Xion (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
attheclocktower) wrote2014-06-30 12:31 am
attheclocktower) wrote2014-06-30 12:31 am
Entry tags:
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
forestcovered post-Animus app
( PLAYER INFORMATION )
Name: Gorse
Contact: ladygorse@gmail.com,![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
gorsecloud gorsecloud
Are you over 17?: Yep
Characters in Forest Covered: n/a
( CHARACTER INFORMATION )
Name/Work Name: Xion/"Asha"
Canon: Kingdom Hearts
Canon Point: Originally from the end of Day 300 of 358/2 Days, Animus canonpoint shortly after the Ex Machina event (where they retake the Machine Room from Riki) and her making her decision to return home
AU/CRAU: Y, CRAU fromtowerofanimus
Age: 16/17 physically (via Tower aging, her real body back on her home world is 14), 3 actually
History: Bless the day I decided to make this
Note that Xion went to the Tower of Animus on Day 300, which is around when Axel knocked her out and brought her back to the Organization the first time.
Personality:
One of the biggest aspects of Xion's personality is her struggles - particularly with her sense of identity and her sense of worth. Canonically, at her original pull point, Xion is in the midst of a slow loss of self-identity, particularly coming to believe that she is less of her own person and much more a part of Sora. And she's already in the midst of a grand loss of self-worth, particularly after learning that she is a replica, who has caused so many problems just by existing. As a part of this, Xion struggles with a high tendency to blame herself for certain actions and events, particularly ones she has some direct involvement with.
Xion has a very all-or-nothing way of dealing with pressure; when faced with it, her resolve either hardens like steel or crumples entirely. An example of the former would be when faced with all of the different obstacles and pressures against returning to Sora. During all this time, even when facing her own friends, her resolve never wavers - not that we can see. On the other hand, when faced with Saix's criticisms of her performance and her existence, she breaks away and flees the situation, unable to withstand his insults. The difference that determines which of the two reactions is difficult, but generally, when the cause is one she considers worthwhile, she's much more likely to face any pressure associated with dignity. Especially when her friends are involved.
To Xion, the most important things are her friends (and later her family). They were all she had to live for the longest time, and later, they're what she was willing to give up everything for, rather that let herself live to be the one to destroy them. They are an utterly inextricable part of her life - she's spent most of her days with them, and they've helped her out of many a tight spot and through many a difficult time. Particularly with Roxas and Axel, she admits outright in her personal journal that she loves them - a very bold claim after being raised in an environment where she's constantly told she cannot feel (even if her being a Nobody is a lie).
Under more normal circumstances, Xion can be curious and inquisitive. In the end, she's still very young, experience-wise. Her knowledge base is patchy at best - it's shown once in canon that she knew what a candelabra was, and yet didn't understand the concept of love without explanation. She's willing to ask questions, particularly with people she trusts.
However, when it comes to people, particularly ones she doesn't know, she's much more cagey. She's less shy and skittish than she could be, owing to her not being as married to Organization doctrine as she used to be, but she's definitely no socialite. Even for those she does meet and speak to, it can be difficult to get her to open up. With her deepest secrets, particularly her origins, what she is, and what she was made for, she plays her cards very close to her chest, and it can take a great deal of time before she'll willingly show her hand.
It doesn't help that when Xion is faced with a very upsetting or stressful personal events or revelations, Xion's instinct is to withdraw. Canon shows how, upon being confronted with her failures by Saix, her defeat at the hands of Riku, and the slow emergence of Sora's memories, Xion abandons her friends at the clock tower and stops spending time with them and speaking with them. Similarly, she does not discuss how her Keyblade has stopped working for her until pressed. She does not wish to burden her friends with her problems, and doesn't even like talking about them until she can understand and figure them herself - an extremely difficult task, given her own inexperience. However, Xion is very bad at hiding her emotions, so even to those who don't know her well, should they find her, it will likely be all too clear that something is bothering her.
Xion can be very sentimental - she's the one who starts the tradition of leaving Roxas a gift on his pillow (a shell) every day while he's asleep. She also shows a fondness for collecting shells, and always keeps a Thalassa shell with her (until Roxas took it). She holds her memories in very high regard - almost as high as her friends. They're all that she really has that is "her own," and they're all that would've been left when she would've returned to Sora.
At least, that's how she started. As of her time in Animus, some things have shifted.
Unfortunately, as is probably normal for a horror game, Xion has become incredibly desensitized to a lot of awful things, thanks to all the bad things that have happened to her and her friends such as being brainwashed and kidnapped and physically tortured multiple times. This is such to the point that when Cid Highwind (FFVII) told her that being a Turk would paint a target on her back if Hojo ever came to the Tower, her reply was essentially "Okay but Jason is worse." Xion is basically used to the zombie apocalypse adage: "There is no safe, only safer." Monster attacks are seen as normal. Experiments and psychotic games are unfortunate but a thing that must be endured. She's just used to not living in a safe/calm place anymore.
Conversely, as also predictable for a horror game, Xion has developed certain negative tendencies and phobias after traumatic incidents, particularly deaths. Thanks to being crushed by her costume in the Halloween event, being trapped in a small crystal and tortured by Ganondorf, and later being buried alive, Xion now has a tendency to get rather uncomfortable in very small enclosed spaces, especially if the small places cause any difficulty in breathing. She has a slight discomfort of flames (due to a Tower death), and of heights (due to Vanitas leaving her dangling off the Tower once), and low-level red lights. One of her strongest reactions though comes from if she is restrained, particularly her arms, owing to an encounter with Jason where he grabbed her arms to restrain her, then strapped her down on a morgue table, killed her close friend in front of her, and then proceeded to vivisect her.
She's lived long enough and experienced enough for a lot of her inexperience and naivety to have worn off. It does still show itself occasionally, however, not to mention the Tower has never really given her much experience in what having a normal life - and many aspects of it - is like. Things like a decent selection of food, getting decent clothing without making it, and a bed you don't have to sleep in are foreign concepts to her. Additionally, she's still rather slow on the uptake when it comes to romantic matters. She has developed a crush or two, but didn't realize what it was until much later, after the subject of them had already left the Tower.
Several of her beliefs and feelings about certain facts have shifted - some very dramatically. For instance, she no longer cares nearly as much about being a replica. However, this change is not the result of gaining the belief that she is just as much a person as anyone else - at least not solely. She has begun to develop that idea lately, aided by her friends; however, the bigger factor has always been the fact that in the Tower, there were always so much bigger things to worry about then the circumstances of one's birth.
A similar shift is an increase in her self-confidence, which shows itself more in how it doesn't. This is to say, Xion's less likely to be down on herself and blame herself than she used to. Additionally, she's more likely to take on tasks and jobs, seeing them as something that needs to be done, and herself as someone who can.
On the other hand, she now has a fear of abandonment, owing to all the friends who have come and gone in the Tower. Most particularly in the period of February to July of 2013, almost all of Xion's parental figures vanished from the Tower one by one. In some cases, Xion would be told to go to someone else who would help her in the place of the person who'd vanished, but only for that person too to vanish shortly thereafter. She has consequently grown wary of such people, to the point of acting distant and outright turning down Diarmuid's help when he offered (at the behest of one of her previous guardians).
In a way, Xion's development in Animus has reflected the same development as canon for her - going from spectator to driver of her own fate. July of 2013 was a huge turning point for her. She - and the Tower at large - found out several pieces of Dax's research, which made her realize that several people she knew were in danger, including Reno. She also learned that the Tower residents were being conditioned in learned helplessness. At that point, she resolved to not fall prey to it, and for a little while became almost reckless in her attempts to fight the admins, culminating in the end of July infiltration of the admin levels and her personal encounter with Jason afterwards.
However, the most dramatic shift has been her attitude towards her future. For the longest time she struggled with the decision about what to do about her life back home. She knew -from talking to others - that her future was not set in stone. In addition to that, she formed strong bonds, friends and family, in the Tower. She has constantly fallen back and forth between wanting to stay with them, and knowing that she couldn't abandon everyone back home, should her worlds be restored. However, for the longest time, she was afraid of acting on the possibility of changing the future, for fear of making things worse. For a while, she even considered not going home at all. And yet, when she faced down Riki's attempts to retake the machine room in the Ex Machina event, she said something very important - that they would never stop fighting for a future they could believe in. It was after this that she came to a realization - that why couldn't that same idea apply back home as well? And so, Xion came to the conclusion that she could fight for a future that she wanted - one where Sora woke up, but not at the expense of her and Roxas.
Debt: In canon, Xion makes the choice to return to Sora, thus putting the needs of her friends and the world before her own. Because of her time spent at the Tower, she has instead refuted that decision, and instead opted to fight for a third option where she can survive and everything will work out. This decision can and will doubtlessly create a lot of problems for a lot of people - a fairly big debt to be paid off (even though we don't know if the worlds will be restored yet since endgame is still in progress, Xion has full faith they will be, and thus this would still feel responsible. If this does not work as a debt, just let me know and I can find another).
