[ooc info]
Character Name: Roxas
Fandom: Kingdom Hearts
Gender: Male
Age: 23
Sexuality (if applicable): Asexual.
Original or Anomaly?: Anomaly.
Appearance: Roxas appears, mostly, to be a healthy young man at first glance. He's whip thin and pale and looks a little faded around the edges, but nothing too out of the ordinary. Until you start to look closer, that is. His messy blond hair is cropped short in an almost militaristic way, and his bright blue eyes are, well, a little less bright these days. Mostly hollow. His is a face lined only with tiredness; you can tell from a glance he's not used to smiling. He's got scars, too - little ones, faded things, but common, crowding on his arms and legs, with just a single one on his face. All the evidence of how hard he's fought. Everything about him seems a little hollow or empty, like the light's gone out of him. His clothing more or less reflects that - dull tones, tan and gray and black, and little use of color. The ratty, dusty scarf he usually wears these days is more of a mask than a thing meant to keep him warm. He comes off plain, unremarkable, likely to fade into the background at any moment - which is just what he intends, really.
He no longer takes great pains to hide the gaping hole in his chest. Keeping that dark space hidden had served a purpose while he was on the run - it would be a dead giveaway for his identity, something he didn't need to risk. But once he joined the resistance, there was no longer any real need to hide the truth of what had happened to him or who he was. So he ditched his old gauze wrappings a week after joining Sora's group and never looked back. If you catch him shirtless, that eerie, machinery-lined black hole will be on proud display, along with the matting of jagged silver-pink scars around it.
One important thing to note about Roxas is that he looks his age, instead of fifteen. Roxas's connection to his Other - the fact that he and Sora are alive at the same time - causes him to physically age at the same rate that Sora does, a trait only one other Nobody, Naminé, shares.
Personality: Sharp, quick, harsh, and stoic. Roxas is a very cool customer, rarely emoting or even commenting - he just gets the job done efficiently and moves on. He's prone to tight frowns and a rigid spine, carrying himself like the only thing that keeps him going is stubborn will. That's the face he normally shows, anyway. To be quiet, unresponsive, uncaring -- it makes things easier, helps him cover for all the pain he carries around. But there are still a few faint slivers of humanity left underneath that facade, remnants of the boy that used to be. Roxas is not all bad, once you get him to open up. The sharpness will dull to just a quiet, absent sort of nature, and he'll come across more as calm instead of stoic. He'll seem tired - but it's not impossible to make him smile. Deep down, in fact, Roxas is actually very kind, a bit shy, and a lot socially awkward -- and has noble tendencies that can get him in trouble. Even deeper down, nearly buried by years of hardship and pain, is a passion that will come out once in a great while when those people most precious to him are in danger.
Simply put, Roxas is not uncomplicated - he's a man of many and different layers, and seeing them all can take a great deal of patience and time. Getting past that business-like, cold surface, discovering the mostly calm, mostly damaged boy beneath, and finally uncovering the kindness and the drive to survive that lie at his core is very, very difficult for a reason, though. Roxas has gone through a very great deal of pain in his life, and he's not at all quick to trust - no, he'll beat the crap out of you soon as look at you if he thinks you present a threat. His suffering has made his anger a terrible thing, and if you incite his wrath, he will kill you and he will not hesitate. Though prone largely to quiet acts of kindness, he can be extremely cruel when provoked. Combine that with a stubborn hard headedness and a slight impulsive streak and you get a very dangerous bundle of constantly fizzing nerves and desires and self-loathing.
Roxas isn't all that easy to handle, really. But above all, he wants to do good. He wants, more than anything, to do the right thing. The kid may have more layers than an onion, but that one simple wish should tell you all you really need to know about what kind of person he truly is.
History: At the beginning of the end, there was a boy whose name was Sora. And Sora was on a desperate search for a friend. Sora was a special boy with a Keyblade to cut the darkness and a bright, bright heart - so even when that heart was cut on its own Keyblade, Sora did not die. No, he was brought back from the darkness - but a piece of him was broken off and sent spinning off to a faraway world. That piece woke up as a pale boy with blond hair and blue eyes, and he was told his name was Roxas.
Roxas awoke into a universe where The Organization ruled supreme. A centuries old empire, it controlled nearly every known world with an iron fist, running more like a business than a dictatorship. It would guarantee the safety of the worlds under its purview in exchange for Keybladers - and hearts. Just a few hearts. And people offered them up willingly - turning their own children into Nobodies so those children could go on to advance through the Organization's ranks and improve themselves. It was a sick, broken system. But Roxas knew nothing of that. Roxas was a special Nobody, after all - he was born with no memories whatsoever. This made him a perfect blank slate - and a perfect new weapon. Being a special Nobody, he had a special power - he was the first Nobody ever known to be able to wield Keyblades. Never in the hundreds of years of the Organization's existence had a boy like Roxas ever once come along. He caused quite a furor.
