1004/Icing on the Cake

Icing on the Cake
Date of Scene:	20 November 2014
Location:	Afterus - City of Home
Synopsis:	Roxas and Xion discuss things, and are joined by Aqua after a while.
Cast of Characters:	624, 629, 630

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Roxas (629) has posed:
The City of Home in Afterus is a sprawling, expansive place with many Temples spread throughout. It has so many gods, after all, that it's difficult to express them within the confines of a single area. Thus, much like the Temple of Public Transportation is the primary Temple of Arthur Lowell, so too are many other buildings dedicated to deities that have a much more mundane function than might appear at a first glance. For instance, one such Temple of Hospitality is a major hotel in the city. It's run primarily by Prospitian Carapacians, so it's cheap to stay there.

That is where our heroes would eventually make their way after the previous night, lacking a safe tunnel through the Darkness to return home. Yet, there was an urgent matter to attend to before they could go clean up and get some rest.

"C'mon." Roxas had said. "We did pretty good, so we can't turn out without some icing on the cake." It's a saying that he doesn't really fully understand, even though he uses it so casually. To him it just means that they're going to get ice cream. So, he'd lead Xion through the nearby city streets until they'd found someplace that was still open.

It's dark out, but not late enough that everybody's turned in yet. Black and white carapaces roam the streets mixed with humans and trolls. Roxas and Xion aren't a particularly odd pair here, and Roxas had asked for Xion to wait outside, promising to bring back something good.

NOW... Roxas emerges from the ice cream parlor with a pair of popsicle sticks in hand. He looks slightly disappointed. This isn't the kind of ice cream he prefers-- as a matter of fact, it's a couple of orange creamsicles. But, even though faint disappointment leaks through, the black-clothed youth still looks pretty happy as he hands one of them off to Xion.

"There. It wouldn't be much of a successful day if we didn't end it like this." Roxas remarks, cheerfully. He wishes Axel was around with them, but he's already decided not to talk about it. That'd just be too gloomy.

Xion (630) has posed:
    Xion had been the perfect companion for their trip, though she seemed a bit less emotive than Roxas. She just kind of pleasantly smiled as they moved through the city, though she was that same sort of distant and quiet for long stretches. Off in her own little world, she's generally docile and zombie-like, but there's the spark of will there that reminds Roxas that she's still there, still has a personaltiy and such.

    It's just off in her own head. At the 'icing on the cake', though, she animates, her grin broadening to a full smile. "Ooh! Yes, lets. Should we go get Ax..." She begins, before her grin falters, change to confusion. "...el. Why do I feel so weird...?" She asks, before shaking her head to clear it, running her gloved fingers through her hair and razzling it just to re-center herself. "Sorry. Just this odd sensation. I don't know them all yet. Ummm... yeah! Let's get some. Do you think the stores will be open? Well, not that it matters, but it'd be rude to steal things." She comments. But they find a store! Full of tasties.

    Roxas enters, and Xion waits, leaning against a light pole and pulling up her hood. When Roxas returns, she's swinging Souji's sword around lightly in the mostly-abandoned nighttime streets, letting it disappear to accept the ice-cream. "ooh! It's a different color! Let's see how this tastes." She comments, taking a little lick before a tiny bite, shivering.

    "Hmm... I don't think it's as good... Which is great!" She gives a huge grin.

    "It means when we get home, the ice cream will be even more good, because we'll know what we're having all the better." She notes, licking hers slowly and savoring the flavor.

    "Well, we should find a way to get home, if the Corridors are too clogged with Heartless. Do you think Saix will be mad we're late?"

Roxas (629) has posed:
"Well... it's a little too sweet, but that's alright. Not everywhere has the same things, and it's important to try new things." Roxas leans up against Xion's light pole to one side of her. It's chilly out, not entirely suited to ice cream weather, but... well, it's just too much of an ingrained tradition for him to shake it. She's right though. The orange creamsicle stuff isn't as good as what they're used to. Maybe it's just the nostalgia of it. But, partially at least, it's just that the sweetness is a bit too strong. Making it sweet-and-salty mellows it out, so Roxas isn't very used to this kind of flavor.