Additionally, she'll rack up some fees for being given back her real body and for any memory absorption disabling that is done (assuming that is okay? I asked on the FAQ and never got an answer).
Xion will likely request a wish - that her memory absorption ability be disabled permanently, even after she returns home.
Suitability: Some people would think that the hell she went through in Animus would entitle her to a good life back home, to be able to make the decision she makes and get all the support she needs, a metaphorical good turn for all the bad she's put up with. She wouldn't agree with them; at least, not entirely. She might agree that it gives her the right to make a choice for her own sake, rather than just the world's, but she would disagree that it should exempt her from the consequences of her actions. Because of this, her still-present issues with guilt and self-blame, and the nature of what her debt is, Xion will be accepting of the situation, and will likely even be a bit relieved that the debt and paying it off will be so straightforward.
Given her pre-endgame status, she will likely need to be tricked a bit into coming - mainly along the lines of making her believe that the work could be deferred until after everything has been resolved. She will be a bit upset at first, and a bit antsy about how things will go/be going back in the Tower, but so long as she's sure/learns that time is essentially frozen until she goes back, she will acquiesce without too much difficulty.
Previous Game Info: Oh boy this is going to be long.
Tower of Animus
A virus has been sweeping through the universes, systematically destroying all life on them - every animal, plant, even down to the microbial level. From each universe that is destroyed, one soul is saved and pulled to the Tower of Animus, where that soul is placed in a film-covered wireframe, then is made through advanced glamour technology to make them look like their original selves.
The characters then wake up in their assigned beds, unaware of what all has happened, and receive a note telling them that their world was destroyed and they were saved. However, the Tower is not a happy place. There are dangerous, twisted monsters everywhere - especially at night - the floors almost seem like they might have been designed by sadists, and the administrators are more often than not a piece of work themselves. Zo and Dax seem to be on the resident's side (while Dax was alive at least), but Riki is more ambivalent (ultimately caring more about the Tower than anything else), and Ruana and Jason enjoy subjecting the residents to cruel games and experiments for their own amusement (while Jason was alive at least), and have no interest in fixing the residents' worlds or sending them home.
Over time, the characters have come to learn more and more about the Tower itself, how it used to be used for (very unethical) research into abilities the natives possessed called psionics, and how Ruana is the sole survivor of that research, and, as it seems, the world as a whole. They learned about their bodies being nothing but wireframes, of the glamour, and began to search for more information about the virus that destroyed the worlds and how they might fix them. Eventually they found enough information to reveal to Zo that Ruana was likely the cause of the virus, and he defected fully to the residents side.
This culminated with a confrontation, right as the Tower's power went out, with Riki and Ruana on one side, and the residents, Zo, and several retrieval units who had been modified to actually develop personalities and sentience on the other. Riki died in the earlier rounds of the struggle, and at that point, Ruana turned on the former residents. With a little help from Zo, the characters regrouped and half split off to fight Ruana themselves, while the others stayed behind to figure out how to save their worlds. It was those characters who learned the full truth.
They learned that Ruana was the subject of experiments to try to sever the soul from the body safely, and thus achieve immortality. The experiment succeeded, but at the cost of every living thing on the planet becoming absorbed into her. That Ruana had tried to seek death, and failed due to her invulnerability. How she eventually concocted a plan to instead recreate the experiment that created her on numerous other universes that she had seen through her original psionic abilities of astral projection, and to bring those survivors to her own so she wouldn't be lonely. And they learned that Zo's abilities could reverse the process, so long as they returned to their own worlds.
At that point, those fighting Ruana seemed to be gaining the upper hand, and realizing this, she attempted to kill everyone rather than lose them. Instead, Zo managed to send everyone where they wished to go (home or otherwise), before sacrificing himself to (hopefully) put Ruana to rest, finally.
And then, at some point after returning home, characters all discovered a door. It turned out that Zo had managed to save a small remnant of the Tower. Characters could build what they liked there, and what was more, it would allow all who had been there to visit each other's worlds at will. (Basically this was a post-game open musebox)
Xion's history/development:
Xion's story in Animus can, at its root, be almost described as an extension of her canonical story arc, albeit an unusual one.
When she arrived at the Tower, she was quickly faced with some harsh realities about her situation, both in the Tower and back home. She came from during the period that she'd been given time, trying to decide what path she would take on whether to return to Sora or not. However because Roxas was from the future, he didn't remember her, and for that reason, Riku (who had already been in the Tower for at least a month) told her about some of the future she faced and more importantly, the decision that she made in his timeline and its result. This information affected her thinking for most of the rest of the game.
Her introduction to the harshness of the Tower was, initially, subtle. The Tower's power was shaky during the February of 2012, with temperatures very low. Xion compensated by helping to set up a campfire, and thus got to meet many of her castmates in the Tower at the time, including Sora. However, her first true introduction to the Tower's true nature was being on the outside of the Hitori Kakurenbo event, watching both Riku and Naminé die horribly across the network. She, Sora, and AU Riku tried to break in to the event to help them, but were forced to retreat due to monster attack, with both her and Sora injured.
After that, Xion kept her head down and as best out of trouble as she could, making some friends along the way. However not all trouble was easily avoidable, and Xion had several negative run-ins with a boy from her worlds (though long before her time), named Vanitas. This involved Vanitas kidnapping her and using her as bait for a confrontation with several others from her world. While Xion herself had not been the primary target, many of her closer friends - particularly Axel and Reno - were not convinced she was safe. In the aftermath (as well as after some continued encounters with Vanitas), they did their best to help keep her safe and teach her how to fend for herself in ways Vanitas wouldn't expect (since Xion's self-teaching with her Keyblade didn't even hold a candle to what Xehanort had taught Vanitas).
Around mid-May or so, Xion was one of a few people selected by Gandalf to try to form an organization centered around the idea of learning as much as possible about the Tower and what was really going on. Which Xion was reluctant, she did her best to help. It was the first time she would take any sort of leadership role in the Tower, though the group itself did not make it very far before falling apart, and it would take time before Xion would reprise this sort of role in any shape or form.
Unfortunately, a huge wrench was thrown in all of Xion's plans when Axel departed unexpectedly. Xion was devastated. However, before departing, Axel had made Reno promise to take care of Xion if anything ever happened to him. In the course of keeping that promise, Reno ended up making Xion a Turk and basically accepting her as family, something Xion had never really had before.
That summer was full of ups and downs, things like a blind date party, a giant whale crashing into the Tower, and Xion (unknowingly) starting to absorb energy from her AU self and later Sora. However, at the end of that summer, Xion ended up falling under an experiment that Master Xehanort was performing on the Tower at large, casting everyone into an enchanted sleep and then gathering information from their dreams. However, during this sleep, Sora and Reno were able to dive into one of her dreams, which was taking the form of replaying a memory from her past. Consequently, Sora was able to find out what she was to him, and Reno learned some of the implications of the future Xion faced. In the aftermath she talked to them both, and Sora made it clear to her that he didn't want her to disappear for his sake, and told her to find another way to wake him up. Unfortunately, Xion was skeptical that such a way existed.
Unbeknownst to Xion, during this period, Reno had been playing the role of spy on Ganondorf for Zelda and the group Xion herself had helped found. However, Ganondorf suspected his role, and with Xion's closeness to Reno becoming more readily apparent, Ganondorf took the opportunity and had her kidnapped. After the Evil Alliance meeting held the next day, Ganondorf produced her and began to torture her, to see if Reno would break to protect her. He did, but it was only through the intervention of Riku that Xion was able to escape.
During this period, Xion experienced her first Tower Death, which among other things reset the amount of memories she'd absorbed from her AU self and Sora. Fearing a reprise, Xion ended up approaching one of the administrators - Dax - and asked him to remove it. He agreed to do so easily, though at the time Xion didn't know that he was not actually disabling her powers (as her powers were already suppressed), but rather just an aspect of the glamour. Still, Xion was relieved to not have to worry about it for a while.
Near the end of December and into January, Xion received some good news - that Reno and Elena were getting married. Overall Xion was excited and overjoyed at this development, particularly when she got to play the role of flower girl. However, they did run into some unexpected bumps along the way, including the attention of none other than Ruana herself (which led to an assassination attempt at the wedding itself). Still, aside from the hiccups Xion was delighted to be a part of it, and happy for her two mentor figures.
February, however, turned out to be one of the most turbulent months that Xion had ever spent in the Tower. Unexpectedly, several people from a city called Hinoto-Ri (crossover event withdestinystrings) arrived in the Tower, including several people from their worlds and some who recognized Xion. However, Xion soon learned that the version of herself in Hinoto-Ri actually had managed to escape the fate she'd come to accept: that she would disappear and be forgotten in order to wake Sora up. Perhaps surprisingly, this actually upset her greatly - she'd taken her future for granted, and the idea that it wasn't opened up new and terrifying possibilities; hope about her future was to Xion like a beam of sunlight is to a person trapped in darkness for far too long - painful in its suddenness and intensity, to the point where she couldn't handle it. It would take a long time before she could truly accept the possibilities this information offered her.
