[center][img]https://fontmeme.com/permalink/220729/023912a75a8a9b16c801799640a60148.png[/img]

[H3]Suoh[/h3][u]Roxas vs Ninten & Lucas[/u]

[b]Word Count:[/b] 3,601
[b]Level 7 Roxas:[/b] 11/70
[b]Exp:[/b] 4
[b]NEW EXP Balance---[/b] 15/70[/center]

Roxas was already exasperated by the time he managed to regroup with the others. The Others that he had fought his way through managed to drain him of much of his MP, and now he only had enough for one or two spells before it would have to recharge. But it wasn’t long before the group’s troubles took another bad turn. Suddenly they were confronted by more members of Psych-OSF, and unfortunately the Seekers were outnumbered. They were calling Luka’s entire platoon traitors, and Hanabi and Yuito too since they were there as well. This was not a battle Roxas wanted to fight, but it became increasingly clear that he wasn’t going to get a choice.

[color=Gold]”I may not be a Scarlet Guardian, or even a psionic at all.”[/color] Roxas said, summoning both of his Keyblades, [color=Gold]”But these are my friends, and that’s all I need to know!”[/color] The two psionics who happened to be nearest to him looked like kids - no older than Raz, Lili, or even Roxas himself. Still, with that SAS link of theirs, Roxas knew he couldn’t take them lightly. He took a deep breath, and then Roxas went on the attack. He tested the waters first by throwing his Keyblades, one at each of the boys.

[center][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeOF8WNDUxU[/youtube][/center]

From the beginning Lucas looked nervous, standing behind his friend Ninten despite being taller. He clearly didn’t want to follow through on the challenge posed by the other OSF soldiers, and when Roxas stepped up to take them on, he reflexively took a step back. Unfortunately, he’d have to run a lot farther to escape from the Seeker’s double keyblade toss. As one hurtled toward him he hunkered down behind a psychic bubble shield, his eyes squeezed shut, but as ever his companion took the initiative. “Hyah!” With practiced timing Ninten whacked the first keyblade with his baseball bat, returning it to sender with interest. The other bounced off Lucas’s shield, depleting it by about a third though it’d recharge fast once he lowered his guard.

“You’ve gotta be brave, Lucas!” Ninten called out with determination, his bat at the ready for more projectiles. With an enemy in their midst, it went without saying why Ninten needed a partner in this fight. “We can’t let these baddies win. Just think what Commander Camilla would say!”

Lucas took a deep breath and lowered his guard. Both his friend and his platoon leader were right, and he couldn’t afford to let either of them down. Instead he clenched his teeth and balled his fists, the sight of which made Ninten smile. “Alright, let’s do this!”

His PSI energy surged around Lucas as he used OffenseUp, granting him an attack boost just before Lucas let loose some power of his own. “PK Thunder!” An orb of intense lightning appeared and flew through the air, guided by Lucas to home in on the location of his opponent. While it traced a serpentine path toward Roxas, a trail of electricity in its wake, Ninten prepared to use QuickUp to grant his ally a speed boost as well.

When his own Keyblade was suddenly flying back at him, Roxas wasn’t too worried. He reached out and recalled the flying blade to his hand with a flash of light. The other weapon also vanished shortly after colliding with Lucas’ bubble shield. From there Roxas made a split decision on who to focus on first. The blonde boy used his powers to summon a bolt of lightning that he could apparently control in its trajectory, while the boy with a red hat used his powers to apparently buff himself and his partner. Roxas chose to focus on Lucas first, seeing the PK Thunder as a more immediate threat to deal with.

Roxas tried dodging away from the lighting at first, but this was how he figured out that Lucas was actively controlling its trajectory. So instead of trying to run he whipped around and threw his Keyblade a second time, hoping this was sudden enough for the weapon to collide with the lightning before Lucas had a chance to maneuver it around. Immediately after this, Roxas summoned his other Keyblade and pointed it in Lucas’s direction, [color=Gold]”Fire!”[/color] he cried and shot a Firaga from the tip of the Keyblade that hurled toward the blonde psionic. These two weren’t the only ones capable of wielding elemental attacks.

His efforts were rewarded with a solid [i]bonk[/i] to his target’s oversized head, eliciting an “Owie!” as Lucas recoiled. When a roiling blast of fire followed it up, Lucas panicked, his fight-or-flight reflex activated. He managed to put up his PSI Magnet just in time, meaning that the Firaga got absorbed by the rippling nexus of energy and partially converted into health. Rather than drop the Magnet, however, Lucas continued to hide behind it.

