OOC: Application.
Series: Kingdom Hearts.
Character: Roxas, Organization XIII member… XIII. Also know as the Key of Destiny.
Age: Actual age is a little over 1. He looks 14.
Sex/Gender: Male.
Canon Role: Sort of hard to define… technically he is the protagonist, hurr. In KHII, he’s a side-character (whose importance is paramount, however) but in 358/2 Days, he’s the protagonist.
"Real" Name: Keanu Lawrence.
Please give us a personal history of your character's life and explain to us in detail how they grow and develop over the course of their canon:
The story starts with a fourteen-year-old boy being chosen to save the world(s). He left his own world, found new ones, made new friends, and journeyed with them to stop the forces of darkness. Bad People decided opening the “door to darkness” was a pleasant idea and began plucking “Princesses of Heart” (seven girls without darkness in their hearts - in the games, darkness is basically bad and light is basically good, though it also has a whole yin-yang factor to it) from their worlds to open said door, as they were the only key to it. The childhood friend of the boy was one of these Princesses; her heart was needed to open the door, but rested in the boy.
Ultimately, his heart had to be unlocked, using a special key. The boy sacrificed himself to free his heart and the girl’s, becoming a Heartless - a dark entity that has no heart of its own.
And thus, the Nobody Roxas was born.
Nobodies are a curious race - they are the bodies (giving them form) and souls (giving them life) left behind by those whose hearts have been consumed (or released by the Keyblade of People’s Hearts) by the Heartless. Only people who had strong wills result in Nobodies, and only the strongest result in human-shaped Nobodies. The more humanoid a Nobody, the more powerful it is.
Born into Twilight Town once Sora released his own heart, Roxas was soon discovered by the leader of a group of purely-humanoid nobodies called the Organization. This leader, Xemnas, gave Roxas his name and a place to go to, having no memories of whom or what he is or what he is supposed to do. The same day as joining the Organization, Roxas is placed under Number VIII, Axel, as “babysitting duty”. During the following week, Axel tells Roxas about his existence as a Nobody as the other members of the Organization teach him how to fight and complete the missions assigned to him. He is also told that the goal of the Organization is to complete “Kingdom Hearts” by basically sacrificing hearts to it with the promise that it will “make whole” all the Nobodies. Roxas is a pivotal part of this plan as he can wield the Keyblade and thus is the only Nobody that can safely release hearts when exterminating Heartless.
Over time, Roxas and Axel become friends, spending their leisure time eating sea-salt ice cream on a clock tower in Twilight Town. Axel eventually gets sent to a second base by the name of Castle Oblivion. While he’s away, Roxas is put in charge of the fourteenth member of the Organization, Xion. Xion is the only Organization member that is similar to Roxas’ age - and later he finds she is able to wield the Keyblade as well. Though both are mutually emotionally distant, they become friends after Roxas falls into a coma for twenty-three days.
After his awakening, Roxas begins to once again question his existence - why can he wield the Keyblade? What is the Organization really after? As Roxas is sent to more and more worlds on his various missions, he begins to experience memories that aren’t his. He begins to grow impatient at his unanswered questions. Xion reacts much the same, and eventually defects from the Organization to “find herself”. Through the interference of Riku, a friend of Sora’s, Xion discovers that she is an imperfect replication of Sora created by his leaked memories by Xemnas as a back-up plan in case Sora was unable to be used for the Organization’s purposes. Taking Riku’s advice, Xion decides to “merge” with her true self (as she wants to become the “real Sora”, as that is her reason for being created). Roxas follows Xion’s example and leaves the Organization himself, though not without protest from Axel, who knows the Organization will destroy him because of his betrayal. Roxas simply states, “No one would miss me,” and leaves for good.
While searching Twilight Town, Roxas once again encounters Xion, who has taken on the appearance of Sora. She says she wants to merge with Roxas (though this is nothing more of a ruse, as she realizes that Roxas and herself cannot coexist; she decides to willingly disappear in an attempt to save Roxas and halt Xemnas’ plan, which is ultimately created a Kingdom made from hearts that he will rule, as the goal of making all of the Nobodies “whole” was never really his goal at all.)
Xion then transforms into a mechanical monstrosity, engaging in a long and grueling battle with Roxas. At the end of the fight, she seems to have forgotten who she is, though she says “it’s okay”. During Xion’s final moments (in which she has returned to her original form), she tells Roxas that she has no regrets and what the Organization’s true colors are. With her last breath, she pleads to Roxas to not allow Xemnas to win.