However that was not all February had to offer. Halfway through the month, amid several sadistic "games" Ruana was playing with her residents, Reno disappeared, devastating Xion. And finally at the end of the month, several residents were able to infiltrate some of the administrative levels and discovered that when residents of the tower "died" their soul was filtered out of their bodies and placed into new ones. However this information came only with the aid of one of the admins, Dax, and when his treachery was exposed, he attempted to stage a coup against Ruana, and was killed in the attempt. All of these events were enough to completely shake the status quo for the Tower residents, and only forewarned of more upheavals to come.
Unfortunately, shortly afterwards, several important friends of Xion's left, including Elena. With both of her primary mentor figures gone, Xion clung to Shion more tightly than ever. However at the same time, she came to see that she couldn't count on them to protect her or help her anymore, and began to try to be more self-reliant.
This proactive streak came at a very opportune time, as a few residents of the Tower, including Zelda, had received a postmortem gift from Dax, one that would theoretically help them learn key information about the Tower itself. By taking several computer chips and placing them on every floor of the Tower, they would reveal something come the beginning of the next month - June, which happened to be a month that Ruana was in charge. The plan was pulled off successfully, and come June, the chips brought down not only the entire power supply for the Tower, but also the glamour system. What the residents had seen during their infiltration in February was only the tip of the iceberg - virtually everything they could see, including their own bodies, was in fact an illusion created by nanofilm and advanced tower technology. While some were deeply upset, Xion managed to take the information in stride - it wasn't the first time she learned that huge portions of what she believed about herself were in fact a lie.
However, there was more to it than just the glamour - by forcibly draining the power core, the Tower now only had enough power left for one year, after which (should they fail to figure out a solution before then) the residents would either die or be left to wander their abandoned worlds for all eternity. All of this combined information inspired some rebelliousness in Tower residents. Xion was partially among them - she ended up leading a group of characters who were attempting to hack the computers to get more information about the Tower, after the original leader of the group unexpectedly left the Tower. The group was caught and punished, and Xion and the other hackers in the group were labeled a threat by the administrators, who set a retrieval unit to follow them around. Despite this, Xion was still somewhat reluctant to fully, openly fight the Tower administrators. Gathering information was one thing, outright rebellion was another.
However, in the middle of July, resentment among the residents exploded, and a boycott of the collar checkups was proposed. Xion protested, having experienced a month of no collar checkups before. However, the boycott participants were proven to be correct when the boycott allowed them to get their hands on several tubs of collar fluid, and later, when Jason himself was shown briefly on the network which included two very important words for Xion - learned helplessness. When she found out what the concept actually was, she was deeply upset, partially because she realized how very subject to it she had been, and not just regarding the collar checkup. She even wondered how the idea of learned helplessness applied to her mindset towards her own future - was she too scared of possible negative consequences to take a chance for her own freedom? After talking with several friends, Xion resolved to not be subject to learned helplessness any more, and committed herself wholly to fighting the Tower admins who sought to keep them under control, almost to the point of recklessness.
An excellent opportunity for this sprang up as a result of that very boycott - in order to properly study the collar fluid they found, which would help them gain back their real powers, the residents needed real tools (as opposed to film tools) from the administrative levels. Xion joined a group of her friends in literally jumping down an elevator shaft to try to get to Jason's floor and retrieve lab equipment from there. However this plan backfired when they attracted the attention of none other than Jason himself. Shenanigans ensued and Xion's group split up. Xion herself was chased and eventually captured (and tortured as punishment) by Jason, though not before she and Yu Narukami saw Jason's true form underneath the glamour, as well as some of his full abilities. Despite suffering severe emotional fallout and trauma from the incident, rather than being cowed by it, the incident instead fueled Xion even further to fight against the Tower admins (though she still struggled emotionally when facing Jason himself).
The aftermath of the infiltration kept many of the residents busy, Xion included. However something happened that ended up turning her emotional outlook around significantly - Zo was able to bring back Reno and Elena to the Tower. She was immensely relieved to have them back, to the point that when they were trapped together in a room with several others during the Quarantine event, Xion was willing to fight some of the other residents in order to help Reno get some of the limited supplies they might need. She also gave him one of her precious shells, the ones Roxas gave her.
Once they were revived after the Quarantine, Reno and Xion were able to speak to each other about what happened. Xion affirmed that she cared about him so much, and admitted to him that she didn't want to go back to her own world, that she felt that she wouldn't be able to escape her future if she did so. Rather than being harsh as she feared, Reno accepted her decision easily. More than that, he and Elena officially adopted her and Shion - or at least as officially as such things could get in the Tower. Xion was relieved and overjoyed, but a small part of her still wondered in the back of her mind if she was making the right choice.
That December, confrontations between the residents and the administrators rapidly came to a head when several retrieval units (who had been modified by Dax prior to his death and had thus gained sentience, recognizable from their droned counterparts by their chipped collars) led by a unit named R-037, or Aria, revealed themselves and cut Jason off from the residential levels of the Tower to build a secret floor the chipped units and residents could use as a sort of base. Jason broke through and attempted to attack the chipped units before they could complete their task, and several residents stepped up to stop - and possibly kill - him. While Xion was not a part of the latter charge, she did attempt to face him. However, his total lack of any kind of regard, and her group's failure to be able to do anything significant to slow him down, did little to help Xion achieve any sort of closure.
Near the end of January, there was a massive explosion - the last one of several over the previous few months. One of the admins, Riki, announced that the explosions were the fault of Jason, and that he had compromised the remaining power left to the Tower, and that the power would go out unless the residents agreed to provide some their own soul energy as a temporary power source. Fearing the loss of what could become her future home, not to mention valuable time they needed to fix things, Xion volunteered. As a side effect of the machine she was strapped to, Xion ended up - for one infinitesimal moment - seeing every single possible timeline her world could have taken. While she wasn't able to remember most of what she saw beyond vague impressions and flashes of clarity, it left her wondering once more about her future and the possibilities it could hold.
As punishment for the explosions, Ruana threw Jason into one of her games and used the residents to try to kill him. Xion once again tried to face off with the admin, and left similarly unsatisfied, even guilty, because Elena had sacrificed herself to ensure Xion and the rest of their group could escape. Jason was later killed, denying Xion further opportunities of gaining closure via facing him.
The next month, the residents of the Tower attempted to hack into Dax's personal files, to try to discover what he knew about the virus that destroyed their worlds and any other information that might help restore them. Xion was successful in finding exactly the information they were looking for. However, at the same time she also discovered that there was an AI created by Dax to protect that information, and that the AI would likely be destroyed now that it was discovered. Xion adamantly refused to let that happen, and with the help of Aria and the others involved in the hacking attempt, managed to save the AI and transfer him to the hidden floor, giving her a great feeling of personal triumph.
However, another important bit of information that the residents realized from Dax's files and analyzing them, was that Riki had been lying about the condition of the power core in the Tower, back in January, and was likely going to be using their soul energy for his own purposes. In order to stop that from happening, several residents, including Xion, went down to the machine room where Riki was working to seize control of it for the residents and chipped units. While Riki left the room easily enough at their request, as soon as he was gone he began to use his technomancy abilities to cause the room to attack them. After a long and grueling fight, they managed to pull the plugs on all the computers in the room, cutting off Riki's access to it. Xion herself pulled the final plug, shouting at Riki that they would always fight for a future they could believe in.
While the results of their successful taking of the Machine Room were exciting enough, in the aftermath, Xion realized that her statement - about fighting for a future they could believe in - could apply for more than just the Tower. It could apply back home, where she could fight for a future she could believe in there too, a future where she fulfilled Sora's request to find another way to wake him up, a future where she and her friends could all survive, just like the other self from Hinoto-Ri. And so, Xion finally came to the decision that she would return home after all, and that she would not give up fighting until she could find a way to do what was best for everyone - herself (for the first time, for real) included.
Major CR
Canon
Family (Cross-canon)
Friends (Cross-canon)
Negative (Cross-canon)
And this isn't even counting all of the acquaintances she's made, but if I included everyone she's met this app would be another 2 pages longer.
Inventory: Her Organization coat, boots, and some clothing she made personally underneath it, and a pin identifying her as a member of the Turks. Also a bracelet and pendant given to her by her adoptive parents. She's also wearing a belt tied around her waist, to which is attached a pouch. This pouch currently contains all of her most precious objects. Particularly it contains several shells - some given to her by Roxas, some from Zo, others collected from the Tower - a paper crane, a paper songbird, and some of her more incriminating and treasured correspondence.
