Who IS Axel?

Well, who? Nothing about the guy makes any sense at all.

He pretty much orchestrated it so that every other member of the Organization but him in Chain of Memories died. If he knew that Marluxia and Larxene were planning to ty and take over the Organization, why didn’t he just call Lexaeus, Vexen, and Zexion? Marluxia’s a wimp and Larxene is pretty damn kickass, but Lexaeus is positively manlytough, Axel’s a monster, and Vexen is nothing like as wimpy as he’d made out to be. They could have quickly overpowered both of them and used Namine and the castle as they saw fit.

Instead, Axel saw to it that he was ordered to kill Vexen to “preserve his cover” and then, for absolutely no reason, had Zexion killed by the Riku replica. He also sat by and let the real Riku defeat Lexaeus when he could have stopped it all from happening in the first place –but he still attacked Marluxia and clearly wanted to stop the Organization from being overthrown.

Which begs the question: Who the hell was Axel actually taking orders from? Add that to Kingdom Hearts 2, in which he utterly disobeys the Organization and puts their plans in jeopardy by trying to bring Roxas back, and then he comes to Sora’s rescue and sacrifices himself. If he didn’t have emotions, why did he do it?

The answer, I believe, is that Axel somehow got part of his heart back. Maybe he didn’t even realize it – but his association with Roxas somehow gave him back part of his emotions, and that drove him to help Roxas by helping Sora.

And then there’s the question of exactly whose Nobody is Axel? We know nothing about any of Organization aside from the first six members before they became Nobodies. Axel is one of the ones who genuinely wanted his heart back (alongside Xaldin and Saix) as opposed to, say, Xigbar, Luxord, or Larxene, who just looked like they were having fun.

Axel’s name in particular stands out, too. You wouldn’t think Luxord would be much of a name, either, but upon scrutinizing it, it becomes clear that he could have been something like Drolu or Rodul, which isn’t too far-fetched. But Axel? There’s only four letters and only one non-X consonant, what the heck was his name? Ael? Eal? Ela? The name was pretty obviously made by the designers to sound badass, but what if there’s more to it than that? I mean, obviously Axel would want to call himself something kickass. But what if he wanted to hide who he actually was?

Think about Roxas and Sora. They look rather alike (similar features, similar hair) but you can very easily tell that they’re different people.

Now think about Axel and Riku.

I can’t help but notice a similar resemblance. They have a similar hairstyle and their eyes look very much alike. And that’s my theory: Axel was – or is – Riku’s Nobody. It seems obvious that Riku almost – or maybe actually - lost his heart at some point or another – what if almost was enough? “Xakiur” would certainly have wanted to exist. And after realizing both how goddamned hard it is to make an Organization name out of Riku, and that Xemnas would have tried to perform all sorts of terrible darkness experiments on him if he knew he had the Nobody of the boy Xehanort’s Heartless had marked in his group…

…I wouldn’t tell them my real name, either. So he said “My name is Ael” and they came up with Axel. Maybe Xigbar recruited him, he isn’t too bright. Because, the more I think about it, the less likely it seems that such a huge plot hole would be left in such a major character. The only problem with this theory is that Riku is about sixteen, and Axel looks like a man in his mid-twenties.

My next bit of random speculation is just an observation on the Keyblade – exactly what are its properties?

I wonder this because let’s take a look at Xaldin for instance. Using the “Learn” reaction command, Sora can teleport – exactly the way Xaldin does – and deliver a devastating attack that bypasses Xaldin’s defenses. How the hell does Sora know how to do that?

And what about Xigbar? Not only does Sora suddenly manifest the ability to teleport, but he anticipates the movement of his reflected projectiles and knows exactly how to deflect them so that hey hit Xigbar or the Snipers. He also can somehow stand in the air the way Xigbar does.

Swordmaster or not, Sora is a fifteen year old kid who thinks that whacking a computer with his Keyblade will make it work. I’m not saying he’s stupid, because he isn’t, but Sora does /not/ know how to teleport and figure what must be immensely complicated trajectories just by looking at stuff. I’m not even going to bring up all the little things he does where he somehow knows exactly how to use his enemies’ strengths against them. How can he wield the Berzerkers’ claymores and Marluxia’s scythe? Does he anticipate that throwing Larxene at herself will stun her? How does he twirl his Keyblade precisely so that he can grab hold of the giant meteor ball Heartless, and how does he somehow learn the Rising Sun technique from the Armored Knights?

Wow, I totally just went into all the little things he does. My point is that it seems that the Keyblade has some ability to absorb the power of its opponents. Is this significant? Probably not, it’s just the anime-inspired nature of Kingdom Hearts. Is it interesting? Yes.

And last but not least, theories on the upcoming Kingdom Hearts games, mainly 368/2 Days. This is, for me and NewKid, the most anticipated of the three – screw Terra. I want to be Xigbar and Saix (MOVE ASIDE) and NewKid’s been wanting to play as Axel since Kingdom Hearts 2 came out. The 14^th member? Many people are saying it’s Aqua or her Nobody, and this probably makes sense in some way. What concerns me is not the member’s identity, but her purpose. It’s Organization XIII. There are thirteen members, the Organization is complete. Why bring in a fourteenth?

My theory is that someone – I doubt it was Xemnas, he isn’t sane enough at this point – made a backup plan. If I were Saix, or maybe Xaldin, I sure would have after the Organization took so many casualties in Castle Oblivion. So they left behind a fourteenth member of the Organization to carry on if they failed. On second thought, maybe it was Xemnas – he’d have wanted someone to carry on his twisted world-creation experiments. Trouble is that the only major female characters there are are Kairi and Aqua… but that’s what new games are for, isn’t it?

I’m betting a lot of the game will revolve around the Organization’s forays into worlds, summoning vast numbers of Heartless and then helping Roxas lay waste to them to gather hearts. But something unexpected happens – maybe we’ll get to see Roxas turning his back on the Organization, and maybe learn a thing or two about Axel. I’d like to see more of the Organization’s past. Maybe learn who Saix or Larxene used to be…

Only time will tell. And we’re buying two goddamn DSes.