"Why do you feel weird? Well... probably, you miss Axel. When you like somebody, and they're not around, sometimes you feel bad. Or... something." He's not sure how it is for normal Nobodies. That's not something he has context for, but he doesn't want to draw attention to that, so he sticks with explaining the situation. Roxas has often wondered, is it really so bad that Nobodies don't have hearts? The question, he later learned, didn't apply to him. But apart from being clueless, Xion seems pretty...

... Well, not normal. But only weird like a normal person can be weird.

"E-eh? Great? But you said..." He looks at her in vague bewilderment. It's actually a good point, in a weird sort of way. Roxas just kind of blinks at Xion, wondering how she can have issues with such basic stuff while making statements like /that/.

Roxas makes a worried noise at mention of returning home and Saix. "Sorry, but there's no way we're getting back home tonight. We're going to stay at an inn if we can find one. Saix... w-well... maybe the heartless we eliminated will make up for it, but it doesn't really matter right now. We can't do our jobs if the Heartless get us before we even RTC. I figure we can just wait for them to calm down and head back through the corridors tomorrow sometime."

Xion (630) has posed:
    "It's different... And tasty, in its own way! But I think ours is better. But that's the way the world works, right? The more you experience, the more you... learn, the better you understand the world. The better you understand the world, and the things in it, the better you understand how things relate. When you experience something, but it's the only thing you've ever experienced, it's the best thing you've ever done. It's what you're best at. But that's not... not really how it works. I want to figure out what /I'm/ good at. Just like the ice cream." Xion explains, taking a big bite for emphasis and letting it melt in her mouth.

    "So it's like the ice cream." Xion continues. "Any ice cream we eat is good, becuase it will do one of two things."

    She raises a finger. "We figure out Sea Salt Ice Cream is, in fact, better." She gives a knowing smile, as she raises a second finger. "We figure out whatever other ice cream we eat is better than Sea Salt Ice Cream. Which is also good. Either our favorite thing becomes more of our favorite because we now have more reference to it. So, you see, learning is always good."

    She lowers her hand and goes back to licking her ice cream.

    Quietly, to herself, she whispers. "So I miss him..."

    She smiles. "Well, that's good. Missing someone means you're bad because a good thing isn't there. It's not a real 'bad'. That would be... Angry. Or sad."

Roxas (629) has posed:
"Hmm... well... you seem pretty good at fighting, to me. You've just gotta pay more attention when big guys broadcast attacks like that." Roxas points out, waving his quarter-of-a-popsicle at her. He's already consumed the vast majority of it, taking large bites that probably look a bit painful. Most of it is stick now, rather than ice cream itself. Matter of fact, he bites off another chunk right after using it to point. That seems like it'd be awfully painful on his teeth, really. He attempts to talk while letting a chunk of it melt in the side of his mouth, coming out rudely muffled, "But... you know, I'm not good at this kind of thing..."

"I'm glad you're with me and not with somebody else though. They're our friends and all, but a lot of them are seriously jerks. They treated me like I was just a huge nuisance when I first showed up." Truthfully Roxas was a huge nuisance at the time, but he doesn't really think of it that way so much. After all, he couldn't help it. Certainly no more than Xion can help her current level of inexperience.

Xion's descriptions of things she feels and what they are gets the oddest look out of Roxas. He finishes off his icecream with another chomp to buy himself some time and then says, "Sounds like you're getting a hang of things. It's like... I don't know. Homesickness. But, I don't know if I've ever missed the castle that much. It's in kind of a strange place..."

Roxas looks out across the city. "I mean, this place just feels way more alive. So does Twilight Town. I guess that's just how it is with a group like ours, but we live pretty differently when you look at it much."

Aqua (624) has posed:
    "So I'm not the only one who thinks this is a pretty big place?" comes Aqua's voice, as she walks up from behind the duo; her armor is gone, giving place to those casual, if a bit fancy, clothes that she typically wears otherwise, with some traces of the armor remaining (mostly the boots and some plates on her upper arms). She doesn't seem to have any traces of the battle, but that's what white magic is for.