Additionally Xion is followed by a small menagerie of creatures, particularly a Dusk named Sunny that she received as a regain, a Meow Wow named Excalibur, left to her upon Sora's departure from the Tower, and a cat named Thalassa, received from Data (littlelifeforms, one of Spot's kittens)
She also has a list of objects that belong to her but are not specifically with her, and these other items can be found here (along with some of the aforementioned items that are with her)
Abilities, Strengths, and Weaknesses: First and foremost among her abilities is the Keyblade. The Keyblade has several powers - it can manifest and disappear at the will of the wielder. It also has the power to lock and unlock any door or portal. It also has the ability to return to the wielder's hand, should they ever be disarmed. Beyond this, there is an inherent magical nature to the Keyblade itself - despite its unwieldy shape and form, it functions quite similarly to a sword, and can have very powerful cutting ability when required. It seems to draw power from the wielder's strength of heart.
She also has the full arsenal of Days spells at her disposal - Fire, Blizzard, Thunder, Aero and Cure (and each of their respective higher levels) to be specific. While Kingdom Hearts on the whole has many other spells, any other kinds of magic she'll need to be taught or learn through some outside source (some of which she has in Animus, which will be listed below).
Also, she also has the ability to summon corridors of darkness, magical passageways that can be used to travel between distant locations quickly, or even between worlds (though obviously the world-hopping aspect will not be working in game). The only downside is prolonged, frequent exposure to the Corridors of darkness can have a corrosive effect on one's heart if they are not wearing a dark coat or have a heart of pure light.
This ventures a tiny bit into the realm of headcanon, but I believe that Xion, as a replica, was "programmed" with several abilities upon her creation. Most of these are simple things that would've saved time teaching her - things like how to walk and basic language and etc. One of these abilities that's relevant in particular though is how to hack certain technological devices, most particularly computers. It's possible we see this in canon, when she hacks the Organization computer to find the files about Castle Oblivion and herself, halfway or so through the game.
Lastly, there is her memory absorption - wherein she may absorb the memories (primarily) of those who are closely connected with Sora (Generally I play this as Sora, Roxas, alternate versions of herself and possibly Ventus). It is an ability that she cannot control. As of her canonpoint it is fully on and functional, however she will be asking for it to be nullified, as I mentioned above in her debt.
From her time in the Tower, she's also learned several abilities from elsewhere in her own canon, such as other spells. Particularly, she's learned the following:
In addition, she's learned decent hand-to-hand combat from Reno, and some self-taught skills in sewing. She is and remains mostly an utter disaster at cooking, however.
So far as weaknesses go, though she is a bit better than she used to be thanks to nearly two years of (sometimes more consistent than other times) training, overall Xion is fairly lightweight and not the greatest when it comes to actual physical strength. Her defense and ability to defend herself is limited as well, restricted to simple blocking and the single barrier spell Aqua taught her, which she's still getting the hang of. Emotionally, she still has a tendency to be more closed off with people she doesn't know as well, and particularly without close friends, a likelihood of withdrawing when upset or depressed.
Additionally, as a result of being in the Tower so long and having to go so all-out to fight the administrators, Xion has less of a sense of immediate self-preservation and is more likely to be careless, particularly with actions that might only result in minor injuries. Not to mention her Xion-ish tendency (even if she cares about herself more than she used to) to put others much higher on the priority list than herself, thus resulting in her throwing herself into danger for their sake.
( SAMPLE )
Characterization Sample: Exhibit A - Shortly before the Ex Machina event, where they retake the Machine Room from Riki
Exhibit B - shortly before her canonpoint
Name: Gorse
Contact: ladygorse@gmail.com,
gorsecloud Are you over 17?: Yep
Characters in Forest Covered: n/a
( CHARACTER INFORMATION )
Name/Work Name: Xion/"Asha"
Canon: Kingdom Hearts
Canon Point: Originally from the end of Day 300 of 358/2 Days, Animus canonpoint shortly after the Ex Machina event (where they retake the Machine Room from Riki) and her making her decision to return home
AU/CRAU: Y, CRAU from
towerofanimusAge: 16/17 physically (via Tower aging, her real body back on her home world is 14), 3 actually
History: Bless the day I decided to make this
Note that Xion went to the Tower of Animus on Day 300, which is around when Axel knocked her out and brought her back to the Organization the first time.
Personality:
One of the biggest aspects of Xion's personality is her struggles - particularly with her sense of identity and her sense of worth. Canonically, at her original pull point, Xion is in the midst of a slow loss of self-identity, particularly coming to believe that she is less of her own person and much more a part of Sora. And she's already in the midst of a grand loss of self-worth, particularly after learning that she is a replica, who has caused so many problems just by existing. As a part of this, Xion struggles with a high tendency to blame herself for certain actions and events, particularly ones she has some direct involvement with.
Xion has a very all-or-nothing way of dealing with pressure; when faced with it, her resolve either hardens like steel or crumples entirely. An example of the former would be when faced with all of the different obstacles and pressures against returning to Sora. During all this time, even when facing her own friends, her resolve never wavers - not that we can see. On the other hand, when faced with Saix's criticisms of her performance and her existence, she breaks away and flees the situation, unable to withstand his insults. The difference that determines which of the two reactions is difficult, but generally, when the cause is one she considers worthwhile, she's much more likely to face any pressure associated with dignity. Especially when her friends are involved.
To Xion, the most important things are her friends (and later her family). They were all she had to live for the longest time, and later, they're what she was willing to give up everything for, rather that let herself live to be the one to destroy them. They are an utterly inextricable part of her life - she's spent most of her days with them, and they've helped her out of many a tight spot and through many a difficult time. Particularly with Roxas and Axel, she admits outright in her personal journal that she loves them - a very bold claim after being raised in an environment where she's constantly told she cannot feel (even if her being a Nobody is a lie).
Under more normal circumstances, Xion can be curious and inquisitive. In the end, she's still very young, experience-wise. Her knowledge base is patchy at best - it's shown once in canon that she knew what a candelabra was, and yet didn't understand the concept of love without explanation. She's willing to ask questions, particularly with people she trusts.
However, when it comes to people, particularly ones she doesn't know, she's much more cagey. She's less shy and skittish than she could be, owing to her not being as married to Organization doctrine as she used to be, but she's definitely no socialite. Even for those she does meet and speak to, it can be difficult to get her to open up. With her deepest secrets, particularly her origins, what she is, and what she was made for, she plays her cards very close to her chest, and it can take a great deal of time before she'll willingly show her hand.
It doesn't help that when Xion is faced with a very upsetting or stressful personal events or revelations, Xion's instinct is to withdraw. Canon shows how, upon being confronted with her failures by Saix, her defeat at the hands of Riku, and the slow emergence of Sora's memories, Xion abandons her friends at the clock tower and stops spending time with them and speaking with them. Similarly, she does not discuss how her Keyblade has stopped working for her until pressed. She does not wish to burden her friends with her problems, and doesn't even like talking about them until she can understand and figure them herself - an extremely difficult task, given her own inexperience. However, Xion is very bad at hiding her emotions, so even to those who don't know her well, should they find her, it will likely be all too clear that something is bothering her.
Xion can be very sentimental - she's the one who starts the tradition of leaving Roxas a gift on his pillow (a shell) every day while he's asleep. She also shows a fondness for collecting shells, and always keeps a Thalassa shell with her (until Roxas took it). She holds her memories in very high regard - almost as high as her friends. They're all that she really has that is "her own," and they're all that would've been left when she would've returned to Sora.
At least, that's how she started. As of her time in Animus, some things have shifted.
Unfortunately, as is probably normal for a horror game, Xion has become incredibly desensitized to a lot of awful things, thanks to all the bad things that have happened to her and her friends such as being brainwashed and kidnapped and physically tortured multiple times. This is such to the point that when Cid Highwind (FFVII) told her that being a Turk would paint a target on her back if Hojo ever came to the Tower, her reply was essentially "Okay but Jason is worse." Xion is basically used to the zombie apocalypse adage: "There is no safe, only safer." Monster attacks are seen as normal. Experiments and psychotic games are unfortunate but a thing that must be endured. She's just used to not living in a safe/calm place anymore.
Conversely, as also predictable for a horror game, Xion has developed certain negative tendencies and phobias after traumatic incidents, particularly deaths. Thanks to being crushed by her costume in the Halloween event, being trapped in a small crystal and tortured by Ganondorf, and later being buried alive, Xion now has a tendency to get rather uncomfortable in very small enclosed spaces, especially if the small places cause any difficulty in breathing. She has a slight discomfort of flames (due to a Tower death), and of heights (due to Vanitas leaving her dangling off the Tower once), and low-level red lights. One of her strongest reactions though comes from if she is restrained, particularly her arms, owing to an encounter with Jason where he grabbed her arms to restrain her, then strapped her down on a morgue table, killed her close friend in front of her, and then proceeded to vivisect her.
