a little boy's antics in a big boy's world ; frustrations in the world that never was

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a little boy's antics in a big boy's world ; frustrations in the world that never was

Riku is never that antagonistic with the Organization - not anymore. He's been far too busy with DiZ lately to act like a jerk, and definately too inclined to avoid the Castle altogether. But that doesn't mean he doesn't revisit sometimes, either to check the library or keep tabs on their actions.

He just doesn't... take a valid part.

Today is different. Maybe it's because of running into Namine in the bar, or maybe it's his frustration at an argument with DiZ last night. Maybe it's his lack of sleep, maybe it's missing his friends, maybe it's something altogether. In any case, he's pretty annoyed, and in need of an outlet.

Right now, he's sitting in the middle of one of the castle corridors, using Way to the Dawn to carve drawings into the castle wall. It doesn't really work that well - all it really achieves is marks and loud scraping noises - but it's entertaining him. That's clearly enough.

This corridor isn't his only victim. Another hallway's got million of papers scattered all over it. They looked important, so now... they can be less important. Something that served for a kitchen ( do they even need to eat? ) has been trashed up, all the good food taken and the rest of it scattered in interesting ways.

This outlet doesn't involve trying to bait anyone. Not at all.

One satisfactory sounding scrape, and a smirk curls at the edge of his lips.

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Xemnas may not have a heart, but that doesn't mean that he lacks something of a refined taste. He was a human, after all, and thus he possesses certain unconscious predispositions. He eats, even though he doesn't really need to. He has a bed and he sleeps in it, despite not actually needing the rest. They're human things to do.

Creating a comfortable environment to live in is also a human quality, which is why when Xemnas crosses through the kitchen as a shortcut to another hallway, he stops dead.

"What in the..." It's not what's missing that concerns him, no, because he can't even taste anything, not really. But the mess that's been left behind is another matter, and he snarls as he shoves open the opposing door and marches into the other hallway.

He is entirely too busy to do anything about it himself, but once he finds out who is responsible they will be cleaning every last bit of it up with their tongue, if Xemnas has anything to say about it.

Riku should blame Larxene. She always needed a job to do, huh? Busy her stupid little head with something other than wasteful little thoughts.

He decides that he should express himself in other ways. He feels the need for a song! And so, he lifts his voice high -

- "Farmer Xemnas had a dog, and Saix was his name-oh..."

The noise Riku is making, because that's honestly what it is, reaches Xemnas' ears only after being amplified and dubiously enhanced by bouncing around the cold, hard walls of the Castle. The Superior's first reaction is the snarl and snap back that he is not a farmer and that Saix, whatever his abilities may be, is a Nobody and not a canine.

Fortunately some shred of control stops him from doing so. Perhaps a sign of his frustration would be taken as incentive to create more havoc. Xemnas grits his teeth and listens, but the echoes are so extensive that he can't really tell where the noise first came from. The sound is too distorted for him to tell who's making it, either.

And so, bristling with barely suppressed anger, the Superior of the Organization stalks down the hall, listening very. very. carefully. in hopes that he can figure out who to punish for all of this.

Is song time over yet? No, not really. Riku's got to get a reaction sometime, and he'll just keep going until he gets it.

What else, what else? Hmm. Riku jumps to his feet, tapping the tip of the blade against the floor as he strides down it, looking for something else to entertain him with.

"Three blind Nobodies, three blind Nobodies, see how they run -- see how they run. They all ran after Larxene now and she cut off their bits with a carving knife. Did you ever see such a sorry sight as a Demyx singing falsetto?"

Demyx may not be the most dependable or talented member of the Organization, and Xemnas can't imagine anyone running after Larxene, but that's beside the point right now.

The Superior has had it.

"That is quite enough, I will have y-AAAAH!"

It's not a scream, per se, because Xemnas does not scream. It is, however, a shout of surprise, because in his anger he didn't see the mess of papers strewn across the hallway floor. Furthermore, owing to the lack of friction between paper and polished marble, the ones that he steps on slide unexpectedly.

Were it not for Xemnas' lightning reflexes, ones that send him into a quick and agile back handspring without a conscious thought, and a patch of bare floor behind him, things might have become substantially more embarrassing. As it is, he barely even notices that the papers strewn across the floor are important, ones that will take hours to reorganise.

Barely, being the operative word. He notices. And is not much amused.

"Hah!" Riku calls, from his own hallway. "I heard that! You ran into a trap, didn't you?"