    "Sorry. I saw you two from afar and might have eavesdropped just a moment. Thanks for the help against the Heartless. It's rare I see other Keyblades. Roxas and Xion, was it?"

    She wants to say more; comment on their faces and eyes looking familiar. But since she can't place it, or figure out why she feels that way, it'd be too awkward. Emotions without attached memories are just... weird, even by her standards. Fighting Heartless? Fine. Swinging key-swords around, fine! Feeling something for no reason? Now that, that is weird.

    "The coats, where did you get them?"

Xion (630) has posed:
    "Good? Well... Everything I do, is because it's in my head. I'm almost like a puppet on strings, just moving how I'm supposed to. I don't /really/ know how to fight. I just move, because that's what... I have to do. Not have. Should. I... I'm actually just bad. Bad at everything. I haven't been able to find a thing I'm good at. My... memories just /make/ me good at things. My keyblade, too. Everything. Numbers, building things, fixing things, casting spells... It's all automatic. It's not /me/. That's what I want to find out. What /I/ am. What /I'm/ good at." Xion explains, as her creamsicle runs down her glove as she thinks, and talks.

    Then, well, Roxas makes it a little better. "Yeah." She agrees, on the note of 'jerks'. "Some of them make me feel bad too. But when there's so few of us, that are like us, you need to expect things, right? I... I think that's right. It's all so fuzzy and mixed up. I'm glad you don't treat me as a nusiance." She offers, the last part barely above a whisper. She didn't know why it made her feel so weird, so warm in the face, but she didn't... exactly mind it.

    "The castle is... It's home, though. I like the quiet. It helps me thing, make sense of things. Other places are loud... They're harder. Though, the Castle is alive in it's-" She begins, before AQUA appears! "Yep. I'm Xion. Uh... Other keybla-Oh! You're a keyblader too?" She wonders, her previous blushing quietness gone in an instant. "Well, it's our job to hunt Heartless. Is it yours, too?" Xion asks, her eyes twinkling. IS SHE A KINDRED SPIRIT?!

    Then Aqua asks about their coats, and she glances to Roxas. This... Is this a secret?

Roxas (629) has posed:
"Um... It is pretty big, I guess..."

Roxas's head swims, and he leans heavily back against the lamp post. He was already doing that, but it's a lot more obvious that he needs the support of it now. He looks at Aqua unsteadily and tries to connect the dots. But, unfortunately, the gaps still persist. There's nothing he can do about that. A little bit of him feels put off that this other Keyblader had been listening to their conversation. They've been pretty loud about it, come to think of it. Anybody could've heard. But, he really doesn't want to get in trouble, or get his friends in trouble. Even if they ARE jerks.

"Yeah, that's us. And, er... I'll be honest with you because I feel like you're somebody I can trust. The people we work with all wear coats like this. We don't really know where they come from, I guess one of us must have made them, but that's all we can really tell you without backstabbing all our friends. I guess they're useful for warding off the heartless?" Roxas looks down at himself ponderously, but doesn't speculate on the subject further.

As for Xion's musing, Roxas looks at her without an inkling of understanding. He says, "I never really thought memories would be that big a problem. You feel that disconnected from it all...? Anyway, I wouldn't treat somebody like a nuisance. It felt pretty bad when it happened to me, so I don't think I could stand doing it to somebody else. Besides, what's the point in being a jerk to somebody you're trying to accomplish stuff with?"

Aqua (624) has posed:
    "Oh. I see. It's fine. I met a man once, in the Darkness. He wore a coat like that. I still don't know who he is or where he is now, but if there's a lot of those coats around I guess it can't be helped. I didn't mean to intrude. The name's Aqua. I think. It's all I have left in there," she says, pointing at her head.

    She looks between Xion and Roxas. What a shame teenagers like that are stuck fighting. She knows what it's like, wanting to fight, but she still wouldn't wish it on others.