She's lived long enough and experienced enough for a lot of her inexperience and naivety to have worn off. It does still show itself occasionally, however, not to mention the Tower has never really given her much experience in what having a normal life - and many aspects of it - is like. Things like a decent selection of food, getting decent clothing without making it, and a bed you don't have to sleep in are foreign concepts to her. Additionally, she's still rather slow on the uptake when it comes to romantic matters. She has developed a crush or two, but didn't realize what it was until much later, after the subject of them had already left the Tower.
Several of her beliefs and feelings about certain facts have shifted - some very dramatically. For instance, she no longer cares nearly as much about being a replica. However, this change is not the result of gaining the belief that she is just as much a person as anyone else - at least not solely. She has begun to develop that idea lately, aided by her friends; however, the bigger factor has always been the fact that in the Tower, there were always so much bigger things to worry about then the circumstances of one's birth.
A similar shift is an increase in her self-confidence, which shows itself more in how it doesn't. This is to say, Xion's less likely to be down on herself and blame herself than she used to. Additionally, she's more likely to take on tasks and jobs, seeing them as something that needs to be done, and herself as someone who can.
On the other hand, she now has a fear of abandonment, owing to all the friends who have come and gone in the Tower. Most particularly in the period of February to July of 2013, almost all of Xion's parental figures vanished from the Tower one by one. In some cases, Xion would be told to go to someone else who would help her in the place of the person who'd vanished, but only for that person too to vanish shortly thereafter. She has consequently grown wary of such people, to the point of acting distant and outright turning down Diarmuid's help when he offered (at the behest of one of her previous guardians).
In a way, Xion's development in Animus has reflected the same development as canon for her - going from spectator to driver of her own fate. July of 2013 was a huge turning point for her. She - and the Tower at large - found out several pieces of Dax's research, which made her realize that several people she knew were in danger, including Reno. She also learned that the Tower residents were being conditioned in learned helplessness. At that point, she resolved to not fall prey to it, and for a little while became almost reckless in her attempts to fight the admins, culminating in the end of July infiltration of the admin levels and her personal encounter with Jason afterwards.
However, the most dramatic shift has been her attitude towards her future. For the longest time she struggled with the decision about what to do about her life back home. She knew -from talking to others - that her future was not set in stone. In addition to that, she formed strong bonds, friends and family, in the Tower. She has constantly fallen back and forth between wanting to stay with them, and knowing that she couldn't abandon everyone back home, should her worlds be restored. However, for the longest time, she was afraid of acting on the possibility of changing the future, for fear of making things worse. For a while, she even considered not going home at all. And yet, when she faced down Riki's attempts to retake the machine room in the Ex Machina event, she said something very important - that they would never stop fighting for a future they could believe in. It was after this that she came to a realization - that why couldn't that same idea apply back home as well? And so, Xion came to the conclusion that she could fight for a future that she wanted - one where Sora woke up, but not at the expense of her and Roxas.
Debt: In canon, Xion makes the choice to return to Sora, thus putting the needs of her friends and the world before her own. Because of her time spent at the Tower, she has instead refuted that decision, and instead opted to fight for a third option where she can survive and everything will work out. This decision can and will doubtlessly create a lot of problems for a lot of people - a fairly big debt to be paid off (even though we don't know if the worlds will be restored yet since endgame is still in progress, Xion has full faith they will be, and thus this would still feel responsible. If this does not work as a debt, just let me know and I can find another).
Additionally, she'll rack up some fees for being given back her real body and for any memory absorption disabling that is done (assuming that is okay? I asked on the FAQ and never got an answer).
Xion will likely request a wish - that her memory absorption ability be disabled permanently, even after she returns home.
Suitability: Some people would think that the hell she went through in Animus would entitle her to a good life back home, to be able to make the decision she makes and get all the support she needs, a metaphorical good turn for all the bad she's put up with. She wouldn't agree with them; at least, not entirely. She might agree that it gives her the right to make a choice for her own sake, rather than just the world's, but she would disagree that it should exempt her from the consequences of her actions. Because of this, her still-present issues with guilt and self-blame, and the nature of what her debt is, Xion will be accepting of the situation, and will likely even be a bit relieved that the debt and paying it off will be so straightforward.
Given her pre-endgame status, she will likely need to be tricked a bit into coming - mainly along the lines of making her believe that the work could be deferred until after everything has been resolved. She will be a bit upset at first, and a bit antsy about how things will go/be going back in the Tower, but so long as she's sure/learns that time is essentially frozen until she goes back, she will acquiesce without too much difficulty.
Previous Game Info: Oh boy this is going to be long.
Tower of Animus
A virus has been sweeping through the universes, systematically destroying all life on them - every animal, plant, even down to the microbial level. From each universe that is destroyed, one soul is saved and pulled to the Tower of Animus, where that soul is placed in a film-covered wireframe, then is made through advanced glamour technology to make them look like their original selves.
The characters then wake up in their assigned beds, unaware of what all has happened, and receive a note telling them that their world was destroyed and they were saved. However, the Tower is not a happy place. There are dangerous, twisted monsters everywhere - especially at night - the floors almost seem like they might have been designed by sadists, and the administrators are more often than not a piece of work themselves. Zo and Dax seem to be on the resident's side (while Dax was alive at least), but Riki is more ambivalent (ultimately caring more about the Tower than anything else), and Ruana and Jason enjoy subjecting the residents to cruel games and experiments for their own amusement (while Jason was alive at least), and have no interest in fixing the residents' worlds or sending them home.
Over time, the characters have come to learn more and more about the Tower itself, how it used to be used for (very unethical) research into abilities the natives possessed called psionics, and how Ruana is the sole survivor of that research, and, as it seems, the world as a whole. They learned about their bodies being nothing but wireframes, of the glamour, and began to search for more information about the virus that destroyed the worlds and how they might fix them. Eventually they found enough information to reveal to Zo that Ruana was likely the cause of the virus, and he defected fully to the residents side.
This culminated with a confrontation, right as the Tower's power went out, with Riki and Ruana on one side, and the residents, Zo, and several retrieval units who had been modified to actually develop personalities and sentience on the other. Riki died in the earlier rounds of the struggle, and at that point, Ruana turned on the former residents. With a little help from Zo, the characters regrouped and half split off to fight Ruana themselves, while the others stayed behind to figure out how to save their worlds. It was those characters who learned the full truth.
They learned that Ruana was the subject of experiments to try to sever the soul from the body safely, and thus achieve immortality. The experiment succeeded, but at the cost of every living thing on the planet becoming absorbed into her. That Ruana had tried to seek death, and failed due to her invulnerability. How she eventually concocted a plan to instead recreate the experiment that created her on numerous other universes that she had seen through her original psionic abilities of astral projection, and to bring those survivors to her own so she wouldn't be lonely. And they learned that Zo's abilities could reverse the process, so long as they returned to their own worlds.
At that point, those fighting Ruana seemed to be gaining the upper hand, and realizing this, she attempted to kill everyone rather than lose them. Instead, Zo managed to send everyone where they wished to go (home or otherwise), before sacrificing himself to (hopefully) put Ruana to rest, finally.
And then, at some point after returning home, characters all discovered a door. It turned out that Zo had managed to save a small remnant of the Tower. Characters could build what they liked there, and what was more, it would allow all who had been there to visit each other's worlds at will. (Basically this was a post-game open musebox)
Xion's history/development:
Xion's story in Animus can, at its root, be almost described as an extension of her canonical story arc, albeit an unusual one.
When she arrived at the Tower, she was quickly faced with some harsh realities about her situation, both in the Tower and back home. She came from during the period that she'd been given time, trying to decide what path she would take on whether to return to Sora or not. However because Roxas was from the future, he didn't remember her, and for that reason, Riku (who had already been in the Tower for at least a month) told her about some of the future she faced and more importantly, the decision that she made in his timeline and its result. This information affected her thinking for most of the rest of the game.
Her introduction to the harshness of the Tower was, initially, subtle. The Tower's power was shaky during the February of 2012, with temperatures very low. Xion compensated by helping to set up a campfire, and thus got to meet many of her castmates in the Tower at the time, including Sora. However, her first true introduction to the Tower's true nature was being on the outside of the Hitori Kakurenbo event, watching both Riku and Naminé die horribly across the network. She, Sora, and AU Riku tried to break in to the event to help them, but were forced to retreat due to monster attack, with both her and Sora injured.
After that, Xion kept her head down and as best out of trouble as she could, making some friends along the way. However not all trouble was easily avoidable, and Xion had several negative run-ins with a boy from her worlds (though long before her time), named Vanitas. This involved Vanitas kidnapping her and using her as bait for a confrontation with several others from her world. While Xion herself had not been the primary target, many of her closer friends - particularly Axel and Reno - were not convinced she was safe. In the aftermath (as well as after some continued encounters with Vanitas), they did their best to help keep her safe and teach her how to fend for herself in ways Vanitas wouldn't expect (since Xion's self-teaching with her Keyblade didn't even hold a candle to what Xehanort had taught Vanitas).
