Bored, Bored and Boom (Hollow Bastion; open, incomplete)

[infinityshot]

After introducing River to her room, Xigbar had wandered off in search of something to do. He was still loath to return to his charred room, and therefore had taken a quick detour to one of the libraries before finding his way to one of the gardens

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[sword_and_demon]

Sparda was assaulted by several sensations almost all at once.

The first sensation was a very familiar one, power, strength running through his veins. Demonic power he hadn't ever expected to feel again, this was followed shortly by his hand wrapping around the hilt of a sword he hadn't held in centuries. The Force Edge, the sleeping, dormant form of the weapon that shared his name. In an instant, however, he could activate it. The seal has been broken!

The Dark Knight barely had time to register all these things before he was blinded by the sudden presence of light, or, rather, by the sudden lack of all-consuming darkness, next to which anything was blindingly bright.

However, more disturbing than either sensation was the feeling of falling, and Sparda was briefly concerned for his own safety, before the thought occurred to him that he would most likely survive the fall, and that even if it was a long enough drop to injure him, he would have plenty of time to transform and use his wings to fly somewhere safe. If there was even a place that could be considered safe where-ever he'd been dropped off.

[infinityshot]

There was one thing that was good about having a deep bond over the powers of space, and this was the fact that usually Xigbar would know when something was headed in his direction. Of course, even this was not entirely reliable, and he would find himself getting smacked by something.

At this moment, thankfully, he knew something was heading down towards him at a rather fast, and so he threw the book that he was reading aside to float with the others and leaned back...

And was promptly landed on by what appeared to be a man. The good part was that the person fell mostly in his lap rather than on his head, and the bad part was that the man was heavy and didn't fall entirely on his lap, but kinda also close to his chest, knocking the air out of him. The chair tipped backwards as he gave a yelp and then crashed to the ground along with the books that Xigbar released from their hold in the air. Oh well. At least he was the one being smooshed, Xigbar was thinking sarcastically. He was being rather good at not making his unpleasant thoughts known.

Instead, he said softly, "Ow. That hurt," and then proceeded to curse gravity.

[sword_and_demon]

Sparda was still attempting to turn himself so he could see how far he was going to fall when he landed. His fall had apparently been cushioned by someone. Someone sitting down, because the person he landed on yelped as the chair they were both depending on for support tipped backwards.

When the chair crashed to the ground Sparda rolled gracefully off the man and into a standing position, feeling very dazed and even more confused, two things that were not a frequent occurrence for the Dark Knight. He was somewhat surprised that he hadn't lost his monocle, but quickly cast aside thoughts of that when the man who had broken Sparda's fall declared that being landed on hurt. No doubt.

"Oh, please forgive me, I didn't see you there." He said that as though he'd done nothing more interesting than accidentally bump into someone coming around a corner. In fact, Sparda didn't seem at all bothered by what had just occurred. Or by the fact that he had no idea where he was. Instead he held out a gloved hand to help the man up, immeasurably relieved he hadn't skewered the man with the Force Edge when he'd landed on him.

[infinityshot]

A part of Xigbar's mind stated that of course the man hadn't seen him because he had been falling! The other part of Xigbar's mind decided it was high time to get some air into his lungs, so he took a breath.

Had he been anyone but Xigbar, there would have been the slight possibility that the man would have found himself possibly skewered, shot at with various projectiles, eaten...something. Since it was a bored Xigbar, he figured that it wouldn't hurt to find out a bit about this guy before sending him into a different dimension. After all, it wasn't every day that a person fell from the sky, though not entirely unheard of.

Xigbar took the hand offered to him, almost amused that someone was actually apologizing to him. The person obviously didn't know who or what he was, which was perfectly fine to him. He brushed his clothing off (as if that would help).

"Name's Xigbar," plastering a grin onto his face. "Outta curiousity, ya normally fall onta people?"

[sword_and_demon]

Sparda was glad to see that he hadn't hurt the man from falling on him, either. When his hand was grabbed, the Devil had absolutely no trouble pulling the man, Xigbar, fully and completely to his feet as though he weighed nothing at all.

"My name is Sparda. And no, you're the first person I've dropped in on in such a manner." He met the grin with a smile of his own, placing Force Edge on his belt where it hopefully wouldn't do any damage. Glancing around briefly, he decided it was a good idea to determine just where he'd landed.

"The fall was somewhat disorienting, I don't suppose you could tell me where I've landed, could you?" Hopefully he'd get some answers before this person connected his name with who and what he was.

[infinityshot]

"It's more bothersome when ya don't know if yer fallin' down," he said, leaving it at that. The man could decide whatever he wanted to about that cryptic remark. Sparda, huh. At least he didn't have a habit of falling on people...

"Yeah. Yer in Castle Oblivion. Welcome to da place of infinite, blinding white walls. It's disgusting. Though my room's kinda blackish gray at the moment. Ya know...explosions and all..."

So first he dealt with a happy-go-lucky g-d-something-or-other, then a girl who appeared to be here-but-not-here and then a guy who looked like he belonged in a courtroom wooing ladies. This day was kinda getting exciting! What next? Dancing strawberries?

"So, ya human, Heartless, Nobody, g-d...?" he continued for a while with other...species, for lack of a better word. Xigbar was rather bored with the whole 'I'm a fill-in-the-blank,' but for some reason, people seemed to think it a very important question. "And where are ya from?" he finally finished. In retrospect, maybe he should have asked that last question first...

[sword_and_demon]

Castle Oblivion. That was certainly an intimidating name. And not one he was familiar with, either. Sparda quickly assembled what he knew. The seal had been broken, he'd spent at least a couple centuries trapped in darkness, this person was clearly familiar with quite a number of creatures that weren't human, and Sparda was ashamed to say he didn't particularly recognize any of the names.