Too bad he's not sure who he got. There's two chances out of thirteen that it could be someone who could actually hurt him. But maybe he doesn't feel like being careful, today.

Well, now Xemnas knows who's behind this. He wouldn't have put it past Larxene and her sometimes-infantile displays of frustration, but that voice, echoes or not, is definitely Riku's.

Xemnas manages to gather up all of the papers and dump them in his office; he can deal with them later. What he needs right now is some way to release his pent-up aggression. He ponders this as he continues along the hallway, relieved not to run into anymore difficulties.

And then he hears the scraping. It sounds familiar, almost like metal... against... stone...

Oh, NO.

One has to wonder why a Nobody would deal with paperwork, anyway. What exactly is he tracking? What consents does he need?

Riku lifts the keyblade, propping it against his shoulder as he ducks down another hallway. "Are we playing this the easy or hard way?" he calls. "Because the hard way's a lot more fun."

Xemnas is brilliant, possibly too brilliant for his own good. Being able to lay everything out in front of him is helpful. Besides, it is a Scientist's Way, to record and document. It's also this scientist's way to keep everything in good order. Damn it all...

"More fun for you, perhaps," Xemnas seethes, under his breath. You've overstepped your bounds, Riku, by more than you really want to think about. At some point, there will be punishment for this. He's not sure precisely what, or when, but that's his fun, figuring all of that out and bringing it down upon Riku's head with no warning.

For now, he does not give Riku a truly audible reply, but merely follows the sound of the boy's voice.

The gouged walls do give him pause, however. As he takes in the sight of the boy's artwork, or at least wanton destruction, Xemnas wonders if just this once he might give Larxene a bit of a present. No, then she might strain at her leash too much, like an animal that's tasted blood and becomes uncontrollable as it wants more and more.

Riku won't let himself get caught off guard by Larxene, anyway. He's prepared to kill her next time, if necessary.

"Aw, you stopped playing?" Riku sounds a little disappointed. "Too bad. I thought it took more to make you guys give up."

Perhaps Xemnas is still playing, just own his own terms. After all, the fewer reactions that he permits himself, the more stealthily he can move, without noise or utterances that might otherwise give him away.

For him it has become a game of hunter and hunted, and Riku's swath of destruction is the spoor that Xemnas is following. Because he, of course, is the hunter.

Nobodies don't just give up, after all. But they do try to twist things to their advantage, whenever they can.

Riku can smell darkness getting a little closer, and he ducks past a few corners and through a room with as little noise as possible. He wasn't going to be stupid, anyway - it wouldn't be good to get caught yet.

If at all.

"Have you heard the latest gossip?" He asks. "Axel's trying to set some new fashion standards. They're all the rage in Hollow Bastion."

"If at all" is probably Riku's safest bet, at this point.

"I do not think, Riku," Xemnas says calmly, "that Axel has any deep interest in the fashion. Now, why don't you stop running away and clean up this mess that you've made?"

Voices can also act as distractions. The Superior follows along Riku's trail, keeping a careful lookout for any more... unpleasant surprises.

"Nah," Riku says. "He's just got a deep interest in Roxas' butt."

So whoever's following him knows who he is. He considers letting them get a little closer, so he can recognize their voice - but again! That would be just dumb!

He reaches the library, and ducks in behind some stacks.

A deep interest in- a deep interest... Oh, for Nothing's sake.

Xemnas stalks into the library; he knows Riku is hiding in here because he can smell him. It's not like Riku's ability to smell darkness, no; these two were simply one and the same, at one point in time.

He can tell more or less where Riku is, by this point, and thus he avoids the boy's line of sight as he moves into the veritable forest of books.

Riku grabs onto one of the ladders, scaling to the next level of stacks. He stands there, looking over the rest of the library - but he's not really high enough to see everything.

"I propose a bargain," he calls, leaning over the railing. "You guys like games, don't you?"

"Not childish ones such as this," comes the reply, tone and timbre of the voice distorted by echoes. "But I will at least listen to what you have to say."

"I know you guys aren't allowed to hurt me," Riku says. "So if I lose the game, you get a free punch to the face. I won't even tell."

If whoever it was didn't want to do that before, they definately wanted to now!

"But if I win, you gotta do somethin' for me."

"What?"

"Dunno yet," Riku says. His voice is more than a little cheerful. "Guess you're going to have to find that out, won't you?"

"Your proposition is unacceptable, then," Xemnas replies. "It is an unfair exchange, for one party to have a specific reward and yet no limitations or even a general idea for the other."