Around mid-May or so, Xion was one of a few people selected by Gandalf to try to form an organization centered around the idea of learning as much as possible about the Tower and what was really going on. Which Xion was reluctant, she did her best to help. It was the first time she would take any sort of leadership role in the Tower, though the group itself did not make it very far before falling apart, and it would take time before Xion would reprise this sort of role in any shape or form.
Unfortunately, a huge wrench was thrown in all of Xion's plans when Axel departed unexpectedly. Xion was devastated. However, before departing, Axel had made Reno promise to take care of Xion if anything ever happened to him. In the course of keeping that promise, Reno ended up making Xion a Turk and basically accepting her as family, something Xion had never really had before.
That summer was full of ups and downs, things like a blind date party, a giant whale crashing into the Tower, and Xion (unknowingly) starting to absorb energy from her AU self and later Sora. However, at the end of that summer, Xion ended up falling under an experiment that Master Xehanort was performing on the Tower at large, casting everyone into an enchanted sleep and then gathering information from their dreams. However, during this sleep, Sora and Reno were able to dive into one of her dreams, which was taking the form of replaying a memory from her past. Consequently, Sora was able to find out what she was to him, and Reno learned some of the implications of the future Xion faced. In the aftermath she talked to them both, and Sora made it clear to her that he didn't want her to disappear for his sake, and told her to find another way to wake him up. Unfortunately, Xion was skeptical that such a way existed.
Unbeknownst to Xion, during this period, Reno had been playing the role of spy on Ganondorf for Zelda and the group Xion herself had helped found. However, Ganondorf suspected his role, and with Xion's closeness to Reno becoming more readily apparent, Ganondorf took the opportunity and had her kidnapped. After the Evil Alliance meeting held the next day, Ganondorf produced her and began to torture her, to see if Reno would break to protect her. He did, but it was only through the intervention of Riku that Xion was able to escape.
During this period, Xion experienced her first Tower Death, which among other things reset the amount of memories she'd absorbed from her AU self and Sora. Fearing a reprise, Xion ended up approaching one of the administrators - Dax - and asked him to remove it. He agreed to do so easily, though at the time Xion didn't know that he was not actually disabling her powers (as her powers were already suppressed), but rather just an aspect of the glamour. Still, Xion was relieved to not have to worry about it for a while.
Near the end of December and into January, Xion received some good news - that Reno and Elena were getting married. Overall Xion was excited and overjoyed at this development, particularly when she got to play the role of flower girl. However, they did run into some unexpected bumps along the way, including the attention of none other than Ruana herself (which led to an assassination attempt at the wedding itself). Still, aside from the hiccups Xion was delighted to be a part of it, and happy for her two mentor figures.
February, however, turned out to be one of the most turbulent months that Xion had ever spent in the Tower. Unexpectedly, several people from a city called Hinoto-Ri (crossover event with
destinystrings) arrived in the Tower, including several people from their worlds and some who recognized Xion. However, Xion soon learned that the version of herself in Hinoto-Ri actually had managed to escape the fate she'd come to accept: that she would disappear and be forgotten in order to wake Sora up. Perhaps surprisingly, this actually upset her greatly - she'd taken her future for granted, and the idea that it wasn't opened up new and terrifying possibilities; hope about her future was to Xion like a beam of sunlight is to a person trapped in darkness for far too long - painful in its suddenness and intensity, to the point where she couldn't handle it. It would take a long time before she could truly accept the possibilities this information offered her. However that was not all February had to offer. Halfway through the month, amid several sadistic "games" Ruana was playing with her residents, Reno disappeared, devastating Xion. And finally at the end of the month, several residents were able to infiltrate some of the administrative levels and discovered that when residents of the tower "died" their soul was filtered out of their bodies and placed into new ones. However this information came only with the aid of one of the admins, Dax, and when his treachery was exposed, he attempted to stage a coup against Ruana, and was killed in the attempt. All of these events were enough to completely shake the status quo for the Tower residents, and only forewarned of more upheavals to come.
Unfortunately, shortly afterwards, several important friends of Xion's left, including Elena. With both of her primary mentor figures gone, Xion clung to Shion more tightly than ever. However at the same time, she came to see that she couldn't count on them to protect her or help her anymore, and began to try to be more self-reliant.
This proactive streak came at a very opportune time, as a few residents of the Tower, including Zelda, had received a postmortem gift from Dax, one that would theoretically help them learn key information about the Tower itself. By taking several computer chips and placing them on every floor of the Tower, they would reveal something come the beginning of the next month - June, which happened to be a month that Ruana was in charge. The plan was pulled off successfully, and come June, the chips brought down not only the entire power supply for the Tower, but also the glamour system. What the residents had seen during their infiltration in February was only the tip of the iceberg - virtually everything they could see, including their own bodies, was in fact an illusion created by nanofilm and advanced tower technology. While some were deeply upset, Xion managed to take the information in stride - it wasn't the first time she learned that huge portions of what she believed about herself were in fact a lie.
However, there was more to it than just the glamour - by forcibly draining the power core, the Tower now only had enough power left for one year, after which (should they fail to figure out a solution before then) the residents would either die or be left to wander their abandoned worlds for all eternity. All of this combined information inspired some rebelliousness in Tower residents. Xion was partially among them - she ended up leading a group of characters who were attempting to hack the computers to get more information about the Tower, after the original leader of the group unexpectedly left the Tower. The group was caught and punished, and Xion and the other hackers in the group were labeled a threat by the administrators, who set a retrieval unit to follow them around. Despite this, Xion was still somewhat reluctant to fully, openly fight the Tower administrators. Gathering information was one thing, outright rebellion was another.
However, in the middle of July, resentment among the residents exploded, and a boycott of the collar checkups was proposed. Xion protested, having experienced a month of no collar checkups before. However, the boycott participants were proven to be correct when the boycott allowed them to get their hands on several tubs of collar fluid, and later, when Jason himself was shown briefly on the network which included two very important words for Xion - learned helplessness. When she found out what the concept actually was, she was deeply upset, partially because she realized how very subject to it she had been, and not just regarding the collar checkup. She even wondered how the idea of learned helplessness applied to her mindset towards her own future - was she too scared of possible negative consequences to take a chance for her own freedom? After talking with several friends, Xion resolved to not be subject to learned helplessness any more, and committed herself wholly to fighting the Tower admins who sought to keep them under control, almost to the point of recklessness.
An excellent opportunity for this sprang up as a result of that very boycott - in order to properly study the collar fluid they found, which would help them gain back their real powers, the residents needed real tools (as opposed to film tools) from the administrative levels. Xion joined a group of her friends in literally jumping down an elevator shaft to try to get to Jason's floor and retrieve lab equipment from there. However this plan backfired when they attracted the attention of none other than Jason himself. Shenanigans ensued and Xion's group split up. Xion herself was chased and eventually captured (and tortured as punishment) by Jason, though not before she and Yu Narukami saw Jason's true form underneath the glamour, as well as some of his full abilities. Despite suffering severe emotional fallout and trauma from the incident, rather than being cowed by it, the incident instead fueled Xion even further to fight against the Tower admins (though she still struggled emotionally when facing Jason himself).
The aftermath of the infiltration kept many of the residents busy, Xion included. However something happened that ended up turning her emotional outlook around significantly - Zo was able to bring back Reno and Elena to the Tower. She was immensely relieved to have them back, to the point that when they were trapped together in a room with several others during the Quarantine event, Xion was willing to fight some of the other residents in order to help Reno get some of the limited supplies they might need. She also gave him one of her precious shells, the ones Roxas gave her.
Once they were revived after the Quarantine, Reno and Xion were able to speak to each other about what happened. Xion affirmed that she cared about him so much, and admitted to him that she didn't want to go back to her own world, that she felt that she wouldn't be able to escape her future if she did so. Rather than being harsh as she feared, Reno accepted her decision easily. More than that, he and Elena officially adopted her and Shion - or at least as officially as such things could get in the Tower. Xion was relieved and overjoyed, but a small part of her still wondered in the back of her mind if she was making the right choice.
That December, confrontations between the residents and the administrators rapidly came to a head when several retrieval units (who had been modified by Dax prior to his death and had thus gained sentience, recognizable from their droned counterparts by their chipped collars) led by a unit named R-037, or Aria, revealed themselves and cut Jason off from the residential levels of the Tower to build a secret floor the chipped units and residents could use as a sort of base. Jason broke through and attempted to attack the chipped units before they could complete their task, and several residents stepped up to stop - and possibly kill - him. While Xion was not a part of the latter charge, she did attempt to face him. However, his total lack of any kind of regard, and her group's failure to be able to do anything significant to slow him down, did little to help Xion achieve any sort of closure.
