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The feedback is everything: the jolting vibration of every groove in the pavement, the rattling of the wheels, the whistling of air against his skin, the buzzing that fills his bones from the culmination of it all. Sora grits his thrumming teeth, focus narrowing in as he approaches the edge of the wall—
He soars, for just a moment, gravity leaving him behind before slamming into him with a vengeance. The board falls away from his feet, clattering to the ground. He goes tumbling after it, saving himself from any serious injury with a well-timed dodge roll. His palms come up from the ground grazed as he lets out a frustrated groan, pushing himself up.
“Ooh, unlucky,” Ven says, several feet up in the air, perched on his Keyblade Glider. “Better luck next time?”
Sora scowls, picking up the fallen skateboard. “I swear I used to be better at this,” he says, looking up at their practice arena: the stone wall guarding the stairs up to the outer wall of Radiant Garden. He remembers skating here, before, what feels like a lifetime ago: remembers flipping high above the buildings, heart in his throat, breathless with exhilaration. The memory is a far cry from the fall he’d just taken.
“Were you better at it?” The voice is Roxas’. He’s riding back and forth in the space at the foot of the stairs, practicing basic kickturns and kickflips, landing evenly every time. Sora’s only a little jealous. “Or was I just good at it?”
It takes Sora a moment to grasp the implication, and when he does he finds himself bubbling up with indignation and denial. “What, you think you’re the reason I can ride a skateboard?”
“Uh, yeah.” As if to prove his point, Roxas spins his board in a 360 flip, skating a circle around Sora—literally. “When did you learn to skateboard?”
“I—” Sora cuts himself off, abruptly faced with the fact that he has no idea. When did he learn to skateboard? Instead of answering, he shoots back his own question: “When did you learn to skateboard?”
“Twilight Town.”
Sora thinks on that for a moment. “Does it count if you learned it in a simulation?”
Roxas shrugs, pops a frontside pop shove-it, and counters, “You tell me.”
Sora grumbles. Arms crossed, he says, “Well, we still can’t prove you’re the reason I could skateboard. Maybe I just lost my skills along with the rest of my powers when Xehanort tried to possess me. Ever think of that?”
Roxas scoffs. “Yeah, because that was his priority. All of your magic, the Power of Waking, and sick kickflips.”
“You don’t know!” Sora insists. “Maybe I could’ve defeated him way easier with the power of sick kickflips!”
“Man, I’d pay to see that,” Ven comments. The two of them look up. He’s hovering, upside-down, above their heads. Sora had, honestly, kind of forgotten that he was here.
“Hey,” he says, “maybe Ven’s how you got your skateboarding skills.”
Roxas shakes his head. “Nah. Ven can’t skateboard.”
Sora gestures at him. Ven, put on the spot, flips his glider upside down and performs a midair hardflip.
“He’s floating.” Roxas sounds unimpressed. “I’d like to see him try that on a real board. Wheels on the ground.”
Ven considers it for a moment. “Nah, I’m good.” He nudges his glider down so they have to strain their necks less to look at him and sits down on the edge of the transformed keyblade, legs dangling in the air. “I’m happy to let Roxas be the skateboarding champion.”
Roxas preens. Sora huffs.
Sora says, “Hey, I can drive.”
Roxas and Ven look at him. Like, look at him look at him. Like he’s just said something really weird.
“Uh, yeah?” Roxas says, all raised eyebrows and raised inflections.
“Like, a Gummiship?” Ven clarifies.
“Yeah!” Sora nods. “Like, okay, you’ve got your glider, and Roxas can skateboard, but I’m the only one out of the three of us that can drive.”
“Huh.” Ven thinks on it for a moment. “I guess that’s true.”
Roxas, without missing a beat, says, “Riku’s a better driver than you.”
“Hey! That’s not true!”
“It is. You drive like a maniac, dude.”
“No I don’t.” Sora scowls at him. “You’re just saying that to make me mad.”
“I’m just telling the truth.”
“You don’t even like Riku.”
“Nope.” Roxas pops the p. “But I like his driving more than yours.”
Ven says, “I like Sora’s driving more than Donald’s.”
“Anyone would like anyone’s driving more than Donald’s.”
Sora says, “Donald taught me to drive.”
There’s a long pause. “Y’know,” Ven says, “that makes a lot of sense.”
“Maybe I owe you some more credit,” Roxas allows, and then, at Sora’s resulting smile, stresses, “Maybe.”
“Maybe you owe me any credit at all,” Sora grumbles, but he figures he’s not actually mad.
“Gee, Roxas, you’ve been so prickly lately.” Ven kicks lightly at his shoulder. “Been spending too much time around Lea?”