He begins moving toward the sound of Riku's voice again; Xemnas is not foolish enough to make such an open-ended agreement.

"Alright," Riku says. He doesn't really care about gaining anything from this - it's just something stupid to pull. "Put some frogs in Larxene's bed."

Might be interesting to hear her reaction. Unless, of course, they were just her type.

It... would be interesting to reserve that as a punishment for anyone who misbehaved in the future. After all, Xemnas concludes, he has nothing to gain by playing fair. But.

"Considering your current mood, I believe that it would be easy enough for you to do that yourself."

Besides, it's not like Xemnas keeps frogs around for such occasions. Vexen might have had some, but IV is dead now, and thus not a viable option.

"Are you stupid?" Riku inquires, scoffing loudly. "I ain't going anywhere near that bitch. I'm not crazy."

He smirks.

"Maybe I just want to see you have to explain why you did something like that."

Yeah, he figured out who was in here with him. He was slow about it, but he wasn't going to be slow forever!

"No, but I am beginning to suspect that you might be. And such an explanation is something that you will never see, Riku, I can assure you of that."

He sighs. "Of course, if you're too afraid to go near her yourself, I suppose I can always give her your regards. With words, of course, as opposed to amphibians."

"Hey," Riku says, shrugging. He starts walking around the second level, his boots intentionally clunking on the floor. "I'm not stupid. I just figured, you think I'm your pet, I might as well make it interesting for you."

His grin shows far too many teeth.

"Not all dogs behave."

Avoiding the middleman of the stairs entirely, Xemnas simply disappears from the first level and reappears on the second in a swirl of black.

"Dogs that do not behave, however," he says, "are subject to discipline that obedient pets are not. The overly confident ones are especially prone to being reprimanded."

"Go ahead," Riku says, carelessly. He plants his feet and looks up at Xemnas, with a defiant look in his eyes.

"I'm not exactly scared."

"Good," Xemnas says simply. "An animal that is afraid is easily broken, and is useless. An animal that is not afraid is more likely to learn from its mistakes."

Not that Xemnas really expects Riku to change his ways, but right know he doesn't care. All the Superior knows is that he's frustrated, annoyed, and really has had quite enough of the infantile behaviour. What he wants, what he really and truly wants, is to hit something.

And so he throws a lightning quick punch right at Riku's eye, pulling it just enough to avoid any permanent damage. After all, the boy might not be as useful were he disabled.

Riku doesn't even twitch. He just stands there and takes it, his jaw set firmly to prevent any sort of wincing.

"You took the reward without even playing the game," he says, after a moment. "Isn't that against the rules?"

"You never established rules at the beginning. It is not, technically, possible for me to go against rules that do not exist. You should have taken that into consideration when you started all of this."

Xemnas folds his arms over his chest and regards Riku quietly for a moment before speaking again. "I also did not agree to play your game, and thus am not bound by any rules you may have chosen to set after you started."

"So basically," Riku says, "The rules stand however you want, just to amuse you."

He shrugs. He's not really surprised by that. Sometimes he doesn't object to it, either. Sometimes he feels like having a hard time.

What did that mean, anyway?

"Wonder how you keep so many loyal followers that way."

"I am the Leader. I see no reason for the rules to stand otherwise." Xemnas' expression is, of course, emotionless.

"Loyalty has nothing to do with it, save among those who choose to give it to me. The others know that the only rules that exist here are mine. If they obey orders, the rules will favour their continued existence.

"If they don't, then the rules can easily be rewritten to make sure that I will no longer need to concern myself with whether or not they'll do what I tell them to. That is something that I make all of my subordinates aware of."

Painfully aware of, if necessary.

"You're not my leader," Riku says. "And you're going to find that I don't care about those rules at all."

Riku hops onto the stairs again, making his way quickly down.

"You're not going to get anything you want, yaknow. Not in the end."

"If you don't play by the rules, then I'm not obliged to, either. That makes your position here far more tenuous than you realise, I think."

Xemnas doesn't seem to be at all concerned with Riku's last statement.

"Your presumption is amusing, little Riku. I look forward to seeing how this game plays out. After all, I have logic and rational thinking on my side. You have emotion and impulse, fickle bedfellows at best. And you need the information that I have. No, even if you don't care about the rules, there is only so far that you will go. Not while your curiosity remains unsated."

He makes no move to stop Riku. The boy can run as far and as fast as he wants, he won't get away.

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a little boy's antics in a big boy's world ; frustrations in the world that never was

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