Near the end of January, there was a massive explosion - the last one of several over the previous few months. One of the admins, Riki, announced that the explosions were the fault of Jason, and that he had compromised the remaining power left to the Tower, and that the power would go out unless the residents agreed to provide some their own soul energy as a temporary power source. Fearing the loss of what could become her future home, not to mention valuable time they needed to fix things, Xion volunteered. As a side effect of the machine she was strapped to, Xion ended up - for one infinitesimal moment - seeing every single possible timeline her world could have taken. While she wasn't able to remember most of what she saw beyond vague impressions and flashes of clarity, it left her wondering once more about her future and the possibilities it could hold.
As punishment for the explosions, Ruana threw Jason into one of her games and used the residents to try to kill him. Xion once again tried to face off with the admin, and left similarly unsatisfied, even guilty, because Elena had sacrificed herself to ensure Xion and the rest of their group could escape. Jason was later killed, denying Xion further opportunities of gaining closure via facing him.
The next month, the residents of the Tower attempted to hack into Dax's personal files, to try to discover what he knew about the virus that destroyed their worlds and any other information that might help restore them. Xion was successful in finding exactly the information they were looking for. However, at the same time she also discovered that there was an AI created by Dax to protect that information, and that the AI would likely be destroyed now that it was discovered. Xion adamantly refused to let that happen, and with the help of Aria and the others involved in the hacking attempt, managed to save the AI and transfer him to the hidden floor, giving her a great feeling of personal triumph.
However, another important bit of information that the residents realized from Dax's files and analyzing them, was that Riki had been lying about the condition of the power core in the Tower, back in January, and was likely going to be using their soul energy for his own purposes. In order to stop that from happening, several residents, including Xion, went down to the machine room where Riki was working to seize control of it for the residents and chipped units. While Riki left the room easily enough at their request, as soon as he was gone he began to use his technomancy abilities to cause the room to attack them. After a long and grueling fight, they managed to pull the plugs on all the computers in the room, cutting off Riki's access to it. Xion herself pulled the final plug, shouting at Riki that they would always fight for a future they could believe in.
While the results of their successful taking of the Machine Room were exciting enough, in the aftermath, Xion realized that her statement - about fighting for a future they could believe in - could apply for more than just the Tower. It could apply back home, where she could fight for a future she could believe in there too, a future where she fulfilled Sora's request to find another way to wake him up, a future where she and her friends could all survive, just like the other self from Hinoto-Ri. And so, Xion finally came to the decision that she would return home after all, and that she would not give up fighting until she could find a way to do what was best for everyone - herself (for the first time, for real) included.
Major CR
Canon
- Sora - The person she comes from, one of the most precious people in her life. Though she never got to meet him at home, in the Tower, she was able to, and more. With one slight snag - the Sora in the Tower came from a timeline far before Xion's (just after Destiny Islands had first been destroyed, in fact). However, despite the information gap, he won her over entirely with his heart, his friendship, treating her like a little sister, even (especially) after she found out who and what she was. He's also rubbed off on her a fair bit personality-wise, and most significantly, he worked very hard to convince her that she had the right to chose a future that worked best for her, something that was very important to the decision she ultimately made.
- Riku - Riku is one of the few people who remembers her from home. He's also the one who told her about her future when she arrived in the Tower. Overall in the Tower, he has also taken the role of an elder brother, most particularly a protective role. She's someone he can go to when she needs advice or help. She's more than thankful for the help and support he's provided her.
- Riku (AU) - While they might not be as close on an emotional level, Xion still regards him with a healthy measure of trust. Especially she trusts him to have her back when she needs it, and in the Tower, having someone you can trust to fight by your side is something very important.
- Riku Replica ("Ira") - Her little brother, Ira was someone who Xion cared about a great deal and yet - because some of his tendencies and his playing the (sort of) double-agent - worried about immensely. They didn't always see eye-to-eye on everything, and oftentimes had to stay apart to prevent her from exposing him to danger, but she still trusted him, and they had each others back when they needed it.
- Xion (AU) ("Fey") - Fey is the only other version of herself that Xion has ever met. While her circumstances seemed ultimately very different from her own - circumstances that Fey never told Xion herself - these two came see each other as sisters, having each others' back and protecting each other as they could. Before Fey left at least.
- Naminé - While they didn't speak as much as they should or could have, Naminé was someone Xion has come to regard with significant trust. She's trusted Naminé to be there, to be someone she could talk to and ask for help if she needed it. While Xion wishes she could have been there more for Naminé in return, she is still glad to have met her.
- Axel - Xion's relationship with Axel - one of her most important in canon - has become incredibly complicated. She still loves him and treasures him as one of her most important people. However on a more practical level, she isn't sure how to interact with him anymore, and her ability to trust and confide in him are much more restricted. This is not due to any significant flaw on his part - rather it's the result of his ephemeral presence in her life ever since her arrival in the Tower; he's never stayed more than a few scant months at a time.
- Roxas - Xion's relationship with Roxas is similar to her relationship with Axel for almost identical reasons. However the situation with Roxas is exacerbated further by the fact that while Axel almost always was able to completely or partially remember her, Roxas was usually the opposite. Even though she understood the reasons, it still added an further bump to a rocky situation. She still loves and cares about him immensely though.
- Aqua - Xion has met many iterations of Aqua over her time in the Tower; some have had more impact than others. Generally she's seen Aqua as a mentor and teacher figure, however the biggest impact came from the Aqua from Hinoto-Ri, who helped calm Xion down when she was upset by several of the events (particularly finding out about possible futures) of February 2013. Since then, Xion has come to see all Aquas generally as people she can trust emotionally as well.
- Terra - While she personally wasn't ever really all that close to him personally, she still sees him - partially from Riku's influence - as someone she can trust in a pinch.
- Ventus - Friends with Roxas when she first arrived, Ven is very cheerful person in his own right, and someone Xion is happy to consider a friend, if not a particularly close one.
- Xehanort - A character that Xion should probably be more wary of than she actually is. While she has heard some warnings from characters like Riku and Aqua, Xehanort has not done anything inherently threatening (that Xion herself knows about), certainly nothing on the scale that the things Ganondorf or Ruana or Jason have done. He left the Tower a long time ago, but she regards him with a certain wariness but also curiosity.
- Vanitas - The first true Tower-born problem of Xion's life, save her arrival. He used to inspire dislike and no small amount of fear. However she hasn't seen much of him for nearly two years now, and much greater and fresher horrors from the Tower have made him seem rather tame.
Family (Cross-canon)
- Reno (Final Fantasy VII) - her adoptive father, one of Xion's most precious people in the universe. He took her under his wing and helped her through so much of the worst the Tower had to offer. He accepted her - completely - for who she was and the decisions she made, even offering to let her go home with him to his world when she thought she might not want to go home. When she lost him, it was like a part of herself had disappeared. And after he'd come back, it was like she came back to life again. For a while she was almost unhealthily dependent on him, but recent actions and decisions have helped her to assert her independence. She still cares for him so much though, more than words can ever really say.
- Elena (Final Fantasy VII) - While she's not as close to her adoptive mother as her adoptive father, there is still no denying that Elena has played an important role in Xion's life, and is still very much a mentor figure for her. Supporting her, caring about her, and accepting her so completely and making her feel loved.
- Shion (No. 6) - Literally one of the first people she met in the Tower, Shion is Xion's brother in all but blood. They've worked together, they've fought together and died for each other. During the period when even Reno and Elena had left her, they were the metaphorical rock to which each other clung. She loves him more than words can say, and while she's grown up enough to no longer need for him to be there, his absence will still be a significant blow.
- Lancer/Diarmuid Ua Duibhne (Fate/) - Xion's relationship with Diarmuid was an interesting one. It started when - after a string of departures from the Tower - he was asked to look after her and Shion. Because of that string of departures though, Xion was very closed off and reluctant to even give him a chance, though she acknowledged his good intentions. After Reno came back, however, she found her opinion softening a great deal, and began opening up to him more and more. He helped guide her and support her towards her future, becoming a confidant that was easier to speak to than even Reno at times. She's very glad to have met him.
Friends (Cross-canon)
- Yu Narukami (Persona 4) - One of her earliest friends in the Tower, Xion has come to love and respect Yu more than words can really say. He's comforted her through some of her darkest times in the Tower, and fought alongside her during some of the harshest of battles - including being the one beside her when they faced down Jason's true form during the July infiltration. She's also been harboring a longtime crush on him, though she kept that knowledge to herself for a long time, especially when he disappeared from the Tower for a time.
- Sheba (Golden Sun) - Her closest female friend, Sheba and Xion met during one of Ruana's sadistic games, where Sheba gave Xion a token that allowed her to escape and won Sheba a significant amount of trust from Xion. Since then, the two have had each others' backs many a time, and bonded fairly closely over a variety of things.
- Asch the Bloody (Tales of the Abyss) - One of her more unusual and unexpected friends, Asch's familiarity with replicas helped him to bypass some of the usual barriers of trust that people need to bridge with Xion. He is someone who she can usually count on to give (if a bit blunt and rough) honest advice, and to have her back, should she need it.
