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Take my hands instead, won’t you?
Vanitas stared blankly up towards Ventus and took in his glassy, pale eyes and the utter stinging warmth of his touch against his scarred cheek. How he had longed for that touch, that aching love and peace that had been so violently stripped away from him for so many years and left his heart a hollow, shattered mess of pain and agony that chewed away at his mind every lonesome moment he lived.
Vanitas had never felt so entranced by anything in his life. As Ventus held his face and leaned in closer, Vanitas felt like a magnet being pulled into the storm of pure light that resided within his other half. Ventus’s long, thin fingers softly dragged down and across Vanitas’s face to tilt his chin upwards ever so slightly. The bubbling and growing light within Ventus urged him forward, urged him to take his other half into him, urged him to complete both himself and Vanitas once more, urged him to consume and eviscerate the darkness in front of him until there was only light.
“Come closer to me, Vanitas,” Ventus spoke in his monotonous voice, tinging it with the slightest hint of affection.
His face nearly pressed against Vanitas’s, their lips almost close enough to brush against each other. In that moment of being shrouded in Ventus’s light, Vanitas felt himself begin to slip away. He did not protest; he refused to fight, refused to distance himself any further from the other boy. He craved to be home again so terribly that nothing else mattered, nothing else even existed beyond Ventus and his light in that moment.
With a nearly-blinding flash of pure white, Vanitas and Ventus felt themselves morph and melt into one another.
Warmth.
Sadness.
Love.
Pain.
Joy.
Loneliness.
Peace.
Pain.
Pain.
Pain .
What?
Ventus—
Stop.
Sweetness and affection and pleasure were no longer present. Nothing good was present. Pain and terror filled the senses of the two of them—no, filled the senses of…
Vanitas.
No.
Vanitas did not feel himself joining with Ventus. Their hearts had not linked, their bodies were not becoming one.
No, no, no .
Vanitas felt himself being torn apart. Ventus’s light wracked his form and stabbed through his body like a thousand unrelenting Keyblades. He felt himself slipping away—a terrible sensation now.
Ventus was there, his light unwavering and powerful, consuming and destroying more and more of what remained of Vanitas’s broken heart and soul.
STOP!
Vanitas used his last ounces of energy that were quickly diminishing to pull himself apart from Ventus, pull his heart away from his other half in a way that was all too painfully similar to his birth. He felt his heart shriek as both pain from the light and agony from being torn away from Ventus simultaneously clawed at his very being. Another blinding flash of light and a powerful wave of darkness passed between the two of them, and they were both thrown to the hard ground below as consciousness was temporarily stolen from them both.
Why…
Vanitas began to stir awake, blinking his eyes to focus in on his blurry, blank surroundings. His body felt as though it was at war with itself; he felt stinging pricks in his chest and stomach, as well as sparks of comfort and warmth coursing through him. Suddenly, even the positive feelings within him started to crawl up his body and towards his throat in violent spasms of pain. Vanitas clutched his stomach and vomited on the spot, sending what remained of the beautiful, horrible light out of his body and across the parched soil beneath.
It felt disgusting and soothing all at once, an endless stream of conflicting feelings too simultaneous and too new for Vanitas to grasp or settle into at all. All he had known was suffering and anguish, and that was all he needed to know.
Is this supposed to be the salvation I was promised?
Vanitas sat up dazed and lost in thought as he stared forward towards Ventus’s sprawled out, motionless body. His response was delayed and his reaction to the sight didn’t kick in until several moments of his eyes rolling about listlessly around the Badlands had passed.
Ventus .
Vanitas snapped back into the reality of his situation and began crawling forward towards the other sleeping boy. He leaned in towards Ventus and his left hand hovered over his pale, ashen face.
What happened to you?
Nothing about this was right . Though he could always feel Ventus along the way, could always feel bits and pieces of his overpowering light enter and exit his heart, he never even imagined this was what his own light was doing to him.
Is he always in pain, too?
