Roxas scoffed with an eye roll,
“Truly a man with personality.” Talking about Xemnas had been. . .well easier than expected. The ‘boss’ was somewhat of a sore spot for him. After all, he’d been through a lot of pain just because of that one person. And all his friends who had been hurt. . .well the past is the past. Roxas shook off his thoughts and returned to the question at hand,
“Well…to be honest there’s a lot of new for me currently. So adding three more to the hurdle hasn’t been too overwhelming,” There’s a warm smile across his face as he spoke, “I have so many questions, but I don’t know what I should ask first…” Roxas shifted to cross his legs and better face Ventus. If this was going to become a full-on talk he wanted to be comfortable,
“I wanna know about your home I guess. What was is like training to use the Keyblade? And how you met Aqua and Terra? Or I guess how did you become friends?” He could feel a rush of other questions just on the tip of his tongue but he stayed quiet. Honestly, he needed to relax. The insatiable curiosity Roxas had needed to be taken down a peg or two eventually…
“Home? Well... For a while. it was all I knew! Training, goofing off with those two... Hoping Master Eraqus didn’t catch Terra and I doing anything too dumb... It was nice. Every day was a lesson. Something new to learn! It wasn’t easy.”
He turns as well. The conversation was turning out more more interestingly than the sunset, for the moment.
“In fact, I bet lots of the others couldn’t take it!!” Ven laughs, crossing his arms in an almost playful manner. “Or... Not. Yeah they’d probably do fine... The lessons and exercises were just... what we did, I guess. Learning about light and our duty to defend it. The world order... Still though, responsibilities or not, it was nice. Simple, back then. Everything I ever really wanted was just... down the hall! As for Aqua and Terra... I didn’t know how I met them until later.”
He thinks for a moment... How do you explain this..? Ah well... Here goes. “Before I trained with Master Eraqus, I was Xehanort’s pupil. Uh... Yeah. Bad start, I know. But at the time, nobody knew he was trouble! I... don’t remember much, but the training was brutal. It was all about embracing rage and darkness, and crushing enemies... I think, even then, he was setting me up to form that weapon. The X-Blade... Maybe to fight Aqua or Terra for it? I don’t know. Eventually, it was too much. There was a whole horde of heartless. I remember begging for help. Saying that I wasn’t ready... But he just watched. Eventually... They got me. My heart was being overrun by darkness... So Xehanort split me in two. Forcefully pulled that darkness out. That’s what Vanitas is...”
He trails off, but shakes his head. This wasn’t even the question he’d been asked! “That’s when I met Sora for the first time. I didn’t really know it, but his heart reached out to mine. He gave me some of his light, so I wouldn’t lose anything else. After that, I guess I wasn’t as dead as Xehanort thought. But he didn’t want to train me anymore? So he took me to Master Eraqus. Terra and Aqua were already there. I was really out of it, so I don’t remember much about the beginning. But eventually, we got to be pretty close friends. Training alongside each other, and laughing together!! Lots of stargazing. How about you? Xion and Axel, right? How’d you guys start out?? And get this close?!”
The story Ventus had just shared was a heavy one, true. But... Oddly enough, he didn’t seem to mind. He felt Roxas would understand, even if that didn’t make much sense. And he really did wonder about the other’s friends. He has his own curiosity in this!!