But Roxas himself was not too aware of why. He just knew he had swords shaped like keys and he could use them to kill Heartless. And that was what he did for months, just following orders because there was nothing else to do. But being a blank slate didn't make him a lifeless doll - he had a will of his own, and a burgeoning personality, thanks to the influence of two people he'd come to call his friends. Naminé was the first, quiet and warm, encouraging him and making him think, spurring him to curiosity and greater questions about his existence. Her quiet kindness was like a balm after the studied harshness of nearly everyone else he'd met, and he found himself developing a lot of affection for her. Axel came second, more or less by accident - Roxas found himself inexplicably drawn to the older Nobody, despite knowing that as the Organization's number VIII, he was very dangerous. Still, he ended up forging a relationship with the older man - one he came to rely on and take comfort in. He never said it aloud, but he thought of Axel as his best friend. With him and Naminé, Roxas became content.
As content as a Nobody could be, anyway. The clockwork in his chest - a creation of the Organization, a mechanical abomination that gave Nobodies back what they had lost at the expense of countless others - let him feel and experience and become almost human, but it also gave him frustration and anger and confusion. Thanks to Naminé's gentle proddings, Roxas began to seek out more information about the questions underlying his life - sneaking into the restricted archives of Hollow Bastion, creeping off to other worlds when he was meant to be on a mission, eavesdropping on conversations he'd be beaten for overhearing. The words "Other" and "Keyblade Master" and "special" and "Somebody" kept popping up over and over, and the more Roxas heard, the more he wanted to know. The more he found out, however, the more he began to hate the Organization and what it was doing - he found the whole thing disgusting and cruel, and began to make plans to escape. To discover the truth about who he was, why he had the Keyblades, and leave behind this Organization and its demented "business practices" - to Roxas, it was like killing two birds with one stone.
Then came the dreams. The dreams of a brown-haired boy with eyes just like his, standing on a beach, staring up at the sky. Those dreams had Roxas waking up in a cold sweat -- and one night, they finally compelled him to just get out and run for his life. He didn't tell Axel or Naminé - he didn't want to risk their lives by making them complicit in his betrayal. Because that's what it was - Roxas ran far, far away, and turned traitor on the single greatest group of bastards and villains in the known universe. Being the kind of special, possibly once-in-a-lifetime Nobody that he was, Roxas and his flight caused a huge uproar in the Organization - among the higher ups, anyway. It was kept quiet, locked down - no need to let the underlings or the whole damn universe know. But Roxas was fast and desperate and clever, and evaded every search party sent for him. The clockwork kept ticking away in his chest and despite the pain over leaving his friends and the fear and the confusion/need/want inspired by his dreams, Roxas kept going.
A whole year went by this way, Roxas running, the Organization pursuing. Once, just once, Roxas thought he heard Axel calling his name, seeking him out. Yelling for him. It stopped the boy cold in his tracks, froze something deep inside him. But he ran. He just ran as fast as he could in the other direction and didn't hear that voice again for a long time. It ceased to matter around then, anyway, because Roxas's clockwork gave out. Earlier than it should have, for no reason at all - but give out it did, and Roxas was left with a dead thing in his chest and no way to feel the panic he wanted to feel. Disgusted, wanting to be angry and wanting to be devastated, Roxas decided to rip the thing out of his chest. The removal and replacement of a clockwork was normally a procedure overseen by special surgeons in the Organization - and here was Roxas, doing it in a back alley, a sharp knife and his fingers his only tools. He nearly died, that night, blacked out from the pain at least - but when he woke up, the twisted piece of machinery was in his hand and his chest was alive with burning pain and the deep gouges and cuts that would later turn into silvery pink scars, and he was alive.
His physical pains were all he could experience, now. Lacking a heart and any emotions rocked him, but he shut himself off from the old memories, numbed himself up, and kept moving. The dreams forced him on. A few more years passed this way, and Roxas learned how to be a fugitive. He'd steal from anyone and everyone, though usually he'd leave a few munny in return. Now and then he'd stop to help people, hood of his jacket up, careful never to show his face. Then he'd hear the footsteps behind him and set off running again. In this way, Roxas grew up and turned 18 and ran into the most horrible thing of all.