Vanitas shuddered at the thought passing through his mind. He certainly never felt such a pain in the past when their hearts had briefly connected when Ventus’s light was a bit too strong. Xehanort definitely never mentioned anything like this when he had made the feeble promise of Vanitas receiving freedom from his own suffering by joining with Ventus.
I can’t join with you like this .
Slowly, agonizingly, Vanitas felt panic rising up within him. He began questioning the futility of the situation, questioning his entire life and purpose up to that point. Had Xehanort truly been lying to him about it all? Did he know Ventus was unable to forge the χ-blade with him? Did he know how sick the light made Ventus? Vanitas pondered for a moment whether or not his life full of torment and daily punishments for merely existing was just as horrifying as what Ventus had been living with.
What did he mean he wasn't allowed to wield his Keyblade?
Why was he acting so strange?
Why does he look so different now?
His body is so weak, but his light is so strong.
Is he being destroyed by his own light?
Is he so disillusioned by his own light he doesn't even realize it's killing him?
Is his light going to kill me, too?
So many questions that Vanitas didn’t truly want to know the answers to raced through his thoughts. Vanitas shifted backwards with a start as Ventus slowly came to, his body twitching slightly and his glassy eyes peering open and fixating on Vanitas’s golden gaze.
Anger.
The burst of foreign emotion sent a shudder through Ventus’s frail body as he stared at Vanitas sitting just inches away, wearing the same frightened look that he knew all too well from Aqua, Terra, and Eraqus. He was angry—an emotion he hadn’t felt for so long that he had truly forgotten how to feel it.
Why am I feeling this way?
Darkness. The powerful embodiment of pure darkness sitting next to him was still alive. Still sitting there as though his light hadn’t touched it, hadn’t defeated it, hadn’t scrubbed the earth clean of its putrid existence.
How infuriating… but why?
Ventus could only be allowed the chance to feel a full negative emotion for so long before it was erased all over again by his overwhelming light. His anger faded, and with it vanished the thoughts that had all but consumed his mind only seconds ago.
But… my light was making me angry…
“Ventus…”
Ventus was unable to think about his confused state of mind any longer as he heard Vanitas whisper his name. Vanitas’s voice was hoarse, raspy as though something had damaged his throat and hindered his ability to speak well without pain.
“I don’t… understand…,” Vanitas murmured, not entirely directing his words towards Ventus, and merely rambling off into the empty air with no true intent staining his voice or the sentence it carried. His mind was as much of a blank slate now as Ventus’s always had been.
“This wasn’t supposed to happen… this wasn’t how it was supposed to end….” Vanitas’s voice rose up in volume, and his shaky legs lifted him off the ground slowly as his head hung low and strands of messy black hair obscured his face.
“We were supposed to join, we were supposed to form the χ-blade together, we were supposed to become one …” Vanitas’s words grew more desperate and frantic as he stumbled across the dry soil and towards Ventus, reaching his trembling arms outwards as though trying to grab something just out of reach.
“You—no, we were supposed to become the world , the strongest weapon, and… my suffering would finally end …”
Ventus could only stare with his doll-like expression and empty smile as his mind and heart refused to acknowledge the brewing darkness in front of him any longer.
Ah, his light was cleansing him once more, ensuring him safety and peace as it always had.
Vanitas collapsed to his knees in front of Ventus, wailing out as heartache and anger tore through his form.
“Why… why is your pitiful light hurting me… why can’t I join with you?! ”
Vanitas’s cries echoed through the lifeless desert, and no answer was granted to him as his heart felt like it had shattered all over again. His confident façade broke apart in front of Ventus, in front of his light that he utterly craved with every fabric of his being, his light that had almost killed him just moments ago.
Ventus was as silent as the rest of the wasteland, having no verbal reaction to Vanitas falling apart in front of him. However, a strange cloud of heaviness passed over him for a second as some piece of his heart ached for Vanitas to be a part of him again.
You’re right… why can’t we join together?