"None of those, I'm afraid. And I could give you a name for where I am from, Xigbar, but until I figure out where here is in relation to there, and what name you would recognize here, I doubt I can give you any name that would have meaning for you. That, and I've been away for quite a while, so the name could have changed while I was absent."

[infinityshot]

Xigbar studied the man in front of him for a while, and didn't hide the fact that he was doing that. How interesting. So he wasn't a human but he wasn't anything he had listed either? Well, there were certainly plenty of species out there, so he wouldn't've been able to list off everything anyway.

Ah, the thrill of a new being! Whatever he was, the man was obviously long lived if he even considered the possibility of a world's name changing. Usually that took a while, though in a few rare cases...
It sent tingles down Xigbar's spine to know that he would be able to study this guy for a little bit, and that meant he had to find a way to keep him occupied.

"Relation is relative," he finally replied. "To me, it's quite easy ta go to a world that I know. Distance means little, really. I can't help ya if ya don' tell me more 'bout yerself. 'Course, if ya want something like a drink or food, I can get ya that. I ain't doin' anything at the moment, so maybe we can talk."

[sword_and_demon]

Sparda took a moment to process what Xigbar had said. 'Quite easy ta go to a world that I know. World. That meant... well, this place certainly had a much closer resemblance to the human realm than the underworld, and this man did look like a human, but... other worlds. In reality, it wasn't such a far-out idea.

"Just a moment..." He said calmly, "Other worlds... Do you mean to tell me that not only am I no where near home, but I am not even on Tartarus anymore?"

The demon had lived long enough and had to deal with enough strange occurrences that this did not really bother him as much as it might have shaken a human. Sparda was frowning, as the thought. He had been on Tartarus, and the seal between the demon world and human world had been broken.

[infinityshot]

Tartarus? Well, well, and well...Xigbar tucked that little bit of information in the back of his mind. At the moment, it didn't mean too much to him, really. Worlds were just names for places. What made a difference were the type of people there and specifically, the person he was dealing with right at that moment.

"Well, nope, not really. Castle Oblivion is definitely not on Tartarus." Xigbar stretched. He sure hoped that Sparda wasn't going to have the normal shpiel like the other people who found themselves off of their world. It was really getting tiring to hear the disbelief and other crap.

[sword_and_demon]

"Not on Tartarus? Well. That complicates things." No doubt Tartarus was descending into Chaos now that the seal was broke, and he really needed to get back there.

If he was going to seal it again... surely there had to be a better way to seal the Temen-ni-gru than he had used last time. "I don't suppose you have any idea how I ended up here, do you?" Well, probably not, but it was worth a shot.

[infinityshot]

Xigbar nodded. Yes, usually being somewhere one didn't recognize usually did complicate matters a bit. He just didn't feel like restating the obvious.

"I don' know how ya got here. Ya see, it's kinda different for each person. Some people jsut kinda show up, some show up 'cause their planet died, some show up by accident and others not...ya know. Long list o' stuff."

He put the chair back into its proper position and sat down, crossing his legs. He wasn't getting too much information here and frankly, his attention span was fairly short. Maybe if he poked him a bit, something would happen. Though last time he had poked something, that had ended up being a bad idea.

"S'there a reason ya want to go back ta that place?"

[sword_and_demon]

"There's very likely a massive war taking place there." Well, everyone on Tartarus knew the story, so there was no harm in telling this man, right?

"There are two species that inhabit Tartarus, humans, and demons. Tartarus is divided between the human world and the demon world. For thousands of years, the demons enslaved and controlled the human world. Two thousand years ago, a demon rebelled against his own kind on behalf of the humans, and waged war against the demons. The demon world was sealed off by that demon, the Legendary Dark Knight, who had also defeated the Emperor of the Underworld, Mundus. That seal has been undone." It was a short and rather nondescript telling of the Legend of Sparda, but he could give a few details here and there if Xigbar wanted.

Sparda wasn't, however, going to reveal that he was the Legendary Dark Knight. "Hm, the seal is probably why I was trapped for so long."

[infinityshot]

He shook his head, a grin on his face. "Always with the wars and the power, eh? Seems like it'd be a typical story, ya know? The one day I hear a story where everyone gets along's the day I worry."

It was obvious that there were parts and pieces that were being left out, but most people simply figured they weren't going to get an answer. Most people would simply attempt to manipulate the answer out of a person, usually by playing the give-a-little-get-a-little game. Xigbar didn't want to play that game. In fact, he was getting bored.

"Okay, so what are ya not tellin' me?" he finally asked, his grin growing even larger. Did he really think that he would get an answer? Not really. But the looks on peoples' faces when he pulled something like that was wonderful! "No offense, but I don't have any reason ta...mmm...help ya if ya don't say anything."

[sword_and_demon]

Sparda considered things for a moment, weighing his options. He could remain silent, and not get any help from this person, or he could open his mouth, reveal a lot, and get some assistance.

"Sorry, but I'm not sure what you're asking. You'll have to be a little more specific than that." Xigbar was probably just fishing for information. "I would appreciate whatever help you can give me, however, but I will understand if you're reluctant to get into the middle of a war with demons. It is not a pleasant place to be, I hear."

[infinityshot]

The corners of Xigbar's lips twitched as if he was holding back from laughing. "I really don' think that a war with demons is the only thing ya have ta worry about, really. And I know that there's parts and pieces about yerself that yer not tellin', such as why you were trapped by whatever and so forth."

Xigbar leaned back in his chair, throwing one leg over the the armrest and shifting so he was a bit more comfortable. "Do demons have Hearts?"