#being bored on the bus also created the chronological xehanorts post to be fair

[felikatze]

Could a Heartless wield a Keyblade?

Hello everyone, it's me, author of the "How many people has Sora killed" post, back with another essential lore question.

Throughout the entire series, we've never seen a Heartless with a Keyblade. And yet, is this because there was no Heartless worthy of one, or because they are incapable of wielding one?

To answer this question, we must lay out what the conditions of having a Keyblade are.

1) Being bequeathed one.

2) "The makings of a wielder"

2a) A Heart

2b) Sentience

2c) Strength of Heart

1) is the easiest to answer with a resounding yes. Anyone with a Keyblade must first have been in contact with one. Whether it be purposefully (like Terra and Riku), or accidentally (like Aqua and Kairi), this is a prerequisite. One a Heartless could theoretically fulfill.

2) Having "the makings of a Wielder"

This comes from Terra in BBS. "As long as you have the makings, through this simple act of taking, it's wielder you shall one day be."

So, what are the makings? From what we see in other games, it's "strength of heart." This alone sets two prerequisites of its own.

a) a Heart.

To have strength of heart, you need to have a Heart. This simple condition disqualifies pureblood Heartless as pure constructs of Darkness. However, emblem Heartless remain viable.

But like, do you need a Heart to have a Keyblade? Probably!

Roxas is the most interesting case study here. He's a Nobody, which means he shouldn't have a Heart, yet he is capable of wielding a Keyblade. Two of them, even. Even among Nobodies, Roxas is a special case though. As is commonly known, at the time of Roxas' creation, Sora had two Hearts. A popular theory is that Ventus' Heart ended up with Roxas, giving Roxas his appearance, in this case Keyblade-wielding privileges, and additionally really sped up Roxas' own Heart-growing progress. By the end of Days, this boy got his own Heart to wield Blades with, which is why he can do so in KH3.

Replicas like Xion are a bit of a gray area here. By all means, they should be born without Hearts, as similar beings all are. However, they also have the same capability to grow hearts in the case they are not born with one. Therefore, Xion, through her connecions to Roxas and Axel, as well as her memories of Sora and Kairi, may well have her own budding heart by the time she wields the Kingdom Key.

Thirdly, as an unrepentant re:coded stan, Data Sora is also capable of wielding a Keyblade from birth, and was explicitly born without a heart. Just as explicitly, we are later told his Keyblade was fake, actually, because Mickey hacked it in. This is why Maleficent was able to destroy it. Only when Data Sora declares himself to have a heart through his bonds with his friends does he obtain a real Keyblade. His own, the Zero/One. I love that boy he's just so good.

Here, the exceptions prove the rule, if you make... enough presumptions, as I love to do.

Next up:

b) Sentience

That's right, to have a Keyblade, you need a functioning brain. Your brain lets you have values to believe in, you see. Throughout all of KH, we have never seen a non-sentient being wield a Keyblade. I'm sure I don't need to explain this one too much? Therefore, most Heartless can't wield a Keyblade because they're all animalistic and driven by instinct.

Soooo.... we do know a Heartless with both a Heart and sentience. Why can't Ansem, SoD, wield a Keyblade? He's been in contact with one. Hell, he had one, before becoming a Heartless.

This is where we get back to Strength Of The Heart.

Specific Keyblades are capable of deciding their Wielders aren't good enough anymore. The first example of this is the Kingdom Key playing ping-pong between Sora and Riku in KH1 for strength of heart and succumbing to darkness reasons, respectively. (The thing switches wielders a whopping three times. At least it makes up its mind later [discounting Days]).

In all likelihood, Terra's Keyblade forsook his body when the whole norting thing happened, electing to stay with the Lingering Will instead. As for Xehanort's Keyblade... who knows where that is, honestly. Terranort does get it in KH3 though. Keyblades just think Ansem has rancid vibes. Same goes for Xemnas, probably.

Darkness is, very pointedly, not a dealbreaker for all Keyblades. (Maybe Riku should've went for the Kingdom Key D in KH1, who knows). Void Gear very pointedly sticks around a sentient glob of darkness out to cause problems (affectionate). Logistically, there's not that much separating Vanitas from a Heartless, actually. Just that he's like, half a heart.

For these very reasons, I conclude that a sentient Heartless is theoretically capable of wielding a Keyblade, as long as said Keyblade personally doesn't see being a Heartless as an issue.

When I stated we've never seen a Heartless with a Keyblade, I lied actually!

Thought I was done talking about coded, weren't you? Did you think coded has no plot relevance? You are wrong, in a lot of ways. Play re:coded. Installing desmume isn't that hard.

I digress! Re:coded's penultimate boss is dear old Data Sora's Heartless, because all moments in a recording exist simultaneously. This Heartless

1) has been in contact with a Keyblade. He's Data Sora's Heartless, so obviously he's been in contact with a Kingdom Key. Or, at the very least, has been created to have been in contact with it. Data, ykno?

2a) possesses a Heart. Is a digital Heartless born without a Heart? Doesn't really matter. By the time you fight it, it's eaten all other data Heartless you killed previously, and quite probably has a heart of its own, digital though it may be.

2b) possesses sentience. This guy's capable of speech, and out for world domination, or something. It wants to break out of the journal and eat real hearts, and it tells you as much.

2c) Does it have the makings? Does it only have a proto-keyblade, a summoned weapon like CoM Riku and Nobodies?

You decide ;)

In conclusion, be happy Kairi managed to restore Sora with Princess Powers, because he could've been the strongest Heartless in the entire series.