- Zelda (The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time) - Zelda is one of the people with whom Xion regards with the most respect and admiration. She is honestly what Xion sees as the epitome of leader, and her determination and selflessness are inspirational in the harshness of the Tower. More than that, she's happy to call Zelda a friend, after the bonding the two have been able to do.
- Saber/Aturia Pendragon (Fate/) - Someone who seems to have a lot of faith in her and respect for her and her potential, something Xion's not used to in the slightest but appreciates more than she can say.
- Waver Velvet (Fate/) - Xion... has a hard time figuring out her feelings regarding Waver, though they're definitely not negative. He's the first person she can really recall who's treated her significantly differently after finding out her true age. And thus, the first person who's openly felt like she deserves some of the protections and sheltering that young children are usually given. While she doesn't agree and is more than willing to prove him wrong, she really appreciates his concern.
- Gandalf (The Lord of the Rings) - While not a particularly close friend, he saw the potential in her and believed she could be a leader one day. Something that Xion appreciates now that she can (sort of) see a bit of it in herself.
- Minato Arisato (Persona 3) - Someone she counts on to have her back more than anything. While they haven't spoken much and aren't emotionally too close, they've worked together a lot in several different instances, most particularly during collar fluid research. Thus she sees him as someone reliable and trustworthy.
- Ryoji (Persona 3) - Technically one of her adoptive cousins, though they haven't spoken quite as much as they could. Still, she sees him as a friend and someone she can talk to sometimes, if needed. There's something about how he acts that seems familiar, but she can't figure out what it is.
- Yukiko Amagi (Persona 4) - A friend from Yu's world, who's always been very welcoming and supporting for Xion. While they're not too close, Xion still sees her as a friend and somebody who can have her back.
- Link (The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask) - one of her earlier friends in the Tower, he helped comfort her during some of her earlier darker days, telling her stories from his home world. Shortly before leaving the Tower, he gave her several objects to help her protect herself - objects she's made good use of.
- Enoch (El Shaddai) - Xion has mixed feelings about Enoch at best. She respects him and sees him overall in a positive and well-intentioned light. However the degree of optimism and trust he has displayed is too much, even for her, and she sees him as someone who is sometimes stuck on how he particularly views the world. And just overall not a bastion of good judgement. Overall though he has helped her a few times in the past, and any judgement on her part isn't particularly harsh.
- Zo (Tower of Animus) - Xion feels, to a certain extent, like something of a kindred spirit to Zo. They're both almost the same age (actual age), both have special powers that their allies and colleagues have made use of. Both have been told very big lies about their group's true goal and purpose. She really appreciates and worries about him, especially wondering what will happen to him once everything is settled.
- DJ/Dax AI and Suna (Tower of Animus) - Xion has a particular fondness for two of the Tower's native residents whom she's had a particular impact on. There's the AI she rescued, DJ, and the chipped retrieval unit who began to follow her around (and therefore whose personality growth was heavily based on what she saw in Xion and her closest CR), Suna. She almost feels rather motherly towards them, and extremely protective.
Negative (Cross-canon)
- Ganondorf Dragmire (The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker) - One of the people (if not the person) Xion hates most in all of the multiverse. He has used and hurt both her and her family countless times without any kind of remorse, for reasons she cannot (nor does she want to) understand. His attitude is something she detests as well - constantly painting himself as the best and everyone else as fools, every action as an inherently selfish one, as well as doing everything solely for his own interests. Her thought processes and reactions regarding the Gerudo are not entirely rational, to the point of her hypothetically wanting to oppose a plan simply because he supports it.
- Jason (Tower of Animus) - While he may not particularly care about her or see her as noteworthy (who knows, the man's dead now), Xion actually has a history of reasons to dislike this particular admin. From throwing cruel and careless comments her way shortly after her arrival to physically torturing her for daring to cross him, if there's an admin Xion has hated more than any other, it's him. And it's he who, to Xion, best represented the careless and oppressive attitude of the admins.
- Ruana (Tower of Animus) - Ruana, Xion doesn't really know what to think about, beyond not particularly liking her and being a bit afraid of her. The easiest way for Xion to describe her feelings though is that Ruana seems hopelessly out of touch with reality and does not understand why what she's doing is wrong, and Xion herself is frustrated at her for it.
And this isn't even counting all of the acquaintances she's made, but if I included everyone she's met this app would be another 2 pages longer.
Inventory: Her Organization coat, boots, and some clothing she made personally underneath it, and a pin identifying her as a member of the Turks. Also a bracelet and pendant given to her by her adoptive parents. She's also wearing a belt tied around her waist, to which is attached a pouch. This pouch currently contains all of her most precious objects. Particularly it contains several shells - some given to her by Roxas, some from Zo, others collected from the Tower - a paper crane, a paper songbird, and some of her more incriminating and treasured correspondence.
Additionally Xion is followed by a small menagerie of creatures, particularly a Dusk named Sunny that she received as a regain, a Meow Wow named Excalibur, left to her upon Sora's departure from the Tower, and a cat named Thalassa, received from Data (
littlelifeforms, one of Spot's kittens)She also has a list of objects that belong to her but are not specifically with her, and these other items can be found here (along with some of the aforementioned items that are with her)
Abilities, Strengths, and Weaknesses: First and foremost among her abilities is the Keyblade. The Keyblade has several powers - it can manifest and disappear at the will of the wielder. It also has the power to lock and unlock any door or portal. It also has the ability to return to the wielder's hand, should they ever be disarmed. Beyond this, there is an inherent magical nature to the Keyblade itself - despite its unwieldy shape and form, it functions quite similarly to a sword, and can have very powerful cutting ability when required. It seems to draw power from the wielder's strength of heart.
She also has the full arsenal of Days spells at her disposal - Fire, Blizzard, Thunder, Aero and Cure (and each of their respective higher levels) to be specific. While Kingdom Hearts on the whole has many other spells, any other kinds of magic she'll need to be taught or learn through some outside source (some of which she has in Animus, which will be listed below).
Also, she also has the ability to summon corridors of darkness, magical passageways that can be used to travel between distant locations quickly, or even between worlds (though obviously the world-hopping aspect will not be working in game). The only downside is prolonged, frequent exposure to the Corridors of darkness can have a corrosive effect on one's heart if they are not wearing a dark coat or have a heart of pure light.
This ventures a tiny bit into the realm of headcanon, but I believe that Xion, as a replica, was "programmed" with several abilities upon her creation. Most of these are simple things that would've saved time teaching her - things like how to walk and basic language and etc. One of these abilities that's relevant in particular though is how to hack certain technological devices, most particularly computers. It's possible we see this in canon, when she hacks the Organization computer to find the files about Castle Oblivion and herself, halfway or so through the game.
Lastly, there is her memory absorption - wherein she may absorb the memories (primarily) of those who are closely connected with Sora (Generally I play this as Sora, Roxas, alternate versions of herself and possibly Ventus). It is an ability that she cannot control. As of her canonpoint it is fully on and functional, however she will be asking for it to be nullified, as I mentioned above in her debt.
From her time in the Tower, she's also learned several abilities from elsewhere in her own canon, such as other spells. Particularly, she's learned the following:
- Strike Raid - an ability where she throws her Keyblade in spinning motion towards enemies, then calls it back to her, rather like a boomerang. With practice, she should be able to learn to augment this ability with different elemental attributes on her own, though she has not done so yet.
- Bind/Stun - a spell that, when cast, ends up "gluing" someone in place with what appears to be small electrical charges. They can still attack and move about, but they cannot move from the spot to which they are currently bound. The spell's effects last anywhere from 15-30 seconds.
- Barrier - a simple spell that briefly erects a spherical wall that blocks most minor and moderate attacks headed for the user. It only lasts for a few seconds at most, and is localized almost exclusively around the user (someone will have to be very close for them to block for them as well)
In addition, she's learned decent hand-to-hand combat from Reno, and some self-taught skills in sewing. She is and remains mostly an utter disaster at cooking, however.
So far as weaknesses go, though she is a bit better than she used to be thanks to nearly two years of (sometimes more consistent than other times) training, overall Xion is fairly lightweight and not the greatest when it comes to actual physical strength. Her defense and ability to defend herself is limited as well, restricted to simple blocking and the single barrier spell Aqua taught her, which she's still getting the hang of. Emotionally, she still has a tendency to be more closed off with people she doesn't know as well, and particularly without close friends, a likelihood of withdrawing when upset or depressed.
Additionally, as a result of being in the Tower so long and having to go so all-out to fight the administrators, Xion has less of a sense of immediate self-preservation and is more likely to be careless, particularly with actions that might only result in minor injuries. Not to mention her Xion-ish tendency (even if she cares about herself more than she used to) to put others much higher on the priority list than herself, thus resulting in her throwing herself into danger for their sake.
( SAMPLE )
Characterization Sample: Exhibit A - Shortly before the Ex Machina event, where they retake the Machine Room from Riki
Exhibit B - shortly before her canonpoint