[color=Gold]”Why are you doing this?””[/color] Roxas suddenly demanded, [color=Gold]”We haven’t done anything!”[/color]

But Roxas wasn’t about to leave himself open from trying to talk. While he asked his questions, Roxas snapped his fingers on his free hand and summoned Burn Rooster. The robotic Reploid leaped into action and proceeded to launch into a fiery flying kick at Ninten. Roxas meanwhile ran forward intending to keep focusing on Lucas while his Striker hopefully kept Ninten distracted.

Ninten’s buffs only actually affected his target, so when Burn Rooster threw himself at the boy, Ninten wasn’t quite ready. The Reploid’s kick sent him into a tumble with a yelp, his clothes asmoulder with flaming embers. Though Lucas had squeezed his eyes shut while defending himself with PSI Magnet at first, he’d opened them in time to see his friend hit the ground. “Ninten!” he cried, his means of defending himself momentarily forgotten.

“Kid!” Rope Snake yelled urgently as Roxas approached. “Get your head in the game!”

Roxas raised his weapon, but found himself unable to actually bring it down for a strike. This just didn’t feel right. None of it did. Roxas shook with anger and confusion, [color=Gold]”I’m not your enemy. I don’t want to fight.”[/color] he said after he stayed his Keyblade, [color=Gold]”And I have a feeling you don’t either.”[/color] That last part was for Lucas in particular. Roxas could see that the kid didn’t seem to want to actually be here right now. There had to be some way to end this without fighting. And while Roxas knew he could be making a big mistake right now… he dispelled his Keyblade.

If he or the others were really the traitors that these Psych-OSF agents were told they were, then why would at least one of them be so reluctant to fight right now? He hoped maybe this would make Lucas and Ninten think and maybe even question their orders. Of course, they might not. It was a giant risk Roxas was taking, but he preferred it over the alternative of wielding his Keyblade against two kids who didn’t know any better.

Somewhat paradoxically, the Nobody’s heart was in the right place, but the die had already been cast. Diplomacy would never win in the World of Light while Galeem reigned. After Rope Snake’s urging, and his attacker’s hesitation, Lucas quickly mustered up the willpower to do just as he was told. He lashed out with Rope Snake himself, snatching Roxas and reeling him on. Taken by surprise, he received a couple PSI sparks from the psionic’s oversized cranium before Lucas used his power to fling his disoriented opponent over his head and behind him. As he took a tumble, Lucas clasped his hands together and lifted his head up. “PK Freeze!” From the ether he formed a miniaturized ice storm and flung it in an arc after Roxas, the wintry singularity growing bigger and stronger the farther it went.

By that time Ninten had risen, and he used this opportunity to cast DefenseUp on himself.

Roxas was acrobatic enough to right himself in midair after the psychic throw. Deep down he knew it was pointless to try and talk them down, but he couldn’t help himself. He saw something icy arcing its way toward him and had to act fast. Before he even started falling back down, Roxas summoned Oathkeeper and pointed it straight forward, [color=Gold]”Freeze!”[/color] he called out. Once again he was using an elemental spell of his own. This time it would be ice vs ice as Roxas’ Blizzaga clashed with Lucas’ PK Freeze.

Unfortunately that was the last of Roxas’ MP. His feet touched the ground and he simply readied his Keyblades, knowing that now he’d have to outlast these two long enough for his MP to recharge itself. The enormous mass of ice crashed to the ground between the two sides and shattered noisily, filling the air with cool diamond dust. Once Ninten finished up his pre-fight buffs with OffenseUp on himself, he hefted his bat and ran forward through the mist to challenge the keyblade wielder head-on, prompting Lucas to run after him. While he gauged his opponent’s strength in melee combat, Lucas circled around shooting PK Fires to try and keep his friend covered.

This was not a particularly great situation for the Nobody to find himself in. He was obviously no slouch in melee combat so fending off even the buffed Ninten’s strikes was something he would ordinarily not have much difficulty with. It was Lucas who was making this harder than it otherwise would be. He fired off a series of little yellow lightning bolts that suddenly burst with fire as soon as they touched anything. And without any MP, there wasn’t much Roxas could do about them. Not while Ninten was staying in his face and keeping him from disengaging.

Roxas did manage to avoid most of the PK Fires, but at least one of them nailed him in the back while he had his Keyblades locked with Ninten’s baseball bat. The only idea he could think of after recovering from that was to jump a step back from Ninten and then throw both his Keyblades in a circular arc around himself. That would at least give him a moment’s reprieve to reposition himself so that at least his two opponents weren’t flanking him. Then he recalled his keyblades to his hands and immediately threw one in Lucas’ direction. Then he readied his other Keyblade to try and block what he anticipated would be another direct melee strike from Ninten.

