Chapter Text
“Why did you make your chakrams the handle for your keyblade?”
He blinked, looking over at where Roxas and Xion were sitting on a bench outside the training circle, watching his form as he went through a few routines. After the Keyblade Graveyard, reunions, and spending several weeks just relaxing and reconnecting, he felt it was a good time to get back into his keyblade training. And as his two best friends were old hands with the thing, he had asked them for their opinions, hoping to show off a bit and impress them with what he learned while they were gone.
He did not get the response he was expecting. They had both been pretty blunt on what areas he was lacking in, how his refusal to use anything besides fire magic was holding him back, and he grumpily conceded their point. In retaliation though, he had dragged them with him back to Merlin’s time pocket world for the day. If they had so many problems with his form, they should at least help him get better with the all powerful weapon. And he did keep insisting that he was going to be a Keyblade Master one day, he had to grab into any help he could get.
He really wanted to see the look on everyone’s faces when Yen Sid had no choice but to grant him the title.
He just had to get there first.
“Uh, I didn’t, it's just how it looks,” he dismissed the keyblade, forming his old chakrams in its place. “See, completely separate. These are way bigger anyways.”
“It's the same shape though,” Xion tilted her head. “I don’t think I’ve seen that in other keyblade designs, and Sora’s had a ton.”
“That's only cause he keeps putting weird keychains on them. Isn’t the keyblade supposed to represent your heart anyways? Or something?”
“I guess then my heart is very pointy and…” Lea stared at the chakram. “Round?”
“Also firey. I think the round part is right though, I remember what Sora’s looks like. although the pointy?” Roxas raised an eyebrow with a smirk. “You’re too soft for that.”
“Hey,” he pointed threateningly at the boy with a barely suppressed smirk. “I’ll have you know I can be plenty pointy when I need to be.”
“Axel’s right,” they both looked at Xion in surprise, but she had a sly smile on her face. “Look at how skinny he is, his whole body is a point. Whenever I hug you I feel like I’m hugging a knife!”
“Hey!” he dismissed the chakrams, dramatically planting his hands on his hips. “I’m not that skinny.”
“No Xion’s right,” Roxas grinned at him with a laugh. “You are really pointy.”
“Torn apart by my own best friends, I see how it is,” he rolled his eyes as they laughed together, and he gave them a soft smile. “Now, stop distracting me. I’m supposed to be getting better with this thing I don’t appreciate you trying to keep me from my destiny of being better than you half-pints.”
“That’ll never happen.”
“Well we’ll just have to see on that, won’t we.”
He resummoned his keyblade, tossing it around a few times in his hand before giving a nod, letting the training round begin again. Merlin had put intricate spells on the training ring so anyone using it would have actual enemies to hit, dodge, and fight when practicing on their own. Lea wondered why the stand in enemies were floating pieces of furniture though.
Going through the round, he kept an ear out for Roxas and Xion as they yelled at him suggestions and different mistakes he was making. Jumping up to the side he held his arm back for a toss, squinting at a zooming chair heading in his direction.
“DON’T THROW YOUR KEYBLADE! BLOCK!”
“Huh?” he looked backed at Roxas and Xion in confusion, and the motion revealed to him the stool that he hadn’t seen barrelling straight towards his head. Doing his best to throw up a block, he winced as he took the brunt of the attack, landing back on the ground with a grunt. At least he had managed to stay standing.
“Damn it…”
“You ok Axel?”
“Yeah I’m fine,” he waved off his friends concerns, looking at his keyblade with a frown.
It just felt off to him. He was used to two weapons to cover him, and he always had been a distant fighter, using his chakrams to pressure people into moving away from him, safer at a distance. It wasn’t good to go from those habits, to a keyblade that required close combat and feeling like his free hand was dangerously empty all the time. He looked at Roxas, sighing. “I kind of wish I could wield two keyblades like you. Anyway I could steal one of them from you for a bit?”
“I mean, if I could teach you sure, I wouldn’t mind, but it's like,” Roxas shrugged. “They’re my keyblades, they work as one for me. I don’t think we could trick the magical unknown keyblade system into letting you use two different ones.”
“Yeah, no obviously not,” he sighed, walking back to them, dragging his feet in aggravation. “So? Any better? Give it to me straight now.”
Roxas and Xion shared a look, and he felt his heart sink. It kind of sucked, not being able to pick up wielding faster, he felt like he was gonna keep just being stuck behind everyone else, struggling to catch up and be there for them.
He had to be there for his friends. He had to be ready in case anything tried to take them away again.
“Well, you’re still a bit too willing to throw your keyblade away at every attack, it leaves you open all the time,” Roxas rubbed his chin.
“And I still don’t like how you hold it,” Xion nodded. “I think you might break your fingers one day.”
He slumped down in dejection. “Ah.. got it…”
“But I think it's a good start! Like, you got a really unique style, which will throw people off!”
“I know I need to keep working-wait what?” he looked at Roxas, blinking.
“Like, throwing and weird stance is different from us, but obviously there’s a part of it that clicks for you, you just need to get better at when’s the best time to use that stuff,” Roxas nodded quickly. “And when you make your keyblade into your chakrams again? That's super cool, I don’t think I could do that.”
“Me neither! Well, maybe if I copied you like I did with Roxas’ keyblade and Isa’s claymore,” Xion clapped her hands together in excitement. “I think you just need to figure out how to make your whole thing more… stable I guess?”
“Axel is never stable though. More refined is more like it.”
“Yeah that's a good word for it!”
“So…” he shifted, tossing his keyblade over his shoulder as he stared at them. “You don’t think how I do this is… terrible?”
“What?”
“No!”
“We never thought you were terrible. Just kind of… really rough,” Xion wiggled her hand back and forth. “But you still look cool at least!”
“Yeah! Which is obviously most important.”
“That and not getting hit.”
“Eh, looking cool is still more important. Hayner said so.”
“Hayner doesn’t fight Roxas.”
“He does in Struggle matches!”
He felt a small smile fall over his face as his two friends bickered. It still didn’t feel great being so far behind everyone else with keyblade training, but he supposed that was ok. He got into it later then everyone else, and had a completely different skillset holding him back. Eventually he’d adapt to it.
And honestly, his friends saying he looked cool was a nice ego boost.
“Alright, thanks,” he stretched his arms up with a grin. “I think I’ll do one more round and then its ice cream time.”
“Aw yeah! Ice cream! You’re paying.”
“With what munny-you know what sure, fine, whatever.”
He swung his keyblade in his hand, watching the blade sparkle with an ever burning flame. One day he’d feel like this weapon was a proper extension of himself. He just had to keep reaching for it.