This completely halts to regeneration of Sora’s memories - a plan that had been playing out behind the scenes through all of these events. It is discovered that after Sora escaped from Castle Oblivion, he needed to recuperate to fix the broken “chains of memories” created by the meddling of Kairi’s Nobody, Naminé, under the Organization’s orders. As Sora’s memories are continually restored, Roxas begins seeing the other boy’s memories as well, which is the catalyst to his resolution of betraying the Organization.
Roxas returns to the World That Never Was (the original base of operations for the Organization) in order to destroy Xemnas. He is intercepted by Riku. Because she has joined with Roxas, Xion is able to throw one of his Keyblades (Roxas acquires his ability to use two because of his merging with Xion) to Riku in an attempt to hamper Roxas so he cannot face Xemnas, as she believes he is not strong enough to defeat him. Riku defeats Roxas and is subsequently captured (he faints because he’s a pussy or something idk) as he and a man called DiZ want to merge Roxas with Sora to speed up the latter’s memory recollection. It’s shown that while battling Riku, Roxas’s memories of Xion slowly begin to fade (as for everyone else. Xion does find out that once she fades away, everyone’s memory of her also will.)
Zombies don’t develop through time, so I’m afraid I can’t answer that latter question. Oops.
Just kidding (though not about the zombie thing.) Roxas starts out as a completely apathetic boy, simply going along with what others say so he has something to do. After his birth, Roxas is. That’s all. He has nothing to live for, no reason to really do the Organization’s missions; he doesn’t even seem that interesting in becoming whole by regaining his heart. He simply works towards it because it’s a goal.
Becoming friends with Axel (and eventually Xion) changes that. Roxas finds that there is something he enjoys. He comes to realize that being away from his friends is an uncomfortable feeling. When he believes Axel is dead, he feels “choked up”. Gradually, he becomes accustomed to feeling these emotions that none of the other Organization members can feel, only emulate.
When Sora’s memory restoration begins affecting him, Roxas begins questioning his own existence. Why was he born? Why is he able to use the Keyblade? The Organization fails to answer these questions. With Xion’s departure from the group, Roxas begins to come into his own way of thinking - thinking for himself instead of following orders just to follow them. His irritation with his lack of knowledge makes him begin to feel indifferent, though he still holds that strong bond of friendship with Axel and Xion.
What point in time are you taking your character from when he/she appears at Landel's and why?:
I’m taking him from near the ending of 358/2 Days, after Riku has knocked him out but before he has completely forgotten Xion.
Please give us a detailed description of your character's personality:
The most important detail of Roxas’s personality is that he can feel emotions, setting him apart from all of the other Nobodies: essentially he (and Naminé) are the only exceptions to this rule. At his core, he is much like Sora, though he has his own personal differences.
For one, Roxas is much more quick to anger than Sora. In contrast to the beginning of Days, he is a boy who stands his ground - a fact that comes through his aggressive, in-your-face fighting style. During his fight with Riku, it’s shown that Roxas has an arrogant, confident side that comes through during battle (during this battle, he states, “You can’t beat me! No matter how many times you try!”
He’s strongly independent; even self-centered in a way. He does not like being compared to Sora. (He says many times through the game that “his heart belongs to me!”) Coincidentally, a lot of his clueless personality from the beginning of his existence also shines through. Roxas often seems to be rather solemn. He seems to take a lot of things literally and, when not angered, is generally very calm and rather quiet. He lacks much of Sora’s impulsive nature, though he shares his lack of patience with people who are trying to use him or confuse him.
His largest shared trait with Sora is his devotion to his friends. Roxas is nearly only ever shown as cheerful when surrounded by Axel and Xion; during their private moments, it’s as if he lets this hidden Sora part of him shine. He hates to seem them fight (Shouting “No!” when Axel and Xion look as if they’re going to fight at the end of Days) and is extremely loyal to them. Though somewhat aloof, he doesn’t dislike the company of others.
Luckily for himself, he also does not share Sora’s extreme naiveté. Though he seems to be clueless sometimes, it is not so easy to fool Roxas and, though his anger is quick, he is much more likely to think his actions through than storm in like Sora.
