I'm Alone Again

[seasaltkeys]

Who: Roxas (seasaltkeys ) and anyone else.
What: Dealing with loss in constructive ways. Maybe.
Where: Empty lot in Twilight Town where Roxas is trying to construct his skatepark
When: Daytime
Warnings: Nothing I can think of other than feels with a side of melodrama?

Roxas had never taken well to losing things.

Whether it was an item or a person or anything really, Roxas took the loss very hard. He couldn't really say why. Maybe, it was because, in his mind at least, he'd had too much taken away from him. Loss meant change, and change meant a constant reminder of how tenuous his life was.

The dreams weren't helping.

While he'd managed a bit of sleep, thanks to Carolina's cat and the dreams not being nightmares, he still wound up with a lot to think about. Which, admittedly, was not something he wanted to do.

Instead, he was determined to work on his skatepark. If he could at least build a ramp, that would be some level of progress. Plus whacking the nail with the hammer was somewhat satisfying. He could focus on the banging and the clattering and not on his thoughts.

It didn't really occur to him that the amount of noise he was making might be a distraction to others.

Comments

[skysmirror]

So this was what being left behind felt like.

It was a new experience for Xion. In her experience, she'd been the one to leave her friends (for their own good; for everyone's good). Being on the other end...well, she was starting to see why Roxas and Axel had always come looking for her. Back then.

Lea wasn't the first of the others here to wake up, nor the first to do so that she'd been friendly with. But it was different, she was finding, when the one to vanish was one of your best friends.

At least the dreams weren't Nightmares. Still, as with Roxas, the whole situation had given her a lot of food for thought.

Not that it was easy to think with the noise coming from the area of the planned skate park. Well, she'd been heading there with some wood for him, anyway. Pooh was carrying wood, too, and Lightning had some tied to her back. They both looked very proud of themselves for helping.

[seasaltkeys]

Roxas was working very determinedly on a ramp, trying to build a base that would be able to support his weight if he jumped off of it or landed on it. Unfortunately, he wasn't really sure how to be sure it would work without testing it himself. And if it broke, he'd be right back at the beginning, only with some wasted wood.

He sighed and say back for a bit. There had to be a way to do this.

Bouncer, in the meantime, had spotted Xion and bounded up to her, wagging his tail.

[skysmirror]

Building things did seem to be a lot trickier that they'd thought at first. Funny how you could build something that looked like it would work but then broke when put to the test. There had to be a better way...Oh, well, they'd figure something out.

Xion smiled at Bouncer's greeting and knelt down to pet him, setting her wood aside for the moment. "Hi, boy. Sorry Barkley isn't here right now." Maybe she could let Lightning rest and bring out Barkley for Bouncer to play with while she and Roxas worked.

Spirit properly greeted, it was time to say hello to his Person. "Hi, Roxas. We brought some more wood."

[seasaltkeys]

"Hey," Roxas replied, looking up at Xion before back to the ramp. "Thanks, you can put it over there."

He gestured vaguely to the piles that were steadily forming. The more wood they had the better, especially if they were going to be breaking it with test trials.

[skysmirror]

"No problem." Xion smiled and went to put her wood down with the rest that had been gathered. Pooh and Lightning followed. Once the wood was safely stored, Xion dismissed Lightning and summoned Barkley. There, now he and Bouncer could play.

Xion herself went to sit by Roxas. "How's it coming along?"

[guerriera]

MEOW.

A warm lump of purring fruit-scented cat made impact with Roxas' back, shifting immediately to crouch over his shoulder as he hammered away. Lela wasn't put off at all by the hammering, either, instead mewfing and pointing a paw curiously. What's this what's this?

[seasaltkeys]

The impact catches Roxas off guard and he stops for a moment before looking around to see what hit him. Bouncer and Flipper are supposed to be watching for nightmares after all.

Then he hears the purrs and relaxes a bit.

"Where'd you come from?" he asks instead, giving the cat a little scratch before going back to work.