    "My job? No, it's nothing like that. I did some pretty terrible things, so I'm trying to make up for them. The Hearless want to swallow worlds, and the Keyblades have the power to stop that. I remember that too. It'd be a waste not to use it... but I don't really feel connected to it. The sword, I mean, it's... off. But it's there for me, and it lets me do good where I go now. It just feels like the right thing."

    Another glance between the two, as Roxas explains he wouldn't want to mistreat a partner, or do unto others what he doesn't like himself. "Have you two been fighting for a long time? Not a lot of people have what it takes to stand up and push those things back. You must have pretty strong hearts."

Xion (630) has posed:
    "I've got a lot of them. Different ones, from all sorts of people. And they're all sort of talking to me, or are in my head... or something, sometimes it's a little confusing. But it's why I know things - I just listen. I think that's why Saix paired us up? Maybe he's not all bad!" Xion offers in answer to Roxas, as Aqua speaks on Strange Things and Awkward Questions.

    "A man? In the darkness? And he wasn't coming or going, he was just there? I don't know if that was one of us... Usually the Heartless don't notice us, but we can't stay in darkness forever. We just use it to get from place to place. The coats keep us safe. Were... you in the darkness? That's so weird!" She offers, a sort of curious wonderment alighting across her face.

    Then she explains that she did terrible things, causing Xion to look crestfallen.

    And then Aqua talks about Strong Hearts.

    Xion just looks paralyzed, shaking slightly, as she tries to figure out the words to say. That she doens't have a heart? That she's broken in a way that can't really be fixed?

    That Roxas is the same way?

    But the keyblade, it chose them, it's theirs, and Keyblades are weapons of the heart! Does that mean her keyblade...

    There is a splut and a clatter, as her mostly-eaten creamsickle hits the ground and clatters once, mostly-melted ice cream making a little mess on the ground to the gentle sussuration of tightening gloves.

    Xion stares pointedly at the ground, trying not to breathe hard and kind of failing.

    How was she supposed to answer? Why did she feel so /awful/?

Roxas (629) has posed:
". . ."

A man in the darkness, wearing one of their coats? Roxas wonders about that. It could be any of them, but... there had been reports about somebody wearing their coat that isn't a part of the organization. Could it have been the imposter? It's hard to say, and there's only so much he can say to somebody who isn't a Nobody. This person doesn't feel like one, and since she has a Keyblade of her own he can conclude that she has a Heart, even if she is a Nobody. It's not somebody he can be completely honest with, no matter what.

Roxas tosses his ice cream stick into a nearby trash bin, surprisingly managing to ring it without issues despite his obvious instability. Why's she looking at them like that...? He says, "I guess it all comes down to the same thing with me. But, this is all I'm good for, so it's not like I can just choose to go do something else. I don't have any memories before a few months ago either, so there's nothing for me to go back to."

"Besides, doing this... I don't know. It's like you said, it feels right."

To Aqua's question, Roxas shakes his head. "Nah... I mean, a few months maybe? I can't remember before that. Maybe I've been fighting a lot longer. I don't remember a time I wasn't fighting so far, but it was always pretty easy for me." He looks vaguely uncomfortable at mention of the strength of their hearts, and avoids looking at Xion at first. Unfortunately, she's freaking out a little too hard for him to just ignore it.

Oh boy. Nothing really prepared him for this.

"I don't know about me, but Xion is pretty strong, even if she doesn't think so. She copied that Souji guy's weapon and put down a huge Heartless with it. You've gotta be at least a little strong to pull something like that off, especially in the middle of a fight." Roxas nudges Xion in the side with his elbow, playfully. It seems like something Axel would do.

Aqua (624) has posed:
    "He was just there, yeah. So was I. I don't remember why, sorry. I know I didn't like it, though. It was... quiet, and very lonely there. The Heartless never stopped coming, and there wasn't a way out. I think the man got me out, but I don't know if he made it out himself, or if it was just someone else. It's pretty blurry. I don't even know how long I was in there. It kind of... messes with your perception of time, maybe?" Aqua shakes her head. She's not really sure, and absolutely doesn't want to go back there to find out.