Of course, Roxas had figured out, by now, why he was special. Being on the run gave him access to much more information. Information like his status as the first and only Keyblade-wielding Nobody. Information like the fact that he had an Other, and this Other was named Sora, the leader of the only truly effective band of freedom fighters. Information like the Organization was full of whispers and infighting over what to do with him. But he never expected what he found, one unfortunate night. It had been an accident, portalling onto that world, a total coincidence - but the sight he saw burned itself into the backs of his eyelids and never left. A whole world mutilated, destroyed, hundreds of dead, some left as barely-alive mutated monsters. Roxas wandered through the wreckage, too numb to react, and happened on the cause - a Nobody scientist who'd been experimenting, endlessly, killing hundreds and hundreds, trying to create a single Nobody like Roxas. Just one. He did not succeed even one single time.
Roxas murdered him on the spot. And then he ran.
The investigation teams followed, of course. Word of the deaths - and their cause - got out. And The Organization erupted, splitting down the middle, with those who wanted to create more Nobody Keybladers on one side, and those who wanted to keep the status quo on the other. A civil war broke out that spread to infect just about every world. And Roxas, the cause of it all, kept seeing those bodies in his dreams and witnessing suffering from the war in his waking moments, and came to understand the pain and weight of guilt. Even without a heart, that emotion became unbearably, agonizingly clear - and it accompanied him like a shadow, always. Roxas became desperate to atone for the wrongs his existence had caused - but hurting and lost, he had no direction. None except Sora.
He'd always seen the boy in his dreams. They'd been brief at first, just glimpses, but slowly became longer, deeper, to the point where he and the other boy could talk. And the other boy would tell him about his home and his friends and his dreams, and Roxas would listen and sometimes smile and offer little in return. Murmurs about old friends, an old life. He came to understand before too long who Sora was, and the knowledge gave him just enough determination to survive. Being with Sora on that beach in his dreams was Roxas's sole source of comfort and solace. It was his one place of safety. And he sought it out with a desperation that began to border on obsession, even insanity.
But then it happened. Roxas, now 20, finally found his Somebody tucked away in a safe place, planning his next tactical move, surrounded by allies, and ready with a big, sad smile for the broken person Roxas had become. Roxas clung to Sora like a sailor adrift for days on end, barely speaking, acknowledging others only with the occasional nod or big, blank eyes. But slowly the shell of pain and guilt melted away, and Roxas almost began to smile again. He began to want to help, to be a part of this movement to bring the Organization down. He brought his Keyblades to bear and fought like a tiger for the resistance Sora led.
A year later, Axel turned up, angry and hissing and dark, and Roxas's reunion with his former friend was not a pretty thing. They oscillated between sorrow and rage, wanting to kill each other and just wanting to walk away forever, but Roxas's quiet, pained remorse and Axel's reluctant, grudging recognition thereof finally saved the two from disaster. After a long night, they rescued their friendship, and became closer than they possibly had been before. But Axel also brought bad news - Riku, Sora's old best friend, had been turned into a Nobody. Just like Roxas.
To say Roxas was devastated by the news would be understating the matter. To know that his existence had caused someone so precious to Sora to be turned into a monster -- he slipped back into quietness, into his stoic efficiency, trying to block out the guilt. But Roxas wasn't going to find reprieve yet. Because Riku's Nobody - Xurik - eventually came calling. He brought with him a ferocious battle that nearly destroyed everything and, even upon losing, a brooding presence that, even imprisoned, spread unease and doubt and worry. And even that wasn't the end. Six months after Xurik's defeat, one of Sora's informants scurried in (yes scurried - mice are quite useful!) to inform the resistance of a girl in a white dress, being used as a tool by the Organization to manipulate the new Keyblader Nobodies. Roxas knew with instant, numbing certainty who it was: Naminé, the girl he had left behind. The girl he had loved and betrayed.
By now, Roxas was breaking under the weight of his anger and guilt. Things he'd started to feel, maybe because he was close to Sora, maybe because he was that "special Nobody" -- he didn't much care. He felt them and it hurt and finally, finally, his temper flared wild and hot, blasting through the numbness. Immediately, he demanded to be allowed to go rescue Naminé - and if not allowed, he'd desert and go anyway. To his great relief, he was given permission - and, with Axel, went to infiltrate The World That Never Was and bring the girl back. Knowing the place as they both did, they got along undetected, sneaking and warping and stopping dead when anyone came near. But they found her. And Roxas took just one moment to hold her so, so tight, ignoring Axel's impatient growls to go. Finally, listening, he let her go, took her hand, and turned to run --
-- only to realize he was not where he had been. Instead he was on another world, far away, with a little Sphere popping up beside him, and Roxas nearly swallowed his tongue in surprise.