[guerriera]

I live here! meowed the cat, forgetting that People didn't necessarily understand Spirit-speak. She shifted so that she was just a light weight draped over his shoulder, finding the boy quite comfortable. She'd been happy to help with the Sleeping, approved as it was by her Person. Her Person wasn't sleeping again, however, which meant Tobin was keeping an eye on her.

Her Person was also not very far away, hence why Lela was out and about 'by herself'. A paw stretched towards the hammer and the wood he was attacking. Maow? Whatdo, Roxas?

[seasaltkeys]

Roxas looked between the cat and the hammer he was still holding, trying to make sense of what Lela wanted? What would a cat want with tools. He held it up to her none the less.

"I'm trying to build a ramp...did you want this?"

[guerriera]

"A ramp for what?"

Given that Lela was staring directly at Roxas when he had asked his question, and her fuzzy lips hadn't moved at all, she wasn't the source of the question. That was the woman standing behind them both, dressed not in armor but in a tanktop and sweatpants, both black with a single strip of cyan down one side. Red hair was tousled, darkened by sweat from her run, but Carolina didn't appear winded at all.

She looked from Roxas to the in-progress ramp, then lifted an eyebrow to follow through on her query. Lela merely purred more loudly.

[statisticallyterrible]

Roxas' banging about certainly had lead to distraction, an unwanted and unneeded one. Should he have a trained ear, he'd perhaps note the erratic beat of hammering now gained an accompaniment--the clacking of hooves over the streets.

Kri-Kri did not like distractions. Or noise. Or much of anything that did not directly concern him. All this racket only lead to the conclusion that someone thought they were louder, and thusly more important, than he.

The large goat picked his way over the wood and supplies strewn around Roxas (in ancient times equine lords used human slaves to build elaborate, hay-strewn castles), eventually huffing his irritation directly down the moping Nobody's neck.

[seasaltkeys]

Roxas jumped when he felt the breath, hammer falling from his hands as he scooted forward, keyblade appearing in his hand out of panic. Although, the logical side of his brain was telling him that if it was a nightmare, it would have attacked by now.

Instead, the goat would have to deal with a Meow Wow, making a noise that Roxas had to assume was an attempt at a growl, because it was the least intimidating noise Roxas had heard.

He stared, trying to figure out what to do. "Sorry?" he tried.

[statisticallyterrible]

Kri-kri glared down at the Meow Wow, and gave a warbling bleat. Noise violations are a criminal offense punishable by having your hair chewed on. Accomplices are subject to being sat upon.

Still, it was a bit harder to dispense justice and order when the culprit had a giant key weapon in hand. Kri-kri tossed his mane and kicked at a board of wood. You need to stop all this racket, right now, or Officer Yog will be forced to take measures..

[seasaltkeys]

There's a few wuffs, a little less braver than the attempted growl, to suggest that hammers are loud and it's not his person's fault. Bouncer has never really stared down a cyber yog before, and since this spirit is a good spirit, he probably can't get away with a meow wounce. Roxas in the meantime, misses the Cyber Yog's meaning entirely.

"Hey, watch it! Don't break the wood!"

[statisticallyterrible]

Well, perhaps Bouncer's person ought to try a quieter pastime, like featherdusting, or the noble sport of pillow toss. He spited Roxas' warning by nudging the boards some more. You can't tell him what to do, you're not his pers--

A click of the fingers caught Kri-Kri's attention, and he looked back to Chell approaching from the street corner, face set stern. He bleated his frustration at her, but she snapped again, and he stepped back from the workspace.

Chell's scowl softened as she approached, sending Roxas an apologetic look and leaning down to check what damage her nuisance of a spirit caused.

[fatemeter]

At least one passerby that day didn't seem to mind the distraction much. Though the kind of manual work she could hear from several streets away had never been Naoto's forte, that didn't mean she couldn't be curious - or fascinated, even, once she was close enough to get a decent view of whatever was taking shape underneath it. Some kind of base, she thought - for what? At first, it was a little early to tell...

But the Komory Bat perched on top of her cap was less content to quietly stand by at the edge of the empty lot as its sensitive ears were assaulted and wait for some more clues to take shape. Presently, with an ear-splitting screech that cut through even the noise of the hammering, it launched itself away from Naoto's head and barrelled through the still-ringing air straight towards the offending tool.