    To Roxas, she shakes her head again. "There's always a choice. To go do something else. To do what you want. Whether or not it's what you remember how to do. But... it sounds like this is what you want to be doing, so maybe there's nothing else you'd like to do right now. It's good to keep an open mind. Maybe one day you'll figure out something you want to do more than fighting." Generic advice but it's the best she can manage.

    Xion's response makes the older Keyblader look worried. Did she say something wrong? She even dropped her ice cream! Uncomfortable, that's what she is now.

    "Sorry, did I say something wrong? And yeah... the Keyblades, they don't pick helpless people. I couldn't tell you how they work, I just... when you hold one, you can kind of feel it. It's something special. If you have one, it's definitely not for nothing. I think... the same is true of all special gifts, not just the Keyblades."

Xion (630) has posed:
    Xion is so... bad feeling, inside. The roil of her gut, a tingling in her throat, a heady sort of pressure behind her eyes, she feels so bad, and she can't... figure it out. None of her memories help. In fact, they're horrible, filling her head full of conflicting melanges of broken and torn memories of a thousand and one instances where this mattered, causing her to press her hands into her temples, digginer her fingers into her hair.

    She practically doubles over, before slowly she recovers, focusing on something - anything - that wasn't the sensations in her body. A bit of roadway with a crack on it, her glove that needed cleaning, anything, and she brought herself back. The pain in her eyes dimmed back down to the serene sort of calm she had even when she was exuberant and chipper. "S-sorry. No, I... I'm fine. You didn't say anything... bad." She offers, stumbling across her words. She can't call the things Aqua said to Roxas and her... 'correct'.

    Because every memory she had, of her past lives, made her feel empty in a way that wasn't entirely physical. Xion knew what she was.

    Dragging her thoughts away from that, she forced a smile as easy as any skilled liar, and shook her head. "It's fine, even if you're wrong about some things. Everything is an experience. It's funny, though. Our keyblades are exactly alike, mine and Roxas'. The only different part is the keychain. But maybe you're right. I won't say I'm not special, for certain!" She finally relents, moving off of sadder subjects.

    "Sorry about my little issue, I... Felt really bad for a few seconds. You shouldn't worry about it. I had a lot to... think about."

Roxas (629) has posed:
"You probably got lost. Maybe... I don't know, maybe your world fell apart, and you got lost out there. I mean, that's how people wind up in places like Traverse Town." Roxas offers to Aqua, feebly. His own origins are similar, even if he actually knows the details of it better. Coming into existence in Twilight Town is a strange way to be born, but that is how it happened. It's not many beings that can remember their literal birth, but for all practical purposes, he sure does. "But... being in the darkness without protection is a pretty bad idea. I wish I had an extra coat to give you. They're really good for that."

All good intentions, nearly no wariness, even though he has a desire to protect the secrets of his mysterious group of weirdos in black coats.

As for the assertion that there's a choice, Roxas looks a bit conflicted. He shakes his head, "I guess... I don't really like fighting all that much, but it's something I'm good at, so it seems like a waste to stop doing it. And there are people who need me to fight for them. Nobody else is going to do it. Except maybe Xion, but I can't just leave her alone. I could walk away, but I think I'd be a pretty big jerk to do it."

"And, uh... well, don't worry about it..." Roxas doesn't want to lie, but he can't explain what's wrong with Xion. He barely even knows. Worse yet, he's just not well-equipped to handle an intensely awkward social situation like this. This is probably pretty evident to Aqua -- Roxas isn't that great at being evasive, so it's easy to tell that's what he's doing.

"Come to think of it though," He wonders aloud, thankful for a different topic to speak on, "it is pretty weird that our Keyblades are the same..."

Aqua (624) has posed:
    "I see. Still, sorry. It's awkward, talking with people when you don't really remember anyone. I haven't really formed any bonds since then, so I'm a little bit rusty making conversation. If I say stuff that makes you uncomfortable, you can just say so, I won't be offended," Aqua offers Xion, before looking between them. "The same?"