Strengths: Physically, Roxas is pretty strong. He's not that tall, for a guy, - 5'10" to Sora's nearly 6 foot - and on the thin side, but what weight he does have on his body is all muscle, and his light frame helps him move fast. One of Roxas's great advantages is his speed, and he makes expert use of it when fighting. Dual Keyblades - Oathkeeper and Oblivion - are his to call at will, and he wields them with a deadly accuracy and efficiency. He also possesses the element of Light - capable of blinding and painful attacks in the form of pillars and orbs of light, Roxas is no one to fuck around with. Years of being on the run have honed his senses and reflexes to ridiculous sharpness, making him nearly unbeatable in a direct confrontation. After all, Roxas has more health bars than GOD. Emotionally, he does carry some of Sora's strengths - like that dogged determination. What little humanity Roxas has left is also a strength - it gives him the ability to be kind, or even noble, and these good qualities let him keep friends and be an asset to the people around him.
Weaknesses: Despite those kernels of goodness, Roxas is extremely emotionally damaged. Watching hundreds die more or less in his name was enough - then finding out that his Other's best friend had been turned into a monster like him and that the girl he'd once loved had been reduced to a mere tool shook Roxas to his core. Years and years of pain - at leaving his friends, at watching the universe erupt in a war he blamed himself for, at having everything precious to him damaged or taken away - have very nearly broken him. Though seemingly stable on the outside, Roxas is incredibly emotionally fragile, and if one is capable of pushing the right buttons, they could send him careening wildly over the edge. Once angry, Roxas becomes impulsive and irrational, letting his rage blind him, and becomes extremely prone to stupid mistakes - once openly angered, Roxas is easy to defeat, even in spite of his prowess in battle. Also, he's not an infallible fighter - a ranged opponent or one who knew him very well could still break his guard.
First Person Sample: .... [very quietly, voice blank with shock] This is not the right place. I was .. I need to save her, not, I can't be here right now, wherever this is...
[He's just. Staring. At the beach, not minding the storm, eyes so fucking wide as he stares around. He's visibly stunned.]
I don't understand. This shouldn't be possible. And Axel, shit, he--
[finally he manages to recover himself a little, glancing at the Sphere with sudden sharp curiosity] ... why does this thing look familiar? What the hell is going on? I don't--
..... I have to find out what's going on here. Now. I have to get back. If something happens to Naminé and it's my fault again ... [runs vicious hand through his hair, grimacing] If anyone can hear or see me, you need to tell me how I can get out of here now.
Third Person Sample: This was eerie. This was extremely eerie. The little Sphere, the strange orange jumpsuit, it felt like some vague dream or a name on the tip of his tongue, familiar yet far away... what was this place? Something, something ... it was right there, but somehow...
Roxas shook his head out for at least the third time, raking a hand through his hair again. It was a hell of a shock to go from such a tense rescue mission to .. being on some beach on some world. No portal had shown up, either ... it shouldn't have been possible. Roxas's brow knit tight as he stared around, trying hard to make sense of what wasn't logically possible, and his whole body stayed tense. Ready. Bizarre as it was, it could still be a trap.
And Naminé .. he had to get back to her. All his years of struggling and pain had culminated in that moment - in finding her and realizing that maybe, just maybe, he could make it all up to her. He even had a sliver of hope that he could win her forgiveness for what he'd done. It had driven him with a passion and a desperation he'd never felt, ever. And for that brief moment, he'd gotten to hold her in his arms ... but now, suddenly, he ended up here?! The only outer sign of his frustration was his eyes narrowing to slits, but inside, Roxas wanted to scream.
Goddamn. This really was bad. Roxas hated feeling so ill at ease; not being in control of a situation meant not knowing how it'd turn out, and that kind of vulnerability wasn't something he tolerated much these days. Not to mention that now Axel was at risk, and somehow, the two people most precious to Roxas had been put in danger all over again, because of him. The frustration over having come so close to a goal he'd been working towards for nearly eight years wasn't helping.
Abruptly his expression settled into a blank, stony look. He took a deep breath in and slowly let it out, waiting until he was sure he had a grip on his suddenly roiling non-emotions. Now was not the time to be pacing and worrying and tearing his hair out. He needed to plan. And figure out what the hell was happening. Gather info, look for ways out ... a goal. Yeah ... that would get him through. Anything to keep the crackle of panic under his skin at bay.