Unlike Roxas, unfortunately, Ninten wasn’t a trained fighter. He generally fought with the finesse (and strength) of the little boy he was, refined by his experience in the OSF but still no great shakes. His stat boosts helped even the odds somewhat, but he’d generally given worse than he’d gotten. When Roxas launched a keyblade revolution the unexpected trajectory of his weapons resulted in a clock to Ninten’s head that left him a little dizzy, but when Roxas hurled one at Lucas he knew he couldn’t relent. He dashed in and performed a big bat swing that Roxas blocked, leaving himself overextended and vulnerable. Lucas managed to roll out of the way of the other keyblade, and when he saw his friend in trouble, he knew it was his turn to save Ninten. “PK Thunder!” The thunderhead snaked its way toward Roxas, cast because Lucas was now too far for PK Fire, but his projectile’s travel time left a little to be desired.

Roxas was about to follow up against Ninten only to spot the PK Thunder arcing his way. This was starting to become repetitive, but until his MP recharged all Roxas could do was keep holding out. He shoved the overextended Ninten aside and took off in a sprint, with the PK Thunder seeming to give chase. Roxas wasn’t sure he could outrun it for long, or even how long Lucas could sustain the attack. And so the only solution Roxas could think of was to charge straight in Lucas’ direction. He’d have to snake around to try and dodge the PK Thunder but if Roxas could get in striking range he could probably hit Lucas and hopefully break the psionic’s concentration to dispel the thunder attack.

When Roxas broke into a run to evade the seeking thunderhead, Lucas knew that his PK Thunder didn’t have the longevity -or speed- to give chase. Instead he sent it into the ground to cut it off early, and as Roxas sped his way he cast off a second one. Rather than try to tag his agile opponent with it, however, he sent it in an loop above and behind him. If Roxas thought that this was a misfire, though, he’d be sorely mistaken. The moment Lucas guided the PK Thunder into his own back, an explosive reaction launched him forward in a headfirst corkscrew, armored against interruption. His aim wasn’t perfect, but if Roxas wasn’t ready, he’d find himself on the receiving end of a surprise headbutt. With the pressure off him for a moment, meanwhile, Ninten went to heal himself with the PSI skill LifeUp.

Roxas was utterly confused when Lucas fired a PK Thunder that he turned around onto himself. The Keybearer had no idea what the kid was actually trying to do, and so when Lucas suddenly came flying forward at him head-first, Roxas could only put his Keyblades up in a defensive stance. But the sudden attack left him no time to properly brace himself. And so when the charged up headbutt collided with him, it resulted in Roxas getting knocked down the ground. His Keyblades being up prevented him from taking serious damage, but that didn’t stop him from having the wind knocked out of him. Roxas lay there a moment, realizing that Lucas had to recover from launching himself and that Ninten was nearby appearing to heal himself. Roxas pulled out his last Potion, put it up to his mouth, and drank it.

That at least dealt with the damage Roxas had taken so far, or at least a portion of it anyway. But he was still catching his breath from being winded even as he pushed himself to his feet. But just then, his MP was finished charging. So far Roxas had been fighting with the equivalent of an arm tied around his back thanks to having no MP. But not anymore. He dashed forward toward Lucas and aimed the tip of one of his Keyblades at him, [color=Gold]”Fire!”[/color] The firaga spell shot forth and rolled through the air at Lucas. Afterward Roxas suddenly lunged to his side and attempted to rush Lucas with his Keyblades from an angle that was different from the firaga’s trajectory.

A fireball Lucas could handle, and he put up his PSI Magnet to do just that, absorbing it just like the spell he’d soaked before. Thanks to his speed, however, Roxas turned his simple cast into a two-pronged attack, and when it came to physical strikes, PSI Magnet did nothing at all. And Lucas soon found himself being knocked a few feet upward by Roxas bringing his Keyblades around into an upper slash. And that was all the opening Roxas needed to leap up and strike at Lucas a few successive times, four to be exact. On the fifth attack, Roxas hooked his Keyblades onto Lucas and brought him back down in a sort of suplex slam.

At this point Roxas chose to cast yet another spell, [color=Gold]”Thunder!”[/color] he cried with both weapons pointed straight up. This called down a short-lived rain of thunderbolts around himself. Lucas would naturally be within the area of effect, but if Ninten had tried to approach with any baseball bat attacks, then he’d be inadvertently putting himself within the area of effect as well.