    Identical Keyblades, there's a weird thought. Not that she remembers how they work well enough to say if that's normal or not. "Maybe it just means you're fated to be together. Like twin brothers and sisters. That's a bit corny, isn't it?" She smiles sheepishly, obviously a bit ashamed of saying something that... well, corny, that's the way she put it.

    "Ah, don't worry. My armor protects me. I wandered for a while without it, but I was able to scrap it together here and there. I don't know why I did. The man said I shouldn't bother, but I did anyway. I think I just wanted something to hide my face." She points at her left pauldron, and the crystal on it. "I just hit that and it appears. The activation crystal was on me, but there wasn't any armor. I must have lost it when whatever happened happened."

    For all she knows Roxas is probably right. She might have just been on a world where the Heartless won. Sure seems like the most likely way to end up stranded in the Realm of Darkness.

    She chooses not to press on the matter of always having a choice. Roxas is right, there are people who need heroes out there, and walking away from that is a pretty significant choice that carries a lot of moral implications.

Xion (630) has posed:
    Xion shakes her head. "It's okay. We're still us. Even with a past to remember, or without one, you're still you. So... We're fine." Xion replies, potentially oddly for Aqua but for Roxas, an affirmation of words spoken in private. "I wasn't offended. I kind of... can't be?" Xion offers, with a little smile. "It's not important."

    "Corny? No, it's not... like corn at all?" She offers, sounding confused. With a shwing of pale light, she summons Heart's Desire to her hand, lifting it to show to Aqua. It is, down to a T, the Kingdom Key... Except for the keychain. Where normally there'd be the Kingdom Key's keychain, hers is a black glove holding a broken white heart. "This is mine. It's called... Heart's Desire. I guess because of the keychain? It can do a few things." She explains. Aqua can inspect it, if she likes! But she's pretty tightfisted on it... Not that it COULD be taken, theoretically.

    On the subject of armor, she looks impressed. "Oh... Wow. Armor! I never would have thought that would protect you against the darkness. I just have my coat. Though, Heartless kind of ignore us already. Not because we're evil, thoguh!"

Roxas (629) has posed:
"Hmm... We're not really related, though. Just partners, until our boss decides to split us up I guess." Roxas seems a bit bothered by this notion, but it's a subtle enough shift in his features that it's easily missed. Apart from liking Xion, he's not sure how well she'll do out in the field by herself. She seems to have much worse issues than he did. Or at least... they're different and pretty severe, and they come at kind of inopportune times. Will it ever get her in trouble? Sometimes his quirks get HIM in trouble... but maybe that's just the way of things.

Regarding the armor that Aqua wears, Roxas looks pretty interested. "You can store it just like that? That's -really- useful. Too bad our gear isn't that heavy. It'd probably help with enemies like that one back there. Is it hard to make?" But maybe it wouldn't be so good against something that throws lightning around as casually as Thor. That was pretty painful, even without getting caught in it for very long.

Roxas has to stifle a snort at Xion's misunderstandings. He shakes his head and says, "No, no... corny is... it's when something is kind of stupid and like in a fairy tale or something. Kind of just way too in-your-face about what it means. Like two people having the same Keyblade... or, I dunno. Aqua, what's something else that's kinda corny? It doesn't have anything to do with being like corn."

Aqua (624) has posed:
    "Can't be offended? That's the most interesting special power I've ever heard of," Aqua says in an obvious attempt to make light of the conversation rather than dwell on the negative. Although, it's kind of true too.

    She examines the Keyblade although not so close as to make Xion uncomfortable. She decides to produce her own Keyblade, in a shimmer of purple-blue light, in fair trade. It's kind of big, for one; the Master Keeper seems like it was made for someone taller, possibly just larger in general than Aqua is.

    "This one's mine. I think it's called the Master Keeper, but like everything else I remember it's... information without context, sorry.

    "The Heartless ignore you? That'd be handy to have. It must make getting around fights a lot easier if you don't do anything to draw their attention. Ah, as for corn..."