[seasaltkeys]

Roxas had raised the hammer to give the nail one last whack before calling the job done, for the most part, when he saw the bat flying at him.

He scrambled back and Flipper, who was paying attention for once, threw his ball at the bat.

[fatemeter]

If the bat even saw that ball coming, it was too late to do much more than veer a little off to the side - definitely not far enough to spare it the soft whump a second later, sending it corkscrewing out of the air like a deflated balloon.

Still, winded as it was, it wasn't half as ruffled as Naoto, who hurried after it with one hand on her hat and up to the wooden frame just in time for her Spirit to flop down on the ground in front of her. "E-Excuse us!" she squeaked.

[seasaltkeys]

"Flipper!" Roxas yelled, but it was too late. A sudden komory bat might have been a surprise but it wasn't that big of one.

He glared at the R&R Seal, who shrugged and nonchalantly went back to looking out for nightmares, before sighing and pulling out a potion for the bat.

"Sorry. He's...a little protective."

[fatemeter]

Naoto allowed herself a small sigh before pulling herself together. Even if there was already no reclaiming her dignity after that display, which seemed likely to her, that was no reason not to try and be dignified about that.

"No, I apologise. It's only natural that an animal might perceive a noise like that somewhat differently to a human... I should have realised."

The proffered potion caught her eye, but she quickly shook her head. "He's certainly exaggerating, so please don't go out of your way."

Ignoring the affronted glance that the bat had just attempted to shoot at her, she crouched down to scoop it up and away from the wooden frame.

[battleborndr]

A bit of eavesdropping on the communicators and a stroll away from his two female companions was how he ended up in Twilight Town. They'd never let him live it down if they find out he ended up at another one of these "sleeping worlds" without them, but, ah, he was here now, right? He may as well poke his head around a bit before heading back to Traverse Town. Surely they won't come calling anytime soon, wondering where he is.

Truth was, he hadn't been sleeping well. He hadn't been adapting to the concept of sleeping more in the first place, but to add the dreams he'd been having on top of it? No. Just... no. He thought he'd come to some loose terms with his Time Lord counterpart, but his dreams suggested otherwise.

It was frustrating, and churned up the bitterness that he had tried to keep stuffed down in a corner of his mind.

The noise, unsurprisingly, was what drew the Doctor to the skatepark. Harkness the Hebby Repp wailed at the hammering, none too happy, which twisted at the Doctor's nerves even more so. He really needed to get his hands on those sweets that he'd seen people talking about.

"Quite the project you've got going here," the Doctor said as way of introducing his presence, raising his voice loud enough that it may reach over the sounds. He honestly tried for cheerful, even though he was feeling anything but.

[seasaltkeys]

It took Roxas a moment to realize someone was talking to him, and he put down his hammer. He'd moved on from the ramp and was now sort of working on the frame for the halfpipe. Hammering things into triangles was a little more difficult than he'd thought it would be.

He looked at the Doctor, and then at the variety of half-started projects he had in the lot, and the one completed ramp.

"Yeah," Roxas said with a shrug. He might still be moping, but he could take pride in it. "It's gonna be a skatepark, once it's done."

[battleborndr]

"Skatepark, huh?"

He can't skate, though maybe it'd be fun to learn. He liked the thought of trying new things, and how hard could it be, anyway? He couldn't possibly die from skateboarding, right? That'd be a terrible way to waste his one lifetime. Rose would be so disappointed in him.

"I know someone that might get a kick out of that." Jenny. He could definitely see Jenny trying it out. He grinned at the thought.

[seasaltkeys]

"Cool," Roxas replied, almost excited by the prospect of someone else using the park. "It'll be open for everyone once it's done, but that might not be for a while."

He'd at least like a decent ramp, or a rail or something to do jumps off of.

[battleborndr]

He should offer to help, but if he was honest with himself, he just didn't really want to. There were other things to be doing, like exploring! And finding out how to get out of all this. How anyone thought this was a good time to build a skatepark... Unless the kid had been one of the people who have been in this mess for months.

That might warrant a break.

"How long have you been in this... world of dreams?"