Roxas, to Sora’s surprise, scowls. “What, I can’t be prickly by myself?”
Ven seems equally caught off-guard. “What does that mean?”
Roxas, realising he’s misstepped, shrugs and turns away. “Nevermind. Forget I said anything.”
Sora glances at Ven. Ven glances at Sora. Roxas takes the opportunity to kick up his board onto the wall and grind his way up to the top of the stairs.
Ven’s gaze says, Do you know what’s going on with him?
Sora’s replies, Not a clue.
Ven’s response is a helpless shrug, and Sora’s is sudden determination, grabbing his own skateboard and racing up the stairs. “Hey!” he calls, startling Roxas where he’s preparing to jump. “Wait up!”
Roxas does not wait up. Sora’s hand closes on empty air as Roxas flips himself up and over towards the nearest rooftop. Gritting his teeth, Sora kicks his skateboard up onto the wall, jumps up onto it, and attempts to follow Roxas along his trajectory.
He doesn’t get very far.
One half of the board falls down, catching on the edge of the rooftop. It tears away from his feet, leaving him free-falling. Sora lets out a yell and falls back on old survival instincts, letting his body flop loose as he ragdolls down across the roof tiles, grabbing for the gutter to hang from one arm. He sways, several stories above the ground, disoriented and dizzy, feeling his fingers start to slip.
And then someone’s there, hand around his wrist, and he looks up to see Roxas’ exasperated expression. “Now what’d you do that for?” he asks, lowering his other hand and gesturing for Sora’s. Sora pulls up his other arm, grabs onto Roxas, and allows his friend to pull him up onto the safety of the roof. Ven joins them after a moment, lowering down on his Keyblade glider and then dismissing it. He’d managed to catch Sora’s fallen skateboard, apparently, and hands it off to him as Sora answers Roxas’ question.
“I wanted to make sure you were okay!” he says.
Roxas rolls his eyes. “Seriously? That’s it?” He reaches out and ruffles Sora’s hair. Sora squawks and bats him away. “You’ll give yourself even more brain damage trying to pull stunts like that.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Roxas just shrugs. Ven fails to stifle a laugh, and that prompts Roxas to let one out too, leaving Sora scowling at both of them. Finally, he lets out a sigh and joins in with the laughing, even though he’s not fully sure he gets the joke.
“Seriously, though,” he says, frowning at Roxas, “are you okay?”
Roxas doesn’t meet his eyes. “Fine,” he mutters. “Don’t worry about me.”
“Are you sure? Ven’s right, you’ve been off all day.”
Roxas shakes his head. “It’s just… Some stuff I need to figure out for myself.”
Sora doesn’t feel right about that, but a quick glance at Ven—who shakes his head—convinces him to drop it. He sighs. “If you say so.”
“Hey!” The shout from the ground startles them; Sora spins to see Yuffie waving at them from below. “You three!”
“Yuffie!” he shouts back with a grin. “What’s up?”
“Get down from there, you hooligans!” she shouts. “You’re making a racket! And a mess!” She points to her feet, where several shattered roof tiles are lying. Sora looks down at his own feet and notices where the missing tiles were before his haphazard slide had dislodged them. He shoots her a sheepish grin, rubbing at the back of his head.
Roxas sighs and slaps the side of Sora's shoulder. “See? What did I tell you.” He shakes his head disappointedly. To Yuffie, he yells, “We’ll be right down!”
“You better!” she yells back, then disappears back inside.
“Come on,” Ven says, re-summoning his keyblade and throwing it up into the air. “I’ll give you two a ride down.”
The glider comes down and he hops onto it, offering a hand to Sora and then to Roxas. The three of them squeeze onto the glider—which is definitely not big enough for them all—and Ven lowers them all down to the ground.
“Well!” Ven says once they’re all down on solid ground. “I figure that’s enough excitement for one day. Wanna get some ice cream?”
“Sure,” Roxas says easily, all signs of his previous hostility gone. He turns to Sora and adds, “And then later I can teach you how to ollie.”
“What? I’m not that bad!” Sora protests. “Right, Ven?”
Ven scratches awkwardly at his cheek and doesn’t meet Sora’s eyes. Sora deflates.
“C’mon.” Roxas wraps an arm around Sora’s shoulders and begins to drag him in the direction of Scrooge’s ice cream shop. “We’ll make a skateboarding champion out of you yet.”
Sora allows himself to be dragged, Ven leading the way, a smile on his face. His palms and knees still sting from the multiple tumbles he’d taken, but it hadn’t been a bad way to spend his morning. He’s still surrounded by friends—and really, what could be better than that?