    Her stomach grumbles.
    Guess it can't be avoided, she eats on the go a lot.

    "Corny is when something is so over the top positive you'd think it could only be true in a story. Oh, like... a curse that can only be broken by true love's kiss. But sometimes those stories are true, too!"

    And last up, the armor. She glances at the pauldron and back to Roxas. "The armor itself is just regular metal, but with magic in it. I enchanted it myself, to protect from the Realm of Darkness, so... I could probably manage another, if you found a suit your size. The storage, though, that's... that's what the pauldron does. I don't have a second one, but if you really want, we can try to find someone who can look at it and make another. This seems to be a really big world, there must be someone out there."

Xion (630) has posed:
    Xion just smiles. "Well, if I don't know what being offended is like, and I can't really feel it, then..." She shrugs. "I can't be offended." She repeats, as if it has some sort of magical power, of if repeating it made it more true. The raw fact of the matter was, she really couldn't be. She simply didn't have the capacity.

    After showing off her BIG, THICK SWORD to Aqua, Aqua shows Xion (and Roxas), her BIG, THICK... LONG SWORD. It's even bigger than average! It is also strange, in some ways, but Xion doesn't know to comment on it. Xion just grins and shakes her head at Aqua.

    "That's my power. Information without context. Skills. I can do... anthing. It's not really me doing it, but I can guide myself to do things. It's /like/ I'm good at things. And by things I mean everything." She extolls.

    "Corny. Okay! Got it."
    She doesn't got it.

    "I guess I'll have to work on my things. And you can work on getting a shiny armor rock!"

    "And then when we come back together, Roxas will have a shiny rock, and I'll have tried new things, and we'll all be better for it!"

    She nods with a finality.

    "Don't worry, Roxas, I'll go ahead and tell Saix what's going on! I'm sure he won't mind."

    He will mind.

    Roxas, Xion is sacrificing herself for yu. Don't let it be in vain. T____T

    If not stopped, Xion would wander off in the direction of the CHURCH OF GOIN' PLACES GUD.

Roxas (629) has posed:
"H-hey, hang on a minute..." Roxas looks and sounds incredibly torn. He wants to hear more about some of this stuff and talk with Aqua, but he doesn't think it's a good idea for Xion to wander off on her own. So he decides that the best choice is to just combine these two desires and make certain that they've got each other's contact information. In a mad rush to get going, he fumbles around in his jacket looking for business cards -- failing a few times by reaching into the wrong pocket -- before producing one from an inner pocket and shoving it into Aqua's hands.

"Sorry, but I'm responsible for her, I can't let her run off like this. Message me later, okay?" He's in such a rush that he doesn't stop to figure out whether or not Aqua knows how to use a radio. Either way there's a radio frequency and the number XIII on the business card. Might be she'd already gotten one from him the other day.

With that having been done, Roxas tears off after Xion, stumbling awkwardly a few times as he goes. Apparently this Saix guy inspires a lot of get-up-and-go... or maybe just plain ol' fear.

Either way, much like Xion, Roxas is gone in pretty short order.

Aqua (624) has posed:
    "So your powers are to not be offended and to know how to do anything... that sounds really useful. I wish I had something special I can remember other than... well." She vaguely waves the Master Keeper around. "Not that it's nothing! It's... probably a lot more than people have. But if I had a special talent, I'd use it to protect even more people, I think."

    She unsummons the blade, in the same purple-blue shimmer.

    "Sorry, I'm being odd. A-Ah, erm, b-bye?"

    Off Xion goes!

    Aqua turns to Roxas.

    "It's alright. Your bosses sound like they're pretty severe. It's weird to think there's a group of workers out there who have some sort of Heartless-hunting organization set up, but it also sounds like you're doing good."

    She takes the business card and then stands there, alone, confused, glancing at the buildings around her. She's hungry! And doesn't have a radio. Two entirely unrelated problems.

    'SHIFTY DISTRIBUTOR'S 24/7 HOT NOODLES & RADIOS' reads a sign.

    ... sure, she'll take it.