Please give us a physical description of your character:
Roxas is the shortest of all of the Organization members, standing at around 5’4”. His frame is rather small and he’s a bit wiry, echoing Sora’s own appearance as well. His hair is comprised entirely of brown-blond spikes that sweep together toward the right, with a few stray locks hanging in between his eyes. The latter are a bright blue, an exact echo of Sora’s. His face is very boyish, with rounded cheeks and large eyes.
For the duration of Days, he is dressed in the Organization’s uniform, consisting of a long (probably leather) coat that flares out around his ankles. The sleeves look like they were made for another member (interesting almost since every other Organization member’s coat is tailored specifically to them) as they almost completely envelop his hands, which are covered with black gloves. The coat is adorned with silver beaded pull cords and accents, and has a two-sided zipper (in which one zipper pull is at the top near his neck, and one is near the bottom, though the latter is always pulled up around his knees for maneuverability.) Like every other member, Roxas wears black pants under the coat. Unlike every other member, he wears black shoes instead of the usual knee-high boots.
What kinds of otherworldly abilities does your character have, if any?:
… good god, here we go. For this section, I’m going with how he fights during his boss battle from Final Mix because he never uses his powers otherwise.
Roxas is imbued with the power of light. This seems to equate to “he can move so fucking fast that you will never be able to hit him and he will brutally assault you as you taper off his twenty-two bars of health”. Roxas gains his full strength after absorbing Xion - he can move so quickly he leaves behind lens flares, glide a short amount of time (probably an ability inherited from Sora after his trip to Neverland) and can create thirteen sword-shaped weapons of light which can form a laser array.
Most importantly, he can wield two Keyblades simultaneously. He’s able to levitate both of them and whirl them around rapidly. He can perform this crazy-ass move where he levitates in the air as his thirteen light-swords surround him and ignite the entire area in light while he fires multitudes of balls of light that home in on his target and explode.
Yes.
As for his style, Roxas is far more aggressive than Sora. Wherein as the latter uses moves that block and dodge attacks, Roxas does neither. He is constantly on the offensive, rushing towards his opponent and trailing after them until they’ve fallen. He uses a variety of extremely physical moves to slide around his opponent and slice at them rapidly from their back as well as whip all over the damn place and hit them as hard as he can.
His two Keyblades appear as Oblivion (a darkness-based, black Keyblade) and Oathkeeper (a light-based, white Keyblade), both formerly acquired and wielded by Sora. When he uses only one Keyblade (as he does for the majority of Days) it appears as the Kingdom Key, Sora’s first and default Keyblade that is simply yellow and silver.
Further taking abilities from Sora, he can use the boy’s spells in battle, such as Blizzard, Fire, and Cure.
Also, he has control over lesser Nobodies known as Samurai (tall, white entities that have slits across their face that resembles masks and use two swords akin to Roxas’s two Keyblades. They move in quick, similar ways as Roxas).
It’s not important in the grand scheme of things, but it’s extremely important when remembering Roxas is a Nobody: he is capable of feeling emotions, despite not having a heart. It is because his strange creation method (and being the Keyblade Bearer’s Nobody) that causes him to be the exception to the Nobody rule.
If present, how do you plan to tweak these powers to make your character appropriately hindered in the setting of Landel's?:
HE CAN DO EVERYTHING YOU CAN’T STOP ME.
First of all, he can’t summon his Keyblades all willy-nilly like some kind of Nobody of a Keyblade master or something. He’s only going to be able to summon them if he has something in his hand (like a stick :B) which can take on the Keyblade’s form. Furthermore, he can only summon it when he’s in immediate danger. He can still wield two simultaneously, but only if he has two objects to take on their forms. Also, if he wields two versus one, he’s going to get much more fatigued much faster (sore muscles, shortness of breath, drained strength). He’ll be tired after using one Keyblade, but considerably less than if he had used two (basically the same symptoms, but not quite oh-god-gonna-faint levels.) He can only use the Keyblades for the duration of a battle or a dangerous situation, but if it goes on longer than twenty or so minutes the Keyblades will disappear and he will not be able to summon them that night again. As it goes, he can only summon one Keyblade twice a night, and two Keyblades once a night.
As for that crazy light shit? Sorry, no go, Rucksack. The only light-based thing he can do is create a very small (about the size of a golf ball) ball of light that doesn’t do much but illuminate an area to the equivalent of a lighter. Thus, really useless. It’ll only last for about five minutes, and he’ll feel tired (like he’d just run for a bit) after it disappears.
He also can't use any of his spells (Fire, Blizzard, Cure, etc.).
