too much but didn't care because I was way too focused on saving my best friend.
[it blinded him more than that blindfold ever could. times he questioned things happened and several times. sacrificing someone who so obviously felt sora rubbed him wrong. by the time those uneasy feelings won out, sparing roxas from his fate was too late. the most he managed to do was spare namine from elimination when diz ordered it. ...even with her, she still wasn't spared from rejoining kairi, either.]
I guess I needed you to prove to me that... [he pauses, his frown deepening as he glances downward] That I stole your life from you.
[admitting that is hard. so hard. it implies that his goal for over a year had been a bad one... no, saving sora wasn't bad, but the way they went about it was. they wanted to do it quick. if a few nobodies were sacrificed then so what? no hearts meant it was okay.
but it wasn't. it felt wrong and was wrong. seeing him with mary like that, just being friendly and protective with her, drilled home the fact that he screwed up about as bad as it gets. nobodies like roxas and namine and xion all had hearts, all had lives. like a true villain, riku ignored that possibility and took away their chance at living.]
You had a right to live like anyone else with a heart; I denied you that right. Words don't make up for anything and I don't expect them to, but I... I'm sorry, Roxas.
[he truly is.]
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the first thought that comes is wondering what made sora so important. why? why was sora so important that he was worthy taking down? why did xion have to go too? it wasn't fair to either of them, and even if roxas has some very vague acknowledgement that he's born from sora...
he's not sora. he doesn't think he belongs with sora, either. he doesn't know him—unlike other nobodies who remembered their original lives without much deviation, roxas is sure they can't be the same.
and maybe riku is acknowledging that now too, but it's really hard for roxas to accept that much. he hears the apology, and while time will definitely mend the rift and maybe make things ultimately better for them both later on, roxas isn't ready for any of that. so the silence is long and heavy, filled with tension as roxas tries to figure out what comes next. he wants so badly to brush off riku's apologies and say they're not good enough, because what he did was unforgivable...
but he can't. he doesn't know why; maybe it's because of sora, or maybe it's because he can tell for the first time that riku is being incredibly sincere about what a shitheel he was.
but that doesn't mean he's ready to accept it, either. his head is swimming from the overload, so instead what he lets out is a very quiet, cold question as he keeps his gaze fixed on his hands.]
...Is there anything else?
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what gets said is a not so subtle push to moving on to chatting about something else. topic change happily accepted. riku looks back toward roxas, not hesitating in giving a blunt response.]
Tons.
[a pause comes before he speaks again.]
But instead of throwing more stuff at you, why don't you throw stuff at me.
[no one ever got around to explaining things to roxas properly. good chance that he needs some things cleared up and riku doesn't mind having a q&a session right now. they can chat about more intense things as they come or a different time. adding any more super heavy stuff unnecessarily when the kid's at his limit feels too dick a move.]
I'll answer whatever questions you need cleared up.
[straight answers, no dodging around them. consider it the first small step in making things up to roxas.]
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somewhere floating in his mind are approximately five million questions. questions about hearts, about the organization, about sora—about xion and naminé, about xemnas and xehanort. about castle oblivion...
about why he has the keyblade.
about why he has two keyblades.
there's still so much that remains unanswered, but in this state, roxas isn't able to actually ask them. his mind is blank, it's throbbing and the expression on his face probably indicates that he's having an extremely tough time with all of this.]
I don't know. [he finally says after another long silence. his tone is definitely strained as he does so—the overload of having so much to ask is just too much for him. he's not "collapsing and passing out in the middle of castle oblivion" level of overwhelmed, but it's too much.
funny, how being told he has a heart suddenly made every feeling that much more intense.]
I— [he hesitates. he wants answers now, he wants to demand every answer from riku that he can. but all the same, he's too overwhelmed to cohesively ask those things, and probably not much in a state to process it either. he still needs to reconcile the fact that his entire worldview has been completely shattered in the blink of an eye.]
I need time. To think about it. [there's just so much.]
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when the reply comes, it can't be called surprising. so much has to be swimming around in his head... and in his heart, now that he knows for a fact it's there. sorting it out will take time. good thing riku doesn't mind putting things on hold. the last thing he wants to do today is keep on kicking a guy who's already overloaded enough as is.]
All right. We'll call it quits here for today.
[riku stands, stretching lightly after getting up.]
Whenever you're done thinking, lemme know.
[the ball is staying in roxas' court. part two of their chat will happen whenever roxas wants it to.]
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[that's all he manages to say. he really just wants to run, to leave and be away from this situation. roxas needs badly to clear his head at this point.
there are still a lot of questions, a strike raid that needs to be aimed at riku, and some form of thanks for at least finally being honest with him about these things he should've known all along. but for now... for now, he just needs to go. so he stands, and rather than leave the traditional way... he's opening up a corridor and scurrying out that way, so he can just go where he feels safest directly without having to travel too much.
bye, riku.]