Ninten had watched the combo Roxas performed on Lucas with dismay, unable to intercede with his bat while the keyblade wielder kept his friend in the air. In a panic he used the SAS to activate Umbrakinesis, Audiokinesis, Telekinesis, and Precognition all at the same time, desperately trying to find something he could use as an attack. With everything at his disposal though, Ninten got overwhelmed, and he ended up doing nothing. Only when Roxas brought Lucas back down to earth could he do what he did best, and run in to whack his foe with his baseball bat. Instead he took a thunderbolt to the head, but as much as it hurt, he could see -and hear- Lucas getting worse. “Stop!” he yelled, his voice boosted by Audiokinesis to a shockingly loud level. Finally getting an idea, he used Telekinesis to hurl his baseball bat like a boomerang, then tapped into his own PSI. When he cast Hypnosis, Roxas fell asleep where he stood, slumping over limply. 

Lucas hit the ground at his opponent’s feet as the lightning storm abated, and Ninten ran toward the both of them, his bat returning to his hand on the way. “Coming your way!” he yelled, empowering himself with OffenseUp. As Lucas rolled away onto his feet, Ninten struck Roxas with a home run swing, sending him flying toward the kid he’d electrocuted. Lucas snatched him with Rope Snake, whirled him around, and buried him in the ground headfirst. Somehow that didn’t hurt very much, but what came next very much did. Lucas performed a dash, slid to a stop right next to Roxas in a cloud of dust, and delivered [url=https://pm1.aminoapps.com/6432/1da7d60dcf52e972ba07b215e282e9d9b6aab8f7_00.jpg]PK Love[/url] “HYA!”

First was the shout, big and loud enough that Roxas was momentarily disoriented. And that, apparently, was all Ninten needed. The baseball bat came crashing into him, and then Roxas felt drowsy all of a sudden. He fought to keep his eyes open but the Hypnosis was too strong and the Nobody fell asleep. He was awoken by a bit swing from Ninten that sent Roxas flying. Then he got snared by Lucas’ rope snake and then hurled upward by his powerful crackling PSI attack.

Roxas was in trouble. He was taking serious damage at this point and would go down unless he healed himself. But if he did that, he’d lose all his MP and would once again have to survive long enough for it to recharge. He wasn’t sure he could do that a second time against these two. Especially not with Ninten being able to heal himself and presumably Lucas too with his LifeUp. So the choice was either risk having the two outlast him, or try to go all out now and hope it’s enough to end this now. Either way he was taking a gamble.

Roxas managed to right himself while he was in midair. And then he came shooting straight back down at the unsuspecting Lucas in the form of a streak of light that exploded into a Cross Slash as soon as he hit the boy. Ninten came charging in for a swing of his bat, but it just met Roxas’ Keyblades. And Ninten wasn’t expecting an instant response that came in the form of Roxas sweeping his blades around himself in a circular slash that was Dual Counter. And then, with only a sliver of MP left, Roxas thrust both his Keyblades skyward.

[color=Gold]”You can’t stop me!”[/color] And upon that command, columns of bluish light shot straight up from his Keyblades and into the sky only to come crashing down onto the ground around Roxas. The columns of light were fast, difficult to avoid and could hit hard when they struck. Ninten avoided the first couple of columns but his own mental and physical fatigue started getting the better of him and he started taking hits. Lucas instinctively tried to put up his PSI Magnet, after all it was able to absorb the Nobody’s spells earlier so why would this be any different. But PSI Magnet could only absorb so much before even it was overpowered by the strength of Roxas’ light columns. And then Roxas floated up a few feet, [color=Gold]”Give me strength!”[/color] he cried bringing both his back down and bent at the elbows as if to fully exert himself. At this, the columns of light increased in size, strength, and speed. If this [url=https://kh.wiki.gallery/images/c/c5/Magic_Hour_KHD.gif]Magic Hour[/url] attack was hard for the boys to avoid before, well now it was bordering on impossible.

In moments, Roxas’ Magic Hour petered out and ended. It left him drained and exhausted. But luckily for him, it looked like the gambit paid off. Ninten and Lucas were both sprawled on the ground, neither were able to overcome the barrage of light columns. But they were only unconscious, which was a relief to Roxas. He never had any desire to fight these two boys in the first place, so if they had become spirits he would have felt terrible.

[color=Gold]”I’m sorry it came to this.”[/color] Roxas said softly to the unconscious Ninten and Lucas. He staggered toward them, with Oathkeeper still in his hand. [color=Gold]”May my Heart be my Guiding Key.”[/color] He performed a Keyblade Purge, first on Ninten and then on Lucas. With them being unconscious, the technique went off without a hitch and so they were both freed. But it was after this that Roxas finally dispelled his Keyblades and plopped down with a thud. He was so tired he couldn’t even stay standing. This was now the third and fourth people he had used the Keyblade Purge on within a relatively short period of time. And that fact was definitely beginning to take its toll on the Nobody.

[color=Gold]”I hope we can be friends after all this is over.”[/color]